Archive of Our Own

His Mark didn’t mean anything. A few days of crying, a week or so of testing and specialists, and then a full year of ‘perhaps something will change,’ and that was the final verdict. He, Stiles Stilinski, age sixteen, had no meaning to his life.

Most people would say he was being melodramatic. Lydia had in fact said a number of times, in a number of ways that included eye rolls and heavy sighs, that he was doing just that. Except then she’d gone into her Mathematical Analysis class with a sweet-smelling toss of her perfect hair and left Stiles standing in the hall because—

Well, because he had no meaning in life. No assigned classes to take. No purpose.

His Mark didn’t mean anything.

He wasn’t Other. He wasn’t Mind. He wasn’t Soul. The blue-white lines running beneath his skin were just that: lines. A collection of pretty patterns that lit up when the specialists poked and prodded, but not when he did anything specific. When Lydia worked on intense projects assigned in her college-level courses, dark fuchsia filigree punctuated with the odd geometric lines coursed under her fingertips and at her lips, brushed at her temples. Her Mark moved quietly, like running water in no particular hurry, as it knew where it was headed.

Stiles’ss moved liked someone was attacking it. The color was mostly the same, a pale blue-white that very occasionally shifted into a deep blue. But the lines themselves were chaos. They curved and arced, then turned hard corners, running a psychotic map along his body that led absolutely nowhere.

The halls were quiet. Everyone was in their designated classes, their courses already being tailored more specifically for their future paths in life. He knew he needed to head for Economics, where Coach would lecture them about the financial future of the country, or whatever, but he couldn’t make himself go.  What was the point?

So he moped his way out of school and into the parking lot. He slouched into his car and carelessly started the engine. Then he just sat there, staring at the steering wheel. Where was he going to go? School had just started and he was already ditching. His dad would be so pissed, and his dad didn’t need that. Not after the crap fest that the summer had been. Even Dad guilt couldn’t make him go back inside, though. This was the first year of school where all of his friends had their Marks fully present. Even though they weren’t always visible, they were all anybody talked about. They showed up more easily and randomly at this age, too. Everyone his age was a giddy, self-assured, rainbow of potential. And he was just a mess.

Looked like Jackson had been right about him being a weirdo all along. The only thing going right in Stiles’ss life right now was that the jerk hadn’t ever come back from his “vacation” in London. Win some, lose…like, everything. Stiles sighed and put the car in reverse. He’d go to school tomorrow. He’d done half the day, right?

“Right,” he muttered to himself as he pulled onto the road out of town. Driving always calmed him down. Just him, Roscoe, and the open road. Roscoe didn’t care that he had no future. Roscoe loved him anyway.  

He drove around town for a while, grabbing some curly fries because he wasn’t totally suicidal. Feeling a little twinge of guilt, he dropped by the house and left his dad a note that he was going to be at the library for a few hours. Chances were his dad would work late anyway. They hadn’t really…talked since the final verdict. They would. Probably. Soon.

The house was too empty, so he got back in the car and kept driving.

Stiles drove until Beacon Hills faded behind him, right out to the edge of the reserve. It was probably stupid to drive out this far by himself. The majority of the reserve was Other territory. Packs ran in the woods, and he knew from his Dad that a handful of Others lived in houses on the reserve, people who wanted some space from city life. Lots of Others lived in the city, or wherever, but to live out on the reserve you had to get permission from the Hales.

The whole area really belonged to them. The Hales had lived around Beacon Hills for…ever, he was pretty sure. He’d heard they’d owned most of the land for years, until they donated a lot to the city and created the reserve. They had a big house and private land out there somewhere, but Stiles had never seen it.  He’d never seen any of the Hales, at all.

Daylight had almost faded when he was most of the way to the reserve. By the time he hit solid forest the moon was coming up. Another mile in, he pulled off the road and parked Roscoe. A few feet into the woods there was a small game trail that led out to an overlook. It was a place he’d been coming a lot since this whole fiasco started. Stiles tromped gracelessly through the woods, making the quiet forest a riot of sound. Hopefully there wasn’t anything out here that wanted to eat him. Although realistically, it would just look at him and see how worthless he was and go find someone else to eat.

The forest gave way to a small outcropping of rock that dropped off abruptly. Beneath his feet the majority of the reserve spread out to the west. Stiles walked right up the edge of the cliff. The trees blended out into soft darkness below him.  The sky looked almost blue in comparison to that darkness, only the brightest stars making an appearance against the light of the moon tonight.

Stiles dropped onto the rock and let his legs dangle off the edge.

The moon made everything look alive, like it was waiting for something. Stiles held up his hands and looked at his bones in the white light. His Mark was quiet, probably because nothing he did activated it. Because it didn’t mean anything.

He didn’t mean anything.

Stiles sighed and flopped on his back. The rock hurt, but in kind of a good way. Like a hey-maybe-if-you-had-a-purpose-it-wouldn’t kind of way. Like if he was going to mope then the rocks would be there to help him out.  He held up his left hand. The moonlight was almost the same tone as his mark, now that he looked at it. Weird.

“What the hell are you doing out here?”

He almost jumped off the cliff. A big hand grabbed the back of his hoodie, hauling him away from the edge. Once he was safe, Stiles scrambled to his feet. The guy who had simultaneously almost scared him to death and saved him was tall, dark and handsome personified. Even his scowl didn’t really detract from some serious cheekbones, and an even more serious jawline. Stiles realized he was staring and snapped his mouth shut.

“What the hell are you doing out here? Aside from creeping up on innocent teenagers and causing them to leap off cliffs?” He shot back.

The guy crossed his arms, and Stiles definitely didn’t note how it made his upper arms stand out against his leather jacket. What? He was useless, not dead.

“I asked you first,” the guy said. His eyebrows managed to come together even more. Magically forming unibrow.

“Oh, sure, because that makes sense. Even though you were the one sneaking around in the woods at night.” Stiles didn’t have to answer to creepers.

“You’re the one on private property.”

Stiles frowned. “This isn’t private property. It’s the reserve. Anyone can come out here.”

The guy took a step toward him. He held up one finger. “First, anyone can come out here during the day.” He lifted another finger. “Second, that’s the reserve,” he pointed at the forest below, “this is private property. So you’re trespassing.”

Stiles leaned back a little. “Well…put up some signs or something.”

“There’s a sign by the road.”

“An invisible sign?”

The guy rolled his eyes. “Look, just go home, kid. You could hurt yourself up here in the dark.”

“Yeah, like when creepy strangers come out of nowhere and scare you off cliffs.”

Tall, dark and spooky took another step toward him and Stiles moved back. Moonlight lit up one side of the guy’s face, and Stiles figured it out. His eyes flashed electric blue, the color following the lines of his face down, sharp straight lines that accented his features. The color disappeared under the collar of his jacket and faded.

“You’re…” Stiles stopped, surprised.

The guy raised an eyebrow. Wow, he must practice that.

“You’re an Other.” Some facts clicked together in his mind. “A werewolf.” A tiny voice in the back of Stiles head told him to go get in the car. Like now, probably. Like right now.

Both eyebrows went up. “Smart. Observant. You Mind?”  

The air in his lungs turned to rock. “No.”

“Oh,” he said. He seemed surprised. “Soul?”

It was difficult to talk with his jaw clenched so tightly. “No.”

The werewolf shrugged, as if coming back to his original point. “Where’s your car?”

“I’m not telling you,” Stiles snapped.

“Fine,” the werewolf snapped back. He took a slow breath. “Don’t trip and kill yourself in the dark, then.”

“I walked out here in the dark, idiot,” Stiles said. And he could walk back. Right now. Because he was tired. Not because of pushy creeper werewolves invading his personal time and space to mope. Things he’d read on the internet about not turning your back on predators flashed through his mind. Nope, it would be fine. He was a guy, not an actual wolf.

“Don’t do it again,” the guy called after him. “Idiot.”

Stiles was an adult, so he chose to ignore the parting shot. A smart adult, which is why he also came up with a whole pile of insults on his drive home. Just in case.

All the lights were off when he pulled up to the house. Dad was probably still at work. Stiles gave Roscoe a thank you pat and went in the front door. Confirming his suspicions, the note he’d left his dad was still sitting on the kitchen counter. Stiles sighed and went up to his room. He tried to be hungry but just couldn’t muster the energy.

So instead, he handled his problems the usual way. By dropping everything on the ground and lying face down on his bed. It usually worked.

The smell of his comforter didn’t bring about any enlightenment. Mostly, he just felt like he should do laundry more. Stiles rolled on his back. He lifted his hands and focused hard, trying to make the Mark light up beneath his skin. Nothing happened. Most Marks only appeared when someone was actively tapping their power, the thing that made them unique and special, like Lydia solving problems or that wolf guy going all fangy. Specialists had something they could inject which lit the Mark up, too, a process he had become intimately familiar within the last year.

Stiles sighed and dropped his hands. He knew what the Mark looked like. He’d seen it a lot, really. Just not for any reason aside from specialist sessions. The Mark was just a little different on every part of his body. Most people, there were a handful of similar shapes and lines, some simple and graphic, others intricate and involved, that moved or lit up on different parts of their body. They were all different. Different shapes, different motifs, different colors. Some were brighter than others; some glowed dimly over more of the body. Stiles had noticed that the younger you were, the more recently your Mark had begun to show, the more often it lit. He’d only seen his dad’s a few times.

It was awesome. He’d gone by the precinct in middle school, late for him, when his dad had been in the middle of a really tough case. When he’d walked into the office to drop off the Pad Thai his dad had been standing in front of his big corkboard with his sleeves rolled to the elbow. His Mark ran from his wrists up past his shirtsleeves, giving the room a dull light. It wasn’t luminescent, but it glowed steadily, solidly. The lines were straight and simple, mostly defined by the thickness of the lines rather than their course. He remembered not being able to tell the Mark apart from his dad’s skin right away, the color was only a few shades darker than his skin.

Stiles had felt so proud of his dad in that moment. His dad was exactly who he was supposed to be. He had found his place.

Stiles just assumed that he’d eventually find his place too. That he’d make his dad feel proud that way.

There was a pain just below his ribs that suddenly expanded. It pushed against his ribs, his heart, his throat, choking him. No tears. He’d stopped crying a while ago. Truly, it was hard to really cry since his mom. Sure, it happened, but nothing ever felt quite as bad as…that. This had come close. Yet true to form, he’d run out of tears pretty fast. Now everything was just pain. Dull, constant pain, pushing against his edges.

Stiles pulls his pillow to his chest and curls his body around it.

Growing up is the worst.

Scratch that. Everything is the worst.

*

He really hadn’t been expecting Other.

Like, for reals. That…didn’t make any sense. He didn’t know anybody Other. He wasn’t related to anyone Other. It had to be a fluke.

Except it wasn’t. The specialist was standing right there, talking to his mom about more specialized tests and what to expect and making sure they figured out what kind of Other he might be sooner than later. All Scott could do was sit there and stare at the posters on the wall listing all the different kinds of Marks. Mind, Soul and Other were the largest classifiers. Each Mark then broke down into more specific classifications and specializations that usually took longer to determine.

“Okay, Scott?” The specialist and his mom were both looking at him.

“Uh…” Scott glanced at his mom. She was standing with her arms crossed, looking stressed but calm. Of course. His mom was a professional at being in stressful situations and not letting it freak her out. She nodded slightly.

“Yeah, okay.” He had no idea what the specialist had said, but it seemed good enough. The woman turned back to his mother and started handing her papers.

“This is a card for our Other specialist, Dr. Deaton. He’s wonderful. I’ll give him a call and set up an appointment for tomorrow, if that works for you. We don’t recommend waiting to get further specialized for Others.” She glanced at Scott. “Just in case.”

