Chapter Text
Derek isn’t breathing.
Shit.
Shit, shit, shit. Derek isn't breathing.
Stiles’ thoughts are running away from him in a course that's frighteningly familiar. A panic attack. Derek Hale isn't breathing and Stiles is about to have a panic attack.
Get a hold of yourself, Stilinski. Just think...check breathing, check pulse...
Stiles' ear is pressed near Derek's mouth but there's no tickle of airflow. His long, pale fingers move to Derek's neck, near the angle of his jaw, but no bounding pulse leaps up at his touch.
Shit.
Stiles doesn't even realize he's sworn aloud until Allison nearly gasps, blurts out: "No pulse?"
"Shit," Stiles mutters. "No, there's no pulse. And he's not breathing. Oh god..."
Again, he's about to lose it, about to freak the fuck out.
No, no, you can't do that. You can't freak out. Just keep it together, for Allison's sake. You're not going to save anyone by having a panic attack, he tells himself.
Allison is pressed close, leaned over Derek as well, her hands hovering, looking for something to do.
Okay, no pulse. Now I've got to start chest compressions, Stiles’ brain registers.
He’s been taught first aid, CPR, and so he coaches himself through it with another string of profanities and a mumbled explanation to no one in particular. He starts the chest compressions, knitting his hands together and placing them over Derek's solid chest. He's wearing a white t-shirt under his leather jacket, but Stiles' hands still look pale against the fabric. He wills them not to shake as he straightens up, trying to get more leverage, put more force behind the movement. He counts in his head, thinking about how the guidelines for CPR changed a few years back: chest compressions first, that's the most important thing. Get the heart pumping, the blood flowing.
"Call Deaton," Stiles tells Allison, nodding toward his phone where it lies on the pavement. Normally, it'd be "call 911," but Stiles is hoping that the Alpha will recover quickly. He has to. He's Derek Hale.
"Come on, come on..." Stiles mutters as he continues the chest compressions, pushing down forcefully, almost angrily.
"Come on, Derek..."
Allison stands, Stiles' cell phone pressed to her ear. And then it's as if a light goes off in her head, though, and she's running toward her car before Stiles can even ask.
"Come on..." he pleads, "Dude, you've got to breathe..." Stiles says as if Derek is just being stubborn. He's reminded of the night he almost had to saw Derek's arm off, after the werewolf had been hit with a poisoned bullet. He'd looked sickly then, weak, but he still managed to terrify Stiles. But Stiles didn't really know him then. Scott had arrived just in time, and so Stiles had been spared chopping off the dude's arm and being plagued forever with gruesome nightmares. Derek had still passed out, and Stiles wonders if punching him in the face this time would help.
Stiles goes through the thirty chest compressions, his mind ticking of all the steps he had to memorize in order to get his certification.
Okay, check pulse again.
Shit, no pulse.
Looks like he's going to have to breathe for Derek.
"You can't do anything the easy way, can you?" Stiles asks the unconscious man, his hands coming to rest on either side of Derek's face.
They'd been in the woods, Scott and Isaac off guarding the perimeter while Stiles and Allison stayed put near the main road to Beacon Hills Preserve. Stiles had been trying to lighten the mood, take Allison's mind off worrying about Scott for one second, when Derek had slipped through the trees, a look Stiles could only describe as panic written all over his face.
And that's when the lightning struck.
He tilts Derek's head back, chin thrust forward just as he'd been taught in CPR training during health class in the ninth grade. Of course the dummies they'd practiced on were a far cry from performing CPR on a real person, especially when that person just so happened to be Derek Hale.
Stiles fits his mouth around Derek's and blows in two deep breaths. He knows he's supposed to watch Derek's chest, see if it rises, indicating that the air went in, but he can't stop staring at Derek's face, his features slack, his eyelashes dark against his pale skin. The alpha's stubble is scratchy under Stiles' fingers.
