Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

He woke to the sound of a baby’s cry.

His body jerked, suddenly alert and awake, and sat up, instinctively rising to action before his brain could catch up with the rest of him. His vision swam for a moment, but once the sleep cleared away, he found himself in an open field of grass, some wild flowers sprouting here and there. He could hear cars passing by on a nearby street, so he knew they were close to civilization.

Lying next to him, clutching blades of grass with tiny fists, was a baby. Their lips were wobbling, like they were about to scream again, so he gingerly extracted the baby from the grass and tucked them close to his chest. “Shh, it’s alright,” he assured the child, and his voice was rough, which was something to note. 

“Who are you?”

He snapped his head around and clutched the child tighter to his chest. But then his senses caught up with him. Pack, mate, family, safe, calm, anxiety, panic, panic, panic wafted from the man sprawled in the field a few yards away. The man raised himself to his knees and kept his eyes narrowed. “Where is this place?”

For a person who was supposedly, if his senses were right, and something told him they always were, his mate, there was a lot of fear emanating from him.

“Who are you?” his mate repeated slower, when he hadn’t responded, voice desperate. 

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “Who are you?”

The man with the warm brown eyes gaped at him in surprise. “Um. I don’t know.”

The baby in his arms promptly burst into tears.

After spending long minutes teaming up to console the baby, who only quieted when both men brushed calming touches over their arms and head, lulling them back to sleep, the two stared at each other.

Finally, he said, “I don’t know if you know this, because I can tell you aren’t one, but I am a werewolf.”

The man looked surprised, but didn’t smell scared. Well, any more afraid than he had been before. “I didn’t, but I knew— know about werewolves. It doesn’t surprise me.”

“Then do you also know we are mates?”

The man tipped his head to the side before shaking it. “No, that I didn’t know. But I know what mates are. So I probably used to.” He paused, opened his mouth to say something, squeaked, closed it, and hesitated. A minute passed in the quiet clearing before he finally said, “So the baby?”

The child, who was now sleeping like they’d never woke up, smelled of formula and human, but was clothed in a onesie that carried both of their stale scents. “I believe they’re ours,” the werewolf admitted, smiling shyly at his mate. 

The man exhaled heavily and sat back in the grass, legs sprawling out in front of him. “Wow.” He grinned lazily. “Seems like I hit the jackpot. Wish I knew your name. And the name of our kid.” He suddenly sat up. “Do you have anything? Check your pockets. Carefully, with the baby— I have my wallet! Sweet!” He flipped it open and rifled through the contents, wiggling a card out of one of the pockets and staring down at it. “Mieczyslaw Stilinski,” he declared triumphantly, his tongue naturally folding over the complex syllables. His brow furrowed as he flipped it over, exposing a taped-on sticky note. “’In case of arrest or medical emergency, note that I go by Stiles Stilinski in all personal and professional capacity.’ Sweet!” He beamed over at his mate and declared. “So I’m Stiles.” 

Stiles shuffled over and took the baby from the werewolf‘s hands, as he’d struggled to feel out a wallet or phone while trying not to wake them. Stiles rocked the baby in his arms carefully, eager eyes lighting up when the werewolf unearthed a beaten leather wallet from his jacket pocket. 

“Derek Hale.” Derek. Okay, sounded right, he guessed. “I’m twenty-seven, and the address on here is for New York, but… looks like this license is expired. Let me see if I have a newer one.”

Stiles examined his license further too. “Mine’s updated, won’t expire for three years yet. Says Beacon Hills, California. And I’m twenty-one. Seems a bit young for a baby, but she is very cute.” He cooed down at the sleeping bundle.

“She?” Derek asked, finally finding his updated license, for some reason hidden among the cash (of which there was a shocking amount). Maybe he’d needed to show it to someone and then quickly pack it away, so he’d shoved it in the first available pocket? Maybe he’d been on a plane recently; you needed proof to get past security, right? 

Or, they’d, obviously. He didn’t think he’d have gone anywhere without his mate and new baby. 

“Yeah, she. Her onesie says ‘Daddy’s Girl.’” He smirked at Derek. “Wonder who’s the daddy?” He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.

Derek tried not to blush, and failed. “Probably you,” he admitted, eyes downcast to his wallet to see if he could find any more details other than an address in the same city as Stiles’. “She smells like both of us, but she’s human, so…”

Other than some credit cards bearing his name, and some business cards for various businesses he didn’t recognize or see any significance to (Did he and Stiles have a dog? Why did he keep a vet’s number in his wallet?), his wallet shared nothing new. Well, at least they had money. And maybe more, if the credit cards worked. They hadn’t expired, which boded well for them.

“You find anything else?” he asked Stiles, who shook his head.

“Don’t have a phone on me, either. Our best bet is to find the closest road and start walking. And hopefully quickly, because I don’t have a spare diaper on me and even if this babe was changed right before our memories got snagged, it won’t last forever.”

“Good point. And we’ll need formula soon, because she’ll probably be hungry maybe even before that. And actual food, she looks old enough to be eating solids.” Derek agreed, and stood. “You want to carry her or should I?”

“I’ll carry her for now. She’s sleeping pretty soundly and it would be best to keep it that way. You have any clue how close we are to anything?”

Derek closed his eyes and concentrated on what he could hear. The road was closer than he had thought, and cars were passing by on it, multiple a minute, so it was likely to be close to something. He could also hear voices coming from far to their right, towards the trees. Maybe they were near a hiking trail. 

Derek explained the two options to Stiles. “Which do you think we should try? The road’s closer, but people means a cell phone, maybe a building, maybe a store.”

“Let’s head further into the trees and track the voices. If it’s too far, we’ll head back here and then I’ll make you race to the road and flag down a car, or something.”

Derek rolled his eyes, but thought the choice was sound. “Okay, you are my mate, my biological compass,” he agreed casually. Stiles smiled shyly at him, adjusting his hold on the (their) child. 

“You lead the way. We’ll watch your back.”

Derek couldn't help but reach out and wind a hand around Stiles’ neck to tip their heads closer together. Fingers playing with the ends of his hair at his nape, Derek pressed a lingering kiss against Stiles’ forehead. 

Stiles exhaled softly, easily leaning into him, and Derek didn’t have to see the smile to know it was there.

Derek didn’t know if, had they gone roadside, they would have found success any faster, but they did find success not too long after they stumbled upon a man-made dirt path and a sign pointing them towards either the hiking trail or the biking trail. Following the trail backwards, the voices growing louder and words more distinct as they approached, they happened upon the entrance to a park where there was a display board showcasing the entire forest and all of the activities it was known to inhabit. Past the small parking lot, Derek could see a squat building that brought him hope.

Stiles took over then, bouncing the now awake but thankfully silent little girl on his hip as they entered what was labeled as the Information Center.

“Hi there!” Stiles greeted the only person in the small building. “My husband and I are afraid we lost our phone in the—” he faltered, before recovering, “—pond! So we were hoping there was one here we could borrow. Our friends are probably wondering what happened to us. They’re our ride too.” He pretended to sound so put-out, and it worked pretty well as far as Derek could tell.

The desk attendant glanced back at Derek, and Derek wondered if his resting face looked mean or something, because they cowered and looked back at Stiles. “We have a landline, but it might be easier if you use my cell. Here.” She pulled it off the desk and handed it over. “You can shoot them a text, that might be faster.”

Stiles passed the phone to Derek and he was at his side to take it immediately, bypassing the messaging app and clicking on Maps.

“Thank you so much,” Stiles gushed dramatically. “We’ll give it back ASAP!”

They waved a hand. “Take your time. Stops me from playing Pocket Camp all day.”

Stiles huddled into Derek’s personal space and leaned in so he could see the phone screen. Their daughter reached out to grab it, and Stiles expertly thwarted the attack by giving her the string on the hoodie he was wearing to gum on instead.

Derek smiled at him as he felt his heart melt a little. “You’re amazing.”

Stiles flushed a deep red and pointed at the screen. “Focus, hot stuff. Search for Beacon Hills, see how far away we are.”

When the results pinged, they both sighed. “Two hundred miles, give or take.” Stiles huffed. “Well, could be worse. We could have been all the way in New York and needed to fly home. We just need to find a car rental and drive. I have some cash in my wallet, and a debit card.”

“I do too, and credit, so hopefully that’ll carry us,” Derek added. He pulled up the web browser. Stiles leaned away to smile encouragingly at the bored attendant who barely paid them a glance, and then leaned back in close. Derek could feel his mate’s breath against his cheek.

“We’ll also need a car seat,” Stiles blurted, and then lowered his voice. “So we definitely need to find a store before a car.”

It took some googling, and Stiles had to ask for a pen and pad of paper so that they could jot down the bus number they would need to take that would get them to the closest Target that would have everything they needed. They might also be able to buy a phone there, not that they had anyone they could call. 

“Hey, open the camera,” Stiles demanded. “I wanna see my face. I have to look better than my license photo.”

Derek did, and was surprised to see his own face staring back at him. He knew, logically, it was his face, but until he saw it, he didn’t recognize it as his own. He had a dark scruffy beard and pale eyes, and yes, his resting face did look pissed. It was probably the heavy eyebrows.

“Yes, you’re beautiful, now let me see me,” Stiles whined, tilting the phone towards himself. 

“So are you,” Derek assured him.

“I’m moley!” he exclaimed in a whisper. “I mean I could have guessed by the state of my hands, they’re covered too, but wow.”

“I like them,” Derek assured, again, and Stiles acknowledged him this time with a kiss on the cheek.

They deleted the used apps and erased the browsing history, just in case, and handed the phone back to the attendant with many thanks. 

When they stepped back outside, Stiles whined and fanned himself with his free hand. “Ugh, did it get hot? Here, take her, I’m going to take off this hoodie.”

Derek swept up the baby who giggled at the sight of him, hands reaching up to pull on his beard. Stiles wrapped his hoodie around his waist with the arms and rolled up the sleeves of his button-up he’d been hiding underneath. “Ugh, why do I wear so many layers?”

Derek chuckled, and Stiles chuffed at his amusement. 

He waved a hand up and down, gesturing to the whole of Derek. “It’s probably because your body is so goddamn flawless that I have to compensate or cover up.”

Derek huffed in annoyance. “Stiles, I like your body, okay? You’re tall and have broad shoulders and your neck is insanely tantalizing. And I had a baby with you, so obviously this is not the first time you’re hearing this. So stop with the self-deprecation, alright?”

“Huh,” Stiles said after a moment of stunned quiet. “I just… I just had a feeling like I should tell you to take your own advice.”

“That’s good,” Derek cheered. “Maybe our memories will come back naturally.”

As the bus pulled up, Stiles readied the change to pay the fee and said, “Derek, there’s something we haven’t discussed.”

As they settled into a pair of seats, and their baby girl climbed into Stiles’ lap so that she could stare out the window, Derek asked, “And what is that?”

“How did we lose our memories in the first place? Who did this to us? Why would they hurt us? Were they evil, bad people? Are we the evil, bad people?” 

Derek shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know. I’m worried too, especially since we’re not just two adults, we have a child to care for. I’d like to think someone with some humanity wouldn’t hurt people with a child. But I don’t feel nefarious, or have any thoughts of…power, or what have you. And I think that if someone wanted to turn us in for something, they wouldn’t have left us in a populated area. We’d be locked up, and they would have taken Frog away from us,”

Stiles sat quietly, hopefully thinking over Derek’s words. He hovered a hand over their baby’s back, to make sure she wouldn’t fall as she lurched in Stiles’ lap as the bus started up. 

“Frog?” Stiles finally asked.

“Oh.” Derek blushed. “Well, we don’t remember her name, and she can’t tell us it if she does, and your hoodie has a frog on it and she kept smiling at it, so…” Derek shrugged.

“You can’t name our daughter after a cartoon frog!” Stiles exclaimed with a laugh. “Especially when you’re just going to go with Frog.”

“I have a feeling of deja vu,” Derek whined, knocking his head back. “Or I bet I would, if I could remember our naming conversation the first time.”

Stiles snickered, probably also imagining the conversation and likely ensuing argument, and jostled Frog so that she was facing Derek, who put on a goofy face that had her erupting into giggles. 

“Well,” Stiles considered, “It’s not a horrific nickname.”

The bus took twenty-four minutes (Derek was inherently aware of this for some reason) to reach their stop near the shopping center. Derek spent the time keeping his hands hovering around Frog the entire ride, jerking forward to settle her if she so much as blinked, even though Stiles kept a secure hold on her. It really was just as unsafe to not have her in a basket or car seat on the bus as in a car, but they didn’t have any other choice. Stiles used Frog’s hand to wave goodbye to the terse bus driver who seemed to melt under the baby’s stare and waved back. 

The two switched, and Derek took Frog while Stiles took charge of the bright red shopping cart, list of things they needed clutched in his fist. They’d tried to latch Frog down into the cart at first, but she started to make a face, and Derek panicked, swept her into his arms, and bounced up and down to eliminate any risk of a tantrum.

Stiles navigated the store flawlessly, like he had its path ingrained in his brain without him realizing, so Derek followed along behind, the ever-dutiful mate. They went for the baby aisles first, stocking the cart with formula, bottles, and diapers, approximating the correct size. The few jars of baby food clanked at the base of the cart as Stiles piled them in. Derek picked up a pack of plastic spoons and added to the pile.

Frog squealed when she spotted a stuffed bear with a circular rattle body and made grabbing motions towards it. Derek handed it to her after popping it off of the shelf, and she babbled at it.

They contemplated the strollers and carrying baskets and settled on just a car seat, guessing they already had a stroller for her back home and it was unlikely they would even find a need for it. They bought food for themselves, Stiles’ eyes going bright over a package of Reese’s, so Derek took two and thew them in the cart. Bottles of water joined the loot, because they would need to actually mix the formula powder with something and Derek wasn’t going to give his daughter tap water. Clearly, he had deep rooted feelings on the subject. 

The electronics section had a variety of phones, and Stiles picked up one of the smartphones that didn’t have too high of a price tag and came with a postpaid method. Stiles took Frog and browsed the kids’ toys, all of which she was too young to play with but were bright colors that distracted her, while Derek used his credit card and address on his license to fill out the paperwork to get the phone online. He started googling car rental agencies immediately, realizing that they were going to have a lot of things to carry. 

Their last stop was for clothes. They picked out a couple more outfits for themselves before snagging half a dozen onesies for Frog (one even with the cutest cartoon frog on the front that Stiles didn’t even debate over like the rest), because she was likely to spit up over her outfits and might need several in a day. And they wanted to have back up, just in case they couldn’t make it back by the end of the day. 

Derek arranged for a rental car delivery drop off in one hour as they waited in line to check out. Thankfully, this Target had a Starbucks cafe area near the exit, so they bundled up all of their purchases (opening up a chest sling and donning it on Stiles that Frog wasn’t happy with, but at least wasn’t screaming about being placed in) and shoved the plethora of bags and box under the table while they waited for their car to arrive.