Just in case? Just in case what? Just in case he was some kind of crazy creature and he hurt his mom? Oh god, what if he hurt his mom? Scott dug his fingers into the edge of the table. This couldn’t be real. It couldn’t.

“Scott, honey?” His mom rested one hand on his arm. “Do you have any questions? Are you ready to go?”

All he could think about were what ifs. “Can’t we go to the specialist today?”

The doctor smiled gently. “I know this seems scary. But trust me, only very rarely do Others start to manifest their type immediately. Tomorrow will be plenty soon enough. But if you need anything, give us a call.”

“Come on baby, let’s go home.” Melissa slowly herded him out of the room. Everything felt kind of fake. It didn’t help that this wasn’t the hospital he was used to. They’d just moved, his mom had gotten an amazing job offer to transfer to Beacon Hills and she’d taken it. Scott was okay with it, really, he just…kind of wished that maybe his mom could have waited a year so he didn’t have to get his Mark, transfer schools and find out he was a freaking Other in the span of like a month.

Oh, and he heard that lacrosse tryouts were coming up at his new school.

They drove home in silence. Scott could sense his mom giving him worried looks every time they hit a red light but he kept his gaze firmly out the window. He didn’t really want to talk. He didn’t know what to say. It’s okay, mom, just hopefully I don’t turn into a crazed animal and eat you?

“Scott, it’s going to be okay,” Melissa said as they walked into the house. Boxes made up most of the furniture. They’d been eating take out for almost a week, and empty Chinese cartons sat on the counter. Usually his mom was pretty neat—a byproduct of nursing, she claimed—but after the move his Mark had started lighting up and that had been pretty much it for organizing and unpacking.

“I guess,” Scott replied. He knew he was being sullen. He was a teenager. He was allowed.

“Baby, we’ll get through this.” His mom touched his shoulder, stopping him in the hallway. “I know it seems like the end of the world, but it isn’t. No matter what, we’ll get through this.”

Scott tried to smile. “Yeah, I know.”

“Get some sleep, you have to be at Dr. Deaton’s at ten.”

“Okay.” Scott started up the unfamiliar stairs to his room.

“Scott?”

“Yeah, mom?”

“I love you.”

“Love you, too.”

Scott closed the door to his room and collapsed face down on the bed. Every single thing was stupid. Every. Single. Thing.

He stretched out his legs and kicked a box. DVDs spilled all over the floor, more decoration and color in that space than anywhere else in the room. Scott groaned. He’d pick it up tomorrow. It wasn’t like he didn’t have enough space to walk around him. His new room was big, definitely bigger than his last room. The bed sat in the center of the space, and he’d still have enough room for his desk, which had lived in the living room in their old townhouse. The bathroom was actually attached to his bedroom—freaking amazing—and he thought the doorway might be wide enough to put up his pull-up bar. No more putting it up and taking it down when his mom wasn’t home so he wasn’t in the way. This was a room big enough for his life.

Scott just wished his life was a little bit simpler.

*

“Werewolf,” Dr. Deaton said matter-of-factly.

Scott’s Mark glowed a deep gold under his skin. He couldn’t keep looking at his hands, at the way the solid, sharp lines moved gently against the small intricate patterns between them, like clouds in the night sky. There was light at the edges of his vision where the Mark ran over his cheekbones and jawline. Even his vision itself had gone a little strange. Gold light seemed to radiate dimly from everything, including Dr. Deaton’s face, calm and detached, as he pronounced Scott’s future.

“Werewolf?” Scott repeated. Even as the word left his mouth, it clicked. Werewolf. Werewolf. Moon on his skin and sharp teeth to defend, protect, keep his own safe.

Oh. Well.

“Yes.” Dr. Deaton turned and put down the light-up probe thingy he’d been using to activate Scott’s Mark. In normal tests he hadn’t seen this much of it, or had it be so bright. That was probably why Deaton was the expert. “A very powerful Beta, to be precise.”

Scott blinked. “Powerful?” It was hard to say. His mouth felt strange and a little malformed, like he had a retainer in.

Deaton smiled, and Scott wasn’t sure if the smile was supposed to be encouraging, or condescending, or if maybe the doctor had just remembered something funny someone had told him once. “Yes, Scott. I think that with the proper support and training, you will be a fantastic Beta one day.”

“Oh. Uh…thanks?” He really didn’t know what the proper thing to say in this situation was. But manners were manners.

“Would you like me to get your mother?”

“Yeah, okay.”

After Deaton stepped out to grab his mom from the waiting room, Scott picked up his shirt and jeans from the chair where he’d left them neatly folded. There was a mirror perpendicular to the chair, and he couldn’t help but take a peak while he pulled on his jeans.

The Mark ran up his shoulders and followed the line of his collarbone. The weight of the golden lines changed over different parts of his body. His ribs had a higher concentration of the tighter, swirling lines, like a cloud bank over the moon. Solid, straight lines ran diagonally over the planes of his chest to his back, where they angled sharply to follow the line of his spine. His upper back and shoulders were etched with slimmer lines slanting slightly downward and another mass of the swirling lines, smaller this time. The swirling lines went up the back of his neck and into his hairline. Scott stepped closer to the mirror, twisting back and forth to try and see from every angle. The swirling lines were a slightly lighter gold than the solid lines, but it all shifted and changed slowly.

Scott made himself look up, at his face.

His eyes were glowing.

Gold, so gold, brighter than the rest of his Mark. Scott gasped and flinched back a little. His forehead looked more pronounced, his sideburns came almost all the way down to his chin. He. Had. Fangs.

Whoaaaaaa.

The door opened and just like that, everything vanished. He looked totally normal. The only remnant of his weird, Mark self was a fading gold glow beneath his skin. Scott hastily pulled his shirt on.

Dr. Deaton leaned on the edge of his main table while his mom took a seat on the examination stool. Between the two of him, Scott was pretty sure they could medically run the world. He also felt weirdly intimidated.  

“So…” his mom started, “a werewolf, huh?”

“I guess,” Scott said with a small smile.

“Well.” Melissa picked up his chart and flipped through the pages. “At least you aren’t something lame.”

Scott doesn’t stop laughing until they get back home.

*

Laura Hale scares the holy crap out of him.

It’s only been a few weeks since Deaton drove him over to the Hale family house—which, wow—and since then Laura has been dragging him all over the woods and yelling at him to—

“Keep up!” She came out of the woods next to him, moving flawlessly through the dense California undergrowth.

Scott didn’t keep up. He flinched violently to the side, into a tree and then fell—very ungracefully—through a whole big lot of that California undergrowth. Good thing he had really awesome healing powers because he’s pretty sure he would look like a pack of crazed cats attacked him otherwise. As it was, everything still stung.

“Crap crap crap crap,” Scott muttered to himself while trying to stand upright. He’s pretty sure he rolled down a slope. Before the month is out, he’s going to have every part of the woods on the Hale property mapped out. With his body. Rolling around.

“She does it on purpose,” a male voice said from above him.

Scott flinched again. “I think you do, too.”

Derek Hale walked down the slope with only slightly less grace than his sister. “You’ll learn to hear us coming.”

“Yeah, sure. How is this helping me learn, again?” Scott finally managed to get up to his feet and brush all the twigs off. The ones he can see, anyway. There were twigs everywhere in his life now. It was like sand at the beach.

“You need to learn to trust your instincts,” Laura said. She stood a little behind Derek. Her dark hair caught the slivers of moonlight. “The wolf knows how to take care of you. You have to learn to listen to it.”

“I don’t know how this is supposed to make me do that.” Maybe he was feeling a little resentful, okay. But this was the third night they’d gone on the Laura-Hale-fun-run-of-death and Scott was tired, sore, and more than a little cranky.

Deaton had told him he needed to stay with the Hales through his first full moon. That had gone over so well with his mom. She’d shut it down for two days before having a long talk on the phone with someone—not Deaton?— she wouldn’t share with him. After that, he’d packed a bag and gone out to the Hale house for “wolf training” or whatever. It was not exactly his favorite plan. It was not really a plan he liked. He missed his mom, even though they talked a couple times a day through text or the phone.

School was temporarily out, apparently. Scott knew that the year after you got your Mark you were supposed to start specialized classes with people who had the same Mark. For Scott, that apparently meant being kidnapped by Hales and not going to school at all for a whole month.

“It’s a number of things.” Laura stalked past her brother and stopped a foot away from Scott. She cocked her hip and put her hands on her hips. Scott had begun to think of this as “Laura Lecture Pose #1.”

“First, you need to start embracing your abilities fully. Speed, strength, sight, smell, the sooner you get used to expanding your normal ideas of what those mean, the better. Not trying to freak you out, but things are just going to be harder the closer it gets to the full moon.”

Scott noticed Derek looking around the woods. Man, Derek probably heard this speech more than he did.

“Second, the best way to do that is through instinct. The best way to motivate your instincts to take over is through pushing yourself. Finally,” Laura shifted her weight from one foot to the other. “if you learn what it’s like to lose control, here, with us, in a safe space before the moon, it won’t be as terrifying when it happens on the full moon.”

The Hales have danced around this topic a little. Scott’s head snapped up. “When?”

Derek turned back to the conversation, a slightly sad smile on his face. “Yeah, Scott. When.”

That shuts him up. Laura wraps her nightly lesson, or possibly takes pity on him, and they troop back to the house. The house always overwhelms him a little bit. It looks like something straight out of Gone With the Wind, he thinks, except not all ruined by the Civil War. The land closest to the house has been cleared in every direction, except for a few great big trees that looked too important to cut down. There was always light coming from the house. Not every single light in the house, but always something to “find your way home by,” as Laura had put it.

Scott wasn’t sure about the Hales just yet, but he definitely liked their house.

They went in the back door. There was a small hallway for hats and shoes and such. It didn’t get a whole lot of use on the coats end. Except leather. Scott had noticed a definite werewolf affinity for leather jackets. Laura alone seemed to have a few in every color.

There were a few other pairs of shoes next to the door. Scott knew the heavy combat boots belong to Boyd, and the heavy-yet-stylish boots belonged to Erica. Both of them had already been here when Scott arrived, and were apparently past the running around like psychos in the dark part of the training. The next phase of training seemed more like what he was expecting. Classes, calmer training sessions with Laura and Derek, and more interactions with Talia Hale. Scott was looking forward to that part.

He followed Laura and Derek into the kitchen. The absolute best part of this house was that there was always, always, always food. Werewolves ate a lot. And teenagers ate a lot. Combined, that could have put any household into debt just trying to make enough hamburgers and sides for a few dinners. But the Hale house was magic. The fridge always had enough in it to make some kind of a meal—steak, ground beef, chicken wings, pork chops, salad stuff, whatever. There was a whole separate fridge with beverages and desserts. And the pantry. Scott was in love with the pantry. It was walk-in closet sized, filled with every snack imaginable.

Scott visited the pantry multiple times a day.

Laura snagged an apple and a box of pretzels from the pantry. “I’m going to bed, kids. You’re getting better, Scott.” Before Scott could react to the compliment, she was gone. That was how Laura did it.

“She’s right,” Derek said, standing in front of the fridge.

Scott slid onto one of the bar stools at the huge kitchen island. The Hale kitchen ran in the tradition of brown, speckled granite and warm hardwood.  Six or seven people could eat easily at the island, with another seven or eight seats at the big, picnic-style kitchen table.  There was a whole separate dining room somewhere, too. He hadn’t seen it, and Laura said it was only for formal events. Roughly half the rooms in the house seemed to be for formal events only. These rooms, toward the front of the house, had high ceilings and big windows, lovely, stiff furniture that was nice to look at and terrible to sit on. It was in one of those rooms that he had first met Talia Hale.

