Still don't own this, or by god Sterek would be more than our imaginations.
Branches cracked and fell limp, making way for a hulking figure pushing its way through the forest. The sound of movement rang sharp through the air of the previously undisturbed silence. Derek paused a moment to take in his surroundings to ensure that they were still on track.
"You can't smell north meanie brows, are we lost?" Stiles huffed in line behind him, Scott bringing up the rear. The group had started their hike well over an hour ago, following Derek's lead. They had kept a pretty brisk pace and, to Derek's mild surprise, Stiles only seemed a little out of breath, but he should have expected as much. Things about Stiles had been surprising him a lot lately. Scott seemed fine of course, his wolf stamina lending him an aide, but his cheeks were tinged red from exertion. He looked at Derek expectantly, waiting for an answer to Stiles question. Derek instead chose to ignore it, merely clenching his defined jaw and turning his attention back to the clearing.
" . .face-" Stiles muttered under his breath.
"I can hear that!" Derek snapped.
"Good! Maybe you can hear a compass too!" Stiles shot back. Derek rolled his eyes.
The forest was in full glory around them, the trees reached high into the air, branches creating a canopy that filtered light down to the ground below. Song birds filled in the empty noise with their harmonious backdrop. The other unseen residents of the forest stayed at a distance, wary of those who broke the usual stillness.
Derek took a step forward and scanned the ground. He wasn't lost, Derek knew this part of the forest well. It was where he came to train without hunter interference, he just had to regain his bearings. He had to find a marker. He scanned some more. There, out of the corner of his eye he spotted it, a purple wolfsbane flower posing under a jutting rock.
"This way," he motioned with his head and hiked on.
"Oh boy." Stiles' muttering reached his ears again, coated with annoyance. If Derek had it his way Stiles would walk ahead, so that he could enjoy the spectacular view. Stiles had chosen to wear a nice fitting tank, gray at the top that faded into blue at the chest, that showed off his rarely seen muscles and well toned physique. But since he was the only one who knew the way he had to settle for having his obsession at the back of him, taking in his scent that drifted forward. It filled his nose with hints of cinnamon, cedar wood, and sugar.
"Derek switch bags with me." Scotts voiced carried up from the back of the line.
The alpha spared the other wolf a glance. Scott looked almost comical carrying the large pack on his shoulder that held a majority of their camping supplies. It's big bulking mass gave him the appearance of a turtle. Derek's bag in comparison was a little over a third of its size.
"No, you need the strength training." He adjusted the smaller bag on his shoulders, flexing his back just to rub it in.
Scott fixed a look that he hoped would burn through his "mentor's" skull.
"Well how much longer until we get there? Wherever there is," he asked.
Derek smiled. "We'll be there by sundown," he lied.
Stiles and Scott looked up at the sun peering through the canopy straight above them.
"Fuck!" they exclaimed in unison.
After twenty more minutes they settled into a more amble walking pace. Stiles hummed his current favorite song to himself, eyes darting around absorbing the green world that surrounded him. He wasn't annoyed at all over the fact that they were going for a long walk. In fact he was more upset that they had left before he had time to read the newest chapters of Naruto, Bleach, and One Piece. Despite being a teleporter he simply couldn't teleport to any place he couldn't picture in his head or else he could end up anywhere. The first time he had tried it when he was thirteen he had ended up inside of a Victoria's Secret dressing room, occupied. Results aside, it was one of his proudest moments.
Derek knew the way, so they had to follow Derek. He just didn't think their little camping trip was a great idea to begin with. Things around Beacon Hills had been getting increasingly violent with Peter and the Argents. He felt it was critical that they stay in town in case anything happened. Thanks to his dad's detective work, some snooping on his part, and the trail of bodies Derek's uncle was leaving behind they had a basic idea of his next targets. Sure the three of them couldn't cover all their bases at once, but with his power he could damn sure try.
'Hell I can go to China for real dumplings and a Pikachu doll and back before Derek finishes shaving the fur off his ass. I can even visit all seven continents and come back sooner than the time it takes Scott to get a clue."
