Chapter Text
Derek Hale met Stiles Stilinski on a Monday.
Derek Hale saved Stiles’s life on a Tuesday.
Derek Hale figured out that Stiles was his anchor on a Wednesday.
Derek Hale kissed Stiles for the first time on a Thursday.
Derek Hale realized he was in love with Stiles on a Friday.
Derek Hale bonded with Stiles on a Saturday.
Derek Hale lost Stiles Stilinski on a Sunday.
-----
Under the protective glow of the full moon, the whole pack – Derek’s pack – was gathered out in the preserve behind the renovated Hale house. The weather was perfect, chilly for a human but ideal for a werewolf. Laughter tinkled out, mixed with playful growls and excited murmurs. It was the first time the whole pack had gathered with their alpha for the full moon in months, so everyone was more relaxed than usual. The atmosphere was light and comfortable and –
Happy. It was happy. Derek hadn’t felt this content in a long time. Not since… Not since losing him. Stiles.
Derek sighed and lifted the wolfsbane-laced beer up to his lips, taking a small sip. He leaned back further into the tree he had claimed at the beginning of the night and surveyed the scene in front of him. He saw Scott wrapped around Kira, their fingers interlocked and their eyes only for each other. He saw Lydia roll her eyes fondly at Jackson’s antics and talking animatedly with Erica, whose eyes were, for once, not red-rimmed with tears. He saw Cora and Isaac pretending not to watch each other and comically failing. He saw Malia in her coyote form, chasing Boyd around with excited yips.
The pack had found a way to cope with losing Stiles – each in their own way. Scott had gotten a second tattoo to honor his fallen best friend. Lydia had locked herself in her room for three straight months, before finally emerging, with tear-stained cheeks, with a proven mathematical theorem in her hands. She dedicated her Fields medal to Stiles. Isaac pretended to be unaffected, yet Derek caught the younger wolf’s fresh scent around Stiles’ grave every single night for an entire month after it happened. Erica holed herself up in the local comic book store and read all available editions featuring Batman and Catwoman. She said it helped her feel closer to the lost boy. Boyd got Stiles’ bat encased in a glass display and hung it in the Hale house den.
The others all found their own way to cope.
But not Derek. Derek still mourned Stiles’ loss. He still mourned the death of his mate.
-----
Derek closed his eyes at the swift stab of pain that pierced his heart at the thought of Stiles. Who was he kidding – Stiles was always on his mind. He was always in pain. But sometimes… sometimes it was harder than others. Because looking at the pack in front of him, the pack Stiles had worked so hard to form, he couldn’t help thinking –
Stiles would have loved this.
The younger man was the bravest, most loyal and devoted person Derek had ever met. He was fiercely protective of those he loved and he loved the pack. He loved being able to help in all the way he could – with his Spark, with his research skills, with his cooking, with everything he had in his soul.
He would have loved to have been here, under the full moon, with the pack happy and safe. He would have stood beside Derek, fingers threaded together and his body leaning against the werewolf. He would sigh wistfully and look up into Derek’s eyes. He wouldn’t have had to say anything – his bright amber eyes shone with the love he felt and spoke more volumes than words ever could.
Derek almost bent in half at the pain that consumed him. Stiles wasn’t there with him, by his side like he always used to be. Stiles was gone, gone. Derek stifled a sob, wary of letting any of his betas hear his bone-deep, teeth-rattling sorrow. They were finally in a place where they could stitch themselves back together. He refused to be the reason to drag them back into the darkness that had consumed the entire pack after Stiles’s death.
They coped with losing their emissary, their friend, the person who kept the entire pack together. It wasn’t their fault that Derek couldn’t do the same.
-----
Stiles and Derek’s coming together was slow and hard and oftentimes frustrating, but once they finally got their heads out of their assess and acted on the feelings that had slowly but surely been building for years, it felt like the most natural thing in the world. Derek felt like, for the first time in his life after the fire, he could breathe.
