Chapter Text
Stiles pulls Mac down so she’s sitting next to him, with room for Derek on the other side. Veronica sits down on the coffee table so she can face them. Derek nods and settles down next to her. “This is the basic version. If you need more detail, you can feel free to ask.” He looks over at Veronica to make sure she understands that she’s welcome to ask questions as well.
“Shoot,” Mac says. “Werewolf 101.”
“We’re stronger and faster than humans, even in our human form. Better reflexes, et cetera. We don’t get sick, or hardly ever get sick. One wolf out of hundreds might catch something particularly virulent, but even then we shake it off within hours. Unless it’s magic, which is different. So kiss your days of having the flu goodbye. We also heal. Cuts disappear, bruises don’t even show, bones will mend in an hour or so if nothing is displaced. Our idea of fatal is different.”
“Holy shit,” Mac says. “That sounds awesome. What’s the catch?”
“Hunters, mainly,” Derek says. “We do have some weaknesses that humans don’t. Silver is bad news, hunters aside. Skin contact lasting more than a minute or two will start to burn. If it enters our bloodstream it causes excruciating pain. Aconite, wolfsbane, is exactly what it sounds like. It’s toxic to both humans and werewolves, but there’s a order of magnitude. And, uh, I hope your parents don’t like hanging mistletoe at Christmas.”
“It blocks supernatural energy,” Stiles explains, and snorts with laughter. “God, now I’m remembering our first Christmas together. Not the one we spent in the hospital, the one after that. When all of a sudden nobody could get into the house and we couldn’t figure out why.”
Derek shakes his head. “Not all supernatural energy. Mostly just werewolves and other shifters. A lot of sorcerers and witches love the stuff.”
“Well, my parents love plastic stuff,” Mac says, “so I don’t really have to worry.” She looks at Veronica. “Plastic. Mistletoe. Why did it take me seventeen years to figure out I wasn’t their child?”
Veronica shrugs and puts her hands up in surrender. “Family is a hard thing to judge. Duncan and I thought we might be half-siblings for a while.”
“Now that is a story that I want to hear,” Stiles says, “some other time when we don’t have werewolf related stuff to deal with.” He still has Mac pulled against his shoulder, almost into his lap, and his thumb is twitching against her shoulder. “Although really, nature versus nurture is some interesting stuff. I mean, I am so like my dad in some ways but so unlike him in other ways. There have been some really neat studies of identical twins who were separated at birth, and – ”
“Focus, Stiles,” Derek interjects, amused.
“No, really, there was this pair that both married women who had the same name, I think it was Betty, and then they named their kids the same thing, and named their dogs the same thing, it was totally creepy – ”
“Do you need some caffeine?” Derek asks. He reaches along the back of the sofa behind Mac, running a couple fingers gently over the back of Stiles’ neck. He’s careful not to use his whole hand, which could turn into a grab or a hold.
Stiles blinks at him. “I took my Adderall at like five AM because I woke up super early, but everything’s been so crazy that I’ve . . . am I being that bad?”
“No. Well, you were fine until you got sidetracked by the twins thing,” Derek amends. Normally he wouldn’t care, or would even find it endearing, but there’s Mac, brand-new to being a wolf and brand-new to the pack, and he knows Stiles will kick himself later if he can’t stay focused on what she needs.
“Maybe the adrenaline is finally wearing off,” Stiles says. “I’ll go get a soda.” He gives Mac’s shoulder a squeeze and says, “Be right back, okay?”
Mac sighs a little and says, “Okay,” before moving from Stiles’ shoulder to Derek’s.
“On the continued topic of health and safety, did you have any health conditions? Take any medications?” Derek asks.
“Uh,” Mac says, her face flushing a little pink. “Well, I took birth control pills. Y’know. But other than that, no.” She suddenly looks horrified. “Oh God! If I got pregnant, would I have babies or puppies?!”
“Cubs,” Stiles calls in from the kitchen. “Wolves have cubs, not puppies.”
Derek resists the urge to laugh. “You’re not helping, Stiles.” He smoothes his hand over Mac’s hair and says, “Babies. Ten fingers, ten toes, pink skin – or whatever color would be appropriate depending on the parents – no fur. There’s a chance they could be werewolves from birth, but that would depend partly on whoever the father of the children was. But you’d carry human babies, and only one at a time. Unless your family is prone to multiples, you’d have the same odds of twins that any other woman would.”