“Thank God for technology,” Stiles groused, cheersing Derek with his coffee. 

Derek tipped his cup back and took a sip and immediately recoiled at the taste, reaching for the extra packets of sugar they’d grabbed. Stiles snorted and laughed at him, and Derek playfully glared as he stirred in three more packets. 

They stuffed the cheap and flimsy duffel bag they also bought with the clothes and food, but decided not to test the patience of Target employees by unboxing a car seat in their cafe.

“We’ll do it outside,” Stiles whispered to him, conspiratorially. “We can toss the box in their dumpster.” His eyes were alight with mischief. Derek found it entirely endearing.

“I can see why I love you,” Derek said, only half joking, and Stiles’ answering hand squeeze seemed to reflect his understanding of that. 

Frog started to fuss, and Derek sniffed and immediately recoiled. “Um, she could do for a change. And maybe rinse out the bottles while you’re in there so that they’re clean enough to use.”

Stiles took her and their new supply bag into the family restroom while Derek kept an eye out for the rental. He followed the incoming car with the mapping option on the agency’s app and was glad to see it was still fifteen minutes away, which should hopefully be enough time for Stiles to get Frog into a fresh diaper and outfit and give her some food, because she was likely pretty hungry. 

When Stiles emerged from the restroom looking slightly harried but with a proud smile on his face and a clean baby, he and Derek shuffled the box and the rest of their items outside before the rental could arrive. Stiles took the phone and kept watch while Derek went around the corner of the building to open up the car seat. He dumped the box into a large pile of recyclables, gathering up all of the product information and instructions and placing it in the no longer plastic-wrapped seat and getting back over to Stiles just as the phone pinged, alerting them that their car was arriving at their pick-up destination. 

“I gotta say,” the rental car employee said as they hopped out of the driver’s seat and passed Stiles the keys, “I’ve never done a delivery at Target before!”

Stiles smiled and laughed along, fabricating on the spot, “Well, our ride broke down on the way home. Thankfully we could just pull into the shopping center before it went out on us completely, but we need to get home for this princess’ birthday in two days, so we don’t have time for the lengthy repairs.” Frog let out a squeal and threw around her new bear rattle, which seemingly sold the story.

The agency representative shrugged and laughed. “Makes sense! Glad we could be here for you to help you out of this jam!”

“And we’re grateful that you are! You know no other company does direct deliveries like this?” Stiles gushed.

The representative preened, and Derek held back a snort. 

Derek, as the allotted driver and renter, signed off on the electronic paperwork that was presented to him on a tablet, confirming his card details and adding on the warranty and the gas-saver-whatever, just to speed up the process and get out on the road. The sun was starting to set, and they had hours to go. 

The representative wished them all well, wiggled a weird goodbye to Frog whom Derek now held against his chest with the wrap, and then headed over to a company-logo embossed car that Derek hadn’t even noticed that must have followed behind, to take them back to work. 

Derek turned once they disappeared to find Stiles’ wiggling ass sticking out of the back of the car as he grunted and struggled to buckle in the car seat. Derek stared unashamedly at his mate and made an appreciative noise. Stiles stuck his head back out, looked Derek up and down, blew a puff of air up at the strands of hair falling into his now red and sweaty face, and said, “If you can get this buckled in five minutes, I’ll blow you.”

Derek laughed, warmth spreading across his face, but not feeling embarrassed because this was probably how their relationship went. It felt so natural to banter with Stiles and make sexual jokes at each other. “I’ll give it my best shot for an offer such as that.”

Stiles bit his lip, did another, slower, once over of Derek, pausing halfway up deliberately, and then met his eyes. “I might even give you ten.”

Derek didn’t hide the shiver that ran up his spine, and he reached out and cupped Stiles’ left cheek, thumb tracing back and forth, connecting his moles. “Don’t tempt me,” Derek growled and flashed his eyes.

Stiles sucked in a sharp breath, and he stank of arousal. He swallowed thickly. “We probably shouldn’t, until we remember. In case sex is, like, the catalyst and we forget everything all over again.”

“Might be worth it,” Derek countered.

Stiles released a shaky breath. “I don’t really want to forget you again,” he whispered, and the words cut Derek straight to the heart.

He dropped his hand, readjusted the sling’s hold on Frog, and nodded. “I agree. And the baby kind of makes things difficult.”

Stiles plucked their daughter off of his chest and started babbling to her, their noses brushing. “Who’s a little cockblock? You are! But we love you! Yes we do! You’ve already stolen out hearts all over again! Look how many outfits your daddies bought for you! You probably have thousands. I’d buy another dozen if you gave me a smile!”

Derek got to work securing the car seat, and Stiles hadn’t been exaggerating. Even looking at the instructions, the clasps were complicated, and he feared maybe the car wasn’t built right for this to latch in properly, but after over five minutes (but under ten) Derek had it in securely. He jostled it, and when it didn’t budge more than a centimeter, he relaxed. 

They quickly buckled Frog into it, giving her the rattle to play with, and she didn’t whine about the situation, so she must be used to car rides. 

“I’ll sit in the back with her, see if she’ll eat, and whip up a bottle. I guess I’ll sit on a water bottle for a while, get it warm enough that it should be safe and she won’t spit it back out for being too cold,” Stiles suggested.

Derek nodded, but before Stiles could shuffle around to the other side of the car, Derek wrapped his hand around Stiles’ arm and pulled, making the younger man crash into him. Derek cupped his face again, but this time kissed him on the lips, a searing kiss that made Stiles go weak in the knees, if his leaning into Derek was any evidence. 

Derek broke the kiss and panted against plush pink lips, “You called us daddies. You… Something in me really liked hearing you say that. Also, I’ve been wanting to kiss you since I first saw you.”

“Today, you mean?” Stiles asked.

“Yes. And probably the day we first met, whenever that was. I don’t know that I ever would have lived my life not knowing you were the one for me.”

Stiles swayed into his arms again. “You sweet talker,” he whined. “How am I not jumping you every hour of the day?”

Derek chuckled. “Could be the baby we have to take care of. Could be that we’ve been together so long we’re good at restraint, or we’ve come up with some sort of schedule.”

Stiles snorted. “Sex schedule.”

“But as much as I’d love to do more, we should get on the road so we can make it home before the day ends.”

Extracting themselves from the embrace was tough, but the thought of returning their memories and getting home was too sweet a siren song. Plus, home likely meant a bed, which was ideal for such personal conversations.

For the first hour of the drive, Stiles worked on warming a water bottle between his thighs so that they could give Frog the formula she was clearly wanting. She kept spitting back out the pureed peas and the mushed carrots and the banana applesauce or whatever it was called. Stiles tried each of the different foods, and she swallowed some of it, but clearly wasn’t content. 

Derek drove as gently as he could while Stiles prepared the bottle, for fear of powdered formula spilling all over their rental. Stiles managed it with minor spillage, thankfully only on himself, and once the bottle was near Frog’s mouth, she dropped her bear and grabbed for the bottle and didn’t let go.

The two simultaneously let out an exhale of relief. Derek could hear Stiles slumping back in his seat. 

“Pull into the next rest stop,” Stiles requested.

“Why? You okay?”

“I’m fine,” Stiles assured. “Well, I think. We’ll just need to burp her once she’s done, and that’s not safe to do in a moving car.”

“Right,” Derek said, turning on his blinker and merging into the exit lane. “Glad one of us remembers.”

“Hopefully we won’t be like this for much longer. Plus, it seems like the memory wipe has to do with people and places, not things we already know. You seem to remember driving well enough.”

“Thank God for that,” Derek grumbled. 

Stiles gasped suddenly and threw himself forward between the two front seats, his seatbelt cutting into him, “Break!” he shouted, as Derek’s foot was already easing onto the pedal, having seen the red lights blink on on the car in front of him.

Derek turned his head slightly to scowl at his mate as he eased himself back into his seat. 

“And you haven’t forgotten how to be a backseat driver.”

Stiles snorted. “Pretty sure that’s in the werewolf mate marriage vows. Love, cherish, til death, and will always tell you how to drive, especially when our precious one is in the back seat.”

“Sounds like something you’d add. I think.”

Derek could hear Stiles’ grin and feel the fondness emanating from behind. “Yeah. I think so too.”

The burp-stop also became a bathroom stop, because they each chugged an additional bottle of water during the drive, and they also took the break to eat some of the snacks they purchased. And then it took even longer than that.

“We should probably strategize.”

Stiles hummed around a mouthful of chips, and Derek winced as crumbs fell into his lap. Stiles opened the car door, stepped out to shimmy them off of his shirt, and then sat back down. 

“Strategize what? I feel like our plan is pretty solid here, from the little information we know.”

Derek glanced at Frog, who wasn’t sleeping, but looked close to it. She had pale blonde, maybe brown, hair tufts that curled over her ears, that maybe had a bit of pureed banana in them. He reached out to pluck the dried food out of her strands. She snuffled, snagging his hand as he pulled back and wrapping her fist around his forefinger and pinky. He let his captured hand fall into her grasp, and she squeezed the tips of his fingers, light brown, maybe green, eyes slipping closed.

“I’m worried,” Derek admitted, voice soft. “A lot of my gut reactions have me thinking things like getting home, finding our pack because I can feel them as we get closer, and then hunting down whoever did this and making them restore our memories. But we can’t just go all out full force. We have Frog. She needs to be protected, above all else.”

Stiles hummed, and Derek pulled his gaze away from their daughter to watch his mate think over his words. “I admit I was having similar instincts. Maybe we are newer parents than we thought? I mean, she looks like she’s maybe seven, eight months old, but she could be older and just small for her size— and I’m not even going to let myself freak out wondering if our baby is malnourished or not growing right—” Stiles cut himself off and took a deep breath, waving a hand in front of his face as if he could physically erase those worries. 

“But that’s something we’ll figure out. Maybe that’s something we have to ask first. Because I feel like she is ours, right? You feel that?” Derek nodded in agreement; he even felt the pack bond extending to her. “Right. So I think you’re right. There’s things we don’t know, things we should ask, before we dive in head first.”

“Well, the GPS is navigating us to the address on my license. Let’s compare my address to yours, then maybe do a search. Recheck our wallets, maybe something will click if we look at the town’s map.”

Stiles rolled up the chip bag in his lap and tossed it back into the duffel. “This pit-stop is going to be much longer than we thought,” he joked.

Stiles sat next to him in the passenger seat, both of them flicking their eyes back every minute or so to make sure Frog was still fine. Derek had taken his fingers back, but she was dozing, so thankfully their absence didn’t cause a tantrum, but the truce may be tenuous. 

Stiles took the phone from the cup holder where Derek had deposited it earlier and opened Maps. He asked Derek for his license and compared theirs, plotting their locations. “Looks like our places are within two miles of each other, okay. Maybe I’m still living with my family?” He then froze. “I wonder if my family knows about werewolves.”

“Considering you’re mated to one and have a child, that’s probably a safe bet,” Derek countered. “But when interacting with people, we should be cautions and let them lead the conversation, or bring it up covertly.”

Stiles agreed. “Maybe there’s stuff on the internet about us like, uh, public social media profiles, news articles, things like that?”

Derek felt uneasy about searching his name, but he didn’t know where that fear came from.

“Maybe someone’s noticed we’re missing and alerted the police?” Stiles thought aloud, double checking his license to make sure he spelled his name right before letting the search engine load. He made a pleased noise. “Oh, okay. Well, there’s stuff. Not a ton, but let’s see…”

Derek leaned close and Stiles shifted so that they both met in the middle over the center console to see the screen. There were several results under Stiles’ name (his nickname, which it seems he did use for literally everything), including a Facebook profile, Twitter, and Instagram, though the latter two were protected and locked, so they could only see profile pictures and the brief bio. Both said the same thing:

Stiles - 21 - GWU ‘18 - FBI in Training. No, Seriously. 

“Dude,” Stiles exhaled. “I’m training for the FBI? I’m amazing!”

Derek chuckled at his enthusiasm. “Makes sense. You’ve been level headed throughout this entire situation, and you’ve come up with every plan we’ve had.”

“GWU… so I’m still in school. GWU, what is that?” Stiles opened a new tab and typed in the acronym. “George Washington University in DC! Alright… I must be home for the summer?” 

Derek was starting to get a weird feeling in his chest, and not a good one, but he didn’t want to worry Stiles. “Anything jogging your memory?” he asked instead, to hide his insecurity.

Stiles shook his head, however. “No. But it feels right. Like of course that’s who I am!” Stiles smiled sweetly at him and kissed his cheek. “Hope I don’t make you too lonely when in class.”

“I’m sure I also do something besides long for you.”

Stiles’ smile softened and his cheeks pinked. “I kind of wish not,” he admitted, and Derek pecked his lips because he could.

“So social media is a bust. My Facebook is unlocked, but I don’t say anything. I have a few hundred friends, but none of the names look familiar—”

Derek pressed his finger to the screen and he leaned closer, as if the words would bring him more clarity. “Wait, that name. I’ve seen that before.” Derek reached into his wallet and rustled through the business cards and pulled out one that was frayed. He held it up to the screen. “Alan Deaton. So we both know a vet, and apparently well if you’re Facebook friends.”

“Maybe he’s involved?” Stiles suggested, sounding hopeful. “Or a family friend? We can swing by the animal clinic and see if he recognizes us.”

“Worth a shot,” Derek agreed.

They looked through Stiles’ Facebook for a few more minutes, and noted the names of people tagged in the rare photos posted over the last few years: Scott McCall was most listed, next to Lydia Martin, then a Kira and an untagged but mentioned Malia, Liam, and a few others who were one-offs. Scott and Lydia seemed like people to research, though their faces didn’t jog anything in either of their memories, and Stiles suggested he do it once they're back on the road because they didn’t want to spend too much more time dawdling. 

Derek was never mentioned or shown in photos even once, and he said nothing.

Their biggest discovery was the identity of Stiles’ father. “He’s the sheriff!” Stiles squealed, and then they both quickly looked back at Frog. She shifted in her sleep, but when no further noise disrupted her she started snoring.

They both exhaled in relief and tuned back to the phone. Stiles navigated back to the web browser and searched “Sheriff John Stilinski Beacon Hills” and got hundreds of articles where he was mentioned, mostly in local newspapers. He was a tall, blond man that Derek could see being an authority but also being a father.

“He looks nice,” Derek contributed, because he didn’t know what else to say.

Stiles hummed in agreement. “Wow, he’s worked on a lot of cases. Big ones, in the last few years. I wonder if it was supernatural stuff, like maybe that’s how we met? My dad was working on a case you were involved in and I couldn’t keep my nose out of it.” He wrinkled said (cute) nose. 

