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Derek grew up watching Stiles sing. The boy was talented, he could give him that. Ever since his mother had received the boy--just barely a man--as a gift from the polish mafia, his antics had entertained the Hales many a night between stressful meetings and high-stakes dinners. Somehow, even when they had the most intimidating dinner guests, Stiles always managed to charm them. Derek had listened to the boy back when they were around ten and the Greenpoint Crew, a crime group from Brooklyn made up entirely of polish immigrants and their families, visited his family. Stiles would entertain them, delighting both families. The Greenpoint Crew was known for their ruthlessness, and to improve relations with the Hale crime family after a particularly sour weapons deal they gifted the Hale family with Stiles.
Other than entertainment, Stiles didn’t have much of a use, or at least none that Derek had ever seen. On any normal day he was often seen walking around the grounds with his lute strapped to his back or his cello in hand, laughing gaily with whomever he decided to keep company with that day. Derek often saw his mother and father in Stiles’s presence, and his sisters were quite fond of him as well. Derek, however, always felt that there was something off about the musician. He always smiled too sharp and spoke too loud, like he was daring eavesdroppers to listen in.
Also, he incessantly flirted with Derek, but that was more uncomfortable and annoying than unsettling. As one of the only available direct sons in the Hale crime family, Derek was highly sought after by other crime families, and many dinners were full of unwanted advances and flirtatious banter. So he was used to it. But the way Stiles did it...it felt different. And it was almost constant. Derek received winks, smirks, and lingering touches from the young man. It was weird.
As a gift, Stiles was technically not a member of Cosa Nostra, but he was a prized associate. The Hale crime family had many associates and soldatos due to the fact that his mother had a soft spot for strays. Their soldato ranks were full of half-italians, street urchins that his aunts and uncles found on abandoned corners and working in shopping centers. That was how they got Isaac, their westside head soldato, who enjoyed a position right under his mom. Isaac was half-Italian on his father’s side (the requirement for becoming a made man) and ruthless. Derek’s mother was always checked out by him at the grocery store, and she began to notice the fresh and yellowing bruises all over his body. She had taken to him immediately, seen the fire in his eyes, and now Isaac was part of their family forever, a made man until he died.
That was how the Hale crime family had continued to expand, even in this time of technologically enhanced police forces and FBI infiltrators. Their inherent talent of picking out strays that were so grateful that they wouldn’t even consider betrayal had only made them stronger. Well, that and their cover businesses. They had five main businesses: a consulting firm, a restaurant, a dry cleaning place, a flower shop, and a “hired help” business for bodyguards. Being in California left them with lots of business and options, and their far reach made them one of the strongest crime families on the west coast. Compared to the east coast they were fairly insignificant, but they more than held their own against the local families like the Argents and the Casanovas. There was a time back when Derek’s grandfather, who was their Don, was a mere soldato and the other crime families were threatening to their cosa nostra, but that time had long passed.
1 - “All Your Fingers”
But back to Stiles. He was currently taking up all of Derek’s attention, as he was nimbly playing his lute and singing a simple tune, filling the room with his swelling voice. The Argents, who were visiting, were lulled by his sweet music. They didn’t even flaunt their weapons like they did their previous visit, they were so distracted by it. Well, most of them were distracted by the music. The young Argent girl was distracted by Scott’s constant glances at her, his smile making her blush. Derek noticed that his mom saw it, too, and her face twisted in the odd way it did when she was getting an idea.
Stiles seemed to notice both of those things, too, as he started playing “My Heart Will Go On,” making Allison blush an even darker shade of pink. Derek’s mother just got a larger gleam in her eye and continued talking with one of the Argent family caporegimes. Not many Argents were present in their family home, as big gatherings seemed to garner too much police attention, but there were enough there to smooth over business deals that Derek wasn’t privy to. His attendance was merely precautionary, proving to the Argents that the Hale bloodline was still strong and not to be messed with.
Stiles finished his rendition, then bowed to his audience. Taking a sip of water, he stepped softly off of the tiny makeshift stage he had created for himself out of an overturned turnip crate and glided out of the room. “Derek,” Erica was suddenly behind him, placing a gentle hand on his back. “Your mother suggested that you make sure Stiles gets to his rooms alright. He ended his set quite abruptly, she thinks he might have seen something that upset him.”
