#sterekdystopian

*

The world ended not with a bang, or a whimper, but an extreme case of discrimination.

The war that had begun in a small town in California spread wide and far like cancer, infecting most who it touched, and killing who it couldn't.

When Stiles had wished for the world to know about the horrors of the night, of darkness and blood-red moon, of sleepless nights and exhausting days, he hadn't wished this. No. He'd wished a shoulder to lean onto, for people to pick up the slack when he couldn't. But all his wish had accumulated to was death, death, and death.

Even now, there is death. Even after a tireless war that lasted years, that took away most of the living creatures of mother earth to the afterlife, even after Monroe was sent to hell, there is death. Death in the name of food, shelter, greed.

Death in the name of survival.

"There's no one here."

Derek's statement is not even a surprise anymore. Stiles huffs.

"It's the end of the world, and people are still idiots,"

Derek looks at him. The sunlight gleams off of his tanned skin like it's illuminating a masterpiece, the blood and the dirt and the countless other stuff on Derek's person a riot of colors. His eyes, that Stiles has still not been able to pin down to a certain color, looks the same color as the algae they'd seen a few miles back. Growing alongside destruction.

"People were idiots," Derek corrects, and Stiles snorts. Derek presses his lips together. "We should keep moving."

Stiles nods, but as Derek takes a step forward, he reaches out and takes Derek's hand, intertwines their fingers together even as Derek shoots him a confused glance. Takes his other hand and rests it against Derek's bearded cheeks, rubs his fingers against his lips. Soft, smooth, familiar.

"We could try to live," he says, even though his heart is not in it. Derek kisses his fingers, the one still near his lips. Untangles their hands to bring them to Stiles' cheeks, cups them and leans in, kisses him with everything they've ever said and will never get to say in this lifetime.

"We could try to live," Derek agrees, when he pulls back, and Stiles rests their foreheads together, aware of the foul stench of rotten bodies that surround them—that must be even more awful to Derek. "But who would we live for?"

Stiles huffs out a short laugh, closes his eyes. "Us?" He says, like Derek hadn't said the same thing not a few days ago and he hadn't exploded with rage and grief and sorrow.

Derek laughs, too. It tapers off into a shaky sigh. "We don't know how long we can survive, Stiles. Those who are left, they will hunt us down, and if I lose you,"

Stiles wounds his hands around Derek's neck and kisses him, hard, drinks in the words Derek doesn't get to say—Derek has lost so much in his life, he's lost everyone; they both have. Stiles will do anything to undo it, all of it.

But.

"I don't know if it will work," Stiles says, and the confession hangs in the air between them as they share the same breath, drink each other in.

"If anyone can do this, it's you," Derek assures him. Stiles doesn't believe that he can do anything—if he could, then they wouldn't be standing where they are now, in a town that is at once empty and filled with the ghosts of their pasts.

They wouldn't be in Beacon Hills again, fighting their way through deranged hunters—because of course, the few who are left other than them are hunters—to reach the Nemeton.

But Stiles believes in Derek. His heart, his soul, his Alpha.

So he says, "If anyone can go back in time to save everyone from dying, it's gotta be us. I can't be the only one to do that, big guy. You're coming with me."

Derek kisses him again, a smile stretching across his gorgeous face; even if Stiles can't see it, he can feel the smile under his lips. "Always," Derek promises. And even here, standing on the brink of hope, having stumbled and fallen down the worst the world could have to offer, Stiles believes him. 

*

Six-hours and a conversation with the Nemeton later, Stiles Stilinski wakes up fourteen-years in the past, his mother—his mom who is alive—rousing him from his sleep with a gentle hand and hushed words.

Across the town, Derek Hale wakes up too, ears hurting as his first pack—his family—stampede inside and outside a house that is not yet burnt, and never will be, if he and Stiles get their way.

That's what they're here for, after all. To save them all.