He thought back to a couple of days before when Derek had first proposed the trip to him and Scott:
The three of them were assembled in an alleyway behind a warehouse opposite the part of town Allison said the Hunters were patrolling that night. They were meeting for the first time since Scott had saved Derek from Kate, Allison's aunt a couple of nights ago. While Scott had tracked him down Stiles ran interference keeping Peter away from Scott's mother. Currently Derek was on the subject of battle strategies, realizing that all the separate dangers were beginning to drift closer together. The climactic end was soon to be upon them.
"So you can't teleport a knife into his heart, or silver bullet? Anything?!" Derek was leaning over the hood of Stiles' Jeep, intense, and searching for answers to their problems.
"No, besides being rude it just doesn't work like that ok," sighed out Stiles. He was happy to help anyway he could but his power had its limits.
"Well how come?" Scott asked, he was a bit disheartened that things couldn't be that easy, but he was glad to be learning something new and intriguing about his friend for once in a long time instead of the other way around.
Stiles stood up and stretched. "Well when I teleport," he began, "it's a two step process." He held up five fingers on his right hand. "First I reach out with my mind, I picture where I want to go and it's like when I do my mind reaches out and puts a marker there." He put his pinky down and replaced it on his left. "Then my molecules kinda just break and split apart." He flashed his fingers for effect. "Then I come all back together, sexy brains and all, over here.." Now his left hand held all five fingers. "Right now in this alley I can go almost anywhere except for where you and Derek are standing."
"Is it cause we're werewolves?" Scott questioned dumbly with a squint.
Stiles didn't even feel the need to make fun of his friend because this was pretty confusing.
"No, it's not that. Ok here, I'll show you." Stiles bent down to pick up a rock from the ground and placed it on the hood of his Jeep, then he cupped his palm to cover it.
"My powers naturally stop me from teleporting into anything solid because my molecules need room to reform and it would be really hard to explain to someone why my face is sticking out of a wall. But with people I couldn't try even if I wanted to. You see," Stiles explained, "the body has its own bio electromagnetic field that makes this kind of interference, so I can't put a marker inside you." Stiles demonstrated his point by poking a finger at his hand covering the rock, unable to get through.
"Well what about whenever you teleport me and Derek? I mean it doesn't feel comfortable at all but we totally go with you when you do it." Derek looked at Scott surprised at the well thought question. Scott did have a point.
"That's different. Anything touching my body naturally gets tuned to, well, me after awhile. When I bring someone else with it's the same process fast tracked. I push through all those little molecule bonds, pretty much rip em all apart," Stiles meshed his fingers together, "and match us up to the same frequency so you can come along for the ride. That's where the nausea comes from, cause I basically just went and turned you into cosmic mush and back in a split second. Not everyone's built like me!" The grin on Stiles' face was smug as he jutted towards himself with his thumbs. "One of a kind."
'True that,'' Derek mused. He needed to clarify one thing Stiles said to see if his plan would work at all.
"So basically if somethings with you long enough you can take it with you or send it on its own."
"Mmmhmm," Stiles nodded.
Derek continued, "But because of a person's bio electromagnetic field you couldn't send a knife into them, even if it's not you, because you can't put one of your markers there?"
Stiles smiled, "Exactly!" He was glad that Derek had come to an understanding that his perfect plan wouldn't work.
"And I doubt you could only take a part of a person instead of all of them, like say, their head," Derek reached for a perfect solution one more time.
"Nope. All or nothing," was Stiles' response.
"Well now we're back at step one," the wolf huffed.
"Oh yea," Stiles' smile fell.
The group was quiet as the three of them pondered a way to deal with the ravaging Alpha. Working together improved their odds against the Alpha, but Derek knew they couldn't just charge at him and hope for the best, they still needed a definitive solution. Scott wanted to ask the Argents for help but he knew that Derek didn't trust them an inch. Stiles didn't either, worried what would happen if they found out he was a faerie. He had forbid Scott to tell Allison about him or anything remotely fae or nemplim related. Scott felt it was important they all work together to end this, but sometimes he didn't know if Allison's family would be able to see past the fact he was a werewolf. They all stood quietly, musing over a solution, until-
"What's the 'V' stand for?"
