A/N: This is a story that goes with a picture on deviantart. The cover is the art and the link to the page is on my page. Thank you, ApolloFan! I own nothing.

A/N 2: I have decided that I wanted to break this story up, give it some more feels, add a pinch more Sterek to the end and see what you think. It's basically the same as the original one-shot, but with bonus features. So here yah go, my loves!

Disclaimer: I own nothin', but if Jeff Davis wanted to let me have Derek for a night, I promise I'd consider bringing him back...

The Best Part of Me

By wolfgal97

"What do you mean I have to stay at your creepy burnt house in the middle of the woods?"

"Stiles, you won't be alone. I'll be there, too," Isaac pointed out.

"Oh, so a newly made beta werewolf will be there with me in an alpha werewolf's house. An alpha who hates me, to top it off. This is just wonderful."

"Derek, Scott and I are all just worried about your safety. The alpha pack has made it clear that they're interested in you. The best way to keep you safe is for one of us to watch you at all times."

Stiles rolled his eyes. He understood why he couldn't stay at home. He didn't want to put his father in harm's way. With the alpha pack watching him, he did need to stay around a wolf friend, but Isaac and he didn't really talk much, and Derek... well, he had no freaking idea what was going on with that nutty alpha.

"Why can't I just stay with Scott?" the human asked.

"Because Scott sucks. He'll be moping about Allison and plus, he has a job. He's not available to watch you well enough. Besides, it's best if you stay with Derek and me. I mean, he's an alpha and you guys are friends."

"Woah, woah! Derek and I are not friends. He doesn't like me and I don't know if I really like him that much either. Sure, we've saved each other's lives a few times, but other than that, I have no idea what gives you the impression that Derek gives a howl about me."

Isaac shrugged, now obviously feeling self-conscious. "I don't know. He... he just seemed really upset when he read the note."

For some reason, Stiles' heart sped up just a little. "Really? I mean, other than basically telling us they want to use me as a chew toy, what did it say?"

"Derek has it. But basically, it said that they saw we had a human pet and that we should keep an eye on you or you might go missing," Isaac whispered.

"Really? That's all that's got you guys freaked out?"

"Stiles, it's a whole pack of alphas. I would be freaked out if I were you."

"You mean if you were human and weak?" Stiles asked, silently admitting his fears. It had been eating away at him, feeling that he wasn't important enough to be pack. Just because he was human, he wasn't strong or fast enough to tribute to the pack.

Isaac watched the human very carefully. "You do know that you're pack, right?"

Stiles shrugged, but kept his eyes on the road. "Not really. I mean, sure, I help Scott out. And Derek and I are usually okay with each other, but really, I'm not important. If I wasn't there, I wouldn't be missed."

"What are you talking about? Of course you would be!"

"Really, Isaac? You tell me what I do for the pack. I mean, Erica and Boyd did more than me, and they're missing. Scott is all loyal and good, you're a fast learner and have more control than any of them, and then you have Derek, the wolf enigma. He's strong, fast, he knows what he's doing, and he does it all while looking like that!" Stiles exclaimed while pulling into the Hale house yard where the last Hale was waiting in the porch.

Isaac was about to comment, but he didn't have the chance to. Stiles parked and got out of his car while pulling his bag out of the back seat. Isaac rolled his eyes in frustration before getting out himself.

"What took you so long?" Derek barked from the porch. He was fixing Stiles with that intense stare that only his eyes could pull off. Stiles shivered under his gaze.

"I had to get packed, sourwolf. And you know how fashionable I am. I had to make sure I packed my whole wardrobe," Stiles shot back.

"Plus, I had to wrangle him into the car," Isaac coughed.

Stiles was ready for Derek to slam him against a wall and threaten to rip his throat out with his teeth. Or for a verbal assault about how Stiles needed to stop joking around when something so serious was going on. He did not. The alpha simply nodded and turned to stalk into his burnt shell of a house.

Stiles gave Isaac a questioning look, but the teen just shrugged and followed Derek inside. Stiles stayed close to him. "So... where do I sleep?" the human asked.

"Where ever you find space," a new voice called from what used to be the living room.

Stiles' eyes bugged. "Can someone please tell me what the hell psychowolf is doing here?!"

"He's pack. And right now, we need as many on our side as we can get," Derek explained calmly.

"Besides," Peter said, "someone has to fix up this dump. Might as well be someone with style."

Stiles looked around and had to admit, the place looked a little better. Rooms that had once been half-standing had been completed with new wood. Now, you could see the beginnings of a kitchen, complete with microwave, oven and stove. There was also an older round wooden table in the smaller room in the back, showing that room to be the dinning room. And then there was the living room where a green couch and a few chairs were. A bookcase had even been drug in. It was old and battered, but a few shelves had a couple of books on them.