Since then, Scott had gotten to know the more livable rooms in the house. There was a sprawling living room with plush couches and chairs designed for lots of people and cuddling. It would seem that werewolves were really into cuddling. Scott thought it was interesting to see the divide. Clearly, the Hales, being a respectable family that had helped found and support Beacon Hills for generations, made sure to keep up appearances for anyone who might come to the house for professional reasons. Yet the actual Hale family was close and cuddly, and valued comfort and warm colors above being respectable. It was a little like him and his mom, just with eight jillion more people.

“Really?” Scott asked. Derek didn’t really hand out compliments at all. He seemed to mostly follow Laura and Scott through the woods, appearing only when Scott had fallen down or tripped on something.

Derek nodded. He finally closed the fridge. Without being asked, he pulled down two bowls and started heating up some of the stew they’d had for dinner last night. “Yeah. You’re a fast learner. It took Erica much longer to even keep up a bit.” Derek paused in the middle of pulling silverware out of a drawer. “Don’t tell her I said that.”

Scott laughed. Erica scared him a little bit, too. He always felt like she wanted him to be looking at her boobs, but that she might also claw his eyes out if he did. To be safe, Scott spent a lot of time glancing over her shoulder. That always made her laugh. Scott liked when she laughed, it made her look the sixteen years old that she actually was. It also made Boyd smile.

“Was it hard for you?” Scott asked.

“I guess.” Derek shrugged. “I was more scared I’d be something else, though.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.” Derek pulled the bowls out of the microwave and set one down in front of Scott. “I couldn’t imagine being something besides a wolf. Especially after Laura’s Mark was Other. Then Cora…”

“Cora?” Scott lifted his head. He’d heard passing mentions of Cora, but no one would directly address her.

Derek stared at his stew. “Cora is my younger sister. She’s a year older than you.”

“Oh.” Scott waited. After a few minutes of Derek’s hunched shoulders and continued eye contact with his stew, Scott let it go. “Are there any other people coming to live at the house?”

“Not that I know of.” Derek sat up a little straighter.

“Do you guys take in everyone with an Other Mark who types as a werewolf?” It didn’t really add up to Scott that they would do that. Maybe there just weren’t that many werewolves in Beacon Hills.

“No,” Derek said. “Just people who need it.”

“Wait, what?”

Derek put his bowl in the dishwasher and held his hand out for Scott’s.  “People who need it. I guess. Or…wolves who we might want to join the pack when they get older.”

Scott blinked. Pack. He hadn’t thought it out that far at all. A pack…weird. He liked the Hales, though. They seemed like a good pack.

“But you don’t have to worry about that for two years,” Derek continued. “For now, you just have to focus on learning and controlling your abilities.”

“And Boyd and Erica? Do you want them in your pack too?”

Derek tilted his head. “It’s complicated. You’ll have to ask them. Besides, I don’t decide who’s in the pack. I’m not the Alpha.”

“Right.” Scott thought of Talia Hale with her gentle grace and quiet authority. He strongly suspected she was the one who had called his mom. When they’d arrived at the house, she’d been there to greet them, wearing a long white dress and a soft sweater. Scott didn’t see her much, but so far he hadn’t seen her wearing shoes. Talia Hale looked like the kind of woman Scott imagined had been the inspiration for wise women and sages in fantasy novels and mythological history. Just more intimidating.

“Hey, where are you going?” Scott asked. Derek had picked up his jacket off a chair and was pulling it back on.

“Just out to the preserve. There’s this dumb kid who keeps driving up there and wandering around near the cliffs. I’m worried he’s going to slip and fall, so I’m going to go make sure he hasn’t died or broken a leg or something.” Derek rolled his eyes as he said it, but Scott figured Derek didn’t do anything he didn’t feel was important.

“Can I go with you?”

Derek looked at him for a moment. “Sure, why not.”

*

School was hell. His teachers don’t know what to do with him. He had study hall four times a day, because he wasn’t taking any specializing classes. The few classes he did take were awkward in the extreme. His teachers didn’t call on him, didn’t include him in group discussions, barely looked at him—except for Coach, Coach was Coach until the end of time. That much was nice.

It didn’t really balance out, though. Stiles barely saw his friends. Lydia had quickly moved into specialist classes only—even for a Mind, she was totally off the charts, of course—and Danny was only in Econ with him. Jackson was in that class, too, so that meant no mild Danny time unless Stiles felt like getting his throat ripped out by the newly Marked Other. Of course Jackson would get to be something cool like Other. Everything was unfair.

When he did see Lydia, she didn’t seem concerned. Rather than lamenting his pathetic uselessness, like a good best (supposedly) friend, she just sipped her cappuccino and flipped her perfect strawberry blond hair over one shoulder.

“Well, just stop whining and do something about it,” she said. It was a variation on most of Lydia’s “advice.”

“I told you, it’s not that easy! You know it’s not! Aren’t you supposed to be smart?” Stiles snapped. He was sick of hearing that this was somehow his fault. He didn’t choose this.

Lydia sighed. “I know it’s not your fault, Stiles. That’s not what I’m saying.”

“Oh, awesome. So what are you saying?” He couldn’t keep the bitter tone out of his voice.

“Do things, Stiles. Try a whole lot of different things out. Experiment, run trials, whatever you want to call it.”

“Why?” Stiles asked.

Lydia sighed again, and put her coffee down. She faced him head-on, mouth turned down in a way that meant pay attention. “Stiles. You have a Mark. Marks mean something. Marks react to the thing that is meant for you, that defines and shapes you.” She leaned back, took a sip of her coffee, and looked as though he was the least interesting person in the world. “So go find out what that means.”

It’s a full minute before Stiles closes his mouth. So obvious. His depression-soaked brain hadn’t been able to see a solution, or hope. Not after all the tests and the time and the defeat. But Lydia had turned it around in a few days. Or faster, they hadn’t really seen each other lately.

Lydia drinks her coffee in silence while his mind follows the prompt. A Mark always meant something. It only existed to mean something. Marks reacted to whatever inspired them, lit up like Christmas. His only lit up in tests and with specialists, so that meant…

He hadn’t found it.

But it was out there.

Trial and error time.

“I have to go to the library,” Stiles said, standing up.

Lydia rolled her eyes. “Or you could try the internet, nerd.”

“You know, Lyds, nerd culture is mainstream now. So when you use the term ‘nerd’ in a derogatory manner, all you’re doing is confirming that you’re the one outside the zeitgeist.”

“I’m cutting you off from Netflix.”

As it turns out, she doesn’t have to. Stiles fell deep into Mark research. His excessive study hall time actually became pretty awesome. The Beacon Hills library had a pretty good selection of books on Mark history, from the origins and discovery to modern research. Everything he learned confirmed Lydia’s hint. When people had first begun to notice that the Marks reacted differently to specific people and actions, they’d started to categorize them. It had taken decades of research and study before the main categories had even been determined. After that, they’d just kept breaking things down, trying to figure out the best ways of learning and development for different types, and how to maximize potential.

It was fascinating. Stiles had never given a lot of thought to the history of Marks. They were just a thing that happened when you turned sixteen that determined the rest of your life, in a way. They were an answer to the age old question “what am I supposed to do with my life?” Unfortunately for Stiles, the answer to his question was still ???!?!?!?

After a few days (and really late nights) of googling everything he could and checking out stacks of books from the library, he realized something. The suffocating fear that had lived in his chest for the last year was fading. There was still something there, but it was more like fuzzy apprehension instead of total destructive terror. Yeah, his Mark was a mystery. But it meant something. He meant something.

It was just going to take a little work to figure out what it was.

Stiles lifted his head to see his computer glowing 11:43 at him. Crap, he really had  to go to bed. His dad had come home and checked in a few hours ago, then dropped into bed. It had been a rough couple of months. Stiles knew his dad was working more to compensate for not being able to help. When they talked, it was sort of awkward. His dad would never walk away if Stiles needed to talk, but he also had a good sense of when Stiles just didn’t want to talk anymore. Currently, he was pretty sure his dad didn’t care what he was doing, except that Stiles actually seemed excited about it. When he had something to tell, he’d talk to his dad. No reason to jump the gun.

He looked back down at the book on the origins of Other categorization. It was fascinating, it really was, but every time he tried to read nothing stuck in his brain. He just keep looking at the same sentence over and over. Right, time to take a break. Or go to bed. Bed would be the smart, slightly adult thing to do. So naturally he pulled on a zip-up hoodie and sneakers and grabbed his car keys.

Driving late at night was one of Stiles’s current favorite activities. There was almost no traffic, less the further out of town he went, and everything was quiet. He drove without thinking about his direction, and wasn’t surprised to find himself approaching the pull-off for the preserve. Jerky wolf guy aside, it was still one of his favorite spots in Beacon Hills. It wasn’t like anyone was going to arrest him for trespassing. His dad wouldn’t let something that stupid go on his record, and would definitely find a better punishment for Stiles’s stupidity.

He pulled off the road and parked Roscoe in their usual spot. It was dark, much darker than it usually was when he came out here. Stiles stood at the edge of the forest for a minute, wondering if he should just go home. There wasn’t a lot of dangerous wildlife in these woods as far as he knew—not without going further into the reserve—but there were a lot of other ways he could hurt himself out there in the dark. If he fell or sprained an ankle he wouldn’t be able to do anything until someone came and got him.

He got out his phone and flipped on the flashlight app. That would work. And he had a cell phone, he wasn’t stupid. The path was pretty clear anyway. Between him, other people and wild animals, there wasn’t too much undergrowth on the tiny path itself. There was also not much of a moon tonight. The little flashlight was the best light he had.

It only took a few minutes to reach the overlook. Stiles settled a little further from his usual spot at the edge of the cliff. Not because that asshole had almost scared him into jumping off it last time. Just because. It was dark. He turned the flashlight app off and waited for his eyes to adjust. Without the moon, he couldn’t pick out individual trees and landmarks in the valley below. Just a great darkness. Last time he was struck by how much that emptiness reminded him of the way he felt. It didn’t really feel that way now. Still big and scary, but maybe not as dark.

Stiles could beat it. To prove his point, he picked up a small rock and threw it off the edge of the cliff. Take that, vast emptiness.

“Seriously?”

This was exactly why he hadn’t sat close to the cliff. Stiles hoped the darkness covered up how high he jumped. Then he remembered, werewolves. Werewolves with superior vision, smelling, speed, strength and endurance. So his spaziness wasn’t safe even in darkness.

“Dude, you have to announce yourself. If I fall, it’s on you,” Stiles snapped, trying to make out the stupid broody werewolf in the dark. Every freaking time. How did he know? Did he just wander around the woods to see if he could scare innocent teenagers just trying to find themselves?

There he was. Stupid jawline and stupid shoulders in the stupid nighttime making it hard to see him and his stupid…friend?

“So what, you needed back-up this time? Couldn’t scare me on your own?” Stiles really wished they’d say something else. Or come out of the darkest part of the shadows. Or just not be the biggest creepers in the world.

“I told you not to come out here anymore,” the jerk wolf said. He stepped closer so Stiles could see the blue glow in his eyes.

“Ooooooh, scary.” Stiles rolled his eyes. “Do you just not have anything better to do with your evenings?”

“Actually, patrolling the property is part of my evening. Making sure dumb teenagers don’t get themselves hurt.”

Stiles sighed. “Dude, the closest I’ve ever come to getting hurt is when you starting sneaking around like a creeper.” He shot a glance at the creeper wolf’s friend, but he was still standing too far away. Stiles’s weak human eyes couldn’t make out his features.

“You’re still trespassing,” the taller guy said.

“You’re still incredibly boring.” Stiles brushed his pants off. “But since you’ve effectively ruined my nice solitude for the evening, I think I’ll be going home.”