Derek looked up at Stiles incredulously. "What?"
"The 'V', in VH1, what's it stand for?" Clear, innocent brown eyes met with confused, hardened green ones.
"Stiles we need to focus!" Scott scolded his friend has he swatted him in the back of his head.
"Alright alright!" Stiles shot Scott has dirtiest look as he soothed the stinging at the back of his head. He turned to Derek and in his most serious tone asked, "Have you ever considered sleeping with Kate again?"
"WHAT!?" Derek shouted out all the air in his lungs.
Stiles continued unphased, "Maybe she's doing all of this because she still has a thing for you. Maybe this all just stems from forlorn love not given a chance to breathe. She could just stand a woman torn between her family duty and the teenage passion she still keeps in her heart for you. A high school love tainted by the silver shadow of her family's name that reminded her of the inevitable and drove her into madness. Now she's desperate to interact with you anyway she can. Each bullet at your head a metallic cry for help." Stiles paused.
Both Derek and Scott's faces were painted with mild shock and horror.
"OR maybe she's just a crazy bitch who's jealous you're spending all your time with teenagers. C'mon Derek put those smoldering green eyes to work. Buy her some flowers, tell her her hair looks nice. Give her a Halestorm to cool her off. Smile at her, I know that chin's good for something besides - OH MY GOD if you keep doing that you're going to get lock jaw."
Derek unconsciously unhinged his jaw that was locked tight from restraint. He never wanted Kate to touch him again, still feeling degraded and ashamed from the way she had caressed his body while he was her captive. There was only one person he wanted to have that privilege but right now he kind of wanted to punch him. Stiles opened his mouth to speak again but the scorching glare from Derek made the words fall cold in his throat. Scott just shook his head in disbelief at his friend's ridiculousness and they all fell silent again.
"We're going camping," Derek announced after a long beat.
"Huh?" Scott could hardly handle this back to back confusion.
"Umm, what now?" Stiles' head snapped up from the ladybug he had been trailing on the ground. Scott and Stiles leaned back against the latter's Jeep awaiting this newest developments explanation, while Derek stood across from them, arms folded.
Derek returned their confused looks with a stern one of his own. "Like I said, Stiles, "he emphasized, "we're going camping."
Stiles' faced raised into a warm smile, "Someone's been watching the Dora the Explorer marathon haven't they?"
"Shut up Stiles!" Derek bared his teeth.
"Derek," the younger werewolf spoke, "Why would we go camping at a time like this? If you haven't noticed your uncle is out there KILLING people! He's trying to make me kill people! And he's trying to date my mom!"
"I know Scott," Derek said in a softer voice to try and ease the teens tension. "Look, I know my uncle. Even before he went mad from the fire he was always ruthless and cunning when it came to a fight. We already know why he killed the video store clerk, and those two men in the woods. He's going after anyone involved in the Hale fire." Derek stopped for a second, remembering how Scott had told him how Peter had really killed his sister for power. It made his heart freeze and his blood sear, that his own uncle had taken Laura's life, just to be Alpha. He took a deep breath to detach himself from the rage.
"We know why he wants you Scott. He wants you to join his pack so that he can be stronger. He wants you to kill your friends. He wants you to kill me. He may want to see others suffer and hurt, but he also has a flair for the dramatic. If there's no one around to watch his show then he won't even bother to go on. We need to train hard and come up with a good plan or else we're done for, and you need to learn how to control your instincts better so he can't turn you against your friends, which I can teach you. If me and you aren't here Scott he won't have anything to do."
"Are you crazy? What about my mom?" Scott's voice was thick with fear and worry.
"He's only trying to get close to your mom to torment you. If you're not here she'll be fine," Derek reassured.