“That’s a good possibility,” Derek agreed. “I don’t see my name anywhere, though, so I don’t think I work with him, Besides, like with this one,” he pointed at the article currently displayed, “I would have only been twenty-three, maybe? Big case for a rookie deputy.”

“Well, look yourself up next. I’ve got some good jumping off points for me, it’s your turn,” Stiles encouraged, pressing the phone into his hands.

The dread in Derek’s stomach turned into a solid mass, but he took the phone and let Stiles’ shoulder press against his own spur him on. 

D-E-R-E-K-space-H-A-L-E

It took a minute for the page to load, but when it did, Derek’s breath seized in his chest.

Right in the top searches was an article from the previous year: THE HALE FIRE: Ten Years Later, And What We Now Know

The short blurb below said:

If you’ve been a long-time Beacon Hills resident, you’ll remember… Only three Hale family members escaped the blaze alive: Laura, Derek, and Peter. Cora Hale, ten years old at the time…

With shaking fingers, Derek opened the full article. Stiles was silent at his side.

If you’ve been a long-time Beacon Hills resident, you’ll remember the shock when this once-sleepy town became the home to a horrific tragedy that rocked our foundation and set us on a path for the worse. When the Hale Manor house caught fire on September 13th, 2005, the town mourned the death of eleven individuals including our then-current Mayor. All beloved members of the community, the Hale family was one of the founding families of Beacon Hills and had been a staple for centuries, known for their preservation of the local preserve and its wildlife. Many joked they were the protectors of Beacon Hills’ nature. 

Only three Hale family members escaped the blaze alive: Laura, Derek, and Peter. Cora Hale, ten years old at the time of the fire, was later found having escaped as well, but due to the trauma had lost her memories, and her whereabouts were not discovered until very recently. Peter Hale, brother to the late Beacon Hills Mayor Talia Hale, the mother of Laura, Derek, and Cora, was badly wounded when he attempted to escape and suffered in a waking coma for over six years following the house fire. He later succumbed to his wounds, marking a twelfth victim to this senseless tragedy. 

Yes, we here at The Daily Beacon say senseless because this tragedy was no accident. Originally the fire had been stated to have started due to a gas leak, but later investigations, when new evidence lead to the case file being reopened in 2011, found it was premeditated arson and murder. Katherine Argent (31), now deceased, was the fire starter, though she ended her life before she could be brought to trial for her crimes. Her crimes including, six years later, the murder of one of the survivors Laura Hale. Some suspect she also killed the infirm Peter Hale, though it was ruled as speculation due to lack of evidence, but because of the close timing of their deaths, the Daily Beacon thinks it awfully coincidental.

Now, ten years later, we know the truth. Adults and children lost their lives senselessly to a mad woman’s whims. Inside sources connect motives to her then relationship to Derek Hale, one of the survivors, who was sixteen at the time of the fire. Derek Hale has refused to comment on this matter, though he did not dispute the claim. Cora Hale was not available for comment.

Below is a list of the deceased. A memorial to honor the contributions of the Hale family will be celebrated on September 12th on the steps of City Hall. The Hale family asks that any donations go towards the children of Beacon Hills in whatever way possible. 

Talia Hale (46). Eric Belmonte Hale (44). Hana Joyner Hale (71). Josiah Hale (40). Emelia Fortuin Hale and unborn child (37). Violet Hale (11). Jack Hale (7). Kara Hale (35). Lily Luther Hale (35). Teodor Hale (4). Peter Hale (34). Laura Hale (27). 

“Stop,” Stiles whispered, covering the screen with a hand, and Derek blinked rapidly, realizing his eyes were glassy.

With gentle fingers, Stiles took the phone back and locked the screen, slipping it into his pocket. He then raised his hands to Derek’s face to turn his head and force eye contact. “You with me?”

Derek nodded slowly.

“How is your control?”

“Control?” Derek felt like his brain was swimming.

“Your claws are out, Derek,” Stiles confessed, fingers brushing over his face. “And you look a little wolfy in the face, too, though you’re still very handsome.”

Derek closed his eyes and took in a deep breath, embracing the scents that hit him: Stiles, Frog, the snacks, the formula, gasoline, the car sanitizer, Stiles, Stiles, Stiles.

Stiles pressed a kiss on Derek’s forehead, and he slowly opened his eyes. 

“I’m okay,” he said, and he felt much more centered. 

“So that was really heavy, yeah? Mhmm,” Stiles hummed and nodded after Derek did. “A lot to take in. I think we should take a break from research until we get to Beacon Hills. Though if I’m being honest, I’m questioning why we’re not heading the complete opposite direction.”

Derek snuggled into Stiles’ hand on his cheek, and Stiles resumed his calming touches. “We have to,” Derek said on an exhale. “There’s a reason we still live there. And if anything, it’s the place I met you,” he attempted a smile, but it fell an inch short, “so it can’t be all bad.”

“Are you okay to drive?” Stiles asked.

Derek nodded. “Yeah, I’m in control. I’m fine. It’s… a lot, way more than I expected, but… if I survived it once, I can do it again.” He hesitated before continuing. “It’s weird. Like you said, reading it, it sounds right, but I feel this disconnect, like it’s me, but me in a movie I’m watching.”

Stiles hummed his agreement. “Let me know if you want to switch, okay? I know it’s against the rental contract, but who’s really going to know we had two drivers?”

“I’ll let you know if I need to switch. Focus on Frog,” Derek responded, looking back to their sleeping daughter. A baby Hale. 

Stiles seemed to hear what he wasn’t saying, because he nodded and then crawled out of the passenger seat and into the back next to her.

Derek took a deep breath in, held it, and then exhaled.

Don’t think about it. Focus on Stiles. Focus on Frog. 

Derek turned the key in the ignition and started the car. The GPS blinked up at him from the front console: RESUME ROUTE?

Yes.

The drive was quiet. The radio, some Top-40 station, played nearly on mute in the background just so it wasn’t completely silent, but the first hour of conversation was very different than the second. 

Frog woke up after about twenty minutes once they were back on the road and was fine for a while, but Derek could sense when she started getting antsy. He got off of the highway just as a certain smell hit him. 

The first thing he said in near forty-five minutes was to assure Stiles it was his turn to change her.

The McDonald’s bathroom was not the ideal clean location to change a baby, but they had a single-stall family restroom, so thankfully he didn’t have to startle any suburban mothers to use the changing table in the women’s. 

Frog cooperated with him amazingly, squirming as he removed her soiled diaper but stilling as he wiped her down, added some ointment to the base of a clean diaper, and latched it around her hips. He realized, with a start, that this entire act came naturally to him. He wondered if having several young cousins and a sibling had meant lots of practice. 

Baby babble brought Derek’s spiral of thoughts to a halt, and he smiled down at his now clean and fresh smelling daughter. 

“You feel much better now, don’t you?” he cooed at her, lifting her up, letting the changing table collapse back against the wall. 

He lifted the duffel back onto his shoulder and bounced her around a few times. “Think you can make it back to Beacon Hills before we need another diaper change?”

She smacked his face with a saliva-wet hand, and he pretended to eat her fingers. She squealed in laughter, and Derek felt his heart swell. 

He felt so much love for this child, an infant that he could tell by scent was not biologically his, and feared her being taken away if this reality was too good to be true.

“I’m going to protect you,” Derek promised her as they exited the bathroom to find Stiles waiting right outside, arms crossed over his chest, worrying at his bottom lip.

Stiles’ face lit up when he heard the door close behind them, and Frog spotted him and reached out immediately, fists closing and opening, beckoning Stiles closer. 

Derek worried. He could feel so many emotions, but didn’t understand the reason for feeling them, especially when it came to Stiles. But they were mates, that he knew plain as day, and whatever, whoever, wherever they were a day ago, Derek didn’t want to let that come between what he knew now, how he felt. Or so he hoped. 

“We should get back on the road. We won’t be there until after ten at this rate,” Derek alerted Stiles. 

“Yeah, let’s go,” Stiles agreed, looking up at him with eyes full of so much emotion. For Derek. He wondered why, if they were mates, he felt like this was something he should drink in, because he would never see it again. 

“Are you okay?” Derek asked, realizing that he hadn’t verbally checked-in for hours. 

“I have my two best people with me,” Stiles said, so flippantly, so easily, “so I’m doing just fine. I’ll let you know if that changes.”

Stiles kissed him then, quickly, before pulling them out of the fast-food restaurant and back to the car. 

The brief interlude seemed to reset everything for the better, and Stiles took up a continuous chatter, to Frog, mostly, as they got back on the road. Less than two hours, and they’d be in Beacon Hills. Derek tried not to dread every mile.

Maybe he was usually a very depressing, self-deprecating person, because the dark thoughts did not easily leave him, even when he felt like his entire world was sitting in the back seat, safe and happy, with him. Maybe his inner thoughts were also often very tragically poetic.

Stiles went quiet after a while, and Derek peeked in the side mirror and could just see Stiles’ face reflected in the square glow of a light, the phone screen. 

“Find anything new?” he asked, unable to stop his curiosity.

“Well, I was looking up this vet, Dr. Deaton. It might be a better idea to give the place a call first, rather than stop by. By the time we get to Beacon Hills, the animal clinic will be closed. They’re almost closed now. We’d have to wait until tomorrow. Which is fine, good night’s rest and all, but I think we should use all the time we have as wisely as possible.” He shuffled in his seat. “Like, what if this curse, or whatever, is a daily thing? What if we wake up tomorrow and have to do this all over again? What if yesterday we were in, like, Nevada and only managed to get to that park where we were before it reset itself?”

Derek thought for a minute. “It could be. We don’t know anything about magic or the supernatural, except what comes to us instinctively. You could be absolutely right. Maybe that is what’s happening, and that’s why you have this theory?” Derek shook his head. “Either way, we’re close. You’re right, we should use every avenue that we can. At least, if this Dr. Deaton is someone either one of us knows well enough, or knows people we know, he will be someone who knows we’re coming.”

“So we’re okay with calling him? Because the office closes in ten minutes.”

Derek gave a small smile at Stiles’ excitement in his voice. “Yeah. Put it on speaker.”

A minute later, Stiles seemed to have steeled his emotions and Derek could hear the tinny ringing from the device. 

Ring. Ring. Rin— “Beacon Hills Animal Clinic, how can I help you?”

Stiles cleared his throat. “Uh, hi! Is this Dr. Deaton, by chance?”

There was silence over the phone before a shocked voice responded, “Stiles?”

Stiles exhaled heavily and could scent the excitement in the air. Derek felt a surge of relief. They were no longer completely on their own.

“Uh, yes, this is Stiles?” Stiles sounded a bit unsure, but honestly Derek was too. “This is Dr. Deaton?”

“No, dude, it’s Scott! Where the hell—”

“Scott McCall?” Stiles cut him off to clarify.

Scott sounded upset. “Yeah, McCall, how many Scotts do you know?”

“Well to be fair,” Stiles said, breathily laughing through the words, “I don’t even know you, or anyone else by any other name other than Derek as ‘Derek.’ We don’t even remember the name of our own daughter, so…”

Scott was silent again, and Derek could feel the tension, his own nerves ratcheting.

“So… wait.” Scott made some noises on his end, shuffling. Derek heard a door shut before he resumed. “That was a loaded sentence, man. But if what I’m hearing is correct, you and Derek… sorry, you said daughter?”

“Yeah! Crazy, right? So, do you work for this Dr. Deaton? How do you know each other? How do we know each other?”

“Stiles,” Derek cut in, fingers flexing around the steering wheel. “Priorities.”

“Derek!” Scott addressed him, sounding excited, like he had when Stiles first spoke. “Good to hear your voice, been a while!”

“Wish I could say the same,” Derek grumbled, “but like Stiles said, I literally have no clue who you are or when the last time we would have spoken would be.”

“Derek, how far away are we?” Stiles asked.

“’Bout seventy miles? An hour and a half, probably less,” Derek deduced, checking the GPS. 

“So Scott, do you know about… ehem…” Stiles floundered, and Derek realized they probably should have discussed what they were going to say before calling anybody. “Like, how do you feel about things that go bump in the night?”

Derek almost slammed his head into the steering wheel. His mind told him it would be poetic justice, but he doesn’t know what that means, because he doesn’t remember anything. 

“Dude, are we having the werewolf talk again?”

“Ohthankchrist,” Stiles exhaled. “Oh, buddy, thank you. I’m sure you’re great, you look super smiley in my Facebook pictures, but I wasn’t sure you would, you know, be able to help. Derek and I both found stuff connecting us to Deaton, so that’s why we called the clinic—”

“Stiles.”

“Stiles. Breathe,” Derek demanded at the same time as Scott. 

Frog started to whimper, and Stiles immediately started shushing her, whispering soft platitudes to her, shoving the phone in between the front two seats for Derek to fumble and take while keeping one hand on the wheel, dropping it into the cup holder and taking control of the call.

“Is that—?”

“Scott,” Derek cut him off. “We’ve lost our memories, woke up this morning in a field about two hundred miles outside of Beacon Hills. We only had our wallets for us to go on, but we’re on our way. It’ll be easier to figure out how to fix things once we can put out heads together, I assume, so we can save questions talk for now, but we need to know if it’s safe.”

“To… come to Beacon Hills?”

“Yes,” Derek growled. 

“Safe as it ever has been, but supernaturally chill. Except for this, now, I guess.”

Derek nodded and kept driving, flipping off his turn signal to get off at the exit ramp that would take them far, far away. Just in case.

“Okay. We’ll be there in about an hour, depending. Where should we go?”

“Your house?” Scott suggested, sounding baffled and shocked. “I’ll talk to Deaton and bring any information he knows. I don’t know of anything going on, but he might, I just got back into town last week. We all did, for summer break. I’ll see if anyone else can come, if they know anything.”

“And who would that be?” Derek tried to remember the names Stiles had noted. “A Lydia? Kira?”

“Not Kira, but maybe Lydia… how?”

“Facebook!” Stiles reminded, grinning at Derek as he turned back shortly to glance at him. He had his fingers in Frog’s hands as she gummed on his knuckles, which probably was so unsanitary, but she looked so happy. 

“Right, Facebook,” Derek repeated. “Okay, so meet us at… my house,” Derek said the words slowly, because they felt wrong to him. “And that’s the apartment, 7C, right?”

“Noooo,” Scott spoke slowly, “Your house.”

Derek immediately realized what he meant, but didn’t like how Scott seemed to forget that he knew nothing. 

“That’s your loft, but you don’t really stay there anymore, at least you haven’t as far as I know. You’ll feel it as soon as you cross in to Beacon Hills, dude, but take the path into the woods and you can’t miss it.”

“Great, thanks.”

“Thanks, Scott! We’ll see you soon. Say ‘see you soon’, Frog!” Stiles waved one of Frog’s tiny fists at the phone. 

