When Stiles wakes up it's on the forest floor, in a bed of leaves, and not at all in his nice warm bed in his nice walled in room. All of which kind of puts a damper on the day, not to mention really confuses him as to how he managed to get there. He was 100% sure he had not been to any party the night before and that he'd gone to bed in his own room. If he was starting to sleep walk as well as have panic attacks he swore he was going to do something drastic.
He wasn't sure exactly what, but it would be drastic. Then he hears the voice calling to him. "Stiles. Stiles! Wake up!" and he's confused because it sounds as if it's coming from right next to him, but there's no one there. He thought he was awake.
He closes his eyes so that he can listen to that voice, the one that sounds so near and so familiar yet he can't quite place it.
X
"Stiles!" He opens his eyes to see Derek kneeling over him as he lies on cold concrete. "Oh thank god," he says and gives Stiles a hand to help him up.
"What happened?" Stiles asks as he climbs to his feet, reaching out and steadying himself against Derek when he goes lightheaded for a moment. "All I can remember is following you out here to meet that pack and then nothing."
"Which is why you should have stayed in the car, like I told you to," Derek responds with his little growly voice that has long since stopped scaring Stiles. "Let's get you home and have Ms. McCall check out your head. You've got a pretty big bump on it."
Stiles snorts in disbelief because really, does Derek know him at all, but doesn't say anything. Derek must not be lying about that bump on his head because he's starting to notice the fact that he's got a pounding headache that gets worse with every jarring step. By the time they reach Derek's Camaro he's nauseous from the pain and just wants to lay down.
His face must be green or something because Derek takes one look at it and then helps Stiles into the back seat so he can stretch out. Stiles is grateful, because he doesn't think he could open his mouth without throwing up. On the drive to the McCall house Derek keeps glancing into the rearview mirror, his eyes catching Stiles' and the worry there is practically screaming it's so loud. Stiles wants to say something to reassure the older man, but he doesn't.
He must fall asleep because the next thing he knows Derek's pulling him out of the car and carrying him up the steps as Melissa McCall holds her door open, face pale. "What happened?" she demands but Stiles doesn't hear the rest of the conversation.
X
He's back in the forest, but this time he recognizes where he is. It still looks the same as it did that night, when he dragged Scott out to look for half of a dead body. He doesn't know how much time has passed since that night, doesn't know when he even got here. All he knows is that he has to be here right now, that he's waiting for something.
So he sits down and waits. It's so silent here, not even the sound of animals or the wind moving through the trees can penetrate the silence. The moonlight illuminates the clearing enough that Stiles can make out where each tree is and that there's a delicate mist floating in the air. He should be cold, he can see the white puffs his breath makes, but he's numb. His sense of touch is as dull as his hearing. The only thing that works is his vision. It's as if he's looking at a picture, not actually sitting in a forest clearing in the middle of the night.
X
He wakes up in the hospital, with bandages around his head and an IV that pinches. Stiles tries to sit up even before opening his eyes but lets out a little groan as the pain becomes evident and then gentle hands press him back down into the bed. "Shh, Stiles," his dad's voice says from somewhere over his head. "Just lay back, son. You hit your head pretty hard, had some bleeding in the brain and they had to do surgery, but you're going to be fine now."
His eyes flutter open but he shuts them just as quickly when the light pierces them. "Dad?" he croaks out, throat so dry that it actually hurts. Then he feels the press of the rim of a cup against his lips and takes a few small slips, easing the burning feeling. By the time the cup is removed he can open his eyes to take in his surroundings.
Scott is standing to his right, wearing that anxious look that makes Stiles want to pat his head and give him a popsicle because it's so cute. His dad's on his other side, holding the Styrofoam cup and looking pretty relieved to see him. Stiles is a little disappointed to see that Derek's not there, but then he spots the leather jacket thrown over the chair in the corner of the room and feels a little better.
"My head hurts" he says instead of asking the questions burning to be answered, such as if Derek had killed the guy who hit him yet.