Stiles spoke up, "You sure about that? Cause if I were a murdering fuzzy panda Alpha getting close to someones mom just to fuck with their head and said person left for a minute? I'd definitely sleep with their mom to rub it in their faces when they got back. Kinda like a 'While You Were Out' type of thing. You know?"
Scott's face instantly paled.
"My uncle's gay! She'll be fine. Trust me," Derek gritted out.
"Oh"
Derek shoot out a look that read 'you're not helping!'.
"What about Allison?" the nervousness from Scott's teenage heart trickled up and cracked his voice.
Derek's head hurt from trying to find a way to understand Scott's lovesick way of thinking. "I think she seemed pretty fine when she was shooting exploding arrows at us the other night with Kate."
Scott huffed his chest in indignation, ready to defend his girlfriends honor. Derek sighed, he really wanted to avoid a fight, especially with Stiles' best friend.
"Look, she's surrounded by a family full of trained and armed werewolf hunters. She will be just fine. Protected and safe, the way her parents want. Any other objections?"
The younger wolf glared him down, err, up. Derek could see him examining his plan from every angle trying to find the one point that would make it crumble. He decided that when this was all over he would work on making Scott trust him more so that things could operate much smoother.
"Fine," Scott said with an almost childlike pout and crossed his arms. Derek gave a breath of relief, then he paused, remembering someone. He turned his attention to Stiles who was looking at him with those melting chocolate brown eyes he loved. They were taking him in, Derek could tell that like Scott he was turning his plan upside down in his head. He was more afraid of Stiles' reasons than Scott's. Stiles was smart.
"You don't have any objections?" Derek asked their faerie counterpart, keeping his face stoic. He prepared himself to mount a defense.
"I don't think it's a good idea," Stiles replied flatly, still looking at him.
"That's it?" Derek asked wearily.
"Yep." Derek was surprised. Stiles' face had an expression he couldn't read. He was beginning to grow uncomfortable under the calculating gaze.
"Ok then, make up a good excuse to tell your parents. I'll come get you guys on Thursday. Come prepared."
And so that was how they had ended up in the woods following Derek to nowhere. Scott and Stiles had both told their parents it was for some kind of lacrosse bonding exercise, and being the busy career parents they were, they didn't scrutinize it too much. Stiles had even forged up fake permission forms for them to sign, leaving them free to tramp through the woods.
"We're almost there" Derek announced to the two behind him. They had come across wide stream with large rocks to step on littered across. This was one of their final markers.
Scott huffed out a groan from under the weight of his backpack. He would be relieved when they finally made it to wherever they were going. He stopped for a second noticing that Stiles was looking at him.
"You want me to teleport you across?" Stiles asked his friend, eyeing the large bag heaped on his back.
"No, I got this." Scott was determined to show Derek he wasn't weak. Stiles just shrugged his shoulders and turned around, ready to cross the stream. Scott eyed him, mulling about how much he had changed since coming out to him about his powers. It was still Stiles, but more of a new Stiles. It made him sad that they never really had a chance to talk much like they did since all this craziness had started. Now, he thought, was the perfect chance to start.
"Hey Stiles"
"Yea Scott?" Stiles was focused somewhere else.
"Tell me more about those faerie defenses." Up ahead Derek's ears perked up. He was curious if Stiles would answer his friend's question.
"What do you mean?" Stiles kept his gaze focused on the rocks in front of him, careful to make sure he landed on top of it and not in the river.
"Well when you told us about how you fought off the Alpha you said 'I had to use one of the faerie defenses.' 'One of,' I'm assuming there's more. Right?" Scott asked remembering the story Stiles told him and Derek.
"Right," Stiles answered as he hopped from a rock and landed perfectly on another. "Well," he said as he prepared to jump onto the next, "I guess I can tell you about the rest. Might as well know anyway, since I might have to use em one day, and it won't help if you're freaking out cause you don't know what's going on."
Scott was pretty sure it was the anticipation that lifted him as he jumped across the rocks ahead of him. He was really curious about what else a faerie could do. Derek didn't give any indication he was listening but in truth he was all ears.
