Panic pulls Derek forward so quickly he stumbles over Stiles' doorway.

Stiles, he says, but his voice isn't working; it doesn't matter. He shakes him awake, loops Stiles' arm over his shoulders, starts dragging him outside.

"Der'k, wha—" Stiles starts. His pillow's left indentations on his cheek. "Wha's goin' on?" he asks outside, voice rough with sleep, but Derek's already racing back inside for Stiles' father.

He speeds through the house till he's dizzy, till Stiles intercepts him with a hand on his arm.

"Derek—"

"I can't find your dad," Derek says. His head is spinning. He can't, he can't screw this up again, not again—

"He's at work," Stiles says, shivering slightly in boxers and a faded blue t-shirt. His hair is rumpled, sticking up on one side. "He's got a late shift, Derek. He's fine. Everything's fine."

Derek lets out a long, shaky breath. Stiles pats him on the back a few times, keeps his hand there.

"Kate was here," Derek says. Just saying it sends a new chill through him.

You lit a match.

"What?" Stiles says, brushing sleep from the corners of his eyes.

"She was here," Derek says. "I—I tracked her scent."

"Her scent?" Stiles repeats. "From where?"

"Your couch."

"My—" Stiles stops, looks at him. He's suddenly wide awake. "And you thought—God, Derek."

But his voice is muffled by Derek's shoulder, arms tight around him.

"She's gone," Stiles swears, low, by Derek's ear. "She's more than gone. Braeden blew her up. It's over."

"What if she isn't?" Derek asks. He can feel her so sharply behind him. Watching him.

Laughing and laughing and laughing.

You think I wanted to touch him?

He shudders, tries to shrug her away.

"I'm off, I'm off," Stiles says, holding his hands up.

No, not— Derek says.

But his voice isn't working again.

Stiles' dad does the full sweep when he gets home, and Derek tries not to feel like a kid making his father check the closet for monsters when the search comes up clean. Obviously she's not just hiding somewhere, but that doesn't mean she wasn't here. That doesn't mean she didn't do something, start something, leave something, something that's gonna blow up in all their faces any minute now. And Stiles' father is human. He sees differently, smells differently, what if he just doesn't notice—And Derek misses it because he's an idiot, and everything and everyone is just destroyed because he didn't, because he couldn't—

"Hey," Stiles says, and touches Derek lightly on the arm. "She's gone. I swear. Nothing's gonna happen to us, okay?"

Derek just looks at him, at his wide-open face, his eyes so soft and serious. His hair is still sticking up on one side.

He catches Derek looking, licks his lip nervously. Derek looks away.

Means to look away.

Derek isn't getting older.

He'd thought, after—if Kate's gone, shouldn't her spell be gone too? Shouldn't he be himself again, whatever that is, whoever that is? Everyone must be getting sick of this, of looking out for him like this. Derek's sick of himself, of not knowing things he should've known a long time ago, of how he's not what—Even if there is something, or was, he's not—He doesn't look right, he doesn't know what anything means. He's the wrong version of himself, and the other one—He's seen that picture, the other one's—huge, and probably—even if someone liked him, or, or could, it's not him. It's that him, that huge him that Derek can't reach, can't become, not for years and years, maybe not at all. And meanwhile there's—other people, and they're better than the him he is now, and—

It's stupid. It's stupid to even think about.

Derek can't stop thinking about it.

There's no DNA tying Mr. Tate to the bodies, there's nothing. Stiles' father can't fight his lawyer. He gets to go home like nothing ever happened.

Malia doesn't live with him anymore. Lydia's parents are divorced and her father lives with his Miss Teen Massachusetts girlfriend and her mother is never home and Malia would be doing her a favor, so Malia's doing her a favor.

Stiles tries, but Malia doesn't want to talk about it. Not to him. She talks to Lydia, to Scott, to Cora, even, but with Stiles she's—guarded, introspective. Cautious, maybe. Derek doesn't understand it, but that doesn't matter. Derek doesn't know anything about anything. Not this version of him.

Braeden's bobcat goes everywhere with her now, fading into shadow around people, growing back into itself when they're gone. It won't leave Cora's side for anything.

