AN: Warning for depersonalization

The line is packed all the way around the corner and it's not even nine o'clock yet.

So far, Stiles has spotted fourteen Hermione's, twelve Ron's, and twenty Harry's. He saw one Luna and high-fived them, because Luna is awesome.

Brad is actually a pretty cool guy. He shook Stiles' hand firmly when he met him, which was kinda weird but whatever. What does he know about the proper dude on dude greeting techniques on 2007? Not much, obviously.

Apparently, Laura's been talking about him while managing to not say much at all, since Brad knows 'a lot about' him. Stiles wonders when she's going to tell him about the werewolf thing, if she's ever going to because he doesn't remember his Derek ever mentioning his sister having a boyfriend in New York.

Laura obviously adores him, though. They've been touching all night, holding hands, resting heads on shoulders, even pressing their legs together as they sit on the cold sidewalk.

The group behind them intermingles their conversation with theirs sometimes, trading book theories and bemoaning the clock. Stiles tries to keep closed lip about what he knows, but it's hard when everyone's so completely off. This person down the row keeps spouting off Snape hate, and it really makes Stiles wanna follow her home and laugh in her face when she gets to that part.

He tries to remember his own younger self and breathes deeply. It's going to be a long night.

There's a guy walking around dressed as Voldemort and Stiles really admires his balls.

Not his balls balls. His figurative balls. The balls that aren't attached to his- whatever. Stiles goes back to playing cards with Laura.

Brad was smart enough to bring a deck of cards, and Stiles feels a bit lost. He hadn't realized how heavily people relied on smart phones in his time, how people in a line like this in 2013 would be checking all sorts of websites for spoilers and pictures from people on the East coast.

"Got any threes?" Laura asks, fingernails clicking on the ground as she leans back.

"Go fuck yourself," Stiles cheerily replies as he hands over his lonely three of spades.

Brad leans close to whisper above the cards, "I heard a rumor that Harry dies."

Stiles promptly bites his tongue.

"That's stupid," Laura says, knocking into Brad's shoulder, "He's the main character! If Harry dies, what kind of message would that send?"

"I don't know," Brad shrugs, "Maybe Ron and Hermione and everyone else keep the good fight going and it's supposed to be, like, not losing hope in the face of death? Or something?"

Laura shakes her head, "Still stupid."

"Still might be true."

Laura flips her hair over her shoulder, and casually says, "I'm sorry, you have to be at least smarter than that to date me."

Brad smirks at her, "Yeah, yeah, alright. When we get this book and we find out that Harry does die, you'll be the one that's not smart enough to date me."

Stiles continues shuffling his cards innocently and knocks his foot into Brad's, "Got any jacks?"

Brad shakes his head and Stiles pouts, drawing a card. He curses and shoves at Laura when he draws a three.

"I hate you," He tells her with feeling, "I've been holding onto that since you dealt."

Laura just cackles.

They continue on like that for another half hour, Laura and Brad breaking up over Harry's imminent death/not-death at least five times, before Stiles gets distracted.

Because, of course, everything can't be okay for more than a few minutes, right?

The sign is glowing in neon, cheerfully telling it's patrons about it's lovely 24 hour service.

He bites his lip, eyes jumping from the car to the store before sighing.

"Let me borrow ten dollars," He demands at Laura.

She makes a face at him and picks up another card, "What? No. Why?"

"Because it's very important," He tells her sweetly, cocking his head slightly in Brad's direction, trying to convey how very important this important situation is with his eyes.

Laura just sighs, like Stiles doing things to save her family is a disruption to her, and buts her head at Brad's shoulder, "Pay the boy so I can continue beating your ass."

Brad rolls his eyes but does as she says without question.

"Keep your kinky shit in the bedroom," Stiles snarks at her. Laura flips him off.

