Teen Wolf 1. Chapter 1

"What do you like about her?" Lydia's voice cut through the silence in the jeep, and Stiles glanced over at her.

"What?"

"I mean, I guess objectively she's attractive." There was a tone to her voice that had Stiles frowning.

"Is this you being catty? Can't handle having another girl added to the pack?" He rolled his eyes. Lydia was brilliant, but she could also be cold, and though he saw that side of her less often now, he didn't care for it.

"Okay first of all, I'm not catty." She pouted a little as she said it, and although Stiles knew he probably shouldn't find it endearing, he did. "And secondly, if you're insinuating that I'm threatened by her, let me remind you who exactly you're talking to." The last sentence was smug, and it grated on Stiles' nerves.

"Yeah, well for someone who's not threatened, you're kind of being a bitch." Stiles said. Lydia just shrugged.

"It's not like Malia's here." The car fell back into silence, the headlights carving a road out of the darkness. Stiles stared ahead with drooping eyes. He was exhausted, they had been driving all day and were nowhere near home.

"Yeah, but I don't really feel like listening to you complain either. You are aware that you had the advantage of growing up in a house with other human beings, one that she didn't? You could cut her some slack." Even as the words left his mouth he knew they were useless. Lydia didn't cut people slack. She judged them and held them to her ridiculously high standards and when they inevitably didn't measure up she cut them down. It was just her way. Stiles had often wondered whether she met her own expectations, but he wasn't brave enough to ask.

"I grew up in a house. There weren't always people there." She said it absently, like she wasn't quite aware that he could hear her. Suddenly she looked up, studying him. He hated when she did that. "Stiles, you look really tired."

"Thank you, Lydia. Thanks a lot." The sarcasm held no real bite. She was right. He was too tired to mean it.

"I meant that maybe you should let me drive." Stiles shot her a look. He had only ever let Lydia drive the jeep once, and it was not an experience he ever planned on repeating.

"I don't think so." Even as he said it, he wasn't so sure. The last thing he needed was to have successfully tracked down the set of fangs that would age Derek back to normal and then die in a car crash a few hours from Beacon Hills.

"Stiles-" As she was about to open her mouth to remind him that the only reason she crashed his jeep that time was because he let a bee into the car, a sign flashed into view ahead. "Fine. Look, there's a motel, why don't we stop and you can sleep, and maybe we can avoid a situation where you drive us into a ditch and I die while wearing leggings." Stiles weighed his options, the flashing sign growing closer. He could try to make the drive himself, which was admittedly reckless, let Lydia drive, which was actually more reckless, or take a few hours and try to get some sleep. It wasn't like Derek was going to grow old waiting for them, which was ironically kind of the problem. With a sigh, he signaled and took the exit. Lydia seemed to relax in her seat.

"Okay, we'll take a few hours. But as soon as I'm up we're getting home. Just because this version of Derek is smaller doesn't mean he's any less impatient. Or a jerk." She just nodded. Stiles pulled up in front of the office, rubbing his hand across his face as he turned off the car. The short walk to the door seemed like a mile. He was beginning to realize the toll the last few days had taken on his body, and he had to drag himself off the seat. He swayed a little on his feet as he jumped down onto the ground, and suddenly there was a small set of arms around him, steadying him.

"God, I'm surprised you didn't fall asleep at the wheel an hour ago." Stiles ignored her, jumping when he felt a hand in his back pocket. As it disappeared, so did the weight of his wallet.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm going to do you a favor. In case you've forgotten you have to be 19 to get a room. I can see the guy at the front desk from here, it will be better if I go in by myself." She propped him up against the hood and strode toward the door. Stiles sighed. He watched through half-closed eyes as she slid through the glass door and pulled a wad of cash of from his wallet. He had taken to carrying it once it became apparent that bribes were now a necessary addition to most of their trips. Chris Argent had left them a substantial account with which to protect Beacon Hills in his absence. It had certainly come in handy.

In the office, Lydia laughed, her hand snaking out to land on the poor guy's arm. He didn't stand a chance. A few minutes later she emerged, holding up a small silver key with a look of triumph.

