"your whispered thoughts tend to keep me awake
your beating pulse is steady just to keep me sane
and like a wolf, my eyes keep flashing red
you're unalarmed, consumed by the gears in your head"

The evening held promise of storm. The air heavy with the musky scent. Scott had complained about the smell more than a few times in the past fifteen minutes. Though his ADD did cause him to space out at random times, he had been distinctly focused on the darkening sky outside for a long time; vacantly aware of Scott's presence.

Stiles was trying not to shut Scott out of his life, after all that has happened. His father was now involved and Scott knew that made Stiles views change on the situations at hand. He already lost his Mother, and he refused to see his Dad go through that again. Losing Stiles would mean no one there to take care of him, make sure he ate right on occasion, make sure he wasn't passed out in a pile of paperwork after a few drinks, or just be there to let him know he wasn't alone. That is how Stiles felt though, alone...and scared. Scared of decisions, scared of not doing something, of doing something, and of how his heart was struggling with his brain.

Days like this though, where he tried to at least pretend to care what Scott was chatting away about, Stiles found himself staring out at the darkening sky, slowly drifting down to the tops of the trees. Distantly, he wondered if the two lone betas were out there too, looking up at the sky thinking of home.
He cared. He may not have showed it often, hidden under his uncertainty and his sarcasm, but he worried about Boyd and Erica. He worried about Scott and how he was struggling with the upcoming days of school and his mom. He worried for his father and he worried for Lydia. Most of all though, he worried for Derek.

The past few months of their short summer, Derek had seemingly and not unnoticeable by himself, eased up on Stiles. It was slow at first, but Stiles gradually began finding small changes in the older wolf. He seems more distant. Stiles changed too though, and it seemed to him only Lydia noticed. For she sat down beside him during of the training sessions,-Derek helping Jackson with technique combat or something that Stiles would have known if he was paying more attention- and put a hand on his knee.

"You know, you should talk to him."She had said, voice low though Stiles didn't know if it made a difference with super werewolf hearing.

He didn't have to ask who she refereed to, but he didn't have to answer either. So he opted for silence. After a few moment of him saying nothing she retracted her hand and turned back towards the guys. For a moment Stiles thought she would drop it, as she stood up to walk back to where Issac sat, but instead she uttered those words that had lingered in his head for weeks. "Even he needs someone to talk too."

Did he? Did Derek even talk? Stiles found it hard to imagine the sour wolf sitting down like a patient in a therapy office ready to pour out and analyze his list of problems. Though Derek had been on his mind a lot more than usual lately, Stiles couldn't help but stare off into the trees, wondering if Derek was inwardly screaming, was just as worried and scared as he was inside, hiding it behind a mask.

Stiles turned his head back to Scott, having no idea what the young wolf was talking about, and sighed.

"I'm sorry Scott, but I really want to be alone right now." He moved around him and grabbed his coat, heading for the door and out of the house, not caring to show Scott out, the boy new his own way.

With a deep inhale of stale, musky evening air, Stiles slipped into his jacket and made his way through the treeline towards the Hale house. It was probably one of the stupidest things to do at this time, walking through the now darkened woods, alone, with a pack of crazy Alphas hiding out somewhere. But he didn't care. His feet took him for a long way until the once beautiful, now half burned up, Hale house, and stopped. He couldn't tell if Derek was there or not, maybe he smelled him coming, maybe he was off grumbling in his Derek ways somewhere, or maybe he was sleeping...did the wolf even sleep? Either way, there Stiles stood, gazing up at the darkness of the house, wondering what he should do next.

The chill in the air was there, but Stiles already felt so numb. He knew there was a reason for him being here but as he just stared up at the broken ruins of the Hale house, knowing only the history of what happened from Peter, and Scott. Did Derek ever talk about it? Did he...? Interesting how one forgets simple detail. What am I doing here...? He asked himself. What possible outcome was he looking to achieve? With Derek, any outcome was as if someone pulled it from a hat. Anything could happen.

Nearly every time, Stiles has misjudged a situation with Derek. The older man surprised him. Stiles closed his eyes. Remembering how he had felt at the student counselors that one day in school last semester. The weight of the world had fallen in one foul, deathly swoop onto his shoulders. Crushing him. He knew there was dangers, he knew he was risking his life each time. But...it changed. That night at the police station with his Dad and Scott's mom, and then with Gerard...