Derek furrowed his brow, first wondering why he had to do it, then imagining what could have scared Stiles enough to make him end his set prematurely. He didn’t even look back at Erica, just slowly stood, nodded to his table, and pushed himself away. He didn't take his eyes off of the doorway Stiles had disappeared through as he stepped through it, steel-toed shoes clicking impressively along the dark wooden floors of the hallway. He didn’t have to go far before he heard some quiet voices down a nearby hallway, and Derek stopped abruptly, listening in to see if it was Stiles.
“Look, baby. I didn’t mean anything by it!” A slightly familiar voice soothed, chuckling a bit.
It sounded like a couple. Derek turned and was about to continue down the hall when he heard a familiar tenor.
“Yeah, I’m sure you didn’t, Matt.” Stiles spit the other man’s name like venom from his mouth, and Derek stilled at the sharpness.
“I was just complimenting you on your performance. No need to get mad,” Matt seemed unconcerned with Stiles’s tone, and Derek could imagine Matt stepping closer. He knew that Matt was another soldato, under a different caporegime than Talia...if he remembered correctly, Matt reported to Deucalion. Derek looked around the corner of the doorway to see the two in an almost compromising position: Matt had his hands planted firmly on Stiles’s hips, but Stiles himself was leaning backwards, looking as if he was ready to back handspring out of Matt’s grip if not for the lute still gripped firmly in his own fist. Derek knew how much one of those things must cost. He wouldn’t risk harming it either.
“I’m not mad. I’m pissed off that you’re still so close to me after I said no.” Stiles spit through his teeth, but the other man still wasn’t getting the message. He leaned forward even more.
“Seriously, with lips like yours, who can blame me? Come on, just a quickie in your bed.” Matt’s grip tightened and he pulled Stiles forcefully towards him. “No one needs to know except you...and me.” Derek stepped closer, opening his mouth to speak, when he stopped cold. Before, Stiles’s eyes were annoyed little slits, his eyebrows dancing on his face and his mouth in a tight line. But after Matt grabbed him, something in him just...snapped.
His eyes went black, his mouth slack in a lazy grin. He had one hand on Matt’s junk while the other still grasped his lute tightly. Derek watched as Stiles squeezed a little too hard, making Matt whimper, before he switched the placement of his hand to Matt’s own. Before Derek even knew what was happening, two sharp cracks tore through the tense silence of the room, and Matt moaned in pain. Stiles had literally broken two of his fingers with one hand incapacitated. Stiles gently pressed one of the newly-broken fingers further back on Matt’s palm, making him sweat profusely.
“Pretty hands,” Stiles observed with no change to the expression on his face. “I’m sure you need these to do your soldato business.” He quickly applied pressure to the finger he had broken, and Matt yelped. “You should consider yourself lucky. You still have all your fingers.” Stiles hummed a little, as if contemplating. “That can easily be fixed.”
Derek felt a little pale as he watched the blood drain from Matt’s face. “Apologize, and I’ll let you go about your day,” Stiles offered, eyes still black as a moonless night. Matt screamed in panic without making a noise, and took a few shaky breaths through his nose.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered.
“Oh, what was that? I would hate to mishear you. Your fingers would also be loathe to forget it.”
Matt whimpered. “I’m sorry!” He whined, shuffling his feet.
Stiles hummed, lips frozen in a small, pleasant smile. “Are you sure? I’m not sure I believe you.” Derek watched as Stiles bent Matt’s finger back until it was resting against the back of his hand.
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” Matt sobbed, staring wide-eyed at his hand.
Stiles released the pressure, but kept hold of Matt’s hand. “I think your hand will think twice before touching someone else without their permission again.” He threw the hand down, and Matt immediately scrambled from the room, brushing past Derek as if he didn’t exist.
When Derek looked back at where Stiles was, not sure what he was going to do or say, the boy was gone.
2 - “My new tie”
“Welcome to the assignment, Hale,” Erica said sarcastically. Boyd silently held out his fist for a bump, and Derek gratefully pressed his fist against Boyd’s. It wasn’t like it was his fault that he was usually prettied up for social events rather than out collecting. Derek heard a familiar laugh and caught sight of Stiles leaning on the front counter of the flower shop, a lily tickling his hair.
“What’s Stilinski doing here?” Derek asked, buttoning the cuffs on his crisp shirt. It was brand new and made him feel prepared for anything.
