Disclaimer: I don't own anything.

Author Notes: Set after the season two finale episode 'Master Plan.'

It was extremely difficult to find a comfortable way to lie down when your body was covered with bruises and each body part had its own special ache or pain. Stiles glared up at the ceiling and tried to reposition again. No, that was even worse. He'd taken all the medication that he could and it still sucked. He wasn't going to get any sleep tonight, or possibly ever again.

Stiles didn't call for help. His Dad had been hovering since Stiles had stumbled home and was still pretty upset and angry at what had happened to his son which in turn made Stiles feel guilty for getting hurt and worrying his father. The Stilinski house was not a happy one.

Stiles was considering just how painful it would be to text somebody when he heard two sets of footsteps approaching his room. His Dad entered first.

"You've got a visitor."

Then Isaac slid in, looking almost shy. The Sheriff nodded at him.

"Don't tire him out."

Once the Sheriff left, Isaac stepped closer. Stiles eyed him curiously. He hadn't expected anybody to come and see him – the evening had been a nuclear brand of crazy for everybody and the pack probably wanted to lick wounds and heal together. So why was Isaac here?

"Thought you'd be with pack tonight."

Isaac looked at him like he was stupid. "I am."

Stiles coughed out a laugh and winced at how much it hurt his ribs. "Ah, please, no mocking right now. My body's turned on me and it doesn't need the extra ammunition."

Isaac frowned and sort of hovered near Stiles. Oh God, another one.

"What? You're making me nervous with the hovering and the silence."

"You don't know?"

Really? They were going to play these kind of frustrating Derek-Hale-esque games now? When he was injured? "Know what?"

"You're pack, Stiles."

Stiles gaped for a while before lifting his chin and trying to look away without causing himself any more pain. "Did I mention that mocking me right now causes injuries? Unless that was your game plan, in which case bravo."

Isaac hovered indecisively for a second, then sat down on Stiles' bed. "You've been pack for a while, since before Scott joined us."

Stiles shook his head. "No, I'm human, and clearly the easy one to kidnap. I'm pretty sure Derek doesn't want liabilities like that in his pack."

His heartrate went up a little when he thought about Derek. Isaac was good enough not to comment on it. Instead, he scooted closer and pressed a hand to Stiles' collarbone, bared by his loose pajama top.

"Woah, unexpected. What's with the…?"

His words tampered off as heat rushed through him and weird inky-black veins spiderwebbed across Isaac's arm. It was like he could barely breathe until Isaac let go, swaying for a second and suddenly looking a lot more pale and wan. Stiles gasped in air and then tried to scramble out of Isaac's reach, which he realized he could do without feeling pain. And some of the marks had faded from his arms and chest.

"What the hell just happened?"

Isaac managed a tired smile. "Werewolves can take away people's pain."

"And suffer instead?" At Isaac's nod, Stiles shook his head. "Thanks, but why would you…? I mean, really, thanks, but why…?"

Isaac gave him that look again and hey, that was uncalled for. "You're pack."

Huh. He really did believe that, didn't he? Stiles was still pretty convinced otherwise.

"Okay, like I said, thanks, but please, don't do that again. It's going to look really weird if I'm suddenly, you know, unmarked."

Isaac nodded, then slunk down onto the bedclothes. He curled himself up next to Stiles, his head resting on Stiles' good shoulder. Stiles froze for a moment; because there was no way he'd been expecting that. Isaac rested a hand on his leg.

"You're pack, Stiles. This helps."

So this was something the whole pack did? Often? Like a…wolf pile? He'd seen enough Animal Planet for that to make sense, sort of. And it did feel nice. Stiles could feel the tension beginning to leave him.

"How come you're not doing this with the others?"

"Derek and Peter are looking for Boyd and Erica. There's an Alpha pack out there."

An Alpha pack? Stiles shifted so that he could look at Isaac. "A pack of Alphas? How does that even work?"

Isaac shrugged and hesitated before asking "I thought Peter was dead."

Yeah. So did Stiles. And he was going to package up that whole being-offered-the-bite thing and push it right to the back of his mind so that he didn't have to think about it. He shrugged a little. "He was. Derek killed him. Hey, I'll tell you that story, if you fill me in on the Alpha pack."

So they exchanged stories, not that Stiles enjoyed recounting how very screwed up the Hale family past was and how surviving the house fire that had killed most of his family had turned Peter a particularly murderous degree of insane. Still, it was something that Isaac should definitely know about if Peter was sticking around. How did that even work, Peter and Derek peacefully co-existing in the same pack? Peter had to have an endgame in mind. And Stiles would get right onto thinking about that once his body was completely healed.

Isaac's breathing had evened out once they'd stopped talking and he was now asleep. He looked so young. What a week it had been for everyone. Clearly Derek had decided that Isaac was too exhausted to help in the hunt or maybe he'd wanted some quality time with his crazy undead uncle. Either way, Stiles was glad of the company.

Speaking of, why hadn't his Dad come up to tell Isaac that it was time to head home? It was very un-Dad-like behavior. Unless...had he been talking to Mrs McCall? Did he know something, something werewolfy? Oh God, that was a thought to terrify. It explained his constant checks on Stiles and some of the weird facial expressions he'd been sporting. And he'd probably wait for the perfect time to ambush Stiles with that revelation and say exactly what he thought of it. Great.

