"I'm proud of you," Is the first thing Deaton says to him once they get back to the apartment.
Stiles doesn't respond more than a raised eyebrow and a clenched fist. He feels like he needs to scream, blood tingling under the surface of his skin. He's not proud of himself, and he hates himself for it. He's not like Scott, not like Derek or anyone else in the pack.
It's never been an ultimatum with him, never was. He's not the type to make the martyr play, to sacrifice his life for the safety of others; complete strangers who've never spoken to him. He feels sick, thinking about his pack and how he's condemning to some other future entirely.
How Erica will never laugh freely and sashay her hips up and down the school hallway, smirking as boys and girls drop their books or fumble and stare. Boyd will never smile and lean close and laugh freely, will never know what it's like to not sit alone in a room full of people. Isaac, god, poor, precious, Isaac will be littered with bruises and a father with expectations too high for anyone to reach.
And what about everything else? What about him and his friends and their enemies? It's all up in their from this point on. He thought that by telling Talia, by letting things happen as they should, his life would be easier. Stiles thought he wouldn't feel such a ginormous weight on his shoulders anymore, that he could breath easier and know that everything would be okay.
But it's not okay, not now, not with everything so radically different and unsure. Not with how everything is going to change and he doesn't even know if he'll make it out of this, if he'll even be breathing tomorrow. He doesn't know the rules to this game, never even thought to ask the timekeep what would happen to him.
"I'm not," Stiles mumbles and drops himself onto the couch.
Deaton rest the box of books on the counter, finger trailing along the edge of the opening. Stiles wonders if he wants to dig into them, absorb their knowledge like he has with everything else.
"They're in Polish," He says.
Deaton nods, "My sister and I assumed they would be. Is there anyway your mother would be able to tell you what they say?"
Stiles shrugs, "She might, but I don't know if I could handle going to see her again. Today's been exhausting enough," He grabs one of his dad's shirts and quickly changes into it, smiling slightly when the feel of the worn cotton rubs against his skin. It smells like their detergent and he breathes it in, trying to put himself elsewhere where things were just easier. "How'd you know I was there, anyway?"
"Talia called me while you were warding. Impressive work, by the way," Deaton adds, "I couldn't see them, as you know, but I could feel them. I haven't felt that level of protection in years."
"The preserve is really suspectable to magic. It amplifies every rune drawn in there by, like, thirty percent," Stiles tells him, mindlessly opening the box and fingering a book. "I think it was has something to do with the nematon. Speaking of which," He snaps his fingers, instantly being assaulted by yet another responsibility. Seriously. Fuck timekeeps. He points a finger at Deaton, his eyes arching unimpressed at the gesture in response, "I need you to help me mix some stuff and not ask any questions about. And then I need you to call some weird little emissary gathering. Everyone you know whose pack knows Talia. That'd be great, thanks."
"Will the course of history be so altered if you tell me what you're planning to do?"
"Probably not, I just like to annoy you."
Deaton hums noncommittally and waves Stiles away. He continues browsing through the books, looking more and more frustrated as time goes on. Stiles, apparently having more self preservation than Deaton, chooses instead to heat himself up a microwavable pizza rather than give himself a headache.
As he waits, he drums his fingers along the counter and hedges, "Talia said you have power of attorney over the pack account?"
"Yes, well, it's the norm for emissaries. Usually each separate member of the pack has their own bank account, and they put a portion of their check into the main account. It's shared by all but to take any money out of the funds, it has to be signed off by either Talia, Randall, or myself. It's usually to pay mortgage, buy cars, provide money for school trips," Deaton looks up at him a strange look on his face, "Things like that. Why?"
He shrugs, "She said I could use it to buy anything I needed and, nothing against you," He tugs at the collar of his shirt, today's was green, "but I'm kind of tired of looking like I'm on my way to a church all the time."
"I offered to buy you your own clothes just last week-"
"Yeah, but," Stiles licks his lips, mouth feeling suddenly dry, "I didn't know I'd be staying long enough to use them then."
