Author's notes: Sorry ahead of time I rushed this one. LONG Day at work and won't have much time off for a while so I wanted to get this part out while I could. I promise after this chapter stuff will be semi/explained. Sorry I'm one for buildup and angst. Please excuse the grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. I was a english major and this annoys me to no end but I have to get some sleep so "the best laid plans of mice and men...yada yada yada." Enjoy peoples.

I don't own any of the characters nor the show...blah blah blah

Ch.2 Propagation of exponential growth

"So what I can tell is far is that it's Celtic but as for what it says...that's gonna take some time." Lydia says as she closes the giant leather-bound book in front of her. Lydia, Isaac and Derek are all sitting at a table in Derek's house, books sprawled out in front of them. Isaac found the table one day on the side of the road and instead of calling someone to help him bring it home in a truck, he carried it all the way back to Derek's. Surprisingly no one saw him. Well thankfully actually, Stiles had no idea how he would have explained that to his dad. Isaac carrying a giant dinning table that would have taken 5 copies of stiles to pick up let alone carry any measure of distance.
"Ugh...it itchessssssss..." Stiles groans and curls his hands into fists trying his best to not scratch as his new...body modification. He doesn't like the word tattoo. Don't get him wrong, He likes tattoos just on other people.
Scott puts his hand on stiles shoulder. "It'll be ok, we'll figure this out." He says. "Yah that's what you think, at least when you go home you can turn back into human. There's nothing I can do other than wear a turtle neck till i move out that will keep my dad from seeing this." Stiles says glaringly pointing at his neck for emphasis.
Allison Comes through the front door. She tosses a bag in stiles direction. "Here ya go, thought these might help." She laughs. Stiles catches the bag and raises his eyebrow at her. He opens the bag and peers down inside. "Really?!" he blurts out.
"You said you don't want your dad to see it, that's as close as you're gonna get without him noticing as long as you do it correctly." She smirks. Stiles takes the bag and dumps it upside down. Compacts, and different containers and tubes all fall out and clatter onto the floor. "Makeup?" Scott asks. "Don't worry stiles, Myself and Allison will show you how to do it properly." Lydia says with a funny voice smiling the entire time. "Oh she's evil..." Stiles thinks to himself.
"Can we get back to the problem at hand?" Derek says or well technically half growls. Everyone there that wasn't at the table makes their way over and joins in. "So celtic you said?" Stiles asks Lydia. "Well you said he mentioned a druid, so i went off that and the symbols on your neck look like what I've found but they still have slight differences and in the world of runes that means everything. So from what I can tell it's probably a very old, rarely used dialect." She says calmly. Stiles groans and puts his head on the book in front of him. "I'm so screwed." He moans. Derek stands up abruptly and walks around the table to stiles. "No you're not." He says and slightly grips stile's shoulder then heads out the door.
Stiles heart skips a beat then speeds up for a second. He's not sure whether to feel relieved to know Derek does care about him in his own sick, twisted, selfish way or just said to say it.
"It'll take some time to find anything further. These books are limited so I'm gonna go home and do some research online. I'll forward you any leads." Lydia says. She grabs her stuff and shoves what she came with into a bag. Stiles stares at her for a second. Lydia, my high school goddess, blessed be thy fiery hair. He smiles at her, waiting to see her walk away so he can watch his second favorite part of her aside from her face. Then it hits him. "Wait! what about the...you know...plan Don't-let-stiles-get-killed-by-his-dad?" He says as he stands up in swift motion, knocking the chair he was sitting in over. She turns to him, smirks and tilts her head sideways. "Don't worry, Allison would you mind? I'll help next time. I just gotta go meet up with get started on his neck research." She says. Allison turns her eyes away from Scott, "What? YAH sure I can do that." She turns to stiles, a evil grin spreads across her face. "Why do i think I'll regret this?" He whispers.

