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“I’ve got a new job,“ Stiles’ father says one afternoon. Stiles is sitting in the kitchen, collar popped and holding a pamphlet for the Piggly Wiggly down the street so he can fan himself. The heat is stifling, even with all the doors and windows open to let the air flow through. Stiles doesn’t know it then, but those words are going to be what changes his life.
They get on a boat two weeks later and Stiles watches from the deck as the last of his old life fades away in the distance.
A small group of them disembark at a lighthouse in the middle of the Atlantic and Stiles spends a half hour having a panic attack in the corner of the room while everyone else watches on. His dad counts with him and tells him about how their life is going to be so much better now.
He and his father board the Bathysphere last. It’s a massive round tin of metal that drags them down below the ocean to their destination. Rapture, is what they call it. A city under the sea--surrounded by all aquatic life and thriving with the most advanced technology Stiles had ever seen.
Stiles’ father gets a job working as the first real law enforcement in the city and Stiles is left to roam and explore. It’s the second day of his third week when Stiles is taking a trip to the Medical Pavilion where Ms. McCall works that he meets Derek.
Derek works for the security company. He builds the doors and cameras and can speak to a machine like Stiles speaks to humans. Derek is quiet and shy, always frowning when Stiles confuses him or talks too fast to follow. He is everything Stiles isn’t, and Stiles thinks he’s in love.
Stiles finds work doing odd jobs around the city, and it’s more to look for a reason to bump into Derek than it is to make money. Rapture is a place of no religion, no sin or God that punishes homosexuals in the fires of hell and with the end of a lead pipe wielded by man. It’s the reason Stiles isn’t so afraid to bump shoulders with Derek as the talk and to try and find those smiles he hides in the corners of his mouth.
They fall in love in Arcadia under a willow tree with branches so low they touch the ground. Stiles is laughing when he loses his footing and trips into the small lake beside the willow. Derek fishes him out and doesn’t let his hand go for a long time.
They share their first kiss in a small alcove just outside the marketplace. Derek is installing a safe for one of the shops and Stiles is trying to haggle down the price for a pair of suspenders. He still pays more than he wanted to, but it’s worth it when they stop next to an awning of an unopened shop and Derek kisses away his complaints like it‘s second nature.
They make love in Derek’s bedroom in Olympus Heights, muffling sounds of pleasure between kisses and hoping Derek’s sister in the next room can’t hear the creak of bed springs. Derek thrusts slow and deep and Stiles clings to him as his body shakes with pleasure. Sweat pools in Stiles’ collarbone and Derek kisses it away, his hands rough and warm when they drag up Stiles’ sides to hook over his shoulders.
For hours afterwards, Stiles lays in Derek’s arms, their fingers entangled as they discuss the possibility of a life together. Derek’s words are rough and quiet, holding so much hope when he asks if they could find their own place one day.
A man named Frank Fontaine shows up in the following weeks. He creates new jobs left and right; he offers the security of ‘home’ that many didn’t have under Andrew Ryan and his new focus on Rapture’s latest pet project.
With Fontaine sudden appearance comes relief to the budding confusion and distress. Inflation continues to grow-- bringing up the price of goods and work. Derek struggles every day to keep his job amidst the sea of unemployment that‘s crashing through Rapture. Stiles sits at home feeling useless and terrified as the technology advances to frightening levels before his very eyes.
Stiles opens a shop in the marketplace selling various trinkets and foods that he makes in his free time. They get a home; a small apartment in Apollo Square just the right size for the two of them. Stiles struggles to help make ends meet while Derek takes on harder and harder work with Securis doing maintenance for the bathysphere and railways, spending countless hours slaving over electrical work with the new security systems budding up everywhere.
Things are rough with all of the economical problems going on, but that doesn‘t stop them from being happy. They have each other and that‘s enough to make all of the stress worth it. Stiles wants to get a cat, he thinks they could use a new family member. He starts to keep diaries, pays the extra $.15 every week for an audio journal. Maybe in a few years he can listen back and remember the hard times with a sense of nostalgia.
Stiles loses his job when inflation gets too high and he has to shut down the small shop he owns in the marketplace. He and Derek start to struggle. Without the extra money, they’re barely scraping by. There is talk in Rapture about new science, of things called plasmids that will help make people’s lives easier.
