would you really rush out for me now?

Notes: welp this is a series now okay (I honestly can't write multiple fic for a fandom without tying them together please don't hate me)

It starts on a Tuesday.

Lydia hates Tuesdays. There is simply something wretched about surviving the grueling abuse of Mondays, only to be punished with the mundane, flat nowhere-near-close-enough-to-Friday of Tuesdays.

If Tuesday were a colour (if Lydia was inclined to ridiculous metaphor à la Stiles), it would be beige.

Lydia hates the colour beige.

The remnants of packs Hale and (essentially) McCall have all made it back to school – all except Isaac (and with it's an acrid taste in her mouth that Lydia realizes that Isaac is the only one Derek has now, Issac is the last of Derek's non-familial pack (Lydia has never been grateful to Cora before)) who hasn't been seen in three days.

Derek hasn't been seen in eight.

Scott is quiet about the entire affair, which is especially strange since Isaac is still living with him (isn't he?), only saying that he's sure Isaac will be back.

The furrowed brow and dark frown are not convincing in the slightest.

Lydia has been fending off Aiden's hungry looks, though he makes it easy with the guilt lurking behind his eyes. He should be guilty, Lydia thinks furiously, but beneath that righteousness is a twist of shame that only digs deeper when Aiden bumps into Stiles in the hallway, literally.

She can't tell at this distance if it was an accident or not, but Stiles barely reacts, despite the sudden appearance of Scott, who shoulders between them in a flash of amb–or is it red? Stiles just looks at Aiden; it is a deadly look, so cold Lydia can feel herself burning all the way down the hall. He says nothing, just rucks his backpack higher onto his shoulder and disappears into the throng of students.

But it didn't need saying.

Aiden helped kill Boyd.

Even Lydia, who has never made clear allegiance to anyone besides Aliison or Stiles, knows this to be unforgivable.

So at the lunch bell, instead of detouring from chemistry to one of her and Aiden's clandestine meeting places, Lydia actually heads to the cafeteria, intent on actually spending the hour eating, for a change.

It only takes two scans of the packed cafeteria to spot Stiles, Scott, Allison and Danny, occupuying the end of one long row of cafeteria tables. There is at least four seats between Danny and the next person in the row of tables, which is a strange relief. Pretending to be normal is exhausting.

Stiles looks up with pale eyes (he hasn't been sleeping, it clear halfway across the room) and lifts a hand in greeting.

"Hey there."

Lydia very nearly sighs aloud, pivoting neatly on her heel to face...someone.

"And who are you?"

She'd spent so long cultivating the mask of the girl she thought she was supposed to be that it's hard to shed, sometimes. Though now, faced with the raised eyebrow of a boy she should probably recognize, Lydia finds she doesn't mind much.

"Connor. Connor Lightman."

The corner of the boy's mouth curl in a way that doesn't seem very light like at all. Lydia narrows her eyes, trying to place the overconfident smile.

"Oh, yes," she says at last. "The new kid."

Just perfect. She has a hazy memory of Connor standing at the front of Ms. Blake's class (who has again impressed Lydia with her ability to just roll with the fact that she not only witnessed the murder of one of her students not two weeks ago, but can carry on with the novel study like his now-empty seat is not two to the left of centre, just behind the previous seat of one Erica Reyes).

The thrice human-glance to Scott to see the casual shake of his head (not werewolf) was enough for Lydia to effectively tune out.

Now though, she looks at Connor and sees so much of Jackson in that downward sneer, too much, in fact, that she makes up her mind right then and there.

"Not interested." She tries for a simpering smile but probably fails, because as she turns again on her heel to walk away, Lydia is halted in her tracks by the firm grip on her arm.

"Well that was rude," Connor says casually, but the shadow in the slope of his cheekbones betrays him. Lydia looks from his face to his hand and has to stamp down that same urge to laugh that has threatened her in as many days since Derek disappeared.

It's probably unhealthy to keep it bottled up, isn't it?

"Oh, I'm sorry, would you like my heel to explain the concept of rejection to your instep?"

She's faced down fucking kanimas, okay? Lydia Martin will not be cowed by some stupid human boy. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see her friends – Allison and Scott are staring (Lydia's sure he's been relaying the entire exchange).

Stiles is already out of his chair.

But it's not him, or even Aiden who simply appears between one breath and the next, brushing her shoulder and sending a familiar warmth everywhere like a plume of dust scattering through the air.

It's Isaac.

"You should really listen better," he says in that same, deceptively casual tone that Connor had used. "I do believe the lady said she wasn't interested."

The feminist in Lydia bristles at the concept of having to be rescued, but the relief at the meresight of Isaac is so palpable she can feel it in her throat, overwhelming everything. It's surprising – a little frightening, even, because when had this rag-tag bunch of kids become so important?

