Title: Warrior's Heart

Fandom: Teen Wolf

Characters: Stiles Stilinski

Summary: When he was five he started to measure his life through moments and lately he's found himself having more moments than any sixteen year-old boy probably ever should.

AN: So…I started watching Teen Wolf at the urging of a family member and I'm hooked. I have watched all two seasons and then of course my muse decided to return with a vengeance so HI new fandom!

This is set directly after the season 2 finale so spoiler warning for that.

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When he was five he told his mother that he wanted to be Captain of the Enterprise when he grew up. In response, his mother had taken him to the craft store and they found plastic stars that would glow in the dark, bought them, and scattered them across his ceiling so he could start his Starfleet training early. The only thing she had insisted on was placing the constellation of Orion right over his bed because she'd said that he had a warrior's heart.

Five was also when he had met Scott and they had bonded over their mutual appreciation of the Power Rangers. Five was when he'd gained a best friend for the rest of his life.

Five had been a pretty spectacular year for him.

At six he saw Lydia Martin on the playground at recess and decided right then and there that she was going to be his wife one day.

At nine he started playing lacrosse. At ten he learned that life wasn't fair because his mom got sick. Too many doctor's offices and hospital rooms and nights spent at the McCalls so his dad could be with his mom.

At eleven he learned that life was cruel because his mother didn't get better. So much grief, crying, panic attack after panic attack because he was twelve and had just lost his mother and no-one, not even Scott, understood.

Stiles also referred to eleven as hell.

At twelve he discovered what hormones were and rediscovered the crush he'd had on Lydia Martin for the better part of six years, the one that had taken a backseat in favor of grief and panic and not being ready to deal with the world. At twelve it felt like maybe, just maybe, life was starting to settle back into some semblance of normalcy after so much sadness and pain. It had been good, sure he hadn't been popular, but Stiles had had Scott, his dad, Mrs. McCall, school, lacrosse, and yeah a crush that would never go anywhere, but he was ok with that.

Then sixteen happened. At sixteen his entire world shattered and reshaped itself when his best friend got bitten by a werewolf and pulled into all of the supernatural bullshit that came along with it. Sixteen is when Stiles had made a choice to stick with Scott because a)Scott was his brother in everything but blood, b) He was the reason that Scott had even gone into the woods the night he got bitten to begin with, and c) At this point he honestly didn't think he had a choice but to be involved anymore. But by throwing his lot in with Scott he'd also cast it with Derek and that apparently made him a target as he'd found out when Gerard Argent and his men had kidnapped him in an attempt to use him as both bait and message.

According to the hunters he had chosen his side and now that Stiles has had time to think about it, he had realized that he had. He had chosen to be part of this giant chess game that is the supernatural world because how in the hell could he go back to 'normal' after all of this?

How could he even pretend that it was all ok?

He had lost any shred of innocence he had had left as he'd started to run for his life, watched people die in front of him, and tried to figure out answers to questions no sixteen year-old should ever have to.

He'd tried to stay out of it tonight. He had tried to let Scott and Derek deal with it because they had the actual ability to do so. He had tried to stay away because Gerard had reminded him that he was human, so human and weak in a world where it could cost him so much more than his life. He had tried to stay away.

In the end he'd failed miserably in his efforts because Lydia Martin had marched into his room and demanded answers before she set off to save the man she loved. She'd reminded him that he had started in on this whole crazy life because people he cared about kept getting involved. His father had reinforced what she had said and helped to show him that while he was human he was still damn useful. In the end, he felt like he was always supposed to be in the warehouse with everybody else even if that meant that he had to come to the realization that he was never going to be the man that Lydia would want.

That realization hurt. It hurt a lot because he'd been hung up on her for the better part of ten years but tonight had shown him that no-one would ever make her feel something like Jackson did and vice versa. Hell her love had helped bring him back from the dead. Even Stiles knew better than to try and get in the way of a connection like that.

He wouldn't try to and he doesn't want to.

But it was going to take time to get over her and the torch he'd carried for all of those years. He hoped that his new role in this life would help him accept it. He's started to realize that the supernatural side might just need a human voice of reason to calm it the fuck down. He knows that he might not be the best candidate but no-one else has volunteered for it.

He's decided that he'll take up that job tomorrow. Tomorrow he'll start planning out how he's going to corner Derek one day and make him answer any and all questions he has about the supernatural. He'll start thinking of how he can do the same thing with Dr. Deaton. He'll worry about coming up with some fantastic cover story for Jackson's non-death with Lydia tomorrow. He'll ignore the fact that Lydia and Jackson, who is mercifully clothed in a pair of his sweats, are currently curled up on an air mattress on his floor because Jackson hadn't had anywhere else to go and Lydia obviously wasn't going to leave him.

But he's decided to ignore that for the time being in favor of being off duty tonight unless the apocalypse is definitely coming. Tonight he's going to breathe in and out and not think.

Tonight he's just going to look up at his ceiling and stare at Orion as he glows in the dark and remember the day his mother had brought him the stars and told him he had a warrior's heart.

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Thank you for reading, as always feedback is most appreciated.