Chapter Text
After his first transformation, after his first howl, Jackson only waits for long enough to hug Lydia. After that, he runs.
It doesn't take Derek long to find him, though, or to get him back to the lair. He's collapsed in an alleyway close by the warehouse—his breath is shallow. He snarks—mutters something about how he and Derek need to never run into each other like this ever again—but he can't properly fight back when Derek scoops him up, coaxes Jackson's arms around his neck.
Hell, Jackson's barely even conscious. If Derek couldn't hear his breath and his heartbeat going strong, he'd think Jackson was dying. Again.
There's not much at the lair to make a bed out of, much less one as nice as Jackson's probably used to sleeping in, but Isaac helps Derek get their new beta set up in the subway car. They spread him out over a bench and wrap him up in a blanket. Peter snickers and doesn't help, but takes it upon himself to make an offhand comment about how domestic Derek's getting in his old age.
Isaac's hand on his shoulder keeps Derek from reeling back and pounding his uncle into the cement. Or maybe it's the way Jackson looks so young, so delicate, while he's sleeping. …No. No, it's definitely Isaac. Has to be.
In the morning, they take Jackson to Scott and Deaton, who take him to Sheriff Stilinski, who's just as baffled as he ever is. Melissa and Deaton have the medical knowledge to cook up some story that basically comes down to no one knows what happened, Jackson's just a medical miracle. Which is about the best explanation for anything that's happened to him in the past few months. By early afternoon, Jackson's back with his parents and Derek's free to plan.
***
Jackson comes back to the lair some two days after his real transformation. He comes when he hears a howl and just knows that it's meant for him, running out of his house in just his boxers.
Not only does he run there faster than he's ever run, but for all he follows the sound, he finds he knows where he's going without that cue. Not just that he's been here before and not just that his surroundings are familiar, but he's sure enough of his surroundings that he could charge through here blind and still get where he wants to go.
Derek's waiting for him there. Alone, as usual. Pacing back and forth in the glow from the street-lamps outside. He doesn't bother to stop or look up when Jackson says, "You rang?"
Or when he tries for, "So, uhm, points for tradition and whatever, but as far as I know? Cellphones replaced the classics because they work better. I'd give you my number if you'd just ask for it—McCall probably would, too. People are into it when you talk to them instead of getting lost in the whole Tall, Dark, And Brooding act."
All Derek does is huff and keep pacing when Jackson points out, "You know it's the middle of the freaking night, don't you? My parents could get up to check on me, and they're going to be worried sick if I'm not in bed."
He doesn't do anything at all until Jackson sighs, rolls his eyes, and tells him, "I've got a whole week off of school to recover from coming back from the dead. Now, I don't know about or how you would spend that kind of time, but personally? I'd like to spend it somewhere more comfortable than whatever junkyard you've set up here. Maybe trying out some of my new abilities somewhere they'll be, like, useful."
"And you don't think that learning about them and how to control them would be, like, useful?" Derek finally looks up from the floor, wrinkling up his nose and eyebrows like Jackson's just drooled all over himself. "You don't think it might be useful to learn how to protect yourself and your pack?"
Jackson takes a deep breath, trying to cover for how he's making a face that probably looks like a doped up fish. And the skin on the back of his neck crawls with the inexplicable feeling that Derek doesn't think he's doing a good job of this. So, Jackson groans instead. Goes for acting petulant, since that's all Derek's bound to think he is, anyway. "God, please tell me I don't have to be in a pack with McCall? It was bad enough sharing the lacrosse team with his scrawny ass, okay? If he's in, then I'm out."
"Scott's…" Derek sighs and purses his lips. Goes quiet again, and picks up his pacing, but while wearing a remarkably pensive look. …Well, it's nice to know that maybe his strong, silent alpha wolf thing isn't completely intentional. Maybe he's just bad with words. Finally, he says: "Scott's a special case. Not a part of our pack, but not an Omega—"
"And that's a good thing, right? I mean, it might be just me, but I don't think he belongs out rushing any frats just yet. He's kinda young. Probably can't hold his liquor. And it'd be awful if he Hulked out all over Greek Week." Sometimes, Jackson is so clever that he envies himself.
Derek doesn't appreciate the humor, though. All he does is blink like Jackson's started speaking French at him and drooled on his shirt again. "…It's a good thing because it means he's less likely to get killed," he says. "You, on the other hand? Probably couldn't survive on your own if I followed you as close as I followed Scott."
"Well, that's kind of unfair," Jackson starts, only shutting up when Derek rounds on him in full. Stops pacing and outright glares at Jackson—like he actually wants to kill him.
"It's not unfair," Derek growls, slowly advancing toward Jackson and his personal space. "It's not unfair because I know what it takes to survive. And I know what it takes to control yourself. You have the ambition and the desire, but you're new to this. You just came out of horrible circumstances—even Isaac thinks so and you know what kind of Hell I pulled him out of."
"Technically, I think I pulled him out of it, Hale." Jackson's voice shakes as he tries to back away. It's getting harder and harder to look Derek in the eye—harder and harder to resist this bullshit urge to bow and bare his neck—but he forces himself to do so. Even if he sounds like some scared-shitless five-year-old. "At least… that's what McCall and the vet told me."
"You almost got Isaac sent to prison in two different ways, kanima." Derek snaps the last word as though it's the worst thing he could call anybody. As though the word itself is filthy. And he just keeps getting closer, no matter how much Jackson tries to get away. At this distance, Jackson can't just smell him; Derek's scent is battering him. "And you're right about one thing. You are working on Scott and Deaton's story here. Which is kind of the whole point."
