a/n: chapter three, have fun, review at your leisure. chapter accompaniment is anything you synthesize by the american dollar.

CHAPTER THREE

Stiles didn't move. Nor could he, even if he wanted to. Nope, he was pretty sure he'd already died and the rigor mortis was setting in, given that he was face to face with a werewolf, and one that had a really pretty good reason for not liking people, his personal history with them and all.

Derek Hale was glaring at him from across the short space of only a couple of feet, eyes flashing the blue of a werewolf who had been born with natural, deadly killer instinct. Killer instinct that Stiles had a pretty good idea was directed at him at that moment.

Stiles had a couple of ways of dealing with panic. The one he most often fell back on was sarcasm and forced wit.

"Hey, uh, buddy, if you're thinking about eating me, don't. I'm skin and bones here. I'd taste terrible," it came out jerky, he could hear his voice crack at least twice and briefly Stiles wondered if it were true they could literally smell fear on people. Derek stayed quiet for a beat, then took a moment to give him a once-over. Probably deciding how he wanted to eat him. Raw, or cooked? Flame broiled or as a stew? He probably had a lot of options. Given that Stiles had about a zero percent chance of defending himself against a full-grown born werewolf. Scott, being bitten and generally less strong than a born wolf, he could barely survive a hug from.

Derek could probably kill him with his pinky finger.

Before Stiles could imagine up any more gruesome methods of his demise, Derek spoke.

"I'm not going to eat you."

"That's - that's reassuring, thank you. Thank you very much actually," talking fast, Stiles shifted on the ground. "Not that I meant to assume, because that would just be racist. Or species-ist, I guess. And I totally didn't meant to it's just, ah, well the way that you're kind of glaring at me and generally putting off a very murderous aura I…yeah. Well-,"

"Who are you?" Derek cut in, breaking up his string of stuttering.

"Um-,"

"Where did you come from? How have you been getting in here?"

"Been?"

"I saw you, you were in here yesterday. Now answer me," Derek growled the command and Stiles flinched.

"I'm Stiles!" he blurted out. "Stiles, that's my name, I work at the sanctuary. I sneak in here, my friend's in here, I found a way in so I could see him," he explained in a rush.

"How?" Derek demanded, another step forward. Slowly Stiles stood, hands held high to show he wasn't making any sudden movements to run. He might have been thinking about it, but he knew he wouldn't make it far. Still, instinct to flee was strong. He never took his eyes off Derek.

"It's a secret?" he ventured. In a movement that was too fast for Stiles to even comprehend, let alone brace himself for, Derek was across the clearing and pinning him to a tree with a forearm to his throat. Suddenly there were teeth in Stiles' face, a lot of teeth holy God I'm going to die.

"Tell me," Derek growled. "You have a way in and a way out, something that I'd like to know about very badly. Now tell me. How do you get in here? How do you get out?"

"Ow, shit man," was Stiles knee-jerk response, despite the very real danger he was about to get his face bitten off by an angry werewolf. Getting pinned to the tree hadn't hurt all that bad actually, the knee-jerk complaint was just that. For a scary intimidating werewolf, Derek was surprisingly gentle at the whole bodily harm as interrogation tactic. Maybe he could give Scott a few pointers in the dealing with humans department. The second he did complain, though, he swore he could feel Derek loosen his grip just a fraction.

"I have my ways. I'm smart like that. I'm not going to tell you anything besides that-," he said, and when Derek growled, he continued in a rush, "because if you try and escape it's not going to work." Stiles looked at Derek, right in the eye, gauging if the guy genuinely wasthe murdering type. Derek tried for a moment longer to glare the information out of him, but finally pulled back and let Stiles off the tree. Relief washed over Stiles, and he rubbed his shoulder.

"How do you know it wouldn't?" Derek asked, once he was a reasonable distance away again. "You seem to get in and out just fine, and you're just a skinny, defenseless human." That stung a little, but Stiles didn't bite back.

"Exactly, I'm human. If the guards catch me downstairs I can say I'm lost on my way to the bathroom. If they catch you it's fire on sight. With bullets. Silver bullets. My friend is in here, has been two years. My best friend. Do you really think if escape was possible, Scott would still be in here?" Derek seemed to think he had a fair point, and the glare lessened into something more of a pensive stare.

