Assisted Migration Applications

by Guede

Summary:

Stiles comes home after a bad college visit, and then things get really annoying, thanks to a couple uberprotective beta werewolves.

“Definitely crossing this one off the list,” Stiles mutters to himself as he trudges up the sidewalk.

A couple of tipsy-looking people on the other side of the road stop and gawk at him and he puts his hand up to the blood smeared all over the side of his face, then rolls his eyes at himself. Rubbing that’s not really going to help much when he’s got the whole side of his jeans torn open, and what feels like enough gravel to fill a whole driveway ground into his leg, and sewage stains on his shirt. If he doesn’t have to bust another pipe to get out of a pair of handcuffs, it’ll be…way too many pipes already busted.

“Hey! Hey, dude, are you…are you okay?” calls one of the people, and okay, so Stiles gets the place points for the odd good Samaritan. “You look like hell, do you need a doctor?”

“It’s okay, I’m on my way home,” Stiles calls back, flapping his hand at them. He turns the corner, then frowns at the quad he sees in front of him. It looks like the one where the campus tour started this morning, but he doesn’t see the statue of the…oh, there it is. Right behind the tent that’s appeared in between now and then.

“Are you sure?” the guy yells back. “’cause listen, if you’re in trouble, I’m from the dorm over there and my RA’s a hedgewitch, we can—”

Stiles sighs and turns around, and starts to explain thanks but no thanks, he’s already seen way too much of the buildings around here and definitely isn’t interested in spending yet more time stuck in one, when suddenly the air is full of blaring sirens and screeching wheels and blinding lights. Wincing away from them, Stiles stumbles back from the road, while on the other side, the drunken people dive for cover behind a park bench.

Two police cruisers shoot around the corner, then get viciously cut off by an SUV that then promptly slams to a stop, so hard that the only reason it doesn’t tip over its front end is because it’s counterweighted by somebody climbing out the rear window. That somebody roars, leaps up onto the SUV roof and then hurls itself towards Stiles, who almost hexes them before he recognizes Derek.

“Oh, hey—yaaa!” Stiles yelps, as he’s flattened into the grass. Which reminds him, his hip is bruised as hell from scraping through a utility access hatch, and it doesn’t appreciate having his own weight dumped on it, let alone the weight of a full-grown beta werewolf. “Ow! Fuck!”

Derek won’t get off. He does shift his weight, but he’s got his arms and legs caging Stiles in so Stiles still can’t move, and his one leg is pressing right against Stiles’ sore hip. He’s rumpling up Stiles’ clothes and that isn’t really great for the gravel rash and Stiles is trying to bat the guy off, because really, so not the right time for his boyfriend’s overenthusiastic scenting, and then Derek stiffens and his body arcs up and off Stiles, and the sound of ozone fills the air.

So Stiles swears and scrambles up, and almost hexes his dad, and then he drops back. “Jesus,” he says. “What—Dad, did you just tase Derek—”

“Low power, he’s already glaring at me,” his dad says, dropping to one knee in front of Stiles. He grabs Stiles by the chin, holds that while he gives Stiles a limb-check—Stiles helpfully wiggles his fingers and thumbs—and then he peers into Stiles’ eyes. “Cough. Don’t argue, son, just—”

Stiles coughs into his dad’s hand. “No plant sap,” he says, and then he raises his own hand to touch the blood on his face. “And this, not mine. And they didn’t drug me, they drugged my guide and please tell me—”

“She’s fine, we already found her, she’s just really sorry about everything,” his father says. The man looks at Stiles for another second, then he takes Stiles by the shoulders. He squeezes a little, taking a deep breath, then pats Stiles and moves his hands so that he’s hooking Stiles under the arms and pulling him onto his feet. “All right, you look okay. How bad are they?”

“They’d better not be dead,” Derek says. He’s still kind of shocky from the taser—he still has the damn prongs in his chest, and they poke Stiles in the arm as he scoots over. He’s slightly less handsy this time, probably because of how Stiles’ father is tapping the taser against his hip, but he still stuffs his face into Stiles’ neck and talks directly to Stiles’ pulse. “Because I want a shot at them.”

Stiles’ father’s brows twitch, not in a good way, and Stiles automatically slings his arm over Derek’s shoulders to block a tase. And also reaches over and worms his hand around till he can pull out those prongs, because they are really stabby little things and Derek might be stoic badass beta but Stiles has more than had his daily quota of bodily discomfort today, and—

“Hey,” Stiles says, frowning at him. “I thought you had an all-day business meeting today.”

Derek lifts his head. “I ditched,” he says after a moment, very slowly and very loudly, shoving his face into Stiles and examining the lines of Stiles’ irises like Stiles’ dad didn’t already do the concussion check. “Because Scott texted that you were missing.”

Stiles twists his head away so he’s got the room to pinch the bridge of his nose. “What the hell, Scott, I said tell Dad and—”

“Scott did fine, he called me and then one of the rangers called up Alpha Hale to cover the preserve while we headed up,” Stiles’ father sighs, looking irritably at his phone. A cop comes up and starts to say something to Stiles, probably asking for a statement, and Stiles’ dad turns and doesn’t even say anything, just looks at the man. The cop backs off and Stiles’ father looks back at Stiles. “All right, so—”

“I didn’t kill anybody, Dad,” Stiles says, rolling his eyes. “I mean. Okay, they’ve been there for a couple hours now and it’s a pretty drippy basement so I can’t guarantee that hypothermia won’t get them but—”

His father keeps staring at him. Stiles rolls his eyes again, but rattles off the number of people, general physical description, probable injuries and then location. Halfway through his dad starts gesturing for cops and rangers to go this way and that way, and also pulls up one ranger to take notes for him while he mutters questions and fields texts from, apparently, the local sheriff and the FBI. An EMT type wanders up and his father absently takes the antiseptic wipes and butterfly bandages from the woman and holds them out to Derek, who’s still knotted all over Stiles’ arm but who at least hasn’t started licking the blood off Stiles’ face.

Actually, considering this is usually right up Derek’s kink street, Derek’s being oddly subdued. Stiles glances over, but all he can see is spiky black hair. He shifts his arm around so it’s curled over Derek’s neck instead of his shoulders, and Derek shifts a little closer, but otherwise just keeps breathing into Stiles’ neck. “So that’s about it,” Stiles finishes for his dad. “Pretty standard group. Um, so…if Talia found out, then Peter—”

“Peter drove here ahead of us and tried to eat the university president,” his father mutters.

Stiles blinks. “Oh. Um. That’s…that’s very…that’s unusually direct of him…so…um, oh, God, Dad, did you tase him too?”

“No, I wasn’t here yet,” his father says. He just stops himself from saying something in anger, and goes on in tired exasperation instead. “Peter didn’t stop to notice that the president happens to be a siren, and she was nice enough that she just put him to sleep and then answered my call. He’s over in the back of the SUV, so Derek, how about you take Stiles over and clean him up while I deal with things? I think I have enough details to go on for now.”

He’s still holding the wipes for Derek to take. And Derek, despite his little bloodthirsty comment, actually doesn’t seem interested in much besides gluing his face to Stiles’ neck. So finally Stiles takes the wipes, and tugs his boyfriend over to the SUV, and pops the back to find a very groggy Peter shaking himself awake.

“Hey, did you really try to eat—” Stiles gets out, before he’s hauled into the car and under Peter.

Derek shoves in after Stiles, roughly enough that Stiles grabs for both their necks, because the last thing he needs right now is a cuddle squabble. But no, actually, the moment Derek’s in the car, he settles down and he and Peter just huddle over Stiles, their faces pressed to his chest, not so much as a grumpy grunt out of either of them. They just breathe in and out, scenting like crazy, and once Peter moves his hand and slides it over Stiles’ arm, and his fingers are trembling.

“I’m okay. Really, I’m good,” Stiles finally says. He loosens up his grip, then tightens it again, but so he’s massaging their napes instead of yanking at them. Honestly, still not the most comfortable position for him, but now that he’s out and his dad’s on the case, he’s…he’s really got nothing better to do, he guesses. And he is glad to see them, weird behavior and awkward scenting and all.

Anyway, it’s over. Everything will go back to normal soon enough.

* * *

Two days later, Stiles is playing hooky from school and it’s not to go have sex with one of his betas. Actually, it’s so that he can avoid them, and their turned way past eleven, all the way to TV soap stalking. “I mean, I know it’s how we got together in the first place, but what’s cute when you’re first dating is just plain horrifying by the time you’re celebrating your first anniversary, you know?”

“No,” Scott says.

Stiles pauses, remembers who he’s talking to, and then just eels the rest of the way out the window. “Whatever. The takeaway here is, they’re driving me crazy. Peter actually tried to finagle being a substitute teacher so that he could come into school with me, and Derek’s averaging a text every twenty seconds. And you know what happened when I didn’t answer him, because we had a pop quiz and amazingly, I am not allowed to have a phone in my hand for that?”

“He broke in and set off the fire alarm and then got in a fight with the fire marshal, I know, I was in class with you,” Scott mutters. He grabs Stiles’ feet and helps him to the ground, and then frowns and grabs at his buzzing pocket. “Well, Stiles, maybe you should cut them a little slack, considering what happened?”

“What? I’m fine.” Stiles slaps Scott’s hand away from his phone, because that’s the Allison ringtone and his buddy can wait two minutes for them to get clear of the parking lot. “Nothing worse than a bruise, even your mom didn’t think it was worth me going to the hospital after we got all the evidence photos taken.”

Scott grimaces and grabs up their backpacks, and then scoots along the wall with Stiles. “I know, but—”

“But what?” Stiles says, turning around. “C’mon, Scott, Peter and me literally met-cute because he knew I had a body in my car trunk, and he got nine-tenths of the way to turning that into a backseat hook-up before I got out of there. It’s not like they mind me kicking ass.”

“Yeah, I know, but I just don’t think this is really the same. I mean, just look at it from their point of view for a second,” Scott says. He hurries up and then slightly past Stiles, head cocked, nose into the breeze.

After a moment’s concentration, he makes the all-clear signal and they scuttle across the parking lot, heads down, passing Scott’s new, very spiffy bike—even if he won’t let Lydia and Stiles build ultrasound emitters into the handles—and Stiles’ awesome, but sadly, extremely easy to spot jeep. And while Jackson’s been coming along as a pack member, he’d flat-out refused to ‘get my ass beaten by your psycho Hale boyfriends just because you can’t communicate like normal people’ and Lydia won’t skip classes on days she has dance committee. So they’re heading for Allison’s car, since thankfully, despite the constant doubleheaded act with Scott, she’s cool like that and will lend them the keys.

“You went off on a campus tour by yourself,” Scott goes on. He grabs at Stiles’ sleeve, halting them, and then detours them around a few cars to avoid a teacher sneaking a smoke. “I bet they were already feeling bad about that—”

“Why? I told them not to come, you know that was always my so not a last resort, shoot me dead if I gotta go there school, and I only put in the stupid application because of politicking bullshit reasons with some state senator who’s on the board of regents,” Stiles hisses. “I mean, Dad didn’t even go with me. The whole idea was, minimal showpiece effort. And a damn good thing, because hell if I’m going there now.”

Scott sighs, and when Stiles tries to get up, he tugs them back down and then grips Stiles’ shoulder. “Listen, you’re my best friend, and I know most of the time you end up being right, but Stiles, I just think running away from them is not the best thing to do right now.”

“Well, then why are you helping?” Stiles says.

“Because you’re my best friend,” Scott says, in as close as he ever gets to a ‘duh’ voice. Then he inches up and glances over the top of the car they’re using as cover. “Also, if I didn’t, I know you’d just go by yourself and that’d be even worse. Okay, go.”

