Okay, so this is kind of like a half chapter? I wanted to explain Derek's desire for Stiles to have the baby, like his big deep down thing behind it. So, here you go :)

It had been almost easy to forget, with Stiles' disappearance and the actions of the Fallen pack, that Stiles was still a traumatised teenage girl who was terrified of anyone that wasn't pack. She had only been awake for an hour when an unfamiliar doctor walked in, talking away about how pleased he was to see her conscious. Stiles froze in her bed, reaching out blindly and grasping Derek's hand in a too-tight grip as her breathing began to falter. The doctor, a youngish guy, only stopped chattering on about nothing and checking over her vitals when he realised that Stiles was practically hyperventilating with fear and Derek was trying to calm her down.

"What's going on? Ms. Stilinski, are you in pain?" The doctor approached the bed quickly, arm outstretched as if to soothe her with a hand on her forearm, but Derek almost growled at him. It took whatever he had left inside not to shift, to get this man away from her as the scent of her misplaced fear permeated the air.

"Get out, now." Derek hissed, one hand on Stiles' cheek to keep her focused on his face, the other trapped between her fingers.

"Mr. Hale, she's my patient! I need to know what's going on." The man took another step towards them before Derek bared, thankfully human, teeth at him and the doctor froze.

"Stiles is an abuse victim, who was drugged and stabbed. She has no idea who you are. I don't care if you want to go and find her father to discuss this with him, but you need to get out. You're scaring her." Stiles' doctor looked flustered for a second before huffing and turning on his heel, swiftly exiting the room.

It had taken Derek close to an hour to get Stiles anywhere near settled after that, and it was another three before she would let him stray any further than the edge of her bed. Sometime between that, John Stilinski had spoken to the doctor, and arranged for the only person outside of pack or family to enter the room be Nurse McCall. Although still wary of her, Stiles didn't fly into full blow panic when she came into the room, so it was an improvement.

There was a general fuss, all pack members attempting to cram into Stiles' room as she attempted to sign herself out AMA, or at least get her dad to. John didn't spend as much time as he maybe could at the hospital with Stiles, but he came when she called, and she had called to get him to spring her. They spent ten minutes arguing about whether she should be released or not, before Isaac practically whimpered and climbed into the bed with her.

"We almost lost you." Isaac whined into her neck. "Please, please stay here until you're better. Please." Stiles had looked lost, glancing down at Isaac and then flicking her attention between the others before sighing heavily and nodding.

"Thank you." Isaac had whispered into her shoulder softly, and he and Derek stayed with her that night.

Since then the pack had been trading shifts watching over her. Derek and Isaac took the night shifts, when Stiles would try to sleep and would need the both of them to ward away nightmares and match her unsteady heartbeat to. The others figured out a rota between them, and Scott sat in the hallway as often as he could, looking like the lost puppy he was. Derek was grateful the kid had intended to help with the Fallen Pack issue, but he had in no way redeemed himself. Therefore, no access to Stiles.

It was one morning, about six days after Stiles had been transferred to Beacon Hills General; when he and Isaac were leaving to catch some sleep and breakfast, that Isaac finally brought up what Derek had been hoping everyone would avoid. It was over pancakes and strong, black coffee that he finally gathered enough courage to actually ask.

"Hey, Derek?" Isaac had put his cutlery down onto his empty plate, hands wrapped around his coffee mug like a lifeline.

"Yeah?" Derek grunted at him, emptying his own cup.

"Why do you want Stiles to have this baby so badly?" He froze halfway to putting his cup down, staring at Isaac who blushed and began staring deeply into the liquid still in his own cup.

"I- it's not- I just want Stiles to be safe, and happy. I don't think she's in any way to be making these decisions right now, and if we gave it any thought, we all know.. She wouldn't want to.. not if she was thinking straight. So i want her to be safe, and happy. It's not about the baby." Derek stuttered, finally lowering his empty cup down to the table. It wasn't the entire truth, just some truth mixed in with almost-truths, enough to confuse Isaac's senses so that he could get out of this conversation without delving into things he wasn't ready to talk about.