“Frog?”

“We’ll explain when we get there,” Derek promised, and then hung up the call.

Derek could hear Stiles’ pout. “We could have talked more.”

“He needs to figure out if Dr. Deaton knows anything, and gather everyone to m-my house.” See, still felt weird. 

“Only sixty-two miles to go!” 

Derek smiled. “Yep. We’ll be home soon.”

Derek tried not to dwell over whether Scott meant a royal or singular “your” when talking about the house. 

The sky was completely dark, the rental’s headlights illuminating the road, as they passed the sign welcoming them to Beacon Hills. 

And as Scott had said, Derek immediately felt it. “The territory,” he murmured. 

He rolled down the window and let the air whip his hair into his face, but he needed it to figure out where he was supposed to go from here, by scent. 

Frog was once again asleep, and Derek wondered if he should worry about how much she sleeps, but knew that if any other new parent complained about their baby sleeping too much, they would get their ear chewed off for being ungrateful. 

Derek suddenly had a thought as his his senses latched on to the scent of pack and followed it. “Stiles, you should call your dad. Maybe Scott got a hold of him, but try calling the station. You said he’s the sheriff, right?”

Stiles reached out and plucked the phone from the cup holder. He had dozed off for about twenty minutes and had only recently shook himself awake, so he’d been pretty quiet. Derek wondered what he was thinking about. His scent didn’t give anything away, which only made Derek worry more. 

“Not a bad idea, babe,” he complimented, kissing Derek’s cheek.

Derek playfully snapped at his nose, Stiles dancing back out of reach immediately with a giggle. “Sit back, it’s not safe to lean forward like that.”

“Yes Papa,” Stiles sighed, and Derek heard his fingers almost noiselessly clacking on the phone’s screen before he made the call.

They picked up near immediately. “Beacon Hills’ Sheriff’s Department.”

“Hi! It’s Stiles! Is my dad around, by chance?” 

“His shift ended at noon today, hon.” The voice on the phone sounded more confused than concerned, which was a good sign.

“Right!” Stiles lied. “Totally forgot, I’ve been so busy getting back for break I forgot what day it is. And, also, I lost my phone, and don’t know his number off the top of my head anymore. Mind getting that for me? I’m borrowing a friend’s phone.”

Stiles was really good at lying. Derek could hear the irregularities in his heart beat as he skipped around the truth, but he spoke so smoothly that if Derek were human, he would have been completely convinced.

Seemed like the Sheriff’s Department was, as Stiles was given a string of numbers he was already prepared to note down.

“Thanks so much. I’ll come by sometime this week to visit, alright? Thanks again!” 

He quickly hung up and dialed again. Derek felt the nerves creeping in once more, but that also had to do with the fact that he found the road into the woods Scott had mentioned and slowed as he made the turn, trees suddenly blanketing them. 

The phone rang out, and the generic voice mail message came through, and Derek could smell Stiles’ disappointment.

“Try again,” he softly urged. “He probably doesn’t answer unknown numbers, but if you call again right after, he’s more likely to.”

Stiles did, and this time the phone call connected after three rings, and they heard a sigh. “This is John Stilinski.”

“H-hi, uh, Dad?”

“Stiles?! Thank Jesus you called, are you okay? Did everything go alright? I’ve called your phone a thousand times and haven’t heard anything for days!”

“Sorry for worrying you, Dad,” Stiles responded. “I don’t know where my phone is. Um, I actually don’t know where anything of mine is. Or who I am. Um.”

Derek just hoped Stiles wouldn’t ask him if he liked things that went bump in the night.

The dirt road turned to gravel, and Derek slowed down even more when he could see lights up ahead. The trees started to part, and Derek suspected they were close. 

“We’re in Beacon Hills. Actually at home, or nearly, I think we’re close to the house, I see lights.” Stiles leaned forward, and Derek could feel his breath on the back of his neck. 

“We?” his Dad asked.

Derek broke through the dense trees, finally, and a large house sprawled in front of him. There was a roundabout driveway in the front, connecting around the back to what Derek assumed was the garage. The house was dark, the lights coming from the three cars parked right out front, in a half circle.

“Yeah. Derek, Frog, and I. Oh! We’re home. Are you here?”

“Stiles, if you were home I would see you. There’s no one outside, no cars.”

Stiles huffed as Derek rolled the car to a gentle stop. Someone approached as he put it into park, and he assumed the figure was Scott. He could sense immediately once he saw him that Scott was an Alpha. Not his, but one he conceded to. And a True Alpha. Derek suddenly realized he knew what that was. 

“I mean Derek’s house, then. Do I still live at home? That’s weird.”

“Stiles,” Derek choked out, his fears coming to light in front of his eyes.

Stiles glanced up at him and gave him a “what?” look. Frog snuffled in her sleep, waking up now that the car was no longer in motion, and started to fuss. Derek didn’t smell anything, but she was probably hungry, going by the minute flexing of her fingers, like she was reaching for something.

“Derek? Is that a baby?” Scott exclaimed, his voice only slightly muffled behind the car’s exterior, but it came out loud and clear to Derek. 

“Why wouldn’t I live with Derek when we have a kid?” Stiles asked his father.

Derek didn’t even register the sheriff’s shout of, “You have a what with Derek?!” 

Frog burst into tears, and Derek unbuckled his seat belt, quickly snapped open the car seat straps, pulled the baby into his arms and pushed out of the car within a second, walking past Scott, who was staring at him with wide eyes, and heading towards the trees away from anyone else to try and calm her. 

“It’s okay, sweetheart. We’re home,” Derek assured her, though he didn’t believe his words himself. “You’re safe, everything is okay. We’ll get you something yummy soon, okay? Daddy just has to—”

“Daddy?” 

Derek ignored the new voice and closed his eyes, swaying gently back and forth. If he ignored it, then maybe he could continue to have this. For another second, another minute, just one more. Please.

He should have trusted his gut and gone the opposite direction, like Stiles had joked mere hours ago. 

Everything had just felt so right. How could it not be real?

“Derek?”

Derek opened his eyes and faced Stiles. The phone was clutched in his hand, and he had a devastated look on his face. 

“This doesn’t make any sense,” Stiles exclaimed, and he sounded on the verge of tears. He looked Derek in the eye. It was difficult to see in the dark, but even still Derek thought he looked gorgeous. “But I feel it. I feel connected to her, to you.” He reached out, wrapping his arms around one of Derek’s, staring down at their (the) baby girl. “This isn’t right, something is wrong, we’re missing something or we were hiding for some reason…”

Derek just shook his head. Stiles recoiled back.

“You knew?”

“No,” Derek rushed to elaborate on his gesture. “No, even now, I still feel how you do. I feared. I had this nagging dread the whole way here, and…” He shook his head. “It seems like the majority of my life hasn’t gone the way I expected or wanted, or well for me at all, losing so much of my family, so I figured this would be another one of those things that is good, which means I don’t get to keep it.”

Stiles’ nostrils flared, and he was clearly angry, but he’d gone back to Derek’s side, so the ire wasn’t directed towards him. “No, that’s not fair. I don’t believe that.”

Derek tilted his chin up slightly to press his lips against Stiles’ hairline, and his mate leaned into the contact with a sigh. “We need to figure this out. For Frog.”

Stiles nodded, lower lip between his teeth as he worked at it. “For Frog,” he repeated. He looked down at her, and she stared back at him, face full of innocence. “Where did we find you, little one?”

Frog, naturally, had no response.

Chapter Text

So here was what Stiles knew:

1. He was a twenty-one-year-old college rising senior, currently enrolled at GWU in Washington DC and is taking part in the Federal Bureau of Investigation fellowship program during the school year, which he apparently worked his ass off (and his mouth off) to obtain his freshman year.

(He doesn’t mean that sexually, at least he doesn’t think so. He thought when his father told him that that it meant he talked them into submission after working very hard, because he just couldn’t see himself prostituting himself to become part of a government organization. Just no.)

2. After flying back to Beacon Hills six days ago for the start of summer break, the last he’d expected to have for a while, Deaton and Lydia pulled him aside at the BH Supernatural Summer Start-up, so it was apparently coined (by himself, he was told with an eye roll from some young kid who probably wasn't that young, but anyone still in high school after you’ve graduated is automatically a child). They hadn’t wanted to worry Scott (“So much for that!”) about the issue, because they didn’t know if it was an issue. Apparently, two weeks before, Derek Hale, resident BH Beta For Life (another eye roll), had left town unworried, telling Deaton that he was doing a meet-up with some old family friends out of state, and to keep an eye on the McCall Pack Jr (”Ughhhh.”), just in case. He’d expected to be gone a week, and now that that time had come to pass twice, they had some concerns. None of them had been able to get in touch with him, until Stiles called him four days ago. No one else had been privy to the conversation, but Stiles had gone to his dad within the hour of said conversation to tell him that he had to help Derek, that everything would be fine, it wasn’t anything scary, he needed a negotiator, someone human. Stiles had packed a bag, booked a flight to a small airport in Oregon, and was off once again, promising to keep in touch. (“You did not,” his father added, but Stiles had come to that conclusion on his own.) This was three days ago.
3. Two hours ago, Stiles and Derek showed up at the rebuilt Hale Manor, without memories of themselves and each other, holding a baby that every ‘wolf and other in the vicinity could smell had been marked as theirs. 

And that was about it. All in all, not very enlightening, and he cursed his past self for not giving more details. 

“I am surprised that you two managed to make it back here with no memories,” Deaton stated, and Stiles was hurt for a moment before he realized that what Deaton meant was that he was impressed. 

Okay, maybe that was still a little insulting. Stiles worked for the FBI, apparently. He could handle work under pressure. 

Stiles turned his head to look at Derek, who was sitting on the edge of the couch in front of Frog, who was lying in her car seat that was propped up on the long metal coffee table. His eyes stayed on her, even when Stiles knew he knew Stiles was staring at him because he flinched, just a little bit. 

Stiles sighed again, for probably the hundredth time. “We thought there might be a time limit to this curse, or whatever, and that it would reset the next— what time is it?!” His head shot up and he looked around rapidly, searching for a clock.  

“It’s after midnight,” Deaton assured him, so he relaxed. “So it’s safe to say your memory loss is not a repeated occurrence. Though, that would explain the complete radio silence on communication from you. But since it is unlikely this is a curse, there is still time unaccounted for after, we assume, Stiles, you arrived in Oregon.”

“Why couldn’t this be a curse?” Lydia, the redhead, asked from where she sat on the arm of the recliner his Dad was collapsed into. 

“Well, magical residue from druids or casters will be left behind somewhere, and it may, and often will, escape a human eye, but a werewolf would not miss it.”

Everyone’s gazes went to Derek, and he finally looked back, but avoided Stiles’ begging eyes. “No, I didn’t sense anything. Though until you said that, I didn’t realize that was something I would have known previously to check for.”

“So this is something other than a spell or enchantment,” Deaton concluded, and all eyes went back to him, except for Stiles’ who begged with his eyes for Derek to look at him, but his mate (his mate, come on!) refused. Stiles wasn’t about to verbally beg, but he wanted to.

“So whatever happened, whoever Derek was meeting with most likely, have powers that are more… inherent? Natural?” Lydia asked, eyes staring off into space, like she was trying to think of anything familiar. 

Deaton hummed, and Stiles wasn’t sure if that was an agreement hum or a thinking hum.

He wished Derek would hum. Stiles had no trouble figuring out what ay of his noises meant.

“I think,” Scott piped up, for the first time since the run-down of What Stiles Missed (that went very similarly to “What Did I Miss” from the Hamilton soundtrack in Stiles’ head) (And suddenly he was remembering musicals? Maybe he was getting his memories back?), “that it’s been a long night, and a very long day for those two, er, three.” He cleared his throat, eyes flitting over to Frog briefly, then jumping away, before he continued. “Let’s table this until the morning. Then we’ll research and call around. Maybe Cora knows where Derek was headed.”

Derek made a wounded noise, and that. was. it. Stiles stood and moved towards Derek, sitting down so close to him that he was almost in his lap. 

“I’m staying with Derek to watch over Frog.” He eyed the room with a glare, waiting for arguments. His Dad opened his mouth, but then closed it a second later, a soft look coming over his face. 

“I’ll bring you a pair of fresh clothes for tomorrow,” he said.

“No need. Derek and I prepared, just in case we would be on the road for longer. I have clothes. But we will need baby things. Uh, food, high chair, stroller, bassinet, crib, toys, we’re okay on diapers, but a changing table…” Stiles trailed off. “But, um, maybe a toothbrush?”

“You have a spare here,” the kid, Liam, mentioned, and Stiles nodded at him in thanks. Of course he did, this was Derek’s house. He probably had clothes here too. 

“Since when?” Scott asked Liam, and the young Beta shrugged, not elaborating on his knowledge.

Stiles looked at Derek, but he still didn’t look back. His hand rested on the edge of the car seat, rocking it gently back and forth, as Frog slept on. 

The group in the Hale Manor living room slowly started to filter out, hands clapped on shoulders, promises made to be back in the early morning with breakfast and thinking caps. Hugs from Scott and his dad, though Stiles refused to move far from Derek.

They were on thin, cracking ice right now. They had 2% of their lives known to them, if that. And Stiles had a sudden spike of fear. He really didn’t want to drown. 

The house was big and quiet once everyone had left.

“We should get some rest, Derek,” Stiles eventually whispered, unable to handle the silence anymore.

Derek stood and moved away from the couch with jerking motions, like he wanted to storm away. “I stole someone’s baby, Stiles,” he spat.

“Our baby,” Stiles asserted, standing and making after him. “She’s ours, we both know it.”

“I don’t know anything!” Derek roared as he spun back to Stiles. His nostrils flared and he seethed, but Stiles only focused on the utter sadness in his blue-flashing eyes. “Neither do you. We’re both blank slates, Stiles!”

“Good!” Stiles shouted back, pushing a hand into Derek’s chest and shoving him, though he didn’t even budge. “Maybe that’s what we needed! Maybe… maybe that’s why we have her! Whoever it was saw what we wanted, what we could be and gave us that. Isn’t that something to celebrate?!”

“So you don’t want your memories back?” Derek accused, voice raw.

Stiles rolled his eyes. “Of course I do, I want to remember the pack, my dad, my job, you. But we can keep this too,” he insisted. They had to be able to. 

Derek ran a hand over his face, over his mouth as he made a smothered noise. Frog woke up with a cry, and Stiles started to feel true deja vu, back to this morning when her cry was the first thing he’d ever heard, or it felt like it. The start of a new life. 

Stiles walked back to Frog and picked her up. The car seat wasn’t the ideal sleeping place for a baby. Even if they didn’t have a crib for her, they could maybe set up a pillow barrier on a bed, just for the night.

