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“You’re sure he’s ok?”
Deaton sighs from somewhere behind him. “Yes, Stiles. He’s going to be fine.” There’s the sound of snapping latex—gloves—and the metal clang of the trashcan lid falling shut. “You got him here just in time. The cure is already working.”
Stiles frowns and reaches out to run his fingers through Derek’s hair. The alpha’s skin is pale and beaded with sweat, but he’s no longer shaking, chest no longer heaving. The gunshot wound high on his right pectoral is still a red, unhealed smear across his chest but it’s not bleeding anymore. The black veins have faded back into his skin, poison chased away by Deaton’s cure. Stiles’ hand flutters over the slowly—oh so very slowly—healing flesh and he absentmindedly remembers the last time Derek got shot by a wolfsbane bullet, all those years ago. He remembers the weight of the buzz saw in his hand and the bile at the back of his throat and now there are tears in his eyes because this time it hadn’t just been an arm. This time…
Suddenly, a hand claps down on his shoulder, and Scott is at his side. “Hey man, everything is going to be fine,” he assures. There’s blood crusted beneath the nails of his hand—Stiles feels not one shred of goddamn remorse for those rogue hunters. They deserved it—but he grins at Stiles all the same. “You and I both know Derek is too stubborn to die.”
A laugh is startled out of Stiles; some of the tension bleeds out of the line of his shoulders and he can’t help but wonder if that’s Scott’s doing. “He’s too stubborn period,” he grumbles halfheartedly. His chest still feels oddly hollow and too tight at the same time but…Derek’s breathing and everything is going to be okay. “Same goes for you Scotty! I said this was a horrible idea from the start!” He levels his best friend with a glare, and Scott raises his hands in surrender.
“But nooooooo. No one listens to Stiles. Which is bullshit because everyone knows I’m the brain and you’re the brawn.”
Scott cocks an eyebrow at that. “What does that make Derek?”
“Beauty, obviously.”
Isaac snorts from his perch on the sink. “Can I start calling him Belle?” he teases as he works out a bit of glass from a cut in his arm. He flicks the shard onto the ground, and his smirking blue eyes find Stiles’. The human boy smirks in return, witty comeback burning on the tip of his tongue, when Derek softly groans on the operating table.
Stiles whirls around, hands flailing in the air, not knowing where to land, not knowing where to touch, but desperately needing to connect. He settles for combing through Derek’s hair again. “Derek?” he questions softly. The werewolf frowns, eyes still closed, and turns toward the sound of Stiles’ voice. He groans quietly again. “Derek,” Stiles says louder this time and suddenly, green eyes flutter open. Stiles’ knees go weak with relief.
“Hey there sourwolf.” He pushes a lock of hair off Derek’s forehead and smiles. “How you feeling?”
Derek blinks a few times, slow and deliberate. His pupils are blown in the dim light of Deaton’s back room, and his eyes are glassy, unfocused. Stiles watches as his throat clicks on a swallow.
“W…what’s this?” Derek slurs, and Stiles leans back in surprise because he’s never heard Derek slur. He’s mumbled and grumbled—especially in the early morning or right after a fantastic orgasm—but slurring is something new.
“Derek? Can you hear me?” Deaton had said something about the wolfsbane being a particularly potent strain. Maybe it was still fucking with the alpha’s senses.
The injured wolf flops his head to the side, eyes going from staring blindly at the ceiling to clumsily roving across Stiles’ face. There’s confusion in their green depths and a little pain. Stiles opens his mouth to ask Derek if he needs something—water, food, a fucking pillow because the metal operating table can’t be comfortable—but Derek beats him to it.
“Who’re you?”
Aaaaand yup. The wolfsbane is totally still fucking with his senses.
The words fumble off Derek’s tongue, mush mouthed and cottony, but Stiles understands. He’s torn between concerned and vaguely amused because Derek kind of looks like a lost puppy. “I’m Stiles,” he says carefully. “Do you remember me?”
Derek pouts. It’s like he tries for a frown but his facial muscles are not all back online. The slope of the eyebrows it’s severe enough, and the usual harsh slash of his mouth melts into a jutting lower lip. “No,” he mumbles petulantly, and Stiles has the distinct urge to kiss his forehead. Once again, he doesn’t get the chance because Derek is apparently easily distracted when stoned.
The calloused pads of Derek’s fingers suddenly find the curve of Stiles’ cheek. They slide around a bit, connecting the moles dotted along his skin. It’s a familiar gesture but an intimate one. Derek usually only does it in bed, and Stiles is very much aware of Scott over his shoulder, Isaac sitting on the sink, and Deaton slowly walking around the outer edge of the table. Blood burns through his cheeks, and Derek likes it (he always does) because he mutters, “Pretty” as he cups Stiles’ jaw.
“Um?” Scott articulates from behind Stiles. “Is…is Derek ok?” He sounds extremely uncomfortable. Probably because Derek keeps calling Stiles pretty boy under his breath.
