Darkest Powers fanfiction
EVERYONE'S SECRET
Derek Souza/OC: Mary Ralluber

Author's Note: I was going to post this up last night, but I never got the chance to. D: Well, here it is! :D Enjoy some more Mary and Derek! Please review! Thanks. ;D

Chapter 1O.

Mary woke up with tears streaming down her face, and to the scent of another werewolf. She sat up, gasping for air, clutching her chest, before releasing a long cry and sobbing her eyes out.

"Mary? What's wrong?" asked Derek frantically, pressing her against his chest, his long arms enwrapping around her. Instead of answering him, however, she buried her face into his chest and her tears splashing against his bare chest.

She'd dreamed about her mother, and, for the first time in a long time, cried about her death. She'd never lived a normal life, but she'd had a normal mother. Before she'd found out about Mary and D. Jay being werewolves, Fiona had cared and pampered Mary with all of the affection a mother could muster. Mary missed that more than anything. She missed singing to songs with her, she missed helping her bake pumpkin bread during the holidays, she missed being read to every night, even as she got too old for that. Mary wanted her mother.

After a couple more hours of bawling into Derek's chest, Mary's crying slowly began to subside and she finally fell back into her slumber, Derek's arms still clenched around her flawlessly-shaped body. She felt comforted in his arms and by his strange and familiar scent. She was saddened to wake up and find the other side of her bed empty that next morning.

The sun poured into her room and she was surprised at what time it was. She'd actually slept in. Why hadn't any of the nurses come to wake her up? Rubbing her eyes out, which, she'd noticed as she caught her reflection in the vanity mirror, were bloodshot from all of her crying last night, and tossed the covers off of her, padding towards her closet in her pajama shorts and t-shirt for some crisply clean clothes. She pulled out a pair of skinny jeans with holes in the knees and a white v-neck. She brushed her mane of black hair and allowed it to fall over her shoulders. Slipping on a pair of socks and her only pair of shoes torn and worn-out black Converse Mary walked out of her room. Even though the temperature was well below fifty degrees, Mary wasn't affected by the cold nipping at her bare arms at all. Just another perk of being a werewolf.

She met with two of the boys in the living room, Brady and Simon playing Xbox. They both turned her way when she'd entered.

"Hot damn, girl. About time you woke up," Brady exclaimed. Mary rolled her eyes.

"Lucky you, getting to sleep in," chuckled Simon with a kind smile. Mary couldn't help but return a brief one back to him.

"Seen your brother anywhere?" she asked.

"You mean you haven't found him?" Simon inquired. She knew what he was referring to. Mary should have been able to sniff Derek out herself. She didn't need to ask anybody where he was. With a quick sniff, Mary nodded and began to turn on her heel.

"Right. Duh. Thanks, Simon," she said.

"You better be careful, babe," Brady warned as she almost left the room. Mary turned her neck with an annoyed look.

"Why, Brady?" she groaned with an eye roll.

"You spend too much time with the beast and the nurses will think you two have got something kinky going on together." He arched an eyebrow and a smug grin appeared on his face. Mary's annoyed expression suddenly twisted into a glare and she bared her teeth. Clenching her fists, she began to breath heavily. Simon's eyes widened.

"Brady, shut up," he snapped at him.

Suddenly, a figured loomed behind Mary and her scent told her it was he who she'd been thinking of.

"You don't know anything, Brady. Besides, I thought you'd already called dibs on her," Derek retorted from above Mary. She felt him touch the small of her back and immediately butterflies were set loose to traverse inside her body. Her breathing slowed and steadied and she'd unclenched her fists, her face relaxing, but eyes still glaring at Brady.

"You called dibs?" Mary repeated, barking with humorless laughter. Brady rolled his eyes and glared at Derek.

"Just warning you two. Better be careful about the time you spend together. Don't think I'm retarded; I know you have feelings for each other," Brady said, and Derek, Mary, and even Simon could hear the jealousy dripping in his tone.

Brady turned back to the game, snapping at Simon to return to the game. Simon rolled his eyes at him, and then met gazes with Derek briefly. Mary watched as the two shared a silent message and Simon finally turned back to the game. Derek leaned down to Mary's ear and whispered for her to come with him, his breath sending ecstatic chills down her neck.

Derek turned his back on her and walked away towards the backdoor. Mrs. Talbot was in the kitchen and he asked if he and Mary could play basketball. As always, the elderly nurse hesitated before finally okaying the two of them to go outside together, but she warned them that she'd be keeping a close eye on them.

Derek nodded his chin over to the direction of the lone basketball resting in the small patch of dirt. Mary obeyed and fetched for it, dribbling it back to him to make it appear that they were actually going to play.

"How are you doing?" he asked, opening his hands for the ball. Mary tossed it to him.

"Better," she said with a smile. "Although, I'll admit I wasn't expecting you to actually leave me."

"You know I couldn't stay all night. If one of the nurses were to walk in with me in there …"

"Yeah, I know," Mary said quickly with a sigh. "Although it was nice while it lasted."

