#pre-sterek

After two days stuck with the harpies being held hostage in a way, it didn’t take much on the Pack’s side. They had been stuck in a rather small circle of mountain ash and no food. The smallest one of them had tried to escape the circle with no luck, but ended harming on of the others. Stiles remembered reading somewhere that another’s harpy talon’s were deadly and, although he didn’t really have anything to back that up, he broke the circle and made two of them, leaving the smaller one on its own and the two bigger ones in another one. The one that had been harmed wasn’t healing. 

Stiles immediately called Lydia, who helped him come up with a plan. He neglected telling Derek or Scott, but he was doing it for the greater good. Vacations. He was going to get the whole Pack a beach vacation, where they were all going to surf. Or sunbath. Or whatever they wanted. Stiles wanted to surf. Derek had promised he’d surf with him. And he knew for the fact that the whole Pack was overdue for a true vacation. And what better time for that than actual summer?

So, Stiles and Lydia got the harpies inside a cave and closed off the entrance with mountain ash. Before they really had any time to adapt to their new surroundings, Stiles jumped inside and started running. The harpies were tired already, and weak from their two days unable to really move, but they were angry. And Stiles knew better than most the kind of edge anger can give you in a fight of life or dead. So he got angrier. Three men in Beacon Hills were now dead. His father had spent the last week unable to sleep a wink, not knowing what was attacking his town before Stiles and Derek had been able to narrow it down to harpies. He thought of Isaac and the long gash on his side that took over a day to heal after a harpy’s talon got him while trying to keep a fourth man alive. He thought of Erica’s arm broken in two places. He thought of his own summer break being followed in a small cave by harpies instead of enjoying his vacations and learning how to surf. 

The plan had been traced, but most of the timeline was up in the air, depending on Stiles’ ability to get one of the harpies to harm another, or for him to get ahold of one of the harpy’s talon to use as a weapon. As always, Stiles’ plan was completely disregarded by fate when he heard Derek’s roar right outside the cave. His time was up. He ran the opposite way and tried to confuse the harpies as best he could. But he wasn’t quite fast enough.

“Stiles!” Derek roared from the entrance to the cave, where the mountain ash kept him from stepping inside. “Come out here.” His words were slightly muddled by his fangs, but Stiles had spent enough time with the wolves to still understand what he said. 

“Just give me a minute, I have a plan!” Stiles called back, running to another side of the cave. Derek said nothing for a few minutes, but when Stiles gave himself a 30 second break to look at him, he saw Derek’s eyes following him around. He was still shifted to his beta form, but he was breathing more normally now. Stiles went back to his plan. It might look to someone else like he was  just running around, but he was following a very specific path, letting a little bit of mountain ash out of his pocket each time, but Derek seemed to catch up to exactly what he was doing because after a few more minutes Derek’s brows were back. He felt like a weight had been lifted off his shoulders by the amount of trust Derek had on him. Another five minutes, and the figure he had been drawing on the floor was done, and he was able to use his Spark, combined with the mountain ash, to trap each harpy in a smaller circle again, but this time binding them in a way that was almost impossible for them to move. He would have been unable to do so before, since he needed to activate some symbols in order to achieve the binding, and if he had broken the mountain ash circle outside they more than likely would have been able to escape. Now, it had just costed him his flannel shirt and a few cuts, but he would make it. 

“Want to help, Sour wolf?” He asked, breathing hard after spending that much time running around while trying to draw the figures the way he was supposed to do it.

He heard Derek’s claws emerge and took that as a yes, walking backwards without losing the harpies from his line of sight, and broke the line of mountain ash at the mouth of the cave with his foot.

“Their talons can kill them.” Was all Stiles offered, still too focused on holding the bindings in place. He had started training his Spark not that long ago, and he still struggled to keep control over it, even if he was getting better at it. 

Derek nodded, and walked towards the smallest of the harpies, as if he knew the plan. He didn’t, but he knew Stiles.

Stiles focused intently on what he had to do, and was able to break the circle of mountain ash surrounding that harpy and almost lost control of the harpy itself, but managed to get a hold of the binding at the last second. It was enough for Derek to get a hold of the harpy, though, tired as she was already, and turn around to launch her at one of the others. The fight was over much faster than Stiles would have expected, but the harpies were tired and he was able to hold up the bindings most of the time. Sometime during the fight, thought, he had closed his eyes to focus on the bindings, instead of being distracted by Derek’s everything while he fought and used each harpy as a weapon, trusting Stiles to watch his back from the third harpy he was unable to even look at while fighting two at a time. 

“Are we done?” Stiles asked, looking at the mess in front of him. He wasn’t sure if the harpies were dead, but they looked like they were. 

Derek grunted an affirmative, trying to clean some of the blood on his arms before joining Stiles by the mouth of the cave.

“I hate cleanup duty.” Stiles mumbled, looking at the blood and feathers and bodies all around the cave.

“Get Jackson to do it. He’s the least injured one.” Derek commented, making his way to his car. Stiles followed him silently, trying to decide if he wanted to yell at Derek for leaving him to tell Jackson he was in cleaning duty instead of telling him himself, but Stiles had come to terms with this role in the Pack, even if he wasn’t exactly sure where he stood with Derek, so he called Jackson to rely the information while making his way down the mountain back to the forest, being careful not to fall on his ass.

“So, which one of us is driving?” Stiles asked happily, once he was able to hung up on Jackson’s million of complains. 

