When Jackson Whittemore's body goes missing, John stops sidestepping and goes after the source.

He finds Derek Hale in bad shape, leaning against a metal support beam of some empty warehouse, half-empty bottle of whiskey propped between his legs like it's all he's got left and he's guarding it with his life. He stinks of drink and yet strikes John somehow as the soberest drunk he's ever seen. He does seem beaten down, though; John chooses to take that as a good sign, an easy win. Hell, maybe this is a white flag. Maybe Hale wants out as bad as Stiles does, only he's in so deep the only roads left are jail or deeper to hell. For a moment, John almost feels a brief flash of sympathy for him. He can't have been older than Stiles is now when he got caught up in this. Entire family burned away except for a comatose uncle and a sister who was barely coping herself, nowhere to go, the whole world on its head and not even a body to bury. Hell, a life like that, who wouldn't turn to drugs and crime?

John knows the slippery slope as well as anyone. He's straight-laced and dependable now, he has to be for his kid, but he was a teenager once too, as much as Stiles may never believe it. He'd had his own rough patch, his own fallout with his well-meaning but confused parents, before straightening out and becoming a husband, father, deputy, sheriff.

Maybe John's been looking at this all wrong. Derek's not some sophisticated crime boss. He's a kid in over his head, with no one who gives enough of a shit to pull him out. Threats might work, sure, a gamble that ends, best case scenario, with a confession or a long, drawn out court case, but now John's thinking that if he works this right, he can play it another way.

Compassion.

John can bet Hale will be a hell of a lot more thrown by someone giving a damn about him than by one more hard-ass calling his bluff. Maybe even thrown enough to turn witness against his boss. John can offer him a deal. Immunity, or a lighter sentence, something. He's got no reason to protect the guy above him over saving his own skin. Derek Hale may be reckless and just plain stupid at times, but he's not suicidal.

So instead of cuffing him and shoving him into the patrol car for the second time in months, John sits down next to Derek like he's just another guy trying to get wasted against a pillar.

Derek startles at his approach, stiffens. His brow creases when John takes a seat gingerly beside him. "Sheriff?"

"Terrible, what happened to Erica Reyes," John says conversationally. Derek's face goes blank, or what John used to think was blank. Now he's got a feeling this is Hale's take on a poker face.

"I don't-" Hale says, but his whole body contradicts him, eyes large and panicked, nostrils flaring. Far from an ice-cold pro. "Have you- What do you mean?"

"We found her body, Derek," John lies. Derek inhales sharply; his fingers find the bottleneck blind. "Why would you- You're lying."

Damn. This kid may be sharper than John gives him credit for. "Seems to happen a lot these days," John says. "Awful lot of bloodshed for such a small county. You know, I never really bought that story. Your sister. See, I'm told it was an animal attack, but I've yet to meet an animal that could cut a girl clean in half. Almost surgical, really. You know any animals like that?"

Derek's blinking hard by now, sweat beading in the hollow of his throat, the bottle shaking in his fist, contents sloshing slightly.

"I think you're in over your head, Derek," John says carefully. "I think you've been struggling for a long, long time, and you're out of options, and you think there's only one way this can end."

Derek holds his gaze, eyes dark with something John identifies as silent agreement. "I-" Derek says. "Sheriff-"

"And maybe you're right," John continues. "But it's not just you anymore. You had to use kids. Damaged kids, lonely kids, needy kids, kids with asthma and epilepsy and abusive parents and a compulsive need to be the best. Why'd you go after kids, Derek?"

Derek swallows hard. "I-" he says, and then he stares at the bottle trembling in his sweaty palm like it's gonna feed him an answer. "It wasn't like that." The line rings hollow, like even Derek doesn't believe it.

"See, the way I see it, you got into this as a kid," John says. "It's all you know, really. Second nature to copy what you're taught, I get that. And I think I can make a judge get it too."