“Whew.” Mac relaxes. “That’s a huge relief, which doesn’t make any sense, given that I had absolutely no plans to have children any time soon. So, uh . . . I guess I don’t really need to keep taking my pills, anyway. I mean, I started taking them because Cassidy and I were getting kind of serious, but . . .” She rubs a hand over her eyes. “That clearly isn’t going to be a problem anymore.”
Derek rubs a hand up and down her arm. “I’m sorry.”
“Look at it this way,” Veronica says, reaching out to pat Mac on the knee, “you’re still not the person in the room with the worst taste in men. After all, I’m dating Logan.”
“Who we did decide only counted as half a person,” Mac remembers.
Stiles comes back in with a can of Coke, already half empty, and an unopened one in his other hand. “If we’re going to talk about bad taste in . . .” he starts, and then realizes that maybe talking about Derek and Kate is really not the best of ideas, although it would certainly take the prize. “Shit, I really am loopy,” he says, and takes another drink of the Coke. “Derek, continue your Werewolf 101 lecture.”
Derek looks up at Stiles and gives him a silent nod, glad that he had managed to curb himself. “I’ve been informed that there’s an adjustment period while your hearing improves, and for a few days you’ll have a hard time filtering signal from noise. You’ll have to talk to the others to get tips for dealing with that. If you ever get hurt in a public place, hide it and lie. Otherwise people will ask way too many questions. We’ll give you a crash course on maintaining cover. Some things we can’t stop, so we adapt to make socially acceptable.”
“Like . . . beating the crap out of a bunch of football players?” Veronica asks, arching her eyebrows.
“Are we calling that acceptable now?” Stiles asks, grinning at her.
“There are two very important reasons why an alpha has enforcers,” Derek says.
“Oh, yeah, the mob talk,” Veronica says. “I want to hear this.”
“One: the alpha lays down the laws and expects that they’re going to be obeyed. If he or she has to come down and get their hands dirty in the more routine things, it generally means that either they don’t trust their pack – which makes them look weak – or the pack can’t handle getting it done – which makes the pack look weak. Two: they’re the alpha. If it gets to the point where they’re personally involved, you’re pretty much fucked. They aren’t going to stop until the problem has been ruined to their satisfaction. Because that’s their nature. The nature of an alpha. They don’t bow to anyone besides their pack. So they have enforcers who do dirty work for them. Without being asked and without needing specific direction.”
“Then . . . why were you the one who beat the stuffing out of those assholes?” Mac asks, her brow furrowed.
“It’s interesting interplay,” Stiles says. “If those guys had been bothering me, it would have been up to the pack to take care of them. But they weren’t. Honestly, their homophobic comments didn’t bother me and their opinion of my life meant less than zero to me. It was, however, bothering Danny. And Danny is in my pack. And that makes it my job to protect him, take care of him, and deal with anything that’s bothering him.” As if quoting, he says, almost formally, “The role of the alpha is to protect the pack, and the role of the pack is to protect the alpha.”
Derek glances over at him. “Who’d you get that from? It’s the second time I’ve heard you say it, just like that.” He pauses and adds, “Sounds like Ravinder, or maybe Mei.”
“Yeah, Ravinder said that to me the first time I met him,” Stiles says. “The others were kind of poking fun at me for having brought Erica along to watch my back, and I had said that it wasn’t like you guys would’ve let me go out alone while they were in town. He was making a point to the others about how that actually made me a good alpha, not a bad one.”
“That really is a strange pack,” Derek says. “Ravinder’s always putting them in their place even though he’s totally not the leader.”
“Of course not,” Stiles says, mildly amused. “He’s an enforcer.”
Derek rolls his eyes. “You enjoyed that, didn’t you. It’s hard to identify an enforcer when half the pack wants the alpha to drop dead.”
“That can happen?” Mac asks, eyes somewhat wide. Her gaze darts over to Stiles as if she can’t quite comprehend it.
“Yes,” Derek says, more serious than before. “You can get bad alphas. You can get alphas that are perfectly good alphas but you just happen to not get along with.” He leans forward a little to meet her gaze. “This is one of the most important things you need to know. You always have the choice and the right to leave your alpha. You’re stronger and safer with a pack, but there are other packs. Never feel like you’re held prisoner to the one you’re in.”