Cora smirked. “We need him.”
Derek looked at her quizzically. “Why?”
She laughed. “Oh, big bro. You have so much to learn.”
Stiles sauntered over to them, grinning. “I’ll be in the back. Mind clearing for me?” He raised his eyebrows at the browsing customers that were still hanging around near the end of the day. Then he turned around and walked to the back of the shop, disappearing behind a door covered in vines.
Erica looked around. “You heard the man. Let’s put on our customer service faces.”
“Do you really believe that?” The young woman looked at Derek with a single eyebrow raised.
Derek was internally screaming, but he forced a tight smile to his face. “Yes, the posies look like your inner...aura.”
She carefully considered that flowers, which were her fifth choice in the last half hour. She snorted. “Either your aura-reading is off, or I’m a complete and utter pussy.” She rolled her eyes. “Thanks anyway,” she said in a way that didn’t actually relay any thanks, then promptly walked out of the shop.
“Good job,” Cora patted Derek on the back, and he groaned.
“That was my personal hell.”
“It’s customer service, what do you expect?” Cora asked. Derek looked around and noticed that Boyd and Isaac were just standing around, looking bored.
“Why are there so many of us here?” Derek asked. “They only needed a few.”
Cora smiled. “You, me, and Isaac need to be groomed further. Gotta get to know the shops, the techniques. And we get to see more torture. God, it’s so cool.”
Derek rolled his eyes at his semi-psychopathic sister.
Erica was ushering her last customer, who had a handful of reeds, out the door. Once they left she flipped the lock on the door and turned around. “Talk about customers from hell.” She grinned. “Let’s join Stiles, shall we?”
She led the way to the back room, rapping lightly on the door and waiting to hear Stiles’s sing-songy, “Come in!” before entering.
Derek was immediately hit with the smell of burning flesh, and he swallowed just in time to halt his gag reflex. He tried to make it seem like he was just clearing his throat, but Cora sent him an evil smirk that meant that he wasn’t as subtle as he hoped he was.
The room was small, just big enough for the five of them to circle around the center, where Stiles was sitting in the lap of a man who was bound to a plastic garden chair. The man had burn marks all over his temples, and Stiles had a small, pen-like device clutched in his right hand.
“Now sweetheart, this would be so much easier if you just told me who tipped you off,” Stiles said in a sickly sweet voice. The man just glared, and Stiles sighed loudly. “Fine.” He stood and pressed the pen-like device onto the man’s cheek, then pressed a button on it that made a buzzing noise. The man screamed through his gag, a tear leaking out of his eye as his whole body clenched up.
Stiles stood and smiled pleasantly at the man in question. Derek shivered. “I do want to tell you, love, that I can do this forever. The burning does not allow for any bleeding out, but does account for all the pain a knife does.” Stiles advanced back onto him, pen outstretched. “And this is one of the best kinds of tools for a second run around.” He pressed the tool back into a previous burn mark, and the man sobbed into the gag as his skin smoked.
“I’ll ask you again,” Stiles said sweetly, “Who tipped you off?” He ripped the gag from the man’s mouth.
“Go to hell,” he spat, and Stiles promptly gagged him again.
“Oh well,” he sighed. “I guess the burning wasn’t enough for you.” Stiles returned to his little side table and picked up a small plastic box and a metal rod. Derek watched with curiosity as Stiles took a tiny metal blade from the plastic box and attached it to the metal rod, creating a newly-sharpened scalpel.
“I like to clean my supplies well,” Stiles said. “You never know when you need them for a friend. Now i believe that you are the opposite, but bringing different sets of the same instruments is so cumbersome, wouldn’t you say?”
Stiles hummed softly, making his way back to the chair. He took his fingers and gently moved them along the other man’s left arm, fingering the skin lightly. Derek shivered again, but this time because he could only imagine the way Stiles’s fingertips felt when they were brushing your skin….
He shook his head and watched as Stiles’s fingers stopped. The grin on his face was unsettling. “Did you know,” Stiles began, “That the reason cuts to arteries are so deadly is because of the intense pressure? Your blood is flowing so fast through them because of the power of your heart that they are incredibly pressurized, and any cut results in what many call a spurt of blood.” Stiles tightened the blade by snapping it into place, and the man winced.