"Even though you were bawling your eyes out all over me last night?" Derek asked with a smirk as he threw the ball back at her. Mary scowled and threw the ball at the hoop. She made the shot as the ball swiftly went through the hoop, not even bouncing off the rim. Derek caught it and began to dribble.

"Whatever."

"You never did tell me why you were crying," Derek mentioned. Mary's scowl dropped and an expression of sadness overtook her face. Derek immediately frowned as he realized it probably wasn't the best topic to bring up. Before he could apologize for asking her, Mary answered him.

"I was dreaming about my mom," she said quietly, softly smiling while staring at the grass behind Derek in a daze. His eyebrows knitted together. Mary was rarely in this kind of state. "I was dreaming about how she used to be with me before she found out about what I am. And then I dreamed of her death, of how my father murdered her because she was going to tell on us." Tears stung at the edges of her brilliant green eyes as she slowly shook her head. Her gaze lifted and met with Derek's own green eyes, reading the curiosity and sadness that wandered in them. "I've never missed her so much before. I hadn't cried like last night since the day she died."

She released a heavy and unsteady sigh, struggling to keep her tears to a minimum. Derek suddenly walked towards her, dropping the basketball and pressing her body close to his.

"Talbot isn't watching," he murmured. "So I can finally hold you again."

His words danced wistfully on her heart and Mary embraced his middle, squeezing him and blinking back tears that wished to free from her eyes. She whispered his name, each letter tasting like sugar and involuntarily making her smile even through her hardship, and felt his fingers tangle through her hair. His grey hooded sweatshirt soaked up the tears that fell from her face.

Suddenly, Derek pushed her away and Mary stared at him, puzzled.

"Talbot's back," he mentioned and Mary slightly turned her head, only enough to see Mrs. Talbot at the kitchen window through her peripherals. Sighing, she turned back towards Derek and nodded, sniffling. The two continued to briefly scrimmage while Mrs. Talbot watched them before they stopped to take a short break.

"I've been meaning to ask you," Mary started, wiping her tears from her eyes. "How have you been feeling? I mean, you haven't gone through the Change yet, and I was wondering if you'd been feeling off lately."

"Off? Not really, no. I feel fine, although, my face is finally clear of that damn acne," he said with a scowl. Mary smiled widely.

"I told you it would work," she sang.

"What do you mean by off, though? Any symptoms I should be experiencing before the Change?" Derek asked, almost too eagerly.

"Well, before you undergo the Change, you last a couple of days with an immense fever. You haven't been looking ill, so I take it maybe perhaps you're not going to undergo it anytime soon." Derek's face fell. "In a way, though," she continued, "I guess this is good. I mean, the first time is the most painful, since your body doesn't know how to respond to the Change. Transforming to and from the wolf stage can be difficult."

"But, at the same time, I want to undergo the Change so I can get it over with," said Derek. Mary nodded.

"That's true." The two were silent for a while before Derek began talking again.

"I think the reason why it's taking so long for me to undergo the Change is, not because I'm willingly resisting, but because there's something about me that's genetically modified." Mary's eyebrows knitted together.

"Genetically modified?" she repeated. Derek nodded.

"I mean, don't get me wrong; I hate that I can't maintain the human part of me no matter how hard I try. I'm always going to be different. But, now I'm even different from the werewolf part of me too."

"How do you know you were genetically modified?" asked Mary.

"I grew up in the Edison Group labs," he said softly.

"I thought you said you didn't know anything about the Edison Group?" said Mary.

"Simon and I lied. We didn't really know you then. We couldn't just blow everything we knew to a stranger. But, obviously we're closer now, and we know a lot more than we probably should." Mary knew he was referring to that night she'd showed him the Change with her own body, the night they'd spent together undetected.

"Anyway, I grew up with four other werewolf pups. They were wild, and I, of course, was the odd one out. I wasn't as wild or violent as they were. I was quiet and was sometimes afraid of the others." Mary smiled sadly and grabbed for his hand. Derek looked down at it and grazed the surface of her hand, finally entangling his fingers with her own before continuing. "They got into some real big trouble and were sent off. Back then, I didn't know what the scientists were going to do to them, but now I know. They killed them.

"All four of us were experiments, and those three wild pups were fails. Later on, though, Simon's dad came and met me, liked me, and took me as his own son."

"So you were adopted into Simon's family," Mary said with a wide smile. Derek chuckled.

"Yeah, I'm the foster brother. But since Simon and Dad aren't werewolves, I couldn't fully understand what I was. Dad could tell me all that he knew, which wasn't exactly much, but it was enough for me to know that I was long overdue for the Change. The Change usually happens when one hits puberty, doesn't it?" Mary nodded. "I hit puberty long ago, probably before I should have, even. No Change. I'm still human, but I reek like a dog. I still get rages and animals hate me. I don't feel accepted in either race. I don't belong."

Mary wrapped her arms around Derek's middle again and sighed as she pressed the side of her face against his chest. She didn't care if Mrs. Talbot was watching, or that she was already on her way outside to break them apart.

"You belong with me, Derek. That's all that matters," she whispered with a smile.