"Why risk it?" he said finally.

"Risk what?" Derek gestured around.

"This, why risk your neck to come in here?"

"Weren't you listening? Scott's my best friend. He's worth the risk." They way Derek looked at him when he said that, Stiles wasn't entirely sure he liked it. Or even what it meant. Stiles felt for Derek, he really did. But he'd meant what he'd said about escape being a terrible idea. They wouldn't make it to the elevator without every security guard on them in an instant, and at least life inside the sanctuary was life. Not death by lots and lots of guns.

"I may not be able to get you out," Stiles said, using his best negotiation tone, after a long moment passed. "But I can offer other services. Not much gets past contraband through the hatch, so if you need anything that's off the list I'm your guy. But like, within reason. I can't sneak in pipe bombs or like, flat screen TVs. Other things I can get, small stuff." Derek looked at him, eyebrow raised.

"What kinds of things?"

"Junk food? Pirated DVDs? How about Reese's? You look like a Reese's man," he said, and Derek rolled his eyes and turned to leave him there. "Or not! Reese's aren't for everyone, are you more of a Snickers man?"

Derek didn't seem interesting in candy bars, he said nothing further as he stalked away. A moment later he was gone, and he moved fast. Stiles tried to follow after him just out of curiosity, but the second he rounded the bend Derek was nowhere in sight.

xx

Dawn was a grey affair in the sanctuary. Mist had settled in somewhere in the middle of the previous night, and lingered as the sun rose. Murky light filtered through, and Derek watched it from the front steps of the Hale house. After the encounter with the strange human kid, Derek had returned to there out of habit more than anything. He'd told himself staying there wasn't permanent, but it was really the only thing he could think of to do at that point. It had been three days. He still hadn't found Laura. He tried to distract himself from the obvious explanation as to why, tried to cling to other possibilities to avoid going insane just then.

For the time being, until he could figure out the situation with his sister, he was, in a very literal sense, stuck up the river without a paddle. Except, possibly not. The human kid, he knew a way out. Reluctant as he was to tell, there was a way. Maybe not a very good one, maybe it would end horribly for all involved, but it was there.

Derek tried to cling to that.

Scott found Derek where he had the day before, in the big house that no one lived in anymore. It seemed like Derek had claimed it regardless. Scott had heard things about the place, knew the rumors. It seemed fitting then that Derek would choose to stay there.

Scott didn't get within five yards of him before Derek noticed him and looked up. Derek's face seemed permanently stuck in an angry scowl, but Scott approached anyway. The others had told him to stay away, but Scott had never seen a born werewolf before. And Derek was a new thing in a place where new things hardly ever happened. How could he stay away?

"What do you want?" Derek growled. Scott wasn't entirely sure about what exactly he wanted.

"Nothing, really. Hi? I guess," Scott said. He stuck his hands in the pockets of his jeans, shuffled his feet against the ground.

"I met your friend last night," Derek said. Scott looked at him.

"What, who?"

"The human."

"Stiles? You didn't hurt him or anything did you? He's not like most people he's-,"

"Interesting. I get it. No, I didn't hurt him. What is it with you people and assuming I'm violent?" Derek looked genuinely offended.

"I dunno, you look pretty scary. It'd help if you didn't glare so much," Scott offered. Derek rolled his eyes.

"I have a question for you, kid," Derek said, ignoring Scott's helpful comment. Scott waited, didn't think he'd get this far with a conversation with the older werewolf.

"Scott," he said. "My name's Scott."

"How did you get stuck here? You weren't here two years ago." Something told him Derek knew exactly how, or at least he had an idea of the reason. Scott was tempted to tell him it was none of his business, they could do that. Two years and he still hadn't gotten Erica's story out of her, he had no obligation to tell Derek. But.

"Your family," Scott said after a moment. "The attack. I was there…downstairs. Guess I was in the way, unlucky for me. Or maybe lucky. I mean, not everyone survives the bite but…here I am." Derek was quiet. Scott was still terrible at reading emotions, even with his heightened senses. Erica was a genius at it, reading the smells and subtle hints the body gave away. She could read people like a book. Scott, not so much. He had no idea what Derek was thinking.