"Dude, I just gave you mouth to mouth. You owe me BIG time, so wake the fuck up!" Stiles swears when Derek's eyes fail to flutter open. He sighs and starts another round of chest compressions.
And then Allison is back, carrying with her a small case of some sort. It's red and Stiles is momentarily distracted from his resuscitation efforts when she unzips it hurriedly.
"Deaton’s on his way,” Allison announces as she rushes up to Stiles.
“And I forgot, my dad put one of these in my car." She adds, showing him the case. "Of course I thought he was crazy."
It's an AED - automatic electronic defibrillator, Stiles realizes. One of the little easy-to-use machines that is pretty much foolproof. The stickers have bright pictures for proper placement, and when Allison clicks the on button, a voice calls out simple instructions. Stiles grunts as he struggles with Derek's shirt, lifting it up just enough so that Allison can reach over and stick on the pads. Her hands are shaking worse than his, and so Stiles wraps his fingers around hers, gently, and she looks at him with those deep brown eyes so filled with worry and panic that he wishes Scott were here, for half a second, to calm her down. She seems to shake less after he lifts his hands, though, and she smoothes the defibrillator pads against Derek's bare chest.
And six months ago, a year ago, there's no way in hell Allison Argent would be out here trying to restart Derek Hale's heart. But things have changed, and Derek's saved Chris Argent's life half a dozen times now, and Allison’s even more. Mostly it involved the nefarious alpha pack, and so Derek and the Argents have formed something of an alliance, Allison hanging around more and more because of Scott.
Stiles tries not to think about Derek biting Allison's mother, and the shit storm that followed.
He nearly jumps when the machine instructs them to stand back, and he panics for a moment over the whole idea of shocking a man who just got struck by lightning.
Derek Hale is not a lucky guy.
But what can it hurt really? He's not breathing, has no pulse – though he is lying there on the side of the road like he simply fell asleep and not at all like a billion volts of electricity just went through his body.
And aren't people supposed to achieve lift off when they get struck by lightning? Wake up with singed clothes and missing their shoes? Of course all that happened to Derek after the white-hot bolt went through his skull was that he took three solid steps toward Stiles, and then collapsed. It figures. And Stiles is fairly certain – no, make that 99.9% certain – that that was no ordinary bolt of lightning.
Allison moves to push the button that will deliver the shock, but Stiles beats her to it. For some reason it seems more appropriate if he's the one to do it.
Derek's body doesn't even flinch, and Stiles suddenly wonders if a defibrillator will even work on a werewolf. But Derek's been tortured before – shocked – so it must have some effect.
And then Stiles is back on his knees and crouched over Derek Hale's prone form before his brain has time to catch up. His right hand is feeling for a pulse while his left hand cradles Derek's head.
"Come on, come on..." He mutters, waiting.
And then there it is, a subtle flutter under his fingers. His breath catches in his throat.
It's not a normal pulse, but it's a pulse. And for a second he believes they actually have a chance. Maybe he does need to punch Derek now.
Allison's been saying something, but it takes him a moment to realize it. She repeats herself.
"The machine, it says to shock him again..."
Sure enough the little display on the AED shows an erratic waveform, and the electronic voice says, "stand clear and deliver shock."
So Stiles stands again, backing away from Derek, but this time he doesn't feel the rising panic. Deaton's on his way and even if Derek doesn't fully recover right there on the side of the road, Stiles is hopeful – at least – that he will recover. The dude got struck by lightning – supernatural lightning no less – and thanks to Stiles' awesome resuscitation skills and, okay, Allison's AED too, Derek has a pulse! Stiles definitely counts that as a win.
And this makes how many times that he’s saved Derek’s ass? When they finally get out of this mess, Stiles is definitely rewarding himself with a werewolf-free weekend.
He bends down to push the button again, and the electronic voice calls out "shock delivered." Allison is standing so close, clutching at the sleeve of his hoodie, her eyes staring anxiously at Derek's features.
It's so subtle that Stiles nearly misses it, but Derek's chest moves – in and then out – as he releases a breath. The AED display beeps out a reassuring pattern and Stiles feels a wave of relief wash over him.
