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isthatbloodonhisshirt · 7 years

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Fever

Sterek A-Z Challenge: Fever

Derek threw open the freezer door, heart pounding in his chest and hands fumbling to grab anything he could find. He had some ice cubes in a tray; not very many, but it was better than nothing. He had a bag of perogies, and some random frozen dinners.

Grabbing everything and shoving it on the counter, he turned and checked that he truly had gotten it all. His freezer was saddeningly empty. That was legitimately all he had. He had never wished so badly in his life to have more food in his freezer.

“Derek, hurry up!”

“I’m coming,” he snapped back, knowing he was directing his anger where it wasn’t warranted, but unable to help himself.

Turning back to the counter, he grabbed the few meagre items he’d managed to scrape up and raced for his bathroom. He slammed into the half-closed door, the knob slamming hard into the opposite wall and cracking into the plaster. He didn’t have the ability to care right then, moving around Deaton and Scott to dump what he’d found into the still-filling tub.

He narrowly avoided getting hit in the face by a flailing arm, the screaming so loud that it was hurting his ears. It only disappeared in brief stints when water entered his mouth and briefly drowned out the sound—literally.

Scott’s shirt was soaked, hands pressed against a broad chest while Deaton continued to look quickly through vials of herbs and powders before standing and occasionally dumping the contents of one into the bath.

Derek, his job done, just stared. He didn’t know what else to do.

Stiles was screaming at the top of his lungs, legs kicking, hips arching, and hands grabbing at Scott desperately, as if there was some way for him to make the pain stop. Scott looked like he wanted to cry, having to yell over Stiles’ screams of agony, insisting he had to stay down, he had to keep himself in the tub.

Every few minutes, Derek would move forward and help Scott dunk Stiles’ head underwater, trying to get some of the cold to seep through his scalp, but they had to be careful not to drown him since he bucked and continued to scream even while submerged.

Derek didn’t know how this had happened. It was supposed to be an easy kill. They’d found the beast, they’d cornered it in the woods. Derek and Scott had taken it out, cut its head clean off its body. They were done. It was supposed to be over.

Stiles had sauntered into the clearing, like the smarmy little shit he was, and while he’d been talking to them about what he’d found that was no longer relevant considering the thing was dead, all of a sudden its tail had whipped up out of nowhere and stabbed Stiles right through the shoulder.

He’d started screaming immediately, and at first Derek thought he was exaggerating, but then he and Scott saw the book he’d been holding and the words written within.

The beast’s tail literally boiled people alive from the inside. Stiles’ insides were burning and liquefying as Derek stood there, staring, feeling helpless.

They’d called Deaton right away, and he had told them to get him back to the loft and into a tub. Originally he’d said the Hale house, since it was closer, but the plumbing there was shoddy at best, and if Stiles was dying, there was no way Derek was risking that.

He’d probably been attempting to break the sound barrier with the speeding he’d been doing trying to get to the loft. Deaton had already been there when they’d shown up and together they’d gotten Stiles into the tub.

There was nothing they could do to fix this. It was one of those ‘has to run its course’ things, and Stiles would either survive or he wouldn’t. That was how this worked. He would survive the heat, or he would burn alive from the inside.

Derek felt his nails digging into his palms, watching Stiles thrash while Deaton read through an old, leather-bound book, mumbling to himself. He looked like he was having a hard time concentrating, which was understandable. Derek could barely hear himself think.

He hated that this had happened. Hated that Stiles had even been there. He was always getting himself into trouble, it didn’t matter if it was on purpose or not. Derek hated it. He had such a small family left, and he didn’t want to lose anyone else.

Not like Erica. Not like Boyd. Not even like Isaac, who’d left and never come back. Derek needed Stiles to be okay. He needed his pack to survive this.

Fuck it, he needed Stiles to survive this. Why did it have to be Stiles? Was the universe laughing at him? Did they think seeing him suffer was funny? Sometimes it felt like it, because no matter what he did, he always seemed to lose the ones he cared about most.

His family, his betas, Stiles. He couldn’t lose Stiles. It was why he’d never mentioned how important he was to him. Once he said it out loud, it made it possible for something to rip him away. Once he admitted how much he cared about him, how important he was, it made it that much easier for the universe to destroy every shred of humanity Derek had left by tearing Stiles away from him.

He’d purposefully made sure to make it very clear outwardly that he did not like Stiles, even as a friend. It had worked, for a time, but then his mask had begun to slip and now all he could assume is that the universe had caught on to his ruse and now it wanted to make him suffer.

Now it wanted to take Stiles away from him, like it had taken his parents, Laura, Erica, Boyd. It wanted to break him, and it was succeeding.

Derek snapped himself out of his depressed thoughts when he realized Scott was trembling, teeth chattering loudly. Werewolves ran hotter than humans, but even Werewolves would be affected by an ice bath, not to mention whatever Deaton had been putting in there to make the water even colder.

Stiles was starting to lose his voice, but he was still clutching almost desperately to Scott, arching his back and letting out screams and sobs, struggling to get himself under control while he was being burned alive from the inside.