Unconsciously, his hand lifted to his face, tracing the outline of the now healed wounds, so freshly visible and painful in his memory. He was scared...he is scared. He was slowly shutting down. Shutting them out, just a walking shell in place of the once lively kid with ADD. Inside though, he was screaming. When he shuts his eyes at night, he can see them,... the bodies. He imagines standing over the bloody remains of his father, Scott and his mom, Lydia and Jackson, Boyd and Erica, Issac, but what he couldn't understand was the overwhelming sense of dread and desperation when he came to the realization the Alpha wasn't among the littered bodies. When he would look for him he always ended back up in that house...the darkness consuming him completely.

When he woke up he was always just as disorientated as the last time. However now, as he opened his eyes to look at the all to familiar scene in front of him, dark scary house and all. Stiles felt it, the desperation to find Derek.

Letting out a steamy breath into the chilled musky night air, Stiles took another step further, willing his body to stop and turn around, to just head home where he should have been. It didn't help though, for now he was standing on the rickety porch, reaching forward to find the door only to realize it was open. Though he was normally more cautious about entering a big scary house, he just stepped right in, more worried of finding Derek laying in a pool of blood or worse, finding he had taken off leaving them behind...'why do you care? 'If Derek leaves, maybe the problems will follow him.

Like that would make a difference. He told himself.

The air was stale and smelled strange as usual. He couldn't ever pinpoint what exactly it smelled like, couldn't find the right word to explain it, but it was unnerving. Stiles could see nothing even a foot in front of him. There wasn't even moonlight, the small sliver in the sky was covered by the storm clouds which were rolling on in as if they owned the place.

Squinting in the blackened atmosphere Stiles removed his hands from his pockets. "Derek?"

The Alpha could sense indecision, the apprehension, coming from the foolish boy. How stupid... to come here at this hour alone, unguarded, with all the dangers that cursed this town. Derek felt the anger swell within him. Anger for Stiles being so careless while he was so frail. The boy was getting older, but his self preservation seemed to be diminishing by the day. What if the Alpha pack, whom they still have yet to have the pleasure of meeting face to face, decided to take Stiles? To bite, or kill him? What if they bit him, and it didn't take. Derek felt emotion swell deeper inside of him, causing him to growl deep in his throat.

If he had any plan to melt into the shadows deeper, and let Stiles believe the house was empty, it has now completely frolicked out the door with the sound. Huffing, clearly irritated and grouchier than he had been moments before, Derek stepped from the shadows. Eyes red and pointedly unamused. "Why are you here?"

Stiles heard the growl after a moment or two of silence. At first, he thought perhaps this was a mistake, that Derek wasn't here, but then he heard the growling sour wolf, and saw him emerge from the shadows. Trying to be a bad ass and scare you again no doubt...jerk.

'Why are you here?' Wow, wasn't that the question of the day. 'Why am I here? Because you won't leave my thoughts, you haunt my dreams...my nightmares, you made me care...I didn't want to care. I just wanted to keep Scott alive, and keep my Dad safe...and pine after the smart and beautiful Lydia Martin. But no, you had to invade my life like a virus! Using me up like cheap dish soap from the mini mart!

Stiles let out a huff, a strange sound, startling him from his own argument in his thoughts. This brought him back to reality and then back to Derek's Question. The answer was there, he could just be honest, he SHOULD just be honest. Tell Derek everything, ask for advice...something. Anything but the words that were now leaving his lips.

"I don't know." Those three words rang true and false. However his heart stuttered a bit as he said them. For at the same time he spoke, he thought 'You know why.' He didn't want to blame Derek, the Alpha had been through so much this past year like the rest of them. Stiles could see how much doubt Derek still had in himself, in the pack, in finding Erica and Boyd...alive. Stiles knew only because he felt it. He felt the worry and sometimes when Derek and Scott talked (more Scott than Derek) about it, something in the Alphas eyes wavered. Maybe he was seeing things, maybe Stiles imagined all of it. Hell, he thought, the nightmares felt real enough.

Why was he here? "Even he needs someone to talk too." Lydia's voice echoed in his head from weeks before.

Stiles let out another breath and his expression went blank yet again. Jaw lightly clenching and un-clenching as he lightly bounced on his heels ever so slightly. How did one start a heart to heart conversation with a sour wolf anyway? 'So, kill any furry critters lately?'

The hyperactive boy sighed, feeling mildly defeated. There was never a way to ease into talking with Derek, so he said what was there, in his mind, right then.

"What if we never find them, Derek. What if...what if we're too late.?" His voice cracked.

At the boy's words, Derek's brow perked, an ever repetitive expression of his when dealing with the human. His confusion seemed to be a running theme (both on his part and that of the boy), which made it a wonder they understood each other at all some times. Stiles seemed to always know what hide just behind his cold eyes, which he hated. Because the more Stiles warmed the cold ice covering his heart, the more he found himself yearning to feel that bit of warmth the boy brought to his fractured pack, his fractured life...and the more he found himself worrying for the humans here had to be some reason why he would be so thoughtless, so careless to walk the woods alone. Derek glared at him, urging for something more. Anything, at this point, would be better than 'I don't know'.