He picks up Laura's keys from where she put them on the floor, because Laura doesn't believe in purses and her jeans have fake pockets, and sets off toward the car. They got here relatively early so they only had to park a block away, which was really lucky. He thinks he heard some people grumbling about walking all the way from the mall, which is four blocks away.

His bag is stored under the passenger side seat, hidden away from the windows and Laura and Brad. Stiles doesn't know when he got this paranoid. He doesn't like it.

He pulls out the disposable camera and turns it over in his hands, wondering if he's really going to do this.

He's been working toward this for weeks- months, even. Once he gets these developed, it'll become real. He still hasn't looked at the text transcripts. Part of him wants to, this burning need swelling in his chest to know for sure, but there's a bigger part, a part that makes his hands shake as he reaches for the thick envelope at the bottom of the bag that wants him to just forget he ever printed them out.

This morning feels so far away.

Stiles pinches the metal clasp open and pulls out the pages. He mentally prepares himself, tells himself that seeing Kate sticking her tongue down Derek's throat was worse than this.

His eyes immediately find the word "cock" and he shoves the papers back in, shaking his head. He can't do it, definitely can't do it, doesn't even want to think about doing it. He's not crossing this line, not like this.

God, his Derek would hate him. Stiles can feel it burning under his skin like an itch. His Derek would hate him for following him around like this, for printing out these text. This is such an invasion of privacy.

It's for the best though, right? The end outweighs the means?

Is that how it is now? He has to be pragmatic when it comes to Derek of all people?

What kind of life is Derek going to have when this gets out? God, he's probably going to have to testify. In a court of law. About his love affair with his teacher. Fuck. Stiles feels sick thinking about how Derek's going to feel, how betrayed he'll be.

Stiles hates this person he's become.

He presses the clasp back into the hole, wondering what his Derek would say to him about all of this. They've talked about it before- what life would be like if they could change things. Of course they did. Who hasn't? It's different in theory, though. Stiles remembers taking a shot of Vodka, shouting over the music droning from the crappy radio in Derek's living room that he'd spend every single second with his mom. Derek helped him to the toilet stall a few hours later and helped him aim his vomit into the toilet, quietly rubbing his back and whispering that he'd spend more time with his family.

He breathes in. He breathes out.

It doesn't matter now.

Except it does, because he can't stop hearing Derek telling him all about Kate in that calm, unattached voice on 4th of July. He presses his hands to his ears but the words keep spilling from Derek's lips, slithering through his mind like a snake.

It was different hearing about it. It was so different compared to seeing it.

There's a knock on the window and Stiles flails, shoving the envelope back into his bag.

He wants to groan at the sight of that fucking baby face. He so doesn't need this right now. Not today. Not after what he's just seen.

Stiles kicks the bag back under the seat and throws himself out of the car, smiling weakly at Derek.

"Hey," He says, smiling that fucking smile that makes Stiles want to throw things at him, because it's so fucking fake and polite. Derek isn't supposed to smile like that. Derek's supposed to glare or just stare at you until you change topics. "Laura didn't tell me you were coming."

"Last minute decision," Stiles tells him, shoving the camera in his pocket, "Uh, look, I have to go do a thing but Laura and Brad are right around the corner. I can walk you there if you want?"

Derek makes a face and shakes his head, "They probably started sucking face as soon as you turned your back on them," Stiles flinches at the words, remembering Kate dragging Derek into the alley, mouth pressed against his. Derek gives him an odd look, "I could go with you? If you want?"

The plastic of the camera is cool pressed against his hand, and Stiles runs his thumb over the side of it, hidden by his jacket pocket. Being around Derek right now is just weird especially when he knows what he's been doing all day. It's not like he'd actually see the pictures, right? That's not how disposable cameras work.

Stiles shrugs and sets off walking down the street, Derek a silent shadow by his side.

"It's a time travel thing," Stiles explains quietly, "So you can't ask questions, alright?"

"That's fine. How's that going, by the way? Mom doesn't really like to talk about it and Laura says you won't tell her anything."