Deaton hums and leans over Derek, peeling back an eyelid and checking his pulse. The alpha doesn’t even flinch, too busy trying to pull Stiles down by the nape of his neck, snuffling along the wrist that Stiles is using to gently push him away. “He’s fine,” Deaton says a moment later. “The cure has a weird side-effect with certain types of wolfsbane. Right now, he’s kind of…”
“Drugged?” Isaac supplies. He sounds delighted.
Deaton nods. “You could put it like that.”
“Will it wear off any time soon?” Stiles mumbles. His voice is muffled by Derek’s fingers, pulling on the swell of his bottom lip.
“Stiles,” Derek suddenly says. “Stiles.” It’s like he’s trying the word out, tongue curling around the letters, rolling the word against his teeth until it’s smooth and polished. “That’s not a name. It’s weird. Who names their kid Stiles?”
“It’s not weird,” the human boy huffs out. It’s an ingrained reflex, a defense long since perfected and scripted. “You seem to like it just fine when—” He cuts himself off this time because Derek probably can’t even remember his own name. He doesn’t need to know that he screams Stiles’ on a regular, nightly basis.
“I know you?” Derek squints up at him in suspicion. Stiles smiles fondly, and lets Derek pet across his nose.
“You do. I’m a friend.”
“Liar,” Derek replies automatically, smoothly. “Lying. I can feel it.” His thumb tucks itself under the hinge of Stiles’ jaw, sweeping over his pulse point. Stiles sighs because, really. Even drugged Derek is impossible.
“I wasn’t lying. I was just…leaving out some of the truth. I didn’t want to…freak you out.” He takes a deep breath, and then meets Derek’s eyes. Might as well bite the bullet (and wow okay it’s too soon for that particular idiom.) “We’re actually together. I mean like…we see each other. Dating. We date. I’m your boyfriend. We’re boyfriends.”
It’s an idiotic sounding explanation at best, but Stiles has always hated labels. ‘Boyfriends’ sounds like they’re fifteen and necking in the back of one of their cars.
…and ok they neck in the back of Stiles’ Jeep a lot but Stiles is 19 damn it! He’s an adult.
Derek’s eyes go wide as soon as his addled brain processes Stiles’ words (it takes him about a minute.) “Mine?” he questions, and Stiles would tease him for sounding so Neanderthal if it weren’t for the fact that he looks so earnest, so awed, eyes blown and mouth parted, like he can’t believe it’s true.
He gets that look, sometimes. When they’re lying in bed at night, tired and sated, Derek will stare at him like he’ll disappear if he so much as blinks. Derek has had so much taken from him that he never believes anything good will last.
But Stiles isn’t going anywhere, doesn’t want to, can’t make him. He’s here for the lung haul, and he’s going to make sure Derek knows it.
So, Stiles tucks away the caveman jokes (but saves them for a rainy day) and nods softly. “Yeah, big guy. All yours.”
A sound caught somewhere between a gasp and a whine leaves Derek, and Stiles is abruptly yanked into a firm, still slightly bloody, chest. “Mine,” Derek murmurs into his hair. His fingers slip underneath the hem of his shirt, one settling along the small of his back and the other wedged between them over Stiles’ heart. “Mine. My mate. Pretty and beautiful and good. Mate.” He shoves his face in the crook of Stiles’ neck and nuzzles, hums in contentment and it amazes Stiles. Because Derek doesn’t know where he is, what has happened to him, hell he might not even know his own name, but the knowledge that Stiles is his mate seems to make up for it all. That…well that’s something. Stiles gives in to his desire and presses a firm kiss to Derek’s brow. He really does love the idiot.
“Mate,” he agrees with Derek, and smiles when the werewolf kisses his neck.
The warm, sentimental glow in Stiles’ chest is quickly doused, however, when Derek shoves a hand down the back of his pants and gropes his ass. “Beautiful mate,” Derek growls into his collarbone. “Won’t let you leave. Take good care of you. Always.”
Rolling his eyes, but not exactly annoyed, Stiles combs his fingers through Derek’s hair as the werewolf marks his territory with gentle hickeys and even gentler hands. He hears a snicker from behind him, however, not too long after Derek starts mumbling perfect as he peppers kisses across his eyelids and cheeks, fumbling and uncoordinated and sloppy. Stiles cranes his neck back at the sound (shushing Derek when he whines, no longer able to suck on his jaw) to see Isaac holding up his phone, recording.
“I’m never letting him live this down,” he says gleefully and Stiles wonders if it’s payback for all the grueling training (coughtorturecough) that Derek had put the young beta through all those years back.
Or if it’s just revenge for when Derek (and ok Stiles was a little guilty here too) used up all the hot water last Wednesday, and Isaac came home to an ice cold shower and an empty fridge. It’s really anyone’s guess.
“Lucky, lucky, lucky,” Derek is chanting into Stiles’ chest, mouth pressing kisses against his sternum. “’M so lucky. Mate. Mine.”
Stiles would beg to differ there. It seems like he’s the lucky one.