Stiles gets a job with Fontaine down in the fisheries. He hates it, reeks of fish every day and has to keep his mouth shut while people smuggle in illegal artifacts and make money off of breaking the law. Every day is exhausting, and he’s dead on his feet when he stumbles into their apartment every night. It’s okay, though.
It’s okay because Derek is there. He can let Derek help him out of his suspenders, let Derek bustle him into the tiny shower and wash away the scent of fish and seawater. Sometimes his dad or Derek’s family stops by and they all eat dinner together with the tiny radio playing music.
That’s when it feels the most like home—looking over the candles on the dinner table and sharing a smile with Derek, their ankles locked together while Stiles’ father and Derek’s sister bicker about the economy and whether people like Fontaine are really helping with the state of affairs. Sometimes Derek will sneak a hand under the table and lace their fingers together. He’ll thumb over Stiles’ new calluses and give his hand a reassuring squeeze every now and then, just to let Stiles know he‘s there.
The Memorial Museum is shut down for renovations and they come out with plasmids that are advertised to give people ‘superhuman’ abilities. They cost so much money—but Stiles thinks, maybe it’s worth it if they really can help make his job and life easier.
Despite the downward spiral that’s been going on around them, Derek and Stiles continue on with their lives. They spend as little as possible—use each other for warmth on cold nights to spare some change on heating, eat less, bathe together. It’s hard but it’s the best they can do with what they’re earning.
That’s when Scott comes by one day to show Stiles his first plasmid. With a single snap of his finger, all the candles on the dinner table are lit, and Derek falls out of his chair from sheer surprise. Scott laughs and Stiles helps Derek back to his feet as the look at the candles in awe. Scott heads home later with a smile on his face and Stiles and Derek leave the candles on until they burn themselves out.
That night, curled together in bed and trying to stay warm with their limbs tangled in close, Stiles proposes the idea of scraping enough money together to get a splice.
Derek refuses—says, “it’s too dangerous. I’m not letting you risk your life just to make the work a little easier.” Stiles tries to protest, but Derek takes his hands and kisses the sores on his fingers. “There’s another option,“ he explains, and tells Stiles of the new program opening up in a few weeks, that they’re paying any willing participant a huge sum of money to act as bodyguards to the children of some scientists.
“It’s called the Big Daddy Project.”
Stiles is just as reluctant. He’d rather get an electricity splice to help with hauling in huge loads of fish than to see Derek volunteering for one of Ryan’s pet projects. “You think it’s any safer? You think whatever Ryan has goin’ on is any better than splicing?” he asks, watching Derek trace the rope scars on his hands.
Derek doesn’t answer.
It doesn’t help that Stiles lost faith in Andrew Ryan a long time ago.
Despite Stiles’ protests, Derek goes in for his first trial. He comes back with a pocket bursting with money and a haunted look on his face. Stiles’ worry only grows when they realize that Derek smells. He smells bad. He smells like blood and rust and a hundred other vile scents all rolled into one. Nothing they do can get rid of the smell. Derek scrubs his skin raw in the shower, bathes until Stiles has to turn the water off and coax him out of the tub because he won’t stop trying.
They told Derek it was part of the experiment; that it was a pheromone that would make the children feel safe around him. Whatever it is, it’s permanent.
Stiles doesn’t care, though. He can’t stand the pained look on Derek’s face every time Stiles cringes away from a hug or a kiss. So Stiles learns when to hold his breath and when to cover his mouth. He has to, because Derek is worth more than this--and Stiles will stay with him no matter what he smells like. He won’t punish Derek for something he can’t control.
They make it work and Derek doesn’t go back for another trial. Instead, they use the money he made for Stiles to get an electro-splice. It helps immensely with the haul, and Stiles does half the work for the same pay. He comes home with more energy and with the ability to power the heater long enough that they no longer need cold showers and to huddle for warmth at night.
The only problem is the hallucinations. Despite what the doctors say--that they’re only temporary and it’s Stiles’ body adjusting to new DNA--they don’t stop. Sometimes Stiles finds himself talking to people who aren’t there. It scares Derek, it scares him a lot—especially on days where Stiles’ mind goes completely. Sometimes he forgets who Derek is, sometimes he forgets himself. There are days where he stops talking entirely, and days where he can’t keep quiet. They make it work, anyway.