She thinks of the key she keeps locked away in a bottom drawer in her bedroom and then pushes the image away. There isn't time for heartbreak right now.

Connor's sneer twists into something even uglier than before. "Get lost. We're a little busy here."

Isaac's eyes drop the veil of casual and calm so quickly that Lydia wants to cry out, to tell him to stop before he starts, because if he wolfs out in front of his asshole, she is never going to forgive him for ruining them all. But his hand just grips the arm that holds hers, like some weird human knot.

Lydia doesn't have to look to know that Isaac's grip is shifted to crushing; the pain he's causing Connor is clear on the other boy's face.

"Isaac," she tries, but gets nothing.

Isaac's pinpoint anger doesn't seem to abate, until Connor's making pained noises, and yet he won't let up–

"Isaac!"

It's Scott's voice, making her jump, enabling her to wrench herself free, and then too many things happen at once. Stiles' hands slam into Connor, shoving him away from Lydia with more force than she knew he posessed.

Scott grabs Isaac by the shoulders turning him towards them, and there is such a haunted look in the eyes of Derek's packmate that Lydia can feel herself going cold, barely noticing when Allison closes around her.

"You alright?" Allison asks, worry colouring her cheeks. Lydia nods, but it's too jerky for her liking. Connor is leaping up from his shocked place on the hallway floor, face twisted with rage, but Lydia is more preoccupied with whatever lights Stiles' eyes, whatever it is in the hard set of his mouth that simply says,

Come on.

It's been a long time since he's frightened her.

People are staring – it's a miracle no adults have appeared yet – and it's only with this in mind that Lydia finds enough function in herself to lurch foward.

"Stiles," she starts, and it comes out like a gasp, which well, probably doesn't help that murderous intent in those dark eyes. Lydia grabs at his shoulders and shoves herself into his frame of vision (thank god for some of her tallest shoes). "Stiles. Stiles, I'm fine."

But he doesn't see her, not until she shakes his gaze away from the bruise already forming above her wrist and latches onto to her face. That anger is still there, but underneath is a kind of apology, a kind of sorrow that will bruise harder than any jerk ever could.

"I'm fine," Lydia repeats, curling her fingers into the soft fabric of his shirt in the hopes that maybe the contact will get through to him. "I promise. Let's go, okay? Please."

She doesn't mean to plead but the crack in her voice belies that intent; her heart is thumping hard against her ribs, but Stiles doesn't have to know that. A beat. Another. And then everything in Stiles' expression goes soft around the edges. He doesn't say anything, maybe he can't or doesn't trust himself to have the right words (wouldn't that be something?), but his hand reaches up to cover her uninjured arm, her wrist, her hand.

Lydia suddenly doesn't trust herself to speak either, crushed with the notion that this moment is actually more important than either of them realize. She just shifts her wrist and takes the hand that covers hers, pulilng him first towards her and then, as he's unresisting, down the hall.

They make it all the way to the double doors of the closest school exit, their friends silent shadows behind them, before Lydia realizes that she and Stiles are still holding hands, and that Stiles' face has now creased and folded into the look of a child lost and alone, and that Lydia will drown in this upsurge of something for Stiles, crashing up through her ribs and up her throat, unless someone says something right now–

"Derek."

The hopefulness in Isaac's tone cuts down Lydia's swirl of confusing emotions like the decisive swing of a guillotine. She looks up, and standing there in the parking lot, looking decidedly worse for wear, is Derek.

Derek and Cora are standing in front of the Camaro, as though nothing and everything had ever happened, as though they are a fractured edge and here is the place where they're supposed to find perfect pieces to fit together again.

For what feels like ages, no one says anything. Lydia isn't sure if half of them are even breathing. But then Isaac kind of stumbles down the steps towards his Alpha, looking as Stiles had looked just a moment before, lostalonewhatdoIdonow, but Derek is there, Derek is home, Derek is ready when Isaac crumbles into his arms, don'teverleavemebehindagain, holding up his beta and cupping the back of his neck, and letting him shake his way back to pack and family.

No one goes back to school. Lydia counts it as one of the best Tuesdays she's ever had.

—

On Wednesday, they're all sitting around Derek's backyard, pretending not to tense at every shift in the wind. Isaac is glued to his alpha, Scott follows because of their now fully-fledged bromance, Allison and Stiles in tow, becaus well, it's Scott.

And Lydia, because Allison is her best friend and Stiles...Stiles is Stiles, not to mention she hadn't exactly missed that look Isaac had shot her before clamouring in behind Cora into Derek's Camaro, the one she'd seen that night in Stiles' jeep, the one that read of too much pain and gratitude and hopefulness all rolled into grey-green-blue eyes.