He stood silently though, stiffening as the boy touched upon the missing Betas.

Though he'd tried to do his best by them, his best hadn't been enough, and when he tried for more, it was little much too late. They chose to leave, chose to look for another pack, a better one, with a better Alpha. They didn't trust him. With the Alpha pack arriving, the Jackson incident, Scott's betrayal, and much more, Derek was already defeated and he knew it, only hearing Stiles say so in his simple implication, threw him over the edge.

"Then they're dead and they chose their fate," he grumbled bitterly. Turning from the boy, aware such a question could have been asked some other time by some other means, his irritation rose and swayed his anger more. There was no need to put himself in such careless and unnecessary danger, not when he couldn't defend himself. Not when he had so many people who cared about him. People who couldn't live with out him. "Why are you really here, Stiles? Don't you think it's a little selfish to be walking in the woods alone at night? Or don't you care?"

Stiles must have looked a little shocked to say the least. Selfish? SELFISH?! He came here to talk to him, to let Derek know he wasn't alone, that Stiles needed him. Believe in him... Stiles face went through a million different emotions at once, his mouth opening to say something; but he didn't, instead his eyes left Derek's hard stare and his expression fell back into nothing. The spark in his eyes fading back to nothing. Perhaps coming here was a bad idea after all.

Selfish...Stiles was nearly anything but selfish. He risked his life to help Derek and his little pack, risked his life by continuing to be there for Scott even after his girlfriends family tried killing them, even after Erica nearly put him through his own jeep and a door, he still held her during the attack in the library when Jackson nearly killed them all... He was always there, trying to fight for the ones he loved, and the ones he didn't.

Or don't you care?

Stiles clenched his jaw at Derek's words. A mild scoff at the question. "Too much apparently." His eyes snapped back up to the Alpha. "I'm scared, okay? More so now that my Dad knows about us, and Scott's mom, it was bad enough before, when they were a little worried about why we were out late or didn't call. But NOW, well hell Derek, now whenever we are out I can't miss the look in my Dad's eyes when I leave the house, for School or just out in general. He's scared, he worries more than ever, not to mention I'm sure Scott's mom jumps every time she hears someone is coming through emergency, wondering if its her son, or me, or some poor soul who got in the way! You know what scares me most? Watching you trying to teach what is left of this broken family we have, trying to put on the brave face when I can see you're just as scared as me." He throw his hands up into his hair trying to calm his now erratic heartbeat, knowing he was letting out everything that's been built up. The anxiety attack coming on though was going to be hard to stop. For he was shaking.

He had to turn and lean his head against the cracked wall, feeling the cold surface against his skin felt good. He let out a shaky breath now as he thought on the nightmares that were plaguing him, and the emptiness he felt when he could not find the Alpha.

"I'm scared I'm going to go to sleep one of these nights, and wake up to find you gone..." Though he said you as in the pack, he could not deny his heart stuttered at the word, his heart knowing he meant Derek. I don't know what to do anymore "I feel as if I'm missing a part of me. Like it was lost somewhere...I feel incomplete..." He barely whispered the last part aloud before falling silent.

Incomplete, it was a feeling Derek knew too well; ever since he'd lost his family that was all he'd tried to amend. Foolishly starting his own pack of otherwise unwanted teenagers. As if hoping he could show them something more. To feel wanted. To have family. But if he couldn't trust anyone, how could he expect them to trust him? To respect him?...he'd done everything all wrong. Sometimes he believed he'd done even worse than Peter.

Derek ended up leaning against the door frame of the living room, looking at the floor at the boy's feet, voice a little softer now. "We all feel that way, Stiles." His eyes trailed up slowly, chancing a glance at the human, his own eyes sullen and wounded, vulnerable. "It's what life does to you."

Tearing his eyes away, the wolf looked out the broken window to the darkened grounds of the house and the dark, haunting wood beyond. "You just can't go out like this anymore," his tone was distant, distracted by his thoughts. He worried about the boy, that much he knew he could not deny, but to admit it out loud or in so many words wasn't his style. "It's not safe. You have nothing to protect you.."