Stiles was always there. It was as amazing as it was annoying. He never left Derek. Not when the alpha was going through his asshole phase, not when Derek snarled and threatened him, not when Derek was pushing him away “for his own good”. He kept coming back every time Derek pushed him out the door. And if Derek locked himself away, Stiles would slide down against a wall, leaning back against it for the entire night, not saying anything, not pushing Derek, just being there.
And it was the best thing Stiles could have done for him. Derek was terrified, so freaking terrified of messing up, of doing something so unforgivable that Stiles would walk away from him. So he reacted by pushing the younger man away before he could do that, before Stiles could hurt him. But Stiles had none of that. He was patient and devoted and so fucking good. Derek couldn’t help but fall for him. It was as natural as breathing.
When Derek first kissed him, it was in the middle of Stiles animatedly explaining something he had spent the night researching, hands flailing around with his wild gestures. His eyes were shining and his lips inviting and Derek hungered. So he kissed him, all the while afraid that Stiles would push him away.
But he didn’t. Instead, the spark sighed and smiled against the werewolf’s lips, sinking into the kiss like he didn’t want to be anywhere else, like this was exactly where he belonged. “Finally,” he had murmured against Derek’s lips.
Stiles was always there for him. Until – Until the day he wasn’t.
-----
It was a group of rogue hunters. One day Beacon Hills was quiet and safe and the next, it was swarming with people out for blood. Stiles spent many sleepless nights trying to come up with a way for all of them to survive the impeding encounter. The sudden arrival of the hunters had taken them by surprise and the spark worked tirelessly to find a way to protect himself and his pack.
On the night of the fight, the pack had underestimated the number of hunters and ended up surrounded, taking fire and arrows from all directions. Everyone was fighting for their life, ducking arrows and side-stepping bullets, claws swiping and Lydia’s banshee screams echoing in their ears, Stiles’s bright sparks flying left and right.
They were going to lose.
Derek could feel the despair claw at his throat even as his eyes bled alpha-red and his body never stopped fighting. They were going to lose and damnit, damnit, it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t enough time. He still wanted more, more time reconnecting with his sister and cousin, more time reconciling with Peter, more time teaching his betas, more time to help people as a Sheriff’s deputy, more time with Stiles.
He hadn’t had enough and it wasn’t fair.
And so he roared. He roared from the deepest, darkest parts of his being and its force made the hunters surrounding them fly in the air, eventually landing in a knocked out heap. He roared and protected his pack.
But he missed one.
A hunter up in the trees saw his last opportunity to take out the alpha. He nocked an arrow to his bow, aimed at Derek’s heart, and released.
It happened so fast. One second, Derek was frozen, unable to do anything but stare wide-eyed at the arrow whizzing towards him. He knew he would die, he knew, and all he could think was At least the pack would be safe.
But then –
Stiles came out of nowhere, hurling his body towards Derek’s and knocking the alpha out of the way of the arrow. The impact to the ground rattled Derek’s teeth and made him see stars for a moment. In the seconds it took him to shake his head to dispel the confusion and turn his head to look at the place he had been standing in only a moment before, he could hear the shuddering gasps and horrified screams from his betas.
Derek wanted to scream himself.
Because lying down on the ground, in the same exact spot where Derek had been standing, was Stiles – with an arrow sticking out of his chest.
“No no no no,” Derek kept muttering, praying, pleading, as he crawled on all fours to reach Stiles. The spark was breathing rapidly, eyes dimming by the second, those amber orbs that captured Derek’s heart in a vice-like grip and never let go.
Derek gathered his mate in his arms, eyes brimming over with tears as anguished sobs ripped out of his chest.
“Stiles, Stiles baby, no, no please, please don’t go, please don’t leave me, please.”
“Shh, shh it’s okay, it’s okay Derek,” Stiles gripped Derek’s hand, his strength surprising the werewolf even as he gripped back twice as hard.
He tried to drain his mate’s pain but it didn’t work. Stiles smiled sadly at him and whispered, “It doesn’t hurt.”
“No no no,” Derek cried. “Why, why did you push me out of the way? It’s not supposed to be you, it was never supposed to be you.”
Derek tried to deny that Stiles was dying, but he could hear the spark’s heart slowing down, he could smell the scent of impeding death in the air. It fractured his heart in two.
