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Derek didn’t know how he ended up here. Correction, he knew exactly how he ended up here: he was guilt tripped by his boyfriend and his father into tagging along to the annual Easter get-together. As such, he found himself in the jeep for a two hour trip to some cousin’s home in Reno with Stiles and the Sheriff. Whoever thought it was a good idea to keep Stiles in an enclosed vehicle for any length of time should get their cranium checked. Okay, it wasn’t really terrible because the Sheriff was no longer in the dark about werewolves or their relationship, meaning they could actually have complete conversations without fear of giving away secrets.
Stiles had been driving, but as he pulled up to a red light, he threw the car into park, yelling “Chinese fire drill!” and jumped out of the car with John following suit. Derek stared in bewilderment as John ran to get into the driver’s seat while Stiles flung open the back door and slid in beside Derek.
“What just happened?” Derek asked, baffled.
“You mean you’ve never heard of a Chinese fire drill?” Stiles asked, incredulous.
“No, or I wouldn’t be asking,” Derek responded patiently.
“Basically, you come to a stop and everyone changes seats,” John explained.
“Oh. Why?”
“Because we can,” Stiles answered, excitedly.
“Whatever makes you happy.” Derek patted Stiles on the head. “How did this start?”
“I think for us it started when Dad picked up Allie when she arrived home from college. He wouldn’t let her drive from the bus stop, but changed his mind pulled a Chinese drill.”
“Who’s Allie and how old were you when that happened?”
“Fourteen and Allie’s one of my cousins. We’ve got like another hour, right Dad?”
“Sounds about right.”
“Cool,” Stiles murmured, snuggling into Derek’s side and closing his eyes. “I’m gonna take a nap, I’ll need my energy for the hunt.”
“Hunt?” Derek asked, slightly alarmed.
“You’ll understand when we get there,” John answered.
Derek gently shook Stiles awake as they pulled up to the house before turning to stare out the window at the sight of a ridiculous amount of plastic eggs littering the yard. “I assume by hunt you meant Easter egg hunt?” Derek gestured at the yard.
“Yup!” Stiles jumped out of the jeep and went around to the trunk to grab a blue basket.
“And you brought your own basket. Stiles, how old are you?”
“About seven,” Stiles replied cheerfully, “I’m not even the oldest one.”
“I’m starting to see why you are the way you are,” Derek muttered under his breath.
“I heard that!” Stiles exclaimed, “and I’m awesome, thank you very much.”
“Stiles!” A girl came shrieking out of the house, jumping on Stiles’ back.
“Jesus, Allie.” Stiles grunted, “you’re heavy.”
“Don’t insult my weight, and you’re a big strong man, you can take it.”
“You ready for me to school you in the hunt?”
“As if. There’s a reason I always win.”
“What’s the average age for this?” Derek asked.
“Like twenty-one, I think.” Allie answered, “so is this the boyfriend?” She jabbed Stiles in the ribs.
“Sounds about right, and yeah, this is Derek, Derek Allie.”
“Cool! Nice to meet you.” She waved. “He seems just as grumpy as I imagined,” she mumbled in his ear.
“I think he’s just questioning why he’s involved with our family,” Stiles answered gleefully.
“I can imagine, remember when I brought Jerry? He was so not ready for this.”
“Oh god, Jerry was the worst,” Stiles choked.
“Well at least we dealt with that before he proposed.”
“True, true.”
“Our family’s a bit intense,” Allie told Derek, “plus when we’re all together, the maturity level is significantly decreased.”
The door slammed open and more people streamed out to greet them. Introductions were made before Allie and Jacob’s mom, Jenny, yelled, “Everyone together! We have to take the obligatory kid picture!”
“Mom,” Jacob whined, “nobody wants to have the picture taken.”
“Too bad,” Her husband, Thomas, replied, “get with your cousins.”
“You do realize none of us are actually kids anymore, right?” Allie pointed out.
“You’re of the younger generation,” John rolled his eyes, “it still counts.”