He didn’t want to get anywhere near Wolfson McCranky. Stiles took a step back to avoid him and—stepped right into a hole. Between one thought and the next he was falling, mind filled with a crystal image of the drop behind him. His dad would be so mad. His dad would be so sad—fuck—

He hadn’t even figured it out.

Damn.

Stiles tried to twist, to catch himself, knowing there was no freaking way he was going to be fast enough and also realizing that he had been sitting much closer to the edge than he really realized. This was going to hurt.

The hurt, weirdly, started in his wrist. It felt like someone crushing the bones in his wrist together and then his body whipped forward and collided with another solid being. They kept falling forward, colliding knees and shoulders, bodies jerking when they both hit the ground. Stiles tried to get purchase on something, a hard task when one of his wrists was still solidly locked in a vice grip. The fingers of his right hand ended up caught in the soft material of a t-shirt while he tried to get his legs untangled from another set of legs. He wasn’t dead. His wrist might be seriously sprained, but he wasn’t dead.

His heart was slamming and his knees hurt from slamming into his rescuer’s and the ground. Even with the pain, he felt good. Really good. Too good to just be adrenaline. Stiles used his t-shirt leverage to push himself up and find—

The other werewolf. The shadowy one. Turns out, the shadows were hiding a really cute face with a sweet, if somewhat off-center jawline. And big, bright gold eyes. Wait—red eyes. Wait—

That’s all he had time to absorb before everything turned to light.

*

The moon was suddenly among them. Scott’s body, his blood, was on fire, too full of light and long-limbed boy. The boy—the guy? they seem the same age—is taking up too much space in his lungs, and Scott doesn’t know whether or not to push him away or never let him go. There’s light coming from every part of him, making up his whole being, and another heartbeat later it sinks into Scott’s skin and—

His Mark goes crazy.

Dimly, he could hear Derek yelling something, feel him touching his arm, his shoulder, but it didn’t register as real. His Mark was moving like a live thing, changing shape and size, and most strangely, color, in large sudden flashes of gold—white—red—gold again. Derek had his hands under Scott’s shoulders, trying to separate him from the glowing boy. Scott tried to shake him off. He didn’t want to be separated from this weird, talkative, moonlit boy. He can’t be. The boy is important.

“Scott!” Derek yelled. The bigger werewolf finally managed to pull them apart. He held Scott by his upper arm and the other boy by the back of his neck. The light of Scott’s Mark went out immediately. The gold and red faded, leaving only the white light of the other boy. Scott squinted at it, looking for a source. It was coming up from his very skin, there were no distinguishable lines or logic in it. Derek held the boy in place, staring.

Scott reached for him. He wanted to touch that light again. It made his heart feel tight and the world feel too real. In a good way? In a good way.

His fingers touched soft skin, underlined by a sharp cheekbone, and the light went out.

Except in the wide, totally stunned, totally beautiful eyes looking directly at him. They burned white, and then briefly blue, before settling into an unexpected deep gold. Scott suddenly and distinctly understood the exact color of amber. Those eyes and the slight smell of honey and forest.

Derek let go of both of them and stepped back. “What the hell is happening.”

The boy with the moon trapped beneath his pale skin and fingers like winter branches leaned away from him. Don’t go, the wolf inside Scott’s head whispered. The wolf and something beneath it, something he’d never felt before. After a moment the feeling faded. Scott shook his head. He’d ask Derek later, it couldn’t be important. Just new stuff. He really didn’t understand this werewolf thing. Or actually anything about this moment.

“So…this isn’t like in the norm for you guys?” The boy asked.

Derek looked from one teenager to another. “Did anything about that look normal?”

The boy gave a little laugh that sounded like a cry for help. Scott wanted to catch the sound and heal whatever caused it, pull the pain from the boy’s body and heart. He blinked. What was happening to him?

“Okay, glad it wasn’t just me.” Those bright-dark eyes flickered to Scott and away, like he wasn’t sure how to deal with him, either. For some reason, that hurt his feelings.

“Scott, are you okay?” Derek asked.

Scott scrambled—with the utmost grace, of course—to his feet and stood next to Derek. “Yeah, I think so.”

Before he could offer a hand, the boy is on his feet. He’s a little taller than Scott, something he couldn’t tell with their limbs all tangled up. Skinnier, too, but the potential to grow is all along his shoulders and waist, down to his slightly too-large hands.

“Okay, so this has been especially weird.” He turns to go, and that something growls deep in Scott’s mind.

Luckily for him, Derek is on it. “No, you aren’t going anywhere. I don’t know what that was, but you’re coming back to the house with us and we’re going to figure this out.”

“What? No way. My dad is home, I’m not about to scare him like that. Plus, I don’t know you, so I think I’ll skip following you into the woods to your ‘house.’”

Derek’s eyebrows come together. “Call your dad, then.”

“What part of ‘no’ don’t you understand?” He stepped away.

Scott could see Derek’s jaw clenching. After a few weeks with Derek, he’d realized as nice as the guy could be, he wasn’t really like that with strangers. When Derek started to step forward, Scott moved in front of him.

“Hey,” he said with a smile.

“Hey,” the boy said back. He looked like he maybe wanted to talk to Scott even less than he wanted to talk to Derek.

“I’m Scott.”

“Stiles…”

“Stiles?”

“Yeah, it’s a nickname.” The response comes on autopilot, clearly familiar. As silly as the exchange may have seemed, the normalcy had clearly calmed everyone.

“Cool. Well, this is Derek,” Scott gestured over his shoulder to the still-frowning werewolf. “He’s actually pretty nice.”

“Yeah, sure.” Stiles rolled his eyes.

Derek stepped forward and put a hand on Scott’s shoulder. “Stiles. My house is less than a mile from here. We can all drive your car, so you can leave whenever you want. Call your dad, have him meet us.”

Stiles frowned. “I just—”

“My mom is going to want to talk to you. We need to make sure you’re both okay.” Derek had switched tones. Scott was reminded of shows where people talked to pissed off bears and tigers.

Stiles looked at them both for almost a full minute. Their eyes met one more time. Scott opened his mouth to say something just as Stiles started to nod.

“We take my car.”

Derek nodded.

“I call my dad on the way.”

“Of course,” Derek said, stepping toward the path back to the road.

“And I can leave to go home whenever I want,” Stiles said.

Derek rolled his eyes. “We’re not kidnappers.”

“Yeah, sure. You give off a real normal, totally trustworthy vibe.” Stiles stuffed his hands in his hoodie pockets. Notably, he didn’t give either of them the car keys or tell them exactly what direction his car was in. That would not really have occurred to Scott, although it made sense.

The car, they eventually discovered, was a cool, beat-up blue Jeep that fit, somehow. Stiles drove while Derek sat in the front and pointed the way back to the Hale house. Scott sat behind them, knees pressed against the thin leather and hands itching to touch the lines of Stiles’s neck. The whole car smelled of metal and what he could only assume was Stiles. Cars were going to be awkward for him for a while, he could tell. This month was the worst.

There was a small squeaking sound. Scott looked down, where his claws had pierced the seat. They were stuck. He pulled his hand up, only making it worse. Derek didn’t turn around, so Scott just put his hand gently on top of the new holes.

“You…” Scott started. “seem pretty okay with all this.”

Stiles glanced over his shoulder. “Dude, this isn’t even the weirdest part of my month.”

*

Oooooooookay okay okay okay okay.

Stiles didn’t really think that Derek-and-Scott, who had become one weird experience/person in his head, were going to murder him. He didn’t. Except there was this voice that sounded exactly like his dad reciting everything that could happen next and the various ways Stiles could prevent it.

Crash the car, run like hell, stab them with the keys, use the mace in his glove box, punch Derek in the neck, elbow Scott in the face, on and on and on.

It helps keep him from thinking about his skin lighting up like New Year’s Eve. From over-analyzing the reaction of his Mark, his totally useless, up to now dormant Mark, to the big brown eyes and too-strong hands of the boy sitting in the seat behind him.  

But hey, at least his mouth was still working. It would go on saying cool or maybe stupid things without consulting his brain so the werewolves didn’t know he was freaking out.

It was definitely the weirdest part of his month.

Nope, it got weirder.

The final turn led up a long dirt driveway lined with thick forest. They drove for about thirty seconds and then the forest cleared all at once. This was some golden-age Hollywood nonsense right here. A half-moon sat on the line of the great roof and gave the house its own personal light. That light came out of the downstairs windows, the front door, and all along the wrap-around porch. Roscoe’s tires crunched over the gravel spread before the house as an impromptu parking area. Stiles didn’t see any cars parked out front, probably because of the like five car standalone garage off to the left.

So this was the Hale house.

“Whoa…” Stiles said. He didn’t mean to, it was an involuntary reaction to suddenly being in a Stephanie Meyer novel. Maybe they weren’t werewolves at all. He eyed Derek casually, while he parked the car. No residual fanginess. Not that he’d really know the difference between werewolf fang and vampire fang. Add it to the research list.

They got out of the car and headed for the house. People were apparently still awake in the massive house. Scott came up next to him going up the porch steps. This porch was the size of their living room.

“Are you okay?” Scott looked genuinely concerned. Not secretly concerned for himself, like Stiles suspected of Derek.

“I guess?” It felt wrong to BS Scott. “I don’t know. This all feels…fake.”

“Yeah, I know what you mean.” Scott had a really nice smile. Like, really, really nice.

“Do you live here?” Stiles followed Derek in the unlocked front door.

“No. Well, kind of. I’m staying right now, but just for a while. I live in town with my mom.”

The front hall was exactly what Stiles had expected. Gigantic, timeless looking, and somehow still tasteful.

Sort of at odds with the really pissed looking dark-haired girl storming down the stairs at them. She looked a few years older than Derek, barefoot and sleep-shirt clad, and murdery.

“Where have you been? Mom is going to—” She came up short, looking at Stiles. “Who are you?”

“I’m—”

Derek stepped in front of him. Stiles might have appreciated the gesture if he didn’t believe Derek did it because he thought Stiles was stupid, not because he was trying to protect him from other crazy dark-haired beautiful people.

“I need to talk to mom,” Derek said.

The girl kept looking at Stiles, then at Derek. “She’s in the living room.”

Derek glanced at the two boys. “Stay here, call your dad. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

Then they were alone. Stiles pulled out his cell phone. “Do you, um, mind?”

Scott shook his head. “If it was my mom, she’d kill me for even being out.”

“Yeah I’ll probably be dead by morning.”

Scott laughed. Stiles dialed his dad and waited for the inevitable. It went about as well as he thought, ending with his dad yelling “Stay put!” and hanging up on him. At least it was a sort of long drive out to the Hale’s property. Hopefully his dad would have calmed down a little by the time he got here. He could have dreams.

Scott was standing by the stairs, pretending not to listen to his dad yelling. “Everything okay?”

“Terrific.” Stiles shoved his phone back into his pocket. “I should have stayed home. My dad really doesn’t need this.”

“I’m sorry.”

Stiles was pretty sure he meant it. He sat on the stairs. The carpet of the stair runner was more plush than his comforter. Scott shuffled around on the hardwood for a few seconds. It seemed like some kind of agonizing decision for him to sit next to Stiles, and when he did, he moved a little too fast and ended up on the stair just above. Stiles stared at his knee and pretended he didn’t notice how weirdly warm Scott was. He wanted to touch him but he was scared. Scared about turning into a strobe light again. Scared because he didn’t know what any of this meant. Scared because he wanted to touch Scott and he didn’t know why.

Luckily, Derek was back to be terrible.

He looked a little freaked out, but no less grumpy.

“Come on,” he grouched.

“My dad is coming,” Stiles said.

“Good.”