"Ok, so the first thing you must know before learning about the faerie defenses is that they were -" the teen turned teacher turned around to see his friend gasping in air, in the starting grasp of a sneeze. "PINEAPPLE!" he shouted.
"Whaa?" Scott stopped mid gasp and stared at his friend.
Stiles explained his outburst,"I read somewhere that if you say the word pineapple while someone is about to sneeze it'll stop it in its tracks. It's supposed to be such a confusing word it short circuits the brain and makes it forget about sneezing. Did it work?"
Scott noticed the tingling in his nose was completely forgotten, "Umm, yea," he smiled at his best friend.
"Good," Stiles smiled back, turning around to keep moving forward.
Derek rolled his eyes, mentally willing the boy behind him to get on with his explanation.
"As I was saying," Stiles continued, "the faerie defenses were mainly invented as a way for faerie's to protect themselves and the nymph's around them in situations their powers normally wouldn't help them in. Nephilim's, being beings of pretty much pure energy didn't have this problem cause they could adapt to almost anything. That was their power, adaptability. They could've just went around the world as a bunch of dancing suns but instead they took physical forms to react with humanity better. The defenses are based off the belief that, as beings of part energy ourselves, we faes could still adapt to a situation past our physical limits. There's seven of them. The first is Defense Number One, the Golden Array. That one's pretty simple, you just make the symbol with your hands, kind of like this triangle thing, and it lets you sense any other faerie within a five mile radius, kind of like Google Maps. It's so that if anyone's in trouble they can find the help that they need. It was made by the 'god', known then, as Athena. Athena was way different from the other Nephilim around her in that she was always observing, and striving to understand the human world around her. She wanted others to be able to share this information freely on their own and so she developed the array. This way faerie colonies could stay connected and pass along information. When you've got a ton of people doing it together it operates on a whole different scale, but when it's just one it can pretty much only be used for what I said before. I've never used it or experienced it but according to my mom the side effects leave you with bad migraines and nausea." Some robins flitting through the tree branches overhead caught Stiles' attention as he talked.
Up ahead Derek listened intently, filing all of this information away for later mental examination. He remembered back to when he first confronted Stiles about his nephilim powers and how the other boy had told him there wasn't much else besides teleport he could do. He had even bribed him with his favorite Cold Stone that he had to stake out for three days to find out. It was becoming apparent that wasn't really the case. There was far more his brunette obsession was capable of.
"Faerie Defense Two is Enthralling. This ones pretty simple and the least harm-" Stiles paused. He noticed Derek had slowed his pace ahead of him, too focused on his words. If Stiles kept walking at the speed he was he would bump right into the man in front of him. Stiles chuckled in his head. He couldn't pass up any opportunity to catch Derek off guard, it would be rude.
"You know what? I don't wanna talk about this anymore. Scott ask me something else."
A loud frustrated grunt sounded from up ahead.
"What was that Derek?" Stiles' innocent voice asked.
"Nothing, keep moving!" was his rough reply.
Stiles grinned evilly, proud in his moment of tripping up Derek Hale.
Scott was oblivious to the whole exchange, more focused on finding out more information about his friend than Derek and Stiles' constant bickering acrobatics.
"Well what else are you willing to tell me?" he prodded.
The lacrosse team benchwarmer studied the eager look on his friend's face.
"Umm, I know! I'll just tell you some basic faerie facts. I don't think we ever went over those. Did we? No? You don't know? Whatever." Stiles pivoted to keep hiking forward. "So basically faerie's are good at three things: fighting, dancing, and fucking. The Three F's."
Eavesdropping again Derek's breath hitched on the last one.
"But Stiles' that's only two-"
"SOMETIMES I change the dancing to 'frolicking', so it works! Gosh Scott for someone who can't find Lana Del Rey on a map you sure are a grammar nazi."
"I told you I didn't know she was a singer at first!" Scott defended himself.