“We should get some rest, Derek,” he repeated, and this time Derek agreed, nodding. He looked exhausted, shoulder slumped and eyelids drooping. He moved towards the stairs, grabbing the duffel by the entrance to the kitchen as he went, and Stiles followed. 

The house really was large, the upstairs splitting off into separate wings almost, and Stiles recognized why it had been called Hale Manor. Each wing had several doors, though Stiles had no sense of how large the rooms would be. The first door Derek tried, making a left from the stairs, was a bathroom. The next was a room painted with a pale yellow on the walls, but no furniture inside. The next room along that same wall was an office, and though there was a daybed against the window, Stiles was looking to sleep in a full bed for hopefully four hours before he had to think any more. Derek seemed to linger in the room, though, for just a second, before moving on.

At the end of that hall was a set of double doors, and Derek pushed them open to reveal a lived-in master. There was a closet off to the left, the door left open so that Stiles could see the clothes hanging in it cast in shadow. A chest of drawers was set under a window, and what looked like a pair of sweatpants was hanging out of one of the cracked-open drawers. 

The bed was made, but hastily so, sheets a royal blue that melted into the black metal framework of the bed. There were approximately one hundred pillows at the head of the bed. 

It struck Stiles that this was Derek’s room. 

“Let’s make a border of pillows, so she can’t roll off,” Derek suggested, and Stiles bit his lip with a nod. 

Stiles laid Frog down in the center of the bed after Derek pulled back the top sheet. They each grabbed a few pillows and positioned them around her as she wiggled and fussed, clearly upset at having been woken up to a yelling match.

“Sorry, Frog,” Derek whispered, brushing his fingers across her forehead. “Go back to sleep, baby.”

Stiles kicked his shoes off, shucked his jeans, and unbuttoned his shirt, letting it pool off of his shoulders and onto the floor. Left only in his boxers, eyelids suddenly very heavy, Stiles sat on the edge of the bed and pulled the top sheet over his legs as he laid down next to the still sniffling baby. He snagged a pillow to support his neck as he trailed the fingers of his free hand up and down her arm and started humming a nonsensical tune. 

Stiles caught Derek’s eye as he mumbled something about sleeping in another room and arched an eyebrow and gave him a slow, flirty smile.

Stiles knew exactly what he was doing, getting into a werewolf’s bed, covering the bed with his scent, mixing their scents. He kept his eye contact with Derek as he reached out an arm towards him. “Stay,” he requested, but meant it as a demand.

Maybe Stiles didn’t have the wolfy senses that Derek did that told him Stiles was his mate, or the fierce biology that could come out at a moment’s notice to protect his pack. But he knew what he felt. He knew what it meant when his heart flipped over in his chest when he met Derek’s eyes for the first time, fourteen hours ago, five years ago, and he knew that he was going to fight for it with everything he had. 

He’d already lost his memories, and probably his dignity. What else was there to lose?

He kept Derek’s eyes until the werewolf reached out and took his hand, a resigned, desperate look on his face, and Stiles pulled him towards the bed, coaxing him to go around to the other side and bracket their sleeping girl. He regrettably slipped his fingers out of Derek’s grip as he moved, and they continued to tingle without contact.

Stiles felt so sappy, like the protagonist in a Hallmark Christmas Classic, and he figured by the way his heart was beating erratically he rarely ever showed affection like this, or at least not to Derek, but maybe it was time to change that. Maybe he should be cliché and wear his heart on his sleeve and go all out on wooing Derek.

The man already loved him, but that was, apparently, the easy part.

Derek stripped himself down to his underwear too, tight clinging fabric that Stiles unashamedly stared at until it disappeared beneath the bed cover. Stiles shifted closer to Frog when Derek did the same, and he kept his eyes locked on Derek’s until between one blink and the next he was waking several hours later to a smelly baby.

Derek still looked exhausted, eyes closed, even though Stiles was sure he had woken up when he had, so Stiles took the turn and whisked Frog off of the bed and into the grand master bathroom, which he hadn’t explored before falling asleep. 

It was grossly huge, and looked hardly touched. Though, so did most of the house, and Stiles wondered how long ago the house had been rebuilt, because it probably wasn’t more than a few months. The sun was still rising, so Stiles guessed it was around five, six in the morning. He’d estimated four hours of sleep and got pretty much that. 

He felt worlds better, but still lacked memories before yesterday. 

Using the counter top, Stiles laid Frog down on the (grossly, as mentioned before) long surface to act as a changing table. 

Once she was all redressed in a fresh diaper and onesie that declared her QUEEN with a little crown on the Q, Stiles settled her back onto the bed so that he could use the restroom and freshen up. Derek curled around her protectively, eyes still closed, feigning sleep.

He thought of the toothbrush Liam had mentioned as he washed his hands after pissing and tiptoed out of the bedroom to seek it out. It was probably in the bathroom closest to the stairs. It hadn’t been in Derek’s (He checked. Twice). 

As he flipped the light on in the bathroom, a voice piped up behind him, “Well, that’s not something to show the in-laws.”

Stiles shrieked as he whipped around, and Derek roared from the bedroom, bounding into the hall, Frog in his arms. He wasn’t all wolfy, but his eyes were blazing blue as he stared down the intruder. Stiles backed slowly towards him, eyes flickering back and forth between the two until Derek’s nose twitched, his eyes flickered, and his face went slack. 

“Who…”

The man at the top of the stairs was tall, blond, and older. He had his arms crossed over his chest and a smirk on his face. “Really, Derek? That hurts. Can’t even recognize your own uncle.”

“His uncle is dead,” Stiles spat. “Both of them.”

The man’s smirk faltered and fell.

“We read the article,” Derek said, though he sounded off, and Stiles watched him narrow his eyes as he stepped forward slowly until they were shoulder to shoulder. “Only me and Cora are left.”

“And me,” the man — werewolf — said, pointing to himself. “And a cousin you never knew you had. I never knew you had, but that’s another story for another time.”

Derek snarled, and even near naked clutching a baby he still looked fierce. “Who?” he asked again.

The man sighed dramatically, body slumping back, like it was such an inconvenience to not step around the truth. “Peter Hale. I live here, well, sometimes. I bounce around. But came back when Cora messaged me last night about your amnesia.”

Derek shook his head, “But you…” He pursed his lips.

Peter, supposedly, smirked again. “Yeah, your internet facts tell you one thing, but your nose says different. I’m a Hale, kid, but yes I did die, then come back, and we’ve had a few ups and down since then, but there’s no need to get into it because you’ll have your memories back soon.”

Stiles and Derek both perked up at those words. “We will?”

Peter’s eyes flickered over to him, narrowed them, and then exhaled heavily and said, “Most likely, now please clothe yourself. Your skin is blinding me.”

“Not like you’re tan perfection,” Stiles snapped back at him, arms coming up to cover his, admittedly, pale chest. He was getting pretty cold. 

“Stiles, take Frog and get dressed. Bring me a change of clothes. If Peter,” he snarled the name, “is my uncle, then I’m sure he won’t mind my state of undress. He probably changed my diapers.”

Peter’s face relaxed again, just a pinch. “I did,” he confirmed. 

Stiles didn’t waste any time, scooping his daughter from Derek’s arms and hustling back into the master, gently setting her onto the bed and then quickly dressing himself with the newly purchased Target clothes. He snapped off the tags and then grabbed Derek’s things. 

Stiles heard a door open and close downstairs, and then more voices. That could be a good or bad thing.

“Oh God— Derek! Pants, please!”

Stiles recognized Scott’s voice after a moment of evaluation, and he relaxed. If Derek and Scott were both there, then any real threat this So-Called-Peter had no chance two-to-one. But since Scott didn’t sound angry (except for at Derek’s lack of dress), it was probably okay.

Stiles would really like to remember the Uncle Peter story, though. 

Though she wasn’t happy still with it, Stiles placed Frog in the baby carrying sash around his front, so that he could bring Derek clothes without fear of dropping her. 

(He did stop by the bathroom to brush his teeth quickly, though, because his mouth was really foul. Frog was fascinated by the faucet.)

Derek was at the bottom of the stairs when they made it down, a frown on his face as he quickly dressed. Stiles left him there to see what brought Scott by so early.

The Alpha gave him a smile and then gave an even bigger, goofier smile to Frog, immediately reaching out to tickle her. She basked in the attention, and Stiles let Scott scoop her up while he hovered in the entranceway of the massive kitchen. He stopped to evaluate it, wondering where a crockpot would be in this mess of cabinets.

“Did you guys get some rest?” Scott asked. Frog was tugging at his hair, but he didn’t seem to notice it as he bounced and swayed side to side, maybe a bit too much. But since Frog had yet to be fed this morning, there was less of a chance she would vomit on him from the excessive movement. Less, not zero, but certainly less.

“Few hours,” Stiles confirmed, at least for him. He didn’t know if Derek slept at all. “But that’s not important. How is he alive?” Stiles asked pointing his thumb over to “Peter” who was just standing there, smirking at a now-dressed Derek who was glaring back at him.

“Oh, uh…” Scott trailed off and scratched at his chin, and Stiles could immediately tell that Scott was trying to come up with some sort of story to feed him.

Stiles sighed. “Never mind. As long as he’s not a threat and stops creeping around our house in the middle of the night,” Stiles commented, overly loud, for emphasis.

“Our house?” Peter repeated, and Stiles heard Derek snarl, and no further comment followed.

Stiles deflated slightly. He’d just gotten so comfortable, he’d forgotten. He didn’t live here, at least not with Derek. “Why are you here so early? I thought we said nine?”

Derek passed by and scooped Frog up and out of Scott’s arms, who whined in protest, entering the kitchen and opening the fridge to pull out the pre-prepared bottles of formula some of the pack had whipped up last night while the others were filling Stiles and Derek in.

“How do we warm up the bottles?” Derek asked the room at large.

“Fill a crockpot with water and turn it on low, and once the water is warm set the bottles in it. That’ll heat up the formula. Oh, and make—”

“—Sure to check it on skin first to be sure it’s not too hot before feeding her, got it,” Derek finished his sentence, banging around until he found what he was looking for.

“Dude, how do you know how to take care of a baby?” Scott asked, and Stiles bristled, arms crossed over his chest.

“I think you know the answer is ‘I don’t remember’ but I’ll just pretend you didn’t ask.”

Stiles knew lots of baby things, not that he knew he knew them until asked, but the more he thought up questions, the more he realized he had the answers too. Proper feeding technique, how to change a diaper, to supply her with more tactile toys rather than screens until she was closer to three when her brain was more developed and prepared to handle it, that a baby net was going to be a very important thing to purchase to put over the crib once she starts to figure out how to crawl out, not that that would be a while yet—

Not that they had a crib, yet, or had actual known legal rights to take care of this baby, and not that there, apparently, was a they.

Stiles took a deep breath, and Scott was staring at him with wide, concerned eyes. He seriously needed to calm down and stop falling into his brain.

“Have you had your meds, dude?”

Medicine. Of course.

“Considering until you said that I didn’t realize I took any, no,” Stiles groaned, smacking his head. “No wonder my brain is working overtime.”

“I’ll text your dad to make sure he brings it,” Scott assured, clapping him on the shoulder.

Stiles gave him a small smile. “Thanks, bud. But for real: why are you here?”

“Well, we got in contact with Cora last night—” something fell over in the kitchen, and Stiles startled, but Scott ignored it, “—and she texted back right away saying Derek told her that he was going to visit the Carbones.”

“Nature spirits,” Peter added, leaning close, and Stiles staggered back into the kitchen to escape.

He looked over to Derek, who had three bottles in the crockpot, which was excessive, but Stiles wasn’t going to ruin this, they could just put them back in the fridge for later. He was leaning against the center island and staring down at Frog, tracing the Q on her onesie back and around. Stiles could tell by his body language, however, that he was listening.

Taking a chance, Stiles bumped Derek gently in the hip with his own and leaned against the countertop next to him. The side of Derek’s body was hot against his, and he took slow breaths, worrying that Derek was about to run off. But he didn’t, and he even leaned into Stiles a bit. Stiles bit his bottom lip and resisted the urge to fist pump in victory.

“She didn’t know anything more than that, though, but she said she’d try to reach out to them, see what they might know, or if they did this. She said they’ve never been a concern before, though,” Scott elaborated.

“Where is she?” Derek asked. He cleared his throat and then clarified. “Cora, I mean.”

Stiles bumped his fingers into Derek’s thigh and let them rest there, a silent gesture.

“She’s in France right now? I think?” Scott looked to Peter, who nodded. “Yeah, which is why she responded last night even when it was so late. She’s a world traveler, man.”

Stiles could feel the tension slowly leak out of Derek’s muscles from the fingertips pressed against his leg. He’d been worried, because she wasn’t here. Stiles would have preferred that the actually fully living relative of Derek’s be here, but at least she was reachable. And since Derek told her where he was going, it meant they kept in contact relatively often. That made Stiles feel better than wondering if Derek had been truly all alone.

Though, in terms of blood family members, it seemed like Derek had more than Stiles, if he was counting. No one had mentioned Stiles’ mother, and there was nothing about her on any of his social media. Stiles assumed she was no longer around, for one reason or another. And though he felt disconnected from that loss, there was still a hole in his chest where he swore grief was supposed to be, he just couldn’t tap into it.

“So we wanted to update you guys as soon as we could, but we also wanted to make sure you did get some rest, so we compromised on six. Though I gotta tell you this is killer,” he admitted, winking at Stiles. “I haven’t needed to be up this early and moving since morning lacrosse practices in high school.”

“You played lacrosse?” Stiles asked.

“We did! And we sucked, at first, but then I got bit,” Scott shot Peter a look, which, uh what? And then continued, “so then I got good, like, overnight, and then by senior year we were co-captains! But those morning practices still sucked.”

“Think she’s hungry yet?” Derek had leaned down and murmured the words, lips ghosting the shell of his ear, and Stiles couldn’t react fast enough to not shudder at the contact.

“She might be,” he choked out, head nodding, keeping his eyes on the wall — oh what beautiful tile backsplash — so that he could regain some sense of control. Derek needed to not be a tease if he was still trying to convince Stiles that they were never together.

“Try, uh, is the bottle ready? Try and see if she’ll latch on the nipple,” Stiles directed. Derek’s heat left his side, and he missed it immediately. To cover up for the loss, he poked his head into the fridge to see what all was in there. Not much.

“You guys promised breakfast, right?” Stiles asked, peeking out behind the fridge door at Scott. “Because Derek must have cleared this out before the trip. There’s not even any milk.”

“Liam and Mason are in charge of breakfast. Your dad and Lydia are on baby stuff duty, and my mom is going to help them. Malia said she’d be by to help, and Deaton was going to do some research before getting here on what Cora told us. He said he thought knowing what type of supernatural entity you interacted with might have left traces either on you or in Oregon, so he was looking into that angle.”

“Deaton sounds awesome,” Stiles commented.