All in all, Stiles believed the place looked a little better. And that was just the main floor. He hadn't even been upstairs. Well, in fact, he'd never been upstairs. Not yet.

"Okay. So I'm here. In a house full of werewolves. What am I supposed to do?" Stiles asked, boredom already setting in.

Derek was already heading up the stairs. "Find away to entertain yourself," the alpha said. And then he was gone.

"So, he makes me come out here, and then leaves me. Where does that make any sense?" Stiles asked the teen wolf laying out on the couch.

"He does that a lot. If he's not giving orders, he's upstairs brooding or out for a run," Isaac explained.

"Well, why doesn't anyone go up there and get him?"

Both Peter and Isaac fixed him with a look questioning the teen's sanity. "You don't go into Derek's room. Ever. You just don't do it," Isaac said.

Peter chucked and turned his gaze back to his book. "My nephew and I agree on the fact that sometimes it's good to get away from the world for a while. He just doesn't understand the idea that you have to eventually come back."

For once, Stiles didn't know what to say to that. He just had a little voice in the back of his head gnawing away at him to go upstairs and drag the alpha out to be with people. He knew Derek was emotionally scarred, but he just didn't know why he cared so much...

"Fine, well what am I supposed to do?" the teen asked, changing the subject.

"I don't care," Peter sniffed. "Just try not to be annoying."

"I'm gonna take a nap," Isaac announced before curling into a ball on the couch.

Stiles sighed. "Yo, Peter! Are there any good werewolf books around here?" he asked.

The wolf shot him a glare, but at the sincere look on Stiles face, he let it slide away before digging in a pile of books on the desk where he and his laptop sat. He found an old looking one with a brown tattered cover and tossed it over his shoulder at the human. "Try that. I think you'll find it... informative."

Stiles caught the book and flipped it over to read the cover. "Lycanthropes?"

"Chapter eight," Peter said shortly.

The boy opened the book and sank into the nearest chair, becoming totally absorbed in what he was reading.

The chapter was all about alpha werewolves and their abilities. It said how they were to look after their pack and would form separate bonds with each pack member, feeling protective of all, but mostly protective of their mates.

Stiles continued to flip through the book, discovering that werewolves not only heal quickly, but they can also take the pain away from others if they wish, though they will feel the pain instead. Stiles thought that that was a sucky deal.

By the time he'd skimmed through the whole book, he felt a little tired. So, he decided to question Peter.

"So, how much of that book was even remotely close to the truth?" he asked.

"Actually, because it was written by a friend of a werewolf, it was closer than most."

Stiles thought about that for a while before another question came to mind. "So, you're saying that other packs have had a human in them before?"

Peter raised an eyebrow. "Regretting not taking the bite?"

"No! I was just curious..."

"You know, if you've changed your mind, you could just ask Derek for the bite. I mean, it sure would make life easier if we didn't have to babysit you," Peter snipped.

And he hit the nail right on the head. "Forget I asked," Stiles hissed.

It was then that the alpha decided to come downstairs. His piercing eyes looked over the room to see his teen beta asleep and his uncle receiving a death glare from a sleepy looking Stiles.

"Stiles," Derek called. The teen jumped when Derek said his name, worried that he'd somehow pissed the huge alpha off. It didn't take much.

"What?" Stiles asked almost defensively.

"Why don't you go get some sleep? You can use the room upstairs to the left," Derek said. His suggestion was more of an order. One that Stiles wasn't in the mood to argue with.

The weary teen pulled his heavy body out of the chair. Stiles stumbled past Derek and up the wooden staircase. He followed the werewolf's instructions and made his bleary way to the first door on the left.

It was when he had fell in exhaustion to the bed that his mind woke up just a little bit. The smell of the pillow his face was buried in... It smelled exactly like Derek-I'll-rip-your-throat-out-with-my-teeth-Hale. Stiles sniffed again, just to make sure he was right. Then, he got up off the bed like it was on fire.

Stiles looked around the room and noted that the only thing in it was a chair with a black leather jacket draped across it. Derek's black leather jacket. The jacket that Stiles knew he wasn't supposed to touch, but wanted to anyway.

So, blaming it on his ADHD, he did.

Like a kid at christmas, Stiles slipped his skinny little frame into the huge jacket that was way too big for him. It smelled like the bed, like it's owner. Woodsy and like the night. Stiles shivered as he breathed in the scent.