"I'm sorry," Derek said. Scott started.

"Oh, thanks- but, no that's not why I came to talk to you. I'm not angry, or anything. I don't blame you. It's not like it was you," he said.

"It could have been," Derek replied.

"I understand why you tried to escape. I do, I hate it here and I think if we had the numbers we'd try too. But really, I don't blame you. It's just the way things are, right?" Derek nodded and Scott scrambled to think of a way to turn the conversation back to neutral waters. He was no good at reading Derek, but given their previous conversation he was liable to get up and run off at any given moment if he didn't feel like continuing the conversation.

"I do want to ask you one more thing," Derek broke the awkward silence.

"What?"

"My sister, Laura, she was caught by the same hunters that got me. Nearly two months ago now. She should have been brought here, but I haven't seen her since I've been here. Have you? She's just a couple years older than me, a little taller, dark hair." Scott thought for a moment, of any of the loner werewolves he'd met.

"No, I haven't. There's no Laura here."

xx

Inventory duty completed to a satisfactory degree, Finstock eased off of Stiles' back, at least for the time being. He was on gift shop duty for the rest of the month, which was only a few more days but still, Stiles welcomed the prolonged break from tour guiding. When his lunch break rolled back around he wasted no time heading downstairs to pop in and see his favorite werewolf buddy. Two days in a row might have been pushing it, but okay maybe yeah Stiles was curious. Maybe he'd have another encounter with the strange and wild creature that was Derek Hale.

He found Scott outside the recreation hall shooting hoops with Isaac. They were mid game when he walked up, so he took a seat on the metal bench on the side of the court and let his backpack fall to the side. He didn't have any goodies for them that day, hadn't had the opportunity to stock up.

"Hey Stiles," Scott called, breath a little thin. He and Isaac were focused on their game, even though neither were particularly good. It was the werewolf reflexes more than anything, Stiles swore. Scott had been absolutely helpless at sports before the bite, always on the bench on the lacrosse team and asthmatic to boot. So Stiles was totally sure that his newfound prowess at physical activities owed entirely to his newfound werewolfness. Convincing himself of that helped Stiles to cope with the jealousy that his best friend could now run literal circles around him whereas before they were equally pathetic together. There was only moderate comfort in that, but Stiles took what he could get.

Watching Scott and Isaac dip, duck and dive around each other in movements so quick they blurred was amazing, if a little intimidating. Stiles swore Isaac was about to go wolf if Scott scored another point on him when his back was turned.

"That's it, I give," Isaac said, collapsing to the ground when Scott did just that.

"What's the score?" Stiles called.

"I dunno," Isaac called back. "I lost count when I knew Scott wasn't gonna show any mercy."

"No pain, no gain," Scott said, smiling as he offered Isaac a hand up. Isaac groaned, but accepted it.

"I'm new at this, give me a break," Isaac said as he took a seat by Stiles.

"You'll get the hang of it," Scott reassured him. Isaac let his head drop against the back of the bench, ignoring him. Scott leaned against the trash can sitting left of them, looking down at Stiles.

"So Derek caught you on your way back last night, huh?"

"What, how did you know?" Stiles asked, eyebrow raised.

"He told me," Scott said.

"What, are you two buddies now?"

"No, I just…I spoke to him this morning. He said he'd seen you in here, wanted to know more about the human that was sneaking in here."

"Really?" Stiles perked up. Only a little though. "What did he want to know?"

"If you were mentally challenged for doing it." Stiles shoved at Scott, who danced away laughing.

"Did he say anything else? I offered him Reese's, but he said no. Did he change his mind? Does he want the Reese's?" Scott looked a little bewildered.

"No, he didn't say anything about Reese's. He did ask me if I'd seen his sister, though."

"What?"

"Laura, he asked if she was here. He said she was caught nearly two months ago and should have been brought here." Stiles shook his head.

"Dude, no she wasn't," he said.

"Uh, he seemed pretty sure she was."

"No way," Stiles replied. "No way Laura Hale would've been captured without us hearing about it. And I haven't heard squat about that. Look, Derek was ginormous news when he came in, Laura would've made the papers. She's an alpha now, she's gotta be near the top of Hunter's Most Wanted. Trust me, if she'd been caught, it'd be major news." Scott looked confused, but Stiles was sure. Laura Hale's capture would've been too big a story for Stiles to not have heard it. And no one had heard didly about Laura Hale in the two years since her escape. Derek's capture was one thing, but Laura Hale was an alpha and a much bigger priority.