"Dad?" Stiles whispers as he slowly opens the front door letting himself in. He makes his way through the kitchen. Walking slowly hoping to avoid seeing his father."Dad?" he whispers again. Stile's knows he is here because the cruiser was parked out front. The fear of being caught and having to explain the tattoo is forcing stiles to move slowly through the house. Up the stairs he's goes, tip toing down the hall. He stops at his dads door, listening for snoring. Nothing. "Dad?" he whispers again. Then realizes if his dad is asleep and he's trying to avoid him, that probably wasn't the smartest idea. Stiles takes his hand off the door to his dad's room and steps back. The door slowly opens. Creaking as the hinges move. It's been since before stiles can remember that his dads door didn't make noise. "Huh?"
His dad's bed is empty. "Dad?" Stiles says one more time. This time forgetting the tattoo and uses actual concern in his voice. Stiles walks into the room and sees no one. His dads uniform is gone, so is his gun. Stiles takes off downstairs. No papa stilinski in the kitchen, or the living room. He must be at the station still or went out with some work buddies.
Stiles opens the fridge. Front row, health foods. His dad hates them but if it means that he has to lose flavor in his meals to stay alive to see his grandchildren then so be it. Stiles scoots the turkey bacon over and lifts the ham. "AH-HAH" he says pulling out a king size candy bar. He opens it and sticks it in his mouth while he shuts the fridge door. Stiles bites a piece off and sees a note on the fridge.

"Stiles,
I've been calling you all after noon but you wouldn't answer. I have to go to a mandatory state training seminar 2 hours away. DO NOT HAVE A PARTY WHILE I'M GONE. DO NOT GET INTO TROUBLE. DO NOT GET DRUNK. I will be back in 2 weeks. I left my debit card on your night stand. Only use it for food and gas. ONLY! Plug your phone in and call me when you get a chance son. I'd prefer if you stayed at Scott's while I'm gone. But its up to you.

-your dad."

For a second, to Stiles it felt like a hundred weights were lifted off his shoulder. His dad was gone for two weeks. He started thanking all the deities he made up earlier for helping him. His phone? He pulled it out of his pocket and sure enough it was dead. "Grr..." He mumbles to himself. He finsishes his candy bar and runs up the stairs and slides into his room on his socks. He dashes over to his night stand and plugs his phone in and sets it down next to his dads debit card. "Hello my precious...my...precious." Stiles says mocking Golem.
Stiles takes a deep breath and WHEWWWW he stinks. "Shower time!" stiles yells and starts running towards the bathroom. He strips and throws his clothes while hes running on the hallway floor. He jumps to get out of his jeans and finally ends up sitting on the toilet and yanking with both arms to get the one foot that decided halfway through the pant leg that it wasn't going to cooperate. With the clothes thrown astray, he starts the water. The stilinski household plumbing takes finesse to operate. A quarter inch to far one direction and its an icey death in the shower, two inches to far the other direction you get boiled to death. 18 years of practice and stiles still can't get it right where its comfortable for about 4 minutes of twisting and sticking his hand in the water and crying in pain cuz its too hot or cold.
FInally he gets the water where he wants it. Standing infront of the mirror, he gazes onto all that is stilinksi. He's not skinny but not enough weight to be called pudgey either. Somewhere in between and he's ok with that. He knows he won't be near the level of brick shithouse that Derek is without becoming a werewolf and having enough stamina to break a whore in half. His dick twitches. "Huh?" stiles looks down at his best friend. He's standing at full attention. "Hmm...where'd you come from?"
Stiles stares back into the mirror and looks at his neck. When allison said she would help him hide the tattoo, even after seeing all the make up,he didn't think it would look like this. Stile's neck was about 3 shades darker then the rest of him. Like he went outside in the middle of summer with long sleeves and pants on. He turns the sink faucet on the grabs a washcloth out of a drawer. Gets it wet then starts scrubbing at his neck. Yap the tattoo is still there. He sighs and drops the rag in the sink. Never can catch a break.
He hops into the shower. He washes his hair, using enough soap to cause a mass bubblebath/shower thing to happen. Stiles starts singing everysong he can think of. Picking lines from one and then switching to another. All the while using the bubbles to create a massive bubble mowhawk. He tries to jam to the air guitaer but the head banging causes his "Bubblehawk" to slide forward onto his face. "Darn you dastardly bubbles..." He shakes a fist towards the ceiling. "Derek." The names just pops into his head. Stiles ignores it and looks down. His best friend is awake...again. He wentaway halfway through his soap balled of "Call me maybe." So in the name of all that is Holy, Stiles does what every man does. Grabs hold and lets it rip. No real fantasy going on in his head. Just the feeling of his soapy hand doing what he's trained it to do best. Please Stiles. His brain throws image after image at him. Every female celebrity he can think of. One after another. Then as usual for stiles it all goes south.
He closes his eyes and in the darkness in his mind he see's two red glowing eyes. At this point he's just going with it. Then his brain supplies a loud mental growl and of all the people he could have thought about at that point in time, he sees derek's face. That was all it took. Stile's hand can't slide any faster and he can't hold out any longer. Long ropes shoot out of his penis and coat the wall. "Damn..." Stiles says. Breathing heavily.

