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Derek clenched his teeth while rubbing chapped lips with blood covered fingers. This was different, everything was different. Being himself. It's a challenge. Being better... now that'll take time.
"Derek?" Scott called out. Maybe he had said his name more than once, but the beta honestly couldn't say. His alpha stumbled down the stairs of the school, to stand in front of him. as the rest of the group huddled closer, trailing behind like children lost, or just waking up from a nightmare.
His alpha?
Scott placed a firm hand on his forearm, causing Derek to blink, and drop his hand from his face. "Are you okay?" The irritation to his lips had cracked, but he felt them heal almost immediately. Red was still fading from Scott's eyes as he swiped his thumb over Derek's mouth. The beta licked and tasted salt.
"Are you?"
The muscles twitched underneath his cheeks.
A pale hand came and interrupted their staring, falling gently on Scott's shoulder. "I think none of us can answer that right now."
Chris Argent broke the silence that had fallen around everyone like a tangible mist, his footsteps like crackling glass, walking towards his daughter and the two werewolves. With awareness coming back, so did the sounds of a sobbing Ethan, barely being carried on the wind. Lydia slowly approached the remaining twin, uttering a quiet, "I'll help you."
The Argent patriarch stopped before them, his face set with lines that aged him far beyond his years, but relief was clear. He said not a word, but something must have tipped his daughter off to depart. With a small nod in Derek's direction, and an almost smile to Scott, the hunters left the scene, almost floating away, content to be in the others presence. No evil touched them now.
Scott stepped away, holding Derek's gaze for just a few short seconds, then turned around to help Stiles walk towards the parking lot.
Derek started to bite his lip again when the alpha and human left his sight.
***
"Is this alright?" Allison picked at the fraying cover of her father's bestiary. It was a superficial question, as this exchange was already agreed upon, but Derek appreciated it all the same. After consenting, she made her way to his couch, but sat on the opposite end. "Where's your-?"
"Here." Derek lifted the metal lid placed on the coffee table in front of them, and pulled out the Hale family book of creatures.
The duo switched books and pulled out their phones to take pictures, than began flipping through the pages to monsters not known to them. Earlier in the week, a few days after the take down of the nogitsune, the Argents and werewolves decided collectively to pool their gathered information together so there was no chance of being ignorant and/or being kept in the dark where some species of the supernatural was concerned.
They have all been through too much to even contemplate going against anything on their own anymore. Experience has shown they work better as a whole pack than a collective of people just tolerating the presence of different groups at odds.
Peter of course vehemently refused to share their knowledge. Lydia shot him in the kneecap, so naturally Derek hasn't seen him at pack meetings in a while.
To be apart of a pack not led by his mother was strange to say the least.
Scott didn't have her aged wisdom, nor mature patience, but he was getting there, and far faster than Derek could have ever hoped to. Scott may not be his mother, but he was a true alpha.
"Is this the same thing?" Allison slid closer, their knees touched, as she dragged the weathered text to lie side by side with the pristine hunter's. "Pegaiai? I think my father wrote it down as a water nymph though."
Derek leaned closer to inspect his grandmother's sharp scrawl, and than compared it to Argent's short hand notes. "It's a class of naiads, according to their domain. I suppose our new bestiary should make that clarification and classify each in the same pages to avoid confusion."
"Well, what makes it different?"
"Pegaiai are known to live in springs, where your father's description of the nymph.." he scratched his chin thoughtfully, "Krenaiai, probably."
Allison put the cap of the pen to her mouth and chewed in habit, "And Krenana live in where?" her dimples appeared.
He almost grinned at the hunter, but remembered she wasn't exactly comfortable around him just yet. Derek could smell past her citrus conditioner and light layer of vanilla lotion (just enough not to be noxious to his sensitive nose) that she was nervous, and something else he couldn't quite place. "A Krenaiai dwell in fountains."
Derek subtly sniffed the air where her neck used to be, previously bent over his arm to squint at the picture in his bestiary. The Argent's didn't have drawings in their book, just detailed descriptions and photos of their kills.
What was that scent? He knew it, the perfume of this emotion. It was the tip of his tongue. Something from his past.
"Derek?"
He looked up from his intense stare-down of the cement floor, expecting to see the girl's face, but all he saw was brown. Their noses touched.
Derek had gotten closer while lost trying to figure out the emotion.
The scent was replaced by embarrassment. Of course; he'd just made an ass of himself invading her personal space. "I'm sorry."