Derek moved forward. “Switch with me.”

“What?” Scott asked, turning to look at him in disbelief. He looked like he was frozen, still trembling as Stiles continued to clutch at him like a lifeline. “I’m fine.”

“It wasn’t a request,” Derek snapped. “You’re frozen. Switch with me.”

It looked like Scott was going to argue more, but Deaton placed one hand on his shoulder and nodded. Scott looked like he wasn’t happy about it, but he managed to shift to the side so that Derek could kneel beside him. When Scott started to pull away, Stiles clutched at him more urgently until Derek had to physically wedge himself between the two of them.

As soon as Scott was free, Derek shoved Stiles back further into the tub. His arms burned, the water was so cold, but he endured it and let Stiles cling to his arms, blunt nails digging into his skin. He didn’t care, he just leaned forward, pressing his cheek to Stiles’ and listening to his gasping breaths and rapid heartbeat.

The screaming had stopped, but the sobbing still hit every now and then. Derek didn’t know if he was getting better or just losing cognitive functions which was affecting his ability to remember how to scream. The thought scared him and he held onto Stiles more tightly, closing his eyes and rubbing his cheek against Stiles’ wet hair.

He smelled like pain, and terror. If he was still able to feel terror, he probably remembered how to scream, which was a relief. Maybe he’d just lost his voice, or was so cold he was unable to voice his agony. Derek didn’t know. He didn’t care, as long as Stiles just held on.

“You’re too stubborn to die,” he insisted in a low voice, not caring if Scott and Deaton were listening. “You’re gonna be fine. You’re gonna make it. Because you’re too stubborn to die.”

Stiles said nothing, but his grip tightened, nails breaking skin on Derek’s arm. He didn’t care, because at least Stiles was okay enough to be trying to hurt him. And it was a welcome change, considering usually it was Derek hurting Stiles, even if it wasn’t always on purpose.

Every few minutes, Derek would warn him that he was going to dunk him, and then would proceed to do so. Sometimes Stiles came back up seeming okay. Other times, he started screaming and sobbing again. It was almost like the pain hit in waves, but when it hit, it hurt. Derek’s ears were struggling to cope with the volume of the screams now that he was practically on top of Stiles, but he didn’t care.

His ears could bleed, his eardrums could shatter, he could go deaf. He didn’t care. He just needed Stiles to be okay.

When the screaming and thrashing started up again, Deaton moved forward and began throwing more herbs and powder into the tub. That earned him a kick to the face, but he took it in stride and ordered Scott to run out and get some ice.

Scott looked like he would rather stay, but Derek wasn’t going to be the one to leave, and somehow, he felt like Scott acknowledged that, so he dug Derek’s keys out of his pocket and left. If this were anyone else in the tub, Derek wouldn’t have let Scott borrow the Camaro.

But it was Stiles in the tub, so Scott could total the damn thing if he needed to, as long as he came back with ice.

Deaton helped Derek keep Stiles mostly in the tub. He kept arching his back and kicking his legs, clawing at Derek’s arm and sobbing, begging for it to stop. Derek grit his teeth, keeping his cheek pressed against Stiles’ cheek as best as he could while the other thrashed about.

“Stiles, you’re gonna be okay,” he promised. “You’re gonna be okay, because I’m not losing someone else I care about. I’m not letting that happen. I’m done losing the people that matter. So you’re gonna survive this, even if I have to drag you kicking and screaming back from the dead.”

He didn’t even know how much of his words Stiles could hear over his own screams. Derek just held him as best he could, half of his shoulder in the tub to keep the other mostly underwater.

Trying to distract himself from how horrible this all was, he kept thinking about how lucky he was to live in a loft inside an abandoned warehouse. If he’d lived in an apartment, the police would’ve been called long before now. While it’d be okay if Parrish or the Sheriff showed up, he also wasn’t sure he’d like that.

If it was Parrish, he would insist they tell the Sheriff. If it was the Sheriff, well, God knew what he’d do. Probably force Derek to let Stiles go, and he wasn’t going to do that.

But then he thought about what would happen if Stiles died. What would the Sheriff say or do if he found out Stiles had been here, alive, for hours, suffering, and no one had called him? What if he died, and the Sheriff could’ve seen him one last time?

Derek didn’t like thinking about Stiles dying. He didn’t like worrying about it. It was making him panic, but he buried it down and struggled to stay calm, stay in control. He just held Stiles more tightly, listening to Scott’s feet pound up the stairs. The loft door slid open loudly and then Scott was there, dropping a large bag of ice on the floor and ripping the top open with his claws.

The water cooled even more when the ice was added. It made Derek’s arms go numb, and he knew he was shaking, but he didn’t care. Not once did he let Scott finish asking him to switch. He always interrupted, and held onto Stiles, and dunked his head under the water every few minutes.

Anything to ensure that Stiles survived until morning. Or however long until the fever ran its course. He didn’t care what he had to do, as long as Stiles was okay.

It was going to be a long night, but for Stiles, it would be worth it.

God, it was always, always worth it.

END.

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