"I told you." Stiles just sighed and held out his hand. Lydia dropped the key into it.

"My wallet?" He shook his head as she raised an eyebrow, placing his worn weather wallet on top of the room key. He closed his hand around it. "Which room?" Lydia grabbed his hand, pulling him toward the first door, numbered 1. Stiles remembered when little touches like these had been exciting for him. Now they were familiar, a comfort rather than a shot of adrenaline. He would be lying if he said the electricity he always felt had faded, though.

When they actually managed to get the ancient key into the ancient lock and open the door, they found themselves staring at something that alarmingly resembled the set of a low budget horror film.

"Oh god." Lydia glanced at him, her face a mask of horror. He was too tired to be overly concerned about the state of their surroundings, a first for him. It would have been refreshing to not be the one complaining for once, if he hadn't been so tired.

The room was small, the floors covered in that mossy green carpet that seemed to exist exclusively in cheap motels. A nightstand separated two generous beds. There were no visible stains on either, so Stiles walked forward and collapsed face first into the closest one.

"Lock the door." His voice was muffled into the comforter, but a few seconds later he heard the click of a lock sliding into place. As soon as he stopped moving the exhaustion hit him like a drug, and he couldn't even move to kick off his shoes. The last thing he registered as he drifted off to sleep was the sound of an exasperated sigh, and something tugging on his foot.

Stiles woke up feeling stiff and not nearly rested enough. He opened one eye just enough to make out a spread of red, no, _strawberry blonde_ hair fanned across the sheets. He blinked in confusion. Forcing his eyes to widen, he glanced around at the depressingly generic furniture and the events of the night before returned to him. His eyes fell on Lydia, sleeping on the other bed a few feet away. Her face was so soft in sleep, it was a cliché really, but the wall she erected in her waking hours was gone, and Stiles couldn't help but drink it in. He pushed himself to his feet, realizing as the covers fell away that Lydia had removed his shoes, jeans and button up, leaving him in his boxers in and t-shirt. Raising an eyebrow, he grabbed his clothes from where she had left them on the floor, and headed to the bathroom.

There was a part of him, as he surveyed the questionable facilities, that was insisting quite firmly that he not step foot in the shower. But a bigger part of him longed for the alertness that would inevitably follow, so he pushed aside his skepticism that he would come out of this any cleaner and stripped out of his remaining clothes. The water pressure was dismal, and the temperature inconsistent, but the burst of cold water at the end actually helped wake him up so he was mildly satisfied as he toweled off. He got dressed and stepped back into the main room, checking his phone for the time. It was a little after six am. He frowned as he noticed the icon for no reception on his screen. He had been hoping to call Scott and tell him why they'd been held up.

He was pulled from his thoughts as a whimper filled the room. He looked up, and saw Lydia thrashing in her bed. He closed the distance between them in seconds, his hand on her face as she tossed under the sheets.

"NO!" Her voice was a scream, it was wrenching and heartbreaking and Stiles knew before her next word which nightmare she was having. "Alison!" The name as a scream sounded the same this time as it had the first, and for a second it felt like Stiles was trapped in the dream with her.

"Lydia." He tried, gently at first, to shake her awake. She continued to thrash, tears flowing from her tightly shut eyes. "Come on, wake up." He found himself about to say that it was only a dream, but it wasn't. It was the worst kind of memory, a nightmare that you didn't get to wake up from, that wouldn't fade in the daylight. At a loss, Stiles climbed onto her bed, pulling Lydia into a sitting position, her head against his chest, his arms around her waist. He spoke directly into her ear. "Lydia, wake up!" She jerked awake with a gasp, pushing away from him in confusion.

Her eyes flickered over him, then around the room. He watched as she pieced it all together, and waited. Suddenly, she grabbed him, fisting her hands in his shirt and pulling him closer, burying her face in his chest. She didn't cry, just sat like that, her ragged breathing slowly evening out. Stiles wound his arms around her back, holding her more tightly. Eventually she sat back, swiping away the tears that had already begin to dry on her cheeks.