Scott lets out a long sigh of relief, as if Stiles has made everything alright again just by complaining about his head. Even his dad looks relieved. "Yeah, that can happen after you crash your jeep into a tree and have brain surgery," he says, in that dry tone he perfected when Stiles was still only just beginning to talk.
It should make Stiles feel better, but it's his actual words that scare him, more than his tone. "Crashed my jeep?" he asks, confused. That isn't what he remembers and his dad knows about werewolves, they wouldn't have made up some excuse to his dad. "What about that omega? The werewolf who hit me?"
"Stiles, what are you talking about? What's an omega? Why are you talking about werewolves?" There's a panicked edge to his dad's voice that hadn't been there before. It upsets Stiles to hear it, but he's more worried about the fact that Scott looks just as confused as his dad.
"Stiles, there's no such thing as werewolves," Scott says, slowly and carefully, and Stiles squeezes his eyes shut, trying to block out everything that's happening.
X
He can hear the wind now. It's still too quiet, unnaturally quiet, but Stiles can hear the wind. It's warm, which shouldn't make sense, but here, right now in this place, it makes more sense than anything else. He knows he's waiting for someone, but he can't remember who. They haven't shown up yet, but he doesn't mind waiting.
Stiles isn't even sure if he's ready for them to get here, because he might prefer waiting. It's getting harder to keep everything straight, but he still believes that that's better than whatever he's waiting for. No matter who shows up, Stiles isn't ready yet to stop waiting for them.
X
Stiles goes back to school on Monday and everyone hardly even notices, not that he really expected anything else. Allison and Lydia kind of coo over him and the pack wolves are all even more protective of him than normal, but everything else is normal. He doesn't mind. Any more attention and it would have made him suspicious. People in this town are too used to weird things to really care all too much when a boy gets kidnapped, as long as he's safely returned.
And he is safe, the pack had taken care of the rogue hunter who had ambushed him at his jeep after school on Thursday by hitting him over the head and then using him as bait. Sure, his dad knows about werewolves now, but really everything's for the better. Stiles is healing just fine and now he doesn't have to lie to his dad anymore, it's the best ending for this misadventure that Stiles could have imagined in his wildest dreams. So really, he's quite happy that no one is making a fuss at school, that would have been too weird.
He just goes to class like normal and everything is fine, until Gerard Argent stops him in the hall to inquire after his health. Stiles knows that the old hunter has promised to stay to the code now that his daughter is dead, but Stiles doesn't trust him. He sees the way Gerard looks at the werewolves, especially Derek, and he prepares for the day that Gerard breaks the code.
Because Lydia's the only other person that knows human behavior as well as he does, that can see the wheels turning in Gerard's head. Derek might pretend he knows what he's doing, but he would be drowning if Stiles wasn't there to keep his head above water.
"And how's your head today?" he asks and Stiles' hand instinctively flies to the bandages still wrapped around his head. "Wouldn't want you to drop dead in class or out in the woods, now would we?"
Stiles has to take a moment to gather his scattered thoughts, because he honestly wasn't expecting to run into Gerard this early in the day and he'd been surprised and when he's surprised his mind goes in unexpected directions. One direction it goes in is 'but I never left the woods.'
It's as if no time has passed, no matter how long Stiles stays in the woods. Every now and then he considers getting up and walking away, but he doesn't. It's as if all of his impulses to just move whenever he's been too still have all disappeared. As if whatever wires in his brain that had been crossed were just magically fixed, even without his Adderall.
The woods just keep on going on and he lies on his back and stares up at the moon. He can smell that musty scent that comes from damp wood and earth, the one that always smells so good but you can only find it out in the wilderness. He's not sure if that's what's calming him down, doesn't really care.
Part of it might be because time is fluid here, he has no clue how long he's been here, but he doesn't really want to know either. He likes not knowing. It makes it easier to pretend.