Stiles snorts, knocking his shoulder against Derek's. It's a normal thing for him to do, but he wonders if this Derek thinks it's weird. "What makes you think I'll tell you if I won't tell Laura? You haven't exactly been Mr. Talkative to me the past two months."

"I've been busy," Derek defends.

Stiles lets out a bitter laugh and nods, "Right. Yeah. Busy sucking face, dude."

Time seems to stop as soon as the words escape his lips, and Stiles feels his heart drop at the light that brightens in Derek's eyes. Fuck.

"So you know, right? I thought you would, I mean, since we're close in the future and all?"

Stiles' jaw clenches and he snaps, "I'm not talking to you about this, wolfbreath. Go hang out with Laura if you want to gossip about your love life. I have shit to do."

He stalks off, anger thrumming deep in his bones, frustration making his hands itch to tug at his hair, when a hand grips his elbow.

Stiles stops, because it's Derek. It's supposed to be Derek, but it's not at all and something in him just feels so fucking wrong to think about it.

"I just," Derek starts, clearing his throat, "I just want to know if she's there with me. In the future? Are we still together?"

Stiles' fist clench and his eyes snap shut, the marrow in his bones raging like it's on fire, blood fucking singing for him to push Derek, to hit him, to do something-

And he does. He spins around and shoves him, using every single ounce of anger he has. Derek's eyes are rounded and huge, and Stiles fucking hates them, fucking hates him, this shitty version of Derek who's just so fucking stupid, and he shoves him again until he flops against the chain link fence.

"Really?" He hisses, and he knows his irises are flowing, knows his anger is getting out of control, but he's so tired of this. He's so fucking tired of everything, he's fucking done. "You're asking me that? Right now? Are you fucking stupid?"

Derek gapes, mouth falling open, and Stiles hates it because it makes him notice how his face is cleanly shaven, not even a hint of peach fuzz, and he wants to punch him. Stiles has never wanted to punch someone more in his entire life and he hates himself for it because this is Derek at his most vulnerable; the teenage boy in love.

He can't stop the words, doesn't even think about them before he's opening his mouth and saying, "Your girlfriend? She's fucking psychotic. Alright? Do you get that?"

Derek's eyes harden and he yells, "She's not psychotic-"

But Stiles just rams him into the gate harder, metal singing as it rattles. He doesn't know where this strength is coming from, doesn't even care, but he shoves him again and again and he wants to scream.

"She is!" Stiles tries to laugh, but it sounds more like a choke, "God, Derek, do you even know what you would say to yourself?"

Derek doesn't look up from the floor.

"Because I do. Because you've told me. Because I'm from your fucking future, Derek, or did you just forget that?"

They stand there for a few minutes, chest heaving, and Stiles slowly slides away from Derek.

His hands ache from fisting them in Derek's shirt so tightly, and he stretches them out, listening to his bones crack. He leans against a lamppost, one leg propping him up, just trying to catch his breath. He rubs a hand along his forehead, collecting the sweat that's gathered there.

Today's been too much. He wants to crawl back to Deaton's and sleep for the next six years. He wants to wake up in his own time and find out that this was all some horrible dream. He wants everyone to jump out from behind the corner and tell him this was all an elaborate prank gone too far.

"I'm giving up so much here, Derek," Stiles whispers into his hand. His eyelids feel heavy and his heart is going too fast.

Derek looks up suddenly, and Stiles can see that his eyes are wet. "Tell me," He begs, "Please. I don't- I need to know, Stiles."

Stiles shakes his head, Peter's warning sounding like an alarm in his ears, "You can't, Derek. Not yet. Please. I- I'll tell you as soon as it's safe, okay? I know it's shitty, but I can't tell you now. We have to follow the plan."

He sees something behind Derek. There's a sharp noise, like a scream, and then a figure is running down the street. Her hair is white and up in a bun, and there's an old man, an old, bald man, chasing after her.

