The first thing Stiles was really aware of was the gentle moving of his pillow. It took him a few seconds to realise that pillows were not supposed to move. He snapped awake instantly, sitting bolt upright and reaching to his side for a knife or something to use as a weapon, although there was nothing there. It took him a few moments to recognize his surroundings, and for his memories from the previous night to come trickling back. Derek carrying him into the Puppy pile…laying between Scott and Derek, with Liam tucking himself beneath Stiles' legs like an honest to God puppy. Stiles remembered curling up against Derek, laying there as the former Alpha had scented his neck, inhaling his scent deeply, enjoying the sensation of being surrounded by the pack. It was the last thing he remembered, and Stiles realised that he'd fallen asleep. He looked down at where he had been laying. Derek lay there looking up at him, and Stiles felt his cheeks colour form embarrassment as he realised that his pillow of choice for the night had, apparently, been Derek.

"Um…did I…sleep on you last night?" Stiles asked in a hushed voice, aware that Scott, Kira, Jackson and Liam were all still sleeping around him and Derek. Derek nodded.

"Oh my God, I'm so sorry, Derek," Stiles whispered in mortification, moving to rise up from the mattress. Derek, however, caught Stiles' wrist in his hand.

"Stiles…it's ok, I didn't mind. Stay."

Stiles slowly lowered himself back to the mattress until he was semi reclined beside Derek.

"I heard what you said last night, to Kate and then…to the man who ordered them all to leave."

"Ra's al Ghul," Stiles supplied.

"Yeah…about…about me."

Stiles swallowed. There was a part of him that had hoped that Derek hadn't been paying attention when he'd said those things.

"Stiles…Scott and Jackson cornered me at the pack meeting before…before we were attacked. They said that I needed to be more confident, that I might miss out. I didn't really understand what they meant until last night when I saw you fighting. All I could think of that whole time was what I would do if something happened to you and you died."

"I was having the same thoughts about you too," Stiles admitted to Derek, his voice hushed. He could hear the sounds of conversation in the other room, but Stiles was pretty sure they wouldn't be overheard…and Derek wouldn't have initiated a conversation like this if he knew that they could be overheard.

"Stiles…I need to confess something…I'm in love with you…I have been for a while. At first you were too young, and I…I couldn't risk doing to you what Kate did to me, but then…you got possessed by the Nogitsune and Allison and Aidan died, and then you left and we thought you'd died, and I had to deal with the fact that you died without knowing how I felt…and now you're back, an…" Derek broke off as Stiles leaned forward and pressed his lips against Derek's.

"I love you too," Stiles replied simply, "and also, since when have you babbled? That's my thing." Derek smiled, his had reaching up and combing gently through Stiles' hair.

"Because you weren't there to break the silence."

"I'm here now…and I promise…I'm not going to go anywhere. You're stuck with me now, sour wolf."

"I definitely hadn't missed that nickname," Derek smiled as he leaned up and kissed Stiles, pulling the younger man so they could lay together on the mattress and simply enjoy being so close to one another after so many years of being forced apart and thinking that they would never have the chance to see each other again.

A/TW

Oliver and Roy walked around the perimeter of the Lacrosse Field at Beacon Hills high school, both of them wearing civilian clothing, although they both had their hoods up against the cool wind that was blowing across the grass.

"What was it you wanted to tell me about?" Roy asked, curious about what had made Oliver isolate him, although when Oliver had asked him about a place where they could go to discuss things privately, Roy had been the one to suggest the lacrosse field.

Oliver pulled out a file he'd tucked inside his jacket, and Roy stopped, taking it and opening it curiously.

"What's this about," Roy asked, confused.

"Felicity was doing checks on your blood…and comparing it to mine to see if there was anything obviously different with you being a werewolf," Oliver began gently, "Only…it turned up something that we didn't expect. Long story short…your mom and my dad had an affair while my mom was pregnant with Thea, and well, you were a result of that. You're my half-brother."

"I'm sorry…what?" Jackson choked, looking up at Oliver with wide eyes, "please tell me that you're joking…that this is some elaborate plank that Stilinski and McCall put you up to.