“I love you,” Stiles replied simply.
Derek’s hands grappled at the wound, trying to staunch the flow of blood, trying anything. But there was just so much blood.
He heard a distant roaring in his ears, but didn’t look up to see which one of the betas had let it out. He didn’t dare take his eyes off of Stiles.
“Please,” Derek begged, his voice breaking. “Please don’t leave me.”
“Derek, Derek,” Stiles crooned, voice wet and rough yet still strong. “Listen to me, this is not your fault, okay?”
Derek shook his head frantically, panic clawing up his throat. He couldn’t lose Stiles. He couldn’t lose Stiles.
He leaned down and joined their lips together in a petrified, pleading kiss.
“I love you,” Stiles whispered against the werewolf’s lips, his grip on Derek’s hand slackening.
“I love you,” Derek sobbed, tears clogging up his throat. “I love you I love you I love you.”
The last thing he felt was Stiles’s smile against his lips.
-----
Derek gave himself one week. Just one week to lock himself away from the world and mourn. One week, then he packed his bags, left a brief, curt note for the pack letting them know that he was going to leave, got into his car and drove away.
The alpha went to every single source he could think of. He went to the darkest, grimiest nooks and crannies. He went to witches, shamans, psychics, voodoo priests, even a fucking necromancer. He pulled strings to get meetings, went to the shadiest parts of various towns, travelled long and far.
He asked them all one question: Can you bring someone back from the dead?
Some kicked him out on the spot, refusing to dabble in “dark magic”. Others got a faraway look in their eyes, as if they were remembering something quite unpleasant. Those were the ones who got his hopes up, only to crush them again when they shook their heads and said that it couldn’t be done.
Every person he asked, desperation lacing his voice and pain shining from his eyes, gave him the same answer: Bringing back the dead was dark magic with severe consequences. No one in their right mind would ever attempt it.
But the alpha wasn’t in his right mind.
His last hope was the necromancer, a dangerous and ill-reputed creature. He had to pull every last string he had to even get a meeting, but Derek was willing to do whatever it took to get his mate back. He didn’t care if he burned bridges or invited danger. Stiles was the only thing that mattered.
Ironically, it was the necromancer who finally convinced the alpha to give up his foolish plan to bring back the dead.
He told Derek that it could be done. The dead can be raised. But the price was high and oftentimes worse than losing a loved one in the first place. Derek shook his head and shoved a duffle bag of money at the necromancer, growling out a “do it”.
To his surprise, the necromancer smiled sadly and shook his head. He pushed the duffle bag back towards the alpha and leaned forward, elbows resting on the grimy table and fingers interlocked.
“I can raise your mate from the dead, Alpha Hale,” he had said. “I can bring back his body. But I cannot bring back his soul. He would be the shell of the man you once knew and loved.”
Derek had sat there, horrified. He thought about it, about how it would feel to see Stiles again, alive and vibrant and real. But then… Then he realized that he couldn’t do that. Because having a pale shadow of the person Stiles used to be, of his vibrant, intelligent, loving soul, would have been the cruelest punishment of all.
So Derek walked away from the necromancer and didn’t look back.
He walked away and went back home.
-----
The first stop he made when he landed back in Beacon Hills was head towards the Sheriff’s house. Derek sat in his Camaro in the driveway of Stiles’s childhood home for a long time, working up the courage to exit the car and go up to the door.
When he finally did, he waited anxiously for the Sheriff to answer. He could hear the older man’s heartbeat growing steadily closer until finally, the door swung open.
The sheriff looked terrible. His eyes were red-rimmed, his shirt smelled stale, as if it hadn’t been changed in a while, and his stance was that of a defeated man.
That day, Derek convinced Sheriff Stilinski to move in to the Hale house. He refused to leave Stiles’s father alone for another minute. Stiles would have wanted Derek to take care of Noah, and the alpha was ashamed that it had taken him this long to reach out to the sheriff.
He silently helped the sheriff pack a few essential belongings, then the two men got into Derek’s car and drove away from the house that held too many painful memories of the man they both loved.