Mac swallows, and she again glances to Stiles as if waiting for him to contest this or maybe make a joke, but he doesn’t. He just sits there, sipping his soda, waiting for her to acknowledge that she understands. So she nods and says, “Okay.”
Derek lets that sit for a moment to see if there’s anything else she wants to say or ask about it. He thinks about offering examples, but decides to leave that for werewolf 201. Since Mac seems content to just cuddle for the moment, he continues. “Since we’re on the subject of packs, here are the basics. We’re stronger in packs. Obviously, we’re pack animals, so it’s what we want and where we’re most content, but I mean it literally. A wolf in a pack is physically stronger, faster, and better able to heal than a lone wolf. This increases with the size of the pack and also with how close-knit the pack is. A close pack of ten might be the equal to a pack of fifteen that are only nodding friends.”
“Well, that explains a lot about you guys, then,” Veronica says. “I mean, you seem . . . really close. And also really . . . awesome.”
“We are really awesome!” Stiles says cheerfully. “But no, seriously, we are a powerful pack. Which still seems weird to me, given how it all got started, but we are.”
“What?” Derek asks, arching his eyebrows, obviously amused. “One fucked up omega, one crazy alpha, a clueless turned ‘wolf, his hunter girlfriend, whatever you want to call Lydia, and a neurotically determined human?”
“Aw, Derek, you say the sweetest things,” Stiles says, making a kissy face at him. Veronica giggles. “Oh! Yeah, that’s something else we might want to explain. Derek’s my lupa. That’s the pack position for the alpha’s mate. It’s . . . kind of a mystical thing, like a soulmate thing, just accept that and move on with your lives. But he’s not actually my boyfriend. Y’know, just in case you care. I’m straight.”
“By straight, he means that he’s screwing Erica,” Derek adds, just to put it out there, mostly for Mac, whose senses would pick up on that as soon as the rest of the pack was back. Some things needed to be explained to her. “They aren’t dating.”
“Nah, we’re just friends with benefits,” Stiles says. “Really, really awesome benefits.”
“Wait, so . . .” Veronica is staring at him. “You did all that . . . with your car . . . and Tad Duvall . . . and that thing on the beach . . . and you’re not even gay?”
“Yup,” Stiles says, grinning broadly.
“It upset Danny,” Derek states flatly. “That wasn’t acceptable.”
“Yeah, but . . . painting your car rainbow colors? Sitting in Derek’s lap down at the Java Hut?” Veronica asks.
“Hell, I’d make out with Derek at the Java Hut if it would help out one of my pack,” Stiles says with a careless shrug.
“What do I care if he sits in my lap,” Derek says. “I lay in his lap all the time.”
Veronica just shakes her head. “I know this is somehow ridiculous on top of magic and monsters, but somehow this strikes me as the craziest thing you’ve done the entire time you’ve been here.”
Stiles grins at her. “What can I say? I have to admit that part of it had nothing to do with alphas or werewolf pack dynamics or Danny. That was just me being a prick to someone who was a prick to me first. Where’s the fun in life if you can’t do things with a bang?”
Derek looks at him over Mac’s head. “How did you survive your own childhood?”
“You remember that I was like the least popular kid in school prior to the werewolf thing, right?”
“No, that was Erica,” Derek says.
“No, even Erica could’ve gotten a date sooner than me, if only by virtue of the fact that she has lady parts and I don’t.”
Mac rolls her eyes. “Well, you two certainly bicker like an old married couple. You’ve got that down.”
Derek frowns at Mac, although it’s not one of his good ones. There are no eyebrows involved. Stiles just grins even wider and says, “Yeah, we totally do. It’s because he has yet to acknowledge that I’m always right.”
“I dare you to repeat that,” Derek says, staring him down.
Stiles purses his lips. “He has yet to acknowledge that I’m right more often than I’m wrong?”
“Better,” Derek says. “I no longer feel an unstoppable urge to inform them of all the times that you were wrong.” He considers, then adds, “That I know about.”
“Eh, you can tell them,” Stiles says cheerfully. “I don’t mind. It always works out, though.”
Derek employs both the Eyeroll of Epicness and the Eyebrows of Judginess. “Like now. Thus proving his point. Even when he does something really stupid, it’ll work out because the pack will save his skinny butt.”
“Hey, isn’t that what the pack is supposed to do?” Stiles asks, smirking at him.
“Yes, and then remind you about it in the vain hope that you’ll learn better.” Derek rubs his cheek almost absently against the top of Mac’s head, as she’s still cuddled up to him. “He really is a good alpha, though. Don’t worry.”