“One of my favorites is the brachial artery. It’s right here,” Stiles tapped a finger on the man’s arm where he had been touching it before, “and it leads to the radial and ulnar arteries. That’s a lot of blood, my friend. The brachial artery is the one we use most of the time for measuring blood pressure. But I like it because you can watch yourself bleed.” Stiles pressed the blade of the scalpel gently to the man’s arm, drawing a few drops of blood. “It takes anywhere from five to sixty minutes to bleed out from a brachial wound. But don’t worry, we’ll make sure your suffering continues longer.”
Derek didn’t even have time to blink before Stiles plunged the scalpel deeper into the man’s arm. His screams were palpable in the room, but Stiles didn’t hesitate. He actually increased in speed, skinning a bit of the man’s arm so they could all get a good look at the artery. It spurted just as Stiles described, and a bit of it flew wildly onto Stiles, splattering his front a little.
“How unfortunate. You got blood on my new tie.” Stiles looked down at his light blue tie, now donning deep red splotches. “How about we fix you up so that doesn’t happen again?” Stiles put down the scalpel and grabbed his pen instrument again.
Derek closed his eyes to try and block out the tortured screams of the man.
It didn’t work.
3 - “The only way out”
After breakfast, Talia had ordered Derek and his siblings into their rooms, yelling at them not to come down until she told them they could. They knew something serious was up, especially since a lot of the caporegimes were gathered downstairs. On principle, they usually didn't have more than two caporegimes together at the same time, as to avoid police suspicion. Derek was usually fine with obeying his mom’s orders, especially if it meant not getting too involved. But...well...that kind of changed when he heard Stiles’s voice.
“What do you suggest?” Stiles was saying downstairs. Derek felt like a child as he lay with his ear pressed against the air vent in his floor, but Stiles’s voice was clear, if not a bit tinny through the vents.
“There will be no second chances today,” Derek heard his uncle’s voice, cool and hard as a glass lake.
Derek could imagine Stiles’s curt nod, his mouth twisted in a grimace as he walked out of the room. He followed the footsteps to what was most likely the dining room. “You understand why we’re asking this of you?” His mother’s voice filtered through the vent.
“There can be no way to trace this back to a made man,” Stiles responded, and his voice had a numbing quality to it.
“The only reason he’s doing it here is because we have a draining room,” a voice from behind Derek said, and he jumped before scrambling to his feet as fast as he could. Laura stood in his doorway, a smirk on her face. “I have a much better viewpoint from where I am,” she said, then walked out of his room. Derek figured that that was his cue to follow her, so he did as quietly as he could.
They used the back stairway in their home, following it all the way to the basement. Laura put a finger to her lips and beckoned him to a locked room that had a small window near the bottom and the top. Derek had noticed the room before, but the light had always been off and it was indefinitely locked. Apparently not to Stiles. Laura crouched to see through the bottom window, and Derek followed suit.
Inside, it was painted a light blue, and plastic covered all the walls and floors. A woman -- one Derek vaguely recognized as Kali, one of Deucalion’s crew -- was kneeling on the plastic-covered concrete floor, fear written all over her face. Stiles was standing above her, wearing long pants and a long-sleeved shirt, gloves, and booties. He had on a surgical hair net, and his eyes were colder than Derek had ever seen them before.
“Kali. You are kneeling here before me today to ask for mercy. I am here to tell you that it will not be granted.”
“Please--” she choked out, and Stiles turned towards her sharply.
“You have lost your right to speak,” Stiles’s voice was harsh. He paused, staring down at Kali with hate in his eyes. Derek got goosebumps.
“Do you remember the first day we met?” Stiles asked conversationally, turning his face away from the window. “You were working the streets. You were nothing. Worthless to even yourself. You were about to end your own life instead of fight. And then I found you, and I took pity on you. I took that gun from your mouth and walked you home.
“Later, you were approached by one of our caporegimes, Deucalion. It was his lapse in judgement that allowed you into our ranks. And rest assured, he is being punished for his misstep as we speak.” Derek and Laura shared a glance. They hadn’t known that.
“Your betrayal is one that cuts me deeper than I care to admit,” Stiles said, still not looking at her. “And it brings me no joy to end the life of the girl I saw on the streets.” He approached her quickly. “Lucky for me that the woman standing in front of me isn’t the same person.
“I recall that I was the one who gave you your ‘Welcome-to-the-mob’ speech. Do you have any remembrance of what I said to you?” He stepped closer, than turned away in disgust. He pulled out a gun with a thin silencer on it, then turned back to Kali, who had tears running freely down her face.
