Chapter Four
Stiles felt like he was crawling out of his own skin. It was true that somebody had to be left at watch to make sure no one got ahold of the vehicles and that nothing terrible happened, but did it really have to be him? He wasn't useless, and he knew Scott knew that. He had his wits, he had his experience, and damn it all he had his bat. And it was the metal one too. It wouldn't even break when he took a swing at a Werewolf. He'd come prepared.
"I saw the Hale house burning." Lydia's sudden statement drew his attention back around to where she was seated on the hood of Argent's SUV. Those beautiful green eyes of hers were wide and fixed on him. "I don't know what it means. Most of the time I don't see things that have already happened, so I don't know what to make of it, but there was a little boy laughing and running through the house, and then it just burst into flames."
"When did you…?"
"Right before Braeden and I left Boston. I've been trying to figure out what it means."
Stiles loosed a long breath, hinging forward to lean heavily against his locked knees. "Okay. Okay…. Maybe it doesn't mean what you'd think it'd mean."
"And what do you think it'd mean?"
"I don't know? That they're gonna burn Derek with the rest of his family?"
"That's what you go to?" she demanded.
"Isn't death and destruction kinda what you predict?" he snapped back and he felt like every thought he had ever had, was having, or ever would have was all swirling together in that moment to push against the inside of his skull.
"It was different."
"How?"
"I told you! I don't see things that have happened. Not really. But this has. And Derek wasn't there."
"You said you saw a little boy."
"He didn't look like Derek."
"How do you know?"
She motioned. "Dark eyes, thin eyebrows."
"Yeah, dude's got… you know what, we're not here to talk about Derek's eyebrows. So what do you think it means?"
"I don't know for sure yet. That's why I haven't said anything. Just maybe… it's tied back to the fire that killed his family?"
"Yeah, it's been ten years next month. Maybe…"
They never saw it coming. The explosion drew both of their attentions instantly. The detonators had to have been set before they got there. Stiles was certain that they hadn't been distracted long enough for people to get in, set them, and get out, but the blast shattered windows and the south-east most wall on the warehouse that their friends had gone into. He watched in horror as flames started to flicker out of the windows, reaching up to the sky.
"Oh my -" Lydia gasped.
"You sure it was the Hale house and not just where Derek was being kept?"
"I'm not sure of anything," she managed. "Should we -?"
"Ah crap," Stiles grumbled, spotting the perpetrators. A pair of Werewolves spotted them too and there wasn't a lot left of them sixty seconds later.
"Your friends failed," a new voice said behind them. A man - an evil Werewolf, he was sure of it - stood at the top of the path that Scott, Argent, and Braeden had taken down to the warehouse. "There was no one of importance left in that building."
"Not even Derek Hale?" Stiles asked, tightening his grip on his bat.
The Werewolf looked confused at that, but he didn't have a chance to question. Instead Lydia drew in a deep breath and, when she exhaled, she screamed. Stiles, standing behind the projection, only had to cover his ears, but the Wolf stumbled at the sound with eyes wide. They flashed icy blue - not all together different from Derek's - and his mouth dropped silently open as Lydia's voice continued to carry. Dangerous. Precise. A weapon. Blood trickled from his ears and he tilted until he fell over and the scream ceased.
Stiles stared at her. "I love you. You know that, right?"
She turned, her expression amused. "Does that mean you'll take me to Mastro's next time I come to DC to see you?"
"I will take you anywhere you want," Stiles managed and he didn't care how goofy his grin was or how if he had to take a second loan out for the date. Done and done.
"Maybe we should make sure our friends are alive first."
Stiles blinked hard, the reminder of the explosion hitting him like a ton of bricks. "Right. Right. Don't hate me? Stay with the vehicles!" He tossed her the keys and took off running down the path towards the damaged warehouse and he could have sworn he heard her shout that he definitely owed her Mastro's Steakhouse after this.
His ears were ringing and it took a fraction of a moment longer than it should have to piece together that the ceiling had partially caved in around them after the blast. Chris shifted, taking account of the injuries the blast had caused. Unless adrenaline was covering something, a potentially compromised eardrum was the worst of his injuries. Maybe a concussion. Mild. He was going to go with mild. He grimaced as he sat up to verify the first assessment and found himself relatively intact. Now for the others.
Braeden was laid out flat on her back, the gash on her head worrisome at first, but at closer inspection less so. She wasn't where she'd been standing when the blast had gone off though, he was sure of that. He turned to look at the pile of rubble that had come crashing down. Scott was visibly trapped beneath it, his legs buried beneath the debris like he hadn't quite gotten clear when he'd shoved Braeden out of the way. The DeBois Beta must have been completely buried though.
Red eyes flashed open and Scott choked against the dust that must have been in his lungs.
"You okay?" Chris called softly, pulling the Alpha's gaze around to him.
"I will be. You?"
"Yeah." He watched Braeden stir where she was. "We need to get out of here."
