A week passed before Stiles worked it out. The whiteness was becoming a lot more frequent as the days went by, but, as panicking as that was, it was also thanks to this that Stiles managed to draw his conclusions.

At first it had seemed random, sometimes he lived through his life, sometimes he recalled bits of it without ever having any recollection of the memories beyond their being there. There was no rhyme or rhythm, or so he thought. One moment he would be hopping into his car, heading home from an evening out with his friends, scarfing pizza like a dying man, and at this point he was pretty sure that was what he was, and the next he was coming to as Derek climbed in through his window demanding he research the latest supposed threat. One moment he was wandering the corridors of school, ready for another fun filled day of learning, and the next he was at lunch, and his friends were all laughing and chatting around him as if he wasn't experiencing a version of his own personal hell.

It was only when he sat down and wrote a list of all the periods the whiteness had taken, and all the memories he had that were still his own, that he realised the pattern. Every lesson he couldn't remember in school was a lesson he was alone in, a lesson none of the pack shared with him. Any lesson with Scott, or Isaac, or Erica, Boyd, even Jackson, were all there safe in the 'lived through' zone. But the lessons he had without them? Only memories.

It was the same with outside school. As soon as he walked away from any member of the pack the whiteness flooded through him and he only came too when he saw Scott in the mornings, or if Derek decided he needed his help for some reason or other and scaled his house in the middle of the night. It was a puzzle, a riddle, but it had a pattern.

Stiles had been right, it was a clue.

But a clue to what?

All he had to go on was that this 'key to permanence' had to have something to do with the pack. He had to do something, change something that was linked to the pack in order to remain alive. But he had no idea what that was.

But it wasn't just the pack was it. It was Stiles in relation to the pack. It was something that one line of fate saw him doing, it was something that fate knew he wanted to do but was too afraid to ask for. So it couldn't be anything drastic like killing a pack member, because as much as Jackson pissed him off at times, that was something he could never see himself doing, and he already helped them as much as he could, so that seemed like a dead end as well. In fact, when he thought about it, there was really only one thing he wanted from the pack, and that was to be part of it.

So maybe that was it. Maybe he was supposed to become pack. God knows he was way too scared to ask for it, to ask for the bite, but if that's what it took to stay breathing then wasn't it worth the fear, the pain? Stiles had no idea how him becoming a wolf was supposed to stop the 'darker path of destiny' from shitting on his friends, but he did know that he was willing to do what he could to stop that from happening. If he could help, he knew he would. He'd already died for the pack once, he really shouldn't be so scared about getting his werewolf on. But with the arrow he'd had very little time to think his rescue through, and now he had nothing but time to think it all through. And time was not Stiles' friend right now.

'Dude, you suck at this game. Are you even trying?'

Stiles snapped out of his thoughts as Scott crowed in triumph beside him. On the screen in front of him the words 'Game Over' were flashing in big red letters as his character's death was playing over and over.

'Sorry Scotty, my minds elsewhere.'

Scott frowned at him, confused and a little pissed at the nickname but he let it slide in order to pursue his worry.

'You alright? You feel sick or something? Want me to get you pain killers?'

His hand came up to rest on Stiles' forehead, but he batted it away as soon as it touched his skin and rose to his feet, tossing the controller onto the floor. Scott followed him as he walked from the living room into the hallway of Scott's house.

'I feel fine.' A lie, but Scott didn't pick up on it. 'I just – I just need to go somewhere for a little while. If I don't text you can you cover for me and tell my dad that I'm staying here tonight?'

Scott looked unhappy about it, looked like he wanted to ask more questions, but the seriousness on Stiles' face must have convinced him against pressuring his friend into talking, so he nodded instead. Stiles smiled and pulled Scott into a brief hug, glad that he had someone as cool as Scott as a best friend, even if he was incredibly obtuse sometimes. Then he left.

The whiteness cleared as he pulled up to the abandoned Hale house which only confirmed Stiles' assumption that that was were Derek was staying those days. He had little doubt that Derek had heard his arrival so he didn't bother knocking on the sad remains of the door frame and instead welcomed himself inside. He made his way into the old, creaking living room, and sat himself down on the worn out sofa while he waited for Derek to come and find him.

It took three minutes, but eventually Derek strode into the room, hair ruffled like he'd been sleeping restlessly, and shirt inside out. Stiles hadn't even considered that Derek might have been asleep when he showed up, but it was too late to go back now, so he decided to forge on.

'What are you doing here Stiles?'

Strangely he didn't sound angry at Stiles' presence, instead there were traces of curiosity in his voice. In the gloom of the room Stiles could just about see one of Derek's eyebrows arched as he stared the teen down.

Stiles sighed.

'I need your help. I need you to do something for me. And I know you probably won't want to but, please just hear me out before you say no, ok?'

Derek paused, seemed to consider Stiles, and then nodded. He dragged a chair forward so that it was in front of Stiles who was still perched on the sofa. He settled himself down on the rotting wood before gesturing for Stiles to talk.

'The voice, the one I told you about, she said something to me, something important. I didn't remember it straight away, but a week ago it all came back to me. She told me that she wanted to send me back here, that it hadn't been my time to die, and when I agreed, that's what she did.'

If he wasn't mistaken, Stiles could have sworn he saw Derek smile. A tiny tilt of the lips, gone within seconds, but there nonetheless.

'But she said that my return wasn't permanent, that I could only be returned temporarily without just reason for my resurrection.'

Derek's eyes were wide, their gaze flicking across Stiles' face at alarming speed.