“Please,” she whimpered again.
“I told you when you joined. The only way out is in a body bag.”
Derek closed his eyes, but it didn’t stop the thump of Kali’s body hitting the floor from replaying over and over in his dreams.
4 - “If it helps you relax”
"Hands up, don't move."
Derek immediately shot his hands up into the air, his face heating up and his palms sweating even more profusely than they were a few seconds before. He felt the cool barrel of a gun press into his back, and he cursed his sisters for making him stay outside alone. Erica was supposed to be out there somewhere, but she would be too far away to help him out of this particular situation.
"Pat him down," the voice commanded, and obedient hands obeyed, groping Derek from neck to toe. They found his gun and one of his knives, but didn't remove his underwear to find the other knife that he had on him. "We're gonna have a good time with you, pretty boy." The voice was cruel and male, no one Derek recognized. But that wasn't much of a surprise. Lots of gangs were involved in that particular drug deal that was going down, and any of them could have seen an opportunity to grab a Hale. Personally, Derek thought that it was a big risk for them to take, and even through his debilitating fear he had to commend them for it.
Derek was wrestled through a doorway somewhere down an alley, but the world was getting fuzzier and fuzzier, and he realized that he had been drugged. And when had they put that rag over his mouth? The rag disappeared, and he tried to open his mouth to speak, but it felt like he was trying to speak through a mouthful of cotton. His fingers and face felt numb, and when his head rolled towards his chest he was surprised to see that his legs were still moving as he was jostled forward.
Hah. Funny word, jostled. Jostled. Jostled. Jostled. How was that even spelled? Did it have a g?
“Shut up,” one of the guys said, pushing him forward roughly. Oh. shit. Had he been saying that out loud? “Shut up,” the guy said again. Shit!
He tried to turn his brain off, imagining himself reaching for a string to click off the light. But the string was too high and too short, and he couldn’t even get it if he jumped. He kept jumping, desperate to turn his brain off. He was still jumping when he heard a familiar voice behind him.
“Only you, Derek.”
He turned around quickly, imaginary string forgotten, to see… “Stiles!” He said, a wide grin stretching so far across his face that he thought it might split.
“Hey, big guy,” Stiles said, that trademarked lazy smile on his face. Was he a lazy boy? No, not a chair. A boy. A man. A killer. Stiles laughed. “That’s a great introduction.”
“Shut up,” the dude holding Derek said, and he aimed his gun at the lithe boy.
Stiles laughed, and Derek realized that the rest of them were also showing Stiles the barrels of their guns. Ha! As if Stiles actually cared.
“Hands in the air, pretty boy,” another guy called out.
“I don’t think so,” Stiles said, beginning to pace. “And please, point your guns at me if it helps you relax,” he said sarcastically.
Derek didn’t even have time to blink before five shots rang out, blasting noise into his eardrums like a train blasts through a tunnel. “Holy shit, trains,” Derek moaned, and was met with Stiles’s laughter. His beautiful, joyus laughter. He felt an arm drape across his shoulder.
“Dude, you are so high right now, aren’t you?”
Derek frowned. “High? No, no I’m druggied. Dragged. Dregged. Drug,” he sang out, earning another beautiful laugh from his beautiful Stiles.
“C’mon, big guy. I think it’s time for you to go to bed.”
Derek really liked the sound of that. Especially if Stiles was going to be there.
5 - “I’m not saying you can’t”
Derek saw himself as someone who was scared pretty easily. And in his line of work, he had plenty of chances to be scared; ones that he took advantage of copiously. He was used to the feeling of his heart beating out of his chest, of his palms slick with sweat, of his rapid breathing that his therapist has taught him breathing exercises to calm him down and keep him from hyperventilating.
But three hours ago, they had received the news that the Argents had captured Stiles and were planning to kill him. Derek had never been more scared in his life.
He wasn’t really sure when he fell in love with Stiles. It wasn’t slow, it was like skydiving headfirst into an active volcano, and the resulting eruption was leaving him drowning in molten lava. And without Stiles here to dig him out ...well, he was going to become a mummy.