"Sorry." She looked away, sliding off the bed and away from him. Her warmth went with her and Stiles shivered.

"Don't ever apologize to me for that." The forcefulness of his tone surprised both of them, and she just blinked. Something like disgust crossed her features.

"Stiles, did you shower?" He hesitated for a moment, thrown by the change of topic.

"I-yeah. I did." She wrinkled her nose, clearly sharing his distaste for their accommodations, but he didn't care. He found the return of a Lydia he recognized comforting, and sighed. "Okay, I'm guessing by the fact that you're making that face that you don't plan on doing the same. We should probably get going." He headed toward the door, doing a quick sweep of the room to make sure they hadn't left anything. Other than his phone and wallet, Stiles didn't remembering bringing anything with them. He turned around to see Lydia frowning down at her phone.

"No service." She held it up for him to see. He nodded.

"Yeah, me too." He grabbed his phone to check again, and found it dead. He let out a little sigh of frustration and pocketed it. "Mine's dead."

"Mine's almost dead. Any chance you brought a charger?" Stiles shook his head.

"Okay, well let's-" He gestured toward the parking lot. "It's at least six hours from here, and Scott will be wondering if something happened to us." She followed him out of the room, and the door swung shut with a bang behind them. Stiles considered locking it, and debated momentarily whether it was hotel etiquette to lock a room when you checked out. Most of the places he'd stayed had rooms that locked automatically. He was distracted when Lydia said his name, her voice sending a jolt of anxiety through him.

"Stiles." He looked up. Her face was a picture of shock, then of fear.

"What?" She just pointed. He followed her finger and saw what had her biting her lip nervously. The parking lot stretched before them, the asphalt shimmering in the heat of the day. It was empty. His jeep was nowhere in sight, the familiar blue replaced by the black of crumbling cement. "Wha-" His mouth fell open in confusion, and he stared at Lydia. Her expression sent his heart plummeting in his chest. It was familiar in the worst way.

"Stiles."

"Who is it?" That look was the same one she'd worn in his nightmares, and he was beginning to suspect in her own. "Who's going to die?" Her hand snaked forward, fisting in his shirt again, this time so tightly he was afraid she might rip it. Her eyes were an ocean of fear, and he resisted the urge to pull her in close and try to press it away.

"You." Her voice shook, but her hand held fast, her grip a vice on his chest. "Stiles, it's you."


	2. Chapter 2

"I- What do you mean me?" His voice cracked on the last syllable.

"What do you think I mean? I mean you're going to die, dumbass." The familiar sniping tone of her voice went a long way to pull Stiles back to reality. He stared at Lydia, her eyes wide, her skin pale. It was that face, the same face, the first one he'd seen when that weight lifted and the darkness of the nogitsune was finally gone. Like she had fallen twenty stories and was lying broken and dazed on the ground. It was the face of losing Alison. He didn't know what it meant that she was wearing it now.

"Okay, can you give me anything else? Like any helpful information at all?" The frightened look on Lydia's face flickered into one of haughty annoyance, but there was something dark in her eyes that didn't go away.

"It doesn't work like that. I can't control it. It's not like a magic 8 ball." Stiles looked at her incredulously.

"Are you saying you can control magic 8 balls?"

"That's not what I meant-" Their bickering was cut off by the sound of the door to the front office swinging shut. They both spun around to see a tall, dark haired woman walking toward them. She was beautiful, somewhere between twenty and thirty, and if it wasn't for the pair of long, curved fangs hanging on a chain around her neck, she would have seemed friendly. Instinctively, Stiles took a step in front of Lydia.

"Where's my jeep?" Well, thought Stiles, at least he didn't sound like the scared seventeen year old boy that he very much was in that moment. The woman smiled.

"What makes you think I would be able to answer that question?" Her voice was slow and lilting, a vaguely European accent lending a hint of music to her words.

"Well, for starters those fangs you're wearing around your neck were in a box in my backseat last time I checked." Her almost distractingly full lips twitched, as though she was suppressing a laugh. "And it's not like you're the only other person here or anything. So there's that." The woman shook her head, raising an eyebrow at Lydia.