Mac lets out a hiccupy little laugh and says, “Of all the things I was worried about, that wasn’t actually one of them.”
“What are you worried about?” Derek asks.
“I guess, just, all that stuff you see in the movies about werewolves . . . am I going to turn into some sort of monster at the full moon and try to eat people and stuff?”
Derek makes an amused noise. “How’s your temper?” he asks, but sobers almost immediately. “No. Only alphas can turn people, so you don’t have to worry about accidentally making more werewolves. We’ll teach you to control the shift so it will be voluntary by your second or third full moon. The closer we get to the full moon, the more touchy and edgy we get, short-tempered, but you’re always you. Even when you shift, you’re still you.” He gives her a few seconds to digest that. “And you won’t be alone. I don’t know what we’ll do in the future, but for now we’re here, and you won’t be alone. The others say it gets easier after the first few months. If you lose your temper or try to do something you shouldn’t while you’re still learning, we’ve got you covered. We’ll watch out for you.”
“Okay.” Mac takes a deep breath and lets it out, somewhat shakily. “Okay, I think . . . I can handle this.”
“Trust me, everyone did stupid shit their first full moon,” Stiles says dryly. “Hell, Erica still does stupid shit around the full moon, and so will Scott if he’s provoked. But according to Lydia, if you can learn to control yourself during PMS, you can learn to control yourself during the full moon.”
“Spoken like a guy who has never had PMS,” Veronica says with a snort of laughter. “According to Logan, I turn into a weapon of mass destruction at that time of the month.”
“Only then?” Mac asks.
Both Derek and Stiles let out a snort of laughter, glad that they hadn’t had to say it. Derek clears his throat and says, “I remember this one time when Laura was PMSing during the full moon, and there was this guy being a jackass to one of the other waitresses at the diner where she worked. He nearly had her in tears. Laura said she would handle him. She walked over and just stared at him. She never moved or said a word, no matter what he said to her. After a few minutes he threw a fifty dollar bill down onto the table and ran from the diner.”
Stiles reaches out somewhat absently to grip Derek’s forearm during this story, knowing it can’t be an easy one for him to tell. But he doesn’t dwell on it, saying, “Erica made sure that she uses the birth control pills to keep that from happening. Pretty sure that’s the only reason we’re all still alive.”
“Ah, Erica,” Derek says. That’s all he has, because really, what can he say about Erica.
Stiles gives him a fond smile. “Have you used up your words?”
Derek arches an eyebrow at him and nods.
“Well . . . I feel better,” Mac says. “I mean, less ready to have a freak-out. And if I do have a freak-out, it’ll be less ‘I’m a werewolf’ and more ‘my boyfriend was a psychopath’. So, uh, I guess that’s good?”
Stiles shrugs a little. “I . . . feel bad for him. I know what he did was terrible, but . . . I can’t imagine what it’s been like for him.”
Derek opens his mouth, shifts uncomfortably, and then decides that what he’s about to say is maybe better left unsaid. Stiles glances over at him, and that hand on his forearm gives another squeeze, as if to say ‘I know’.
“If . . . if he had just killed Woody . . .” Mac chokes up a little. “I don’t know, I still would’ve been angry and, and worried about him, but . . .”
A little of the tension that Derek hadn’t even realized had built up melted away at Stiles’ attention and understanding. “But Cassidy crossed a line?”
“Cassidy crossed all the lines,” Mac says, rubbing her eyes and leaning into Derek a little more heavily. “But at least he didn’t know it was me. I mean . . . that has to be worth something, right? That he didn’t realize it was me he was using as a weapon.”
“Yeah,” Derek says. “If nothing else, you know his affection for you was real,” he adds, because he hadn’t even had that. Kate had never even liked him.
“Maybe a little too real,” Mac says, clearly still creeped out that Cassidy’s idea of celebrating the death of the man who had molested him was to set up a romantic date with her. “Do you think . . . he’ll be okay, someday?”
“I don’t know, Mac,” Stiles says, reaching out to rub his hand over her hair. “I think he can be. But maybe we’ll just have to wait and see what happens.”