Stiles turned his head away from the wall to lean against it when Derek finally spoke. His words laced with something Stiles could not grasp in that moment, for the Alphas eyes had locked with his own and the boy lost himself in them. Noting the emotion whirling in those dark eyes. Stiles brows drew together as he frowned slightly. Even when Derek withdrew his gaze Stiles felt imprint there. As if he was looking at him, without having to. Stiles took in a needed gulp of air when Derek's gaze had dropped , his own eyes dropping to look at the not so interesting floor, which he could barely see as it was. Remember to breathe, right...humans need air... He prattled on to himself inwardly until Derek's voice broke through again. Derek's words rang in his ears when he finally let himself come back down to earth.

"You can't go out like this anymore,"Stiles resisted the urge to roll his eyes. About to open his mouth to tell this man he would go where he pleased, but it appeared Derek wasn't done.

"It's not safe. You have nothing to protect you."

Nothing to protect him from the big bad wolves who could gobble him up at any time. Derek didn't need to say it out loud, Stiles knew the words were there in the fine print of his words. Though Derek may not have had much faith in Scott's ability to keep his friend out of trouble, Stiles felt a tad irritated Derek thought the boy was incapable of some thought on his own safety. The knife his father had slid him across the table a few nights after the incident at the Police Department, tucked safely in his pocket."Just in case..." His father had said. His tone showed there was no room for argument.

When he had seen the hunters pocket knife laying on the wood surface of the dining room table, surrounded by paperwork and empty glasses, Stiles had laughed. His immediate verbal reaction being "Please Dad, a knife? Really? Derek, could scare Godzilla away, I hardly think a hunting knife is going to be as effective as Derek..."But his words faded away as he realized his dad was giving him a hard look. This was non negotiable it read. So Stiles took it and tucked it away, taking it where he went, sleeping with it under his pillow, keeping it with him in the shower.

It gave him a small sense of security, but he couldn't shake how easily he thought about Derek being there, than Scott...or even Issac, as his protector. 'I can take care of myself.' He had grumbled.

But now as he listened to Derek speak he knew why he walked through the woods alone, why he walked outside without frantically looking every which direction to see what may try and eat him.

"I have you." Stiles said subconsciously, unaware of Derek's eyes looking at him with something kin to emotion.

Derek.

It was always Derek.

He cared for the wolf. He worried for him. He hurt when Derek hurt, he was angry when Derek was angry, why? He didn't understand it. Stiles walked about selfishly as Derek put it, because he 'knew' Derek was always near by. He knew if something snatched him up, Derek and Scott would fight to save him or at least find him. Maybe Stiles had too much faith in the Alpha, as Scott had mentioned a few times the past month. Scott still trusted Derek as far as he could throw him, Issac seemed to trust Derek but still had his doubts, even so, the boy was loyal to them all.

Stiles eyes tore themselves from the floor, to look back at his Alpha...my Alpha? ...would he choose Derek over Scott, if he ever chose to accept the bite? Would he, accept the bite? Stiles had tried not to think about it, refusing to let the subject escalate pass Derek mentioning it. Or Issac. Plus the mere fact that he could die if the bite didn't take.

But would he? Choose Derek?

Stiles looked upon the face of the Alpha and let his lips part as he let out a breath, his heart skipping beats. He knew the answer with no doubt in his heart. He'd accept Derek fully into his life, he already pretty much had. However now, as he looked so intently at the man before him he had a weird overwhelming tingle shudder through his whole being. It was as if his heart and his soul was pulling, and ripping from him, trying to seep through his skin to reach out to the man in front of him.

What was happening...did it feel like he couldn't breathe, why did his heart feel as if it would explode in his chest. Stiles eyes widened as felt his chest tighten up. This had happened to him a lot when he was a child, his mother would scold him for not taking his meds, and hold him, rocking him back and forth to calm him down. Anxiety attacks. They were pretty crazy...but this...felt almost...as if his being was trying to become one with the Alpha in front of him.

And it...hurt... "Derek..." He breathed out before everything began moving in slow motion, his hand reaching out in Derek's direction, as his knees gave out and he made his descent for the floor. Then everything began to go dark.

A/N: I heard this song by Maeve Kelly called Lifeline. & It reminded me of this joint writing bit I did with my best friend. It's actually how we met and I wanted to share it. There a lot more to this, but I felt like I'd give yo ua little, and see how you feel about it. CILLI wrote Derek and I wrote Stiles, mpost of it is edited on the derek bits because I was trying to rewrite and keep little bits original. But ended up keeping most of the Derek she wrote in because I can;t top it. So let me know what you think, and PLEASE look her up. CILLI and sourwolflovestory on tumblr!

I'm also up for any jointfic writing with others if you can RP and can follow along like this, meaning know how to write and are goo with your own ideas and such to where you can match brains with me haha. And visa versa.

This is now chaptered out