So…they go, but as soon as they’re up against Allison’s car, Stiles glares at his supposed best friend. “Wait, does that mean you’re monitoring me? Are you secretly texting Derek and Peter? Because Scott, that is so not—”

“That is so not what he’s doing, you jerk,” Allison says, popping her head out the car window. “Scott didn’t even tell me what you were doing. He’s a good friend, so he lied and said that you had an emergency you couldn’t tell the school about and you needed to borrow a car because the jeep wouldn’t work for some reason.”

“Oh,” Stiles says, blinking. He sinks down on his feet, rubbing at the side of his head, and then he makes a face at himself. “Okay, yeah, that’s…sorry, Scott, that wasn’t cool of me.”

“It’s okay,” Scott says. And he does sound genuinely forgiving, but he’s a little more absentminded about it than usual. As in, he’s busy switching to defensive stance against something in the car.

Stiles stiffens. He looks up again and Allison’s still there, her mouth in an unusually tight, thin line, her arms crossed over her chest. And…she’s not in the driver’s seat, come to think of it. She’s in shotgun.

The back passenger door opens. Peter leans out, one of his case files tucked under his arm, smiling like he’s completely expecting his alpha to love him for being so clever as to corrupt an Argent. “Hello, Stiles. Were we looking for an escape vehicle?”

“If we actually have to go anywhere, my car’s just down the block and it’s a lot faster,” Derek grumps from behind the wheel.

Allison shoots him a look over her shoulder, annoyed, and then she looks sunnily back at Stiles and Scott, who seems so genuinely stunned by this betrayal that Stiles almost, almost feels more sympathy for him than burning rage at his girlfriend. “Stiles, seriously,” she says. “You can’t just run out on people like this. After what happened—”

“Screw this, I’m going back to class,” Stiles snaps, spinning on his heel.

* * *

Stiles gets detention that afternoon. Well, he did walk right through the front doors, and when asked why he wasn’t in class, answer that he hadn’t felt like it, but had changed his mind. So honestly, he’s getting what he deserves.

What he does not deserve, in his opinion, is having detention with Scott and Allison. Scott because Scott’s an innocent victim here and only went along with it for Stiles, and also, seriously, Scott could’ve werewolf ninja’d his way past the principal while the guy was dressing down Stiles, but nope, he’d walked right in with Stiles because he’s more concerned about checking that Stiles is okay than saving him and his mom another parent-teacher conference over his attendance record. Sometimes Stiles isn’t sure whether he loves Scott or whether he wants to put his head in his hands over all the valuable lessons in covert ops he’s wasted on Scott.

And Allison, well. Stiles is kind of mad at her at the moment.

“Look, I know how you feel,” she’s whispering to him. “I went through the same thing when Gerard kidnapped me, and then my parents went nuts with the curfew and the rules afterward.”

“Yeah, well, then why aren’t you siding with me, then?” Stiles says. “Because that doesn’t look like you know to me. That looks like you’re being a big, fat, stalker werewolf enabling traitor.”

“Stiles, they’re not stalking you,” Allison says, her voice suddenly rising in exasperation.

Their detention monitor looks up, frowning. Scott immediately plasters on his confused sweet boy who carries toy dogs for old ladies smile and the monitor slowly looks back at the match-three game she’s playing on her phone.

“They’re not,” Allison says, a little lower, but no less frustrated. “They’re worried because you went to check out a college and got snatched for seven hours by a bunch of renegade eco-magic cultists who were going to hold you for ransom till the federal government turned all parkland west of the Rockies over to them.”

“Yeah, and it turned out okay. I’m fine, my campus guide’s fine, even the cultists are mostly fine,” Stiles says. “They moved the last one out of the hospital today. So I don’t see what the big deal is. I mean, it’s not even going to be much of a trial. They’ve already admitted everything, and they’re even fighting to not have court-appointed lawyers because they want to plead guilty and be martyrs to their dumb cause that nobody in the real world cares about.”

Allison huffs disbelievingly at the back of his head. “I know you’ve done all this stuff with the Service, but are you really going to play this like it happens all the time?”

“Well, it does,” Stiles says.

Scott makes a muffled groan, and then there’s some rustling and weird breathing, so either the two of them have figured out a way to make out with their hands—which Stiles actually wouldn’t put past them, they’re both a little more unorthodox than their ingénue faces make out—or they’re having some silent argument behind his back.

He doesn’t turn around. He likes Allison, he really does. He actually likes her enough at this point, for being her and not just being Scott’s girlfriend and the daughter of the guy his dad’s seeing, that he’s surprisingly pissed off at her for not getting it. And for doing that thing where…it’s not like he doesn’t know he and his dad don’t live like other people. Or that he’s had some really fucked-up experiences. But God, other people have no idea how tired he is of everybody always focusing on that stuff when they hear about it. He’s not just the really shitty parts of his life and he’s pretty damn proud of that.

“I’m not,” Allison starts. She sounds like she’s trying to be cautious, and she pauses so that Scott can make sort of squirmy noises on his side. “I’m not saying, okay, that you’re not okay. You—that’s up to you. But I’m just saying, Stiles, people who aren’t you…they have to adjust. And I’m not saying, you need to adjust, I’m—”

“Yeah, yeah, I know, I get it, I’m special,” Stiles mutters. “And I’m not trying to be an asshole here. But I deal with this shit, that’s my life, got it? And I’m actually pretty good at dealing with it and I just want—just trust me that I can.”

“I’m not saying that either, that nobody trusts you,” Allison says. She takes a deep breath and Scott makes a whimpering noise almost at the same time, so Stiles assumes that she kicked him. “That’s exactly what I felt, you know. That my parents, they didn’t trust me and that’s why they were giving me these insane curfews and not letting me go out with anybody, not even my friends. I didn’t think they believed in me, when it was their fault in the first place for not telling me up front why I shouldn’t trust Gerard. If they had, I wouldn’t have gotten suckered in by him in the first place.”

Her voice is starting to rise again, and it’s getting a thread of hurt in it, enough to make Stiles move a little uneasily in his seat. Most of the time she and her dad seem all right with each other, but every so often one of them will have a moment where…they just come off as alone, isolated and alone in a really raw way, and Stiles has always had his dad, at least.

He doesn’t know how he would’ve been without at least one parent, and he really doesn’t ever like thinking about it. So he never really knows how to deal with Allison or Chris when they get like that, and then he feels really shitty about it, since he always comes up with something, that’s his whole shtick. And well, they’ve both helped a couple times now, so they deserve somebody tagging them back.

“So I was really mad, and I was sneaking out all the time and everything,” Allison goes on after a tight, silent second. “I was sort of thinking, well, see, when I do know everything, I can handle myself just fine, and every time I sneak out and come back, that just proves it.”

Stiles grunts in acknowledgement. He’s still feeling awkward, and also, irritated with her to begin with. But that one there, that does kind of ring true.

“But then Mom got hurt, and Dad and I had to spend more time together taking care of her, and I realized what they were doing wasn’t about not trusting me and more about not trusting themselves,” Allison says. “They were really terrified that they didn’t know what to do, that’s all.”

“And did your dad get better about it?” Stiles asks, turning around. “You know, once you realized he was just being a control freak to deal with his fear?”

Scott shoots him a look, but Stiles shrugs it off. He thinks he knows Allison well enough at this point to know she can take it what she dishes out. And he’s proven right when she stiffens, but then tips her head and snorts.

“It doesn’t get better till you sit down and talk about it, Stiles,” she says. “Come on. You know that.”

“Yeah, well, I hear what you’re saying, but people gotta be ready to hear you,” Stiles says, turning forward again.

Allison sighs. “Tell me about it.”

Stiles frowns, then turns back around. Allison’s got her head down, dutifully working on her math homework, while Scott grimaces and rubs his nose and generally looks pained beside her. She looks up after a second, smiles sunnily, and then points her pencil at the clock.

“Detention’s over,” she says, as her eyes track down from the wall to the door. “And look, your ride’s here.”

Derek raises his brows through the glass panel in the door. Stiles slouches in his chair and puts his hand over his eyes. “If I break my chair, do you think they’d give me another hour?”

“Stiles, just go home,” Scott sighs. “Your dad’s gonna come get you at this rate.”

And his dad’s been pretty good about everything so far, especially considering they’ve got another campus tour next week, and that one, Stiles actually does want to see. So he takes his hand down and grabs his backpack, and gets up. “Fine, but if you see a report on the evening news tonight about werewolves howling on the back porch after being smacked out on their asses, you know what happened.”

* * *

Peter should’ve gone back to work, but he shows up about ten minutes after Derek and Stiles arrive home, after Derek glowered away all the usual post-school parking lot chitchat, stopped for every yellow light, and even traded his preferred route that swings through the preserve for the most direct one possible, despite that running through a construction zone that sent bits of asphalt rattling up against the underside of his Camaro. Every little pebble seemed to drive a nail into Derek’s soul, judging from his face, but he did it.

And he did it for Stiles, just like Peter’s strongarming the entire local court system into reorganizing his schedule so he can be home as much as possible, and Stiles gets it. Which is why Stiles isn’t just pulling alpha rank and ordering them to stop it, and instead is giving Derek monosyllables and glaring at the milkshake from his favorite drive-through that Peter brought, and pulling passive-aggressive shit like telling them he’s testing Lydia’s high-frequency emitters to keep them out of the basement.

“It’s day two, and I am turning into a douchebag,” Stiles says. “Are you sure you can’t come home?”

“Only if everybody wants this thesis to go on for another semester, and yeah, I am aware of the irony here,” Laura says. “Also, honestly, Stiles, I’m not sure I’m the right person to be talking to about this.”

Stiles puts his face in his hand. “Laura. You promised. You said, alpha to alpha, we were a support team, remember?”

“Yeah, but look, we’re friends too, and I have to say, I’m having a hard time not saying to hell with my goddamn degree and coming back so I can stalk you around too.” Laura’s in an office or something and there’s a very loud copier nearby, and she has to keep pausing to give it time to keen. “I’m kidding, but not as much as you think. Just…we were all really worried. They didn’t even tell me until it was all over, and I’m still worried. This wasn’t even your last tour, right?”

“It’s my second of five, and don’t even get me started,” Stiles says. “I got up to use the bathroom last night and tripped over Peter’s briefcase, and he had campus layouts of the next one, in military-level detail. Like we’re gonna have snipers or something.”

Laura hums thoughtfully. “Chris Argent’s pretty good with a rifle, isn’t he?”

“If Chris wants to keep seeing my dad and Melissa, he’ll make sure he’s on the other side of the world when Peter and Derek go to shanghai him into being my spotter,” Stiles hisses. “Look, I’m really frustrated here, okay? I appreciate you trying to lighten the mood, but—”

“Stiles, I really am sorry to hear that. But at the same time…they’re my brother and my uncle, and they’re beta werewolves. They’re Hale. Beta. Werewolves. And they love you, and it’s just…it’s kind of our worst nightmare, just as an entire species, you know?” Laura says. Her voice fades out and she asks if somebody’s going to kill the whole goddamn tree when they could just check that book out, and then she comes back with a heavy sigh. “Even in this day and age, your loved one getting grabbed by some nutball hunter when you’re not there…and Kate Argent was planning that with Derek, we found that out afterward.”

Just then Stiles’ phone buzzes: it’s Peter, texting from one floor up to let him know that his father’s home. Stiles sighs and thumbs a short reply, and puts his phone back to his ear. “I get that, but…they don’t act like this any other time. It’s not like when I come back from the preserve and I’ve got a rogue hunter in the car trunk, they suddenly get all freaked out and start saying I can’t go out to the tree by myself.”