Deaton's gaze is intense now, like he's aiming at him to launch a missile right into his face.
Stiles looks away, playing with the button on his cuff, "I know I'm doing the right thing, it's just- I don't know how to accept that I'll never see them again."
"You will see them," Deaton nods, sage-like and soothing as he always is, "Just not as you know them. You'll see them as the people they were supposed to be originally."
"That's not the same," Stiles grinds out, teeth gritted and shoulders tense. "We don't even know what'll happen to me after I stop the fire from happening," He goes back to his food, which finished while he was talking. He takes an aggressive bite out of it, letting the molten cheese set fire to the roof of his mouth. He hardly even feels it, too lost in his thoughts. "What if I just stop existing?"
The question rings throughout the room, and the silence that follows it is thick and heavy. Neither man is willing to break it, and both go to bed with it weighing on their hearts.
Stiles never really knew how much he missed flannel until he had it back on his body.
"Good God," He moans, rubbing a sleeve against his face.
During the much belated shopping trip, Deaton gets him a prepaid phone. The screen is a weird grayish green with pixelated words and the only way Stiles can think to describe it is bulky and black. It doesn't even flip or take pictures. He may or may not grumble about it the entire time they're at Target, but it has a Tetris demo. (For five whole dollars he can unlock fifty plus bonus levels and save his game! Super fun!) Stiles doesn't think it's a complete failure.
"It's only for emergencies," Deaton warns him before he pays for it and the clothes (six flannels, a bundle of white undershirts, one black v neck, a few pairs of jeans, and some socks and boxers). Stiles feels like a ten year old being allowed to walk home from school for the first time.
He can't text with it, Stiles doesn't even think he would even attempt to, and it only has 60 minutes. Super great! Everything is just super!
Stiles barely contains an eye roll, "It's not even a Nokia. You couldn't even get me a name brand piece of shit phone."
Deaton doesn't comment, but the girl behind the register smiles slightly, like she's holding back a laugh. Stiles counts it a success.
When they get back to the apartment, Stiles walks in through the door, and then promptly backs out of it.
"Deaton," He hisses, eyes narrowed into slits. He crosses his arms over his chest and Deaton just stares passively around him, eying the small cluster of people sitting on whatever furniture there is. Which is to say his bed is completely covered in other peoples' butts. Awesome. "Who are they?"
"The other Druids. I called them like you asked of me last night, remember?"
Stiles adamantly ignores the amused glint in Deaton's eyes, "I didn't say today!"
And he pouts, because he just wanted to relax today. He had Talia calling their cell phone provider to see if they could get a transcript of Derek's call log, and he already had been planning to hack into their system to get the logs of his texts, thank you Danny Mahealani for being worn down enough as long as Stiles stopped asking him if he was attractive, which he couldn't do without Talia's account information which he wouldn't get until he had the call transcripts.
Meaning that there wasn't anything immediate to do today, except mixing up that spell, but that wouldn't take more than a few minutes and it's not like he could even use it until the new moon, which is just ridiculous. Didn't anyone tell the maker of it that all supernatural crap was supposed to fall on the full moon? Whatever.
The point is, his day is ruined by responsibilities. He glares at Deaton, who obviously isn't too concerned with his precious day being stolen from him.
"I don't even know what to say to them," Stiles whines. He wanted to be prepared, dammit. He didn't want a remake of yesterday, of blurting out information he wasn't a hundred percent ready to divulge to Talia and Peter. God, he still had to talk to Talia about Peter. Stiles hates his life.
"You'll be fine," Deaton tells him, nudging him lightly with a bag of clothes. "You know, if you had just told me what to tell them, this whole mess could have been avoided."
He points a finger in the vet's face, feeling like he's being punished for fucks sake, and whispers harshly, "No, that wouldn't have worked at all! Because I know you, and you only share information on an 'oops, too late to help anyone!' basis!"
No matter how kind this past Deaton has been to him, Stiles isn't about to start delegating stuff like this to him. He's had first hand experience on just how much Deaton likes to be the man holding all the cards, and he's not about to let him screw up the future just because of his incessant need to know everything and be mysterious.
