Title: To the Rescue
Author: Flashes09
Rating: T (some swearing)
Summary: Sometimes rescues come from the most unlikely places. Slight Derek/Allison. Rewritten scene from episode 1x11 Formality.
A/N: First Dallison fic posted here, and cross-posted on Tumblr (same user name). Please review!
Disclaimer: I do not own "Teen Wolf" or anything associated with it.
To the Rescue
Derek isn't sure how long he's been trapped down here in this damn dungeon, but sometimes it feels like forever. It's a good time to reflect on some of the uglier parts of his past though, even if he'd rather avoid them. For example, he's having a really hard time reconciling the girl that he dated in high school to the woman who had no problem hunting him down and stringing him up in some dank cellar. He's having a really hard time imaging the girl who used to kiss him so sweetly has no problem wiring him to a generator that zaps him with electricity every minute or so, preventing him from healing. And he's having a really hard time imaging the girl who had spent so much time spoiling her niece had become the woman that brought her niece to come check out the werewolf. Kate Argent was not the girl he fell in love with. She was the woman he had come to hate.
But Allison was a bit of a surprise. When Derek had first learned that the Argents had moved back to town, bringing their teenage daughter with them, Derek was sure she was another Kate. That's why he kept warning Scott off of dating her. But the night he'd driven Allison home, after Scott left her at the party, he realized she wasn't another Kate. She was too sweet, too happy, and as Derek soon realized, too innocent. She had no idea about her family's legacy as werewolf hunters.
Well, the secret was out now. Allison's horrified look was burned into Derek's mind. It was a horrible way to find out the things that go bump in the night are real. But he'd deal with that fallout later, right now, he needed to get out of here.
He's still struggling against the bonds when the door slides open again. He pauses, waiting for the inevitable comment, about him, his family, and just how stupid he's been. But he takes a breath and jerks his head up. It isn't Kate he smells. It's Allison.
He's not sure what to expect, so he just watches her warily. She edges closer, clearly unsure, and Derek sees the knife in her belt, and he knows she's afraid.
She steps to the controls wired to the generator and Derek braces for the pain. He hadn't thought Allison could do this, that she could torture someone else, even someone like him. But the shock doesn't come. Derek looks at Allison and she's shutting things down, turning off the generator and the console.
He stares dumbly at her, still not sure what's going on. She approaches him, reaching out her hand, and he growls a little, not really meaning to, but it is an instinct around an Argent. She pauses for a second, her brown eyes locking on to his blue ones, and visibly swallows.
"I'm not going to hurt you." She says it slowly and calmly, and Derek relaxes just a little. She reaches for his side and gently peels away the tape holding the electric wires to his skin. It hurts but, with the electricity turned off, he's already healing. Allison watches in awe as the electric burns scab, scar, then fade away, leaving smooth, clean skin. She soon realizes she's just staring, and Allison blushes as she turns away. Derek can almost smell the blood rushing to her cheeks and he can't help but smirk a bit at her embarrassment. But when she grabs a chair and drags it over to him, he's wary again.
She hops up on the chair and pulls out a slim case that opens to reveal a full set of lock picks and starts in on the manacles chaining Derek to the wall.
"I haven't done this in a while, so it might take me a minute." She says this conversationally, but Derek can tell she's still nervous. Despite what Allison thinks she knows, she's never really been around werewolves and has no idea how they react. For all she knows, Derek surmises, he could rip free and kill her.
"Why are you doing this?" He asks quietly. Although Allison seems to have good intentions, all of this could still be a trap, a small move in a larger game that he barely knows he's playing and without half the rules. Allison pauses, and then looks at Derek, again meeting his eyes.
"This is not how you treat someone. You do not hunt them down and lock them up in a cellar and torture them for information. It's wrong. It's not how you treat a good person." Allison says this with such conviction and passion, Derek has to believe it's real. But he does have a sticking point.
"I'm not a good person, Allison." It's a belief he's had for a long time, ever since the night where his house, his family, and his whole life burned to the ground. There were plenty of other things he had done that he was not proud of, but the death of his family was his most impressive failure. Allison, her hand still on the manacle, turns to look Derek straight on.
"No matter what you've made yourself believe, deep down, you are a good person. I know it. Otherwise, I wouldn't be letting you out." She holds his gaze a moment longer, then she let's go of the manacle so that he can get his hand out.
He gratefully lowers his aching arm and gives his shoulder a few rotations. It's going to be sore for a little while, but it's nothing he can't deal with. Allison hops down, drags the chair to his other side, and starts to work on the other lock. She works quicker this time, more sure of herself and more aware of the sense of urgency in that they could be caught at any moment. Derek intently watches the door and listens for any footsteps, but they get lucky and nobody comes. Allison frees Derek's hand and she jumps off the chair and kneels down to work on freeing his feet. She a pro at this now¸ and the manacles are unlocked quickly, and Derek lands on his feet on the floor, sore and aching, but free.
His first immediate instinct is to run, and run hard. But he's underground and he has no idea where, and he needs help of he's going to avoid recapture.
"Do you know the way out of here?" Derek asks Allison. She nods.
"My dad and aunt are in some sort of meeting right now. If we hurry, we can get away before they notice." She heads for the door and slides it open just enough to slip out. Derek follows quickly, and finds himself in a long narrow stone corridor, lit by bare light bulbs attached to the wall. It looks like it might as well be part of a maze, but Allison knows exactly where to go, taking several seemingly random turns before arriving at a metal door.
It occurs to Derek that they might be in an underground bunker, and he's proven right when Allison opens the metal door to reveal a ladder leading up to a circular metal door in the roof.
Derek heads up the ladder first, scaling the rungs quickly and stopping just beneath the metal door. There's a wheel and he turns it until he hears a click, then pushes upward until the door falls over on its hinges.
They're in the woods, the same woods that run all the way to his house, and he really just wants to take off running. But Allison is climbing out of the hole next to him and clearly doesn't intend to be left behind.
"So, where are we going now?" She asks, scanning the woods.
"We are not going anywhere. I am escaping, you are going back home." He starts walking away, but Allison isn't having it and jogs to catch up.
"I'm not going home. Not after they lied to me for all of these years." She's marching along beside him, so sure of herself, and Derek almost doesn't want her to leave. But he has to make her go.
"They were just trying to protect you. Go home." She starts to protest, but Derek keeps going. "Your family…mine…there's a lot of history there. A lot of history you don't know. Your family isn't bad. They love you. Go home, because you aren't coming with me." Derek stalks off, walking quickly with long strides to distance himself from Allison. After he's walked a bit, he looks back, but Allison isn't following.
That's good, that's just what he wanted, but Derek can't help but wish he didn't have to distance himself from people all the time. Sometimes he just wanted someone to talk to. But he couldn't afford that luxury. People who were around him had a tendency to die, and he had no desire to see Allison dead. Kate maybe, but Allison was altogether different. Maybe Derek didn't need to warn Scott to stay away from her. If she starts hanging around because of Scott, maybe that wouldn't be such a bad thing…
Derek shakes his head. There was no point in thinking that way. Once an Argent, always an Argent. He'd already been destroyed once, no need to try again.
He turned toward his broken house and slowly walked away.
Thanks for reading, please review!