They have to.
Christmas comes and they spend their holiday in bed; kissing and making love slow and warm. Stiles babbles and Derek muffles his words with their mouths. Derek traces the new scars and muscles on Stiles’ skin and Stiles follows the ones he already knows so well on Derek’s. They memorize each others bodies again and again and remind themselves of why they struggle so hard to stay together.
Then the New Year comes in with a bang.
The riots start.
Not many people are safe—those with little money are the first to die. Stiles, despite all the times his brain seems to fry itself, is able to use his electricity to keep most of the rioters away. Derek re-enlists in the Big Daddy program to earn the money they need for things like gun and new plasmids.
Rapture isn’t safe anymore.
The night before Derek starts in the program again, he and Stiles spend it like any other evening. Dinner, an hour listening to the news broadcasted over the radio, and then curling together in bed with Derek’s arm tight around Stiles’ stomach. Stiles falls asleep to lips touching kisses against the back of his ear and his fingers clutching to Derek’s.
Derek leaves for the program and never comes back.
Stiles waits for days, tries everything he can to find a way to Derek. He faces the dangers of traveling through Rapture, makes his way to the Bathysphere station with a pistol in one hand and electricity crackling around his other. Hetries to take the Bathysphere to Point Prometheus, but is barred entry with a shotgun pointed at his face. They take his pistol and send him away to try and make it back home on his own. He attempts to go to Suchong’s clinic—knowing Suchong works directly under Ryan—but it’s been turned from a clinic into a bloodbath. There are bodies everywhere, torn open like they were dissected. Stiles wretches into a wastebasket and tries to ignore the bones and gore that were there when he bent over it.
Even armed with a pipe and his electricity, Stiles is terrified. Fontaine is offering new ways of splicing. He’s taking advantage of the chaos, advertising cheaper splicing and other things like injections that enhance a person’s strength and overall health (Stiles hasn’t seen Scott in over a week, but the last time he did, Fontaine had cured his breathing problem).
Stiles has nothing to lose, now. Derek is gone.
He goes to get another splice, one to make him stronger and faster, and it becomes a blur from there. He remembers stumbling around his and Derek’s apartment, ripping out drawers and upending the table to try and find Derek. Derek is gone and everyone is his enemy. Everyone wants to hurt him. He gets headaches and he’s always confused. He can’t remember if he’s found Derek yet, or if Derek was ever there to begin with. Sometimes he blacks out and when he wakes up he’s in a different place. There are times where he doesn’t realize he’s screaming, and other times where he can’t stop laughing.
He thinks he’s insane but he can’t remember if he’s always been like this or not.
Then the little sisters come, and with them the big daddies. Stiles doesn’t know what they are, but the little ones glow. They glow the color of ADAM.
ADAM is what Stiles wants. It takes away the headaches, gives him peace of mind, makes him stronger, and lets him sleep without the nightmares.
Stiles isn’t stupid, though. No matter how bad the headaches are, it isn’t worth the pain that comes from trying to get past the Daddies. Big, monstrous men in suits who are always in the company of the little ones. Some carry massive guns, some just rely on their brute strength and the drills they haul around with them.
The headaches get worse, though, to a point where Stiles keeps blacking out and he knows he needs ADAM or he’s going to die.
He waits. Waits and waits and tries not to make too much noise until finally a little one wanders too far from one of the big ones. This one is a little girl with dark skin and a dirty pink dress. Stiles thinks if he tries he can get the ADAM. Just one hit with his pipe and the headaches will stop.
He lunges and she screams, and Stiles can’t even stop himself from screeching when a massive hand wraps around his stomach and hauls him up in the air. He should have known it wasn’t likely to get the ADAM, but he had to try. He thinks if he had tried harder, it might have worked. He’s so strong now, so much stronger than he once was. It isn’t fair.
The Big Daddy is shaking him, shouting something incoherent behind his giant helmet. Stiles laughs because he’s going to die and it’s all a bit ridiculous. He doesn’t remember why he’s laughing and that makes him laugh more.