They had been painstakingly looking for him, since the Argents had gone radio silent after their initial message, delivered in blood on a thick piece of parchment paper. Derek wasn’t entirely sure of their intentions, but by the look in his mother’s eyes and the panic in everyone’s step, he knew that if they didn’t find him, it was unlikely that Stiles would survive this ordeal.
His mother, once again, had confined him to his room. But when Laura once again stood in front of his doorway, this time twirling the keys to the camaro on her finger, he immediately followed her.
“I got a tip,” was all she said. Derek noticed the blood smeared on the corner of her blue shirt, and decided it was best not to ask.
“Where is he?” He asked, leg bouncing in the passenger seat. His eyes were searching the blurring landscape out the window.
“There’s a butcher shop not far from here. The argents have been channelling money through it for decades, under everyone’s noses. It isn’t one of their known front businesses.”
They sat in silence for the rest of the way. Laura parked the camaro in a dimly-lit alleyway. Derek followed her down the alley, and she handed him cool metal. A gun. “Be ready. Keep the safety off, and be ready to shoot to kill. They aren’t going to show Stiles any mercy, so we will return the sentiment.”
Derek shuddered, holding the gun in his hands. But the longer he looked at it, the angrier he got at the Argents for taking Stiles. He felt a hot rage that he had never experienced before, and he swallowed his fear successfully for the first time in his life. Laura stopped in front of a metal door in the alley, inclining her head. This was it. She held up her gun questioningly, and Derek nodded grimly in response. She counted down to one on her fingers and burst through the door, gun raised.
Inside was Stiles, very poorly guarded and tied to a radiator. Barbed wire was tied around his legs, and blood trickled copiously to join the large puddle on the floor that he was sitting in. He had a purpling bruise that seemed to cover the entire left side of his face, and his eyes were murderously glinting at a man standing above him. The man had almost no hair, was stooping with arthritis and age, and had a snarled grin overtaking his face.
Derek’s brain helpfully supplied him with a name. Gerard Argent.
Laura pounced, pressing the barrel of the gun to Gerard’s temple. Derek immediately went to Stiles, producing wire cutters from his utility belt (who looked dumb now, Cora?) and snipping the barbed wire. Stiles looked relieved, letting his head fall on Derek’s shoulder as he cut.
“You found me,” he breathed out, voice hoarse.
“Laura did most of the work, I just tagged along,” Derek said casually, cutting the last of the wire to free Stiles.
“Thank you,” Stiles said sincerely, looking into Derek’s eyes. Derek fell into them, lost until Laura cleared her throat.
“I think it’s time to take care of this bastard,” she said lightly, throwing Gerard on the floor and clicking her gun, advancing on him aggressively.
“No!” Stiles yelled, and the abruptivity of it made Laura stop dead in her tracks.
“You don’t want me to kill him?” She was looking at Stiles as if he had something wrong with him. Which , derek had to concede, was the response he was having to.
“I’m not saying you can’t kill him,” Stiles said, “I’m just saying you can’t kill him here.” He turned to look at Gerard, who was now at his feet. He casually pulled his foot back and kicked the man in the ribs. He moaned. “I think he deserves a public execution.”
Laura clapped delightedly. “I love making examples of people!”
Stiles smiled and threw his arm around derek’s shoulder. “Now, I don’t think I can walk out of here. Mind carrying me, my knight in shining armor?” Derek rolled his eyes, but hoisted Stiles up, bridal style. He had a feeling he would do anything Stiles asked.
And when he was rewarded with a kiss a few seconds later, he knew he would do anything Stiles asked.
+1 - “They wouldn’t dare.”
Derek walked slowly along the tile floor, letting his heels click deliberately with every step. Heel, toe, heel, toe. Click-click, Click-click. It seemed to have the effect he meant it to, and he watched the four young kids in front of him visibly swallow. He didn’t speak, just kept on pacing. Waiting.
“What are you going to do to us?” One of them finally burst out, and Derek looked to see which one spoke. Oh, definitely not the one Derek was expecting. It pleased him to be wrong. The others, lined up on their knees in front of him, looked baffled that she spoke.
He let them wait a minute before he responded. “I’m not going to do anything,” he said. “What happens to you is to be decided by your caporegime, who is more than capable.” He paused again, this time for about five minutes. He stood in complete silence, waiting to see if another one talked. Wisely, they all stayed silent.