Peter snorted. “Awesome, but vague.”

“Sounds like someone else I know,” Stiles shot back.

He turned his back to Peter to cut off any ensuing argument, because he really did not want to waste energy on that right now, and focused on Derek where he had Frog in his arms and was tapping the bottle against her bottom lip, to see if she was interested in it.

“Are you hungry, Frog?” Stiles asked in a soft voice, hand cupping the back of her head and fingers combing through her light curls. “Want some breakfast, hm?”

“She’s very quiet,” Derek said, a touch of worry in his voice, even as her lips closed around the bottle’s nipple and started to suck.

Stiles adjusted his angle of grip on the bottle, to make sure no air was getting in as she sucked by curling his fingers around Derek’s wrist and tipping slightly.

“Some babies are quiet,” Stiles assured him, and that was another fact he didn’t know he knew.

Derek must have heard the truth in his voice, because he didn’t say anything else, and the two of them stood next to each other watching Frog devour the entire bottle one suck at a time.

Two very awkward hours later, Stiles had a plate of French toast in front of him that he was devouring while making silly faces at Frog who now had a proper high chair to sit in. It was apparently the one Stiles had used as a baby. None of the stores had opened until just recently, but his dad and Melissa, Scott’s mom, had dusted off some of their old things from the baby years and piled them into the car to bring over. Now they had a high chair, a stroller, parts of a crib (to be assembled later), and a bassinet.

Stiles had taken his ADHD medicine, the proper dosage thanks to his father’s memory, and he couldn’t feel any different, but he figured maybe that meant it was working.

Frog’s tray table was covered in pureed peas, which Stiles agreed sucked, but she had devoured most of the cheerios, chasing around the last few with pudgy fingers. They didn’t have any bibs yet, so they tied a kitchen towel around her neck, which worked well enough. Stiles even tied it up on the bottom to form a pocket so that any dropped food would be caught and not go all down her front.

The house was quite full now, even fuller than it had been last night. Introductions were weird, for obvious reasons, but Mason seemed nice (and human, which Stiles appreciated), Malia was apparently another distant Hale, Peter’s daughter, which, ugh? Melissa was so sweet, helping Stiles and Derek set up the high chair correctly and showing them the proper way to hold and burp her. Things that mothers will always remember how to do, especially mothers who also apparently work in hospitals.

A scary looking man named Chris Argent was in the corner of the room, and Stiles didn’t know what to make of him except that Derek took one whiff of him and sneered, which didn’t surprise the man and only garnered a sigh in reaction, so Stiles chose to stay away at any possible moment, just to be safe.

Scott hadn’t left, which was great because Peter hadn’t either. Lydia had showed up around seven with coffee, promising actual sustenance was coming behind her, and declared the yellow room next to the master would be a nursery.

Well, she’d said temporary nursery, but Stiles hadn’t given up his guns yet. Frog was theirs, and Derek promised.

Derek wasn’t being cold to him anymore, which was insanely relieving, but it really was just a matter of time before they figured out what had made them lose their memories and things reset again.

Maybe Derek was just taking what he could while he still had the chance. Sounded like something he would think, if Stiles had his personality pegged, which he was sure he did.

“Derek, I think she could do with a washing up,” Stiles teased as Frog smacked her lips and burped. “And it’s your turn.”

Derek nodded and didn’t argue, detaching the tray table from the front of the chair and lifting Frog from the leg holes. He used the towel bib to wipe down the rest of her face before untying it deftly with one hand and tossing it towards the sink.

“Hey, where’s the laundry room in this place?” Stiles asked the room, and three arms shot out and pointed towards a closed door off of the walk-in pantry. “Good to know.”

Stiles rinsed the towel in the sink and then used it to wipe down the tray table, dropping soggy cheerios into the trash can. He brought the soiled towel to the laundry room, nudged open the door, and stared at the gleaming washers that he was worried had never been used before. There was a basket half filled with various towels, so Stiles added the “bib” to the pile and then left, figuring he’d do a load at the end of the day with their clothes and any new clothes they would need to wash for Frog.

When he reemerged, Derek sidled up to him, sans baby. He jerked his head towards his father who seemed to be chatting with Frog very one-sidedly.

“I think you’ve made a good impression on your father-in-law,” Stiles joked, hoping it wasn’t too out of line.

“Considering he’s a sheriff and has yet to shoot me, I feel decently safe,” Derek responded.

Stiles took a risk and reached out to take Derek’s hand. The werewolf flinched at the contact, and Stiles started to pull back. But Derek didn’t let him go far and intertwined their fingers together.

“Look, Stiles,” Derek started, and Stiles held his breath, but then there was a knock on the door, and Derek said, “Deaton,” and that was that.

“I have gathered all of the information I have on nature spirits,” Deaton announced a half an hour later after eating some breakfast himself and laying out everything he brought, which was a surprising amount. “I haven’t had much time to look into it yet, but I did contact some friends and will update you all with anything I hear from them.”

Scott stood and tugged on his mother’s hand. “Mom and I will go to the store and get more formula and stuff for Frog.” It had taken him a while, but he was finally naturally adopting the baby girl’s nickname. “Lydia, I know you were going to go, but we need your brain here.”

Lydia preened at the compliment and sat up straighter. “Fine. But take my card.” She wiggled a credit card out of her purse and handed it to Scott who only hesitated a second before accepting it. Stiles assumed there was a story there, or maybe Lydia was stinking rich and paid for everything. Either way, Scott and his mom left with a list, and Stiles trusted Melissa to grab anything else she saw was important.

“Only the best for my baby girl!” Stiles shouted after them, and Scott gave him a double thumbs up.

Stiles heard his father groan and say, “I need so much red meat after this.”

They each picked up a book and started reading. Deaton had a laptop with him as he sat at the kitchen table, a pinch to his brow that never left.

Liam, Mason, and another newcomer Corey who stuck to Mason like glue (it was sweet, and Stiles was only a little bit jealous) all sat on the floor of the living room, backs against the coffee table as they shared a small pile, discussing between each other all of the weird things they were finding.

Argent had come with his own book, but Stiles didn’t want to ask why or how, and he stayed in his corner, flipping a page every few minutes with a soft hum.

Stiles’ father was on baby duty, keeping an eye on her as she crawled along the carpet, her bear rattle practically glued to her hand. She would sometimes end up next to the young boys, smack the books with her toy, get some attention, and then crawl away satisfied.

It was highly amusing to watch. But watching was not very productive.

Derek was a hot constant at his side (hot like warm but also hot) as he flipped through a thick hand-bound with binder rings print out. The ink was quite faded, but Derek seemed to be doing just fine.

But Stiles assumed Derek wasn’t going to be much help, much like himself. Because each page he read of the heavy, somehow dusty, tome in his lap gave him information, but it just sparked his brain, like oh yeah, I knew that!

It wasn’t conducive to looking for something new, that stood out, when everything was new to him.

After an hour, Stiles sighed and made the switch with his father, regrettably leaving Derek’s side and helping his father stand from the floor (“Old man knees, kid, watch out.”).

“You take this, keep looking, I’ll take over with the babe.”

The babe was currently pawing at Lydia’s shoes, and Stiles just saved Lydia’s uncovered toes from getting bashed in by a bear rattle as he swooped in to save the day. He made growling noises at her and pretended to eat her face, and she just bashed him in the shoulder with the rattle instead.

“Alright, updates, anyone?” Deaton called from the kitchen where he hadn’t moved a muscle. “Chris?”

Argent shook his head. “Been double checking the bestiary. We don’t have much on nature spirits, and what we do have is mislabeled as woodland spirits so maybe sometime soon that will be another chapter we will have to update.”

Stiles saw Lydia nod to the man in understanding, and Chris became a tiny bit more trusting in his eyes if Lydia worked with him on things.

“Everything listed has them as a peaceful kind, welcoming to hunters, and even has helped harvest, err, herbs we’ve needed in the past. There is a small note about the Carbone family, but nothing more than that they have made contact with an Argent at some point. Their abilities are, naturally, Earth based, and they are a people who can blend in easily.”

Lydia jumped in when Chris took a breath. “Yes, same information here.” She pointed at the book in her lap. It was full of sticky notes and tabs. She was open to one of the pages tagged with a bright yellow square, but he didn’t know what the smiley face drawn on it meant.

“There are no specific names mentioned in the text here, but nature spirits are said to be only mediocre, as far as power goes. They would be no match for a werewolf, maybe even no match for a human with Stiles’ skills.” Stiles had the feeling he should preen, so he did, and Frog immediately passed gas, so Stiles quickly left the room to change her diaper.

He hoped Scott and Melissa got back fast, because their original purchase of diapers and wipes was half gone and it had been less than a day.  

When Stiles returned, Lydia was still speaking. “But, again, that’s all circumstantial. Derek went as a friend, as did Stiles. I worry that we are focusing on the nature spirits when we should be focusing on the symptoms.”

“That’s what I’ve been combing through, Ms. Martin,” Deaton said. “The ability to remove memories, but not intelligence and experience, which is the situation we find ourselves in, is not as rare as you may think. But often times it is attributed to something human counteracting with something magical.”

“Like a head injury,” Mason suggested.

“Exactly. Like I mentioned last night, there was no found essence of magic or enchantments on either of you, which narrows down the search significantly, but unfortunately narrows it down also completely. This is not something that has happened before.”

“But variables are variables, they will always change,” Lydia remarked. “A case that seems unrelated could actually be the closest thing.”

“So should we stop looking at nature spirits and focus on…anything else?” Malia asked. She had been handed a tablet and had spent the last hour bantering quietly with Peter and touching the screen maybe three times.

“Not completely,” Stiles’ dad said. “We still might find something. But like Alan said, looking at the results might lead us to the question.”

“Backwards thinking,” Derek muttered, and Stiles hummed in agreement.

Frog started to fuss, and Stiles looked down to see her straining towards Derek, so he happily obliged, swapping child and book with Derek.

“You feeling okay?” Stiles asked him under his breath.

Derek nodded. “Yeah, you?”

“Yeah. I’m not worried,” Stiles admitted. “Sure, we had some panicked thoughts yesterday, but we took our time getting back and everything is still okay, we’re still going. So I think things will fix themselves.”

“So what are we researching for?” Derek asked in a whisper that half the room could hear.

“Because I could be wrong.”

“Something tells me that you rarely are.”

Stiles patted his cheek, because it wasn’t the right time to kiss it.

“I think we should focus on the baby,” Peter said in a suddenly quiet room.

Stiles glared at the older werewolf. “There’s nothing wrong with Frog.”

“Other than her name,” Peter noted, and Stiles sneered. “I mean that she was clearly not born yesterday, so where did she come from? Babies don’t just magically appear.”

“Actually,” Lydia interrupted, “They do. But that is usually a changeling child, summoned similarly to a demon.”

The word demon struck a chord in Stiles, and he shivered involuntarily, suddenly feeling very, very cold. He took Derek’s hand in his, squeezed it, and focused on the warmth coming from him to soothe the ache.

“Is the baby a demon?” Peter drawled.

“Absolutely not,” Derek shot back instantly. “She’s human. I can smell that. There were no distinct scents tied to her other than ours, and now all of yours.”

“She does smell weird, though,” Liam offered, and Stiles shot him a look. “Not a bad weird! Just different. I’ve been working hard on distinguishing scents, but I don’t know what the other thing is.”

“Maybe she had her memories wiped too, and it’s whatever did it that you’re smelling on her,” Corey suggested. “I know what you mean, now that you point it out, but it may just be that. Or nature spirit scent. They were with nature spirits, and neither of us has ever smelled them before.”

“We should get back to work,” Deaton suggested. “If you have a hunch, go after it. If something comes up, let everyone know.”

Derek’s hand squeezed his, and Stiles glanced over. He had a conflicting look on his face as he stared down at their hands. “Take Frog?” he requested, and Stiles did, setting the research aside, and watched Derek stride from the room and up the stairs and turn left.

“Remembering anything yet, Stiles?” Deaton asked suddenly hovering over his shoulder.

Stiles didn’t jump, but that was only because he was holding his daughter and his instincts kicked in. “Not really. Some of the things I was reading registered in my brain as remembered knowledge, but names and memories don’t stick.”

Deaton nodded, as if he expected the answer, and then went back to the kitchen table.

Derek came back down the stairs a minute later, and Stiles had no idea what he had done, but now he looked determined.

“Scott’s back,” three voices piped up seconds before steps could be heard on the front porch.

The True Alpha stumbled through the door laden with bags, apparently choosing to carry everything himself but one bag of food Melissa was holding.

“So, hey, we got lots of stuff, but we may have an issue. Like, three minutes ago, someone passed through the territory, and they weren’t human, and I think they’re coming here.”

There was a reasonable amount of worried noises bubbling up at that declaration.

However, Derek seemed immune as he went straight for Stiles, and Stiles stood from the couch to meet him eye-to-eye, Frog distracted with stretching out the collar of his t-shirt. He wrapped his arms around them, fingers curling at Stiles’ elbows.

“Stiles,” Derek said, such authority in his voice it made Stiles shiver. “I have no idea who you are or who I am but I love you. It was clear to me before and I’m tired of forcing myself to ignore it because if I am feeling this ache for you now after a day, I must have been in agony before without you. Your scent is everywhere in that office upstairs, but it is also in my bed and was in my bed from long ago but I didn’t recognize it because it had gone so stale, and I don’t know what that means but I must have given in at some point in the past so there is no need to stop myself anymore.”

Despite the baby in his arms, Stiles made a noise similar to a sob and surged forward and kissed him, kissed his mate, and Derek gripped his arms tightly, pressing Frog safely between them as he responded to the passion, the rest of the chaos in the room ignored.

It was when four people burst in through the front door, one man and woman and one young man and woman, startling them into breaking their kiss, that Frog giggled and then exploded.

It all came back to Stiles in a flash.

As soon as he stepped off the tiny airplane at the tiny Oregon airport and onto the tarmac (yes, they deplaned outside, that was how small it all was), Derek was standing there waiting for him, arms crossed and a smirk on his face.

Stiles huffed and threw his backpack at him, and Derek snagged it out of the air and smoothly tucked a strap over one shoulder. “Nice to see you too.”

“I was home for not even four days, Derek,” Stiles grumbled, stalking past him in a random direction, not sure where he was supposed to head but rationalized that Derek would redirect his course if necessary.

Immediately, an arm came up around his shoulders and pulled him in. “I’m sorry,” Derek said sincerely, and Stiles met his eyes. “I didn’t expect to be here this long, either, but things never happen the way we plan. I promise we’ll be out of here by tomorrow.”

Stiles chopped him in the side, to which Derek didn’t even flinch at, and said, “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.”