Neither will Braeden.

Cora wears her jacket like a medal around her neck, like she had to fight for it, like she won. If Derek was older, he'd tease her about it, but the way things are, he doesn't have a right. She's fallen into what was always going to be Laura's role, the one Cora always wanted: Her own pack, her own rules. Derek's packless, homeless, useless. There's nothing he can say to anybody.

Things settle, even though they shouldn't, even though Derek knows nothing's over. Kate's still out there, and Mr. Tate's still out there, and it's too easy. It's too easy, and it's too quiet, and Derek doesn't know what to do with himself. Where to go, what to say.

He doesn't go anywhere. He doesn't say anything.

He watches. Just making sure there isn't—Just making sure. He checks the house before Stiles goes in, stays up keeping guard, tells himself he isn't just finding some way to matter, somehow, some reason to be there.

Kate's still out there. She's not just gonna leave him alone. She's not just gonna leave his family—leave this family alone.

They're not his family. They're not his anything. Nothing is.

He has to remember that.

Things settle and stay settled. Stiles goes to school with Scott and Malia and the rest of Scott's pack, Scott goes to work at the clinic four nights a week, the pack watches movies and gets popcorn between the cushions. Derek watches, and lurks, and gets the popcorn out again, and tries to pretend there's a point to him. Stiles finds his side, drags him into the middle of things, but it's obvious, it's obvious. He's trying too hard, and Derek doesn't belong here.

Stiles still tries to hold Malia's hand, and he still sits with her at lunch, passes his chips over to her without even opening the bag. He buys her flowers, he does everything.

Sometimes she watches him when he's not looking, and sometimes he watches her, scratches at his eye and ducks his head and Derek has to go do—something.

Sometimes Stiles comes after him, tries to urge him back, but Derek's not what he wants, can't be. Not the way he is now. Maybe not at all.

Stiles is just being nice. He's just too nice, and Derek doesn't deserve it.

Cora and Braeden leave town together, Braeden's bobcat following them like a shadow. Cora gives Derek a new phone, her number and Braeden's as contacts one and two.

"Call me," Cora says, and hugs him, hard. Derek holds on, holds himself still when she goes, tries not to feel like the last part of his anything is slipping away.

His fingers find the touchpad when she's gone. He almost considers it, just calling her.

What happened?

You told me to call, idiot.

Maybe it could be easy, with her.

"Hey," Stiles says, and touches his arm.

Derek tucks the phone back in his pocket.

There's food.

There's always food, but Derek doesn't notice it much. He's never hungry, he's never—it's just there. It's just pointless.

Sometimes Stiles makes him eat something, looks at his plate and looks at him and looks—so serious, face soft and eyes—I'm sorry, I should've told you, I should've just told you, Derek, I'm so—and Derek eats something, till Stiles looks okay again. Sometimes all food, any food is sushi and matcha ice cream with Kate, with Kate all over, with him promising her anything, anything. Sometimes Derek can't breathe at all, thinks about keeping not breathing.

It doesn't matter. It shouldn't.

There's nothing for him here, he's nothing for anyone, there's nothing.

There's just—Stiles, and that look on his face.

So Derek eats, sometimes. So he breathes, and keeps breathing, and tries not to think about it.

Tries not to think about anything.

Peter comes back on a Wednesday.

Stiles is in school, and his father is at work, and Derek is just—wandering. He doesn't run, not anymore. He'd run out of road too quickly, and then what?

Start running without somewhere to go and all you're doing is running away. And once you start, you won't stop. You'll always be running.

Dad used to say that.

Malia offered Derek his jacket back, but he couldn't take it. It's January, almost February now, and the wind bites into him, but he needs that. He can't just put on Dad's jacket and pretend things can still be okay, pretend this howling emptiness in him isn't all his mistakes echoing back at him. He can't watch movies, and talk so easily, and laugh, and fall back into this shape of someone who didn't destroy his family. He can't do that.

He's not gonna do that.

Peter comes back on a Wednesday, and he smells like alpha.