Derek raised both eyebrows at Stiles, and looked significantly at the Camaro a few more meters away.

“Not right now, man! You can drive with your bloody hands, I don’t care. I meant to the beach!” He said excitedly, almost jogging to the Camaro with an energy he wasn’t sure where it had come from.

“The beach?” 

“Yes! We won!” Stiles celebrated, waiting for Derek at the Camaro, while Derek stared at him from his position when Stiles had first asked him who was driving.

“What?” Derek asked, confused.

“Vacations, Derek!” Stiles said, doing his victory dance.

Derek sighed. “You can drive if you want. He can decide how many cars we will need and who’s going where once we all shower and make sure everyone has stopped bleeding.”

“Vacations!” Stiles yelled again excitedly, getting in the car. “I need a surf board.”

“You were going on and on about surfing?” Derek asked incredulously, now sitting at the driver’s seat. 

“I told you I had to learn.”

“Stiles, you were literally wearing water shoes the other day.”

“Yeah, I bought those in preparation. And googles. I haven’t gotten a surf board.” Stiles said simply.

Derek sighed. “I will drive you to get one after I shower. We can divide the Pack in cars after that.”

Stiles was a thinker, but even he could not process things that fast. One moment he was waiting for his soup to finish cooking, the other moment a near feral werewolf grabbed him and dragged him through the forest. Then there was a bang, Derek stumbled and Stiles with him. A second bang made Stiles’ ears ring and Derek drop to the floor. A third bang followed and everything went dark.

When Stiles woke up, it was to the sound of cheering, snarling, growling and angry howling. He groaned, but a werewolf hot hand was on his shoulder immediately. The slight scent of pine that his human nose could pick up, told him that it was Derek.

When the noise didn’t abate, Stiles fought himself upright and slowly opened his eyes. He ignored the cold nose in his neck for a moment. It didn’t have priority.

Then however he blinked. Well, that was a new one. Stiles and Derek were in a cage. Their cage was in the middle of a row of cages. All around them were snarling, growling and howling supernatural creatures.

“Derek?” Stiles’ voice was low and the cold nose in his neck let out a hot huff of air. Good, the wolf was listening then. “Where are we, Derek?”

Another hot waft of air that sounded suspiciously like a sigh was his only answer.

“Don’t bother, kiddo.”, a voice from his left suddenly cut in. “He’s been non-verbal since they brought you in. The stunner is hell on born weres.”

Stiles eyes latched onto the source of the voice. In front of him was a wendigo, if the white eyes and sharp teeth were any indication. Stiles frowned: “Non-verbal? I know he doesn’t talk much on a good day, but non-verbal?”

The wendigo shrugged: “Most weres are non-verbal when they bring them in. The stunner damages their brain too much. A few get the chance to recover, others don’t. I’m Mark.”

Stiles nodded: “Stiles. So, since the werewolf latched to my neck can’t answer me, where are we?” Mark sighed: “Somewhere deep in Mexico. Underground fighting ring. And no, there’s no way out. There’s three ways to die though: one - you don’t adapt quick enough and wither away. Two - you die in the arena, hopefully quick. Three - the Calaveras find this place and kill us all.”

Cold dread settled in Stiles stomach. He did of course try to find a way out, but Mark’s warning seemed to have been sound. Stiles also kept talking to Derek, who did seem to be less feral every day. Stiles didn’t even begin counting the days. It didn’t seem important.

“Stiles.” Derek’s voice was rough from disuse, but the urgency in it immediately shook Stiles awake. Three men stood in front of their cage. Without a word they dragged the cage out and into a huge concrete chamber. Both Derek and Stiles were silent, assessing their situation. When a second cage was brought in, Stiles stomach sank.

The fights were brutal, ugly and bloody. But Derek was formidable. Stiles didn’t know where the werewolf got his strength from, but he fought like a man possessed. And he managed to keep Stiles relatively injury free. Derek risked everything to protect Stiles, often tearing three or four opponents limb from limb in his wolf form.

One day though, even Derek’s strength wasn’t enough anymore. Their opponent was a giant of a man. He towered easily over Derek and was at least twice as broad. Derek didn’t stand a chance. And when Derek slumped down, covered in wounds, not able to stand anymore, Stiles knew this was it.

When the giant advanced towards Derek to finish him off, something clicked inside of Stiles. Power welled up in him and for one horrifying moment, he thought the Nogitsune was back. But this power felt warm. This power felt good. And Stiles gave in.

Like when he had been possessed, his skin became pale and the purple bags under his eyes became even more pronounced. Instinct took over. He grabbed a piece of broken glass from the floor and carved a rune into his skin, just below his ribs on the left side of his torso.

The moment the rune was finished, Stiles carved another one into the inside of his right lower arm. He then pressed the two bleeding runes together and focused his whole intent onto the giant. He immediately went up in flames.

Both Derek and Stiles collapsed just moment later.

When the Calaveras finally found the place, Stiles body was covered in runes that were carved into his skin. Derek had reluctantly done a few, but he had hated the idea of hurting Stiles.

Luckily for them, Chris Argent had been with the Mexican hunters and they had been saved instead of killed.

Standing in front of his father’s house, Derek covering behind him, Stiles reflected on everything that had happened. Everything that had changed. Derek had focused his whole being onto Stiles. They couldn’t be far one from the other.

Stiles ran a hand through his hair. How was he even going to start explaining all this to his dad?