"I'm not joking, Roy. Your mother…your biological mother…she and her husband couldn't have children…he was infertile. My mom was pregnant with Thea and my dad and your biological mother were having an affair, and a couple of weeks before Thea was born your biological mom found out she was having you. Her husband wanted to raise you as his own, and they came back here to Beacon Hills so that you could be raised away from the press in Starling City, and from my family too probably. When they died, and you were born, my dad wanted to come and claim you, but my mother stopped him…she said that your mother wanted you brought up away from the madness that is Starling City, so you got adopted by the Whittemore's instead."

Jackson stumbled over to the bleaches and sat on the bench that Stiles had spent so much time occupying as he looked over the documents Oliver had given him. It was all there, black and white proof of his supposed father's infertility due to childhood illness, letters written by both Oliver's parents and the DNA tests Felicity had carried out. Roy looked over at Oliver.

"How long have you known?"

"Only after you left," Oliver replied, 'I wanted to tell you in person, I thought that this was too big to do over the phone, and I didn't want to intrude on you and Stiles' trip and reunion with your friends and Stiles' dad. You already seemed nervous enough coming back without me dumping all of this on you.

"Thea is still Merlyn's daughter, right?" Roy asked nervously.

Oliver chuckled and nodded, "Yeah, you and Thea are not related."

"Oh thank God, because that would make for an awkward conversation."

"She's not pregnant is she?"

"No," Roy replied emphatically, "but, well, we have dated and, had sex, so, that would make things awkward enough if we found out we were half siblings."

"You're right," Oliver relaxed. Roy and Thea had been broken up ever since Thea found out Roy lied to her about his helping Oliver be the Arrow, although Oliver wasn't sure how long the break up would last.

"Are you ok," Oliver asked Roy, who discretely wiped some tears from his eyes.

"I never knew my biological parents, I didn't even know I was adopted and that my real parents were dead until I was seven. I knew they were rich, but they didn't mean anything to me. I went to their graves for the first time when I came back after we thought Stiles died. In all of the years I spent in this town growing up I never really wanted to go. I never really knew how I felt about them. My adopted parents…I know that I didn't make life easy for them, but…but even now I don't want to reach out to them, although I know that they deserve to know that I'm alive. They…then never hurt me…not like Isaac's dad did, but I knew that for them work came first, and I was well down their list of priorities. I was so obsessed with being number one in high school…on the Lacrosse field, in the corridors, just so that they would be proud of me, so that they would spend time with me. I used to wonder if things would be different if my biological parents were still alive, if they would have treated me differently…loved me as much as Scott's mom, or Stiles' parents did. I used to treat them like dirt, even after Stiles' mom got sick and died, because I was jealous of their family, and how much they were cared about. Hell, I used to treat everyone like dirt, but those two most of all. Does that make me a shitty person?"

"No," Oliver replied, "you were a kid. Yes, you had issues, but that doesn't make you a shitty person. Look at how much you've changed since then."

Jackson huffed out a short laugh, "I was so angry when Scott all of a sudden was better at lacrosse than me, and we were made co-captains. I was convinced he was talking drugs or steroids or something. When I found out the truth…I demanded that Derek give me the bite. It…didn't work right, and I became something…wrong. A Kanima. When I was shifted I had no control over myself, I was a slave to the bidding of another. It took time, but I realised that I was putting everyone else at risk, so I pushed away those that I was closest to…Lydia and Danny…to try and protect them. In the end I almost died and things…fixed themselves. I left Beacon Hills the first time with my parents not long after that, and I only came back when everyone thought Stiles was dead, and then I left again, alone. I don't know why I thought I needed to leave Beacon Hills, maybe I just couldn't handle being back here. Derek got it, he said that maybe I would find my place if I went out on my own, like Cora did. And I did, it took longer than I thought but it happened. For years I'd been on my own, and then I…I made a new family…a new pack, and now I found out that…that you were my brother all along…everything just makes more sense know."

Oliver reached out and put his arm around Roy's shoulder, and the younger man leaned against him.

"Maybe my inner wolf could tell…maybe that's why I trusted you so much at first…more than I'd trusted anyone since Danny. My wolf could smell that we were brothers, and it latched onto you as a way of giving me pack…family…a home again."

"Well, you've got it," Oliver promised, "A home, family…pack, whatever you want, it's yours."

TW/A

Stiles felt lighter than he had felt in years, as if the weight of the world had been lifted off his shoulders. While Oliver and Jackson had slipped away to talk about…whatever it was that Oliver wanted them to talk about, Stiles had filled in his family on everything that had happened to him since he'd left Beacon Hills, with some exceptions. He said enough that the pack could read between the lines. He made it clear, without actually saying it, that the casualties from the previous night were not the first people Stiles had killed, self-defence or otherwise.