Derek's face goes blank again. "A judge." This doesn't feel like fear as much as confusion. Can he really be that deep in, that indoctrinated, that he doesn't understand how royally screwed he is? John's gonna hold out a panacea, and Derek Hale's gonna stare right back at him and refuse, because he doesn't even understand why he would want it.

"Do you understand the legal implications of what you're doing, Derek?" John watches him carefully. "The court doesn't take kindly to people taking advantage of kids. I think that's an understatement. And after what happened to Stiles-"

"What?" Derek's tone goes suddenly, incredibly sharp. He really doesn't sound like he's lying. He sounds worried. Maybe even a little panicked. His fist is tight enough around the glass bottle to shatter it. "What happened to Stiles?"

"You don't know?" John finds it hard to believe. And yet he does believe it. Derek's nostrils are flaring, he's sniffing like he's near tears for god's sakes. "Tell me what happened," he demands, and suddenly John sees the man who convinced a group of teenagers that he could make it all better. But then he's gone again, retreated behind a face so desperate it almost hurts to look at him. "Please."

"What's your connection to my son?" John asks. Derek squeezes his eyes shut, presses his lips together, opens his eyes and breathes. "I... We... He's helped me out a few times."

John's brow jumps in disbelief. "He's helped you?"

Derek winces. "I... Yes."

"And you didn't by any chance repay him by beating him black and blue after the game last night, did you?"

The bottle shatters in his fist. "No," he says, seemingly uninterested in the broken glass digging into his skin or the whiskey puddling on the ground around him. John moves slightly sideways to avoid the spatter. "Is he-" Derek starts, cuts off, restarts. "How is he?"

"Are you sure you don't want to get a little cleaned up?"

"It's fine," Derek snaps. "I'm fine. How is he?"

"You're bleeding," John points out. It's not a life-threatening wound, but it's a nasty nick, and there's bound to be more damage if Derek keeps sitting where he's sitting. John stands up. "We're getting that looked at."

"I'm fine," Derek insists, shoving his bleeding hand into the pocket of his ever-present leather jacket, reminding John, in some strange way, of his own kid protesting and pushing him away. Yeah, well, John's always had a stubborn streak. Hell, it's where Stiles gets his.

"Maybe you don't like taking care of yourself, or maybe you've got some macho reputation to uphold, I don't care," John says. "You're getting checked out by a doctor, and I'm going to be right there with you. Are we clear?"

"I don't-" Derek is clearly searching for a way out of this one. What his damage is with doctors, John doesn't know. And he doesn't care. Derek gives up, stands up, shoulders slumping. "Yes, sir," he says, which- which is unexpected, to say the least. "But I'm a quick healer, and it's just a scratch."

"Yeah, well, call me overprotective," John says without thinking. Derek goes still, face blank again, but John's getting the hang of this. This one's closest to startled skepticism and something impossibly vulnerable John can't identify. And then it clicks. "I won't force you into a hospital, alright, I get how those tests- But I've got a, a friend, Melissa, she's a doctor. She'll take a look at the hand off the record, as a favor."

"A favor," Derek repeats. John nods. "Don't ask me why I'm helpin' you, 'cause I'm not quite sure myself. Maybe I think you can fix this if someone just gave you the chance. Maybe I think you want to take Gerard Argent down as bad as I do."

Derek's eyes go almost red in the dark, John thinks, but it must be a trick of the light, a reflection or something, or a hallucination maybe, because it's gone in a moment, maybe was never there at all. "You want me to help you take down Gerard Argent?" Derek asks, close to breathless, and John thinks the stillness of his face is closer now to bloodlust.

"It's an option I'm weighing," John says carefully. "Is that something you'd consider?"

Derek nods, once, twice, three times.

"Absolutely," he says, like he doesn't even have to weigh the risks before making up his mind. He's half-smiling, too, a sharp feral grin that looks disturbingly comfortable on his lips. "What do you want me to do?"