Derek led them back through the house, passing room after room. The house got less formal the further they went. More of Stiles’s casual glimpses caught comfortable chairs and pillows, instead of glass tables and satin curtains. At the very back of the house there was a solid wood door with a symbol carved into the grain. Stiles didn’t know what it was off the top of his head, although he’d guess something gaelic, Irish. It was swirly like that.

The werewolf knocked softly and opened the door. Then he just stepped aside.

“You aren’t coming?” Scott asked. The panic in his voice freaked Stiles out almost more than anything else that had happened. Who was in the room? The werewolf godfather?

“No.” Derek nodded his head at the door. “But you should.”

“Okay,” Stiles said, walking through the door. Acting as scared as he felt was never really his thing.

Scott muttered “Crap” quietly enough that Stiles didn’t really hear it and followed him into the lion—wolf’s den.

*

“True Alpha.” Talia Hale spoke Scott’s future gently, with utter conviction.

“And a Catalyst.” Her tone for Stiles was more amused, kind and a little surprised.

“What?” They, on the other hand, both sounded like idiots.

Good thing his dad was there to glare him into silence. Scott quieted too. The parent glare worked on everyone.

“Ms. Hale,” his dad said, not looking away from the teenagers, “could you perhaps please explain a little more exactly what you mean?”

“Talia, please, Sheriff.” The Hale Alpha rested her hands on the heavy wood desk. Stiles was getting to a point where he thought maybe the Hales had created the clear space outside the house by making everything in the house out of the trees.

“What’s a True Alpha?” Scott asked. He looked really freaked out. Stiles almost put his hand on Scott’s knee, but then remembered that his dad could see him.

Talia smiled gently. “It’s very rare. Something like one in a hundred years, or so, I believe.”

Scott blinked.

“What does that have to do with Stiles?” His dad asked. Stiles shot him a smile.

“Yes, of course.” Talia stood and walked around the desk. She settled her dark, knowledgeable gaze on Stiles. He wasn’t totally sure if this was a predator-prey thing, but he really wanted to be anywhere but right here, right now. “Stiles.”

His dad stood up straight, arms crossed. So Stiles wasn’t the only one getting the predator vibe. Too many wolves.

“Ye-ah…?” Stiles wasn’t sure if Talia was really talking to him.

“You, Stiles, are something I wasn’t quite sure existed. One in a few hundred years have ever been recorded. But Dr. Deaton and I—”

“Deaton?” Stiles couldn’t believe it. His so-called specialist had been holding out on him!

His dad gave him a different look, this one clearly meaning ‘Son, shut up.’

Talia seemed amused. That seemed to be her motif. Dangerous, kind, and amused. “Yes. Deaton and I are…friends. He told me about your appointment. Based on his information, and my own analysis, I believe that you, Stiles, are…a Catalyst. Congratulations.”

Stiles glanced for a second at Scott, then longer at his dad. Okay, his turn to talk. “I…what is that?”

“I had to do some searching, actually. Luckily, Dr. Deaton had a suspicion, and had already done some work.” She lifted a thin file from the desk and handed it to Stiles. “There isn’t much. We will have to do some tests, and obviously some of this will be trial and error.”

The file was sparse. Sparse, and the most information about his Mark he’d ever seen. “So a Catalyst is a thing?”

His dad held out a hand for the file.

“Yes, it’s a ‘thing.’ I’m not sure whether incidents of Catalysts are simply ill documented, or if you are genuinely the first Catalyst anyone has seen in a very long time. What we have found suggests that your job, Stiles, is to reveal when someone has more potential than they might perhaps realize. When, let’s say, their Mark has not told us everything about what they can do for the world.” Talia drummed her fingers on the desk. “Like with Scott.”

“So…” Stiles looks over at Scott, who looks exactly as stunned as he feels.

“So for the time being, just to be sure we aren’t missing anything, I’d like you two to spend time together. That way, we can study both of the reactions of your Marks and figure out exactly what this means for you.”

“O-okay,” Scott said. He shot a look at Stiles, followed up by a small smile. “That sounds—”

“Cool,” Stiles finished, smiling back.

*

It actually really was.

Stiles, it turned out, went to the same school. Having a slightly weird terms friend in Beacon Hills was in Scott’s opinion still better than no friends at all. Scott wasn’t starting school for another week per Talia’s orders, but Stiles texted him his class schedule just in case. Stiles had….a lot of study hall?

After school got out, Stiles had agreed to come out to the Hale house with Dr. Deaton so they could work together on his Mark. The learning process was pretty slow. There wasn’t much history of Catalysts, so they were kind of just trying everything they could think of. This meant a lot of Scott and Stiles sitting in a room and holding hands while Deaton and Talia made notes about their Marks.

Very weird terms for friendship.

Stiles had nice hands, though. Hands that Scott tried not to spend any time on. Long fingers, pretty warm—except when they were freezing cold right when he showed up. Scott always tried to wrap as much of his hand as he could around Stiles’s fingers until they felt like human fingers again. The other boy never said anything about it. He didn’t stop Scott from doing it, either.

Sometimes Scott’s Mark reacted like it had the first night, on a smaller scale, turning shades of red and gold and shifting shape. Sometimes it just glowed gold like normal, not seeming to have any interest in Stiles. Stiles Mark always did something. The very very weird part was, it never did exactly the same thing. The first few days it would light up for a few seconds and then disappear. They’d sit for hours with Deaton and Talia poking and proding to no end. Then it started to light up in different colors. Blue, purple, green, anything but the blinding white Scott had seen. The Mark didn’t really seem interested in doing anything it didn’t want to do.

The second week was worse.

Scott had known the moon would be hard. Laura had told him. Derek had told him. Talia had told him. But this…

He could feel his blood running through his veins, twenty degrees too hot. The skin on the backs of his hands itched, his bones felt like they were all rubbing up against each other, grating away his self-control. Everything made him mad. Derek started taking him on runs, no Laura surprise attacks involved. Just long, long, hard runs. Even with his increased stamina, the runs were tough. But they made him too tired to get mad, too tired to worry that he was going to wolf out any minute.

The time he spent with Stiles…

It was a mixed bag. The first day was awful. The moment he touched Stiles, he could feel the other boy’s pulse like it was his own, slamming in his chest. It hurt. Scott had bolted without a word and hidden in his room for almost an hour. It wasn’t until Talia must have asked Stiles to leave that he came out. The pulse faded from his perception, covered with Jeep engine and quiet downstairs voices, until he felt like he could breathe again. Then he’d spent the next hour apologizing for the chair arm he’d crushed, the parts of the door he’d shredded, the blood he’d gotten on the rug from digging his claws into his palms, and the broken vase in the upstairs hallway. All while totally wolfed out, trying to talk around fangs and too much smells and sounds. Humiliating, to say the least. 

They’d taken the next day off. Talia was understanding. She was also a fairly intense and didn’t put up with nonsense. The morning after his reaction to Stiles, Scott had mentioned over breakfast that he thought maybe he could take a break today. Laura and Derek had snorted into their cereal and left the table, leaving only him and the perfectly arched eyebrow of Talia Hale as an answer.

The second day was…Scott wasn’t really sure what it was. Where Stiles’s Mark hadn’t reacted at all during Scott’s freakout, on the second day it lit gently in a soft gold color. The symbols moved slowly, with no obvious pattern. Scott found himself watching the gold move over Stiles’s arms and disappear into his t-shirt. It probably looked nice across his collarbones, matching the sharp lines and underlining the paleness of his skin with gold. In time with Scott’s thoughts, the Mark flashed briefly dark red, then faded entirely.

Stiles pulled his hand away, gently. Deaton and Talia took diligent notes. Scott started talking about lacrosse. And talking about lacrosse. Annnnnnd talking about lacrosse.

“Yeah, dude, you should try out. Coach would love another Other player on the team. Right now he just has Jackson and I honestly think it’s made him worse. All he wants to do is talk about how much he has to ‘hold back.’” Stiles made a face. “It’s basically the worst. I’d quit, but I think then my dad would make me start like…cleaning.”

Scott laughed. “Yeah I…like lacrosse. Or I liked it. I don’t know if I can play now.” He glanced at Talia. “Hopefully I can.”

“I think if you didn’t try out, Coach would hunt you down and beat you until the lacrosse stick was a part of your hands.” Stiles’s hand tapped against his leg. Scott had noticed that he was never still, never took a break from moving. It was kind of hypnotizing.

“Okay, I’ll try out.”

“You better.”

“I will!”

“And then you better take Jackson down. I’m not joking around here,” Stiles said, totally deadpan.

Scott couldn’t stop laughing long enough to respond.

*

Everything had somehow gotten worse.

It wasn’t Scott. Scott was awesome. Scott was funny, smart, strong, kind, and….cute. Really cute. Too cute. He needed to knock that off. Seriously.

Because it was freaking Stiles out. A lot. He had to go hold Scott’s big, warm, hand and try not to look at his wrists and his shoulders and his easy, reassuring smile, like it was totally normal and he did it every day. Luckily, so far Scott hadn’t seemed to notice his heart slamming like crazy the entire time. Or the…other stuff. He was pretending Talia and Dr. Deaton weren’t noticing either.

So he started texting Scott all the time. If Scott realized exactly how annoying he actually was, he would go take his place amongst the beautiful inaccessible people like Lydia and Danny and Stiles would have a game plan. He knew how to deal with crush-from-afar. Crush-holding-my-hand-because-of-weird-science, he had nothing for. Neither did Google. Unfortunately, Scott texted much the way he acted. Quick responses, nice, funny, sarcastic when Stiles was being sarcastic, smart, a little bit snarky…it was not discouraging. It was making Stiles feel like they were/could be friends. As totally amazingly awesome as that would be, he didn’t know how much up close and personal time he could take with Scott before he did something stupid. Like put his mouth on Scott’s mouth. Or his crooked jawline. Or his collarbones. Or—

Not helping.

Every time thoughts of Scott got too overwhelming—it had been a while since he had a new person to crush on, okay?—he started doing research on Catalysts. Google didn’t have anything beyond what he expected, no specific references he could find about a Catalyst being a type of Mark.

He reviewed all his notes with a fresh lens, creating a new notebook with things he believed might be referring to something like a Catalyst. It was a thinner notebook. Stiles pulled quotes he thought might be talking about Catalysts, references to odd Mark behavior that sound like his, or affected someone else’s Mark, anything.

            …she inspired and moved people just by being close, by the light of her skin and her soul, she gave them new purpose and changed their course…

            ...when working with the subject, it must be noted that we at several occasions experienced radical changes in his Mark, brief and drastic changes that were no longer evident with study continued…

            …I once saw it turn completely different colors, they seemed to change if he was with someone new, and then fade away, but it only happened once and we all agreed it must have been some kind of fluke…

Almost totally useless. Not a one actually had the word “Catalyst,” which had him wondering about Ms. Hale’s and Dr. Deaton’s resources. Maybe when you got to be that wise and worldly you didn’t need resources. You just spoke truth all the time and everyone listened. Either way, he decided to bring his notes to his next meeting. They’d probably just nod politely and tell him they already knew all that.

Not that he was totally sure when that would be. Last time, Talia had glanced at Scott, cut the session off early, and politely told Stiles that she would call him when they could “resume.” Code for “full moon time now please GTFO.” What Stiles had turned up about the full moon made him feel bad for Scott. It sounded like a pretty rough deal, starting out. Or always. But he guessed it kind of balanced out what with the speed and strength and superior senses and healing and junk.

Every time he’d texted Scott today he’d gotten brief responses, usually after a pretty long pause. Poor guy. The official full moon was tomorrow night, so he guessed today and tomorrow would be the hardest.

‘Good luck, dude!’ Stiles tapped out. Okay. That was the last text he would send. He was now officially leaving Scott alone.

