PART IV

The flash sears through the clearing, like fireworks and a supernova rolled together. It's whiteness defined, and it's blinding. Stiles instantly regrets not bringing sunglasses. Not that they would do anything, since it would be like bringing a flyswatter to a nuclear war. But still. The light kind of makes his ears ring.

Afterwards, everything is way too quiet. Did the blast bust his eardrums, or has the whole damned world just stopped in its tracks? Stiles takes a couple of steps forward, waving his hands before him, so at least he won't walk face first into a tree. Or a troll, for that matter.

"Hey, hey! Did it work?! Guys? Did it work? Holy shit, it worked! Guys?" Stiles yells. He still can't see, but hell, if it worked, totally worth it.

Something slams into him hard, and he yelps like, no, not like a little girl, stumbles and almost falls down.

"What the fuck was that?" The something roaring into his ears with the iron grip on his shoulders is Derek. Stiles wished that meant he could chill out from the near-death experience, but apparently no. He wishes he could see Derek's face, because wow, he sounds worried, but perhaps it is for the best that he is temporarily blinded. No use popping inappropriate feelings or, for that matter, boners during near-death experiences. Self-control isn't his strong side.

"Deaton's magic. Industrial-strength artificial sunlight," he stammers. "I don't know. He said it would probably work. He didn't have all of the ingredients. Shit, it probably would have killed us if it had been at full strength. But it worked, right? It worked?"

"Fuck!" Derek is shaking him now; Stiles can feel his claws digging through his sweater. He sounds panicked. "If you do that again, I'll kill you!"

"I can't see. Are the trolls dead? I can't fucking see." There is a rising tightness in Stiles' chest. It doesn't help that he's pinned still by the huge warm hands on his shoulders. He wishes he could breathe.

"Yeah, it worked. Way to go! They're all dead, like stone-ified," Scott chips in. He's standing somewhere to the right, not that far away. "Hey dude, chill out!"

"Stiles, calm down!" Derek sounds worried. Stiles registers that he can see dark eyes and a wrinkled, werewolfy nose only inches away, but it's all too much at once. His heart feels like it's buzzing rather than beating. Something black and tarlike is squeezing it hard. The air in his mouth burns and won't go down into his lungs. He tries to swallow it, but it hurts too much.

"No! Don't touch me!" he yells. But Derek doesn't care about that. Sure, he lets go for like a second, but then he's there again, crowding him against a fucking tree with his arms and stupidly warm chest. Stiles is dying. Literally dying. There's no way he can breathe when someone is touching him. He needs to move, move, move, or run. Yes, he needs to run, and get the fuck out of there. If only he could breathe.

And then it's over.

It's like rising through a mist. Stiles becomes gradually aware of a mouth and wet breathe against his throat, stubble that isn't his, and arms wrapped tight around his waist. He releases the grip on Derek's neck and lets his free hand slide down to awkwardly pat him on the back. His heart is still beating so fast and hard he feels like throwing up, but it's okay. He's got it under control.

"Hey," he tries to say, but it comes out a hoarse whisper. "Hey, I'm okay. I'm okay now."

Derek doesn't let go of him one bit, but he kind of looks up at him a bit, so Stiles gets a glint of dewy eyes and tight-set mouth. Oh god. That mouth was on his neck just seconds ago. Stiles so doesn't need any more freak-out material right now. He swallows hard.

"Hey," he says again. His voice is a bit stronger now. "Did you just nibble on my neck?"

"Stiles. Shut up." But the arms pinning him against the tree eases up a little until they are just resting around his waist. The warmth feels reassuring now, not a shade of the sweaty panic left in it. And heck, Stiles is too worn out to even feel awkward about it. He feels like he has finished a marathon.

"I, uh, I want to go home now."

Derek releases him then, only an arm slung around his back. Stiles is pretty sure that he'd fall over if it weren't for that arm. He misses the embrace as soon as it stopped.

"I can take you…" Scott volunteers meekly, but is ignored by the older werewolf. Oh god, had Scott been watching the entire thing? Stiles isn't even sure how long he was out of it. Scott looks worried.

Stiles takes a couple of steps forward, and regrets it immediately. Walking turns out to be harder than usual. Sometime between going temporarily blind and forgetting how to breathe, his knees turned into Jell-O and stayed that way. But Derek isn't far away and grabs him by the elbow, and it gets easier from there.

The trolls look smaller when they are dead and turned to stone. They are not only less terrifying like this, you can see how incredibly ugly they are too. Those are faces that not even mothers can love. It certainly explains why they only come out at night.

It's a relief to know that the pack is all right. Ethan is helping Isaac pull feet-long wood splinters out of his neck and his back. Ethan's bruises are already fading from purple to nothing. He waves at them from across the clearing, and Isaac tries to muster a smile too.

Derek turns to Scott, who is still tagging along.

"You should stay here. Take care of the trolls. We can't leave them like this. Ethan will help you."

"Yeah, probably should. We'll knock them down, turn them to rubble," he says and shrugs. "…Or else someone's going to come along and report the huge ugly-ass statues to City Council. We can't have that."

Stiles is led back through the woods, back to the road. Derek is still at his side, supporting him. Stiles thinks he started talking at him, as soon as they were out of hearing distance from the others. But focusing is still hard, and the world is loopy at best, so he isn't exactly sure. He shouldn't risk talking back, although he'd like to. But fuck it.

"Thanks, Derek," he says. "Real nice of you to hug it out, back there. It means a lot to me, you know. I'm sorry. I just lost it for a while, okay? I know you don't like me, so. Thanks a lot."

He doesn't hear everything Derek says to that, but he stops him and digs his fingers deeper into his arm. If Stiles didn't know better, he'd say Derek looked heartbroken. What had he done wrong now?

"Don't say that. Don't fucking say that."