His laughter cuts off with a groan when the fingers holding him up start to squeeze the air out of his body and then he’s being thrown against a wall. He knows what comes next. A drill, bigger than his head. It’ll gut him through and then the little sister will suck him dry with that little needle of hers.
There’s a face behind the helmet, he thinks. It’s hard to tell with all the lights and colors swimming in Stiles’ vision. He thinks he knows those eyes. Maybe he kissed those lips.
Big Daddy shoves him harder into the wall and grabs at his head. Stiles waits to die but he doesn’t. The little one is screaming and Stiles is still alive. He’s dragged in close, until his hands are touching that massive helmet. Stiles paws at it, thinks maybe there’s nothing inside and maybe it’s hiding ADAM.
He laughs some more and he’s being thrown to the ground. The little one is yelling and suddenly she isn’t. Stiles thinks he could be dead but then again he’s been living in a nightmare for a very long time. What if he’s in Hell and there really was a God all along?
There is pain in his gut and Stiles screams and claws at the ground, tries to breathe even though dead men don’t need air.
Just like that, the pain is gone. The people in the room who were watching aren’t there anymore. The colors fade and Stiles is looking up at a Big Daddy and Little Sister who have not killed him yet. The little one’s needle is empty—void of any ADAM that had been in it previously.
Stiles stares at the blood on his hands and the puncture wound in his gut. He thinks she’s drained him but it feels like he’s full up on ADAM. It’s hilarious to think such a thing, because little sisters take and take, but never give.
He laughs, and the Big Daddy lifts him up and shakes him again. Stiles can’t stop laughing because he’s pretty sure that the little ones should be draining ADAM from him, not giving it to him. That’s how they harvest it, after all.
The big one is saying something, Stiles is pretty sure. It sounds like his name, but Stiles is crazy so everything sounds like his name. He’s crying, suddenly, because the last person he ever heard say his name was Derek.
Derek had eyes like the ones hiding in that helmet.
“You have his face,” Stiles cackles, but it comes out as a sob that he’s strangled with his grinning. The shaking stops and the drill clatters to the ground. Stiles has never seen a big one drop their weapons, but there’s a massive gloved hand reaching up and cupping the side of his face.
Stiles is lowered to the ground and there’s a thumb stroking slowly under his eye and down his cheek in a motion so painfully familiar that Stiles is gasping out Derek’s name before he can think about it. The hand withdraws and Stiles clutches to it because he doesn’t want Derek to leave him again.
The little one is still there, hiding behind the big daddy’s leg. Stiles doesn’t care, not one bit, and paws his way closer until he’s clutching at that helmet. It’s so hard to see into it, so hard to focus his eyes, but no one has ever touched him like that except Derek. Maybe Stiles has lost his mind, maybe this is last moment of sanity before he dies, maybe he’s already dead.
He’s laughing but he might be crying, and the helmet won’t come off. There are hands keeping him from clawing at that fogged and scratched glass, and Stiles starts to scream because his headache is starting up again and that means he’s still alive.
He’s still alive, and Derek is a monster.
How fitting.
Stiles cackles, legs giving out and finding himself hauled up into the big one’s arms like he’s some sort of ragdoll. He breaths in and it’s the rotting, putrid scent that Stiles remembers suffering through for months. He sniffs and he’s hit with a memory of a warm body and apologies whispered into his skin.
“I remember Arcadia and the maple tree,” Stiles says, because he does. He remembers Derek pushing him up against that tree, remembers pawing at Derek’s trousers while his suspenders were knocked off his shoulders and their lips pressed desperately together. It was their third kiss.
The big one squeezes Stiles tight enough to push the air out of him and Stiles can’t help but laugh some more.
It’s hard after that, not to attack the girl. Sometimes his headaches are awful, sometimes they make moving around unbearable.
Sometimes he wakes up and Derek is pinning him down with the drill in his face, and Stiles doesn’t remember why.
She doesn’t have a name, but Stiles calls her Bunny because she likes to hop in pools of blood and splash it around like rainwater.
Stiles doesn’t think she sees things the way they do—but then again, Stiles doesn’t think he sees things quite right either. The other big ones stay clear of them, mostly because Stiles can barely control himself from taking ADAM from Bunny, let alone the others.