"Your boyfriend, he is very sarcastic. I don't like that in a man so much. But he is very cute." She stepped closer, trailing a finger along Stiles chest. He didn't realize he was holding his breath, but Lydia did. An expression of distaste crossed her features before she rolled her eyes.

"He's not my boyfriend. And as much as I would enjoy hearing the entirety of your profile, how about you tell us what you want. If it was just the fangs, why don't you give us back that piece of junk Stiles calls a jeep, and let us get out of your hair." Stiles stared at Lydia. She wasn't Alison, she didn't love to fight, didn't relish the idea of a battle the way her friend had. But she was stubborn, maybe more so than anyone he had ever met, and she didn't like to lose. Why was she giving up so easily? They had spent nearly four days in the desert in Nevada trying to find those fangs, and she had complained without end the entire time. It wasn't like her to let someone take something from her so easily. He jumped in, not so willing to give up what they had come for.

"Why do you want them? Because we actually would only need to borrow those, for like two days, just so we could restore a brooding pubescent werewolf to his adult-sized, facial-haired glory. And then, you know, you could take them." The woman waved her hand in the air dismissively.

"I know all about Derek Hale and the change that was put on him. His problems are of little interest to me." Her eyes narrowed as she stared at Stiles, and something about her gaze made his skin crawl. "You however, are very interesting. How is it that you got into my grandfather's house to steal these from his crypt?" Lydia frowned.

"Crypt? You mean the hole in the ground that his body was dumped in like a hamster?" Stiles noticed the rage in the woman's face before Lydia did, and he stepped in front of her.

"You," She hissed, her face twisted in anger, "were not able to see the crypt of the man whose body you defiled because you were unworthy. Do not presume to speak on things you do not understand."

"You're talking about all the iron?" The words slipped out before he could stop them. Her eyes widened in surprise.

"You could see it. The spirit gate."

"If that's what all that iron work was, then yeah." He thought back to how odd it had looked against the dust of the basement floor. The house itself had been easy to break into, small and old and abandoned, why anyone would have chosen to bury a family member inside had been a question on his mind. When they had descended the stairs into the basement he had noticed the spiraling black gates rising out of the floor, hinged together against one of the walls. He had assumed they were meant to stand outside, where they could be opened, but he was beginning to suspect they were exactly where they were intended to be. The other pieces of metal winding around the walls and the ceiling had looked just as out of place. Stiles glanced over at Lydia. He hadn't mentioned the strange decorations because they had gotten in and out quickly, both spooked by the idea of grave robbing. He hadn't realized she hadn't seen them.

"But that's…" The woman seemed at a loss. "You are a human." Her gaze flickered over to Lydia. "She is supernatural, but she does not have the sight because she lives in the world of shadows, she stands with death. But you, you should not have the sight, you are not…" She stepped closer suddenly hooking a hand around the back of his neck.

"Woah what are you-" She yanked him forward pressing her lips to his in an almost violently passionate kiss. Lydia watched in shock, then irritation. She cleared her throat. The woman broke off with a noise of alarm. She let go of Stiles, backing away. The look on her face, for the first time, was not one of superiority. She looked afraid. Stiles, looking a little shell-shocked just stared at her. Without another word, she spun on her heel and ran for the woods, disappearing into the trees. Stiles thought he saw a flash of fur before the shadows eclipsed it, but he couldn't be sure.

There was silence for a moment, both of them too confused to know what to say. Finally, Lydia broke the silence.

"What the hell was that?" Her cheeks had a slight flush, her eyebrow creased in something other than confusion. They had moved closer, unconsciously, and Stiles found himself looking down at her.

"I... have no idea. I literally have no idea what's going on." He found himself pressing the heels of his palms into his eyes, pushing until he saw stars. The fangs that they had spent four days hiking through the Arizona desert for and stolen off a corpse were gone. His jeep was gone. Their phones were dead, and it appeared that the guy who had been working at the front desk of the motel the night before was also gone. Stiles had a strong suspicion he wouldn't be back. "I- don't even know where we are." The words came out roughly. He hadn't realized how angry he was. It was as though suddenly his frustration with the past few months, with Scott turning and Lydia screaming and the never ending parade of supernatural events and monsters was finally tallying up in his mind.