Deaton doesn't look affected by his speech at all, "Just go tell them what you need to say. It'll be over shortly. You can do this, Stiles. I have full faith in you."
Stiles rolls his eyes and huffs, but does as Deaton says and walks into the room.
Leah and Jocelyn are there, and both smile kindly at him in unison. He waves back.
"I still haven't been able to find anything on your runes," Jocelyn says apologetically, "From all the resources I've exhausted, it seems that they're completely ordinary."
"It's alright," Stiles says, even though it isn't. It's rare, but sometimes he still reaches for an easy access rune to use it, and comes away only feeling empty and lost. He doesn't mention that though, just shrugs and sits on the coffee table, elbows resting on his thighs. "It doesn't affect my ability to ward or use magic, so I can make do."
The words sound hollow to even him, but no one says anything about it.
Everyone in the picture is there, along with a few other faces. He knows they're all not apart of Deucalion's packs separate packs, since there were only four other alphas in it. He wonders if the twin's pack emissary is here, if he could maybe pull them aside and plead for them to have better treatment maybe?
Once, when he asked Derek about what being an omega in a pack was like, Derek's silent wince was more than enough of a response.
"You already know Jocelyn and Leah," Deaton says, gesturing to the two woman sitting on the edge of the couch. "This is my sister, Marin, and this is Cassandra, Delia, Rhea, Tristan, Amara, and Julia."
His eyes stop on Julia, and he just... stares. She looks almost exactly the same as the Darach, the woman who seduced Derek and ritually sacrificed twelve people. The only real difference is the shape of her nose, and her hair is straight to her mid back rather than curled in ringlets around her face.
It hits him all at once, a sudden explosion in his chest. The way she looked at him, amusement written all over her face, before she kissed his father, the only woman to have done so since his mother passed, and jumped with him out of the classroom window. How she kept him, and Scott's mom and Allison's dad, trapped in a root cellar for days. How she became another reason for Derek to lock himself away, just another person who lied to him and used him and made him an accomplice to murder.
Deaton calls his name and Stiles blanches, not realizing until the fizzling and crackling between his fingers surges up and twist around his arms, sparks of electricity zapping up and around his biceps, that he's lost control. The shirt he's wearing smells like smoke, but he can't even think about it, his anger and hurt so out of control.
He wants to bare his teeth at her, like a wolf, wants to grab her and run the current through her body, make her feel every ounce of pain she inflicted plus some. But he doesn't. He reigns himself in, pulls taught on his magic until it's locked away and his skin is just smooth flesh once again.
Julia just raises an eyebrow at him, seeming unimpressed. It just makes him want to hurt her even more.
"Are you going to do that every time we come over, Stiles?" Leah smirks at him. Jocelyn grins too, but hers is friendly instead of snide, as opposed to her sister.
"Sorry," Stiles lies, finally looking away from Julia. He shucks off his flannel, internally bemoaning the loss of the plaid as soon as he got it, until he's standing in the room in nothing but a white undershirt. "You just looked like someone who wasn't really a good person."
Tristan eyes the tattoos on his biceps, nodding silently as he takes them in. Stiles can see a few in actual ink run along the ridge of his neck, curling behind his ear and disappearing into his wiry hair.
Deaton, Jocelyn, Marin, and Leah all share a look, silently communicating with twitching eyes and raised eyebrows.
"Stiles specializes in protection magic," Deaton says to Julia, who is still leaning back against the couch in an ease that makes Stiles want to punch her. He has to try to remind himself that she hasn't done anything yet, that she's a victim of what Duecalion has planned too, but it's really hard when she's sitting a foot from him. "Forgive him for anymore brash gestures."
"Are you his mentor, Alan?" Tristan asks, smiling when he looks at Stiles, "If not, I would love to take such a powerful spark under my wing."
"A born spark and a time traveler. If my brother weren't training him, you can bet I would have stolen him already," Morrell smirks, leaning her head in that way she does while he wide eyes look at Stiles in a way that makes him feel like he's back in her office, talking about Matt. Like she's seeing inside of his head and pulling out every secret he keeps. "It's bad form to proposition so publicly, Tristan. I thought you, of all of us, would know that."