"Okay." Isaac nodded, draining the rest of his caffeine.

"Okay." Derek reiterated, throwing some bills down onto the table to cover breakfast. "Come on, let's go get some rest."

It weighed on Derek's mind for the next two days as he tried to sleep at home without Stiles, and then tried to sleep beside her at the hospital. He kept thinking of ways to tell Stiles all the things she needed to know, without actually saying the words out loud. Kept trying to work around the choking feeling that descended on him each time he tried to force the words out, past the memories and the need.

Finally, on the third night after Isaac had asked, he skirted the night off because Deaton was in need of some help, and Derek was left alone with Stiles during the night. Curled up against him, Stiles' body was warm and soft, still wracked with tremors and surrounded by pain and fear. He could faintly hear the echo of another heartbeat inside of her when it was dark and quiet and he was focused like this. It's the double thrum that finally coaxes the words out of him, as he lay there with Stiles who is half dozing against him.

"Isaac asked me the other day why i want you to keep the baby so much." Derek whispers to her in the dark, getting a hum of acknowledgement in return.

"I told him it was because i wanted you to be safe and happy. That i think in the long run, when we work past this, you would regret the decision you were making, and you wouldn't be happy, or safe, and that's all i want for you." Her head moves sleepily against his chest, long hair tickling his neck.

"It was the truth, i do want you to be safe, and happy. You know i want that, right?" Stiles nods against him, shifting her head until her wide eyes were looking up at him, still shrouded in sleep.

"But it wasn't the whole truth?" She whispers back into the dark. He's so glad her voice is void of judgement, just curiosity that she has missed and a desire to know what's going on inside of his head.

"No, not the whole truth." Derek blinks away tears at the memories forming in his head, looking across at the wall behind Stiles' head instead of her eyes.

"In the house, the day of the fire, there was my mom and dad. Peter, his wife Hannah and their son Daniel. My aunt Amelia, and my elder sister Julia and her husband Micah. They were celebrating, a big family thing, waiting for Laura and I to come home from school." His voice is raw, and thick, words fighting to get past the lump of emotion and memory lodged inside his throat.

"What were you celebrating?" Stiles murmurs, warm breath brushing over his neck, eyes still transfixed on his face. He can't bring himself to look down at her.

"Julia and Micah... they'd been trying for years, since they got married. All they wanted was a baby, and when i first.. with Kate. It was only about a week later they announced they had finally gotten pregnant." Derek swallows hard. "She was fourteen weeks pregnant when they first told us, and she was five weeks away from her due date when the house burnt down." Stiles stills against him, one hand over his chest, the other tightening its familiar, grounding hold on his wrist.

"Derek.." Her voice is soft, full of an emotion he can't quite identify.

"They were celebrating," He continues, "Because the baby had finally lay so that they could find out what they were having. We were excited, Laura and i were rushing home to see them, but the police and the fire department were already there and.. I'll never know now, whether i was getting a niece or a nephew." Derek finishes quietly, hand moving to cup the back of her head, stroking his fingers through her hair so softly.

"Oh." Stiles breathes out, shuddering against him. He finally looks back down at her, raises his hand, the one with her fingers wrapped around his wrist, and brushes away the tears that have spilled on her face.

"I see Julia, in you. You remind me so much of her, your humour, and your intellect, and the way you mother us all." Derek leans down and presses a kiss against the soft hair on her hair, turns his face sideways to lay his cheek against her, cradling her against him.

"You'll make a great mom, Stiles. I want to see you do it, because i never got to see Julia get her chance."

"Thank you." Stiles replies, voice shaking in time with the small vibrations of the muscles under her skin. She turns her face into his chest, drying her tears on his shirt. Derek nods against her, presses another kiss against her hair and pulls her in so close it feels like they might never separate, but that's okay. If he can keep her this close, he'll never be able to lose her too.