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Stiles doesn’t know what induced the panic attack, just that something must have.
It had been over a month since the nogitsune had been defeated. Scott wasn’t talking to him; he would barely even look at Stiles if they happened to be in the same room. But he was finally back in working order as of last week, or at least what could count as working order considering the fact that he rarely sleeps or eats anymore.
He had been held up in his house for a month; no school, no diners, no friends, and, sadly, no dad -just another person who couldn’t stand his presence anymore. His ADHD had been driving him crazy the entire time he was on house arrest, and no amount of Adderall had been helping either. He couldn’t focus on anything, his mind was moving at a mile a minute and he just couldn’t sit still even with something to distract him. So to combat his unease he decided to go on a walk.
He’ll be honest, his friends weren’t just avoiding him, Stiles was also avoiding them. Some of them had been trying to contact him, mainly Lydia and, surprisingly, Isaac (Derek was apparently out of town again but that didn’t surprise him much either considering what Stiles had put the guy through while he was possessed). But Stiles couldn’t face them, he had done so much while under the nogitsune’s control and he wouldn’t have them relive all of that just because he was lonely.
He didn’t want to walk through town or around the neighborhood, Beacon Hills is a small town and he doesn’t want to run into anyone he might know (and he was also doing whatever he could to avoid Malia after what happened in Eichen House. It wasn’t that the brief time they spent together wasn’t nice or that she wasn’t, just that their ‘time’ together made him realize a few things about himself like how not straight he was and his feelings toward a certain Sourwolf) so he chose to go to the preserve instead.
During the walk, he had somehow ended up at the Hale House. He was honestly surprised the thing was still up. Nature had almost claimed it entirely by now, its walls more ivy and vines than, well, wall. He could even hear some sort of critter rummaging around inside the decrepit structure. It was kind of beautiful in a morbid way if you thought about it. The house once belonged to what was essentially a pack of wolves in human form -though some were just that, human- a natural part of nature obstructed by some less natural building materials. But now though? Now nature had reclaimed the spot fully in the place of the natural things that used to live there.
He was about to walk away and continue down the path that led him there when the panic attack struck out of the blue. He was perfectly fine one second then doubled over trying to get control over his erratic breathing the next. Maybe if he hadn’t come to the Hale House he wouldn’t have had the panic attack. Maybe if he had sensed the panic attack coming sooner, or even at all, he would have got himself under control long enough to hear the snapping of twigs and crunches of the leaves coming from the nearby bushes. Maybe he would have heard the low growl that followed. But he didn’t, he didn’t even register another presence with him until he was tackled to the ground and red glowing eyes were in his face.
Then came the fire in his veins and after it, he was consumed by darkness.
BREAK
Stiles wakes on the forest floor feeling numb. He doesn’t know if he was still at the Hale House or if the alpha dragged him somewhere else. Either way, he’s not sure he wants to find out.
When Stiles tries to get up, he screams out at the blinding pain that shoots through his body and collapses back onto the ground. After a few more attempts to get up and a lot of tears have been shed, Stiles somehow manages to stand up. It takes a minute for him to grasp his surroundings, the tears and pain making his vision blurry. The first thing he notices is the state he’s in. His clothes are torn to shreds and drenched in blood, his body is riddled with claw marks and possibly a few bite marks -which is what really worries him- and he can’t really tell where his skin starts and the blood ends. Below him, the forest floor is also covered in his blood, but it seems the ground has already soaked up most of it. He finally looks around to find that he is, in fact, still at the Hale house.
After a few more minutes of standing there and trying to collect himself, Stiles starts to make his way back to the jeep. He should probably try and find a lake or a stream to clean up in, but he doesn’t know if he would make it that far. It’s a long and extremely painful process but eventually, Stiles makes it back to the jeep. It’s almost more painful climbing into the beast of a vehicle than it was making the trek to it.
He has to drive slowly to try and not aggravate his wounds any further. By the time he gets home, it's dark out -which he is very much grateful for. His dad’s not home either, which isn’t all that surprising considering the man spends most of his time working or held up in his room sleeping now and the only time Stiles would see him was when the man was going to and from work or his bedroom. And since it’s dark he luckily won’t have to explain his wounds and bloody clothes to any random passerby.
Since some of his wounds have started to slowly knit themselves together -which Stiles doesn’t know whether to be grateful for or not- it’s easier and less painful to move. Once he’s unlocked the front door and made it inside he goes straight upstairs and to the bathroom. The whole process takes a lot longer than he would like to admit.