~ ~ ~ ~
Logan gets back to the Stilinski’s rented house at around one thirty in the morning, by which point everyone is asleep except Stiles. Mac has fallen asleep cuddled around Derek’s solid, reassuring bulk. Veronica is curled up on the cushions to her other side. Logan reports that after extensive discussion with the woman from Oblivion, the agreed-upon plan of action was to say nothing until Dick finally got around to noticing that his brother was gone. At that point, Logan would say something along the lines of, “Yeah, he’s on that semester abroad, don’t you pay attention to anything that comes out of his mouth?” Oblivion would provide all necessary documentation to back up his claims, as needed. Logan doubts any of it will actually be needed.
Stiles isn’t so sure, mostly due to Cassidy’s financial games, but as it turns out, nothing is in Cassidy’s name. Since he’s only seventeen, everything was done with him as a silent partner; his step-mother Kendall was the public face. Everything will go to her now that Cassidy is gone. Logan isn’t thrilled about that, but he doesn’t see a way around it offhand. They agree to talk about it later. Logan sprawls out next to Veronica and is sound asleep a few minutes later.
Mac is obviously tense and edgy the next day. Stiles, recalling her desire to run, decides to drive them out of town a bit. He desperately misses the preserve, which is a great place to break in new wolves. Nowhere anywhere near Neptune is as unreservedly wild. But after an hour or so in the car, they’ve left the crowded coast enough to find a place to let off some steam.
“I used to know what this sort of terrain was called,” Stiles says. “It’s like . . . sage brush desert or something.”
“Wow,” Logan says. “Let me write down that bit of crucial information before I forget it.”
Stiles flips him off and says, “Nobody invited you anyway.”
This is technically true, but Mac wanted Veronica along and Logan goes where Veronica goes. Once Mac really gets going, it doesn’t matter. Veronica and Logan are left far behind. They eventually agree to wait and have a nice picnic (Stiles having surreptitiously packed one for them while they weren’t looking). Even he has trouble keeping up with Mac, who shifts into her partial form and just runs and runs and runs.
By evening, she’s exhausted, and she falls asleep on the car ride back to Neptune. She checks in briefly with her parents but only tells them the date ‘didn’t go well’ and she and Cassidy broke up, and she’s going to spend the night at Veronica’s. Her parents sympathize and have no objection to this, which is a relief to everyone. The gears are already turning in Stiles’ head about how he’s going to manage this long-term. He needs to make some phone calls, and possibly write some checks.
He knows the pack is leaving Beacon Hills mid-morning on Sunday and are scheduled to get back just before dinner. He sets up shop in the kitchen while Derek is out back with Mac. She seems comfortable in his presence, and he starts teaching her some of the finer points of controlling her strength and her reflexes. Stiles keeps half an eye on them but is busy explaining everything that’s happened to his father, who is understandably relieved that the killer has been caught and even more relieved that Stiles was able to apprehend him without bloodshed.
His phone rings around four thirty and he glances over to see that it’s Lydia. He picks up and says, “Stilinski day care; you wake ‘em, you take ‘em.”
“Sweetie, I think the children are already awake,” Lydia says, her tart tone of voice suggesting that he may want to look in a mirror, as he’s clearly the only child around. But there’s a hint of relief to it as well. Honestly, she would be worried about him if he picked up the phone in what most people would consider a normal fashion.
“Most likely,” Stiles says. “Hey, what’s your ETA? I’ve got, like, eight meatloafs – meat loaves? Why does calling it ‘meat loaves’ somehow make it sound disgusting? – to put in the oven and – ”
“About thirty minutes,” Lydia says. “I’ll take a vote on the plural of meat loaf before we get there,” she adds, her tone a little dry, though he knows she actually will.
“Cool,” Stiles says. “So, uh, why are you calling me?” he adds with an internal wince.
Lydia decides to skip right to it. “What have you done?”
Stiles hesitates. “Am I on speaker?”
“Do you want to be?” Lydia asks.
“Yeah, put me on,” Stiles says, and once she’s done so, continues, “Okay, guys, I want you to know that I’m not trying to string you along but before I tell you what happened, for the sake of posterity, I want to hear what you’ve actually noticed and when you started noticing it.”
“We could feel the bond again a little over an hour ago,” Lydia says. “But it was just awareness of its existence at first.”
“Then things started to feel, I dunno, weird, about half an hour later,” Scott adds. “Not bad, just weird.”
“So you can feel me, and Derek,” Stiles says, wanting to clarify, “and you can feel that we’re okay, not hurt or anything, but something in general just feels off?”