Before he'd said anything, he'd packed up all of his belongings, leaving them in a convenient place, just in case the pack turned on him for what he'd done….but he hadn't needed them. Stiles had avoided meeting the gaze of the rest of the pack most of the time he was talking, and it was only when he was finished that he looked up to meet their eyes, gauging from their expressions whether or not he needed to start running.

Scott, Melissa, Lydia, and Stiles' father were all crying, and Stiles had felt fear shoot through him, having not meant to upset them. He wondered if somehow he'd reminded them of something triggering that he hadn't known about, or maybe he'd reminded them of Allison by something he'd said.

The fear was enough to make his breathing hitch, as if he was about to have a panic attack. Stiles started silently counting his fingers, trying to calm his breathing as his heart began to race in his chest.

"I'm sorry," he choked out, beginning to repeat the apology as a mantra as he unconsciously began to rock backwards and forwards in his seat, thoughts cutting through his mind like knives…voices that sounded like his mother, Allison, Slade, Kate and others that Stiles had killed over the years.

'He's trying to hurt me. I don't care if you don't believe me, but he is. He's trying to kill me!'

'Murderer'

'Killer'

'Little psychopath'

'Scott should throw you out of the pack'

'You don't belong here with the pack'

'You're going to be responsible for the death of everyone you've ever cared about.'

'In so many ways, Stiles, you're just like me…'

"Stiles," Derek's voice interrupted Kate's taunting, and Stiles blinked, realising that Derek's hand was encircling his arm, rubbing his uninjured shoulder gently, trying to coax him back to the present. Stiles swayed and tried to inhale, his lungs refusing to co-operate, cobwebs of darkness spreading over his vision as his

"Hey…hey Stiles, stay with us," his father's voice joined Derek's. Stiles blinked, fighting off the darkness in his vision as he tried to focus on his father's voice.

"I…I can't…I'm sorry."

"Come on, Son, focus on me…focus on my breathing. Here." Stiles felt his father grab his hand, pressing it against his own chest. The familiar technique stirred something within Stiles, and he automatically began to track the rise and fall of his father's chest, focusing on replicating the movement with his own breathing. He felt his panic attack sliding away, and he slumped a little, still tired after the previous day, and the worn out by the panic attack, and the strain of talking to the others about what had happened during his time away from Beacon Hills.

Stiles stiffened up when Derek moved away, before relaxing again when Scott occupied the space Derek had vacated, enveloped him in a hug, pulling Stiles to rest against the Alpha's chest, while Stiles' father sat on Stiles' other side, running his fingers gently through Stiles' hair, while clasping Stiles' hand reassuringly in his own.

"I…I'm actually surprised I lasted that long and got through telling you guys all of that that without having a panic attack," Stiles admitted with a wry smile, but his father shook his head, his eyes shining with tears.

"Oh, God, Stiles, come here," The Sherriff murmured, running his hand through Stiles' hair, before cupping his face and gently kissing Stiles' forehead.

"You…you went through hell, dude." Scott softly added.

"Purgatory, actually Scott" Stiles corrected. Lydia laughed, although no-one else appeared to get the joke.

"Lian Yu…it means purgatory in Chinese," Lydia explained reaching out and taking Stiles' hand in her own.

"Wanna tell us what the panic attack was about?" Stiles' father prompted gently.

"I…I thought you were going to kick me out," Stiles replied honestly, "for what I did. I'm no better than Peter…or Kate. I've killed people, I am a trained assassin."

"No…Oh God no, Stiles," his father shook his head.

Scott too was shaking his head, "Dude, that was self-defence…You were protecting yourself and your friends. You're not a murderer. Hell, you went overseas and trained to be an assassin. You're freaking Arya Stark."

"Scott's right," Derek contributed from where he was crouched, "You're not a bad person. You're one of the best people I've ever had the privilege of meeting, who went through some horrible situations, and came out with your humanity intact."

The Sherriff nodded to Derek's words where he was sitting, "Stiles…you did what you had to do. I'm proud that you realised that. I was so worried after what happened with the Nogitsune that you were going to give up, but you didn't. You kept fighting to stay alive, to come back. It would have been so easy for you to give up, but you never did. I'm so damn proud of you, Stiles."