"That girl moved an entire Oak tree from the ground and put it through the chest of a troll!" Tristan defends, "It wasn't my fault for seeing an opportunity and taking it."
Deaton crosses his arms in front of his chest, "Yes, and you never thought that with a spark so well lit she didn't have an incredibly powerful mentor?"
Jocelyn leans across the table, ignoring the bickering above her head, and whispers to Stiles, "He ended up with a snake tongue and pig tail for a year. You don't steal one's prodigy, it is law."
"And he's lucky he got away with just that," Leah snorts, "If someone had tried to steal my Martin from me when he was still learning, I would have took their hand."
Stiles really doesn't know what to do with that information.
He clears his throat, and the banter above him cuts off, "I only know for sure that I need to talk to emissary of Deucalion, Ennis, and Kali." Marin, Leah, and Julia all sit up a bit straighter and share a look, "And if any of you have a pack with a pair of twins that can morph into this giant werewolf, you'd probably be great to talk to too."
Rhea sighs and switches positions on the couch, hooking a leg over Delia's knee. Delia doesn't seem to notice or mind the gesture, "What trouble do those two get into now? I swear, ever since Ronan took pity on them and allowed them into the pack, they've done nothing but be a nuisance."
"Anyway," He coughs, and then looks at Marin. Her face is hard, like she already knows what he's going to tell her, and she probably does. Jocelyn did say that Deucalion hadn't allowed anyone else but her in the room since Gerard took his eyesight. She's probably been talking him down from this for months. "When he killed his beta out of defense, Deucalion realized that if an alpha kills a member of their pack, they absorb their power. In my time, he gets Ennis, Kali, and the twins to do this too."
Julia glares at him, here eyes hard and glowing faintly under her iris, "Kali would never do such a thing! She's a good alpha. She cares for each member of the pack like they're her own children! I've never seen an alpha besides Talia with that much devotion."
"Right. And I'm sure she isn't in love with a morally ambiguous guy like Ennis, huh?" Stiles raises an eyebrow, eyes jumping from Leah's shocked face to Julia's. He's practically begging for Julia to hit him. He wants to attack her back. It doesn't matter if she's more experienced, Stiles has pure rage flowing through him. Revenge is always stronger than righteous anger, right?
The only one who doesn't look surprised is Morrell, who's wearing a carefully blank mask. Stiles wonders how long she's suspected this, if, when he lets her in his room to rant and rave at her, Deucalion's let his plan slip.
"How do we avoid this?" Rhea asks, although she looks bored rather than interested. Stiles should probably tell her to not underestimate Ethan and Aiden as much as she is, but he doesn't think he will.
"I don't know," Stiles shrugs. It's not like he can tell them to do what they did, run around uselessly until a Darach shows up and helps take the "alpha of alphas" down on the lunar eclipse. "Aren't you guys supposed to know how to deal with power hungry assholes?"
"Our job within the pack is to keep balance," Deaton says, "We advise the alpha and they take our opinion into account."
Stiles makes a face, "That's completely helpful. Great job, guys."
Morrell throws her hair over a shoulder and crosses her legs, "Don't listen to Alan. Not all of us run things how he does." Deaton gives her a tired look, like this has been a long standing argument, "I will handle Deucalion. By tomorrow night, he won't be a problem. I'll send my new alpha to meet with Talia to reinstate the treaty before the week is over."
The other emissaries look at Marin like she's an alien, stunned more by her casual coup against her alpha than the knowledge of the alpha pack. Tristan scoots away from her and brings his arm to his side, no longer leaving it around her shoulders.
Morrell sighs, "Above all, we are supposed to keep the pack safe. That, at the end of the day, is our job. Not to be therapist for our alphas. Not to handle finances. We protect. We watch." She looks around at each of them, eyes settling on Stiles. Her eyes glow white for a few seconds, and then fade back to brown, "We do."