As soon as he’s closed the bathroom door he removes the bloody rags that are his clothes and throws them in the trash can under the sink. His dad’s room has its own bathroom so the man only ever uses this one if he feels it’s absolutely necessary. Even though it’s unlikely the sheriff will find the clothes, Stiles still plans to change out the trash bag and throw the one with his destroyed clothes away, maybe even burn it.
With his clothes off Stiles can see just how bad the alpha attack was. There’s almost no part of him that isn’t stained red with blood. And if it wasn’t for the fact that the several bites he was given had taken, his skin would probably be patchwork at best (he would also probably be dead right now, but he didn’t really want to think about that). It looked like the alpha had wanted him more as a midday snack than as a beta.
Letting out a long sigh full of regret, pain, guilt, and so many other emotions and feelings he got into the shower and put the settings as hot as he could. Despite the pain that came from mixing the hot water and his slowly healing wounds, the shower made him feel a lot better than he had since before Void. It allowed him to escape from his shitty and depressing life and just focus on the spray hitting his skin and the blood-tinted water now flowing down the drain.
He stayed in the shower until the water turned freezing, wanting to avoid as many of the things he knew he had to do now for as long as possible. When he got out of the shower several of the scratches and bites were now nothing more than scars but there were still quite a few that weren’t even close to being healed. He could also tell some of the super-senses that came with being a werewolf were also starting to settle into place. While washing away the blood, the chemicals from his body wash were more potent and he could hear the journey the water made down the pipes.
Glad his dad still had yet to come home, Stiles exited the bathroom completely naked and walked to his room. The cool air felt nice on the wounds that weren’t completely healed but not so much on the rest of his body. He quickly dressed in a pair of sweatpants and an old baggy BHPD t-shirt that used to be his dad’s, his comfort clothes, before making his way back to the bathroom to grab the trash bag that had his bloody clothes in it. After he disposed of the bag (through fire, because why not) he was going to go back to his room and pass out but his stomach stopped him. So after he cleaned the kitchen of almost all snack foods he went upstairs and flopped onto his bed.
He was out before his head even hit his pillow.
BREAK
Stiles was sitting in his desk chair staring at his phone on the desk. He had typed in the number and even rehearsed what he would say to the person it would connect him with, but he had yet to manage to actually hit the call button.
When going down the list of people that he could call to help him with his new furry issue there were a few he automatically crossed off the list. Most of the pack went first, out of the ones that were actually werewolves they only had about a year or so’s worth of experience under their belts, so he didn’t really think they were qualified to help him. The next to go was Peter, while the guy wasn’t an insane psycho werewolf anymore, Stiles wasn’t exactly sure how trustworthy he was either; he also didn’t have the guy’s number so Stiles couldn’t contact him even if he wanted to. He briefly considered Scott since he was an Alpha and, besides the Hales, had the most experience being a werewolf, but the guy pretty much hated his guts now, he hadn’t even attempted to contact Stiles since the nogitsune had been defeated. There was also the fact that Scott resented being a werewolf despite the good being one had done for him.
So that left one person for him to contact. The one person Stiles was really hoping that he wouldn’t have to call.
Derek Hale.
It wasn’t that he didn’t like the guy or thought the man couldn’t help him, he just didn’t want to disrupt his life again. Derek got the hell out of dodge and Stiles didn’t blame him, Beacon Hills was basically supernatural hell on earth, especially for the Hales. So having to call him because he was bitten and didn’t have anyone else to turn to, made Stiles hate himself more than he already did.
Letting out a sigh Stiles pushed down his anxiety as best he could and picked up his phone. He hesitated for another couple of minutes before taking a deep breath and hitting the call button. It rang for a minute so Stiles thought that it might go to voicemail, hell he was even hoping that it would, so when the call connected, he started to silently panic.
“Stiles?” When Stiles didn’t answer him the man's voice became a little frantic. “Stiles is everything okay?”
“N-not exactly.” Apparently, that was the wrong thing to say.
“What! Stiles, what happened? Are you okay? Is the pack okay?” Derek was rambling out questions and talking more than Stiles ever thought he was capable of. Stiles could hear Derek rummaging around and a jingling that sounded like keys.
“Derek, calm down. The pack is fine, everyone's fine.” Stiles could still hear Derek rummaging around. “Der!” That caused the noise to stop. “I promise you the pack is fine.”
“What about you?’’ the alpha asked after some silence.
“That is… To be determined at the moment.” Derek started moving again. “You don’t have to come back to Beacon Hills for me, Sourwolf.” Derek paused again.