Scott nodded in agreement, but as he started to scoot his way out from under the pile of rubble, a ringtone echoed out from his jeans pocket. He shot it a confused look before digging for it, pulling it out and looking at the cracked screen before answering. "Hey, Doc."
There was a pause, presumably with Deaton saying something on the other end of the line, and Chris watched every twitch of Scott's face until he felt a pat against his leg. He looked down, finding Braeden there. He offered her a wordless hand up.
"Is he okay?" Scott demanded, his expression darkening. "Okay. Okay. We'll be there as soon as we can." He ended the call and looked at them. "Derek's at the clinic."
"Is he okay?" Braeden asked the question that Chris found himself unsure if he was ready to hear the answer to or not yet.
Scott's lips twitched downward. "He's alive."
While the teen was clearly leaving something out, at least Derek hadn't been at the center of the explosion. They had to take the partial wins where they could find them.
"Everyone okay in here?"
Chris' attention jerked over to the sound of the new voice and he spotted Stiles crouched on top of the rubble half blocking the door, bat in hand.
"We're good," Scott answered as he stood, visibly favouring his right leg. Chris moved, offering him a shoulder to lean on as the four of them made their way out before the Beta decided to stir.
When he had first woken up, it had been to the sounds of his own howls of pain as Deaton had done his best to clean the several day old wounds that had yet to heal. He remembered hands on him, careful as they could be to avoid aggravating other injuries, and his mother's emissary speaking in a soothing tone, asking with all the patience of a doctor used to seeing this kind of damage to do his best to lie still.
Derek was relatively sure he'd passed out shortly after that, because the next time he'd opened his eyes he was lying on the table with a blanket covering him and Braeden sleeping in a chair she'd pulled up next to it. He had reached out, fingers clumsy as he groped for her, but she'd roused enough to press a kiss to his forehead and tell him to rest.
"Goin' soft on me," he thought he'd managed, pulling a smile from her.
"Got a lot invested in you."
If he'd woken up again in the clinic, he didn't remember it. Instead, the next time he was fully back to consciousness, he found himself in a room he didn't recognize. He moved, not daring to sit up just yet but wanting a better view, and saw a collection of boxes and storage containers pushed against the far wall. The bed seemed to be the only real furniture save a chair that he was certain they'd hauled in from Scott's room. While there was a blanket and pillow there, indicating that someone had been standing guard at some point, it sat empty now.
Voices drifted in through the open door and Derek closed his eyes, following them downstairs. They were discussing someone named Lucien who was, apparently, responsible for Hunters showing up at the warehouse where the DeBois Pack had kept him.
He eased to his side, injuries pulling as he did, and he managed to untangle himself from the sheets to find fresh dressings that covered claw and bite marks from his shoulder, down his rib cage, and to where Anton had gotten his leg between his teeth while they'd been fighting. Derek winced, careful not to pull anything open again. Healing from an Alpha always took longer, and he wondered just how close to death Anton had dragged him.
Slowly, carefully, he eased his legs over the side of the bed and let his bare feet drop to the floor. Soft pajama pants unfurled down, covering his bandaged calf, and he pulled in a steadying breath. Okay. Time for the true test.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Melissa McCall demanded from the doorway and Derek stopped halfway to standing, which was a terrible idea that sent him crumbling instantly to the floor.
"I'm okay. I'm fine," he snapped as she moved to fuss over him.
"You're not. You've had everyone in this house scared to death, so have a little respect for our tattered nerves and take it easy."
He blinked, startled by the reaction. It had been a long time since someone had tried to mother him, even Scott's mother. "Sorry."
"It's okay," she huffed. "Here. You ready? On three. One, two, three." She was surprisingly strong as she helped guide him up and back to the bed. He took a heavy seat there.
"Everybody okay?"
"A few bumps and bruises, but you took the worst of it. They had a run in with something Chris' cousin set into motion."
"Cousin?"
"Someone he was relying on for information before he reached out to you."
Derek hummed a soft reply and glanced towards the door. "They're gonna want answers."
"Do you have them?"
He frowned, considering. "Some."
She glanced back through the door, looking like she was considering her options at hand. Finally she turned back to him and gaze was intense. As if she were ready to pick up on even a hint of a lie. "Are you ready to give them?"
It was strange. People didn't usually ask that. "Maybe not, but I don't think we have the time to waste either."
"Okay." And that was that. She moved towards him and reached out, flashing a knowing smile at his confused look. "I guarantee if you try to take the stairs in your condition that you'll end up a heap at the bottom."
After a moment he took her outstretched hand and leaned just enough to keep his balance, but not so much that he'd take her down with him if he did happen to tumble. Her tried and tested nursing skills did them both good though. They were halfway down with no mishap when the conversation in the living room ceased, attention swiveling to them.
"Hey, look who finally woke up," Stiles cheered from his place sitting on the arm of the couch rather than the cushion like a sane person. "How're ya feeling?"
"Better," he managed, winded just from the stairs and he had to grab hold of the banister as they hit the bottom to keep himself stable. He felt the wound in his left shoulder pull and faltered in his next step.