“I’m here to determine if you all are worth the trouble,” he said. “My mother is not a patient woman, and she does not like her time to be wasted.” Derek began walking again. “So, let’s make this easy. Are you worth the trouble?” He crouched down and looked straight at the girl who spoke, and she turned her face away.
“Yes,” she said quickly.
Derek hummed and pulled away. “You see, you tell me that, yet you demonstrate in your actions that you are not. So, which is it?”
“I’m worth it,” one of the boys burst out, and Derek sharply turned toward him.
“Are you now?” The boy nodded hurriedly, face burning. “Prove it.” Derek said.
“What?” The boy obviously was not expecting that.
“Prove it,” Derek said again.
“I...how?”
Derek sighed. “Obviously, if you cannot prove it, you are not worth it. And now you are wasting my time.”
“Give me a chance, and I’ll prove it!” He said.
“See, we already did that,” Derek said. “And you failed. The only reason you’re getting this second chance is because someone vouched for all four of you. And thus, my mother wants you all reassessed. Now, prove to me that you’re worth it.”
"What do you want us to do?" Another asked.
Derek turned to him fiercely. "I want you to be loyal!" He hissed. Then he turned away again and straightened his cufflinks. "This entire family needs you to be loyal."
He stood basking in the silence of the room as he waited -- this time, not for one of the soldatos to speak, but for something else. Eventually, it came, in the form of heavy knocking on the metal door. Derek walked slowly to it and opened it, and was greeted by Stiles.
Stiles grinned widely, pushing his way into the room. He had his kit with him, along with a bottle filled with an unknown substance. Derek can see the caution and fear in the kids' eyes, and he feels a smug satisfaction. Stiles's reputation precedes him.
Stiles slowly unrolled his kit on the small metal cart that sat in the middle of the room, and the four kids watched in fascinated horror, like one might watch a man stepping in front of a train. Stiles carefully and deliberately picked up four guns from his kit, stepping around the table and placing one each on the floor in front of the four kids. He then repeated the process with four knives.
Finally he stepped back behind the metal table and pulled out four long, threadless needles. Derek watched with the same intensity as the four recruits as Stiles pinched the needles between his thumb and forefinger and stepped up to the girl who first spoke.
Derek stepped towards them to recite his part. "Hayden. Do you promise to be loyal to the members of the organization? Do you promise to be rational and honorable? Will you respect your family and show courage?"
"I will," she said, looking slightly terrified.
Stiles took one of the needles and pricked her trigger finger, squeezing until blood bubbled to the surface of the skin. "This drop of blood symbolizes your birth into our family, we are one until death," Derek stated. Stiles held out the gun for her to take, which she did. "You live by the gun, and you die by the gun." Stiles the took the gun from her and handed her the knife. "You live by the knife, you die by the knife," Derek repeated. Hayden nodded grimly.
Derek walked over to her and kissed her on both cheeks. "Welcome to the family, sister."
He stepped back and he and Stiles repeated the process until all four new recruits were sworn in as family members.
While Stiles cleaned up, Derek helped the soldatos to their feet, congratulating them and letting them know that he was their superior. "If you have a problem with another soldato, you go to your caporegime. If you have a problem with your caporegime, you come to me," he said.
"If your mother is the boss, does that mean you'll be next?" One of them asked timidly. Liam, was his name.
"Either me or my sister will assume the role," Derek said, leading them out of the room and towards the afterparty.
"What if someone kills you? Who will we report to then?"
Derek stopped in his tracks, turning towards the kids. "So you've heard about the recent Argent threat," he said. The kids nodded.
For seven years, Kate Argent had been trying to get revenge for her father's death, mostly by targeting Derek. Although he wasn't the 20-year-old kid he was back when Stiles had been kidnapped and Gerard killed, Kate was still a threat. One that Derek was excited to put an end to.
"I wouldn't worry too much," a voice said, and the kids all jumped. They turned to see Stiles sauntering towards them. He slid past the four kids and sidled up next to Derek, pressing a palm onto his husband's chest. His other palm held onto the kit menacingly.
"Why not? Aren't we supposed to protect the members of our family? 'Live and die by the gun?'" Mason asked.
Derek turned to him. "I'm glad you said that, and yes. But don't spend your time stressing over my death. No one will ever kill me," Derek said, voice hardening. He spared a glance at his husband, as dangerous and sharp as he was comforting and beautiful. Stiles's returning smirk was so familiar it was almost painful. "They wouldn't dare."