“Stiles, I got back a couple of days ago,” Derek told him, clearly confused.
“What?” Stiles yelled. “Why didn’t anyone tell me? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I wanted to make sure you were okay first, you know after everything that happened. I checked with the pack beforehand, and Scott said you wanted some space and time to think or something like that.” At that, the only thing going through his head was how much he now hated Scott McCall. That Scott, a person he once considered to be his brother, had been keeping him from the pack, Stiles’ pack, made him feel things he never had previously.
“Stiles, did you just growl?” That shut Stiles up real quick. He hadn’t even realized he had growled until Derek said something. “Stiles, answer me.”
“Growl? Who growled? Did you growl because I sure didn’t growl?” Stiles let out in panic.
“I’m coming over.” Before Stiles could even protest Derek had already hung up.
BREAK
Stiles spent an hour pacing in his room waiting for Derek to climb through his window (because no werewolf seems to be capable of using his front door) so he was surprised when he heard a knock come from downstairs. He slowly and cautiously made his way to the front door but when a louder and more urgent knock came he sped up some.
When he looked through the peephole, all he saw was Derek with a raised eyebrow. When he opened the door, thinking the man was alone, he saw almost the entire pack on the front porch of his house (including Jackson and Peter, unsurprisingly excluding Scott and Cora). When he saw Jackson there as well he was rather surprised; the last he had heard the guy had been shipped off to London by his parents to recuperate from the whole Kanima experience. Primarily the portion where he was dead however briefly.
“Whittemore?” Stiles voiced. “When did you get back?”
“Derek wasn’t the only one McCall told that you needed space,” Jackson told him with a slight sneer. “Now, are you gonna let us in, or do we have to keep standing out here like a bunch of idiots?” Stiles huffed a laugh despite the anger he was currently feeling for his used-to-be friend and walked into the living room, the pack not far behind him.
“So, Scott lied to all of you and said that I wanted to be left alone?” Stiles asked the group.
“Yeah, pretty much,” a guilty-looking Lydia told him.
“We figured since you guys were best friends that you would have been talking to him at the very least. Since none of us had heard from you anyway,” Erica added.
“Sorry to tell you guys this but I haven’t spoken with Scott in over a month, in any capacity whatsoever.”
“You mean he hasn’t talked to you since it ended?” Isaac growled.
“Not a word,” he confirmed, which got several more growls in response.
“I’m going to kill him,” Derek said, eyes flashing, and, unknown to Stiles, his own eyes flashed in response causing several people in the room to gasp. “That asshole bit you.” Derek seemed to be getting angrier by the second and when Derek moved to leave Stiles grabbed the alpha’s wrist to stop him.
“What… What color are my eyes?” Stiles hesitated to ask. By the several winces, fallen faces, and looks of understanding from Jackson and Derek he knew what the answer was. “I thought as much.”
“Stiles, you know none of that was your fault, right?” Derek asked as he crouched down in front of the newly turned beta. When Stiles didn’t answer Jackson spoke up.
“Do you blame me for any of the things that happened when I was the kanima, Stilinski?” Stiles seemed taken aback and immediately started to shake his head no; he was being controlled that entire time, Stiles could never blame Jackson for what happened then. “Then don’t blame yourself for this shit either. Just like I was, you were being controlled by an outside force. Well for you it was technically an inside force most of the time, but it still wasn’t you doing those things, not by choice. You had no control over it. You, just like me, only have blue eyes because our bodies were forced to do something we couldn’t stop from happening. So stop blaming yourself and start accepting the truth.” Jackson was yelling and breathing a little heavier by the time he was done speaking.
Stiles once again was taken aback. Jackson had changed a lot in the last year, London had clearly been good for the young werewolf. The only thing Stiles didn’t understand was why the beta would ever return. But he could get that answer another time.
“Stiles, how and when were you turned?” Peter asked quizzically.
“It wasn’t Scott if that’s what you’re all thinking. At least, I don’t think it was anyway. Like I said before, I haven’t talked or really interacted with him since the nogitsune was taken care of.” Kira was the only one who looked even slightly relieved by this news. “I wanted to get out of the house, get rid of all the energy and tension that had built up in the last month, so I went for a walk in the preserve. I ended up at the old Hale house and when I was about to leave, I had a panic attack. I don’t know why or what caused it, it just sort of happened. During the panic attack, what I'm pretty sure was a Rogue Alpha came across me and I didn’t notice it was there until it was too late. It attacked me and bit me several times in the process. I eventually passed out from the pain and blood loss and when I woke up the alpha was gone.