“Pretty much,” Allison says, eyeing the phone. Her tone suggests that Stiles had better spill the beans immediately.
“Yeah, a lot happened,” Stiles says. “We caught the killer, it’s not my fault that we didn’t call you, we managed to de-kanima Mac and turn her into a wolf, and, well, she kind of needed an alpha . . .”
Allison sighs. So does Lydia. “So you adopted her,” the redhead says.
“No more lizard?” Danny chimes in.
“No more lizard,” Stiles confirms. Hearing the note in Lydia’s voice, sounding unsure, he says, “Look, guys, I . . . I’m really sorry. I didn’t really do it on purpose, I just . . . she needed someone and it just, it called to me. I couldn’t ignore it.”
Lydia sort of wants to forgive him already, and from the looks on the others’ faces, she’s pretty sure they agree. It’s clear that none of them like the uncertain tone that Stiles is using. But they’re only part of the pack. They’ll all have to work through this together. So she decides to skip around it for now. “We’ll talk later. How’s she doing?”
“She’s pretty shaken up,” Stiles says, “but less so by the werewolf transition and more so by the fact that Cassidy was our puppet master.”
“Cassidy?” several of the others in the car clamor.
“He didn’t know Mac was the kanima,” Stiles says. “Which makes it . . . a little better, I guess.”
“What did you do with him?” Allison asks, her voice a little thin. Although she’s obviously not pleased that he was killing people, it’s the fact that he was using Mac that makes her want to take a shot at him, even if he hadn’t known it was her.
“He got the supernatural equivalent of arrested and sentenced to ‘until he’s no longer psychotic’,” Stiles says. “Look, I’ll explain everything when you guys get back. Are . . . are you mad?”
“No,” Lydia says, after some consideration. She’s not angry, because it worked out, but she wants Stiles to think about what would have happened if it hadn’t. “But what would you have done if we didn’t like her?”
“I don’t think I would have done it, then,” Stiles says. “But if I had, I would just have to find her a local pack, somehow.”
“Okay,” Lydia relents.
Stiles lets out a breath, almost a sigh, of relief. “Who’s driving the other car? Do you know?”
“Either Boyd or Isaac,” Scott says. “They might have changed after lunch.”
“Okay. Thanks. I’ll see you guys soon.” Stiles says his goodbyes, contemplates his phone for a few moments, and then dials Erica.
Erica obviously looks at the caller ID before she answers, because she picks up with, “What’s up, hot stuff?”
“Hey, you,” Stiles says. “Wanted to know if you guys had noticed anything different about the bond since you were coming back into range. I’m doing, uh, scientific research.”
“Uh huh.” Erica sounds dubious. “Sure you are. The last time we were doing scientific research, we – ”
Her voice is suddenly muffled by a hand over her mouth, and Isaac says, “For God’s sake, don’t tell me whatever you discovered about your vagina.”
“Uh,” Boyd says. “To actually answer your question, yeah, actually. I mean, I noticed a difference, not that I want to hear about Erica’s vagina.”
“Figured,” Stiles says, with a snort of laughter. “But I figured I would warn you before you got back that we got Mac all shifted into a werewolf, and she was kind of upset, and so I may have unintentionally adopted her into the pack, and yes you have every right to be pissed at me, you can smack me around if you want.”
Erica wetly licks Isaac’s palm, and he jerks his hand away. “Eww, Erica,” he protests, and wipes his hand off on her shoulder. “Yeah, Stiles, ‘cause I’m going to be pissed at you for being nice to someone who needs it.”
“You’re the only one who doesn’t get to be pissed at me, after you invited Logan into the pack without my okay,” Stiles says, amused. “But everyone else can be pissed if they want. Mac is nice and we all like her, but it was still a serious breach of pack etiquette. Lydia already yelled at me.”
“No scary, intimidating dinner,” Erica agrees.
Stiles gives a snort. “Yeah, you were real intimidated.”
“I absolutely was, and don’t you forget it,” Erica snipes back without heat.
“I hate to ask this,” Boyd chimes in, “but what are you going to do when we all move back to Beacon Hills?”
“I’m working on that,” Stiles says. “Oh, and speaking of stuff I’m working on, I need to get dinner in the oven. I’ll see you guys soon?”
“Sure,” Erica says. “Don’t adopt anyone else while we’re gone,” she adds cheerfully, before hanging up before Stiles can unleash a witty retort.
