It was agonizing, waiting for them to wake up, Cora could burst at the seams. They laid on the bed, side by side and you could swear they were Romeo and Juliet. Only they weren't dead. Derek wasn't sure how long he'd been out for but when he finally woke from his slumber, his head hurt like he'd been hit by a Mac truck.

"Derek?" Cora walked up to him.

He tried to sit up against the wall, his chest heaving. "What... what happened?"

"You took away too much pain from her... you've been out for two days."

"Two days?" He glanced over at Claire beside him. "She hasn't woken up?"

Cora nodded, adding. "She woke once, but I think it was just because she was having a nightmare."

Derek attempted to stand, his head pounding. It took him a few tries, but he managed to stand straight without falling off.

"You should rest."

"I'm fine. I need to move."

Cora looked at him with a disapproving stare, but let him slowly make his way to the couch. Instead of making it to the couch, Derek landed up on the floor by the window, determining that the walk to the couch was far too much of a walk. Cora sat down next to her big brother and gave him a good look over. Beads of sweat collected on his forehead, and his breath was labored more than it should have been.

"Are you sure you're okay?"

"I'll be fine in a few hours.."

"He's lucky to even be alive since he's not an Alpha anymore." Peter walked through the doors and towards them. "That little stunt you pulled isn't easy to pull off and you're lucky to be alive."

"Glad you're happy." Derek said sarcastically, but it lacked it's usual sass. He was too tired to deal with his uncle.

People think a soul mate is your perfect fit, and that's what everyone wants. But a true soul mate is a mirror, the person who shows you everything that is holding you back, the person who brings you to your own attention so you can change your life. A true soul mate is probably the most important person you'll ever meet, because they tear down your walls and smack you awake. Claire had not only smacked him awake, but dumped a whole bucket of ice water on him. Every nerve went white hot. He was still reeling from the loss of the only family he had left. But he couldn't shake Claire and her calming nature. The worst type of crying wasn't the kind everyone could see-the wailing on street corners, the tearing at clothes. No, the worst kind happened when your soul wept and no matter what you did, there was no way to comfort it. A section withered and became a scar on the part of your soul that survived. For people like him, his soul contained more scar tissue than life.

He had scars. She had known that. He had mental, physical and emotional scars. He was a walking freak show of sorts, but she didn't seem to care. With each day he felt the barriers melting. He let them melt. Because of her genuine laugh, because of when they were still just kids, because he knew that she would win. Too much was between them, pulling them together at the same time as it pushed them apart. Their need for each other would always be in constant battle with the need to keep the other safe. Love wasn't forged by circumstance or changed by sorrow. It simply was. Fierce and free as the darkness within him. Not everyone in the world is alike. And some of us are a lot more different than others. Some of us were born like this, some of us were changed. But no matter how this happened to you, if you are here it is because this is your destiny. It was chosen for you. The truth is that your whole life can change with one split-second decision, and it doesn't matter if you told yourself you'd never do it or if you stepped into the moment with no intention of doing it. All it takes is for that one second of absolute panic when the solution shines right there in front of you, and you grab it... only to have it turn into ash in your hand.

The sound of groaning brought Derek out of his thoughts. Claire was pushing herself up into a sitting position, holding her head. Despite his body yelling at him, Derek went over to her, sitting on the bed next to her.

"Are you okay?"

Claire nodded her head slightly, still holding it. "I feel like I got hit by a truck, though."

So gently and softly, Derek had leaned forward and kissed her. For a moment it took her by surprise, her headache disappearing for a fleeting moment. You can blame it all on fate and the universe, but in the end you alone decide if you're going to lie down and let hell take you under, or if you're going to stand strong in defiance of it all with your middle finger raised. If you muster that courage to stand under fire and not go down, you will amass an inner strength that no one can touch. You won't be another faceless, nameless, forgotten human in a long historical line of the defeated. You will be a steeled warrior, and a force to be forever reckoned with. And beneath the pain that lingers, you will have the comfort of knowing that you are strongest of all. That when others caved and broke, you kept fighting even against hopeless odds.

We don't have a choice in how or when our bad days will blind side us. But what we do choose is how we allow them to leave us once they're gone. You can use those moments as a catalyst to spur you on to greater things or you can let it be the event that breaks you and leaves you shattered and forever lost in darkness. But there was only so much worrying you could do before you just had to accept what life throws at you and move on, because some things were going to be out of your control, and others can't be fixed or changed. And for everything he'd lost over the last couple of months, he still had a lot. More than he expected, actually.

Sometimes fate is like a small sandstorm that keeps changing directions. You change direction but the sandstorm chases you. You turn again, but the storm adjusts. Over and over you play this out, like some ominous dance with death just before dawn. Why? Because this storm isn't something that blew in from far away, something that has nothing to do with you.

This storm is you. Something inside of you. So all you can do is give in to it, step right inside the storm, closing your eyes and plugging up your ears so the sand doesn't get in, and walk through it, step by step. There's no sun there, no moon, no direction, no sense of time. Just fine white sand swirling up into the sky like pulverized bones. That's the kind of sandstorm you need to imagine. And you really will have to make it through that violent, metaphysical, symbolic storm. No matter how metaphysical or symbolic it might be, make no mistake about it: it will cut through flesh like a thousand razor blades. People will bleed there, and you will bleed too. Hot, red blood. You'll catch that blood in your hands, your own blood and the blood of others.

And once the storm is over you won't remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won't even be sure, in fact, whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm you won't be the same person who walked in. That's what this storm's all about. Derek was a survivor. It was in his blood, his veins. And nothing was going to change that. It was hard to know what was worse: him being with her, or him being without her.

Claire bit her bottom lip once he released her from the kiss, her gaze looking up at him with a emotion that Derek hadn't seen in awhile. It made Derek's mind go crazy. There's nothing more annoying than cold logic and reason when you've got a good fit going. He wanted to do things to her that a good girl definitely shouldn't let a man do to her. And if his mind was as crooked as his thoughts, she wouldn't walk for a week. Which would give him a perfect excuse to just lay in bed with her, all day. Oh he was teasing himself now. Love, he thought as he held her to his heart, was an agony beyond compare. He was putting himself through unnecessary torment and torture.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Somehow, I was going to make this into a nearly 5,000 word chapter, but that would be a bit much, to be honest, so I broke it down into parts. Here's the first part! Hope you like it and as always, reviews are so welcome! :)