"If you say so," Scott said, a little unsure, but he trusted Stiles.

Stiles stayed as long as his lunch break would allow, tried to go a round with Isaac in the court but ended up just giving Isaac a confidence boost by sucking infinitely worse. ("I have no werewolf juice, I hate you both, leave me alone," he wheezed when they were done.) But it came time when he finally had to leave. His trip back was more or less unfortunately uneventful, a small part of him hoping for another encounter with the reclusive and glare-happy Derek. He did stop about midway to his destination to set out a pack of Reese's, a couple other various and sundry things he'd picked up in the gift shop, and a few magazines he'd picked up in a gas station on his way to work. Definitely not the sort of magazines that would make it past the contraband list.

"Hey Sourwolf," he called into the forest, on the off change Derek was nearby. "In case you changed your mind about the Reese's. And you seemed like a Busty Asian Beauties guy. Have fun with that." Maybe Derek heard him, maybe he didn't. Stiles left the presents on the ground and hoped they'd find their intended.

xx

Maybe it was something about the way Scott had said it, but Stiles found himself thinking about their conversation as the day wore on. Laura Hale. Derek's older sister, and the only other surviving member of the Hale family. He knew about her, sure, who around here didn't? Derek and Laura were big news, Laura's capture would have been all over the place if it had actually happened. But Scott seemed sure that at least Derek was sure, and though he hadn't gotten that information from the source himself, Stiles trusted it enough to give it more thought. He had nothing else to focus on working the gift shop, anyway.

When his afternoon break rolled around he found Lydia behind the reception desk.

"Hey, Lydia I need to ask you something-," he started before she cut him off.

"You'd better have my pastry in your hand or you're getting nothing. Ever again." Stiles blinked, smacked his forehead. He'd forgotten, again. Shit.

"I'm sorry, seriously, but-,"

"Stiles, I'm not entirely sure you know how the whole bartering system works. You bring me a thing I want and I do a thing you want. It's that simple."

"Okay, yes, I know, I know but this is serious, I really need to know-,"

"I warned you," she cut him off again in her sing-song voice. He hissed in frustration.

"Lydia, this is serious," he snapped. "I really, really need to know something, and I swear to god tomorrow I won't forget and I'll personally order you a whole freaking case of them, I just need this right now." She looked up at him, glared, and gave him that look that involved a lot of eyebrow.

"Well?" she snapped.

"Laura Hale, have you heard anything about her lately?"

"Laura Hale? No. Nothing. Why?"

"Um…reasons. I got a tip from a…source that said she was captured by the Argents, two months ago or so." Lydia's eyebrows shot up.

"Stiles that's nuts, no way that would've happened without it being everywhere-,"

"I know, I know. But is there, I don't know, any way you could check? Hunters have to keep records of captures, don't they? And the Argents operate out of here. Can you double check somehow?"

"…I don't know. Maybe," Lydia said finally.

"That's good enough for me. Thank you Lydia, and I swear to god I'll have your stuff tomorrow. Lunch time. I won't forget."

"You had better not," she called after him as he left.

That matter settled for the time being, Stiles spent the remainder of his break by the pack display just on the inside of the exhibit hall. It was directly across from the entrance to the gift shop, he spent a great deal of time staring at it on duty from his spot at the register. He liked the pictures on the wall, there were several photos of werewolves on one frame that meant to be depicting them in their natural habitat, but Stiles knew the shots had probably been taken of wolves in captivity. Probably without their consent, too. How else would a photographer be able to get so close to transformed werewolves without having their heads bitten clean off?

They weren't faked, either. Some places liked to put up photos of regular wolves and tried to sell them as genuine werewolves, but Stiles could spot the differences a mile away. The two species may have shared similar ancestors, but werewolves had a certain shape and bulk to their shoulders and hind legs that was distinct. They were all generally slightly larger than the average wolf as well, though their pelts had about the same variety as natural wolves. Scott had told Stiles that his fur was brown when he transformed, but Stiles had never seen it first-hand.