"I… I don't…" Jackson shakes his head, nearly chokes on his erratic breaths, smacks into the wall so much sooner than he thought he would. "I don't know… what the Hell you think you're talking about, Professor Lupin, but this whole big, bad menacing werewolf act isn't going to work on me… It's kind of tacky, really? And I'm not going to…"
He trails off at the feeling of Derek's arm pressing into his neck and the other one bearing down on his chest. Silently, Jackson thanks God that his breaths were already getting shallow. It occurs to Jackson that he could try to throw Derek off—that most people would try to throw him off, especially after getting turned—but Jackson's heart races each time gasping knocks his throat into Derek's arm. And he doesn't want Derek to press into him harder—he definitely doesn't, like, seriously, though—but wriggling underneath of him makes the hairs on the back of Jackson's neck stand up on end. Makes something hot twist around and pool in the pit of his stomach.
And under Derek's scrutinizing, narrow-eyed glare, Jackson tries to shove himself further into the wall. The thought of Derek watching him, catching his scent and hearing his heartbeat, being so close as this—it makes the knots in Jackson's stomach worse, and he's not sure if he wants it to stop or not, and the urge to bare his neck is back. Maybe not looking at Derek will make it harder for him to get a sense that Jackson isn't right—or so Jackson thinks. Trying to duck his head just makes him feel Derek's arm on his throat that much more—the arch of his neck just brings them closer. And he only breaks it, looks back up at Derek because he's only supposed to like this kind of thing from Lydia.
Because she's a special case. The one person who's allowed to make Jackson feel weak or give him some weird thrill when she fucks him, or chokes him, or smacks him around. None of what they ever did is indicative of anything Jackson really likes.
He has to notice that something's up, but at least Derek doesn't react. Or maybe he's mistaking everything for simple fear. All he does is pull back so he can shove Jackson back harder, and say, "You're going off a report about what you've been through, Jackson—but Scott and Deaton have no idea what kind of Hell you really experienced. Matt would but we can't ask him because he isn't here anymore, and do you have any idea how many kanimas have ever survived? Changed back into humans, or werewolves?"
Jackson doesn't know, but he has a good idea—and still, he catches his mouth speaking for him. Still, he snarks back, "Loads of them? Maybe on a private island somewhere sunny? With three different pools and room service?"—and he winces—moans, feels his skin crawling with need—when Derek knocks his arm into his neck again.
"None of them, you idiot," Derek hisses. "At least, none that we have any kind of record of. All we have is myth and legend and rumor. And you might be a wolf now, but do you really think you're just going to forget what you went through? What you did? Remembering all of it—that's a very real threat, Jackson, and if it happens? You're screwed unless you shut up, sit down, and learn something about what you are now. About how to handle it."
Jackson wants to say something snarky in response, but he can't. He's having a hard enough time focusing on anything but Derek's eyes and the placement of his arm.
"You need to learn how to control yourself," Derek goes on, moves his arm against Jackson's neck without pushing harder. "And with what's coming our way? Not just the full moon, but everything we're going to have to deal with? You need the pack, Jackson, or you're going to die. And to kill one of our kind? It's hard, even for another werewolf. Imagine what it felt like when your body tried to reject the bite. Imagine what it felt like when you died—then magnify that pain by a power of ten. That is what it'll feel like, if someone manages to kill you now. And I've got that on a firsthand account."
Jackson's cheeks flush pink under the weight of Derek's words—under how they smack into him and leave him unable to think about the firsthand account of death thing beyond, well, okay, that's pretty weird, but considering the whole werewolves thing, it could be worse—and under the realization that none of this has occurred to him. That it's pretty stupid of him, not thinking about any of this.
Lately? Going off of all the stuff he's heard but doesn't remember? No one could blame him for not stopping to think about the practical side of being a werewolf. But he didn't stop to think about any of it before Derek bit him, either. …Granted, hindsight's twenty-twenty and Jackson also didn't know what dying felt like, back then. There's still the problem of how he didn't consider anything practical. There's still the major problem of Derek sort of, kind of choking him.
And then there's what Derek says when Jackson agrees to play by his rules: "Go back home. Get some sleep. And show up here tomorrow morning, nine AM. We've got work to do."
***
When he gets back home from Derek's lair, Jackson doesn't sleep well. He barely sleeps at all.
He's underwater, but not drowning. It's pitch-black, impenetrable, but he can breathe it—no reason to think it isn't water. Save that when he tries to swim, he can't move through it. All the power he has in him, all the force he can put behind his strokes, and he barely moves an inch.
It takes him forever to claw his way through the water or whatever-the-fuck it is, but once he breaks the surface, Jackson sees why. He's in an alley, pulling himself up through the pavement. He grazes his hands over the blacktop, catches a whiff of rain and garbage and fresh paint. And wrong—someone nearby is wrong. Impossibly wrong.
Jackson realizes who it is as soon as he sees him: some doddering, ice-cold older man with wire-rimmed glasses and flyaway hair. Lahey, the name screams out in the back of his mind. Coach Lahey, who used to lead the Beacon Hills swim team—he's the one who's wrong. He's wrong and he must be punished. He needs to die. It's all that comes to Jackson's mind, the only thought he can manage.
Even when he slices across Lahey's neck, that's it: he must be punished… he needs to die… he deserves it… he needs to die…
When he gets back home from Derek's lair, Jackson doesn't sleep well, and he wakes up in a cold sweat, full up of his nightmares and knowing that Derek's right. In spite of everything Jackson's been through in the past few months, he can suffer through this one thing, admitting that Derek's right.
The trick, he believes, will be refusing to let Derek see him sweat.