Except that left him alone, bored, and really tired of researching. His dad had to work an overnight shift, and Lydia wasn’t responding to his texts. This was Lydia code a for a few things. 1) I’m doing homework, 2) I’m having a party and I don’t want to invite you or 3) I’m getting laid leave me be. Stiles had noticed it had also begun to include 4) I am hanging out with Allison and it is VERY IMPORTANT we are not disturbed because I am in no way trying to get into her pants, we are just friends, don’t be so weird, Stiles.

Not that he could blame her. Allison was gorgeous, and incredibly sweet, and just edgy enough to make Lydia announce her as her new “best friend” on sight. Stiles wasn’t too hurt. Lydia could have more than one best friend, and they filled different niches. Stiles was the good at learning, snarky, fun guy, and Allison was the sexy, sweet, totally dangerous Soul-Marked hunter who could protect you or kill you in a blink. He couldn’t compete with that. He was pretty sure she might have a tattoo somewhere—it was just a theory. There was nothing he could do to match that cool level. Also, Lydia did not want to sleep with him. Which he was totally okay with. Almost always.

And he had Scott.

Or whatever.

And he was driving himself crazy, so he logged on to Steam and spent a few hours yelling into his headset about TF2. Which got him all the way to 11 PM. Awesome. Friday night and he was already out of stuff to do. When Scott got done with all his werewolf training, he was making him hang out. Forget unattainable. He was going to have a guy friend, a close friend. Then they could just see where it went.

Stiles wandered downstairs to make himself something to eat. There was a stash of junk food in the back of the pantry he pretended his dad didn’t know about, but he wanted real food. Plus making real food would give him something to do.

He flipped on the stove and set about using the last of the ground turkey to make a burger. They were out of buns, which was fine because when there was no one around to see him, Stiles just dumped ketchup on the patty and ate it alone. In his opinion, the bun mostly just obscured the meat taste. Unfortunately he had discovered there was no casual way to eat a burger like this without a lot of eye rolling and skeptical frowns.

Halfway through his burger process he heard a soft ‘thump’ upstairs. Ever the policeman’s son, Stiles turned the stove off, held very still, and listened. No other sounds followed. Ever the teenage idiot, he decided he would just go check it out and then finish making dinner. Stiles grabbed his bat from the hall closet and started up the stairs. It was probably nothing, but he wasn’t going to get murdered without putting in a little effort at resisting.

Nothing in his dad’s room.

Nothing in the hall closet.

Nothing in the bathroom.

Great. So it might have been in his room. Stiles lifted the bat. He’d seen this horror movie, and he was not dying tonight. He wasn’t even at a party. He hadn’t even had sex! The nerd who has all the info never dies first. Stiles moved slowly toward the end of the hall and his room. He died after the slutty girl and the jerk guy, but before the pretty, no-one-expects-her-to-survive girl. Not that he knew anyone who fit those stereotypes. Except Jackson. Jackson would die first every time, because he was both the slutty girl and the jerk guy.

The door to his room was open. Of course it was, he’d left it open. He had to watch less horror movies when his dad was working overnights.

“Okay, Stiles,” he said quietly. “Okay. Go in the room now.”

Why had he turned the light off?

Stiles made himself step fully inside his room. All of his furniture seemed threatening. There were too many hiding places in here. Stiles glanced around. Nothing stood out.  He began to lower the bat when his desk moved. Except it wasn’t his desk. It was someone in front of his desk. Crouched down. With glowing eyes oh crap oh crap oh—

“Scott?”

That was as far as he got before the werewolf was coming across the bed at him, furrier and fangier than the last time Stiles saw him. Stiles didn’t think. He just swung the bat as hard as he could at Scott’s crazy glowing eyes.

It shattered into wooden splinters against Scott’s temple, spinning the werewolf away and to the ground. Stiles didn’t wait to see if he got back up. Based on the reaction of the bat to his face, he wouldn’t be down long.

The stairs were far, too far. Scott was a lot faster than him. Stiles bolted for the bathroom, slamming the door shut and locking it. Yeah. This would work. This always worked in movies. Something heavy hit the door. That something was also snarling like a hardcore Harley, so the number of things it could be were pretty limited. Stiles glanced around for some kind of weapon.

“Okay, Scott, buddy, you gotta calm down!” Thud. “Just take deep breaths!” Thud thud.

Stiles had a flash of insight from a self-defense course his dad had made him take. He scrambled to his feet and hefted the lid off the back of the toilet. The door made a really disturbing cracking sound, like the bones of the house were being snapped. Stiles turned and saw claws coming through the wood of the door.

“Scott, last chance, okay, you need to chill ou—”

The door gave way, slamming inward, followed by a whole lot of wolfy, stronger than anyone should be, teenage boy. Stiles panicked, trying to lift the toilet lid and get as far away from Scott in the tiny space as he could. Scott’s eyes flashed, feral and alien, so Stiles creamed him with  the toilet lid. Scott tried to come right through it.

“Scott—”

Porcelain fell all over the floor, making everything somehow more dangerous. Scott collided with Stiles, maybe collapsing, maybe tripping, knocking him back into the mirror. It hurt. Scott hit the ground. Stiles tried not to, but it was hard. Really hard. Shoving down guilt and pain, he pushed Scott away with his foot.  Scott wasn’t really moving, definitely not in full attack mode anymore. Stiles gripped the edge of the counter to keep himself upright.

“Scott?”

Nothing. Scott was definitely still pretty wolf-looking. He also seemed kind of unconscious-looking. Toilet lid for the win.

Stiles took a deep breath. That was apparently a mistake, because it made his head hurt somehow even more. Was it a stabbing pain or a dull pain that meant a concussion? Hopefully a dull pain. Trying to think around the pain, Stiles started to move slowly past Scott, sprawled in the doorway. He just needed to get to his phone, maybe barricade himself in his dad’s room, and call Talia. Talia could fix anything.

He could only hope Scott wasn’t dead.

Stiles got out the door, moving on his toes, and was standing beside Scott’s sprawled legs when Scott twitched.

“Crap—” Stiles turned to run, he didn’t have to get far, he only had to get to—

The hallway carpet, pressed up against his face. Small sharp claws digging into his ankle, his waist, the back of his leg as Scott’s weight settled on top of him. Stiles went completely still, the prey part of his brain hoping that Scott would think he was dead and therefore not kill him.

Scott was growling, low in his throat, but so far he wasn’t ripping out Stiles’s. The carpet was making an imprint on his face. Strangely, that was the thing that hurt the most, aside from the throbbing in his head. Scott’s claws rested gently on the back of his neck without digging in. So maybe he wasn’t going to get his throat ripped out. Fingers crossed.

For a few long seconds neither of them moved. Then Scott leaned down, and Stiles realized that he was going to get his throat bitten out. Even knowing that with Marked werewolves it didn’t work this way, his mind kept supplying him information about werewolf bites and transforming and man his dad just did not need this right now. Fangs brushed the back of his neck. Then Scott tore his throat out and he bled to death on the stupid hallway carpet.

Except no, he didn’t.

He wasn’t doing anything. He was just holding Stiles down and….smelling him? Scott’s nose touched the side of Stiles’s neck, just above where Scott’s thumb was holding him still. Alright. So maybe he wasn’t going to die.

“Scott?” he asked, softly.

The growl went up slightly in volume, and the hand tightened on his neck.

“Scott, it’s okay.” Stiles kept talking. He always kept talking, even when he shouldn’t. Out of his line of sight, his Mark began to glow gently along his fingertips and hands. “I won’t run anymore, okay. It’s okay.”

Scott’s growling faded into something resembling a weird purr. His hands felt hot, hotter than when he pinned Stiles down. Or maybe he was just noticing more.

“Scott? Can I get up?” Stiles pushed up against Scott’s hand slightly, testing. Scott immediately pushes him back down, snarling. “Okay, not up.”

He can see the glow on his arms now, finally, finally that gentle white color that he hadn’t seen in weeks. Of course. Now, when no one is around to take notes and he might die. 

“Scott.” Stiles moved slowly, lifting his arm and reaching back to touch Scott’s hand. “Scott, it’s okay.” His Mark glowed a little brighter. “Everything is going to be okay. You’re going to be okay.”

His Mark was building as he talked, moving gracefully and glowing more brightly. Stiles couldn’t tell if Scott’s was as well, but his skin felt hot, really hot, so maybe it was.

“But you have to let me up, bud. I won’t run. It’s okay. Just let me sit up.”

The grip on the back of his neck loosens slightly. Scott leans away from his neck, but doesn’t let him go.

“Scott, let go.” On the word go, Stiles pushed himself up. Scott didn’t fight him at all. The other boy toppled backward off of Stiles. It took a moment for Stiles to keep himself from running. His heart slammed back up to a flight response almost immediately, but he made himself stay put. Stiles stayed on the balls of his feet, just in case, and twists his body slowly to look at Scott.

Scott was sitting with his legs sprawled on the carpet, still looking very wolfy but also…freaked? Shocked? His gold eyes were wide and coherent, watching Stiles. There were little sparks of his Mark fading around his eyes and arms.

“Scott?” Stiles didn’t move. He’d run if he had to, but it felt like maybe they were past that.

“Stiles?” His name sounds rough in Scott’s mouth, awkward and a little heavy around the fangs.

Stiles shivered at the sound of his name. He’d analyze that later. Right now he needed to focus on Scott. And getting Scott calm and not murdery.

“You…okay?” Stiles asked.

Scott looked around. “Stiles…I…” He seemed lost.

“Hey, it’s okay.” Stiles crawled over to Scott, recent danger forgotten. “You’re okay.”

“Oh my god, Stiles,” Scott said, voice cracking. His hands are shaking. “I’m so—I’m sorry, I—”

He can’t take it. Stiles reached out and pulled Scott to him. “It’s okay, it’s okay. I’m not mad. Just breathe.”

Scott’s shoulders hunched against Stiles’s chest and they both pretended that he wasn’t crying. Stiles rubbed his head until Scott looked totally human again. They didn’t talk about the pain in Stiles’s head or Scott’s red-rimmed eyes. They just sat, holding each other, making everything okay. Or something resembling okay.

Something.

*

Stiles didn’t call his dad. He guessed that Talia would probably tell his dad at some point, or his dad would try to go in the bathroom, but it didn’t seem to be a priority when she came to get Scott. They had barely spoken when she arrived. Stiles had mostly talked to Laura while she checked his head and did some kind of magic-amazing healing thing that made the pain disappear. She warned him that it would hurt in the morning, but probably wasn’t concussed. At least not severely.

He wanted to talk to Scott, to tell him one more time that everything was okay, he wasn’t mad, he just wanted everything to be okay. Except Scott wouldn’t quite look at him, and then he was in Talia’s car and all the werewolves were gone.

Then he was alone.

Alone, exhausted, and more than a little freaked out. It was too much to deal with. Stiles wrote a short note for his dad explaining what had happened, that everything was fine, and that he had gone to bed and would clean up the bathroom in the morning. That would just have to be enough.

It must have been. His dad didn’t come barging in or try to talk to him until he came down to the kitchen the next morning.

Not a great talk.

Stiles ended up having to call Talia and put her on the phone with his dad to convince him that Scott was not evil, or a murderer, or a crazy person. Thirty minutes later, Talia had laid out, point by point, exactly how they would keep Scott at the house during the full moon tonight. She had also assured him that as Scott got more experience he would no longer have this hard of a time during the full moon.