When his best friend had been bitten, and turned into a werewolf, Stiles had accepted it. It had been there and it had been real, and Scott was his brother so he took it in stride as best he could and helped him through the transformation. When it had become apparent that not only Scott but Beacon Hills in general were attracting every kind of supernatural werebeast and demon within a 100 mile radius, he had rolled with it. There hadn't been time to reflect on the absurdity of their situation, there was always someone to save, something to kill. When he had gotten sick he remembered thinking maybe it wasn't such a surprise that he was losing his mind after all. He had been afraid in a way monster wolves and Japanese demons couldn't ever touch. He was the token human of the group, he was just Stiles and he was weak and he was clumsy and he was not, in his own opinion, particularly striking. But he was smart. He was clever and logical and he put things together, and because of that he still had something. He saved people. If he was sick, if he was losing his mind, he had nothing.

That blanket terror was like an eclipse, he felt nothing other than his own madness, and then when the nogitsune took over he was trapped in his own head. Now it was suddenly apparent to him that his life was the material of a bad comic series, and he couldn't contain his laughter. It burbled out of him, angry and incredulous, and Lydia stared at him like he'd lost his mind. Again.

"What?" He just shook his head, the last of the laughter trailing away, leaving a slightly less tense silence than before.

"Nothing. We need to check this place out. See if there's a phone or something. At the very least a map so I know where we are." He gestured toward the office building, waiting until Lydia started walking toward it to follow her.

"She was weird." Lydia's voice came from somewhere under the desk, and Stiles just rolled his eyes as he sifted through the contents of the filing cabinet. They had entered the front office building to find it, unsurprisingly, abandoned. Deciding they had no way of getting home, and no way to call for a rescue, they had taken to tearing the office apart, looking for any supplies that could be useful. So far they had amassed a couple flashlights and a map, telling them they were about thirty minutes over the state line. The closest town was Susanville, but that would have been two hours driving. Walking, it would be at least 15, and they didn't know who that woman was, or if she'd brought friends. Deciding it was safer to stay at the motel for the moment, they'd hoped to find a working phone, but had no luck. They didn't even have computers, instead a hard copy of all guest records had been written out in a log book. From the looks of things, there hadn't been many.

"Do we honestly meet any other kind of people?" He didn't mean to be sarcastic, but it was his default, and he was too busy sifting through office supplies to worry about it. He could hear Lydia sigh even over the noise of the jurassic air conditioner.

"I wouldn't have thought you'd even notice that, considering." Stiles rolled his eyes.

"Are you calling me weird? You are aware that you're a banshee, right? Supernatural being?" She didn't reply, and he glanced up. He could just make out the tips of her boots sticking out from under the desk. "Lydia?" Nothing. Worried, he squatted down, and caught sight of her lying on her stomach, a knife in her hand. She glanced over her shoulder to look at him.

"I found something."

"Yeah," he said slowly, eyes on the blade "that's a knife." She gave him a scathing look.

"Thank you for that. No, it was on the floor, there's blood on it. It has an inscription on the blade." She wiggled out from under the desk and handed it to him. "See? It says quem amiserat. It means the lost. When I touched it…" She looked up at him with those big, sad eyes that he had never quite adjusted to, and blew out a breath. "It felt like death."

Stiles tried not to let it hurt him when he looked at her and he saw scars. He'd loved her since the third grade, back when she had been untouched and unharmed and the world hadn't yet started leaving marks like tattoos on her innocence. He loved her still, after tragedy had scorched it's footsteps permanently in her eyes, and every time she shook, or she cried, and he was reminded that fearlessness had its cost, it hurt him. He looked down at the knife in his hand, still stained a rusty brown with blood that had long dried, and his eyes fell across the lettering on the blade. The lost.