Something settles in Stiles' gut at the scene, because he knows that bald head.

"I have to go do something," He says, hurriedly. He rips the camera and money from his pocket and shoves them at Derek, "I need you to take this to the camera place by the bookstore, okay? I'll be back soon. Just promise me you won't pick them up. I'll get them."

Derek, looking like he's just been given the biggest case of whiplash, nods and accepts the items, cradling them in his hands.

Stiles takes a few long strides toward the end of the street and shouts over his shoulder, "I swear to god, Derek, if you pick up those pictures I'll put mountain ash in your Cheerios!"

He thinks he hears Derek laugh, but he's too busy running after the couple. He sees the end of a coat turn down another block and rushes after it, shucking up his shirt and slapping his speed rune. He takes off after them, running so fast that the wind hits his face like a slap.

There's an alley to his right, the hisses and whimpers leading him down it. His stomach clenches tight in anxiety as the noises grow louder.

Stiles is about to run around a corner when he hears a sickening slap that has him pausing. He presses his body flush against the wall and tries to control his breathing.

"You stupid-" A voice grunts, one that makes Stiles' jaw snap shut, before metal clatters against the brick wall. He peers around the corner, half his face exposed, and freezes at what he sees.

His instincts were right, it's Gerard. Why is it always Gerard?

He's holding a woman to the wall of an alley, forearm pressed against her throat, other hand poised in a fist. He punches her, her head flopping to the side, and Stiles flinches at the memory it invokes, of Gerard holding him down and raining blows upon his own face.

"You're going to murder them!" The woman yells back in an angry whisper as soon as she has her bearings. Her lip's split, and a bit of blood dribbles down her chin, "I am still the matriarch of this family and you do not have the right to go over me like this!"

Stiles feels frozen as Gerard pulls back to punch the woman in the stomach, and she grunts in pain. Stiles sees her eyes clench tight.

"My daughter is the matriarch," Gerard says, and Stiles' blood runs cold as his hand reaches for his pocket, pulls a thick knife out of a sheath on his side. "And you, my beloved, are nothing but an old, sympathizing, hag!"

There's a fear in her eyes and Stiles doesn't understand what's going on, what's happening, but he can't just stand here and watch this, watch Gerard kill another person.

It's the same plan, he thinks as he feels the wind pick up, just a different outcome.

Gerard rears back to jab the blade into the woman's side just as Stiles throws him back.

He flies like a rag doll caught in a child's grip and cracks against the opposing wall with a snap. Stiles feels nothing as he sees Gerard's head bounce against the brick wall when he walks around the corner. He feels weirdly calm as the old man falls to the ground, unattached as blood trickles out of a cut on his temple.

It's like he's watching someone else step closer to Gerard, like he's standing at the mouth of the alley while his doppelganger crouches down to check the old man's pulse. His face is blank and he feels the thump of a heart under fingertips that don't feel like his. He watches as he stands and kicks Gerard in the gut.

He does it again, and again, and again, and Stiles is just watching himself do this, just standing here and he can't stop it, doesn't actually want to stop it, and he kicks again and again and again but he can't feel anything and his face is blank and the woman might be crying, he can't tell, can't hear anything-

There's blood coming out of Gerard's mouth now, dribbling down his cheek and hitting the floor like water under a slightly open facet.

His body crouches down to check the pulse again- still going strong.

There's a ringing in his ears where noise should be, little sounds like cars driving down the street, dogs barking, the woman shoving him into a wall and screaming in his face.

It comes back to him, slowly, awareness trickling back into his body, like his personality is being poured back into himself. There's a tingling in his hands and his foot feels like it's just been repeatedly bashed against a hard object.

"-at were you thinking? He could have killed you! And what if I didn't know about you Wicca boys," His eyes harden at the slur, "Huh? Do you think that seeing you using your wind powers against my husband would have helped with my shock!?" She points a stern finger at him and shakes her head, "You kids these days. When I was younger we had to take precautions about this sort of thing, why, young sparks weren't even allowed to use their gifts unless their mentors were present!"

