Pack makes you stronger. Derek has never doubted this fact; It was one of the fist things he learned as a toddler.

Even before he was able to repeat the words his dad made sure Derek knew what they meant. And later Kate had made sure he never forgot.

But he knows this had to be done. Isaac will go to Scott, he has no doubt about that. It doesn't even bother him; Scott will make a great Alpha. A better Alpha then Derek ever was. And Erica and Boyd? Well, they made their choice. Where ever they are they are free of him now. The bond is broken. The Pack is broken.

Who was he trying to kid thinking he could keep a pack safe? When your pack burns for your mistakes you don't deserve a new pack. He should have burned with them.

Well, he's burning now. He's been burning for days and the fever shows no signs of breaking.

Laura would have padded his back and called it rotten luck. If you get seven years of bad luck from breaking a mirror, how many years do you get for destroying your family?

Enough, Derek guesses. Just enough for a lifetime. Enough for him to run into well-equipped hunters just the day after he sent the pack away. Enough for him to get mased with some type of wolfsbane, tumble over the edge of a ravine and get washed away by the icy river water.

He was a strong swimmer, always had been, and he managed to struggle his way back to shore. The effect of the wolfsbane had been washed away, but it left him weakened.

For the first time since he was seven Derek Hale had the flu.

He couldn't risk going back into the woods, not with hunters and the Alphas all looking for him. And going to Peter was a risk he wasn't willing to take, not when he was this weak. So he found an empty apartment, fully furnished and ready for new buyers to move in. But the `For Sale´-sigh was still up, so Derek took that as an open invitation and picked the lock.

He steered clear of the huge bed and crashed on the floor, shaking and sweating from fever and nightmares.

On the third day he woke up to angry knocking on the door. He half-stumbled over to the window and peaked through the curtain and for a few seconds he was stuck in place, not sure if he should run or open the door and growl, but Stiles continued knocking and when the risk of waking the neighbors became to great he gritted his teeth and yanked the door open.

Stiles didn't even wait for Derek to growl at him, and if Derek had tried Stiles was in a good mind to growl back. Instead he just pushed past his reluctant host and found his way into the kitchen. As he expected it was fully stocked with pots and pans as well as household appliances.

"What the hell are you doing here? How did you even find me?" Derek finally asks, but it's far from his usual growl.

"I had Danny hack your phone." Stiles says and he makes it sound like it was no big deal, even though Danny had made it sound like he deserved a fucking medal for his work. "I didn't know werewolves could get sick, but I just couldn't picture you running away to nurse a little old lady, so I guess that google search for `How to cure a cold´ was for more selfish reasons. Like everything you do these days." Stiles ends with a huge fake smile that he hopes Derek has the ability to decipher as über-fake, even with his fever-fried brain.

Derek makes a show of dropping his phone into the garbage dispenser and then there's a loud grind of metal and plastic.

"What are you doing here, Stiles?" Derek asks when the noise dies down.

"I came to make you soup." Stiles says shrugging, because no way is Derek going to intimidate him with his stupid macho-wolf-routine. He opens the bags he brought and begins to empty the content out on the polished surface of the kitchen table.

Derek goes slightly wide-eyed, but then his whole face darken again. "No. Get out, Stiles. You shouldn't have come here, you're going to lead them straight to me and I can't defend myself like this."

"Well, usually you have a pack to defend you when you need it." Stiles says and picks out the biggest knife in the rack, just to make a statement. "And I'm not an idiot, you know. I know how to cover my tracks."

He starts chopping up carrots. It's very satisfying.

"What the pressure became too big?" Stiles continues. "The stakes too high? Or was it that you were finally beginning to care about them?" Stiles doesn't even raise his voice, he doesn't have to. Especially not with Derek. "Well guess what? It sucks! It's supposed to suck. It's supposed to hurt and leave you drained and aching because that's how you know you're doing it right!"

"They'll be safer with out me. The Alphas, the hunters. They're all after me. Erica and Boyd did the right thing by leaving. Isaac has Scott now."

"Isaac was terrified! He lost Erica and Boyd and then you went AWOL too." Stiles pokes Derek hard in the chest. Derek's hand strikes out, fast as a snake, and grabs Stiles' wrist, but Stiles doesn't try to get free.

"I can't protect him! I can't protect anyone, I never could..."

"Oh, shut up already... So what if you made a mistake?" Stiles says, softening his voice. "You're hardly mister perfect, you know."

Derek narrows his eyes and leans in close. "Maybe you should just be happy to be rid of me then." His voice is half growl, half whisper and very, humanly broken.

"Maybe." Stiles says and licks his lips, making sure to hold Derek's stare. "But I though being a pack meant we were a family." He watches as Derek winches at the word. His grip on Stiles' hands relaxes and softens, but he doesn't let go. "And family means nobody gets left behind." Stiles adds and takes a deep breath. "Now I want you to get your ass back in bed, you sonuvabitch. And eat some fucking chicken soup!"

And then he pushes past Derek and resumes his chopping of veggies with a bit less aggression than before. Out of the corner of his eyes he catches Derek giving a small smile, before the werewolf grabs a blanket from the floor and heads into the large bed.

That night the fever finally breaks.