Stiles stares into the bathroom mirror. Fogged up so he takes his hand and wipes the moisture away. "Hey handsome." he says to himself and winks at his reflection. His reflection follows suit and shares the same grin. Stiles takes his toothbrush and begins to wage war against gingivitus. He finishes that up then looks down for his clothes. "Crap..." He curses realizing that he forgot to bring some with him because he ran like a mad man and left his dirty ones in the hall. Or atleast thats where he hopes they landed.
He makes his way downstairs. He could get use to this walking naked in his own house if it wasn't for the fact its only temporary and his dad is coming back in 2 weeks. He opens the door into the laundry room. "WOOO" he yells as he opens the dryer and sees the clothes he started last night. He digs around inside the dryer till he finds a pair of underwear and slides them on. Batman underroos. Scott bought him them as a joke. Well he bought stiles the robin ones, stiles took them back and exchanged them for batman. What can he say, Stiles may be a sidekick but Bruce wayne is the man. No shorts...or atleast he doesn't see any. THey are probably in his dresser.
Stiles continue in his best fashion and makes a mad dash toward the stairs leading up to his room. Bounding up them two at a time he hops into his room and jumps face down onto his bed. He stays there for a minute then realizes his oxygen supply is dangerously low and not circulating in this position. He rolls over onto his back and pulls his knees to his chest. His head hanging off the side of the bed. There in the corner of his room, 2 red eyes glowed. "AGHHHHH" Stiles yells and stumbles and rolls over and off the side of the bed. Stiles goes to crawl under his bed to hide. (If anyone asks, he was getting the samuri sword to kill the invaders, not hide like a girl...unless its scott, scott knows the sword is above his desk.) Once again he's being dragged out by one foot. "What the hell?" He yells and rolls over onto his back, looking up he sees derek hale...with...a smile on his face? "Oh god the worlds ending!" Stiles yells and tries to scramble backwards but derek has his leg still. "Calm down STILES!" Derek growls...well he says the first two words and growls derek's name. Stiles calms down...well as calm as stiles ever is and looks up at derek. Derek's eyes go up and down stiles body and stop just sout of his waist and dammit there's that smile again. "What the hell is going on with him?" Stiles thinks. He tries to stand up and manages this time, rushing over to his window he sticks his head out.
"What are you doing?" Derek asks. Stiles pulls his head back in and shuts the window. "No flying bacon yet, they probably got lost." He says watching derek give him a curious eyebrow raise then looks away. "What do yah want derek? Yah know this whole creeper window breaking and entering, well not really breaking but still, your coming in through MY window at odd hours, whats up with that?" He says, well rambles in this case. Or all in cases when it comes to him. "Why are you always awake so late?" Derek counters. Stiles wonders what that has to do with price of beans in china when it correlates to his question but whatever. "The same thing every teenage boy does late at night...not sleep." He says. Derek inhales deeply. His face goes rigid. Stiles stares for a second then looks away.
Derek moves closer. "Did lydia ever find anything else out?" He says through clenched teeth. OK weird facial expression stiles thinks to himself. Stiles knows he doesn't stink, he just took a shower. Weird werewolf super sense of smell. "I don't know yet. I haven't checked my email. The meeting was only a few hours ago and I was attacked not long ago either. HELLO weird celtic tattoo collar thingy." He says both hands with fingers point to his neck. Derek continues staring at him and tilts his head slightly to one side.
"Why do i bother?" Stiles sighs and puts his hand on his face. He slowly counts to ten in his head with his eyes closed. He knows derek is a ass but he thought that their might be some decency in him. He knows they haven't always gotten along and that he and scott did kinda once accuse him of murder but hey thats all in the past right? Wrong, or atleast thats what Stiles thought. He knows derek has spent years beating himself up for what happened to his family. From what stiles can gather, between police reports and the whole kate/laura/peter shebackle a while back that things were bad but none of it was Derek's fault. He couldn't help falling in love with a sexy older woman. In stile's opinion, Derek is at no fault at all. He didn't choose his life, fate chose it. And stiles being the caring mother hen that he is will be damned if he was gonna let derek's past get in the way of him being a better person. Stiles always can use more friends even if they seem like they are gonna throw him up against a wall and...*twitch* There goes his penis again. "GO AWAY!" He mentally screams to his junk. Nows not the time to be showing up when their is no party to be had. Especially around a big bad werewolf with a nose that could probably smell what you ate a week ago. Stiles keeps counting in his head...10...11...12...13. He slowly opens one eye, squinting around his fingers. Dereks eyes are glowing again. He drops his hands. "WHAT? I didn't do anything, why do you have the whole big bad growly glowing eyeball thing going on?" Derek takes a step forward. Stiles tries to step back but his legs hit the side board of his bed. "Der..." He manages to get out and Derek's hand comes up slowly. Stiles eyes watch as it moves slowly towards his neck. With one claw extended he touches the symbol on the middle of stiles neck.
A bright light shines from the contact point. All of a sudden stiles sees nothing but white. He wonders if this it what heaven would look like then quickly decides that Heaven would have a mile long buffet table that constantly changed food every time his cravings changed. Then suddenly his mind is being assaulted. Not in the sense of attack but just a flood of images. He sees himself smiling, standing next to his dad. Both of them in suits. Stiles can see the tattoo on his neck in the memory? Memory? But this hasn't happened? He starts to panick. His breathing gets faster as his pulse sky rockets. More images flood his brain. Him and scott at a table knocking glasses together. Still the tattoo is there. Stiles wonders whats going on but can't seem to keep his thoughts on one tract before a new image hits him. He's finding it hard to breath. Hyperventilating is what the doctor called it. Stiles calls it "that sucky time when my lungs want to collapse." He starts seeing black spots amid all the white vast expanse before him. He knows whats coming. He's gonna pass out. He feels the beginning of something pushing its way into his mind. This time it slides in easier then the others. Like it was meant to be there all along. But how something he has no memory of could pop into his head like that well, stiles was stumped, but also trying to focus on breathing at the same time so his multi tasking abilities were at a all time low.
The picture was washed out. THe memory? Ugh it was gonna annoy stiles not being able to see whatever the hell his brain was trying to show him. Slowly it came into focus. First a tree, a willow tree, he knew that from the branches with stringy stuff on it. Him and scott played on them growing up...and occassionally still do. He could see that there were two people facing the camera. But the rest of it wouldn't clear up. He could tell one had dark hair and the other, well it looked blonde but it was short so who knows. The only outstanding features were the tree they were infront of...wait...Stiles breathing started getting worse. It's about to happen, he thought to himself. Down for the count in 1...2...3...The image in his head burned at the edges, till it surrounded just the faces. One set of eyes burned red, the others burned a blue swirled in along side yellow. Down stiles went...blackness...