The Sheriff was grumbling when he hung up the phone. Grumbling, in Stiles’s experience, meant that there would be a “conversation” every time he wanted to do anything with Scott for the next few months, but mostly because his dad couldn’t find any real reason to be mad. In his years as a policeman, the Sheriff had seen more than a few incidents of newly Marked Others causing damage or freaking out, and almost all of them were unintentional. Not everyone had the support system that Scott had. Some families couldn’t accept an Other into their household, some kids didn’t have families at all. The Hales, great as they were, couldn’t take care of every new werewolf or kitsune or whatever else that was Marked in Beacon Hills. Stiles knew they had a foundation to help those who didn’t have the resources to get through the transition process. People still slipped through the cracks. Obviously the Sheriff didn’t really think that Scott was one of those people, he had too much evidence to the contrary. That didn’t stop him from worrying, and it wouldn’t stop him from asking Stiles every few days for the next few months “You sure about him?”

Stiles was sure. Really, really sure.

Scott sent him one text that day. I’m sorry.

Stiles replied with a rambling paragraph about how mad he wasn’t, and how much he wanted to Scott to be okay, which pretty much boiled down into “please please please don’t stop being my friend I like you a lot please.”

Scott didn’t respond.

*

Laura took his phone.

Not that he knew what to say to Stiles. He was having enough trouble just thinking about Stiles. There were remnants of Stiles’s smell on his skin, he couldn’t get away from it. Even after a shower he kept getting small wafts, static shock to his senses. Erica and Boyd were nowhere to be seen, hidden somewhere else in the house to go through hell separately. Scott wondered if their first moons had been this severe, or if he was a special “True Alpha” type case. It was freaking him out.

He kept getting flashes of what happened with Stiles. Running through the woods, following a scent he couldn’t quite identify, finding himself inside, in an unfamiliar bedroom coated with that familiar smell and comfort, he’d felt safe there, even if he hadn’t felt right.

Then Stiles had come in.

Scott shook his head, pushing it down. Thinking about it brought the wolf howling to the front of his sense, pushing the same urges down his throat and into his hands and feet. Run. Outside. Find him find him find him.

“Scott.”

Laura was standing in front of him, holding his wrists. “Scott, you have to stop.”

Stop? Suddenly Scott was aware of the pain in his hands. He looked down to see blood leaking from his clenched fists. Laura helped him slowly open his hands and pull claws from skin. The cuts started healing as soon as he opened his hands.

“You can’t control it with pain,” Laura said gently. She’d never been like this before. For the first time, Scott could see the similarities between her and Talia, the deeper connections beyond their striking cheekbones and dark hair. Laura held his hands, palms up, while they healed. “Pain seems effective at first. It snaps you back to yourself, can give you something that seems like control. But it’s only a band-aid. Surface level.”

“You’re never going to stay in control that way. Especially as an Alpha. You can’t fight with it, Scott. You have to embrace it, understand it, and that will give you control. This isn’t something ‘other.’ It’s just you.”

Laura let go of his hands and gave him a quick hug. “But tonight, tonight is going to suck.”

He laughed at that. “It already sucks.”

Laura nodded and put an arm around him while they walked down to the basement. “But it gets better, Scott. Always remember that. It gets better.”

The basement was home to a decent game room, a giant TV and couch for teenagers and twenty-somethings to pile onto, and on the far wall, hidden behind a sliding fake wall, a giant bank vault.

Scott knew from the pre-moon briefing a week ago that the vault had been purchased and moved here for the express purpose of new moon Others. The Hales had carefully cut windows into the exterior wall of the vault so the moonlight could still get in, and then put bulletproof glass in the windows. Controlled exposure. Laura had told him the door of the vault was lined with mountain ash after they closed it. Deaton would be there in an hour or so to set up the ash, and would stay until morning in case they needed to break the seal. The exterior of the vault was lined below the ground and in the walls with layers of mountain ash. The vault itself was heavy steel, designed to keep robbers out and modified to keep even Alpha werewolves in.

Laura gripped the handle and slowly pulled the door open. Inside the vault there was a mattress and a small cooler with water bottles and sandwiches. High in the corner was a little video camera, so that the Hales and Deaton could monitor the vault, making sure everyone inside was alright. Everyone inside meaning Scott. Just Scott.

He stood at the edge of the vault and tried not to have a panic attack. Talia had not mentioned this part in the sell to his mom. Probably good. Scott could see why it was necessary, but he wouldn’t want to have to explain this to his mom.

“It looks worse than it is,” Laura said. “Honestly, you won’t even really notice once the moon comes up.”

“Yeah, sure,” Scott said. “I believe it.” It was hard to focus even now. He felt shivery, like he was getting a fever, and like he had too much energy inside him. He wanted to run. He didn’t want to be locked in a box like a rapid dog.

Then he thought about Stiles, and the panic in his face, and he decided that maybe he deserved to be treated like a rapid dog.

Laura touched his arm. “It’ll be better next month. Ask Erica and Boyd. Or Derek. Everyone spends their first moon in the vault. I did. You’ll be fine.”

“What if I break something? Or get out?” They had said he would be secure last night, too.

“You won’t get out.” This sounded a little more like the Laura he knew. Comforting, yet somehow derisive.

“But what if I do?” Scott needed someone to tell him that he could be stopped. That he wouldn’t hurt anyone. That he wouldn’t hurt Stiles.

Laura gripped his shoulder, a little too hard. “You won’t.”

All Scott could think as the door swung shut was he wished for a second he could hold Stiles’s hand.

*

“We don’t know where he is,” Derek said. He sounded both freaked out and pissed off, and like maybe it was Stiles’s fault somehow that this was happening.

“Uh, okay,” Stiles said. Real winning conversational skills, Stilinski.

“Go to the sheriff’s station.” Derek sounded like he was walking somewhere very fast. “Tell your dad. Stay close to him and around people. Don’t go anywhere alone.”

Stiles looked down at his bare feet. His life had gotten so weird. “Should I drive?”

Derek made an aggravated noise. “Yes, Stiles. Drive.”

Anger bubbled up, but it came out in a different direction than he expected. “He isn’t going to hurt me. He didn’t hurt me before.”

“It’s not the same. Last night wasn’t the full moon. He tore through a reinforced wall, Stiles. Be careful.” On that comforting note, Derek hung up.

Stiles rolled his eyes at the phone. “Drama queen.”

The rational part of his brain knew that he needed to do what Derek told him. It was the smart thing. The safe thing. Another part of his brain did not like Derek and wanted to sit on his bed and play video games until Scott came to eat him.

What he really had to do was find Scott.

Stiles pulled on his hoodie and stepped into his shoes. This wasn’t a good plan. It wasn’t even a plan. It was an instinct. Could he have instincts? Was that just a wolf thing? Whatever. Stiles grabbed his keys off his desk and his Mark flared, lighting up his hands and wrists. Oh. Okay then.

Irrationally confident in this idea, Stiles recruited Roscoe and headed for the preserve.

*

The line of the moon drags him through the forest, forward, forward, forward, this is his home his land his life and he will run.

*

There’s no real reason to think that Scott is in the preserve, aside from the fact that he hadn’t broken into his house. And good old instinct. From now on he was calling every single half formed idea he had instinct. This instinct was encouraged by the occasional flash of his Mark. Outside the city, the light, he noticed that it wasn’t flashing and disappearing. The lines were still there, solid and unmoving, but so pale and light they blended almost perfectly with his skin. It distracted him a little. Drive, Stiles. Save Scott now, figure out Mark later.

Save Scott. Yeah. Okay.

He briefly wished he had brought another bat.

*

It is all his. He is Alpha, superior, he is the sky and the moon and the dark paths beneath the trees. He is free.

*

It feels wrong to leave Roscoe behind, when he could really use the support. Not that he could drive the Jeep through the woods. Still. Stiles flipped on his flashlight app and started wandering through the woods in the dark. Oh, how far he had come.

Stiles headed out toward the overlook out of habit. It was also one of the only ways through the woods he actually knew without getting hurt or lost. Maybe it would be for Scott too. He stopped a little ways from the edge of the overlook. That drop had gotten a little too familiar lately. Stiles stood for a moment, realizing that he had basically no plan. What if Scott wasn’t even out here? What if he wasn’t looking for Stiles? Or what if he actually was?

‘He ripped through a wall Stiles.’ This might have been a terrible, terrible idea.

Stiles turned off the flashlight app and stood in the glow of the moon. The lines of his Mark slid out from under his hoodie sleeves, gentle and comforting. It seemed to be reflecting the moonlight, taking it in and running it through Stiles’s blood until it showed beneath his skin.

It felt weird. Good, but weird, to be so hyperaware of the moon.

*

Someone in his woods.

*

Maybe he should sit down. This idea seemed stupider and stupider, but he didn’t want to quit yet. Going deeper into the woods seemed like the logical next step. Except for the part where he would probably trip and break a leg and die of exposure before anyone found him.

Stiles had just started to look around for a boulder or a log or a clear area to sit in when his Mark went electric. He had to shut his eyes as the stupid thing echoed the moon again, lighting up the clearing and probably a dozen yards in every direction. Then just as abruptly it went out.

*

Him. The moon in his skin. His moon. That belonged to him.

*

Stiles opened his eyes.  Useless. Everything was black after the flash, his night vision was ruined. Stiles held still, resisting the urge to try and move around before his eyes adjusted.

It sounded like it was right in front of him. Low and purring, more like a creepy hello than a threat.

“Scott? That you?” Stiles found himself raising his hands slightly. It was a little freaky, not being able to see anything. This had been less creepy before his Mark sabotaged him.

The edges of trees started to come into focus. Trees, and two glowing gold eyes. This was getting to be a little too normal. His heartbeat picked up slightly. Only slightly. After last night’s total panic, this was more of a mild anxiety. Mild anxiety he had on lock.

“Hey, Scott.” Stiles could basically see him now, strong dark lines against the loose backdrop of the forest.

Scott stepped soundlessly forward. This Scott, werewolf Scott, didn’t move like a teenage boy. He moved like a predator. Like something dangerous. It gave Stiles goosebumps. Run-away goosebumps, of course. Obviously. Right.

*

*

They stood a few feet apart from each other in the dark. This was the part of the plan Stiles had not considered at all. Honestly, he’d sort of expected a repeat of last night. The tackling, then the talking, then the everything being okay and helping Scott. Scott watching him with a predator’s eyes from a few feet away, both of them knowing that Stiles couldn’t go anywhere fast enough to make a different, but also not knowing what Scott wanted, he had not anticipated.

Then Scott moved again.

Now he was right there, inches away from Stiles, warm and solid and holy freaking fast. Stiles flinched back involuntarily. Scott’s hand shot out and caught his arm, holding him still. Not hurting him, easy as it would be for Scott, just holding.

“Hey,” Stiles said. It sounded totally smooth and in control and not at all squeaky. Scott was just looking at him. His eyes flicked up and down Stiles’s body and over his face. The longer it went on, the more goosebumps Stiles felt going up his arms, the back of his neck, his spine. His Mark begins to follow the shivery feeling over his skin, more and more lighting the longer Scott touched him.

The Mark seemed to distract the werewolf. Scott slid his hand down Stiles’s arm, touching his hand and tracing the lines of light. Abruptly, Scott grabbed his wrist and pushed the sleeve of his hoodie up. He kept trying to push it past Stiles’s elbow, growling slightly.

“Hey, calm down. Here.” Stiles shrugged the hoodie off and dropped it.

That helped. Scott ran both his hands down Stiles’s arms, setting off little sparks of light. There were tiny red lights near the tips of Scott’s fingers.

“How you doing, bud?” Stiles asked softly. This was much less murdery and much more…absolutely nothing than the night before. Stiles was not really sure how much more gentle petting he could take.

Scott didn’t like that question. Or maybe he was trying to answer. In response, he grabbed Stiles upper arms and pulled him close, burying his nose in Stiles’s neck. Scott was warm, so warm, and solid in a way Stiles couldn’t think about too much right now. In a way he would probably be thinking about later. A lot.

