The Family You Choose

"It's Stiles - he's dying."

The floorboard creaked beneath Scott's sneaker and the whole house yawned. Bodies stirred under the crowning sunrise, dipping in between boarded up windows and cracks. Isaac shifted on the couch, a single arm splayed out, bouncing against Erica's shoulder with each breath. She had fallen asleep while sitting on the carpet, back pressed up against the sofa, against Isaac. She had said it was the only way she could get comfortable with the still-healing stripes along her chest and bandaging across her cheek and neck. Now her head was tilted back, knocking Isaac's knee. Jackson had practically had to be wrestled into submission by the Alpha in order to be persuaded to stay the night somewhere without down pillows and instant coffee. He was currently drooling over on a mattress in the corner. Across the room, Derek Hale leaned next to the window, one arm stretched above his head and eyes fixed on the surrounding woods. He was shirtless again, bright white new bandaging along his back. Between Meredith and Melissa and Deaton all stopping by, he'd finally been forced to have his burns reexamined and freshly dressed. But he refused their orders of rest. He'd been keeping watch right there at the window all night. Well, since they had returned from the hospital.

The vampires hadn't stayed. Damon had done a few more laps around the entire town in search of his beloved before retiring to a fitful night of broken glasses and brotherly squabbling at a hotel. Scott only knew this much because Stefan had shown up about an hour ago, mentioning something about needing to get away from his brother and then just as quickly left to take a run in the woods; to "get to know them better" and apparently get something to eat.

Scott had never seen this many people inside the Hale house. Somehow, it made it feel even emptier. Looking around at the scattered slumbering members of Derek's pack had Scott questioning if this is something like how the house once looked, with the whole Hale family crowding every corner.

Their presence punctuated the absence and Scott wondered if Derek could feel it too. The young Beta had watched Matt level a gun at his mother and felt the floor fall out from underneath him. And then she had called him last night, wetness choking off her voice.

"It's Stiles - he's dying."

It was Derek, again, who had held Scott firm to the Earth, kept him from letting his own wolf tear him, and anyone in his way, apart.

Derek, who had been sitting in class at Scott's own school while his family was being murdered in this very house. And it was a house. It had stopped being a home the moment Kate Argent had lit the first match.

Derek, who was still squinting out the window, as if he wasn't standing on the charred and rotten remains of his loved ones.

And suddenly, every ounce of anger or resentment Scott had been holding against the Alpha was burned away. It blazed bright and hot and fast and left nothing remaining in its wake.

Boyd, Erica, Isaac - they were all alone at school in their own way. None of them had a good relationship with their parents; Boyd's hardly paying him attention, blaming him for what happened to his sister, and Isaac's father paying him too much attention, all with blood and bruises. And sure, Jackson was drowning in his own popularity at school, but the discovery of his adoption had severed something between him and his parents. Derek hadn't created a pack.

He had chosen a family.

And he wanted Scott to be a part of it.

Scott felt his phone buzzing against the inside of his pocket and slowly swam to shore and out of his stupor. He was staring at Derek and dropped his chin before the Alpha noticed. The time on his phone startled him. Had he really been standing in that same spot, sinking deeper in his thoughts, for over two hours?

The screen lit up the Sheriff's number and Scott's chest heaved.

"Scott, buddy, you gotta get me outta here."

The Beta blinked and checked the caller ID.

"Stiles? What's wrong?"

"He took it, Scotty. My cell phone. My games. Scott, he took the wifi. I didn't think he even knew how to do that."

Scott sighed. Less than 12 hours after his fever had sent him into shock and his heart had stopped for four full minutes and he was already back to his old self.

"I can hear you pacing. My mom told me you're supposed to be in the hospital for a full day of observation. Weren't the conditions of your release" - which in this case involved Meredith and Melissa going against their better judgment and medical procedures in order to keep them all safe from the Alphas - "this morning pretty clear about bed rest?"

"This isn't bed rest. This is bed anxiety. My skin is crawling. My brain is gonna start crawling all over these walls, too, if I'm cooped up here alone."

"You still keeping the mountain ash border around the house?"

"Yeah, I hid part of it under the welcome mat outside so Dad wouldn't notice and called Deaton about the baseboards, like you said you're gonna do at your place. Even my bedroom is lined. But come on, Scotty, you said it yourself. These big bad Alphas? They're not after me."

"But they could use you to get to us."