Wasn't everyone? He thought of Beacon Hills, and the civilians who lived and breathed there every day with no knowledge of the horror show that was the reality of their home. The people, like Scott, who knew and were fighting and would probably die fighting but would never give up the idea that it was their responsibility. He thought of his father, who was trying to police a town that didn't need police, it needed shamans, and yet he strapped on his gun every day and did what he could because he couldn't do nothing. He thought of Melissa McCall, who was a nurse and saw horrifying things every day and one of those things was her son but she had accepted it and she loved him with an honesty that Stiles couldn't even remember in his own home. They were all lost. They fought, and they loved, and they tried their best to live, but none of them really knew where they were going. Most of Beacon Hills was living a lie. The rest were just trying to survive. Sometimes having a clear view down the road of your future is too bleak to stomach. So they didn't look that far down the road, they just went blindly on. So they were lost.

He folded the knife in on itself and pocketed it. They could probably use it once he'd washed off the blood, but at the moment he was more concerned with getting them home than figuring out who was after them. Every moment without their pack, without Scott, left him feeling vulnerable to the point where he was raw. He doubted he could protect Lydia, he doubted he could protect himself. He was just a human, used to having a pack of werewolf body guards to boss around and involve in his plans.

"I'm guessing there's no chance you found some food." His stomach growled as he voiced his thoughts, and Lydia shook her head.

"Not even a box of crackers. Do you think there's anywhere to eat close enough that we could walk?" Stiles sighed.

"I don't know. We would probably just get lost, and who knows if that weird predatory chick is still out there."

"Please. Predatory? You didn't look like you were complaining when she had her predatory face all over you." Lydia sniffed, prompting Stiles to roll his eyes so hard he gave himself a headache.

"Hey. I was the one who was assaulted by a stranger who stole my jeep and stranded us in the middle of nowhere. I'm not exactly planning on asking her to prom." His stomach growled again, louder. "And I'm starving. We're going to starve to death." He moaned and flopped onto the ground, closing his eyes. The exhaustion that he had barely staved off the night before was back, with a vengeance. He felt someone lie down beside him.

"We're not going to die. At least not yet. I would know." Her voice was close to his ear, and it soothed the raw edge of his anxiety. She might not be of particular defensive use to him, but he was glad to have her there.

"Yeah but I will. Sometime soon, right? Before I starve to death?" He couldn't even muster up the energy to be afraid anymore. It was starting to feel like he had spent the past year being afraid. Now he was just tired. And hungry. He felt something touch his hand, and then he felt Lydia lace her fingers through his, squeezing hard.

"I don't know, Stiles. I feel it, but it's different than the other times." She sounded far away. Stiles didn't like it.

"Banshees are just a wealth of information, aren't they." Once again, the sarcasm dripped out accidentally. He was beginning to suspect Lydia just tuned it out.

"Shut up, Stiles." She squeezed his hand again, and Stiles began to suspect that she was more afraid than she let on. It would be typical of her, so he squeezed back, and they lay in silence for a while. There were, he thought, as they lay there, different kinds of lost. They were literally lost at the moment, stranded geographically from where they needed to be. They were lost from the people they needed, they had lost the things that they needed, and they were beginning to lose faith that things would ever really turn out okay for them. Death was just another type of loss. You were lost from your body, lost from your life, lost from the world. Stiles wasn't sure if he believed in the afterlife. He had thought, after his mother died, that there had to be something, because his mother's life was short and it hadn't been conceivable to his underdeveloped brain that the world could just be that cruel as to cut a person out of existence. So she had only been lost to Stiles, and he had been lost in his own life for a while. If he died, he would be lost to everyone he loved that was living. And they would be lost to him. But maybe he would get something back, something from his old life, something like his mother. It sparked a question, one that would lodge itself in his mind playing over and over and over just to drown out the ambiguity of his oncoming death.

Did lost things ever find each other?


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: **Sorry guys, long wait short chapter but school's been a bitch. I promise I'll try and do better. You know what might speed things up a little? Reviews 3

* * *

"Stiles." A voice buzzed in his ear, and he ignored it, exhausted. "Stiles!" He groaned into his pillow, trying to wave the voice away.