And he thinks it's not like in the movies or television at all, how the person wakes all of a sudden, gasping for breath.
Derek is breathing, and then he stirs quietly, his dark lashes fluttering open, green eyes unfocused, lips parted. And of course he tries to sit up, and groans.
But Stiles is so elated that he kneels down beside the alpha wolf and lets out a triumphant whoop, fist pumps the air.
Derek's gaze settles on Stiles, his eyes still heavy-lidded. And Stiles doesn't care, he just restarted someone's heart! So he grabs a hold of Derek Sourwolf Hale's face and plants a huge kiss right on his mouth. It’s animated – cartoonish, really – but Stiles doesn’t care. He’s so excited, so amped up on adrenaline from the whole ordeal that he’d have kissed anyone in that situation – Scott, Isaac, Lydia, Erica, Boyd – well, probably not Boyd, or Jackson, or Peter…
He pulls away after a few short seconds, a loud, wet smacking noise jarring the silence that had settled around them. He laughs, almost manically, and turns to Allison – she’s pretty much collapsed on the ground near Derek – and raises his hands to grab her and kiss her as well. Screw Scott – he wasn’t there, he didn’t help restart Derek’s heart. But Allison puts her hands on Stiles’ chest and holds him back.
“Stiles…” she warns with a nervous laugh, her eyes going wide.
“Ok, ok…” He shrugs, then turns his attention back to the prone werewolf.
And Derek looks quite recovered for someone who just got struck by fucking lightning, someone whose heart – literally – stopped beating. Fucking werewolf healing…
“What?!” Stiles all but yells when Derek cocks one dark eyebrow in his direction, the alpha wearing that angry, constipated look that Stiles has come to know all too well.
“What the hell was that?” Stiles asks, arms flailing as he stands and takes a step back. He doesn’t actually expect an answer, though he’d like one.
Derek stands – rather shakily – and Stiles winces when the werewolf rips the adhesive AED pads off his chest. Allison quickly zips the machine back into its case while Derek rearranges his shirt. And Stiles is just standing there, all the adrenaline from the past fifteen minutes still coursing through him, nowhere to go now that there’s nothing to do.
Derek pushes past him, a little too close – they are in the Preserve, for God’s sake, there’s plenty of room – and Stiles thinks for a moment that the alpha is going to threaten him, lunge at him, do something…
But no, he just walks right past both teenagers, and Stiles stares at the back of his head, mouth agape.
“Oh. My. God, dude…” Stiles chalks it up to nerves, the way he yells at the back of Derek’s head. “You almost died, and we saved your life…”
Derek stops, maybe twenty paces ahead, and turns to look back at Stiles. Allison is standing behind Stiles, near his right shoulder, and he swears he can feel her tense.
“What?” Stiles manages in a tone of exasperation. “A ‘thank you’ would be nice…” He explains, folding his arms across his chest so he doesn’t start shaking.
And Derek just stares back at him for a moment, eyes narrowed, looking far too superior for someone who was near death only minutes before. But then his features relax for half a second and he nods.
“Thank you,” Derek grunts, and Stiles clenches his jaw shut to avoid it hitting the ground.
“Now come on,” Derek orders, jerking his hand toward the entrance to the preserve. “You need to get out of here, I don’t know how many there are…”
“Whoa, there are multiple…?” Stiles asks. “What exactly are we dealing with? Demons, witches, a group of disgruntled fulminologists…?”
“Now, Stiles…” Derek snaps, motioning with his head for them to move, his eyes flitting briefly to Allison.
But Stiles is already striding toward Derek, his long legs quickly closing the distance between them. Allison rushes to catch up, clutching the AED tightly to her chest with one hand, her crossbow in the other.
“So really, what are we dealing with?” Stiles asks again when he comes up beside Derek. His tone is serious, but he can’t help the grin that spreads across his features. They walk out of the preserve together, Allison not far behind.