X
His headache's been getting worse all day, but Stiles still gets in his jeep at the end of school and heads out to the Hale house instead of returning home. He'd promised he'd be at that meeting, and he will. Just because he'd been hit in the head at some stupid lacrosse game does not mean that he'll break that promise.
Derek is on the front porch when he gets there and from the way that he frowns at him, Stiles knows that the alpha is aware that Stiles is in pain. Not that Stiles had really hoped all that much that he would manage to hide that fact. He just hadn't expected it to be out in the open before he even said anything. But he's a big boy now and can suck it up.
"You should be at home," Derek says as he comes down to meet Stiles at the foot of the stairs. In an uncharacteristic display of affection he wraps his arms around Stiles, maneuvering so that Stiles is resting his face in the crook of his neck. "Sleeping or just doing something that won't hurt your head any more."
Stiles makes some sound in reply, but he's too focused on how wonderful it feels right now to just rest his aching head on his boyfriend's shoulder and be held for a little bit. Seriously, it just makes the entire world go away.
X
The woods are alive now, just as they were that night. Stiles doesn't like it all that much, doesn't want to face what's coming next. But the one he's been waiting for is almost here and he can't put it off any longer. So he goes out to meet her.
X
The whole almost dying of an accidental head injury makes Stiles feel a little melancholy and just off. It makes him worried for his dad, because he'd almost lost his son, because of a stupid accident. Stiles knows he should be careful, that he's not some kind of supernatural creature that has super healing or is just invulnerable, but he doesn't think about that most of the time.
Stiles is just some sixteen year old kid who hasn't grown into his long limbs quite yet and that leaves him more than a little clumsy. That's generally okay, but when that leads to him falling off roofs while trying to get Scott to sneak out and go hunting for a dead body that is not okay. Especially when things like that land him in the hospital having brain surgery cause he fell on his head. And sure, that's mainly because Stiles does stupid things that put him into situations where his klutz attacks can be lethal, but he's also a teenage boy. It's practically his job to do stupid things.
But this time Stiles knows he took it a little too far. So he goes to the place he always goes to when he's feeling his worst, the cemetery.
He likes to talk to his mom all the time, but he doesn't always do it at her grave. He reserves that for the really special occasions, when something has really gone wrong. Besides, if he went to her grave too often someone would be sure to notice and tell his dad, leading to his dad drinking even more than usual. So really, this little system is just the best for everyone involved, because it's not doing anyone harm and as the sheriff's kid, Stiles is really big on doing no harm.
He knows the way by heart, doesn't even need to pay attention. It's not until he arrives at his mom's grave that he notices that the one next to her is fresh, which is weird cause he doesn't remember anyone dying. Stiles' eyes are immediately drawn first to the dates because the first one is his birthdate and the second is from just over a week ago, the day after Stiles had fallen from the McCall's roof.
His eyes raise ever so slowly to the name and just halt there, because he knew, he knew what it would say, and he really, really didn't want it to. But there it is. His name.
X
He knows now, why he's here. Because he was stupid and took Scott out into a forest looking for half a dead body and found a killer instead. And he's so, so sorry for that.
He doesn't want to be dead, doesn't want this at all. But he's ready to face it, ready to stop running through fantasy after fantasy in which his dad was the one that found him and that a werewolf had bitten Scott rather than the rabid dogs that had been released by the killer and had ripped apart not just some woman, but also his best friend. He's ready now, though, so he turns to go look for the one he's been waiting for.
Except he hasn't been waiting for her, not really. She's been waiting for him.
"Hi, mom," Stiles says, a little choked up, as he faces the woman who's standing across the clearing. "Guess I shouldn't go looking for dead bodies in the woods, huh?"
A/N: So I really have a thing for killing off Stiles, huh? Well anyway, this idea came to me and wouldn't leave me alone until I wrote it so here you go, another story. I hope all of you understood what happened, but if you didn't, well, that was a little bit intentional. The last part is really the only one with an explanation.