"Five more minutes, dad." He mumbled. The next thing he knew someone had shoved him, hard, and he rolled unceremoniously onto the floor. His eyes shot open.

"Do I look like your father?" Lydia stood over him, arms crossed.

"No, of course n-" He looked up at the annoyed redhead. "Actually, when you make that expression you look exactly like my dad." Pushing himself to his feet, Stiles groaned. "That's gonna bruise." From the noise Lydia made as she turned toward the window, she wasn't overly remorseful for the sudden display of violence.

"I found this-" She threw something at him, it landed with a soft thud on the bed. "In a drawer in one of the other guest rooms. I guess someone left it behind." Stiles picked it up, chest nearly aching with relief when he recognized it as a phone charger. "It doesn't fit my phone, but it should fit yours." She nodded toward the currently useless hunk of plastic and metal on the bedside table. Stiles jumped off the bed, grabbing Lydia by her wrist and snaking her into a crushing hug.

"I could just-" He pulled back far enough to press a kiss to her forehead. "Lydia Martin, I love you." She rolled her eyes.

"I know."

Stiles released her, ignoring the urge to slip his hands all the way around her waist and pull her closer. He grabbed the cable laying on the bed, and started searching for an outlet. After determining that the only outlet in the room was the one currently powering the lamp, he sighed.

"That's just great." There was no overhead light, just the one lamp, and the bottom of the double outlet seemed to be broken. He glanced out the window, where the sun was already beginning to set. Resigned, he tugged on the cord for the lamp, and the room darkened. There was still enough natural light to see, but it would fade soon, and then they would be stuck in the dark, defenseless and blind. He plugged in his phone and waited, and after a few seconds the screen lit up. Stiles let out a breath he hadn't realized he had been holding.

Something brushed his back and he panicked, the darkness making him feel edgy and exposed. He spun around, slamming Lydia against the wall. She blinked at him, eyes huge in the dim lighting.

"Don't sneak up on me like that." His voice was low, heart was hammering in his chest. He had been through enough in the past year that his nerves were often raw, and he felt a twinge of annoyance at Lydia for being so careless. She had been there with him, she should know.

"Sorry." Her voice trembled, and the anger ebbed away. Stiles let go of her wrists, backing away. The shock on her face sent a wave of guilt crashing over him, and he sighed.

"Yeah, me too." He said. Lydia didn't move from the wall, eyes still massive and staring. The guilt swelled and he stepped forward, slowly. "Hey. Lydia." She seemed to relax a tiny bit, but stayed where she was. Stiles reached forward, gently pulling her in by her shoulders. He wrapped his arms around her, and waited. After a few seconds he felt her body loosen, head tipping forward to lean against his chest. Small arms wound around his back, and his hand drifted upward to rest on her hair. They stayed like that as the light faded, and it was dark when Lydia finally spoke.

"I forget." Her voice was raspier than usual. Stiles wondered how long they had been standing like that.

"What?" He asked, pulling away and sitting on the bed. Lydia followed him, resting her head on his shoulder.

"I forget that things affect you, I forget what you've been through." She said. Stiles looked at her incredulously.

"Are you saying you forget that I'm afraid of things? Because I've never exactly hidden that well." He flashed back to every time he'd use the word terrified in the last year. There were a lot of times.

"You always talk through it, Stiles. You say you're terrified, but then you throw yourself into danger and you make some ridiculous plan and end up saving us." Lydia murmured, her eyes reflecting what little moonlight was filtering through the window.

"My plans… they're not what saves us. Scott is. He always has been." He thought back to the months following his mother's death, the way he hadn't been able to sit still, the way he had been afraid that if he stopped moving, even for a second, his grief would catch him, pull him under. It had been Scott who had been there, unwavering in his quiet support. It was like Stiles could feel him, in his head, even when Scott said nothing. _I'm here, Stiles. I'll be here._ It was what had gotten him through. Scott had been his savior all along.