Derek's an omega, now. He knows that. Knows, in some old dutiful little kid place, that omegas can sense when an alpha is looking for a pack, that their wolves encourage it. The lone wolf dies, the pack survives, Derek knows this.

Peter tells him anyway.

Alphas can sense omegas too, but not just for packs, Omegas are easy kills, picking off the weak, an easy way to show strength, gain power. Derek knows all of this, too.

"But don't worry," Peter says. "As your alpha, let me reassure—"

"You're not my alpha," Derek says. "I don't have an alpha."

"That's right," Peter says, like he can't hear a word Derek is actually saying. "You're weak. An easy target. You need a protector."

"You killed Laura," Derek says. Anger curls back in him, heats him up until he's not sure how he didn't freeze to death without it. "I don't need you for anything."

"You don't mean that," Peter says lightly. He doesn't react to Laura's name at all. "You've always been—"

Derek punches him.

Once he starts he can't stop, can't breathe or see or think. All he is is two pummeling fists, and all Peter is is a tensed wall of muscle, and he stole Laura. He killed Laura just so he could be this, and now he wants Derek to be his beta, and Derek's always hated him but he's never hated him so much he wanted to claw him open, tear him apart, but now—

His hands stay human, curled into fists, and Peter stays a steady, unflinching target.

Derek draws back, opens his hand—

Peter grabs his wrist, twists hard. There's a crack, and a pop, and pain, but that doesn't matter, Derek can still—he's one fist and he can still—

But then there's a hand around his throat, squeezing tight, and Derek can't breathe at all, and fine, fine, fine, but his body gasps, chokes, eyes filling, and then it just—stops. Stops fighting, stops trying, finally just listens to Derek and—stops.

And then Peter lets go.

Something hits Derek hard in the back of the head, and then he's sliding down it, looking up at it dizzily, and it's a wall. There are fists, and claws, and more walls, or the same one, and Derek closes his eyes, surrenders to the pain pain pain pain pain all around him, lets it lull him off to wherever it wants him.

He doesn't have anywhere else to go.

He comes back, comes back to the pain still landing sharp and heavy, throbbing and pounding and stinging and knocking the air out of him and it's fine, it's fine, it's fine. There's blood in his mouth, spilling all down his throat, his ears are wet and ringing.

He's not moving at all.

He's not moving at all, but Peter drags him up, cups his jaw tight, hand heavy on his forehead, forcing his face up, his eyes open. He's so close Derek can taste his breath, taste the hungry rage pouring off him like steam.

"See?" Peter says. "If you had an alpha, this wouldn't happen."

"Bite me," Derek spits, or means to.

He chokes instead, swallows blood. The world spins.

Peter steps back, watches Derek's legs buckle under him. The floor hits him hard, knocks him down—or up, or—Derek can't think, anymore.

Peter just stands there, over him, watching. Derek can see him, the edge of him, can't help but breathe his scent with every thick bloody gasp. He's crumpled oddly, pain-soaked, blood shocking all through him. Or is it the other way around?

Peter doesn't move at all. His heartbeat thumps a steady ache against the back of Derek's head. Derek chokes, his breath rattling in his throat, and tries to—tries to—

"The offer still stands," Peter says, and stays over him, waiting.

Blood slides all down Derek's throat, fights to come up again. His neck is maybe broken, or maybe he just doesn't have one, anymore. Breathing is impossible, and so what? So what? Peter won't leave without an answer, and Derek's never going to give him what he wants. So it's an eventuality, so let's just get it over with.

Derek's body doesn't get it. It keeps choking. Keeps trying to breathe.

Derek's stupid body never listens to him anymore. His eyes keep watering, tears tracking all down his stupid sixteen-year-old face.

He'll probably be sixteen for the rest of his life.

Sixteen and an idiot who destroys everything, who doesn't know anything until it's too late, who keeps hearing Kate Argent in his head, who can't ever stop thinking.

So what's the point? What's the fucking point?

Derek forces himself to curl sideways, where his limbs hang like dead weight on the rest of him, press down on his chest until breathing feels like being stabbed, over and over and over.

Until he doesn't feel Peter at all, because there isn't anything except a cloud of nothing, all around him.

Fucking finally.