"Based on the claw marks and the number of bite marks I had, I don’t think it meant for me to be its beta, more of a midday snack or something. If it wasn’t for the number of times it bit me I don’t think I would have survived either. So I guess there is some sort of bright side.” There were varied looks on the pack’s faces from horrified (Kira) to downright furious (Derek).
“We’ll help you through this, all of us,” Erica said, and everyone else nodded in agreement. Stiles gave the pack a small smile, it was the best he could manage at that moment but he wanted to show some of his gratitude nonetheless.
BREAK
2 Months Later
Not long after Stiles had told the pack what had happened, he came clean to his dad about everything. He originally wasn’t going to, but Derek had basically alpha commanded him into it, saying that Stiles didn’t need to lie to his dad about the supernatural anymore and that it would be safer for everyone in the end if he knew. His dad was extremely accepting and supportive in the end and apologized profusely for how he had been acting recently.
Scott had been kicked out of the pack because of everything he pulled, and for what he did when he found out Stiles had been turned. He lost his alpha status soon after -no one knew why but they assumed it was because he no longer had a pack. Kira and Scott had broken up as well and now the young kitsune was in a budding relationship with Malia (apparently Stiles wasn’t the only one who had to question his straightness after that night in Eichen House).
They weren’t the only new couple it seemed. Not long after all of the Void business Ethan and Danny had broken up on mutual terms and both joined the pack; though Danny was still human. Ethan and Jackson were now getting closer and Danny had started a bet on when the two would finally get together.
Isaac held no grudge against Stiles for what happened when the nogitsune had the Oni kill Allison and they were now rather close friends. Lydia and he had also been spending a lot of time together as friends (which Stiles learned he preferred much more than having a potential romantic relationship with the banshee) as the redhead also held no ill will toward the newly minted werewolf. Ethan didn’t seem to fault Stiles for the death of his brother, Aiden, but they still weren’t really friends either as there was a little too much history there from everything that happened with the Alpha Pack.
Stiles and Derek had been getting rather close as well. Stiles' feelings had been piling up in the last couple of months and his wolf wasn’t helping either; yipping, whining and clawing in Derek’s direction whenever they were in the same room together. Normally Stiles would just ignore his emotions toward Derek, but it was a lot harder with all his new senses. Derek not only looked amazing now, but he smelled amazing and his heartbeat was often a symphony in ears. It was a rare occasion now for any of his thoughts to not be centered around the Alpha and it was driving him mad.
Right now, Stiles was currently sparring with Derek, trying to work on controlling his strength as well as improving his reflexes. Everyone else was either on the upper levels of the apartment building that housed Derek’s loft or out doing something they deemed more worthy of their time.
When it comes to sparring with the pack he likes to try and lose the first few times so he can learn the person's moves; what they rely too heavily on, what they don’t, their weakness, their strengths, etc. He usually wins when he wants to but if he doesn’t it’s mainly when he’s fighting Derek or Peter, their experience often winning over his observation technique.
“Come on Stiles, you can do better than that,” the alpha taunts from his side of the makeshift ring.
Stiles grins at him before charging forward. Derek moves forward as well but only slightly, either way, it’s enough. Stiles makes it seem like he’s going straight for the man but at the last second fakes left and manages to scratch the back of Derek’s thigh. His claws go deeper than he intended them to but he got a hit in which is all that really matters.
“Son of a bitch,” Derek hissed before quickly turning around and tackling the beta before he could even register his movements. He pins Stiles' wrists above his head while straddling the younger man to keep the rest of him down. Both wolves blush when they realize the kind of position they’re in. “Um, if it helps this was not what I meant to happen.”
“I-It does,” Stiles stutters, unable to keep his arousal at bay. When Derek smells just what exactly he’s doing to Stiles he can't help the smirk slowly setting on his face.
“You know I would say you actually wanted this to happen,” he says, a smug grin fully in place. When all Stiles does is blush harder and try to look anywhere but at the man currently on top of him Derek knows he has his answer.
Out of nowhere, Stiles feels Derek’s lips on his own. At first the beta tenses up in surprise but melts into it only a couple of seconds later. They do nothing more than kiss and maybe some light groping and/or humping until they need to break apart for air and smile at each other. Said smile promised a lot even if no actual words were exchanged. If Stiles had any doubts about what would happen when he first called Derek when he was bitten they all went away in that moment.
And Stiles finds out later that the bet for Ethan and Jackson wasn’t the only one going on when the rest of the pack is eventually told of the development.