On days where Stiles remembers what it was like to be sane, he figures this is what it’s like to have a family with Derek. Bunny shares ADAM with him and Stiles helps Derek kill those who want to hurt her. The longer it lasts, the easier it is to think of Bunny as his child and not a means to stop the headaches.
Night is his favorite—when Bunny hides in the vents and Stiles curls up under Derek’s arm to catch a few hours of restless sleep. It’s nothing like what they had, and Stiles sometimes forgets who he is, but it’s better than the months of wandering around alone and in constant agony.
Someone comes to Rapture one day. Stiles knows because things come to life again. Alarms go off all the time, Bunny talks about a scary monster who is hurting other Bubbles (her name for Derek is the same for all the other big daddies), and finally, one day, the square filled with the sounds of gunfire and screaming more violent than Stiles has ever heard.
Stiles remembers home, remembers hiding in his bedroom with Derek, curled up under their covers and clutching to one another as the riots started up. He doesn’t think, just acts. He hauls Bunny up onto Derek’s shoulder and runs for the apartments. He thinks he knows the way, and maybe this monster will leave them be if they hide.
The words that come out of his mouth aren’t right. He doesn’t mean to talk about fish or the fires of hell. He’s trying to tell Derek they need to go back home. It’s frustrating when he can’t focus enough to speak what he thinks, and instead of screaming in frustration, he’s laughing.
Stiles rounds a corner, pipe dragging on the ground and a startled spark of electricity leaving him when he sees an unfamiliar man pulling a crossbow bolt out of someone’s body and then rummaging around their pockets. He’s covered in blood, and there’s a radio hooked to his belt that makes Stiles’ head hurt more when a voice crackles over the other line.
The man stands and Stiles snarls because he is a threat. He reaches up with his pipe, ignoring Derek’s muffled shout and lunging forward. He’s going to protect his family this time, come hell or high water.
Instead of looking surprised, this man reaches up and Stiles watches in horror as sparks of white shoot out of his hand and slam into Stiles’ chest. It’s nothing like his own—it’s painful and it makes his muscles ache and twitch. Stiles chokes and keeps moving forward and the man steps back as ice starts to form over his palm.
He hits Stiles’ legs and Stiles finds himself frozen in place, helpless to move as a wrench hits him over the head and he’s thrown to the ground.
Derek and Bunny are screaming but Stiles isn’t sure what’s going on. His head is spinning and everything is blurry. He watches Derek surge forward, watches as the man dodges the swing of Derek’s arm and delivers a shock that renders Derek incapable of moving or even reacting when the man switches to some kind of contraption that hisses with steam and crackles with more electricity.
Stiles knows Derek’s new body can’t handle that kind of energy, and he thinks he’s meant to be screaming but instead he’s crying as Derek is thrown against the wall and surged full of electric gel.
Bunny is wailing and Stiles drags himself across the ground, laughing hysterically and then watching as Derek’s body finally collapses against the ground motionlessly.
Dead.
Stiles wants to scream but he can’t. There’s blood in his eyes and his legs are frozen solid. He’s helpless to watch Bunny as she is snatched up into the man’s arms. She fights him, pushes at him as he touches her face. Stiles thinks she’s being shocked, but then suddenly she goes still and quiet.
When the man sets her down, Bunny’s eyes are no longer glowing and she’s thanking the man before she runs for the nearest vent.
Stiles reaches for her when she runs by, but she merely hops over his arm and keeps going.
The man disappears into Stiles and Derek’s apartment and Stiles finds himself blubbering incoherently. He thinks he’s talking about Derek, but all he can really say is how lonely he is. It’s very lonely to watch the person you love die all over again, after all.
The door opens and the man is using one of Derek’s old shirts to wipe blood from his face. He’s got an audio log in his hands and Stiles recognizes the sound of his voice.
He laughs, and the man looks at him, pulls out his pistol, and then everything goes black.
“The riots are getting worse and Derek still hasn’t come home. I really hope this all pays off. I miss him, you know. It’s better here without religion or politics. I don’t think up top I could be anything with Derek. I know I say Ryan’s a shithead, but at least the guy could give a rat’s ass about people like me an’ Derek. I’d rather live down here, just barely scrapin’ by, then be up top and without Derek— the guy’s the love of my life, y’know?”