Title: Blank Spaces

Rating: T (16+)

Summary: Derek is just… not having the greatest of days.

Warnings: Main spoilers S1E6, semi-spoilers up to S3, emotional damage of the characters is showing, Derek is a jerk, Derek and Deaton !feels, language, unBeta'd

A/N:I don't know how I feel about this... I feel like it's forced or awkward or missing something, maybe. What do you guys think?

BGE

He'd been full of barely-suppressed rage; his inner-wolf wanted so badly to get rid of the threat, the unknown Alpha. And he'd been so sure he had, if nothing else, a lead from that suspicious veterinarian, Deaton! But then Scott had to come barging in…

He had been denied a chance to maybe take out some of his rage on a responsible person, even if Deaton had no connection to the Alpha – he'd been lying about the spiral-marked deer. He knew something, and that made him responsible for something in the werewolf community.

And now Derek was standing outside of his old high school, waiting for one of Stiles' hair-brained schemes to either be brilliant (unlikely) or to flop like a salmon (it probably will).

… And – cue flopage. Scott sounded like a choking cat. And that was Derek being generous.

Or not. A moment later, a howl erupted from the school, so damned amplified by the sound system that doors rattled, windows shook, the ground filled with vibrations. Derek's ear ached with the intensity of the howl, and his wolf was desperate to respond to this fellow wolf, who was so very loud and thus must be in corresponding distress. It shook more in Derek than he'd be willing to admit aloud. So he reacted defensively.

"I'm gonna kill both of you! What the hell was that?! What were you trying to do: attract the whole state to the school?!

"Sorry, I didn't know it'd be that loud," Scott offered, at least a little bashful.

Stiles, on the other hand, smelled like exhilaration and adrenaline, and his response was breathless, eyes glittering with excitement, "Yeah. It was loud. And it was awesome!"

Derek felt he couldn't be blamed that his automatic response was a simple, irritated, "Shut up." Stiles was such a child.

"Don't be such a Sourwolf." Um. What?

If Stiles thought that was going to be a thing, he'd better be thinking again. That was a ridiculous nickname.

But before he could inform the teen of that, Scott started freaking out. Somehow the vet had gotten away. How this happened to Derek, the man was at a loss to explain. And that was how Doctor Alan Deaton was the last thing on Derek's mind before a ruthless claw emerged from his chest.

(instead of his life flashing before his eyes – because being thrown into the school's brick wall hurt like hell, but it got the claw out of his chest and allowed the healing to start, so he wasn't dying – it was what he knew, what he'd forgotten, about Alan)

It hurt.

-BS-

More was affected by the fire than just the state of his family. It was a trope in a whole lot of fiction, but until the fire, Derek hadn't realized it was a real-life thing, too – bits and pieces of his life were just blanks.

He'd forgotten.

The holes were always there, in the back of his mind, dark and intimidating. At first, he'd had Laura to remember for him. It wasn't that he missed things – all he knew were the holes, not what they contained, and he couldn't miss what he didn't know – and the young Derek pretended it didn't matter so much. Then his safety died, when Laura was murdered.

The Derek who moved back to Beacon Hills, who met Scott and Stiles, who stood fuming before the high school, listening to a dying cat – this was the Derek who went to Deaton that afternoon.

Derek moved into the clinic on silent feet, eager to catch the doctor off guard. On cue, the dark man called out, assuming his entrance to be Scott's. The look in his eyes when he saw Derek, though…

He couldn't identify it, and was too angry, to desperate to end this Alpha already, to bother with trying to read it.

(Choking on his own blood, unable to breath passed the claw in his chest, he recognized it as part pain, part hope, part shock. One small piece of darkness began to lift from Derek's fire-addled mind.)

When Derek's face didn't change in recognition of his emotion storm, he sees Deaton's face falter, and his voice is just a little flat when he asks, "Can I help you?"

(Alan had given up, Derek could see now. Alan had known Derek, had probably thought Derek was mad at him, because he hadn't come to see his old emissary after returning from New York. That look had been Alan hoping Derek had forgiven him; Alan shutting down had been him submitting to Derek's perceived anger. And Alan didn't realize that Derek had simply lost entire pieces of his childhood.)

"Hope so. Wanna know about the animal you found with the spiral in it's side?"

And Deaton's face crumpled in such confusion. "E-exuse me?"

(Alan was hurt Derek was acting so distant. Derek could almost see the realization pouring over his face, in retrospect. It hurt to see Alan crumble, realize the last of his Pack didn't even know who he was, for whatever reason.)

And then it was a dance of words. Of Derek fighting to figure out just what this elusive vet knew, and Deaton trying desperately to keep himself and his involvement in the world that had ruined him time and again from this once-Packmate who clearly didn't know him.

And it was Deaton trying to prove he knew nothing while trying to understand why Derek would reveal his world to a 'complete stranger'. And it was Derek doing the only thing he knew how to do: intimidate the information out of his opponent, using information that would have an unknowing human too terrified to think straight, and a knowing one scared nonetheless of the obvious threat he was making.

(Knowing he'd willingly harmed a member of his family, recalling the pained grunt as he threw Alan on the table, the smeared blood – tangy and sharp – across a familiar cheek… Derek hurt so bad.)

"I don't know what you're talking about, D—Ah, what are you doing to me?!"

(Alan had been about to break his own cover, brave his own pain, throw aside his own walls, to try and breach Derek's. He'd been about to call Derek by his name. The pain of being tossed against a wall head-on didn't even compare to knowing how he'd alienated his Pack's old emissary.)

And then Scott intervened.

(And there was no way to fix the pain, the mistake, the gaping hole that now would exist between them. Because Derek remembered just how bad off Alan had been when he'd arrived to the Hale Pack – even if Derek had been really little – and Derek knew that this would be Alan's last straw. No matter how Derek could try to package the event, amnesia wouldn't be a fix for Alan. When Pack was killed, Alan withdrew. This was just fate proving to Alan – as far as Alan was concerned, using Derek – that his Pack was once more out of his reach.)

-BS-

When Derek finally woke, coughing roughly, once more aware of who Alan Deaton had been to the Hale Pack, his heart sank.

For days, he would carry the hopelessness that had swamped him just as he blacked out.

But as the weeks passed, as they discovered who the Alpha was, as the mysterious kanima made it's appearance, as the Alpha Pack made tracks, Derek came to a realization.

If Stiles – who knew nothing about werewolves, whose life was turned upside down by a vicious attack on his best friend – could adapt, it was okay. If Stiles could convince Derek to take on a Pack of his own, it was okay.

Because if Derek could be convinced to let go of his hurts… Then surely, if Derek was slow and careful about it, even Derek could maybe have a chance to convince Alan not to leave them alone completely.

Not to leave the last of his Pack without a backward glance.

(It would help if he could get Scott to agree to being in his Pack, too. Stiles was Scott's best friend – and convincing Stiles didn't actually look, at this point, like it would be all that hard.)