Allie (23), Jacob (19), Stiles (19), Andy (18), Diana (23), Steve (21), and Selina (22) all lined up, slinging arms around each other and smiling for the adult’s cameras. After about five minutes of pictures. “C’mon, Mom, you should know to check and make sure the camera’s on,” Selina groaned.
“Alright, kids,” Dylan, Steve and Selina’s dad, clapped his hands, “Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to gather the eggs scattered about and locate the basket hidden for each of you with more care than the eggs.”
“On your mark. Get Set. Go!” Jenny shouted. The kids scattered, racing for the eggs.
Selina tackled Steve on his way to a cache of eggs and Allie took out Jacob. There was no sibling camaraderie for this hunt. Stiles tripped Andy and Diana as they both tried to take him out. Running for his life with werewolves all the time had improved his abilities for dealing with relatives. Once all the eggs had been gathered up, the real hunt began: the baskets.
“Found mine!” Allie yelled as she shimmied up the tree next to the shed to pluck her basket from the roof.
“Show off!” Selina yelled as she scaled another tree to grab her basket.
“Got mine!” Stiles yelled, overturning a wheelbarrow to get at his.
Andy crawled through a bush, coming out the other side with his basket while Steve pulled his out of the window basket. Diana found hers under the porch and poor Jacob was wandering around looking lost. “Come on, bro. You do this every year, you’re so unobservant,” Allie chastised as she yanked Jacob’s basket out from behind the woodpile.
“You should really work on that, man.” Stiles rolled his eyes, slinging an arm around Jacob’s shoulders.
“Everyone count up your eggs,” Allie ordered, “we’ll see who won this year.”
“How does this work?” Derek asked, coming to crouch beside Stiles.
“It’s counted like Quidditch: Each egg is worth ten points, the person who finds their basket first gets 250 bonus points. What differs is that each person after the first gets 250 minus an additional 30 points from the bonus,” Stiles replied.
“Seems kind of complicated,” Derek commented.
“We live to keep each other on our toes.” Stiles leaned onto Derek, lightly knocking him over. “Help me count?” Derek reached around him, arranging the eggs into piles of five while Stiles went through his basket. “IT’S SO FLUFFY!” He exclaimed, hugging a black stuffed wolf with red eyes.
Derek eyed it suspiciously. “Think your dad had something to do with it?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well look at it,” He nodded at the wolf.
“Ohhh, I guess either that or the family claim about psychics is true.” Stiles shrugged. “We’ll find out later I suppose.”
“Final counts?” Jenny called, interrupting their chain of thought.
“Four twenty” Stiles answered, tossing a purple jelly bean into Derek’s mouth.
“Four ten,” Selina sighed, lying back in the grass.
“Three seventy,” Andy replied, “at least it’s better than last year.”
Steve began juggling five eggs, “Do I get any bonus points for this?”
“No, Steve, stop showing off.” Allie rolled her eyes.
“Then I’ve got three fifty.”
“Just three thirty for me,” Diana replied.
“Two fifty,” Jacob mumbled dejectedly.
“Allie?” Jenny prompted.”
“Four eighty!” She shouted gleefully.
The rest of the kids groaned, flopping onto the grass. “How do you win every year?” Stiles asked incredulously.
“Magic,” she replied in a sing-songy voice.
“And that would not surprise me in the least,” Stiles muttered.
“Are you being a sore loser?” Derek laughed, ruffling Stiles’ hair.
“Maybe,” Stiles sulked.
Babcia clapped her hands to get everyone’s attention. “Alright, everyone, we’re heading inside. Kids, get cleaned up for dinner. Jacob and Andy, you guys are on table setting duty.”
The boys groaned, but headed dutifully indoors. Stiles slipped a hand into Derek’s, giving it a gentle squeeze. “Now the real fun begins for you.”
“What do you mean?” Derek asked cautiously.
“You get to be interrogated,” Stiles responded brightly.
“I’m going to regret this, aren’t I?”
“Maybe.” Stiles pulled them both to their feet before leaning over and giving Derek a quick kiss. “You’ve faced worse; I’m sure you’ll survive.”
“Right,” Derek replied faintly, allowing himself to be tugged inside.