His best friend rolled his eyes, "Anyway, as I was saying, those are the three F's. All fae are pretty badass fighters, we're pretty much born with natural fighting instincts and reflexes. We love to fight. "
"Well arent' faeries supposed to be all about peace? That doesn't sound very peaceful." Scott questioned.
"Don't believe everything you read Scott buddy. Fae way of life is all for keeping the peace, but when it comes to our own affairs we do what we have to. During election time despite what each candidate has to say and what their stance is on certain issues we tend to lean towards the better looking one, right? I mean look all our presidents. Sure a couple of them look like the bottom of my big toe but the rest are pretty decent looking, and their opponents were butt ugly. Well what do you do when your whole race is just really good looking? Who's going to stand out above the rest? Both sides have valid arguments but there's no clear decision? Easy, you beat the crap out of the other person until they give. That's faerie politics. So after centuries of fighting each other for dominance, and fighting off armies trying to capture us, it kind of just became genetic. I've been fighting at like a black belt level since I was around 8."
'Woah," thought Scott, "That explains all those crazy moves!'"
"And did you guys have dance battles too?"Derek's sarcastic tone just brushed off Stiles, who knew he was still upset about earlier.
"Nope. That also just comes natural. Being part energy and having all that magic inside you has its perks and its downfalls. I don't really wanna explain that one much, it's complicated and starts to sound a lil hippie-ish. Maybe over s'mores!" Stiles clapped his hands together, lips getting wet thinking about the sugary goodness of graham crackers combined with marshmallows and chocolate.
"But I'll skip straight to the last one, even thought it's kind of connected to the dancing thing. Faeries-," Stiles paused for effect, "are sluts! We don't really care who we get it from. Girl, guy-" up front Derek let out a loud groan-"as long as we get it. And we take and give it good. Or so I've been told."
Scott's eyes were wide and his ears were burning, red from his friends lack of shame. "Umm, well that's good to know man."
"Yeaaa," Stiles drawled out.
"We're here!"
Scott and Stiles both stopped and looked past Derek. Ahead of him was a wide open clearing completely void of trees, making an almost perfect circle. The trees on the side stretched up high overhead as if trying to poke the sun. Large rocks littered the ground here and there. The whole area was pretty expansive they both noted as they walked around.
"Hey," Stiles crouched down to examine a large carving he had come across in the center of the space. Three spirals connected to each other at the center. He ran his fingers over the smooth stone, recognizing the image from somewhere.
"This is the same thing you have tattooed on your back," he said looking to Derek.
Derek nodded in affirmation, "These," he gestured around him, "are the Hale campgrounds. We use to come here to train, get away, and get back to nature." He grew sad for a moment remembering his little brother and sister and their younger cousins running around the place.
He shrugged the bag off his shoulders. "You two start setting up camp. I'm going to get some firewood, and when I come back we're going to start training."
Scott more expelled his bag from his person rather than took it off. Finally relieved of his burden he slumped to the ground. His friend walked up to him and patted him on the shoulder to signal that he could rest.
"Oh goodie, more opportunities to punch you in the face!" Stiles smiled at Derek.
"We'll see about that," Derek gave a small grin back before turning to leave the other two to do what he asked.
Walking through the forest Derek's mind drifted to a lot of things. His family, the Argents, Scott, Laura, but mostly on everything Stiles had said. Specifically the part about fairies not caring "who they got it from". With one sentence his whole body had been filled with hope and his heart was on edge from anticipation. This meant that his Stiles was bi by nature, and that he had more of a chance then he previously thought. He grabbed his head in frustration, and ripped the chunk out of the closest tree when his skull couldn't take the pressure anymore. It was bad enough that he had accepted that he was twenty four and in love with sixteen year old, but now he had been given legitimate hope that it wouldn't go unrequited.
"Fuck it. Three days alone in the woods. I'm either going to kiss the shit out of him before this over or kill Scott trying. "
Hey guys! Did you see that season finale the other night? Awesome! I can't wait to see Deaton get all badass next season. I know it's been awhile but I'm glad some of you still like my crazy fanfic. Love it? Hate it? Let me know by leaving a review!