That's when he came to his senses and peeled the jacket off. He gingerly put it back where he found it and backed away slowly like an alarm had gone off to alert the irritable alpha to what he'd done.

And finally, the question sunk in. Why had Derek told him to go sleep in what appeared to be the werewolf's room? His personal brooding den of moodiness? Why had he let Stiles in, of all people?

The teen decided that it must have been a mistake, that he'd found the wrong room. But that wasn't possible. He'd followed Derek's directions to the letter, for once. Maybe Derek had messed up?

Stiles decided to ask. He backed slowly out of the room and closed the door slowly behind him. He then began a slow decent down the stairs, feeling like every move he made was being watched.

It was when he got four steps down that he heard the voices. Down the stairs and in the next room over, he could hear the wolves talking. He froze in place and decided to listen to what was being said.

"So if they show up, Peter and I hold them off here while you get Stiles out, right?" Isaac asked.

"Yes. You two will be able to pick them off here while I keep Stiles safe," Derek said.

"So you get to run while we're left here to fight alphas. Good plan, Derek."

"Peter, Stiles needs protected. When they figure out he's not here, they'll come after me. As alpha, I can take them on while as betas, you need numbers."

"I don't see why the human is so important. I mean, he's smart, yes, but he's not a wolf. He doesn't want to be," Peter said cooly.

"Stiles is pack," Isaac defended.

"As alpha, Derek would be willing to die for pack. Tell me, would you die for the human? Is he that important to you?"

"Yes, I would die for him," Derek said before Stiles could even process what was being said.

"Why? Why is he so important to you?" Peter quizzed.

"Because it's Stiles. He's hyper, annoying, and he never shuts up, but he's my pack."

"Would he do the same for you? Would he save you?" Peter challenged.

For a while, there wasn't an answer. But slowly, quietly, like a whisper, it came.

"He already has."

Peter must not have known what to say to that. But, the sharp-tongued wolf always had something to say. "Fine. If he's that important to you, I'll fight for him. But you might want to ask yourself how attached you're getting to him."

"You're dismissed," Derek growled.

The conversation was over. Stiles knew that he needed to get back upstairs or that they would find out that he'd been listening. He went back up the stairs and found his way into Derek's room. He had just laid down on the bed when the door opened and Derek came in.

"If you want to eavesdrop on werewolves, make sure you control your breathing," Derek said bluntly as he sat in the chair in the corner, head rolled to the side, allowing him to gaze out the window.

Stiles blushed, but played it off. He sat up in bed and fixed the werewolf with a stare. "Are you gonna sit there all night?"

"That was the plan."

"And what? Watch me sleep? That's creepy. And what about when you get tired?"

"Wolves don't need much sleep," Derek shrugged.

"Uh-huh. And why do I get the feeling that you get less than that amount they do need?"

Derek didn't answer because Stiles was right. He didn't get much sleep. He was too busy worrying about keeping his pack safe and about the alphas. And when he did sleep, it was full of nightmares that kept him awake at night.

"Why don't you come get some sleep?" Stiles asked quietly, patting the place on the bed next to him.

"I... I need to be awake. I have to be alert in case-"

"Oh, shut up," Stiles said. "You're a freaking werewolf. You'll hear them coming."

Derek didn't want to admit that the reason he didn't want to sleep was because of the bad dreams that had him waking in the middle of the night screaming. He couldn't...wouldn't show weakness.

Still... the look that Stiles gave him... he couldn't say no. He sighed and joined the teen on the bed. Stiles grinned, knowing that he'd just won.

They both laid down, backs to each other. Several minutes passed before Stiles' mouth had to run. "Derek?"

A soft growl let Stiles know that the wolf was listening.

"Why do you care so much? About me? I mean, I'm just human and I'm not really pack..."

"Stiles, did you not understand anything that was said tonight? You are pack. Whether you think you are or not, you really are. You've done way more for this pack than about anyone. Especially Scott."

"Yeah, but other than that, why do you care so much? I mean, sure, I'm pack..." Stiles didn't know how to say his insecurities.

"You've always been there for me when I needed you, whether you wanted to be or not. You've saved my life before. I honestly trust you more than anyone else. I'm just... unsure about it because the last person I trusted... It didn't end well."

Stiles was surprised that Derek was being so open with him. Derek wasn't really the talking type, but tonight it was like a whole new person was there inside of him, opening up the teen.

"You've already saved me before. That night at the hospital when we figured out Peter was the alpha, if you hadn't come to get me, I would've died."

Derek didn't reply to that. Stiles turned and looked at the wolf to find him fast asleep. The teen smiled before turning back around and letting sleep take over...