“Because they know you have the tree. That’s the difference, when you’re out of town, you don’t have it,” Laura says.

“And I didn’t have a tree for years and years, and I still had people trying to grab me because that’s just a tree guardian’s life, that’s why we were classified for so long, and I was fine,” Stiles snaps. He gets up and then slaps his ass back down again, and then gets up. “I get worry. I get being nervous. I even get the whole PTSD thing. But this paranoia shit, I just—I can’t do it, Laura. You either get used to it or you live like my babcia would want, in some fortress with shit-tons of guards and you never get to go out, and Dad and I decided a long time ago that that wasn’t for us.”

Laura sighs. “Yeah, I hear you. Just…listen, I’m still getting the whole story, they’re not really talking to me either. Just…just try and be patient. Peter usually gets over things fast, and I’ll see if I can get Derek to call me back. And…and honestly, you might want to talk to Mom? Not to make them behave for you, okay, just…with Peter she might have some advice.”

“Ugh, okay, well, I’ll try,” Stiles mutters. The basement door bangs and the wards let him know it’s his dad, and he almost turns to the stairs before remembering all the electrical components he’s got to pack up (for his alibi, in case somebody decided to bust his wards and check). “I mean, it’s…it’s nice that they care. It’s…it’s just…I don’t usually have to deal with this, you know, Dad’s used to it and anyway, he likes to spend his energy on yelling at the people with the shitty security and profiling protocols.”

“Hang in there,” Laura says sympathetically. “Can’t be that much longer.”

* * *

Sure, easy for Laura to say, Stiles thinks just a few hours later, when it’s time to hit the mattress. Which is normally one of the highlights of the day, and Stiles knows he’s got issues when he’s got two peak-hotness werewolves stripping down and snaking under the sheets, and he’s wondering whether he can pretend he needs an extra half-hour at the dining table helping his father with paperwork.

“You’ve been very quiet all night, Stiles,” Peter observes, pulling himself up in front of Stiles. His hair’s all fluffy from the shower, and it’s starting to get sunny enough again that he’s developing the faintest tan line, a light golden vee that’s pointing straight down the center of his chest to the blanket casually half-rumpled over his groin. “Are you feeling all right?”

Derek flops onto his side of the bed, then rolls over to sprawl on his belly. He’s not even bothering with cover, just one long stretch of bare, invitingly toned flesh from his hairline all the way down to his toes, as he wedges his head up by Stiles’ hip. He nuzzles Stiles’ hand, lipping at a fingertip, before looking up.

“Yeah, something come up in detention or what?” he says. “I knew we should’ve just gone in with you.”

“Nothing happened in detention,” Stiles says, rolling his eyes, before Peter can chime in about how oddly impervious to blackmail and threats the principal is proving to be or whatever. “And even if something had, Scott’s there, you know.”

Derek growls, because no matter how many times Stiles reminds the guy that Scott is his platonic non-pack best friend, and therefore is a non-threat to Derek on multiple grounds, Derek still feels like there’s some kind of competition or measuring stick involved. So Stiles sighs and pets his head—damn it, so much for withholding cuddles—and that’s normal.

Peter, on the other hand, he has a funny little moment of stillness. Stiles is distracted and half-looking at Derek, so he almost misses it, and even with what he gets, it’s blurry and out of the side of his eye and so he’s not totally sure what he’s seeing, but Peter almost looks mad. And usually he appreciates Scott, both because he’s friends with Scott’s mom and because he appreciates anybody with a strong track record of getting Stiles out of trouble.

But when Stiles turns to fully face Peter, the man’s back to affectionate with just the slightest charming hint of ruefulness. “Yes, we know,” he says. He pauses, then drops his head as he slides forward. “And I know we’ve been a little…overbearing, Stiles.”

“You teamed up with Allison,” Stiles says. “Overbearing?”

“Hey, she texted us first,” Derek mutters. He twists over so he can look up at Stiles while still stretching back into Stiles’ petting hand. “But—okay, so we know you were pissed off about that.”

“No, really?” Stiles says.

Peter considers going with the smirk and the quip. His face arranges itself in that direction, and then he sighs and sinks down onto his forearms. He’s almost got his head on Stiles’ lap, and the fact that it’s not firmly seated on that spot is a better sign than any that Peter actually understands how annoyed Stiles is.

“We’re worried,” Peter says simply. “There wasn’t a single warning sign, Stiles. Otherwise we never would have let you go by yourself.”

“You didn’t really want to let me go anyway,” Stiles mutters. He’s still trying to remember how frustrating it is to have two werewolves in his privacy bubble at all times, but it’s kind of hard when Peter’s genuinely leveling with him, no scheme or even a verbal misdirect. “I’m pretty sure I remember telling you guys to stay home and not confuse me with on-site sex.”

“If we’d gone with you and done that, I bet you wouldn’t have had time for the tour,” Derek says. And sort of is joking. Derek’s not quite as ridiculously single-minded as he likes to make himself look, and he does grasp the idea that not all of the world revolves around the Hales, even if he tends to willfully ignore it.

He’s just…yeah, he’s worried. Peter’s worried. And Stiles sighs and puts his hands on both their heads, and plays with their hair as Derek starts nuzzling up Stiles’ hip, while Peter, a much more hopeful than knowing look on his face, finally lays his cheek against Stiles’ belly.

“I’m gonna keep going on college visits,” Stiles says, just as Peter moves his head so Stiles’ hand slides onto the back of Peter’s neck.

Peter pauses mid-purr, then nods. He’s also slipping a hand into Stiles’ pajama pants, but as a fellow multitasker, Stiles won’t automatically assume Peter’s distracted by that. “Of course. We’re not about to ban you from ever leaving the town, Stiles.”

“Tree makes that a moot point anyway,” Stiles says. He can’t help a hitch as Peter’s fingertips brush over his cock, and when he scruffs Peter’s neck, the man arches and whines into it in a way that definitely signals distraction.

Which is kind of working. And, well, Stiles wouldn’t be so into them if they weren’t a pair of sneaky, no-holds-barred manipulative werewolves. But he just manages to hold back that little bit longer, squeezing both their napes when they try to move in.

“Yeah, we know, it’s just…it was freaky,” Derek mutters. He’s tugging at Stiles’ grip, not hard enough to get loose, just enough to tell Stiles he doesn’t like it, and his tone is all resentful. But when he looks up, his head reluctantly tipping between hunched shoulders, he’s got that tense, slightly distant glassiness of remembered fear.

He blinks that away after a second, but it was there. And Stiles isn’t—he isn’t a complete dismissive hardass. His dad has a couple old military colleagues who are, who act like missing somebody or being afraid for them is a sign of weakness, and they might have awesome cool tools and get a lot of crazy shit done, but Stiles has never been fooled by that into thinking they’re actually happy about that. They fuck up anybody who cares about them, and Stiles doesn’t want to be like that. His dad didn’t bring him up that way.

So Stiles sighs and loosens up his grip, and then moves both hands to cup Derek’s head, since Peter seems all right just rubbing his cheek up Stiles’ front. “Sure, but it’s over,” Stiles says. “Right? Dad and I took care of it.”

Peter stops moving. Derek frowns, catching Stiles’ eye and keeping him from seeing what’s the matter with Peter, but then he snorts and pushes up to just nip at Stiles’ lower lip. “Yeah, yeah,” he says. “Yeah, we saw.”

His hand dips into Stiles’ pajamas, a lot more direct than Peter’s teasing, and when Stiles hitches this time, Derek just goes ahead and grabs the kiss. Which is a lot more like him, just when Stiles was thinking something was really off, and…well, look, Stiles has been kind of stressed lately. He could use a break. Or two. Or however many rounds Derek and Peter are up for.

Which is at least a couple, now that the two of them seem to be somewhat over their paranoia. Derek’s even bitching at Stiles just a few minutes later, claws planted in the headboard as Stiles fucks him from behind and Peter sucks him off from below, something about cheap plywood.

“Well, if you—didn’t keep—scratching out the protection runes,” Stiles pants. His knee slips on the sheets and he scrabbles at Derek’s hips to stay up, which is not the greatest idea because Derek is sweaty and bucking madly, snarling so close to the headboard that he actually might be biting chunks out of it, too. He finally hooks his arm over Derek’s arm, then drags himself up the man’s back. “Maybe—wouldn’t be constantly replacing it—”

Peter does something to Derek that ends in an obscene little throaty pop noise and Derek shuddering, and then twists out to grab the lube again from the bedside dresser. He flops up back-first against the splintering headboard, then sniffs and twitches his shoulder to flick a falling fragment off that. “I did suggest upgrading it to something more durable,” he says. “Metallic finishes are very trendy right now.”

“Oh, you just want an excuse to overhaul a bedroom I’ve had for all of six—six mon—” Stiles says.

Tries to say. Derek’s coming apart under him, the snarling and destruction abruptly going to a trembling body that’s limp everywhere except where it’s closed down mind-blowingly tight around Stiles’ cock. And Peter, well, he’s just smirking. Smirking and lazing around, both legs hiked up so Stiles can see the way he’s twisting his fingers around in his own hole, pumping them in and out, just where the rim will catch over his knuckles and go tautly red, then pale again as he relaxes into it. Stiles isn’t even done coming and his cock already wants to get into that.

So anyway, Stiles figures they’re fine.

* * *

Later that night Stiles wakes up the squished filling in a werewolf sandwich. As in, Derek’s octopused up against his back, while Peter is tucked against his front, and for a second Stiles actually isn’t sure whether that’s his hand going numb under Peter’s hip or somebody else’s. And when he does determine that that does, in fact, belong to him, and he tries to move it, Peter huffs in sleepy protest and closes down around Stiles’ cock and oh, okay, so that’s actually Peter’s ass that Stiles is tucked into and not just his thighs.

This isn’t exactly the first time that this has happened, and…Stiles takes a deep breath, feeling that warm, snug fit around him, and it is good. But also, he needs the bathroom.

He elbows at Derek, who grunts and just shuffles up so that he’s breathing into the back of Stiles’ head instead of Stiles’ back. Stiles rolls his eyes and pats at Peter, but that just gets him another dozy huff, and a kind of rolling clench at his cock and ugh, hell, talk about internal conflicts. It’s actually kind of weirdly, uncomfortably nauseating for a second, feeling his insides want to do two different things at once.

And motivating. Stiles yanks his hands free, then gets them planted on the small of Peter’s back. He shoves and Peter jerks over, then whimpers, waking up enough to crook his neck as Stiles humps up over him. Sighing, Stiles gives the man a quick scratch over the neck tendons, but otherwise just keeps the momentum going, working himself out of bed before Derek can try and close in and take over Stiles’ cock or anything like that.

Peter whimpers again, but more absentmindedly, and he’s curling up into the warm spot Stiles left when Stiles’ feet hit the floor. Stiles gives his beta another pat on the throat, kicks up his pajama pants and drags them on, and then hurries into the bathroom.

He does his business and he’s washing his hands and thinking, in the semi-muzzy way of typical late-night piss breaks, about how much he really doesn’t want to get up in four hours and go to school, when he hears something. It’s soft, just a kind of scraping noise, nothing unusual for their house, and for a couple seconds Stiles stands there and lets the water run over his hands and wonders what’s the problem.

Then he wakes up. He turns the water off, looks at himself in the mirror, and then yanks the door open.

Derek blinks heavily at him.

“Tell me you need to use the toilet,” Stiles says.