He wondered idly what kind of pelt Derek had.

Under the pictures there was information about pack dynamics, research and psychological studies done on werewolves in captivity over the last half century or so. The alpha, beta and omega relationships were spelled out in bold letters, with a special section that broke down the differences between born werewolves and bitten in bullet points. Another panel off to the side was devoted entirely to alpha werewolves, and the physical difference the alpha instinct triggered in born werewolves. Researchers back in the eighties had discovered that the alpha strain of the werewolf gene, when triggered in a born werewolf, actually brought about physical changes in the wolf. They were stronger, faster, had greater healing abilities as well as an instinctual, psychological compulsion they could exert on their pack members.

All in all Stiles thought it was fascinating stuff, if maybe their methods of gathering the information hadn't been that reputable. No one in the early days had cared much for safety or humane regulations when it came to testing and experimentation on captive peoples. It was awful and horrible some of the things he'd read on the treatment of werewolves, but in the long run the ends had justified the means to most people. There had never been enough of an outcry to give werewolves justice on the matter, no one cared enough to argue on their behalf. The inhumane treatment had largely been regulated away over the past few decades, but that was owing more to policies changing in favor of isolating werewolves from humans than kindness on the lawmakers' part.

People were being pushed further and further away from having contact with werewolves, and nowadays humans and werewolves were hardly allowed any contact at all. Regulation upon regulation built up the wall separating humans from werewolves, and 'out of sight, out of mind' seemed to be the mantra of the country on that matter.

On that depressing note, Stiles went back to work.

xx

The afternoon crawled by at an agonising pace. Stiles got short bursts of activity now and again, but didn't have a steady trickle to keep him busy. After more than an hour of watching the empty shop he lounged on the stool behind the counter, propping his feet up by the display of tacky beaded bracelets. His shoulder rested against the plastic shelf of brochures tacked up on the back wall. With minimal adjusting, he was able to make himself pretty comfortable.

There was a TV hanging in the corner of the shop, meant for playing nature documentaries or ambient background reels of sanctuary information; opening and closing hours, park information, etc. Loop after loop of boring stuff. There were several others dotted throughout the facility, one in the main exhibit hall and another behind the welcoming desk, but the gift shop one at least had access to a few other basic cable channels Stiles could flip through with the remote kept under the cash register counter. There were maybe five channels of actual programing he could choose from, and Stiles suspected his feed was the same as what the TV in the sanctuary's recreation hall picked up. It would make sense, he supposed. He settled on a local news station, figuring it was less boring than listening to the same park information looping a hundred times an hour.

There weren't many interesting stories, nothing exciting happening in Beacon Hills at the moment outside of a new Burger King opening on 4th. That is, until Stiles perked up when they started talking about the sanctuary.

"In other news, we have confirmed that the hunters operating through our local sanctuary have successfully captured and returned one of the members of the Hale pack that escaped two years ago. The public will rest assured one less of these dangerous creatures are at large, and we applaud the efforts of the hunters involved in the capture. We were unable to get a statement from the park about the name or location the lycan in question was captured, or the state they were returned to captivity in, but-," Stiles didn't let the lady on screen finish her story before he flipped the channel, glaring holes in the screen.

Screw her, screw her and her perky little smile plastered on her makeup-caked face. Applaud? She had actually used that word? Applaud the people who murdered plenty of innocent werewolves a year, claiming resisted captures. Applaud the people who dragged the werewolves they could to a life of captivity behind concrete walls. Her attitude made him burning angry, fueling his vendetta against the system at large.

But Stiles knew how useless his anger was. Stiles, and people who shared his opinion, were few and far between. Their voices were a minority in a system that hated werewolves and the monsters they feared they were. The lady on screen had been parroting the majority view on the subject. Change was slow, agonizingly slow, and as much as it frustrated him to admit, Stiles didn't see it happening in his lifetime.

Maybe things would be better someday, but for the time being the country wasn't interested in werewolf rights. People applauded captures and the extreme right-wingers pushed to condemn the whole species every day. There just weren't enough people who shared Stiles' opinion on the matter.

Stiles wholeheartedly hated the entire awful affair, but what could one kid do to change any of it?