She's mad at him, Lydia realizes, tearing a blade of grass between her fingers. She's mad at him for disappearing into the wind without a word, without any kind of sign, because she'd let him believe that he was okay.

She believed it was going to be okay.

Lydia would be hard pressed to believe that now.

So she drops her college-grade physics text she'd been pretending to read since they'd arrived, brushing Stiles as she stands from their place in the grass beneath the scraggly tree. Lydia stalks across the yard to Allison and Scott, who despite all the very-present danger and still-real break up, sit together on the bottom-most step of Derek's back porch, Scott leaning against Isaac's leg as his friend sits above him, while Derek sits above them all, back against the porch rail.

There is something about pack dynamics here, but the absence of Boyd and Erica is too fresh and it hurts to think about.

"I want you to train me."

Allison's surprise is clear. "Train you to what?"

Lydia looks down to where Allison's fingers fletch dark arrows without her even having to pay much attention to them.

"To fight."

Derek looks as though he's about to laugh, which would be a relief from the distress of late, but even the tiny flare fades when he reads the truth of it in her eyes.

Lydia jerks her thumb back over her shoulder, to where Stiles sits.

"Him too."

—

There is a surprisingly large window of reprieve; almost a week passes before anything alpha-pack or Gerard-related happens, in which Lydia forces Stiles to begin Argent-style training with her.

Well, with is more of a looser statement, considering Stiles refuses to spar with her. Allison puts her through her paces, and it only takes half a day's worth of convincing to get Isaac to work with her, fangs and all.

"You know why he won't," the werewolf says, ducking away from her attempted slash. She prefers knives, which is a surprise to no one at all.

Lydia just glares and attempts this roll-duck-twist combo that makes Allison seem like a river, always moving, always changing, always too fast. But Isaac has been a werewolf for longer than anyone probably gives him credit for, so Lydia isn't all that surprised to find herself pressed against the wall of Derek's charred living roomm her knife arm twisted behind her back and Isaac's breath ghosting through her hair.

"Faster," he tells her, not unkindly, but not coddling either. "You have to be faster."

So she pulls out her other knife and goes for it, but Isaac is still faster, or maybe even ready for it, so it's her back that thumps the wall this time, his hand over her wrist. Their stalemeate is too far from his neck to be helpful, but it's progress.

He's grinning and it makes her heart hurt.

"Better," Isaac concedes with a hint of pride. Lydia wonders how far they've come now that it's not weird when his free hand reaches up to brush her loose hair away from her face.

"He doesn't want to hurt you," Isaac says, his tone too gentle now. She wants to lash out, because Stiles already has, does he realize how long the lies and darkness kept monsters coming back to find her? But Lydia doesn't say that.

She looks at her feet instead, feels bare without her minimum three inches of courage, and doesn't think about the way Isaac has successfully crowded her in and made a safe place between his body and charred wall.

"Hey."

And then he's lifting her chin with his fingers and Lydia can't help but think distantly that this is probably crossing some kind of line, because he's lucky to have you was for Stiles, it's all for Stiles really, but she recalls the darkness of the jeep and that same safe space and then Isaac is looking at her with eyes that extend beyond like galaxies, that go on and on and on.

He's going to say something, something with too much meaning for two people who barely know each other, who have grown to understand each other's bodies, curves and edges and movement because they've spent the last four days training non-stop, that's all–

He lets go.

"Go again?"

Lydia takes a breath, then another. "Yeah."

Isaac's smile is brilliant, familiar somehow – she thinks pack and it spreads that warmth all the way down to her toes.

It's not okay still, not yet, but they are still closer to it than they were yesterday.

—

"Fight me."

It's Thursday.

Stiles' head jerks up so quickly it's a wonder it doesn't fly off his neck. She's fresh off a victory over Isaac that he will forever maintain was a freebie and looking at Stiles, lying in the grass behind Derek's house staring at a notebook filled with nearly indecipherable scribbles.

"Wha–no." Stiles scrambles up into a sitting position. Lydia is momentarily distracted by the pull of muscle in his back – he's been training with Derek and Scott and complaining loudly of his peach-like skin at every opportunity. "Lydia, I–"

"Stiles, get off your ridiculous ass and fight me, now."

There is much she'd rather forget about that night, but Stiles' obstinance had been a welcome and flattering reprieve from worrying about Jackson, and well...everything else.

Lydia can see the remembrance on his face and uses that distraction to grab his arm and haul him to his feet; the mere fact that she manages it sends a rush of pride up her spine. This was one of her best ideas yet.

Stiles' reluctance is clear as he follows her to the centre of the yard, and is only heightened when the pack spills out onto the porch. Derek's arms are crossed over his chest as he leans on the porch rail, but there's a distinct interest in his eyes that Lydia refuses to disappoint.