"You think that because you're human you aren't important. That you don't… make a difference." Stiles made a noise, ready to interrupt her, but she held up a finger. He waited. "I've dated a werewolf. Well, werewolves. And a kanima. Honestly, I feel safer with you." She let her hand drop, but Stiles stayed silent. He didn't know how to begin to respond to that. She felt safe with him, here, in the middle of the woods without Scott and Kira and Malia to protect them. He made her feel safe. Unable to find the words, he just wrapped his arm a little more tightly around her and rested his chin on her head. Maybe they would get out of here in one piece after all.

"That's not to say I don't want to get out of here. See if your phone has charged." She spoke again, and Stiles jumped to his feet. He had almost forgotten. Closing the short distance to his phone, he prayed and press the power button. The little tune that played as a logo flashed across his screen sent a wave of relief through him. When the no signal symbol popped up he waited. And waited. Finally, letting out a sigh, he turned to Lydia.

"Still no signal. How do you feel about going on a hike?" Her face said enough. Stiles rubbed tiredly at his face. "How about this. We stay here until it's light out, then we try and find a spot with reception. We can't just stay here forever, it's been almost a day and a half since we've eaten." As if on cue, his stomach growled. He looked pointedly over at her. She bit her lip, and he had to look away. Just because they were in the middle of nowhere didn't mean the normal rules didn't apply. Lydia wasn't interested in him, and he was with Malia. Sort of. Her voice pulled him back to reality.

"Alright, fine. I wish I'd worn my hiking boots." Stiles glanced down at her high heeled boots and suppressed a smirk. The heels were practically a Lydia Martin trademark, but he liked the way he towered over her when they were at his house and she had kicked off her shoes. It evened the playing field, a little. He didn't have much over her. She was smart, brilliant, actually. Her mind was quick and clear and it constantly amazed him. She was beautiful and strong and full of fire. And Stiles, Stiles was awkward and hyper and full of doubt.

They made a surprisingly good team, but he knew that she was out of his league. So was Malia, actually, but she didn't have enough human perspective to realize that yet. Something about Lydia had captivated him since the third grade. He had loved her as long as he could remember. That love had changed as he'd gotten to know her, that aching unrequited crush had relaxed into friendship. The attraction was still there, but it was tempered by the annoyance that flared up whenever they spent time together. They may have made a great team, but it was rare that five minutes went by when they were together without an argument.

Still exhausted after getting no more than 2 hours sleep at a time for the last two days, Stiles collapsed back onto his bed. He had already pulled back the covers, so he kicked off his shoes and stepped out of his jeans, finally crawling into bed in his boxers. Clearly Lydia had seen everything the night before, and he was too tired to be modest.

"Night." He muttered into his pillow.

"Goodnight." Lydia sounded tired, and sad. Stiles flashed back to earlier, Lydia thrashing under her sheets, her face pale and strained. He hesitated, thinking. Making up his mind, he rolled over throwing one arm out across the bed. He nodded toward Lydia. She stared at him for a few moments, and he started to wonder if he had just made a fool of himself, but then she sighed. Copying him, she kicked off her boots and shrugged off her jacket. Looking exhausted, she slid into bed beside him, and he tightened his arm around her. Having left the phone charging, there was no lamp to turn off. Lydia rested her head on his chest, and Stiles tried not to think about how right it felt. He pressed a chaste kiss to the top of her head, then shut his eyes.

Lydia sighed into his t-shirt and it sounded suspiciously like _thank you_. The night was quiet, and while they both knew they had a long day ahead of them, neither was willing to give up their small moment of peace. They drifted off like that, quiet and comforted, and completely unaware that they wouldn't be waking up the next morning.


	4. Quick Note

Hey Guys,

So I never update with Author's notes but I wanted to let you know this story is complete, and I'm now working on the sequel. It just ended up being a different enough plot that I felt it needed a different summary and it's own space. Please check that out if you want to know how this story ends. Chapter 1 is now up, so technically there is a new chapter it's just not here. The sequel is called We Can't Go Back (Or Can We).

Thanks! I hope you're enjoying this!


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Teen Wolf, Romance, Supernatural