“No, but why are you taking so long? Been standing here forever,” Derek says, still blinking. He’s not even awake enough to focus, but he’s trailing Stiles to the bathroom in Stiles’ house.

Stiles slams the door in his face. Derek yelps and Stiles hears him stumble back, and then he comes up to the door again, smacking at it as further down the hall, Peter calls out to them, and Stiles’ dad asks what the hell is going on.

“Hey, what the hell,” Derek says, still rattling the door. “Stiles? Stiles, are you—is something—”

“Are you actually fucking seeing if I can fucking piss in my own fucking house without getting kidnapped?” Stiles snaps.

“Derek, what are you doing?” Peter says sharply, and Stiles breathes a sigh of relief. “It opens in, just go into the next room and check the window from there.”

Stiles yanks the door open again, just as his father steps out of his bedroom, rubbing at his face. “All right, everybody,” his dad says. “What’s wrong with the bath—”

“What’s wrong with you?” Stiles yells.

Derek and Peter freeze where they’re halfway into the next bedroom. Stiles’ dad blinks hard, slowly realizing that Stiles isn’t yelling at him, and then looks around at everybody. He looks confused, and Stiles can’t blame him seeing as Stiles’ betas have gone completely nuts.

“I’m fine! I’m fine! I’m fine, except that you two are being complete jackasses and driving me up the wall and do I actually, actually have to alpha you into giving me my own life?” Stiles goes on. “Fine, I got grabbed, but I took care of it! I am a fucking competent person and I can fucking deal with it without you!”

“Stiles,” his dad says warningly.

“Well, yeah, obviously, since you didn’t even call us,” Derek snaps. He’d been hunching back, looking more and more upset, but it hadn’t been—the anger kind of comes out of nowhere. Suddenly he’s looming up and slamming the guest bedroom door shut and glaring at Stiles. “You called Scott—”

“Because by the time I got my phone back, it was over and I called the people I needed to handle all the post-incident bullshit and what is your problem,” Stiles snaps back. “Do I have to add babysitting you two every time this happens now? Is that what alpha werewolves do? Because fuck that, I’m not dealing with that bullshit, so take it out of here before I make you.”

“No. No, you don’t,” Peter says. He’s tight. His voice is tight, his face is tight, and the way he pivots around Derek and then heads into Stiles’ bedroom practically sings like a harp string, it’s so tight.

He comes back out just a couple seconds later, fully dressed. He and Derek look at each other, and then he turns to Stiles’ father. Peter attempts to pull on a polite face but mostly just manages to look as if he’s semi-possessed by something that really wants to show off his fangs.

“Sorry about the racket,” he says to Stiles’ dad. “We’ll just be going, and not disturb you any longer.”

“Okay. Okay, wait, it’s late, and we’re probably not thinking right,” Stiles’ father starts, but Derek’s already stalking after Peter down the stairs, not even bothering to get his clothes. Stiles’ dad goes a few steps after them, still looking confused, then comes back to check on Stiles. “Stiles? Stiles, what—”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Stiles says, stomping back to his room. He kicks the door shut, as his dad tries to say something, and then tosses himself facedown onto the bed. Fuck this, he thinks, he’s going back to sleep.

* * *

Stiles wakes up by himself. He rolls over onto his side, but that feels weird. Then he rolls back, opening his eyes. He pats around, then sits up, and yeah, the bed’s just got him in it.

He…he sits there and he looks around, and then the smell of something burning and his father’s swearing drifts up from downstairs, and right. Morning. School. Getting up. Right. Stiles…does that.

It takes him a lot quicker than normal, since he’s not fighting off gropes in the shower, or circumventing attempts to slip less baggy clothes into his wardrobe, and he makes it downstairs in time to see his dad scraping something out of the microwave. “I went out to get the paper and left it in too long,” his dad mutters. “’nother one on the counter.”

Stiles grabs the breakfast tacos from the open plastic container, grimacing a little as his hand brushes the neat label in Talia’s handwriting on the side, and he nukes them for him and his father. And then they sit down and start eating.

“So,” his dad says. “Last night. I’m not sure—”

“They’re acting like this never comes up,” Stiles mumbles through a mouthful of food. “It’s just, they were driving me crazy and I know that it wasn’t fun, hey, I was the one who actually dealt with the crazy cultists and all but they’ve never been this nuts for this long and Dad, God, just, I hate being that fucking kid, you know that. I hate being the one who’s always being boxed up and put under guard and no, you can’t do that because something’s gonna happen and am I being an asshole?”

Stiles’ father looks silently at him. It’s not a judging look so much as a concerned one, but that’s…a lot worse, actually, and Stiles puts his head down so that he doesn’t have to look at it. So his dad reaches over and puts his hand on Stiles’ shoulder, sighs, and then pushes Stiles’ glass of juice into his hand.

“So first, why don’t you swallow before I worry about you choking yourself,” his dad says. He keeps the glass pressed to Stiles’ fingers till Stiles pries himself up and takes a sip, and then he gives Stiles another shoulder squeeze before sitting back. “Okay. Second…Stiles, about feeling like you can’t do anything because you’re—”

“You don’t make me feel like that,” Stiles immediately says, thinking he knows where that’s going. He still feels pretty shitty, but it’s his dad and he makes himself look up and meet his dad’s eyes, and show that he means it. “That’s the whole…that’s why it’s so frustrating, Dad. You’re really cool about it. You, and Scott and his mom, and just, this stuff happens but I can deal with it and you all get that so why don’t they?”

His dad smiles and sighs at him at the same time, because Stilinski men are talented like that. “Stiles, I don’t think it’s about getting it or not getting it. Look, first…first, I’m glad that you feel like you haven’t been boxed in, just because of what you are. Because I’ve never—your mother and I, we always thought that was more important. We wanted you to see the world beyond your tree.”

“And I have, Dad, I have.” Stiles flops back in his seat, pushing his glass away, and then shoves at his hair. “I know that wasn’t easy, either. I mean, God, getting kidnapped sucks. And I know it’s weird, not just the stranger danger stuff normal kids do, but learning to run background checks and memorize license plates, and always scoping out exits when I go into a new place, and…Dad, don’t look like that. I’m just—I’m trying to say, it’s not normal, but I’m glad you taught me all that, because I don’t feel scared and I know I would if I didn’t have all that. But I do, so I know I can handle it.”

“I know,” his dad says after a long second. He still sounds a little rough, but the look in his eyes is just straight-up proud, no exasperation or anything else mixed into it. And it’s not like his dad yells at him all the time, but…yeah, Stiles fidgets for a second under it. “I know. But what I was saying was…I know that. I know I taught you what you need to know, so you can get out there and have a life. But Stiles, if you think my heart’s not seizing up every time I get that alert on my phone—I hope you don’t think that, because God, that makes me feel like a terrible father.”

Stiles doesn’t know what to say to that. Still, he tries, because the way his father’s face just drops right at the end, he can’t stand it. “Dad. Dad. You’re—wow, you are so not a terrible father. Dad, I love you, I can’t even think about—”

“Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind the next time you decide to ninja the shit out of cultists instead of just getting to the nearest police station and calling me,” his father says dryly. Then he sits up and takes a deep breath, and looks at Stiles again. “But you don’t get used to something like that, Stiles. As a parent, when your kid is in trouble—when somebody is damn well threatening them…you don’t get used to it.”

“But…but you made sure I know what to do,” Stiles says after a second. “And it’s not like you just leave me out there by myself. I mean, you back me up too. You make sure we’ve got all the info we can get, and just because—you’re the one telling me that we never can know about everybody out there, and we just need to do the best we can and not waste life trying to be perfect.”

“Yeah, I know. But it still kills me when something gets past me. You’re my son, Stiles, it always will,” his father tells him soberly. “And afterward, even if you’re all right, it’s…I still want you to go out there and live the way you want to. I trust you to look after yourself. I do. And I remind myself of that every time this comes up, and I tell myself, I want my son to not live like a prisoner. And then…then I let you go out there, and I don’t regret it at all, you got that?”

Stiles nods.

“Good, because that’s the truth.” His father slouches back a little, running his hand over his face and the top of his head, and then he drops that and just shakes his head. “But it’s an argument I have to have with myself every single time. I guess I’ve been pretty good at keeping that under wraps…”

“Yeah, just a bit,” Stiles says. “I didn’t know. I didn’t even guess.”

“Well, look, I don’t want to put that on you, because I don’t want you hiding yourself just to make it easier on me,” his dad says. “Like I said, I trust you. But whatever was going on last night, just…maybe it’ll help to know that that’s a work in progress, trust. And working on it doesn’t mean I’m shaky about trusting you, you know. It just means…it’s not easy.”

“Yeah,” Stiles says. He sits back and looks at his plate, and then he sighs and looks around the kitchen. The emptier, quieter than usual, kitchen. “Yeah, no, that…that…that’s good to know. It’s always good to know more.”

His dad looks at him a little longer, and then goes back to eating. They finish up breakfast quietly, with just his father’s half-hearted mutter about the quality of the coffee (Peter usually makes that these days), which his dad cuts off before awkwardly asking whether Stiles needs a ride to school (because even though Stiles has the jeep, Derek always offers and on days when Stiles could use an extra ten minutes of sleep, or needs to come up with an extra page on his report before first period, having a driver’s handy). And then his dad grimaces again and Stiles just tells the man to get to work, he’ll call Scott if he has car trouble. If he gets detention again for being late, well, that’ll just give him the time to figure out how to fix this.

* * *

Sorry, Stiles texts Derek and Peter from the school parking lot. Can we talk about it?

By second period, he still doesn’t have a response from them. He does have a text from Laura, which says: that was shitty Stiles and I get it but it was shitty. I’ll work on this stupid thesis for now but if it’s not better this weekend I am coming home.

“Well, at least that means they’re talking about it to somebody,” Allison says, trying to pat Stiles on the shoulder. “So they probably haven’t left.”

“I almost think it’d be better if you were just saying I told you so,” Stiles mutters. He blocks the elbow Scott tries to give him, then detours around a classmate and ducks down the hallway. “Hey! Hey! Cora—”

“Not talking to you,” Cora says, while her minions close ranks behind her, squeezing Stiles out with a barrier of glossy, swinging hair and miniskirts.

Scott steps forward, putting his arm in front of Stiles. Who turns and is going to remind his buddy that he can and will land himself detention plus the scorn of the ruling clique if he feels like it, except before he can do that, Scott lets out a challenge roar.

The minions scatter. Cora stops, then pivots around, brow raised. “Seriously, McCall? Throwdown before math?”

“Look, Stiles just wants to talk to them, okay?” Scott says. He’s not actually in challenge stance, but he’s definitely got his head up and his feet firmly planted. “Don’t be mean when you don’t know what happened.”

“I know that he basically told them to fuck off for being upset psycho cultists kidnapped him when they weren’t looking, like we haven’t already dumped a fortune on therapists for Derek’s guilt issues,” Cora snaps. “So sorry that he’s just a weirdo who thinks that’s normal—”

“Don’t call him a weirdo,” Scott says, his eyes glowing. “He doesn’t ask for people to do that kind of thing to him, and if you’re gonna act like that’s all his fault, you’re even worse—”

“Uh, Scott,” Stiles says, blinking. Because one, Allison is signaling oncoming teachers, and two, his lovable, sweet, mostly pacifist best friend honest to God looks like he might jump Cora Hale. In the middle of the high school. “Scott. Listen. I appreciate it, but—”

“Stiles said he was sorry,” Allison says, hurrying up. She grabs Scott’s other arm and tugs him back a pace, but she’s also got her hand to the pocket of her bag where her portable crossbow is. “But he hasn’t seen or heard from them, and he’s worried too, okay?”