Stiles fights the urge to ask her what's going on, because he really doesn't think it'll help the way she's looking at him right now. He see's Gerard laying on the ground, wonders if that really even happened, if he really did that.

His head is pounding.

"Can you just, maybe, give me a minute to catch up?" Stiles asks her, his voice wobbling in the middle, and the woman seems to just shut down at his plea.

Her eyes soften and she steps back to look him over, and she sighs, "I suppose I may be in shock after all. Forgive me, I should be thanking you."

Gerard's body is just there, like it's glaring at him. She's thanking him for doing this? For whatever just happened to him?

He wants to slide down the wall, wants to put his head in his hands and ice it because it fucking hurts, wants to think through whatever the fuck just happened and how he's going to deal with it.

Stiles really just wants to fucking sleep without having to worry about this shit.

"I'm sorry?" He tries, because she's looking at him and won't stop looking at him and Gerard is just lying there.

"It's fine," She says rubbing her hands together. Is it cold? Stiles can't tell, can't feel anything beyond the nausea in his gut and the tingling in his hands. "He was going to kill me, the useless man. Couldn't even do that right. You look familiar, boy. Have we met before?"

Stiles shrugs, but he can see her face in his mind, standing outside the hospital, encouraging him to go see his mom. How many times has he unknowingly passed by an Argent? Gerard was getting treatment down the hall from his mother and he never had a clue. Kate was hanging out with Derek that day. How close had he been to running into her on his way out the door?

Stiles shudders, and somewhere, in the back of his mind, he hears Gerard's voice scream "Kill them all!"

"Are you going to be okay?" Stiles asks, because it seems like the right thing to say and he doesn't want to be here right now, doesn't want to be anywhere right now. Existing like this isn't worth it, he thinks. He wants to pull that timekeep back and force it to make him just go away.

"Violence is apart of my life, Wicca boy. I'll be fine. But you look a bit shaken up. Is everything alright?" She tries to step closer, but Stiles can't stop comparing her features to Kate as she steps into the light. How many people has she killed? How many werewolves has she wrongly hunted in the name of the code?

Stiles remembers Gerard calling her a sympathizer, but he doesn't know what that means when compared to Gerard's genocide jerk off fantasies.

"I'm fine," He snaps, voice rough. He feels drained. Is laying down to sleep after you saved someone's life rude? Probably.

The woman laughs, "Yes, I'm sure you are. Get out of here, boy. I'll call the police and tell them we've been mugged by a group of hoodlums."

Stiles raises an eyebrow and jerks his chin towards Gerard, not actually looking at him, "You're going to save him?"

"If only to kill him myself," She says easily. Yep, all Argent's are insane. It's a thing.

Stiles wonders what Allison would do to someone if they unsuccessfully tried to kill her. It spreads an ache through his chest, thinking about her and her ring daggers. Hell has nothing on Argent women.

Speaking of Argent women.

"Don't you have, like, a life debt to me or something now?" Stiles asks, bullshitting as he shakes his hands out. The pins and needles feeling is ebbing away now, which makes him breathe a sigh of relief. His headache is still there, but it's tolerable. He'll take an Advil later.

"Too much television rots the brain, dearie," She tells him cheerily as she rummages through her purse. "But, I suppose I can give you a favor, since you did save my life. Don't get a big head, though. I could have taken him had he not blindsided me and I left my handgun at home. 'Just a night out at the movies, Melanie!' he had said, 'Leave your weapons at home!' he said."

She snorts, and Stiles hears her mutter about men under her breath.

Stiles clears his throat to get her attention back to him, "Look, I need you to not hunt the Hales anymore."

