Blanket Disclaimer: The characters and events depicted in these stories are fictional. Any similarity to any actual person, living or dead, or to any actual events, firms and institutions and other entities is coincidental and unintentional. All characters used are the legal property of their respective creators and/or owners and their constituents. I have gained nothing but personal satisfaction from my stories/art/manips.
'Well, this blows…' Stiles sat on an old stump in a barren wasteland. He'd woken up flat on his back, next to that selfsame stump with no knowledge of anything after his argument with, well, all of the pack. Once again they had been telling him how weak he was and how he had to stay behind. Not one to sit around and wait to be rescued, he'd started walking. It was the only thing he could do to figure out where he was and how to get home. Every step, and he'd taken many, led him right back to this stump. It was like he was tethered there by an invisible chain. "Now I know what a dog on a chain feels like."
After some time (a few minutes or hours… where the fuck was his phone?) he'd decided maybe he should give Derek and the pack a chance to rescue him. Surely, they'd notice he was missing, right? Or one of them would wonder why he isn't answering his texts. He held his chin in his hand and tried to puzzle out where the hell he might be, how he got there, and how the in the name of hades he was going to get out.
Time passed slowly, but he could sense that he'd been in this wasteland for a while and he was getting a little concerned. He knew this was not a 'normal' place. He couldn't walk out, and he couldn't fly. Therefore, maybe in some crazy way, he could dig his way out. He broke a branch off the stump and started digging into the ground near his former seat.
He had only struck the hard ground a few times when suddenly it gave way like a thin pane of glass. It cracked out in five directions and a small hole, three feet in diameter appeared in the center. Stiles jumped back, stumbled, and slammed into the stump. He clung to it in shock and stared at a hole that led to nothing. The world beneath the thing patch of dirt he was standing on left no question in his mind that this was not the way out.
He leaned against the stump and felt a trickle of cold sweat run down between his shoulder blades. He might just have to wait for rescue after all. He hoped that the pack had noticed he was gone and were looking for him by now. "I can't get myself out of here…" It was a disheartening thought, even worse when spoken aloud into the desolation of his prison. 'I can't' were words Stiles was not very familiar with. Even if he said them, he never really believed them, until now. He looked up at the sky. There was no sun in the sky, but it was filled with light. "At least it's not raining…" He whispered into the unmoving air.
Derek Hale stood over the bed, staring down. Anger, fear, and frustration radiated off him. He seemed to smolder. Melissa stood in the doorway unsure what to do. The others had gone home; visiting hours were over. Yet, Derek had stood in the same place for past few hours, just glaring down at the bed's unmoving occupant. She eased into the room slowly. The werewolf didn't move, but she knew he'd been aware of her all along. "You should go home and rest."
"I'll stay until the Sheriff comes." That was the last thing she wanted. Derek had been the one to find Stiles and even though it wasn't his fault that Stiles was here this time. The poor boy's father was not likely to be in a mood to listen to reason. She did not want any more tragedy today. It was more than enough that the drunk driver who'd run Stiles off the road and into the tree was in the morgue and Stiles was unconscious and unresponsive in that bed.
"Visiting hours are over. You really need to go now." Derek didn't move. "I'll check on him all night, I promise."
"I'm not leaving him alone."
"He won't notice if you leave for a bit to eat and rest."
"You don't know that."
"Mr. Hale, I must insist you leave. You are putting me in a very bad place here. We have rules for a reason. You have to go home." She softened her tone from nurse to mother. "Please; eat, sleep, and come back tomorrow. Maybe things will improve by then."
Derek's mouth twitched slightly, then he nodded and walked past her without a backward glance.
Melissa let a relieved sigh slip past her lips and walked trembling from the room.
The sun went away. In an instant, it was gone. It took all the warmth with it. Stiles was shocked by the sudden change in his strange environment. He pulled his legs up to his chest and pushed back into the hollow between two large roots at the base of the stump, looking into the blackness, and listening to 'nothing'.
He was beginning to truly despair. Then, as suddenly as it had left him, the light and warmth returned. He released the breath he hadn't even realized he was holding and sagged back against the remains of the dead tree in relief. He didn't know if he could take another 'night' like that here. He really needed someone to rescue him and soon.
Derek waited until the nurse at the station was preoccupied with a personal call on her cell phone and slipped down the hall as quietly as possible. He shut the door carefully and approached the bed. For a moment, he just stared down at the young human who was the most infuriating and annoying creature he'd ever met, and in his own way, the most endearing. Derek swallowed hard and reached out to touch Stile's bruised forehead.
The temperature increased suddenly and for a moment, Stile's wondered if this might actually be hell after all. When it didn't become unbearable, he decided he was being a bit silly. He looked up at the sky and wondered what the point of all this was.
Derek whispered into the dimly lit room. "Wake up Stiles."
Wind, there was wind here. It whirled around Stiles, whipping at his hair and clothes, it was surprisingly warm. Stiles felt compelled to stand up. He looked up into the sky as if searching for the place it had come from.
"Wake up."
The wind whipped at him again, it was stronger, almost angry. Stiles was standing on top of the stump now, staring at a bright spot that had appeared above him.
"Dammit, you idiot! Wake the fuck up and say something annoying!"
The wind was swirling around him like a maelstrom; Stiles could almost feel it pulling at him as if trying to lift him up off the stump. "I can't walk, and I can't dig, the only thing left to try is… to fly." He felt another surge and jumped with it. Launching himself towards the light in the sky.
"I'm not fucking around here Stiles! I know you can do it, You're always the one with the plan, now wake the hell up!"
He could feel it; he was so close. He knew where he was now; he knew he could escape this place. There was a way out. The last surge of wind had pushed him far above the ground, but somehow, it wasn't enough. He was falling back, back into the prison of nothing. "NO!" He screamed. "I won't go back! I won't! You can't make me! I'm Leaving NOW!"
His foot touched the stump and he used it to propel himself back up. He flew straight up through the light and into a place of pain. The pain engulfed him. It hurt everywhere. His eyes flew open and he could only make out shapes, but he knew the shape towering over him. He tried to speak, but only a rasp passed his lips. He tried to move his hand, but it was too heavy.
"Bout fucking time dumbass. How long were you going to sleep anyway?" Derek smiled one of those rarest of smiles and sagged in relief. He pulled a chair over and let all the fear melt into it.
Stiles blinked in response; it was the only movement he could manage and even that was painful.
When Melissa next checked on Stiles, she was ecstatic to see his eyes open, and bemused to see the older werewolf snoring softly in a chair beside the bed. "I'll get the doctor." She told Stiles before literally running down the hall. She was so thankful that she would not have to tell her son, or his best friend's father that the little weird light that was Stiles Stilinski had gone out.
'I flew.' Stiles thought to himself. No one was going to believe it when he told them, but that was okay. He knew, that was what mattered. He almost hadn't tried it. How long had he sat there waiting to be rescued, when he could have saved himself all along? He was reminded of something he'd heard somewhere. "The first person who has to believe in you is you."
~Fin