“I just want to know if they’re still around,” Stiles adds. He slings his arm over Scott’s shoulders, and he and Allison both pat at Scott till Scott gets rid of that low growl. “Just…they haven’t gone out of town, right?”

Cora looks skeptical about Stiles’ motives anyway, but at that she lets out a long, derisive laugh. “Are you kidding me?” she says. “No, they haven’t left. They’re your betas, asshole, that’s not how we work.”

“Well, maybe they could come and tell him that instead of making him nervous,” Scott snaps. He’s still oddly aggressive, shooting Cora another look as Allison finally edges him around the corner. “I might be packless, but even I know a good alpha’s one that would protect their own over keeping themselves from getting hurt.”

That one might make Cora frown. Stiles isn’t sure since he and Allison are hustling Scott into another hallway before the teachers catch up, and give Scott enough detention that he gets suspended from the lacrosse team again (and all Stiles needs now, speaking of packmates, is Jackson in his face about screwing up their starting line-up).

“Bro, not that that wasn’t awesome, and that I don’t appreciate the back-up,” Stiles starts.

“But I probably shouldn’t air out your relationship stuff in front of the whole school?” Scott sighs. He’s hunching over and looking guilty, much more like his usual self. “Sorry about that.”

“What, no, that…well, that wasn’t even something I was thinking about, but…whatever, like social pariah’s anything new to me,” Stiles says, shaking his head. “No, just…well, something going on with you? You’re not usually that invested in my Hale baggage.”

Scott frowns at him. “Just because I don’t want details about what you guys do doesn’t mean I don’t care that they’re…that you’re all getting along,” Scott says, gesturing awkwardly.

He pauses and while he doesn’t quite look at her, Allison smartly decides to excuse herself and go intercept Lydia, who’s appeared at the end of the hall and who has a fill-me-in-on-drama-now face. Scott beams soppily after Allison, she glances back with a smile, and then they both shake themselves and put on sort of freakishly similar taking-care-of-business faces. Between them, they’ve got enough sweetness to give a sugarcane field diabetes, but even Stiles has to admit they’re like that because they are just perfect for each other.

“And anyway, I know some of this is because you called me and not them, and that’s just—that’s just stupid. I still think you’re being rough on them but they shouldn’t be getting mad over that,” Scott finally mutters. He’s not really built to be resentful, but, as with everything else, Scott gives that a decent shot before he sighs. He shakes his head and puts his hand up before Stiles can ask. “No, they didn’t corner me or anything like that. I just—I could tell, though, when Alpha Hale showed up at the office, by the questions she was asking, and how she was looking at me.”

“I called you ‘cause that’s what I do,” Stiles says, blinking. “I mean, because—I was already out and those assholes were down, so when that happens I call you. If I’d still been in trouble, yeah, of course I’d call everybody, but I wasn’t.”

“I know,” Scott says. “I know, and it’s always me because you hate breaking it to your dad that somebody got you again. That’s what I’m saying, it’s got nothing to do with who you’re closest to and I think they’re being jerks by making it into that. Pack hierarchy isn’t that strict.”

Stiles opens his mouth, then closes it. He fidgets and looks down and realizes he’s got half a text typed out, and then makes a face and shoves his phone away. Then he looks up at Scott. “So, you know I don’t just call you because I need somebody to run interference with Dad, right?”

“Yeah, yeah, also because you know I’ll get anybody you need me to, since I don’t have all the official stuff to do first like your dad does,” Scott says, shrugging.

“And because I want my best friend to know I’m okay, Jesus,” Stiles says. He drops his arm around Scott’s shoulders again, squeezing them together, and then lets go. “God. Am I seriously surrounded by martyrs?”

“Well, from where I’m standing…” Allison comes back over, a brightly-smiling Lydia in tow. She has her arms crossed over her chest, but she just holds that for a second before sighing and pulling out her phone. “Okay, fine, so Jackson says that Isaac says that when he went jogging through the preserve last night, he saw Derek’s car in front of the Hales’ place.”

Lydia also has her phone out now, and in her other hand, she has a small black plastic controller that could do anything from open a garage door to remotely power on a series of sound-triggered charges, depending on which project it belongs to. “At this time of day, the least number of people should be on the southwest side,” she says. “That would normally take you three minutes to get to, but you only have one minute and thirty seconds, because we can’t block the security cameras for longer without having to hack the system to digitally alter the footage.”

Stiles blinks. “Guys.”

“You’re just going to mope all day anyway,” Allison says, and then she looks up and gives Stiles a wink. “Besides, I think I owe you one.”

“And you owe me and Jackson, but we can discuss that when you’re less distracted,” Lydia says. “You’re no fun to negotiate with like this.”

Scott clearly wasn’t in on this, but he just blinks twice and then he’s reset to his usual adoring look at Allison. He does manage to clap Stiles on the shoulder—still looking at her—and then he gives Stiles a push towards the right hallway. “We’ll cover,” he says. “Can you just tell Derek that I actually didn’t leave them out of the loop, it’s just your dad wouldn’t let me go so I had to text a ranger to get them?”

“Sure,” Stiles says. He takes a step, then turns back. “But I didn’t tell you to get them.”

“Yeah, but I figured you’d want them, you were just in a hurry,” Scott says. And then he frowns. “Oh, so, did I—”

“No. No, it’s okay,” Stiles says. “You did good, Scott. And…and hey, thanks.”

Scott smiles at him. And so does Allison, giving Scott a kiss on the cheek, and that’s a better reminder than Lydia pointedly clearing her throat over there.

“Thanks for helping me get out, too,” Stiles says, giving Lydia the first nod. It means more to her, and anyway, Allison needs a second to get out of the quick make-out that she and Scott have inevitably gotten into it, so she can actually see Stiles nod at them. “Really, thanks, I…I really appreciate it. So, southwest, ninety seconds…”

“Starting now,” Lydia says, holding up her controller.

“Got it, going!” Stiles says, running off.

* * *

Stiles isn’t an idiot, so when he skips his afternoon classes in favor of driving over to the Hale house, he texts his dad that it’s urgent pack business and he’s very sorry for any disrespect that shows to the principal and of course he’ll do whatever make-up is required, along with doing this week’s disposal paperwork. And he stops off at the tree and has it help him rustle up a couple rabbits that he can bring along.

“You really don’t have to gift every time you come,” Talia says, though she’s already rolling up her sleeves and flopping one rabbit over so she can start gutting it. “You’re family, Stiles, not a guest.”

“Yeah, but I’m the family asshole right now, aren’t I?” Stiles says. He takes a deep breath, and then straightens up as she looks at him.

He actually…well, he’d been hoping that, it being the middle of the workday, he’d get Francis, but of course Talia’s home and she’s the one answering the door. She hadn’t looked surprised at all to see him, but so far she hasn’t been very…her. She’s been calm and mostly waiting on Stiles to do all the talking, and it’s actually pretty unnerving and okay, maybe she’s still being herself, just without all the snarky comments.

Anyway, when Talia looks at him, Stiles can’t help getting tense, but he makes himself not back up. She gives him a thoughtful look, and then she takes the rabbits and carries them over to the porch swing, and waves at him to follow. When he does, she takes a seat, hands him one rabbit and a knife she pulls out of a box under the swing, and then she pops her claws and starts working on the other one.

“I think before we have this discussion, I’d like to take care of a few items,” she says, slitting open the rabbit belly. “First of all, are you all right?”

Stiles isn’t exactly squeamish about dead things these days, but he can’t help staring at the limp ears dangling out of her hands. Then he looks up at her, and just catches a faint hint of Hale mischief in her eyes.

Talia pauses, then smiles ruefully. She doesn’t stop working on the rabbit but she does move it off to the side, so that the swing’s arm is blocking Stiles’ view. “I would genuinely like to know,” she says, sobering up. “I don’t want to make assumptions, but—”

“Well, it’s not like it’s fun or anything,” Stiles says. He pauses then, reminding himself that sounding irritated is a bad way to start off peacemaking. “I’m okay. I’ve had better day trips, I guess, but no bad injuries to anybody, they weren’t really into mindgames, just into trying to convert you to the cause and that’s more boring to listen to than anything else, and…yeah.”

She nods. “All right, then the other thing I wanted to do was let you know that I haven’t talked to Derek or Peter about what’s happened between you. I know they’re upset, of course, and I’ve let them know they have my support, but I haven’t tried to push them. From what I’ve gathered, this is still just between you and them.”

“Thanks,” Stiles says, taking another deep breath. He still has a rabbit, he realizes, and he sighs and flips it around so that the blood won’t run onto his leg as he cuts into it. “I, um, so…so are they around?”

“They were here earlier, but when I say I haven’t tried to push, I mean I really don’t think I should be involved in this. If you’re here to formally ask for my help, of course I’ll provide it, but short of that, I don’t think it’s my place.” Talia shakes her arms and Stiles hears splattering against the porch floor, and then she raises one hand and flicks fur off her claws. “Much as Peter might not believe that…”

Stiles looks a little more closely at her. She still is weirdly not mad at him, but she’s a little frustrated. She sort of twists her mouth when she says Peter’s name, the same way that his dad does when he’s telling Stiles to just slow down and let him work things out the right way, and then her claw breaks and she glares down at the rabbit. Then she sighs and leans over.

Talia puts down the rabbit on the ground, then pulls back so that she can work at her claw, which looks like it was fraying anyway, and now it’s snapped so that it’s the werewolf equivalent of a hangnail. Stiles offers her the knife and she pauses, then takes that from him with a grateful nod and a wry sigh.

“Peter’s a little difficult sometimes,” she says, cutting off the claw fragment. “Being independent’s always been very important to him, and I understand that. But then he comes back and demands to know why nobody’s doing the very things that would drive him up the wall, and…he’s tricky.”

“Did you two fight over me?” Stiles blurts out. “Shit. I mean—”

Talia’s already shaking her head. “No, no, not that. Like I said, we haven’t gone into that. But when he’s upset, he starts picking at everything. You know.”

Stiles shifts around, and then puts his rabbit down, too. He’s getting a little sloppy with the knife and anyway, he’s just not really in the mind to dissect wildlife at the moment. “Yeah. Yeah, I know. And…and I don’t think you need to bother with my mess, but…so, um, he’s really upset. Him and Derek.”

Stupid question. He knows they are, the real problem is just that he doesn’t understand why. He’s got all the little pieces of information about it and he can add one to the other, and he can even understand what he’s seeing when he puts them together, but he just—he doesn’t feel it. He doesn’t want to be an asshole, but he really doesn’t. And getting his dad’s and Scott’s views on it, sure, that helps put context on it, but he still just isn’t feeling it.

Maybe he is just a weirdo with messed-up reactions.

“Well, Derek was always…I’ve always taught my children that they are Hales, first and foremost. And like all things, that is both a privilege and a drawback, but I’ve probably emphasized the privilege part more,” Talia says, with a small, proud, but slightly self-deprecating smile. She pulls the box back out from under the swing and fishes a couple cleaning cloths from it, handing one to Stiles and using the other to wipe off her fingers. “So he grew up thinking that we were the strongest. He wasn’t used to being afraid, before that—woman got to him.”

She’s still for a moment, still and hard as she looks out over the front yard, and right then she reminds Stiles more than a little of his grandmother. The way she hardens, it’s like all the human goes out of her. And there’s not just animal left either—what’s left is something ageless and cool and yet ferocious.