Derek may be pack alpha, but these are her friends, and she'll do whatever it takes to get them all out of this shitstorm alive.

"Get him, Lydia!" Allison calls with a whoop. Lydia lets her lips curl as Stiles shucks his sweater to reveal a t shirt that she swears two weeks ago fit a lot looser than it does now.

She makes the first move because it's obvious he won't; Stiles parries her attack but makes little move to respond. Lydia feels frustration building up in her chest as she attacks again. Stiles dodges blow after blow when did he get so fast but refuses to make a move against her, until Lydia jerks foward and grabs him by the collar of his shirt.

"I am not a fragile little girl," she growls, and it's almost funny that despite her immunity, Lydia must be the most wolfish human of all. "Fight me, Stiles."

Stiles' eyes grow wide and then flinty, before pulling her hand off of his collar and dropping into a defensive stance. Finally, is Lydia's first thought before he shoots forward, and that's the last coherent thought she has for the next ten minutes, as she is forced to use every technique Allison and Isaac have taught her to push back against Stiles.

She can see the deep-set anger and frustration in his face, can feel it in his attacks, and Lydia knows it's not about her, or them and this fight, and knows that this is probably good for him, getting all this out. She also knows that despite all her training that they are outmatched, that in spite of her speed Stiles is faster, longer limbed and stronger.

He is so much more angry.

So when he sweeps her feet from the grass and comes bearing down over her, it's more the shock of landing flat on her back that leaves Lydia breathless. Well that, and the look in Stiles' eyes, that sparked and roaring rage that would ravage anything it touched, that catches words in her throat before they can form and leaves the taste of ash in her mouth.

Lydia's surprise must show on her face, because the spark dies quickly and Stiles' eyes grow wide. Before she can say anything, he's peeled away from her and on his feet, stalking across the yard and disappearing around the shell of the Hale house.

She has to take a breath first, but Lydia jumps to her feet before anyone can come tearing towards her, jerking around to find the pack open-mouthed and silent. Isaac rises and starts to move, halted only by Derek's hand on his shoulder and the minute shake of his head.

Lydia has never been grateful to Derek before, either.

She picks a piece of grass from her hair before running after Stiles.

—

He's halfway to his jeep, digging around for his keys.

"Stiles, wait!"

He freezes, and for a second she thinks he might stay that way forever, an angry slash of shoulder blades and the edges of healing bruises peeking out of hems and collars.

But then Stiles whirls around, closing the space between them in a handful of strides. It takes everything Lydia has not to yelp in surprise as he grabs at her shoulders.

"Why would you–"

But it seems he has trouble finishing that sentence, as if the rest of the words are choking him. Lydia grabs instinctively at his wrists, trying to ground them together.

"Stiles, I'm fine, it's okay–"

"No, it's not!" Stiles is shaking, his eyes wide and wild, and Lydia just holds on tighter. "It's not okay, everyone is dying and there's almost nothing I can do, and I promised, don't you get it Lydia? I promised I would never–"

It sounds as though he really is choking now, panicking, and Lydia does the first thing that comes to mind and grabs his face in both hands.

"Stiles," she says, as firmly and as calmly as possible, "Stiles, just breathe, okay?"

She forces air in gross exaggeration. With a strangled gasp, he follows. Lydia nods encouragingly. "That's it, okay, just breathe, everything's going to be fine."

The objection is half-formed on his lips but she just shushes him. "I know you'd never–" For some reason it sounds too sacred a promise to say out loud. "I know you'd never hurt me. And you didn't okay? Really just winded me a bit, but I swear, I'm fine."

He looks as though he wants to make her swear again on something holy. There again is that sad, lost expression that reads of walls all knocked down; Lydia swallows a whimper before simply giving into this feeling, pitching forward and wrapping her arms around him.

Their height difference has never been so pronounced; Stiles' heart thunders against her ear until it seems to fill her up and echo everywhere. But Lydia refuses to let go, until at last she feels Stiles relax and return the embrace. His grip is so tight he nearly pulls her to her toes as he buries his face in her hair.

"'m sorry," he murmurs just above her ear. It takes everything Lydia has not to shiver. She presses herself a little closer to him, if it were possible.

"I know. Me too."

His heart slows to something strong and steady and Lydia can feel her tension just bleeding out. Stiles is safe too, just as Isaac is, but he is something else as well, something that is equal parts thrill and comfort, familiar and intriguiging, and right then and there Lydia resolves that if they can just survive, she'll find the courage to discover him.

More Notes: lydia/isaac friendship is awesome okay they would be the best dynamic

allison/isaac is actually the best thing so happy it's a thing

THE KISS IS COMING

*SCREECH*

thoughts = love!