Derek led him towards a small parking lot and a beaten-up truck that he unlocked by putting the key in the door and then reaching across to the passenger side to unlock that door. Stiles would be more horrified if his Jeep wasn’t just as old, but seeing Derek interact with this clunker was hilarious.

“How many miles to the gallon is this thing?” Okay, he couldn’t help one quip.

Derek rolled his eyes, but the way he looked like he sent a prayer up before turning the key in the ignition made Stiles think he knew just how ridiculous the scenario looked.

The car did start, and once they were on the road, Stiles asked for the detailed explanation he’d been promised.

“The Carbones are a family of nature spirits, though most of them are human. They are practically the ruling supernatural family of Oregon, if something like that existed, so my family knew them well.”

“How can most of them be human?” Stiles asked.

“Years of mingling with humans will do that,” Derek joked. “The nature spirit ability is always inherited, so even if your father and his father and his father before were human, but your great-great grandmother was a nature spirit, so are you. Werewolves can breed themselves out, but nature spirits can’t, so there’s a lot more of them, and they all like to stick around together, so Oregon and Washington are their main hubs since that family was established.

“This visit was just supposed to be a social call, or so they’d originally said, but I knew something was going on. Every five years or so, my mom or grandma would go up to visit, but I’ve never been invited until now. So I figured something must be happening. Turns out I was needed because of my werewolf status, and family name.”

“Rival pack?” Stiles asked, and Derek nodded. “Against nature spirits? Why the clash?”

Derek shrugged. “Guess they wanted the territory, told them they needed to share. But nature spirits are naturally pacifists, and as far as I’m aware no one has ever challenged them for land. I think if the werewolves had just showed up and settled down there wouldn’t have even been an issue.

“So they called me, wanted me to negotiate with the pack, but they’ve been avoiding me. I’ve met a few of the Betas, asked them to call their Alpha, but they all refused. They said they wouldn’t meet unless I had a second with me. I could have asked Scott, but—”

“True Alpha. They would have seen it as a threat. And Lydia a banshee, omen of death…”

“And anyone else was too young or busy to make the trip. Except for you.”

“Wee!” Stiles mock cheered, and Derek laughed.

Derek was quiet for a bit, the radio fizzing in and out between them, before he blurted, “I think there’s something else, though. I don’t know what, but the Carbones are hiding something. They’re smooth talkers, clearly used to werewolf ears, but I know they are hiding something. But the pack needs to be covered first. The full moon is in two days, and I want this dealt with tonight if possible, before they try something stupid.”

“Hear, here,” Stiles concurred.

They stopped at a fast food place before getting to the Carbone house, because Stiles complained of an aching stomach.

“The plane ride was an hour and a half, Stiles,” Derek argued, but was already turning into the drive through. Stiles beamed at him and blew a kiss.

The Carbone house was a significant size, large than Stiles’, but not bigger than the Hale Manor (old or new). Derek parked in the garage, but had them go back around to the front of the house and knock. When no one answered the door, Derek entered, and Stiles followed behind, a bit wary and mostly confused, until he saw what the house looked like on the back half.

Windows, all windows. They faced the tree line and it made Stiles feel like he could watch for days. Derek was looking at him when he turned, gauging his reaction, and quirked an eyebrow in a “Right?” gesture.

“A lot of them are at work right now, but I was hoping the lack of nature spirits might draw the pack close. You ready?” Derek asked.

“No time like the present,” Stiles agreed, sweeping his hands out. “After you, Ex Alpha.”

Derek snapped his sharper than usual jaws at him playfully, and Stiles giggled.

Stiles was glad they’d filled up on food, because they walked for a long time in the woods, though Stiles could always see the house in the distance, even if he had to strain his eyes. They walked back and forth, spreading their scent.

Stiles called out in a sing-song voice, “Here werewolves, good werewolves, come play with the nice human second to the big scary Hale Wolf.”

After an hour, finally, they were approached. They were closer to the house than far, which made Stiles feel better about their chances in case they needed to run. But he knew Derek would protect him, should something happen.

Out of the trees, very movie-esque, a tall young man emerged next to a slim, short woman with blazing red eyes.

“Going all out, aren’t we?” he asked, unable to stop his mouth.

“Hale, this is your second?” the woman asked, looking Stiles up and down.

“He is. And I assume this Beta is yours. Now, can we finally make some headway into discussing your presence on Carbone-protected land?”

The woman Alpha narrowed her eyes, but nodded. “We’d like to establish territory here. Our last location was unsafe, unstable, so we fled here looking for sanctuary.”

“And you can easily have sanctuary, if that is really what you want,” Derek pointed out. “But you seemed much more inclined to pick a fight, from what I heard.”

She huffed. “Most of the time it is the same thing.”

“Maybe,” Derek allowed. “But the Carbones are nature spirits and only care about keeping the land protected. You are free to live here without risk of them challenging that.”

“How can I take your word for it if the Carbones aren’t making their presence known?”

“Some people work during the day,” Stiles commented. “And didn’t you refuse to work with them without Derek present? And then refuse to work without Derek having a second?” Stiles huffed and crossed his arms. “What’s the delay?”

The Beta shifted, and Derek’s eyes snapped over to him. “Were you waiting for the full moon?”

“The full moon doesn’t give us any more strength than an established pack has naturally,” the Beta snapped, and the Alpha soccer-momed him with her arm so that he couldn’t approach.

“It seems,” the Alpha said, “That we’ve had some miscommunication.”

Stiles sighed. “So does that mean I didn’t have to fly out here at all?” he whined.

Derek cuffed the back of his head, but it didn’t even hurt, and then he kept his hand on the base of his neck, rubbing circles into the muscle. It was like he knew the plane had given Stiles a neck ache.

“It’s been us that have been avoided by the Carbones. We’ve only seen you, and meeting a werewolf alone to discuss territory is never safe, even for an Alpha against a Beta.”

Stiles could understand that, especially if said Alpha wasn’t lying and had recently fled from a bad situation.

“Why would the Carbones be avoiding you?” Derek asked, which was also a valid question.

“That might be my fault?”

Derek and Stiles whipped around as a girl emerged sheepishly from between two trees.

The Beta’s eyes flashed and his entire demeanor flipped. “Lucy!”

Lucy smiled at him, and Stiles recognized that lovelorn look on her face immediately. “Some of this is starting to make more sense,” Stiles whispered, leaning into Derek, even though the majority of the group could hear him no matter the volume.

Derek locked eyes with him, and Stiles jerked his head between the two young ones. Derek furrowed his eyebrows, clearly confused. Stiles sighed and leaned back.

“Let me guess,” Stiles said, and the Beta stopped inching towards the girl whom Stiles was pretty sure was one of the nature spirits in the Carbone family. “Some kind of star-crossed lovers thing?”

The Alpha whipped around to look at the boy and exclaimed, “Lovers?!”

The Beta’s baby blues went wide, lips pursed.

“We’re not lovers, we’ve only just talked,” Lucy piped up, and then the Alpha’s eyes were on her and she squeaked.

“But you could be,” Stiles added, wiggling his eyebrows.

“Stiles,” Derek groaned, dropping his hand, and Stiles immediately missed the weight of it on his neck. Derek rubbed his face and sighed. “Can I get filled in here?”

Lucy nodded quickly, and she clearly was still a bit afraid of the Alpha, because she inched closer to Derek, much to the Beta’s chagrin. “Edvard and I met at school, and we both knew right away that neither of us was human, so we became each other’s safety net, or sounding board when we wanted to talk openly with someone without worry of secrets. And he told me all about your pack — which sounds lovely, by the way — and then confided in me he didn’t think he’d be back next semester because you were all fleeing east. And so I told him about our lands, and that he’d be safe here.”

“So you were the one who convinced your father to convince me to go west,” the Alpha interrupted, eyes narrowed at her Beta, who sheepishly nodded.

“I told him we had guaranteed safety. But I didn’t explain about Lucy’s family, so when we ran into them, you just kind of assumed—”

“Assumed you’d make our pack look the fool!?” the Alpha snarled.

“It’s not his fault!” Lucy shouted, which Stiles thought was awfully brave of her. “I didn’t tell my family everything either, so then they got wary since we’re already on edge and called Derek, and by the time he was here it was a mess and I couldn’t find Edvard anywhere.”

Derek was still rubbing his face, but he looked less annoyed and more amused. “So this is all a misunderstanding?” He nodded when he got nods back from the other supernatural creatures. “Okay. Then let me address you, Alpha—”

“Nona,” she filled in.

“Nona,” Derek repeated. “With Lucy as the Carbone family representative, she will take responsibility for granting you access to these lands to make your home, with the promise that you treat it with respect and if that ever comes into question, you are to talk over any issues with the Carbones. Lucy, I’ll go over things with your family when they get home, so that they understand too.” The young spirit nodded. “Are there any other issues?” he asked.

Stiles shot a hand up, and Derek immediately slapped it back down.

“Great. Nona, Edvard, you have my best wishes, and should you need it, the Hale and McCall families in Beacon Hills will welcome you and your pack.”

Derek turned about face and started back to the house, leaving Stiles behind as he shook out his hand, playing up the swat Derek had given it.

Lucy and Edvard were making heart eyes at each other, and Nona was clearly still annoyed and was not having it.

“Maybe we all can do dinner! Tonight!” Stiles suggested. “Or just those two, or maybe just hang out in the woods, talk, discuss, mingle.” He chuckled. “I’m gonna go catch up with the sourwolf, but howl if you need anything!”

A slow smile crept up Nona’s face as he spoke. “Your mate is a good man. I could use a Beta like him.”

Stiles gawked and laughed awkwardly. “Uh, mate? You hail from Australia, then? No accent, though. Um. I think Derek’s happy where he is. He just rebuilt his house, so…”

Nona said nothing, so Stiles jabbed a thumb behind him and then turned, jogging so that he could catch up with Mr. Speedy Wolf and get back to the house. Derek was already a speck in front of him, so he slowed down with a huff. He’d rather walk and it take longer than be out of breath by the time he made it to the back porch.

Lucy caught up with him after a couple minutes, a happy flush on her cheeks. “We’re going to get lunch together tomorrow,” she divulged, without him needing to ask.

“That’s great! Hey, so when you said you and you family were already on edge, what did that mean?”

Her smile vanished; flush gone. Stiles raised an eyebrow.

“Didn’t think I caught that? I promise you Derek did, and he’s gonna ask you too, so you may want to practice your spiel on me first, because his eyes are just as intimidating as Alpha Nona’s back there, and your speech wasn’t all that coherent before.”

 Lucy whimpered, and Stiles stopped as she suddenly burst into tears. “I can’t say!” she wailed before diving her face into her hands.

“Woah, no, I’m sorry, wait,” Stiles rushed, arms going up and around her, patting her shoulders. “Sheesh, I don’t think you did anything wrong. We just want to help, is all. I’m already here, I may as well be productive somehow.”

She sniffled. “You were great back there, keeping Mr. Hale calm and everything.”

Mr. Hale. Stiles swallowed his snort. “Derek’s good enough at keeping himself calm. Well, at least he is now a days. I don’t think I did much, but thanks.”

She sniffled again, and Stiles winced. He really was not equipped to handle crying girls, especially baby college freshman, he guessed, working on their first loves with complicated family situations.

“You definitely helped, though, I can see why he asked you to come here.”

Stiles cleared his throat. “Um, I was kind of the only choice.”

Her eyes were watery still, but she was no longer crying when she looked up at him and said, “I would think his mate would be his first choice.”

Stiles’ jaw dropped and he backed up a few paces. “Again with the mate! What is this? Derek isn’t—” Wait, he couldn’t say that, it would be a lie. “Mates are a little deeper than our friendship,” he settled on, though he winced and pretended his heart didn’t hurt.

Lucy eyed him like he was the baby college freshman working on the first love with a complicated family situation.

Okay, point taken.

“Stop distracting me,” Stiles changed the topic. “What’s going on with your family?”

Lucy still looked hesitant. “I don’t think I can explain it. They shouldn’t have been hiding it for this long, but this is the biggest, worst, best thing we’ve ever done, so I think it scared us a bit.”

Stiles couldn’t figure out what the issue was other than it must have been some sort of spell or ritual her family did that caused something. Something that could be good and bad.

What surprised Stiles was that when they finally got back to the house, Derek didn’t interrogate the girl. Maybe they had been loud enough that he had heard their conversation. If so, then he’d heard the “mates” discussion as well, and had yet to show any signs of wanting to mention it or wanting to ignore it. Stiles couldn’t tell if that was a good sign or a bad sign.

Stiles took a shower while they waited for the Carbones to get home, wanting to wash the sweat and plane-smell from his skin that irritated his human nose.

He’d shoved a button up and jeans into his backpack before he left, so he had fresh clothes of his own to change into. He debated texting someone to give them an update, but he decided to wait until something actually happened that was noteworthy, and he didn’t think it would be too much longer before that occurred.

Derek was patient and good all throughout the afternoon, welcoming people home as they arrived, even helping to make dinner, before over the meal giving an edited version of the meeting with Alpha Nona. Lucy piped up a couple times, just to agree and enforce that the pack was not a threat, and Derek continued to say nothing.

Until, of course, Stiles had a spoon in his mouth as he enjoyed some after-dinner ice cream, feeling nice and warm and cozy in his new hoodie, and Derek asked, “So, are we going to stop lying or am I going to start ripping arms off,” with the sweetest smile on his face.

Stiles choked, obviously, and Derek patted his back as he coughed chunky money out of his lungs. Stiles wrapped his fingers around the patting arm and squeezed, letting him know he was fine.

The table went silent after cutlery hit plates and bowls. Six pairs of eyes stared at Derek, and even Lucy looked surprised.

“Not actual arms,” Stiles assured the shocked audience of nature spirits. “He probably means tree arms, branches. It’s a metaphor. Basically: why are we here?”

The head of the family recovered first, Lucy’s uncle, if Stiles had the people straight. “Its time,” he spoke gravely.

“Thomas,” Lucy’s mother hissed, but Lucy placed a hand over her mother’s.

“Mr. Hale deserves to know. He can help us,” she insisted, caught Stiles’ eye and smiled. “Stiles too.”

Thomas pushed his plate away from himself, as if to make a point, and stood. He left the kitchen, the rest of the family staring after him. Stiles unfurled his fingers from around Derek’s arm, and it moved from his spine around the back of his chair, fingers brushing his opposite shoulder.

Derek watched the doorway along with everyone else, but Stiles was watching Derek, so he caught when Derek stiffened and his eyes went comically wide. Stiles whipped his head around to see Thomas entering the room, a baby in his arms.

“Um,” Stiles murmured, seeing the tense people all around him. “A baby?”

“How did I not sense her before?” Derek asked abruptly.

“She is protected here, on our land. Unless we reveal ourselves to you, we can stay undetected. This extends to her.”

Derek nodded and gestured for him to elaborate.