Then Talia’s gaze drops and her shoulders move, and that’s gone. And now she reminds Stiles of his father again, with the way regret etches into her face via the grooves around her mouth. “I sometimes wonder, you know, if I’d brought him up a little differently, if he would have…if he’d been more suspicious of her,” she says softly. She presses her lips together, then moves to prop her elbows on her thighs, her wrists crossing over each other between her knees. “Well, hindsight can never be proven. At any rate, yes, Derek’s been a little more sensitive about people he cares about since. Peter, though—Peter’s always been this way. He’s much younger than I am.”

“Yeah,” Stiles says. She looks at him like she’s expecting a little more, but he doesn’t know what else to say. “Um, yeah, I’ve seen your birth certificates.”

Then he winces, because that’s sometimes considered rude in the were community, what with the slower physical aging, but Talia just laughs at him. Then she keeps laughing, but it’s softer, more inward-facing.

“Much younger,” she says again. “He was a little bit of a surprise to our parents, to be honest. And he came in between waves of cousins, too, so he was the only baby in the pack for a few years. Spoiled rotten, of course.”

Stiles did not know that, although he supposes the information was all there in the detailed genealogies Peter and Derek have walked him through. And, well…“That makes sense of a lot.”

Talia smiles again. “Doesn’t it? But then our parents were—they died, and a fair number of the other adults—has anyone told you what happened?”

“There are a couple theories,” Stiles says after a moment. Because no, he hasn’t asked, and while he has gone digging, the were community is still pretty damn good at keeping things under wraps when they want to. What he has found, he can’t really talk too much about without giving away the Service’s sources, and he knows better than that. “The last guardian, Yvette, wasn’t…wasn’t really…”

“She refused to retire for far too long, and she wouldn’t name an heir,” Talia says, a little flatly. Then she gives Stiles an apologetic glance.

“Eh, no, I’m with you on that being a pain in the ass, at best,” Stiles says, and tries not to think too hard about his mom’s last days. “Anyway, so the Nemeton wasn’t doing so well about warning about dangers, and so there was some incident—that’s mostly what the theories were about. But anyway, it hit you guys hard.”

Talia sobers again, and Stiles thinks she might just pretend they hadn’t started talking about it at all. But then she nods shortly. “I won’t go into details now, but we lost my parents and three other adult pack members in three months. And we lost two more before the year’s end to challenges from other packs. Even with my grandmother coming out of retirement…anyway, Peter saw all of that. He grew up very differently from Derek, Stiles, he’s never assumed he’s the strongest, no matter what face he shows to the world. Neither of us have.”

“I didn’t know that, but…but I wasn’t trying to cut any of you out,” Stiles finally says. “I just…Dad and I, we’ve been on our own for a long time too.”

“Which is probably why Peter’s been taking it so badly,” Talia says. She hesitates, and then, in a very Peter way, goes from dipping her toe to plunging into the deep end with a nonchalant shrug. “Ever since our parents died, people have been telling him he’s no help, he’s just a burden, he’s a child when we need soldiers. Even our grandmother. And I tried…I may have pulled him too far in the other direction. I didn’t protect him as his big sister, I pulled him up to fight with his alpha, and he did well but still, Stiles, it’s very hard when you’re that young. We all know that.”

“Yeah, but if they want to—and kids know, you know? They’re not stupid,” Stiles says. He shifts in place, then tosses his bloody rag back into the box under the swing. “We know when things are bad. And it sucks more to sit back and be scared, and not even know what to do, let alone be able to do anything about…it…”

He and Talia sit there for a little longer, because, once Talia realizes that Stiles isn’t about to keep going, she picks up the rabbits again. Guts and skins them, humming softly to herself, and then she carries them inside. A couple minutes later, she comes back out with a pitcher of water. She rinses the blood and bits off the porch, hits the wards to fritz off the rest, and then takes the box from under the swing. Takes that inside, then returns with a giant picnic basket, which she hands to Stiles.

“Well, as I said, I don’t want to interfere with your pack, but I do think things are better done on a full stomach,” Talia says in her normal serene tone. She smiles at Stiles, giving the top of the basket a firm pat, and then leaves that on his lap. “These kinds of kinks come up and you work them out, Stiles. That’s alphahood for you. And now I really do need to stop before I break my word.”

“Dunno, seems like it’s been pretty stretchy so far,” Stiles mutters. He drums his fingers on the basket, then looks up, just as Talia’s swanning back into the house. “But thanks. Thanks for—just, you know, I’m not used to—talking to anybody about it so…”

“Oh, of course you’re welcome,” Talia says, waving her hand at him. “It’s different now, and I much prefer it like this than before. So good luck, Stiles.”

“Yeah,” Stiles says, thinking. “Yeah. Thanks.”

* * *

So he takes the basket and he goes out to the tree. He should’ve thought of that earlier, but well…honestly, he’s still getting used to having that, too. He’s just…he’s just adapting, a lot more than he’d realized.

Stiles sits down with the basket and opens it up. Whatever the hell comes out of her mouth, Talia packed the thing like she was sending Stiles off to a siege, and he goes through five plates before he gets through the appetizer type things and starts hitting entrées. The tree is curious (post-hibernation Nemetons are sort of like babies, wanting to stick everything in their mouths) and Stiles picks out a couple pieces of spanakopita for the roots to fiddle with. Then he sits back.

And he sits. And sits. And ten minutes later, he grabs at his growling stomach, because his stupid body apparently doesn’t understand tact, and then just flops back against the Nemeton’s trunk. “Look, can you just come over already?” he says. “Because I’m not touching any of this till you do. So I’m just gonna get hungrier. And the tree’s going to pick up on that sooner or later, and I won’t be held responsible if it decides to sinkhole a deli to feed its displaced cravings for hummus—”

When he pulls his head off the trunk, Derek and Peter are standing on the other side of the picnic blanket. Derek has his coat zipped up to just under his chin and his hands shoved into the pockets so he looks like somebody pasted a scowling model head on top of a leather beanbag, while Peter’s stance is more relaxed, but he’s still looking like he’s talking to some official he knows won’t ever be useful to him, but that he can’t maul because he’s in public.

“Well, we didn’t want to assume we weren’t intruding on you,” Peter says, just a little icy.

“Which is why even after we fight about it, you follow me around. Because you were, right?” Stiles sighs. “Did you just go ahead and sneak into the school?”

“You can tell Scott that I know he got them to get my mom,” Derek says, answering that question. “Also, that I know I put my number in his phone under ‘Emergency Stiles,’ so I know he changed it.”

“You what?” Stiles says, blinking. “You…that’s way more sneaky than I thought—ugh, okay, getting distracted. Okay, look, I’m—I’m sorry. You were being annoying, but I should’ve just been a big boy and asked why the hell you were being like that in the first place. I shouldn’t have yelled at you like that.”

Derek takes his hands out of his coat pockets and moves them like he’s going to sit down, and then he realizes Peter hasn’t moved. He looks over, his brows up, and Peter’s face twitches in irritation. Then Peter flips his hand at Derek, all do what you want, and keeps eyeing Stiles.

“We did have that conversation, as I recall,” Peter says. “Somebody took you. We didn’t appreciate that, and we still don’t.”

“Yeah, and obviously, that’s not all of it if we had that talk and I thought we’d worked it out, and then you guys actually tailed me to the bathroom in my actual house,” Stiles says. In the back of his head, the tree nudges him, wondering about the negative vibes coming off him, and he grimaces and puts his hand back on its trunk to reassure it. “And now we’re starting to fight about it again, instead of actually figuring out why you’re doing this when you know it bothers me. I mean, do you even know why it does?”

Derek nods, but he’s still looking at Peter for a cue or something, and Peter is…he keeps up the freezing stare for another second, which is long enough to make Stiles nervous, and then he sighs. His shoulders slump and he runs an absent hand over his hair, before finally dropping down to sit on the ground.

“It’s not that we don’t think you’re competent,” Peter says. He moves his arm as Derek hurriedly plops down next to him, then wrinkles his nose a little, brushing off dirt from where Derek’s sent it over his knee and one of the plates. “We do, Stiles, of course we do. If we didn’t, we wouldn’t acknowledge you as alpha.”

“It’s just I called Scott first?” Stiles says.

Funnily enough, it’s Derek who looks pained over that. “Not really.” He scratches at the side of his jaw, then grunts and yanks down his coat zipper, so that he can flap the coat open and stick his hand inside the collar to rub at his neck. “Okay, not like you think. It’s not like I’m—not like we’re jealous of him. He’s your best friend, we get that, we’re not so—so—”

“You get to have friends,” Peter says dryly, with a sideways flick of a look at Derek. Then he pulls his hands into his lap, studying his fingers as he shifts from nail to claw and then back again. He’s a lot less mocking as he goes on. “You get to have your own life. All we want…all we’ve ever wanted, Stiles, is to be in it. And I know we may give you the impression sometimes that we’ll do as we please and we don’t care what you think about it, but—”

“I called him first because I needed to make sure he wasn’t going to do anything stupid,” Stiles sighs. He takes his hand off the tree, which seems to have calmed down, and starts fiddling with the plastic wrap on the plate in front of him. “This…happens a lot, and when I was a kid, before my mom died and back when Scott and his mom were living with us, this hunter grabbed me out of the school playground. Scott didn’t see it, and the school tried not to let the other parents know and was just sending people home early, but he overheard some teachers talking about it and he sneaked away from his mom to try and find me. And the thing is, Mom? She already had beaten the shit out of the hunter and gotten me, but he didn’t know, so he got lost for something like ten hours and Melissa freaked and it was just—it was this whole huge deal and it was terrifying for everybody.”

“I can imagine,” Peter says after a moment. He sounds surprised. “Melissa’s never mentioned that.”

Stiles snorts. “Yeah, well, she kind of pretends it didn’t happen, but I’m pretty sure it’s a big reason why she ended up joining the Service. And so I always call Scott, okay, I have to call him, so I can tell him what to do so he doesn’t come up with his own plan and get into trouble. And I didn’t call my dad, because he would’ve just run straight to get me when I knew he needed to stay put and take care of business. It’s not—I’m just trying to make sure everybody ends up okay. Because it’s shitty what happens to me but it’s even shittier when that ends up fucking with people who wouldn’t even be involved if they didn’t know me.”

“They’re involved because they care about you,” Peter points out. “I hate to state the obvious, but Stiles, we all do it because we want to.”

“Yeah. Yeah, and I know, and I respect free will and choices and all that jazz but I hate it when people get hurt because of me,” Stiles says. He drops his face into his hand and rubs at his cheek, then his eye. “Also, I know how much of a hypocrite I sound like right now, being mad at you for acting like I’m a baby and then basically doing the same thing, so don’t start on that.”

“We weren’t going to,” Derek says. “And look, sorry about just…stalking you everywhere. But it’s just—we thought you didn’t think we were up to it. So I’m not sure how else we were supposed to show you different.”

Stiles looks up. “Wait. You…so you did all that because you thought I was saying you were too crappy to be worth calling up to help?”

He looks at Derek, and then he catches himself because Derek might be able to fling bears with the best of them, but he has self-esteem cracks deeper than the San Andreas Fault. So he looks at Peter, who generally has a very accurate idea of what other people think of him, even if it doesn’t match up to the man’s own view of himself, but Peter’s giving him a surprised face, like that was supposed to be what Stiles was thinking.

“So, the first time we hooked up, you were still covered in blood from bashing the shit out of a zillion minions,” Stiles points out.

“After you’d tricked them into giving us the time to shake off the drugs, and also, had killed a Huldrekall and bonded with the Nemeton,” Peter points right back. He smiles at Stiles, but the amusement in it is wistful, not smarmy. “Stiles, believe me, we’ve always been very aware that you don’t need a werewolf pack at your service.”

