Guilt and Memories

The hallways of the school were their normal crazed bustle of students; some rushing off down the hallway while others loitered against their lockers in tight groups. To Stiles it just seemed like the tide, an ebb and flow that barely touched the shore of his conscious before slipping back out of reach. The only sound that was clear was the pounding in his ears, a steady thrum that made him feel that he had cotton stuffed in his head.

Bodies bumped him but he continued down the hallway, passing Lydia who was surrounded by gaping hanger-ons. Her mascara was artfully streaked giving her eyes a wide, innocent look. Her hand fluttered to her chest, touching the diamond pendant that Jackson had given her just the other day, letting her nails slide under it and sending shimmers of light dancing across the walls.

"She was just lying there. At first I thought she was drunk or something so I was going to wake her up and tell her to go home and sleep it off. But when I got closer I could see the blood." Lydia stuttered to a stop and pressed herself closer to Jackson.

Stiles' heart stuttered in his chest, squeezing like a fist until dark splotches appeared in his vision. Lydia continued her story with a flick of her perfectly curled hair and a quick dab at her eyeliner. "I don't even know why she was at the party. I feel bad because if she had just stayed home where she belonged she would still be alive and I wouldn't be needing therapy."

He couldn't stand to hear anymore. Turning Stiles pushed his way through the masses of students heading down the hallway toward their morning classes and out the door. The memory of Erica … Stiles cut that image off, tried desperately not to see it again in his mind's eye as he slammed out the front doors and down the short flight of stairs.

He could hear Scott's voice calling out to him in confusion and surprise as he hurried by but left his best friend, the shadow of his best friend, on the front lawn of the school as he took off running down the street and back to the pack house.

Tears burned his eyes and his lungs ached for breath as Stiles poured all his energy into running. It had been a mistake to come back to school. The two days of the weekend were not enough time to allow him to overcome the loss, the guilt, the image of Erica and Cora and how he had failed them in this reality as well as his own.

Peter had him before he made it past the front door, halfway toward the stairs. The alpha wrapped him in arms that felt unforgiving and hard before forcing his thrashing form down to the cold tile floor.

"Enough Stiles! I need you to breathe for me. Stop fighting me, damn it. I'm not going to hurt you." But Stiles couldn't stop. His shoes squeaked against the floor as his legs kicked out trying to find purchase. He snapped his head back hoping to take Peter unaware but met only air and the edge of the alpha's shoulder for all his efforts.

Peter tightened his hold, curling around Stiles until the teen's chest was pressed to his knees and his arms were secured, crossed along his chest with his wrists held firmly in Peter's powerful grip. Still he struggled until the last of his energy gave out and his chest shuttered with the need to let the sobs escape.

As soon as his struggles ceased, Peter scooped him up and carried him to the large couch dropping his gently into the center and sitting down on the coffee table across from him, pinning him in place with a stare.

"Why are you home? I thought we agreed that you would return to school and continue your search for the Durach."

"Lydia found her. She found Erica. Jennifer is almost done with her first knot. Even with everything I know from my own reality, I can't stop her here. People keep dying and it's all my fault."

"How is it your fault that a crazy, revenge driven ex-Emissary is killing people in Beacon Hills?" Peter curled his hand around the back of Stiles' neck and pulled him forward until he was resting against his chest.

Stiles forced the urge to struggle down deep and let himself be moved passively by the alpha. Peter huffed gently under his breath. "What was I like in your reality that you are so very afraid of me here?"

"Creepy," Stiles' mouth said before checking with his brain. Peter stiffened and pulled away. Stiles had a moment to wonder if he was going to die quickly or slowly before Peter let his head rock back and laughter filled the room.

"I probably was. I wasn't much better at the beginning here. It was months before my brain healed itself enough for me to realize what I was doing, the blood bath I was leaving in my wake. I was living in a nightmare, the screams of my loved ones still echoing in my mind. I only wanted the pain to stop, the voices to quiet."

Peter leaned closer forcing Stiles to look him in the eye. "I was nothing but instinct and rage but since coming out of my darkness I've only regretted one death, Laura's, and I've tried every day to make it up to Derek."

Standing, Peter let his hand trail over the fine hairs on the back of Stiles' neck. "But how can you ever apologize enough for killing your own family?" With a sad smile Peter left the room, heading into his study and firmly shutting the door.

Stiles was still sitting on the couch an hour later when Derek came home, a bouquet of purple flowers in his hand. "What happened?" he asked dropping down next to him on the couch. Looking a little more closely at the teen Derek let out a small whine and pulled him into a half hug against his side. "They found your friend?"