'She told me that unless I found the key to my permanence, they would have to reclaim me as one of the dead and that without me doing whatever it is that I'm supposed to do, the timelines for the rest of you will become terrible and dark. There's something I'm supposed to do Derek, and if I do it, then I can stay here, and you guys won't have to suffer the wrong path, and I think I know what it is that I have to do.'

He held up a hand as Derek made to speak.

'Since I've been back I keep losing large chunks of my life. The whiteness that claimed me when I died comes back and I have to wait it out until I come too again. The more days that pass, the worse it gets, but I realised that there is a pattern to it. Whenever I am with one of the pack the whiteness leaves me alone, but the minute I step away the whiteness takes me. I figure that it's a clue as to what I have to do to make this resurrection stick.

I figure that I have to become part of the pack, that that is what the timelines want. The voice told me that it was something I want but I'm too scared to ask for, so joining your pack of werewolf misfits fits the bill. And that's where you come in Mr Alpha.'

Derek had a pinched look on his face, his eyes still worried and unable to stay still. He was hunched in the chair, leaning towards Stiles, his mouth pulled in a firm, unsmiling, line.

'What do you want me to do?'

Stiles stared at him incredulously.

'Isn't it obvious? I need to join the pack, wolf me up. Initiate me into the werewolf ranks. I don't want to die again Derek, and I certainly I'm not going to let you suffer because I was too chicken shit to man up and allow a little fang action to be done on my general person. But that requires your assistance of course, you being the barer of the fangs and all that. Hence my late night visit.'

'Stiles-'

'Look, I know that you probably don't want a new pack member, and I know I'm annoying and you want to kill me most of the time, but this isn't for me Derek. This isn't about me. Well it is, but it isn't. You know what I mean. I'm doing this so that the fates don't screw you over. All of you. Am I so unbearable that you would rather bring suffering down on the rest of the pack than let me join.'

'Stiles-'

'Come on. I really don't want to die again. It hurt like hell Derek. And this whole memory thing is freaking me out. And I just want to help –'

'Stiles! Shut up for a minute.'

There was a warm hand on Stiles' knee that startled him into silence just as much as the words did. He glanced up from where he'd been staring at a crack in the floor where a spider kept poking out of every few seconds, and finally met Derek's eyes. His face was pulled tight, creases lining his forehead and eyebrows drawn together. He was looking at Stiles like he'd never seen him before, but also as if Stiles were the biggest idiot he had ever seen in his life, which wasn't actually that unusual for him.

'Stiles, putting aside the rest of the alarming information you just dumped on me, are you seriously asking for the bite so that you can become part of the pack? Because if you are then you are the most idiotic person I've met, and I've known Scott for a while now.'

Stiles smiled a little at the joke, but made no move to respond. The hand on his knee was sending strange tingles up his legs and he was focusing very hard on trying to ignore them.

'How can you not know that you are already pack? That you were pack even before Scott was? I thought you were supposed to be smart.'

'But – but I'm not a wolf.'

'That doesn't matter. Humans can be part of a wolf pack, I mean it is fairly rare but it happens. One of my aunts was a human, same with one of my cousins. Species doesn't really matter, it's loyalty and bravery that make a good pack mate. Stiles, you look after us when we're hurt, you put the pack above everything, even telling your father the truth, you fight things 50 times your strength to protect the pack, you took an arrow to the chest to save my life. And now you are sitting here in front of me asking for the bite when I know you are terrified, in the hopes that it might save us some grief later on. Stiles, you are more pack than any of us, you may not be a wolf, but you have the heart of one. So don't ever think that you aren't pack, and don't ever think we wouldn't want you to be.'

Stiles swallowed past the lump in his throat, blinking away the tears that were stinging his eyes. His heart thumped against his ribs as his lips spread into the most blinding smile he could manage. The words swam in his brain, burning behind his eyelids as Derek stared unblinkingly at his face, seemingly captivated by Stiles' reaction. His hand rubbed soothing circles into Stiles' knee and Stiles got the impression that he wasn't quite aware that it was doing that. He wasn't going to complain about that though.

Eventually he sobered though, the creak of the wind through the house dragging him down from his ego high and reminding him that there was still a problem, still something he hadn't sorted. He swallowed again, his mouth suddenly dry.

'But if that isn't it, what am I supposed to do? How am I supposed to stop fate from fucking up? How am I supposed to stop myself from dying again? I'm back to square one Derek.'

They stared at each other, breathing shallowly, worry pouring off of them. Stiles eyes teared up again, but he refused to let the tears fall, he refused to let the weakness show, refused to let Derek see how scared he was. Eventually, Derek withdrew his hand, and Stiles stopped himself from making a grab for it as it pulled away, the warm patch on his knee succumbing to the chill of the house. But then Derek was moving, pushing up from the chair and crossing over to sit beside Stiles on the sofa. There was a moment of hesitance, a moment of awkward stillness, before Derek put his arm around Stiles' shoulders and pulled him against his side, the movement stiff and unnatural as if it were new to him.

It took a minute, but he eventually relaxed into the hug, and he settled his head on top of Stiles' hair, allowing Stiles the chance to curl into Derek's warmth like he suddenly longed to do. Derek felt safe. And telling him made everything seem much lighter. His mind felt clearer as he cuddled into the tense body beside him, and he couldn't even bring himself to care how odd the whole situation was. He just needed the reassurance Derek was offering, he just needed to be held.

'We'll work it out Stiles, I promise. We – I won't lose you again.'

I know this took longer than the others, sorry about that. And I know Derek hasn't been in it much yet, but I hope this makes up for it.