“But it’s not about whether I need one, God, that just makes me sound like my babcia with her bullshit about proper roles,” Stiles says.

Derek winces, while Peter looks like he’d give a couple limbs, maybe even his own, to reword that.

“Look, I mean, I just—no, okay? No,” Stiles adds, before they all start getting sucked into the guilt spiral. “No, that’s not why. I think you’re great, okay? More than great. You’re…you’re the best werewolves ever, and I totally would call you up to defend the tree and I mean, I do that, you know, so obviously I think you can do it. And—and—just, God, stuff like those stupid cultists is just different. It’s just—that’s just me, that’s just work.”

“Stiles,” Peter says slowly. “We can check with your father, but I’m fairly sure that getting kidnapped is not, in fact, part of your job description.”

“Oh, for…not literally, I don’t mean it like that. It’s just…look, it’s fucked up, I get that, but it’s just crap that comes with being me, that’s how I’ve always looked at it,” Stiles says, a little irritated. “It’s like with you guys, when you run into rogue werewolves on patrol, and you throw down with them. It’s not like you call me for all of those. Actually, it’s not like you even tell me.”

Peter looks up at the tree. “Well, that seems unnecessary, considering—”

“No, I get it,” Derek says, hitting Peter. He pauses, and then pushes at the side of his face like he might be getting a headache. “I mean, I get where you’re going with it. And you’re—it’s not fucked up. It’s not a fucked-up either of us care about, anyway.”

“But you don’t totally get it,” Stiles sighs, looking at them.

“We’re trying, Stiles. We really are.” Peter moves aside a few plates, then scoots himself that much closer, all the while looking Stiles right in the eyes. “But fundamentally, there does seem to be a difference between not telling you about an incident that lasts only a few minutes—”

Derek snorts, cracks his neck. “If that.”

“—and your disappearing for the better part of a day,” Peter finishes. “And I understand wanting to try and make sure that wrapped up properly, but…when were you going to call us? Were you ever—”

“I was going to call you,” Stiles protests. He’s already a little horrified at where that might be going, and he feels even worse when he catches that tiny slump of relief in Peter’s posture. “It wasn’t—I wasn’t—I wasn’t running away from you or anything. Jesus Christ, the whole time I was waiting for those assholes to just turn around so I could slip my cuffs, I was thinking about how awesome it was going to be to get home and see you guys, and that’s why I should just knock them out and not kill them, and end up with more of a hassle. You’re just—you’re home to me, now. So I didn’t call you because I—because maybe it’s stupid, but I wanted to get out of there and go home, not…not get stuck there longer. I just…I was thinking about how great it’d be to get home and see you, and so I was picturing you there, and…”

He sounds stupid. It’s totally stupid. Halfway through Stiles is already willing himself to just shut up already, and when he finally manages to stop his stupid, rambling mouth, he drops his head and scrubs his hand over it out of sheer frustration.

Something rustles up against his hip. Stiles bats it away, only to find out it’s not a leaf or a curious Nemeton root, but a shoe. And then he’s got a werewolf whuffing reassuringly into the crook of his neck, while another one leans up against his other side and rubs a cheek over his hair. He sucks in his breath, then lets it out in a long, long sigh.

“It bothered me,” he starts, and Peter almost pulls back so Stiles stops and wraps his arm around the man’s neck. He pulls Peter down again, so that he’s got his fingers twisted in Peter’s hair, and then presses his face briefly to the side of Peter’s throat. “Just—when you’re following me like that, it kind of reminds me that I don’t—I don’t really get to just have people at home. I don’t get to just go home when I’m done with work.”

Derek rumbles at him and Stiles humps up against the tree a few inches, trying to get some more space so he can fit two werewolves against his front. His foot hits a couple plates and he grimaces, but Derek just grunts and twists and somehow wedges his legs under Stiles, lifting Stiles’ feet clear of the food. He also grabs Stiles’ knee, but it’s not a grope, it’s just to steady them while he converts himself to a body-length pillow for Stiles.

“So we were overreacting, kind of,” he mutters into Stiles’ shoulder. “Sorry. Just felt like we didn’t have anything to do and that felt—it felt wrong.”

“He means,” Peter starts, sighing, and then he makes a throaty, surprised going to pleased noise as Stiles pulls his head up and kisses him.

It’s just kind of a reassuring thing, just trying to make it as clear as possible that Stiles really does want them around. And so’s the whole pulling Peter’s head around and baring his throat, and biting at that as he shivers and kneads at the ground by Stiles’ hip. They’re werewolves, they’ve got ways of doing things that aren’t just animal instinct, that have real meaning for them, the same way that Stiles has ways of doing things for himself and his dad. And if they’re going to remember to adjust for him, he’d better do the same for them.

So Stiles has good motives for it. And he’s even got good motives for biting Peter again instead of going back to hashing stuff out: Peter’s moaning and slumping over his lap, and the weight of the man is dragging Stiles down Derek and Stiles doesn’t want to just cannonball off Derek’s legs and right onto all the food that Talia gave him. He’s just trying to get Peter to get up and off him.

Except Peter just slumps over more, and ends up taking Stiles with him, so they both go sideways across a yelping, vaguely annoyed-sounding Derek, and Stiles kind of flails a little and the tree perks up and so that’s how they end up sprawled on the ground, with plates of food floating on twined-root pedestals all around them. Peter looks up at Stiles, a little wide-eyed, panting, and Stiles is surprised at his surprise, since okay, it’s unexpected but is it really that unexpected, with what Peter’s seen him do?

And then Peter hitches, with his hips under Stiles and his arms which are flopped out over their heads, and it’s weirdly truncated and something about getting pulled up short makes Peter shudder and moan, his head lolling back and oh, okay, right, so the roots kind of got Peter, too. They’re all wrapped around his wrists and forearms, stretching when his arm muscles bulge against them and then snaking tight again, and now that Stiles is thinking about it, he’s got awareness of more roots running up some kind of dark, softish tunnel with less soft things sticking through it and right. The tree’s reaching up Peter’s pants legs.

Stiles gets hold of it right about then, yanking the roots out. He hears cloth rip and he winces, and then Derek struggles up next to him and Peter, a root sliding off his shoulder, while a couple more seem to be both pinning him at the waist and flapping his shirt up off his abs. “Hey, um,” Derek grunts. “So—are you that mad—”

“What, no, I’m not mad, God,” Stiles stammers, trying to rein in the roots. “Fuck, just give me a—”

“Sorry, sorry, sorry,” Peter’s groaning. He rocks roughly under Stiles, then jerks his chin up when Stiles glances back at him. His cock’s getting hard, straining his pants and pushing into Stiles’ thigh, and he fights the roots off enough to get his knees up and spread.

Stiles had been halfway to getting off him, the better to see where, exactly, the roots were going, but Peter bumps and twists enough to make him lose his balance. He catches himself on Peter’s chest, pressing his palms at that, and Peter whines and tips his chin again, pulling it back so far that Stiles wonders how he’s not breaking his neck. Then a root tip feathers over the side of Peter’s throat and Stiles swears and reaches over to brush that away, and Peter whimpers, rolling his head over to shove his neck into Stiles’ grip.

They play like this, sure, but it’s not playing right now. The way Peter’s insisting on submitting, it’s urgent to the point of raw. He’s whimpering not like he’s teasing, or like he’s just riding a wave of pleasure, but like it hurts, like it hurts and he needs something and Stiles might not be an alpha werewolf but even he can get that, with the way Peter’s panting raggedly and jamming his throat at Stiles.

Stiles curls his fingers around that, rubbing his thumb along the tendon, and Peter calms down, but just for a second. Then he starts up with the whimpering, even louder and more desperate, and Stiles—he stops diving into the tree for now because he can’t afford the split consciousness. Just tells it to hold where it is, and then he climbs up to straddle Peter, leaning over and pushing the ball of his thumb as hard as he dares along Peter’s throat.

He looks over to Derek, hoping to get a clue about what this is, and finds the other man stretched out next to them. Less roots holding Derek down, but he’s doing a good enough job of that without them, flattened on his belly, digging grooves with his elbows into the dirt so that he can get lower. Derek’s got his neck crooked at Stiles too, though he’s not nearly as frantic about it as Peter.

“What did I do?” Stiles hisses at him. “What’s wrong?”

It does take a second for Derek to drag his eyes away from where Stiles is gripping Peter’s neck. “You told us to go,” he says, a low whine chasing around the edges of his voice. “We—we didn’t, I know, we didn’t listen, but…you’re okay with that? That we’re back now?”

“Oh—oh.” Stiles makes a face at himself for being so slow, and then he shakes his head hard. “God, no. No, Jesus, I don’t ever want you to really leave. God, are you kidding, I love you guys.”

Then he bends over and he bites Peter. Really bites, not just the little nips and nibbles they usually fool around with, but closing down till his jaw is burning. They’re not just their instincts but instincts are sometimes just the shortest, most direct, most meaningful way to go, and if he has to alpha to get through to Peter and Derek, he’ll do it.

Peter lets out a rough, shaking cry, wrenching at the roots wrapped over him. Stiles feels the tree burst into his head with surprise and pleased curiosity, and looks up and sees that some of the tendrils around Peter’s wrists have drawn blood. He swears and sends a sharp mental slap at the tree, warning it off—its sulky response more or less translates into can tell difference between food and guardian friend, okay—and then he scrabbles a bit as Peter shudders again. Has to take his hand off Peter and put it on the dirt to get his balance.

There’s a damp patch over Peter’s thigh and part of his groin, spreading up through the man’s pants into Stiles’ jeans. Peter shivers a last time, his head falling back as he purrs and tips his hips to press said damp spot into Stiles, totally ignoring the blood smearing down his arms. Stiles pushes absently at him, trying to get him to roll back, and then sees how Derek’s got his face almost in the dirt, slumping between his arms in relief. And maybe gets an idea or two, because he might be alpha-ing for good, practical reasons, but there’s no reason he can’t make it a little more fun.

He pulls Peter’s fly open. Peter blinks a few times, then purrs louder, arching up as Stiles pushes his hand into the man’s pants, fumbles around in the mess there, and then pulls that out. “Alpha,” he murmurs, nuzzling at the underside of Stiles’ chin as Stiles stretches over him. “Mmm, the love’s not required, you know, but...more than returned, Stiles, you should know.”

Stiles laughs, even as he’s wrapping his hand over Derek’s nape. His fingers slide a little, what with being filmed over with come and sweat, but Derek whiffs and then he’s up on his elbows and eagerly helping to get himself hauled over. “Oh, so you’re talking again?” Stiles says. “Primal wolf moment over?”

Derek gets at his mouth just then, going for the make-out as Stiles scruffs the back of his neck, getting him as scented up as any olfactory-oriented creature could want, and so Stiles misses Peter’s initial reaction. By the time Derek drops his head to Peter’s shoulder, neck arched up, hands kneading at Peter’s chest as Stiles worms his other hand down into Derek’s pants, Peter’s just giving Stiles a thoughtful look.

“Talking’s sometimes not the best way to get your point across,” Peter says. He stretches lazily, going along with Derek’s long moan as Stiles gets a good grip on Derek’s cock, and then settles back. “But we could stand to try it a little more often, I’ll admit.”

“Yeah, well…yeah,” Stiles says. He lays himself on top of them for a couple seconds, resting his head on Derek’s shoulder, teasing at Derek’s erection with his hand, and then he pushes off and nudges at Derek so he can get his mouth near the man’s neck. “Well, you’re not pack because I need bodyguards, you’re pack ‘cause I love you. But—okay, yeah, it’s not fair to leave you out of stuff like—like—”

“Cultist kidnappers?” Derek mutters.