"What? So now I'm just in the way? Some damsel?"

"That night at the police station with Matt, he could've killed you. He almost did just to get me to let my mom in. It's what Gerard did. He hurt you to get to me!"

"And I never wanted you to know that. This is why I didn't tell you!"

"Yeah, and you not telling me lead to you being in the hospital. For someone so smart, you can be so -" Scott bit his tongue.

"So what Scott?"

"Look, Stiles, it's just too dangerous for you to be anywhere near this right now."

"When has that ever stopped me? Or us?"

"Well, maybe it should have!"

Isaac and Erica jostled awake in unison. Even Derek's unbreakable glare glanced toward him, and then glided back.

"You see something dangerous, and you just run right in, right? Doesn't matter if you get hurt. Or someone else. Like that night in the woods. We were out there because you wanted to see a dead body. Peter could've easily killed us. Or turned you instead. I'm a wolf because of that night. Everything is because of that night."

"You mean because of me?" Stiles' voice cracked on the other end. "You mean everything that's happened is because of me?"

"Stiles, I, you - you could've died. You did die! And this is bigger than anything we've faced before."

"Scott -"

"What if you had died, Stiles? Huh? What would I have said to your dad? You would have left him alone."

There was silence for a second. Scott knew bringing up the Sheriff would sting, but that was the point.

"We don't even know what happened to you! You were dead."

"So, what? You worried I'm gonna turn into some lizard monster too? I know that's why Derek and company were hanging around the hospital. Not like he or any of them actually care -"

"We have to be careful, Stiles. After Jackson -"

"Who I stopped with my beloved Jeep, thank you very much. Scott -"

"Stiles, I don't want you here!"

Scot could hear his best friend swallowing, breath hitching.

"Look man, I promise, I'll call if anything happens."

There was a long moment before the voice on the other end of the line sounded, small and sharp.

"Yeah, sure. Just make sure to text me if someone dies because I wasn't there to save all your asses."

Scott's eyes were closed when he heard the line go dead.

"He'll be safer," Derek spoke up before Scott's self-doubt got the chance.

The Alpha had planned on pushing his own pack away, if it came down to that. The option wasn't exactly off the table, yet.

"I said it to hurt him. It's the only way he'd stay away. First, Allison, now Stiles. Am I supposed to have anybody?"

"You have us," Derek actually looked at him this time. "You could have a pack."

"I had a girlfriend! I have a best friend."

"And they'll both be better off. And you'd be better off in our pack. You'd be stronger. We'd all be stronger."

Scott paced over the yawning floorboard once more before bowing his head low. Isaac and Erica shared a look before lifting themselves up and wandering out of the room and into the uncovered back of the house, as if it was entirely natural.

"You know, Coach threatened to kick me off the team. My grades weren't great before everything happened. Last school year, I barely passed any of my classes. I promised Coach, my mom, myself, that once everything with the Kanima was over, that this next year was going to be different. I was going to be a better friend, student, son, everything. I had Stiles and Lydia put together a reading list for me. I downloaded a Word-of-the-Day app and SAT prep. I asked Deaton for more hours at the clinic so I could save up and buy a bike so I wouldn't have to always borrow mom's car or make Stiles go out of his way. I had a plan, Derek. A good plan. It's like it never stops. Peter, hunters, Matt, a Kanima, now Alphas? When is it going to end, Derek? When do I get to just be a teenager again?"

There was a long silence and Scott was almost sure Derek had either stopped listening or wasn't going to bother answering.

"I hadn't planned on telling you any of this."

Scott's head swiveled to meet Derek's stare.

"About the Alphas. But then Boyd and Erica already had clued you into what they knew at the hospital and I knew it was only a matter of time before you went to find answers and figured it out, or got yourself killed because you didn't know what you were sticking your nose into. But Scott, I wasn't going to get you involved. You made it clear that you never wanted this life. I didn't respect that before. Didn't get it. I do now and I wanted - I wanted you to be able to just be that teenager. The teenager I never got to be. You deserved that."

For a second time that morning, Scott's mouth was swinging loose. He was pretty sure that in these past few days Derek had said more consecutive words to his face than he had ever heard from the man. He wasn't exactly sure how he was supposed to process that, let alone respond.

Maybe he wasn't as alone as he thought.

A/N: Don't worry, you'll find out what happened with Stiles after that phone call later on.