“Scott, it’s okay,” Stiles said. “Everything is okay.”

Scott bit him.

Stiles gasped, knees buckling, and grabbed onto Scott to stay upright. One hand found itself gripping Scott’s hair, because he didn’t want Scott to stop. Ever. It wasn’t a hard bite, didn’t break the skin, but it was the best thing that had happened to him in weeks.

“Oh my god,” Stiles said. Oh my god oh my god oh my god, said his brain. YES, said his dick. “Scott—”

“Stiles,” Scott growled. Scott’s hand moved up Stiles’s arm to the back of his neck, tilting his head and holding him in place.

“Scott,” Stiles tried to say, tried to say hold on, wait, this is a bad idea, we need to talk, to think. But it just came out like a soft moan that only communicated don’t stop.

*

His moon tastes like the open sky and deep forest and clear water.

*

There was a moment when Stiles knew, clearly, crystalline, that he needed to stop. He needed to push Scott away, talk it out, calm them both down. But his skin felt fire, electric white fire, everywhere Scott’s mouth touched him. Even in his mind, Stiles had never felt anything like this. He didn’t think it was like this for people. For anyone. This was Scott. This was them.

Scott tugged the collar of his t-shirt aside, surprisingly gently, and outlined Stiles’s entire collarbone with his mouth. There would be bruises, he knew bruises, he wanted bruises so bad it made all the skin Scott’s mouth wasn’t touching hurt for it. So much wrong on so many levels.

So good on all the other levels.

*

Skin like his favorite part of dusk, soft in his mouth. So soft, so easy to bring blood to the surface and know that taste too. He wouldn’t. He would never. Never hurt his moon.

*

He didn’t know they were on the ground until he feels leaves in his hair. Scott had his hands on his skin, there was nothing else he could possibly think about. In the back of his mind there was potential disaster and proper sexual protocol and a million life lessons about how to be a good person but he’s gone deaf. Totally and complete deaf and hot and when did he get so many nerve endings?

“Scott, Scott, oh my god, Scott.” It was embarrassing, all of it, can’t stop though because Scott seemed to like it. Scott had his mouth on Stiles’s ribs, his hands on Stiles’s hips, so it’s only right that Stiles gripped Scott’s shoulders. His hands couldn’t even cover the spread, he tried, he stretched his fingers as wide as he could trying to hold on to this too-hot, beautiful werewolf boy.

*

Doesn’t taste the same everywhere. Tastes so good, so so good, too good. Every part of him is taking in the moon and now he’s on fire. Reflected light is better than sunlight, tastes cleaner and makes his whole body ache for more.

*

The sound Scott made when he licked Stiles’s hipbone should be illegal. Stiles is pretty sure it is. He could ask his dad. Oh god, wait, no, he could never ever ever speak of this to his dad or anyone at all ever. Maybe Lydia. But he wouldn’t tell Lydia how that sound made his heart stop beating, made every single blood cell in his body rush straight to his dick, almost made him come in his jeans. Thinking about it later would probably make him come. And come. And come.

“Scott, Scotty, oh god, hey, hey.” Stiles’s mouth was panicking, heeding to that screaming part of his mind.

Before he can say anything else, Scott put his mouth on Stile’s jeans, hot even through the denim.

“Fuck!” Stiles gripped Scott’s hair, back arching against the ground, twigs and rocks scraping his shoulder blades.

Scott didn’t seem very concerned with his jeans. His mouth worked the denim over Stiles’s cock, fangs giving just enough of an edge for Stiles to feel it anyway. One hand held Stiles’s hips in place, the other on the inside of Stiles’s thigh, pushing his legs apart slightly.

“Oh god, Scott,” Stiles moaned.

*

Fuck, so good, so incredibly good. He wants to make his moon feel good, feel everything, wants to make him burn the same way. He can’t take it. Wants to make his moon smell like him, feel like him, taste like them both for days.

*

“Scott,” Stiles tried to push at the werewolf’s head. It was half-hearted, but he was trying. “Scott, Scotty wait.”

Scott’s claws tore at the very top of his jeans a little.

“Wait.”

Stile’s Mark burns down his arms, actually kind of hurting, making him wonder if he’s done the wrong thing here. It isn’t that he doesn’t want it, he wants it so bad he can’t remember what anything else feels like, but he needs it to be them, to be right. To be Scott. Scott of the soft smiles, Scott who holds his hand, Scott who plays lacrosse and likes English class and is oh also the sexiest werewolf Stiles has ever encountered, real or imagined.

*

His body is on fire. Red fire, howling in the back of his mind, the front of his mind, all of him darker and bigger and more than he knew he could be. So he holds onto the moon while his skin glows red, lights him up inside out and the wolf screams. Screams screams screams for more, for the moon, for himself because he is wolf, beta, wolf, boy, wolf—

Scott lifted his head in the dying light of their Marks. “Stiles.”

The first thing he saw was Stiles’s mouth. Open, just a little bit too red, Scott wanted to bite it. After he managed to push that urge down, Scott looked further up, at Stiles’s eyes. Not any better. His pupils were huge in the dark, brown eyes made brighter by his flushed cheekbones and accented by his mouth. Scott felt the wolf shift inside him, wanting. But the wolf was him now. They were the same. Scott could control it.  

Scott could control himself.

“Oh,” Stiles said. His voice was rough, somewhere between fire and air, broken and giving. Scott wanted to hear more in that voice, wanted to hear everything.

“Hey,” Scott said. There was probably a better place to have this conversation than kneeling between Stiles’s legs in the middle of the forest. There was probably a better time to have this conversation than when they were both hard and hot and too turned on to think in full sentences.

That probably wasn’t going to happen.

“Scott.” Stiles didn’t let go of Scott’s hair. He didn’t close his legs.

“Yeah?” If this was weird tomorrow, he could take it. They could take it. Scott knew.

“Yeah.” Stiles made it most of a word and part of a moan, and drove Scott insane. Absolutely insane.

In a good way.

*

Until thirty seconds ago, Stiles would have said he found nothing hotter than a mostly out of control werewolf with a crooked jaw and bright gold eyes and strong honey colored hands.

So wrong.

The most wrong.

Nothing was hotter than an Alpha werewolf, red eyes watching him with total control and clarity, honey hands touching him without desperation, voice saying his name like just knowing Stiles was there was absolutely enough.

Holy shit.

Stiles just barely managed to bite down the ‘please’ in the back of his throat. It seemed like a little too much, and he wanted to maintain some vague level of respectability. Very vague. Not ruling out getting off in the woods, but trying not to beg right off the bat.

Bless him, Scott didn’t ask anything else, just let Stiles grip his hair while he unzipped his jeans and ran his tongue testingly over Stiles’s cock through his boxers.

Stiles started swearing, making up new words and small moans, trying and failing not to go completely out of his mind. Scott held him down just enough to really get his mouth on Stiles’s cock, finally seeming to get frustrated and pulling the thin cotton over his hips and down to his knees. There was a brief pause. It went on long enough that Stiles made himself unscrew his eyes from being shut in order to check on Scott.

Mistake. Big mistake. Scott knelt between Stiles’s legs, holding them carefully open, looking down at Stiles like he might be about to come from the sight.

“Scott, please,” Stiles moaned. Fuck it, he could say please. Please to what he didn’t know. Please be my friend, please be my wolf, be my light, be my everything, suck me off, touch me, love me, anything, absolutely anything.

Although if he’s being honest right now he really, really wants to come.

“God,” Scott said softly, as though he could hear every embarrassing thought in Stiles’s head.

Or something else, as his next move is to lean forward and finally get his mouth on Stiles’s cock, hot and wet and absolutely nothing like anything his mind could have come up with. Nothing is like this. Nothing prepared him for this.

It probably took him four seconds to come. He can’t tell, he can’t think about anything but how freaking ridiculous good Scott’s mouth felt. There wasn’t a lot of expertise, not that Stiles could really tell, it didn’t matter, it didn’t matter, he was falling apart and on fire, seeing white light that may or may not have been his Mark or his mind and coming so hard he was going to be ruined for life.

When his vision came back it’s with the light of the moon and red eyes. Scott was kneeling over him, stunned, overwhelmed, burning.

“Scott,” Stiles said weakly. It took a moment to motivate himself to move at all. His whole body was heavy and loose, sleepy. But more than sleep he wanted to touch Scott. Wanted to get him off. Wanted to see him come.

Scott’s mouth was shiny, red, too much. Stiles reached up with one hand and down with the other, kissing Scott hand while trying to undo his jeans at the same time. There was a brief weird taste that Stiles realized was him, wished desperately that he could get hard again. God, Scott’s mouth. It was just as amazing on his mouth as his cock, maybe a little better, according to his tongue.

Only a few seconds go by before Scott broke away, gasping, thrusting against Stiles’s hand, which has managed to get fully inside Scott’s jeans. Scott’s cock was heavy, amazing, hard and perfect, more what Stiles’s wanted than he knew possible. Stiles stopped thinking and just watched. He wanted to know exactly what this version of Scott looked like. Wanted to know how to do it again. And again. Then probably again.

All the time, if possible.

Especially when Scott moaned against his lips, shaking, coming and coming apart under Stiles’s fingers. It’s awe-inspiring. Stiles did this. Scott wanted this. They both did. It’s overwhelming, burning. For a brief insane moment Stiles wanted to put his Mark somehow on Scott, to brand them together into one for everyone to see.

Scott collapsed on top of him, warm and solid. They both laid in the dark, outlined by moonlight, panting against each other’s skin. For long moments it is all the needed.

Just as Stiles began to doze slightly, Scott shifted and pressed a small kiss to the side of his neck.

“Wanna see a movie this weekend?”

If Stiles had enough energy to laugh, he would. As it stood, Stiles was pretty sure he passed out before he mentally finished listing everything out in theaters right now.

*

They don’t go see a movie that weekend because they both get grounded for the rest of eternity.

Not eternity. Just the foreseeable part of forever.  Stiles’s dad had the good—or maybe terrible—sense not to take Stiles’s phone, so he can spend the prison time endlessly texting Scott.

This was awesome. Not nearly as awesome as when Derek found them passed out in the forest, or when Talia drove them home in silence, or when Deaton weirdly emailed him everything about his decisions concerning their Marks and their meanings, but up there. Stiles had a hard time not turning them into sexts, except he wanted to talk to Scott a little more about where they would be putting their hands from now on. Hopefully the answer was ‘absolutely everywhere.’

Stiles thought it was. But then he got a text that read ‘Stiles, nice to meet you this is Scott’s mom. Scott is grounded I am taking his phone. He will see you at school.’

Well.

The only real response to that is to re-read Deaton’s findings-as a True Alpha, Scott will likely lead a pack the Beacon Hills area has not seen in centuries…you will likely go on to help others who struggle with their Marks, much as you or Scott had struggled—and jack off with a newfound intensity.

It staved off panic about Scott liking him for about two days. That gave him a full three days to totally wind himself up into thinking that Scott probably didn’t even like him that much, extenuating circumstances, Scott being cooler than him, hotter than him, everything more than him.

Stiles was just adding to that list on Sunday night when the doorbell rang. It isn’t pizza or Lydia, so…

He absolutely did not almost wipe out in the hall trying to sprint in his socks.

And there he is, slightly off-center jaw, stupidly perfect smile, and just the slightest trace of red burn in his brown eyes.

“So,” Scott said, “about that movie.”

Stiles laughed and tried to tackle him to the ground with a kiss. “Definitely.”

Their Marks lit up against each other, trailing white and red down their skin, and Stiles wasn’t really worried about who he was anymore. It didn’t matter. This.

This was what mattered.