He tried to hold back the tears as he leaned into Derek's warmth. Derek had just lost a sister for the second time, he didn't need to added strain of comforting Stiles while he cried over a girl he really never knew.

"We buried Cora on Hale property. Peter couldn't see a way of explaining her death to the police and as far as the authorities are concerned she was already dead." Derek's voice took on the strident note Stiles was used to hearing and he realized suddenly how much his Derek was hiding his pain. "I was going to put these on her grave. She always loved purple." Derek let his thumb brush softly across the top on Stiles' hand. "Maybe you could come with me? I'd rather not be alone."

With a nod, Stiles followed Derek out to his car. The drive out to the Hale property was quiet but not uncomfortably so. The smell of the flowers filled the small cab of the car with their calming fragrance and every so often Derek would let his hand brush up against Stiles.

The crunch of gravel alerted Stiles to their arrival at the Hale house. It looked the same as it did in his reality, darkened and burned. Derek quietly led Stiles deeper into the woods until they reached an old oak tree. Freshly turned soil marked to area where Cora was buried but next to it was an older stone marker with LH etched on its smooth surface.

Knowing what to look for, Stiles could see the outline of the wolf's bane laced spiral around the perimeter of the tree. Kneeling he touched the faint marking beneath his feet. "You did this for the other Laura too. I never understood what it meant."

Placing the flowers on the dark earth Derek slid down the trunk of the tree so that he was sitting between his two sisters. "It's a family symbol, a way to honor and remember those lost to us."

Stiles nodded. "I used to leave my mother letters under a rock on her tombstone. I'd write to her like she was just away on a trip or something and not gone forever."

"I was so full of guilt and pain that I could barely function at my family's funeral. I remember that Laura had to hold me as they lowered the coffins into the ground and Deputy Stilinski never left my side. He's a good man, Stiles. Both here and in you reality."

Stiles watched in silence as Derek rested a hand on Laura's marker and tucked the flowers deeper into the soil over Cora's so that the wind wouldn't blow them away.

"It's weird losing her twice. I thought she was dead for so long, I didn't even have time to process that she was alive and now I'm burying her for a second time. I'm not sad, just angry. Angry that I never got the chance to see her again, that the Alpha pack took that away from me, that precious second chance at having part of my family back. It would have been nice for it to be just more than me and Peter."

"I don't understand how you could just forgive him. He killed Laura, took your only sister away from you for power and revenge." Stiles almost bit his tongue as the words spilled out his mouth. One day he was going to learn to think before he spoke.

"It was hard for a while but Peter forgave me. It was because of me that my whole family is dead. Peter lost everything that day, even his sanity."

Stiles' breath hissed through his teeth. "It's not your fault that Kate was a crazy bitch that was raised to hate werewolves by her crazy ass father. She lied to you; let you believe that she loved you. What she did was not your fault."

Derek's fingers carded through the loose soil. "I might not have lit the match but I gave her a way to set the timber aflame."

"Derek," Stiles said reaching across to the older male but Derek stood up in one graceful motion, catching Stiles' outstretched hand and pulling him up as well. "You can't still believe that."

"Logically I know it was not my fault, that she was an evil person and no matter what would have found a way to harm my family. But knowing that here," he tapped the side of his head, "and believing it here," Derek tapped his heart. "It's two separate things."

Stiles understood unfounded guilt, had felt that it was somehow his fault his mother died for years and followed Derek quietly out of the woods and back to the car.

"The idea of me being an alpha is a little terrifying. I've never seen myself in a leadership position. I always knew that Laura would take my mother's place when the time came and that I would either remain as a beta in her pack or join another pack when I found a mate. I can't see myself being a good leader."

"You don't listen enough but you try. You do care about what happens to us even if you don't always show it in the best of ways."

"I least I know I did one thing right." Derek stopped and turned to Stiles. "I made you part of my pack." The kiss was brief, just a brush of his lips against Stiles' flesh but it had his heart racing. "Thank you for coming with me."

"Anytime," Stiles replied breathlessly. He slid into the car while Derek looked sadly around the remains of his childhood home before joining him.

"We'll find a way to stop this Stiles. Find a way to make it right again." Stiles nodded but wondered if anything could ever be fixed. He watched the Hale house disappear in his rear view mirror, the blackened husk getting smaller and smaller until a curve in the road blotted it from his vision.

His life felt like the Hale house. Burnt and empty except for one bright spot. Glancing over at Derek he let a small smile curl on his lips. He reached over and held on to Derek's hand, held on to the only part of this crazy world that didn't make it hard for him to breath and the only part he would miss when he found his way home.