Stiles makes a face. “Yeah, that crap. Because that…well, that is my life.”

Derek shrugs, twisting his head around so that he’s looking at Stiles. “So it’s our life too. We’re not pack just because we’re looking to beat up shit. We want to help you.”

“I know,” Stiles says, and his other hand strays over to stroke at the side of Derek’s jaw. “I know. I just…I gotta get used to it. I just—I haven’t had this many people to call in…never, honestly.”

Derek looks at him. Then moves his head. He’s aiming to lip at Stiles’ fingertips, Stiles thinks at first, and then Derek twists over, does something with his hips to send Stiles’ hand deep into his jeans, trapping his cock between that and his own leg. He puts his chin up and Stiles’ fingers slide off his jaw and down his throat and Stiles gets it. Laughs, bends over, gives Derek his bite too.

It takes a little more than that to get Derek off. Stiles can’t keep his teeth sunk into Derek’s neck forever, his jaw hinge is already aching like crazy, but he tries to at least suck at the same spot as he works his hand along Derek’s cock. Derek groans and jerks his hips, then pushes his face hard into Stiles’ chest as he comes. “Love you,” he grunts. “Alpha, Stiles, love you.”

And then he drops like a rock. Even Peter huffs at the impact, and when Stiles finally convinces the tree to pull back its roots, the first thing Peter does is elbow Derek’s arm out of his ribs.

The second thing is to reach up and touch a finger to the side of Stiles’ jaw, a soft, strangely fragile smile on his face. Peter’s not bone china or anything, but those moments when he completely drops his flair and distracting mannerisms and just looks plainly at somebody, those always feel like they’re bubbles floating on a needle tip.

“I know you don’t take us for granted,” he says quietly. “But I don’t know…we must not always seem like we take you as seriously. But we do, Stiles. We do.”

“I know you do,” Stiles says. He tugs at the arm that’s trapped under Derek, but…he’s not getting that back any time soon. So he shifts his weight and works up his other arm, and rubs some of the dirt off Peter’s hair with his hand. “I wouldn’t have been so annoyed at you if I thought you were just pranking me. Honestly, if that’d been the problem, that would’ve been a lot easier to deal with.”

Peter’s smile turns amused. He tilts his head into Stiles’ hand, and then tilts it back as Stiles stoops and grabs a kiss. Tries to stretch that into two, gets it to one and a half, and then he’s clearly feeling more secure since he’s pouting as Stiles levers himself up. “Well, Stiles, I don’t believe that’s a tree root in your jeans, and since we’re talking about what we can do for you…”

“Ha ha,” Stiles says, wiggling at the arm Derek’s suckered under himself again. Then he looks around, trying to see if any of the plates broke when the tree roots dropped them. “Um, your sister sent me out with all this food, she’s gonna be mad if we don’t eat it.”

“Talia wouldn’t be foolish enough to give you anything that’d spoil that quickly,” Peter says, sliding his hand down Stiles’ side. He frowns as Stiles twists away, only to grin as he uses that movement to tuck the fingers of his other hand into Stiles’ front jeans pocket. “Besides, there’s no reason why we can’t serve you while, ah, serving you.”

Stiles looks at him. Peter looks back, all innocent helpfulness, while his hands start getting rid of Stiles’ jeans.

“I am not sure I missed the self-serving innuendo,” Stiles finally says.

“Of course you did, Stiles, it’s the best excuse you have for dragging me out of sight,” Peter says, grinning.

Stiles hits his shoulder. And then, okay, lets Peter pull him back down. He does grope out for the nearest plate, and he even gets the wrapping off while Peter’s licking his jaw—Derek’s starting to turn his cuddling of Stiles’ arm into stripping off Stiles’ shirt, which doubles the distraction and the contortion difficulty levels—but it turns out to be chicken salad. Which Stiles can’t eat now that winter’s over, and Talia has to know that, and she’s Peter’s sister, after all, so odds that she planned the ratio of vegetarian to non-vegetarian so that…

Actually, Stiles decides, he doesn’t want to know. He shoves the plate away and lets his werewolves pull him in, and he tells the tree to just…make sure they’re not disturbed for a while. Like a couple hours. That should be good.

* * *

“Well, normally we require all freshmen to stay in the dorms,” the guide says. “We believe that dorm living is essential to the college experience.”

Stiles and his father look at her. “So, um,” Stiles finally says. “There’s this thing, it’s called reasonable accommodation laws—”

“Oh, no, of course we will work with you to handle any necessary religious or biological requirements,” the guide says, with a slightly strained smile. “We encourage diversity and we want to do our best to respect the needs of different lifestyles and entities. But we do believe that this can be done while still maintaining our dorm requirement, and we’ve been very successful with that.”

“My son’s going to have to commute back to the preserve at least twice a month anyway,” his father says. “I get what you’re saying, but if he’s doing that, he’s not even going to be here half the—”

“The security here sucks,” Derek says, walking in. “I was standing in the kitchen for ten minutes and nobody came by. I could’ve poisoned the whole meat freezer and gotten myself soft-serve ice cream without breaking a sweat.”

The guide swivels around and stares at him, her jaw slowly opening and closing. He stares back at her, frowning, like he doesn’t know why that would seem like suspicious behavior at all, and then he turns to Stiles.

“Also, I ran into this guy from the student were support group and he says that they’re required to do all their kills off-campus and they’re not allowed to keep any in their rooms,” Derek says. “So I guess we can’t hunt if we visit you?”

Stiles shakes his head, and pulls out his phone to make a note of it. “That sucks. Shasta U lets you reserve butchering slots in their cafeteria kitchens on full moon nights, that was a lot better.”

“Ah, well, I can’t speak to…I’m happy to try and put you in touch with somebody who knows more about our facility policies, but in the meantime, would you like to speak about our financial aid packages?” the guide says.

“Oh, yes, I would, actually,” Peter says, finally pulling himself out of the mass of literature they’d gotten when they’d first arrived. He holds up one glossy brochure. “So, I had to go to your website for the fine print, but it seems like your criteria wouldn’t take into account Stiles being a head of household. That doesn’t seem right, he should have the same standing as any other alpha.”

Stiles’ dad coughs sharply into his hand, then looks at Peter, who just smiles politely as the guide hastily excuses herself to go find somebody more knowledgeable. “You remember the Service is footing the bill, right?” he says once the door’s closed.

“Of course, John, but I see no reason why the federal government should be overcharged,” Peter says, turning his smile on Stiles’ unimpressed father. “As a taxpayer, I certainly would prefer that the Service’s funds be spent on our forests and parklands, rather than on an overpriced, underequipped for-profit entity.”

“Cora’s looking here too, we were already going to check it out.” Derek pauses. “Was going to look here. I don’t think that no-hunting policy is going to fly. She likes her midnight rabbit too much.”

“I wasn’t too thrilled with seeing their eco-magic set-up either. Man, that looked a lot better on their website,” Stiles says, dusting his hands off. “Honestly, probably not going here, let’s not spend too much time figuring out why. I’m not even sure I want to waste time hitting the tour.”

Derek and Peter both look over. They don’t say anything, or even really move, but Stiles’ father frowns for a second. Then he shrugs and pulls his phone out, and frowns even more at whatever it’s showing him.

“Well, up to you, son, but we did schedule for it,” his dad says. “But I can’t go, I think I have to jump on that stupid conference call after all. Sorry about that.”

“Oh.” Stiles glances at his betas, who are very studiously waiting for him to make a call, even though Derek is surreptitiously sharpening his claws and Stiles is pretty sure Peter is blind-texting somebody from his pocket. They’re not…totally ironed out, but they’re working on it, and he can’t help smiling at them. “No biggie, Dad, Derek and Peter can come. And I guess since we are here, and…well, hey, I think Allison was applying here too. We could go and test the dorms for ease of werewolf breaking and entering?”

Derek rolls his eyes, but under that he’s looking pretty pleased. He gives Stiles a hand off the couch, then slings his arm over Stiles’ shoulder. “Scott probably could use step-by-step instructions, if you don’t want him in jail every weekend,” he says.

Stiles hits him, then reaches back to take his coat from Peter, who’s following them out. “I’ll have you know that Scott’s a great burglar,” he says to Derek. “Excellent. Amazing. The were-cats could take tips, he’s so good.”

Derek looks dubious, but he at least tries and hides it in the side of his coat-collar. And then purrs when Stiles rewards him with a nice, hard, neck-scratch. “So you’re gonna come here just so you can keep him from getting caught, is that what you’re saying?”

“Asshole,” Stiles says, turning that scratch into a thwap.

“Besides, Derek, it’s probably simpler for Allison to sneak out and meet him, and she’s certainly better at keeping that under the radar,” Peter says. He’s looking at something on his phone, and when Stiles checks, it turns out to be architectural blueprints for one of the dorms. Of course. “Anyway, for completion’s sake, we should probably test it both ways, don’t you think?”

He smirks at Stiles, who…delays for all of a second, because he doesn’t want to make it too easy, and then he sighs and acknowledges that Peter knows him way too well. “Yeah, sure,” Stiles says. “Why not? I haven’t gotten escorted off-campus by cops because I did something wrong in like, three visits. I’m gonna lose my reputation at this point.”

“Well, now, we can’t have that, can we?” Peter says. He gets the door for Stiles and Derek, and then scoots up behind so that he gets a stealth nuzzle at the back of Stiles’ neck.

Stiles reaches back and grabs his neck, squeezing lightly. “Just no kills,” he says, eyeing Peter and then Derek. “I don’t want to get stuck here overnight.”

“Whatever alpha wants,” Peter says, smirking. Totally baiting for another scruff, and when he gets it, he angles himself in and rubs up against Stiles while he whines.

“Oh, my God, I said burglary, not public indecency,” Stiles snorts, pushing the man off. He shakes his head, then looks off towards the nearest dorm. “All right, then. Let’s do this.”

Notes:

So in this universe, I imagine there's a set of laws addressing the needs of supernatural creatures similar to Title IX and fair housing laws, etc. But like this world, there are discrepancies in how various institutions apply them, and some places are better at accommodating werewolves and other supernatural types than others.

And if you're wondering why the Hales wouldn't already be reccing werewolf-friendly colleges, given that Derek's already gone and Laura's still at one, Stiles is looking at a very specific subset, because he wants his degree to be focused on his work with the Nemeton, and Derek has an audio engineering degree and Laura is working on something sociology-ish, so what worked for them doesn't necessarily work for Stiles. And I don't get into it, but as the youngest kid with two older siblings with very strong personalities, Cora's main criteria would be to go somewhere her big brother and sister haven't.

I may go into this later at some point (especially having finished season 3A, and losing my will to continue watching due to how every character's gotten retconned into being a semi-amnesiac moron at some point now), but Talia and Peter have a better relationship in this series than in canon partly because Talia here gets to make mistakes and own them and learn from them and just generally be an actual human being and not the false saint she is in canon (also, ugh, so sick of every potentially strong female character being undercut--um, so if regular alphas always steal their power, then saint!Talia wasn't a true alpha so she's just as crappy, right, show? Same with Laura? And the only truly good alpha around is Scott? Ugh, no).

I try to create nuanced characters, especially when they're super-badass, because they get kind of cardboardy and unbelievable if they can always do everything and never seem to suffer negative consequences. So I wanted to get across here that just because Stiles and his father come off as really nonchalant about their crazy life, that doesn't mean it hasn't had emotional impact on them.

ETA: Missing scenes in Leaflets 35 and 36.

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 12 of Sustainable Management