Thomas took a deep breath, and the baby bundle in his arms stirred, but slept on, oblivious. “Part of the reason we were worried when that pack arrived was because six months ago, we had a run in with an Omega. Or, an Omega was here, but we never saw her, just sensed she was hiding in the woods. But she left evidence behind. Her child. Except, by the time we found her…” he glanced down significantly at the baby, “it was still winter, so—”

“She was dead,” Stiles blurted, every lightbulb coming on inside of his head at once. “You revived her.”

“We all did,” Lucy’s mother said, standing from her seat. “We’d never done something like that before, didn’t know it would work. But Thomas thought that since it was our land that she lost her life to, we might be able to convince the land to give it back to her.”

Derek exhaled slowly, and Stiles reached down to squeeze his thigh, guessing where his thoughts were straying.

“And it worked!” Lucy exclaimed. “Except once we had her, we didn’t know what to do. We’ve been raising her ever since, but she has some kind of magic. It’s more powerful than ours. And she’s partially a werewolf kid, though human, so we think there was a glitch, basically, in her DNA when we brought her back.”

Derek tilted his nose up and sniffed. “There is a very faint werewolf scent, but she is human. And… yeah, something more. Your scents are coving it up, it’s difficult to distinguish.”

“Here, hold her,” Thomas offered, and Derek’s arm was suddenly gone from the back of his chair and a baby girl was against his chest.

Stiles stared down at her. She had light curly hair that he couldn’t tell if it was blonde or brown, and her skin was several shades darker than Derek’s. Stiles wanted to see her eyes, know what color they were.

“We think she was left to us because she was born human,” someone commented, but Stiles didn’t pull his eyes away from the baby to see who. “And when we failed to protect her the first time, the Earth gave us another chance.”

“Hey Two-Timer,” Stiles whispered, hands hovering but not sure where to touch. He eventually brushed gentle fingers through her hair, and she shifted so that his fingers brushed her cheek and her nose too.

“But the older she gets,” Thomas added, but to Stiles it sounded distant, “the more powerful she is here, and I fear that she cannot stay here for much longer or her power, whatever it is, will kill her. Like too much of a good thing. So we called you here to talk with the pack, yes, but also for your advice regarding what our next steps should be. She is werewolf, by blood, so a werewolf should be involved in the decision. And maybe…maybe a werewolf should take her.”

Derek had this overwhelming look on his face, and when he raised his eyes to meet Stiles’, the look seemed to triple.

Stiles knew that look, or a variant of that look. That was the look Derek gave him when Stiles saved him (shut up, Scott, he totally did) from that hunters raid when he’d hopped on the FBI investigation to free him. They were both heading back to Beacon Hills, standing in front of his Jeep, keys in hand. And yet.

“Do you want to make out right now?” Stiles had blurted, and Derek had kissed his answer onto every inch of his skin.

And he got the same look throughout that summer, and then the next, and that one time over Christmas break, in the new Hale Manor.

They never discussed it, never named it, just reveled in their compatibility and the way they both had their breaths stolen in a good way.

Derek giving him that look times a thousand right now was the opposite of fair.

The word “mate” echoed in his brain and Stiles bit out, “Oh, you asshole.”

“Stiles,” Derek said, sounding defeated, because of course he knew what Stiles was referring to.

“No, don’t give me that shit, Derek!” Stiles shouted, abruptly standing from his chair and stalking out of the dining room. “You’ve been lying to me! For years!”

“I never lied,” Derek argued, standing, tucking the baby closer to his chest, curling a hand over her ears so that it muffled their shouts.

Stiles scoffed meanly. “No, no, you just withheld the truth from me. Mates, Derek! You and I! How did I not see it, it was so obvious with—” Stiles choked on the name, like he always did and probably always will, “with Allison and Scott… I should have seen it!”

“I didn’t want you— shit, didn’t let you. You were sixteen when we met, Stiles, neither of us wanted it then.”

“I wanted it three years ago, though!” Stiles shot back, finger pointing at Derek, and his hand shook with rage. “You had no reason to not tell me, Derek, I was out of high school—”

“Yeah, and starting your life!” Derek was now shouting back. It looked like Thomas was edging close to take the baby out of the situation, but Derek held her close, gently, so sweetly. “You were in DC, Stiles, working for the FBI, everything you worked so hard for. Beacon Hills was done for you, but it was just starting for me. I felt like I could finally go back, settle down, have roots.”

“My dad is in Beacon Hills, Derek, and it’s the home of my pack too, I’d never abandon it.”

“Yeah, but you could,” Derek countered, their voices softening as the argument went on. “But if I told you,” his voice cracked, and Stiles swallowed his next words, “That would have been me taking away that choice. I didn’t ever want to do that.”

“Derek,” Stiles breathed. He reached out, hand curling around to cup his cheek. He could read Derek’s thoughts, his decision in his eyes. The heartbreak was imminent.

“Um, guys?!”

They both turned their heads to Lucy, who looked slightly terrified and was pointing at their midsections.

Derek and Stiles looked down. The infant girl was glowing. And growing brighter every second.

“That’s not normal,” Stiles quipped, voice raw from shouting, and then suddenly everything went white, and then black.

And he woke to the sound of a baby’s cry.

“Lucy, wait!” the young man — Edvard! — shouted as the nature spirit girl rushed forward towards where Stiles was now blinking lights out of his eyes, clutching Frog to his chest like a lifeline.

“I’m okay, we’re okay,” Stiles assured the room.

Derek made a grunt from next to him, arms still squeezed around him, though he seemed out of it still.

“Thank goddess you’re all okay!” Lucy cried, and yep, the tears were back, but Edvard was there to help calm her this time. “We were so worried. You just vanished! Until we got the call from Cora, we had no idea what to do!”

“God bless Cora for being the one to f-figure everything out without lifting a finger off her phone,” Derek grumbled, and Stiles chuckled.

“You guys got amnesia?” Nona, the Alpha, asked as she approached.

“Well, we did, Stiles replied. “But now…” He shook his head, finally blinking the last of the spots from his vision. “Not so much?”

“So the baby did it?” asked Mason.

Stiles and Derek stilled, and Stiles stared down at the smiling tyke.

“You little devil,” Stiles squeal-shouted into Frog’s face, who just stared back at him with a wide grin. “You whisked us off to find a new life in the middle of some forest, just like you did!”

“I don’t think she did it on purpose,” Thomas, the man of the new group, noted.

“Oh yes she did! She knew her daddies were being stupid and needed to get their heads on straight so you took our heads away!” Frog belched in his face, and Stiles ducked his head to blow raspberries in her stomach. “You…you changeling child!”

“Your words and actions are very contradictive,” Lydia alerted him.

“Daddies?” his father choked.

“Well, Derek is definitely Daddy,” Stiles assured, pressing a hand to Derek’s chest as he finally was able to stand without buckling knees. “Don’t even try to deny it, babe, I can read you like a book, and it was game over as soon as she was in your arms. My role is, um… still a bit up in the air.” He bit his lip and caught Derek’s eye.

Derek’s smile slowly built. “You forgive me?”

“Yeah,” Stiles said on an exhale. “I understand why you did what you did, but it’s ridiculous to keep denying ourselves what we want, right? And I want you, mate.”

Scott made a whining noise. “Okay, this is beautiful, but can you two please explain the two wolves and two…others that barged into our territory and your house?”

“I think they have a good excuse, Scott,” Melissa admonished him.

As much as Stiles didn’t want to, he tore his eyes away from Derek and gestured to the newcomers. “Everyone, this is Nona and Edvard, werewolves, and Lucy and her Uncle Thomas, nature spirits form the Carbone family.”

The four gave an awkward wave. Lucy was still sniffling. Edvard was using his shirt to dry her tears. It was sweet, but gross.

Introductions were made, and Stiles remembered everyone! It was like he’d just knocked the plug loose in his brain, but one baby boop and it was back in. He refused to feel embarrassed for the way he acted without his memories because, other than allowing Derek to read an entire article detailing all of the deaths in his life, he couldn’t regret any of it.

Especially the touches and the kisses. Oh, that kiss outside the rental car; Stiles might weep at the memory.

“The rental car!” Stiles suddenly shouted, and Derek swore loudly.

“That’s going to be so fucking expensive,” he grumbled.

“Yeah, I was wondering where the car came from, had hoped you didn’t hotwire it and drive it here,” his father joked.

“I’ll give the company a call, see if they’d do another pick up, so I don’t have to look them in the face when I sign the check.”

Derek left to do that, and though Stiles felt a pang of loss, he realized maybe he had gotten unhealthily attached to Derek over the last day, and it would be good for them to do things separately, for a bit, just so their brains could settle and Stiles could go back to being naturally in love with him.

An hour passed quickly. The rental car left with a sizeable amount of Derek’s cash, the nature spirits and invading werewolves joined the group for lunch, and Frog was doted on by everyone in the house as Stiles gave a dramatic retelling of his quick and also long journey to Oregon.

“There’s still a day missing, though,” Lydia pointed out, physically pointing a bread roll at Stiles. “Between Oregon and you waking up yesterday morning.”

“My best guess is whatever magic Frog possesses she doesn’t know how to use, shocker, and maybe something to do with moving people through space moves them through time. She took us almost exactly halfway between here and the Carbones’ place. And it’s no wonder she slept nearly the whole time; she must have been magically drained.”

“That’s another possible reason there was no scent on her as anything but human,” said Deaton.

“So, Derek,” Thomas said, and everyone’s eyes went to him. “What are your thoughts?”

Derek glanced around the room before he looked back at Thomas. “I want to adopt her,” he said with finality. “She needs a safe place to call home, and she already feels like family. If she wasn’t an infant with no sense of object permanence, I’d say she wanted me as her family.”

“That’s not so crazy,” Lydia gently butted in. “Babies are very good at character judgements. And if she has magic, maybe she made that connection with you on purpose.”

Derek gave her a smile and a soft pat on the arm. “Thanks. I know it seems sudden, but she’s pretty much the only thing I’ve been thinking about, I didn’t sleep a wink last night, so I’ve had a lot of time to decide. But I remember the feeling when I first saw her, like we were already bonded, and if my instinct was to accept that bond, I don’t see why that should change.”

Thomas nodded, a big smile on his face. “That’s great, son. We’ll help you out with the adoption process. It’ll be difficult, and it won’t be immediate. You’ll have to go through the proper government channels and get certified and have the house approved as livable, which shouldn’t be any issue. But we have no problem passing guardianship over to you until everything is finalized. Plus, we’re not so far, just a six-hour drive. It’s not like we’re on the East.”

Stiles winced.

“What’s her name?” Derek asked, eying his now nearly official daughter who was bouncing in Lucy’s lap.

Thomas chuckled. “I guess we never did get around to that, did we? Aurora. A stunning natural phenomenon. Seemed fitting.”

Aurora. Stiles looked at Frog, tilted his head, and squinted. Yeah, he could see it.

“We’ve been calling her Rory, for short,” Lucy chimed in, pinching the baby’s cheeks.

“Not bad. I’m kind of stuck on Frog, though,” Derek admitted.

“That’s because you came up with it,” Stiles teased.

“And because you liked it.”

Stiles hummed, hiding a smile.

The conversations derailed from there. Aurora demanded another feeding, so Derek took her into the kitchen to prepare a bottle and separate the sensitive ears from the baby whines.

Deaton left, taking his research with him, Thomas following behind as they discussed nature spirit things. Lucy, Edvard, and Nona stuck around for a bit, talking with Liam, Mason, and Cory as they regaled to them the horrific tales of Beacon Hills.

His dad had a shift at work, and so did Melissa, so each bade their sons goodbye and left together. Peter disappeared, thankfully.

Malia and Lydia were chatting at the kitchen table still, picking at the last of the lunch meal. They both gave Stiles a Look as he passed, and he held his handsvup in surrender. He could just see Derek moving about in the kitchen, waiting for the bottle to warm up, and coaxing Aurora not to cry.

“So, mates,” Scott said, suddenly at his side, and he snorted out a laugh when Derek fumbled with a bottle nipple.

“Yep,” Stiles said, popping the p. “I mean, we’ve been banging for two and a half years, so.”

Stiles watched the horror grow on Scott’s face. “What? No.”

Stiles grinned. “Yes.”

“You never told me,” Scott whined, stamping his foot like he used to when they were little. “I thought we always talked over stuff like this.”

“It wasn’t very defined of a relationship, Scott, and it happened only a handful of times. Or, well, a couple handfuls, but there was no discussion. But now I get it.”

“He went all Derek Hale on you.”

“Yep. Silent and protective.”

“So what now? I mean, he’s got a kid.”

Stiles patted Scott’s cheek and headed towards the kitchen. “That’s what I get to figure out.”

Derek had a bottle in Aurora’s mouth and an actual bib around her neck (and yes, Melissa had splurged for the plastic-coated, easy to clean ones with the catcher pockets at the bottom), angle of the bottle just right.

“What a DILF,” Stiles whistled.

Derek rolled his eyes, not even looking up. “More like DIAF.” Stiles raised an eyebrow, and Derek glanced up slyly. “Dad I’m Already Fucking.”

Stiles moaned dramatically and leaned against Derek, wrapping an arm around his waist and burying his head in his shoulder. “I love you.” He could feel Derek’s heart stutter under his cheek. “I never said it, before, but I felt it. For a while now. And I know that your life is here, especially with this little one, and my education takes precedence over near everything else right now. But that doesn’t mean I’m not here now, and that I won’t be every weekend I can come back for, and after graduation.”

“You’re more than Beacon Hills, Stiles,” Derek reiterated, reminiscent of their fight in Oregon. “The FBI wants you.”

“The FBI, I have learned recently, isn’t as human as you think,” Stiles whispered in his ear. “But shh, it’s a top secret. Not to me, of course, I found their files ages ago but only recently convinced the head of the supernatural division to loop me in. It’s not a regularly scheduled gig, or often scheduled. I may have to supplement my income somehow with other jobs, like law enforcement or security. True, on the rare top-secret jobs I could be sent anywhere in the country, but that means I can start anywhere in the country.”

Stiles didn’t move as he waited to hear Derek’s response, and when it came, the werewolf sounded hopeful. “Stiles… what are you saying?”

“I’m saying, Derek, that I can’t be your full-time baby daddy yet, but give me a year.” Stiles stood up straight and locked eyes with Derek. “And I really hated sleeping in that office. The daybed is nice, but your bed is so much bigger.”

Aurora finished the bottle and started pushing it away, and Stiles grabbed it from her and set it on the counter behind Derek. In leaning forward, Aurora grabbed his shirt collar and pulled him down with surprising strength. Stiles nearly smacked his forehead into Derek’s, catching himself at the last minute with a hand on the counter so that they only grazed.

“I think she makes an excellent point: no more talking,” Derek murmured, and suddenly they were kissing, but really it wasn’t sudden at all.