"STILES! WAKE UP!" He could hear it, his name. Someone frantically calling for him. At this moment in time Stiles was content. Floating somewhere dark and cool. BAM! something hit his chest. BAM! again. He started to worry, someone or something was trying to draw him out of this paradise? Dark, cool paradise. He felt his breath run cold and watched white smoke leave his mouth as he exhaled. He didn't want to go, couldn't go. He was happy here. Going away from all this was sad. He was at peace here. No constant danger, no worrying over school work. No lacrosse practice, no wondering if scott was gonna finally take a minute away from Allison to acknowledge the one friend he ever had that he's still alive. No swooning over lydia when he's here. He wouldn't even share this place with her, this is all his. No one elses. BAM! That time he felt it. Truely felt it. Something in his chest caught a spark. A small ember so little that it barely even registered in his brain. But it was a start. SLowly it warmed, the caught fire till it blazed through him. He tried to yell, scream but couldn't. He'd open his mouth and white smoke would bellow out. Rolling like a fog along the darkness, casting a eery look against its backdrop. Every molecule seemed to be splitting, rejoining, seperating, redesigning itself over and over.

"STILES WAKE YOUR SHORT LITTLE ASS UP! DO YOU HEAR ME? COME ON STILES! I'VE LOST ENOUGH ALREADY!" Stiles knew that voice. He'd heard it before. Derek? No Derek wouldn't care enough to say stuff like that to him. But stiles couldn't concentrate on that long. A light in the distance appeared. A red glow. It ate at the edges of the darkness, forcing it down, devouring it till all that was left was a circle of white smoke around stiles. The flames in his body seemed to stop. Or he had becomed accustomed to the pain. He wasn't sure how long had passed. Time seemed to last seconds then months all at once. He looked at his arms, there was a soft yellow pulse across his skin, almost like a glimmer from sunlight. He raised his hands infront of his face. He thought he saw claws on the ends of his fingers but wasn't sure. Then as usual, the floor gave out. Well literally in this case, he was falling down. Farther into the red glow. It seemed to snake around him. Coiling but floating, dancing like fire but far too ethereal to hold a steady it was over. Stiles, had finally blacked out.