"Don't be." she stood up, her phone and his bestiary clutched to her chest, "I just-it's getting late and you know my dad. Ever since-well, y'know."
Did he?
Derek slumped in on himself a bit, not wanting to see her leaving his loft as fast as she could. One step forward, two steps- "Derek?"
The wolf's head shot up. Allison wasn't fighting the charming grin spreading over her face. "Have a good night."
She swept over the threshold, and Derek finally realized what he had smelled on her.
Contentment.
***
Solid and whole.
Thank God.
"You caught me!" Scott breathed heavily through his nose and mouth, as sweat dripped from his hair onto Derek's chest.
"Of course." Derek rested his equally dirty forehead on Scott's shoulder.
That had honestly been a close call. The two of them had decided that to help strengthen this new pack bond they've formed, what with Scott accepting Derek as his beta, that they could train on Saturday mornings.
Training had turned into a competition, and the competition had turned into a game.
Racing to a game of tag.
The alpha had gotten cocky, and started swinging from branches; going from tree to tree at a rapidly growing pace until-SNAP! A tree limb splintered in Scott's tight grip-he would've stuck the landing if the momentum hadn't spun him midair-but Derek was right beneath his alpha.
Warm fingers poked his side, so reflexively Derek tightened his hold. Scott's skin was surprisingly soft. Derek let go of the younger boy after another tap. Scott looked flushed, and Derek could hear an uptick in his heart rate. Probably the adrenaline.
"So, uhm, we should maybe, uh," Derek coughed, just realizing their scents had mingled.
"Yeah." Scott agreed to nothing.
***
"What is that?
"It's a-! It's clear what it is!"
Allison's laugh filled the apartment like the best kind of music. It sounded like happiness. He never thought there could be a comparison to such a thing. Her eyes crinkled, shoulders rocked, and all her teeth went on display. "Is it a bear?"
Derek could almost pout (he was), "It's a Djinn."
"Ooh! Now I see it." she laid a pale hand over his right shoulder, fingers twirling with a pencil. "With the, uh... markings?"
Derek groaned and face planted on the coffee table, "Maybe we should just stick to photos."
Allison giggled once more. but made a sympathetic coo. "You drew a pretty great harpy."
Her fingers massaged small circles into his neck.
Contentment grew, and so did something else, but Derek was well on his way to sleep with the calming motions. Fondness?
***
"Derek, wait!"
He was fucking stupid.
"Please, Derek, just listen!"
How could he have thought they saw him as anything other than the pathetic, pack-less, loner?
What was he even doing here, anyway? What was left?
Who was left?
"Derek!" Calloused fingers tugged on his leather jacket, alpha strength forcing him to stay in the doorway.
"Please?" A thin hand rested atop Scott's, both clutching desperately at his fabric.
"What do you want?" Derek ripped away from their grip, eyes flashing cold blue. "I was clearly interrupting you, so get back to it."
They're back together. Of course they're back together.
Why does he care?
"We like you." Simple words.
He rubbed his lips and squinted at them. Both had such earnest gazes.
There was no hiccup in their heartbeats.
"Me too."
***
Allison kissed his neck.
Jennifer bit his ear.
"Can you-?"
Scott licked his collar bone.
Kate scratched his chest.
"Please don't-"
Allison took off her shirt.
Derek leaped off the bed and huddled on the floor, trying to calm his breaths.
Scott and Allison immediately jumped from the bed after him, but didn't touch him. Their hands hovered in the air, wanting to provide comfort, but were at a loss as to how.
"Is it okay?" The breaths were less harsh. "Can we just-?"
The two nodded along, patiently waiting for their partner to tell them what was wrong. He felt horrible. Horribly sick. How could he ever think of those women in their place? Scott and Allison were the purest people he's even met. How could his mind possibly connect them to the foulest?
"Is it okay if we just watch a movie in bed?"
Allison and Scott smiled in reassurance. Nothing but adoration and concern decorated their faces. All three of them stood slowly, with Derek situating himself in the center of the bed. Scott slipped next to him on the right, with Allison to the left. The hunter whispered, "Can we hold you?"
Derek stared long and hard at the blanket covering his legs, before he said yes. Allison wrapped an arm around his shoulder, with the other resting on his stomach, then brought their heads down to the pillows.
"Is this okay?" Scott asked, putting both hands on top of Derek's chest. That question continued to repeat until Scott was hugging Derek's entire right side.
It would take some time for Derek to fully trust them and himself, but they were getting there. They had time.
For now, they cuddled close and watched Lilo and Stitch.