Stiles eyed his bedroom window. No secret visitors since the kidnapping. Had Derek and Peter found the others yet? Or had the Alpha pack found them? An Alpha pack. He really had to hit the books tomorrow. He already felt free of a lot of the pain.

Stiles yawned – who knew that hitting a giant lizard with your Jeep would make you so tired? – and managed to find a comfortable way to lie down without disturbing Isaac. He was asleep in seconds.

Sleep was good, right up until a noise woke Stiles and he noticed a particularly familiar shadow in the corner of his room. He had to swallow down a reactionary yelp. His Dad might be weirdly accepting of pack-mates and wolf behavior, but he was definitely not going to be cool with an older one-time murder suspect hanging out in Stiles' bedroom in the middle of the night.

"How is it possible that you trained your betas to have more manners than you? Isaac actually knocked, on the front door."

Derek took a couple of steps nearer. "Pretty sure your Dad wouldn't want to answer the door right now and find me there."

Okay, point. Still. Stile struggled to sit up until Derek pressed a hand gently to his shoulder. The gesture felt weirdly intimate in the dark and it made something funny happen to Stiles' heartbeat. It got even more intimate when Derek leaned closer, his breath warm on Stiles' face before he scented Stiles' neck. Reassurance, Stiles realized. Derek had nearly lost his pack tonight and now he wanted to make sure that they were all present and accounted for, and safe. Wow, Stiles really was part of the pack.

He wet his suddenly dry mouth. "So…um…Boyd and Erica are okay?"

Something shifted in Derek's expression. "Maybe."

"Maybe? Maybe is not an answer. Maybe is a stalling tactic. I know this because I am the king of stalling, okay?"

There was another shift in Derek's expression. His hand stayed where it was, warm through a thin cotton layer of pajamas. "The Alpha pack sent a message. Erica and Boyd are sleeping it off."

A message. Probably the same message that Gerard Argent had sent when kidnapping Stiles. Stiles flinched at the memory. Derek shifted a little closer and squeezed his shoulder. After a moment's hesitation, Stiles wrapped his hand around Derek's wrist. It felt like the right thing to do and Derek wasn't glaring at him. Instead, he was staring – and there was a difference, Stiles had mentally cataloged all of Derek's eye-piercing looks. His intense gaze was raking Stiles like he was doing some cataloging of his own. He must have noticed the dance that Stiles' heart had done when Derek had touched his shoulder. Why not add humiliation to tonight's pain?

Derek's gaze shifted to Isaac, who was still curled up against Stiles.

"He's wiped out. He did something, something that took away my pain? Can all werewolves do that?"

Derek nodded, his free hand stroking briefly through Isaac's pale curls. "It's stronger in me, as the Alpha."

Stiles bit his lip. He had a question forming. But now that Derek was here, touching him, he was seriously rethinking asking it. He wasn't going to find an answer anywhere else though, as his other source was currently asleep and could be ordered by the Alpha not to answer. So he bit the proverbial bullet.

"Did you tell Isaac to come here and do that?"

The silence seemed deafening afterward. Derek shook his head.

"I told him to stay safe and hidden in case the Alphas were out looking for more of our pack, and that I'd let him know when it was safe at the den."

And Isaac had decided that the safest place to be was in Stiles' bedroom – admittedly the Sheriff and his gun were at home too, so it was kind of a good call. Isaac had also decided that healing Stiles and suffering himself in Stiles' place was top of the 'to do' list too.

"Huh," was all Stiles could come out with.

Something that might have been a tiny smile flickered across Derek's face. Then he disentangled himself from Stiles and straightened out. Stiles felt oddly bereft. Derek didn't look so hot either. He probably thought he was hiding it behind his impenetrable walls but Stiles had his number, literally and figuratively. How many miles had Derek covered tonight searching out his missing pack members?

"You look like shit, sourwolf. Get some sleep."

Derek, who'd begun heading for the window, turned back slowly and pointedly raised his eyebrows at Stiles' bedmate. Stiles flushed, something that he prayed was hidden by the darkness.

"Not that I wouldn't love to be the filling in a werewolf sandwich, but my Dad's not a fan and risking it after today seems like bad idea since he keeps checking up on me and will probably give me a wake-up call tomorrow…"

Derek continued to look significantly at Isaac, because wouldn't Stiles' Dad have something to say about somebody else that had spent time in a Beacon Hills interrogation room lying in bed with his son? Ah.

"Yeah, about that. I think my Dad might know…something. It's just a hunch but he didn't kick Isaac out and Mrs McCall knows and she knows I know about everything so they've probably talked because he ought to know about it and now he does, probably."

Derek nodded. "He hasn't said anything?"

"Oh no. He'll hold onto it so that he can surprise me with it when I least expect it, or he'll wait to see if I'll crack first and tell him. It's Parenting 101 – How To Traumatize Your Offspring."

That, Derek smirked at.

"Another time then," was all he said before he disappeared out of the window.

It was Stiles' turn to stare as he spluttered. Another time? Another time to come curl up in Stiles' bed when Stiles was in it? And if Isaac hadn't done it, would Derek have healed Stiles? Stiles ground his teeth and settled back down to begin the futile search for sleep.

There was no way he was going to find restful dreams after that conversation. His heart was still hammering fast. And his shoulder still felt warm from Derek's touch.

When he woke up the next morning, Isaac was grinning at him knowingly. Because he'd no doubt smelled his Alpha's night-time visit. Great. Stiles threw his alarm clock in Isaac's direction. Fucking werewolves.