"The Hales weren't even on my radar. I didn't know there was even a hunt in place until five minutes ago," Melanie tells him as she pulls out her phone. Stiles is mildly annoyed to find that it's better than his. "They're more human than most packs I'm on good terms with. We were supposed to just come here to talk to my husband's doctor."

Stiles tries very hard to not brain himself against the wall.

"They've been on Gerard and Kate's radar for a while now," He sighs, wondering why it was so easy for Gerard to just go against his matriarch, and then turn around and preach about it to Allison. Why hadn't Kate stepped up when Gerard killed Melanie? Why didn't Victoria or any other Argent woman? How the hell was he allowed to call the shots for so long?

"And just how do you know that?" She asks, squinting her eyes at him.

It never gets easier to say, but he has to, because he needs an ally with the Argents and the only one he has is twelve years old and doesn't know who he is.

Stiles' mind flashes to him shouting in Derek's face, and he grits his teeth as he tells her, "Because I'm from the future."

Melanie's phone promptly snaps shut, and Stiles has a few seconds to feel envy over the flip phone before the old woman is taking a step back, a critical look in her eyes.

The problem with Melanie is that she looks so much like Kate, except her eyes. Her eyes are the same color and shape as Allison's, and the way they squint to analyze his body like an X ray makes a hollow feeling dig itself into his gut. He's seen Allison tear apart someone's motives with her eyes before, looking at a persons hands and face and eyes and everything about them to see if something is off.

It's why she was always the one to do interrogations. Her and Lydia could make someone confess to an ulterior motive in five minutes flat.

After a minute, Melanie sighs, "You know, boy, when you live in this life for so long, you start to just accept things as they come at you. When I was a young girl, my parents moved here from France. I'd heard all sorts of rumors about beast that bump in the night, like any child does, but even that little girl could never believe so many of the things I know to be truth these days. Only a few months ago I oversaw a treaty between a centaur herd and a fairy court."

Stiles winces in sympathy. That must have been hell to negotiate. Two stubborn creatures and you have territory involved? It must have been horrible.

Stiles really doesn't regret saving Melanie Argent. Not if she can coral centaur and fae into agreeing with each other.

"Tell me what you can," She orders him, arms tightening at her sides and legs shifting into a more stable stance, sliding into the Argent matriarch as easily as a glove.

Stiles really appreciates that she said "can" instead of "everything". He tells her about the Hale fire and Kate's history with Derek. His bag is back at Laura's car, but he warns her what he's going to do with her. Melanie nods, as if accepting her daughter's fate.

He glosses over Gerard and the kanima and the mountain ash, packing all of the gore and death and manipulation into a neat little package. Melanie stands stone faced and silent through it all. She smiles a little when he tells her about Allison, about how strong and resilient she is now, about her new code, and he sees her mouth move to repeat the words in awe, as if she never thought about them. Stiles wants nothing more than to find Allison and tell her about this grandma, about the respect and adoration he sees when he talks about her.

Her eyes harden when he starts explaining timekeeps.

"They can manipulate time and stuff if someone makes a deal with them," Stiles tells her, "I think someone made a huge deal around this time because when I summoned the timekeep, they said this year is supposed to be fixed point in time."

Melanie stiffens at the words, "What do you mean by deals?"

Stiles shrugs, "Timekeeps are just made out of the stuff between universes, so they're like just a pitch black shape. My mom said that you give them control of your body for a while, depending on how big the deal is, so they can manipulate history or make sure things are going like they're supposed to."

Her mouth drops open in realization, and a bit of horror, and she pulls on the claps to her purse so hard that Stiles thinks it breaks. She pulls out her wallet, dropping the black bag to the ground, and says, "I found this in my daughters room months ago, hidden in a book. I thought it was just something they did at the fair- I didn't know-"

Stiles gently takes it from her, stomach sinking in dread.

He's looking at a black and white picture of his pradziadek, holding hands with a woman who looks suspiciously like Kate Argent.

pradziadek - great grandfather