He rolls his eyes and goes back to the meatloaf. His father watches him for a minute before saying, “Everything okay?”
“Yeah, yeah, everything’s cool,” Stiles says.
“You look deep in thought,” Stilinski says.
“Coastal sage scrub!” Stiles declares. “I remembered!”
Stilinski sighs. “Stiles, get me a beer.”
~ ~ ~ ~
Surprisingly, everything settles back to normal with relative speed. The pack welcomes Mac with just as much wolf cuddling as she wanted. Veronica and Logan get plenty of wolf cuddles, too, despite Logan’s vociferous protesting that it isn’t necessary. Veronica seems to be a little incredulous that all this is even happening. “You get used to it,” Stiles tells her.
They eat meat loaf – Mac has a grilled cheese – and drink soda and celebrate their new pack member with many toasts and then cupcakes.
At school, everything is normal. Nobody comments on Cassidy’s absence. Veronica is surprised to realize how much of a shadow Cassidy really was. She feels bad for him, despite everything, and hopes that the people at Oblivion are able to help him. Stiles just nods and says nothing when she mentions this.
Meanwhile, Sheriff Stilinski has persuaded Deputy Leo that he would make a fine sheriff. A lot of the people in Neptune are a little hesitant, given his age, but then again nobody else is trying to get the job. A lot of the rich and famous of Neptune are still so shocked at Woody Goodman’s ‘suicide’ that they don’t seem to know what to think of anything anymore. They start to prepare for the transition. Stilinski tells the pack that they’ll definitely be able to leave at the end of the semester.
Neptune works on a school year schedule more like the one in college; finals are the second week of December and then there’s a three week winter break. The pack are thrilled by this idea that they’ll be able to get a long vacation before starting back at Beacon Hills for their last semester of high school.
When Sheriff Stilinski expresses concern about what’s going to happen with Mac, Stiles just flaps a hand at him and says, “Well, I talked to Chris, who talked to this guy at GM who owed him a favor, something about taking care of . . . leprechaun? I could have misheard that . . . and he talked to some other guy about how nice Neptune is and . . . long story short, I’m taking care of it.”
“Of course you are,” Stilinski says, amused.
And three nights later, Mac comes over after dinner and says, “Stiles, how in the hell . . .?”
Stiles just greets her with a big grin. “Something good happen?”
“Uh, yeah, maybe,” Mac says. “I come home from school and my parents are like ‘let’s sit down and have a family discussion’ and suddenly my dad got this great job offer in Beacon Hills, something about managing a dealership there, like ‘oh, no big deal, there’s just this car lot waiting for some guy to come handle things’. And it’s not like my dad is great at what he does, I mean, he’s okay, he sells cars, but this is a huge promotion for him, and everyone’s acting like it’s totally normal! And my dad said he heard through the grapevine that apparently he helped a secret shopper last month – a car secret shopper, or the cousin of some guy at corporate, or something – and they were really impressed with him, and since the manager at the Beacon Hills dealership was ready to retire, they recommended him. And they know that it’s awful to make me move when I only have one semester of high school left, but hey, at least I’ll have friends there, because Beacon Hills is where those transferred students are from! What are the odds, right?”
“What are the odds, indeed?” Stiles asks.
“You are such a shit!” Mac says, laughing. “You couldn’t have warned me?”
“I could have, but it was more fun to let it be a surprise,” Stiles says. He slings an arm around her shoulders. “So what did you tell them?”
“That I didn’t mind moving because I had never been a big fan of Neptune anyway. And that I wouldn’t mind getting away from the memories. You know. Cassidy.”
“All of which is true,” Stiles says, “so it all works out.”
Mac just shakes her head at him, then turns to the rest of the pack and says, “Is he always like this? Just ‘oh, it all works out’ despite everything?”
“Pretty much,” Derek says, his voice and face sour. Stiles just gives him the usual innocent smile.
The next day at school, Veronica punches Stiles in the shoulder. “You stole my friend, jerk.”
“Guilty,” Stiles says. “I didn’t see any other way. We couldn’t just leave her omega.”
“You still suck,” Veronica says.
“You’ll just have to come visit,” Stiles says.
Veronica makes a face at him, but then reaches out and grabs his hand. He laughs and swings their arms back and forth as they walk down the hallway. “I’m really glad you came here,” Veronica says after a few moments.
Stiles just smiles at her. “Me, too.”
~ ~ ~ ~