Braeden moved to meet him there and Melissa passed him off. If he thought he could get away with arguing the over attention he would have, but as it stood he just needed a place to sit. "You good?" she asked softly.
"Enough."
And that's all it took. She maneuvered him to the couch where Scott gave up his seat next to Stiles and Braeden dropped Derek in the middle, putting herself between the injured Werewolf and the teen that had clearly gotten into his adderall stash. To his other side, Argent offered him a quick once over as if he were going to argue with his presence there, but thought better of it, and Derek watched Melissa move to the chair on the far side of the room next to Lydia as her son took a seat on the floor. Apparently she still thought she and Argent were keeping their whirlwind romance a secret. Someone really should tell them they weren't fooling anyone.
"Glad to see you on your feet," Scott said. "You had us worried."
"I bounce back pretty well," Derek answered flippantly. "Who do I have to thank for getting me out?"
"You don't remember?" Argent asked, that steely gaze latched onto him.
"No. I remember waking up in a storage closet and DeBois wanting to test me, but nothing concrete about the escape. I thought maybe one of you found me."
There were more guilty looks than Derek was comfortable with. Scott's gaze was fixed on his shoes from where he sat with his knees pulled nearly to his chest on the floor. "No. We found where they were keeping you too late." He looked up, and in that moment he somehow managed to look both too young and as if he'd seen far too much. "I'm sorry. They used me to get to you. If I —"
"What? Were able to predict what a sociopathic Alpha was going to do with no previous experience with him?" Derek grumbled. "This isn't on you. It's not on any of you, so stop looking at me like that."
"Did you find something we missed?" Stiles asked from his perch.
Derek slumped a little against the couch and he felt Braeden's hand touch the side of his leg discreetly. She knew. She had probably known for a while, but it hadn't been her secret to tell. He loved her for that, but it was time to put the cards out on the table, no matter how much he hated it.
"Derek?" Argent coaxed. "What'd you find?"
"I haven't been… entirely open about why I knew what I did about the DeBois Pack." All eyes were fixed on him now and he pushed back against the small twitch of irritation. "They're, uh…. My father was born into it."
Argent stiffened. Apparently he hadn't been expecting that. "Tobias Hale was human though."
Stiles floundered, half falling from his place at the news. "Your dad was Human?"
Derek directed an irritable look at him. "Human-born to a Werewolf pack, yeah."
He watched as the history lesson he'd given the teen just before they'd been attacked seemed to click into place. "They sent him away…"
"At fourteen he had a choice: accept the bite or leave. Dad always said he thought a person should be comfortable in their own skin, so they sent him to the US to live with distant relatives."
"I may be missing some big chunk of Werewolf history, but I'm pretty sure that the Hale family was established here long before your dad showed up," Lydia pointed out.
"My mom was the Hale. Dad grew up in New York, came to California for college, met Mom. Mom used to say he was more of a Hale than some members who'd been born into the pack. He took the name and he lived by it." Derek pulled in a breath and realized the unsteadiness he felt had less to do with his injuries and more to do with the subject at hand.
"I met him once. He had the triskelion tattooed on his forearm for the whole world to see," Argent murmured. "We always just assumed he was a distant member of the pack that had married Talia. No one knew… Hale and DeBois. That's a hell of a bloodline you have, Derek."
"That's why they wanted you to join their pack?" Scott murmured. "You told Stiles that they kept their line pure, and they would have gotten the best of both with you."
"I don't think they'd care if they hadn't found out that I'm Evolved. Including Anton and me, there are only five in the world right now."
"But only one that isn't also an Alpha," Argent mused.
"If you joined him, you'd add power, but if you are part of another pack then you're a threat," Braeden said softly and he gave a small nod.
"That about sums it up."
"Well, we're not solving it tonight," Melissa said from her place. "Mountain Ash is in place and I think it's time to turn in. We can tackle what to do about it in the morning."
A low rumble of consensus echoed through the group and Derek didn't know his energy could be sapped up quite that fast. He needed to get back upstairs soon or he'd make his bed on the couch for the night.
"Derek?" He turned from where he'd eased himself off the couch with Braeden's help and Argent was already standing. "Your dad did die in the fire, didn't he?"
"One of six Humans your sister burned alive, yeah."
"Do you think a sibling or a cousin or something might have been the one to let you out?"
"You asking me if I think that we might have an ally in the DeBois Pack?" He waited for the nod of confirmation. "Maybe. I hope so. We're going to need it."
He turned and started the slow journey up the stairs, Braeden's arm laced around his back for support. Maybe they did have someone on the inside. If they hadn't rescued him, someone must have, and that could be the difference between winning and losing.
TBC
Notes: Sorry for the delay! Life has been more than a little crazy lately.
Does the new piece to the puzzle adjust anyone's theories? All I can say is that there is a big twist coming next chapter ;)
Next Time: Braeden and Derek talk about Tobias Hale, Peter finally makes contact with the Pack, Argent lays down the rules with Lucien, and Derek looks for answers to Lydia's vision.