Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

The worst part of living on Pandora, was being alive on Pandora. It was a punishment on its own. The people who settled there lived in hell and pathetically counted down the days until they finally stopped being lucky. It felt like there wasn't a thing on the planet that didn't actively try to kill its inhabitants. If you wanted to do more than survive, if you wanted to really live, you had to be a criminal. You had to be willing to shoot people down, steal money, and die for the chance of a better life. Not such a big deal if you had a New-U contract. Death didn't have to be permanent on Pandora. Just frequent.

Too bad a New-U contract cost more than Stiles' weight in organs. For people like him, and so many others living honest lives, it just wasn't an option. Death was a medical bill no one could pay. Because even if you managed to scrimp and save for the contract, that was only step one. Your DNA got stored, your memories are on a file somewhere in a big database. But to replicate yourself? That required a nominal fee, a percentage of whatever you had in your bank account. So you think to yourself, keep the money on your person. Only bank a bare minimum. That's not smart, that's asking Hyperion to come to your door with a flamethrower. You'll be on the receiving end of a slow and merciless death, that sticks.

So the system was flawed. Undeniably flawed. You almost couldn't call it a system at all. But there was a group out there signing pay checks for government workers and the economy was still running. Stiles' dad use to be a sheriff. They'd lived in a small glacier outpost town that exported fish mostly. Keeping their town safe was like trying to empty the ocean with a bucket.

The best he could do was teach everyone the importance of keeping their community strong. He told everyone that they had to have hope. That they had to believe their little slice of Pandora was worth fighting for and worth being good for. The two of them had wanted to believe it would be enough. It wasn't. Now the two of them lived a handful of miles from Windshear Waste in a fortified shack, miles and miles away from anyone. Their biggest source of income these days was from scavenging the junk Jack dumped over their heads. Needless to say, they weren't rich. Dead men had small pockets.

With a grunt Stiles drove his shovel down as hard as he could into the permafrost. The spade went in an inch, maybe. He groaned and levied the shovel. His feet scrambled underneath of him, sliding this way and that over the slick ground. He grunted again and tried to pry the shovel up but it wasn't budging. The poor sap was frozen to the ground.
Stiles leaned heavily against his shovel and tipped his face to the sky. He blew out a puff of air and watched it dissipate. "You just had to be face down. Your last dying act was just a big fuck you to Stiles huh?" He reared back, rolled his shoulders, and kicked the dead man in the side. His foot connected with a crunch. Stiles drew back, howling in pain. The body was frozen solid without a single inch of forgiving flesh. He swore and started hopping around, holding his smarting foot. "Absolutely amazing!" He hissed through his teeth and swung his foot back and forth to shake out the pain.

The ground was littered with wannabe vault hunters. Most of them were just overconfident assholes that thought having a gun was enough to cut it in the big leagues. They didn't know Pandora. They didn't know the real nitty gritty of what it meant to be a vault hunter. A gun? That wasn't anything out here. You had to have enhancements, element packs, shields, relics. Pandora ate idiots like these for breakfast and walked away starving. People just didn't understand what they were getting into when they stepped off the boat. The lucky ones died landing. The unlucky ones ended up here, on Jack's dumping ground.

Your eulogy would be a quick sarcastic jab if you were lucky. But it'd probably just be the honking laughter of some huge idiot with a mini gun. Then you get a shallow grave on ice. Buzzards had taken to tossing out their hits from varying distances and betting on the landing. Sometimes the impact could cave fresh snow but more often than not it just turned the hits into people soup that spread and froze into layers and layers of red ice. More than one wayward shoe or gun had landed on Stiles' property and knocked out something important.

"What a waste." Stiles yanked his shovel free and started prowling through the ice for someone else. Face down guy had what looked like a decent shield on him but it was pointless to waste his time if he'd only break it during removal. He climbed up and over a pile of robot shells. He'd need to come back with a cart later to pick those up. Sliding down the metal, Stiles lowered himself into a crouch and tapped the ice with his shovel. Sheltered from the wind, there was another body, face up this time. She'd been young. Probably only a few years older than himself. Her eyes were open and frosted over. Stiles used the blade of his shovel to shift aside her coat. The stiff fabric cracked at the bend and slid down like a sheet of metal. Under it her skin was bare. But there was a piece missing. Someone had carefully carved a hunk out of her.

In death a Siren's markings dulled, becoming reminiscent of a scar. A lot of people on the planet thought it was Pandora sucking the magic out of them. But it didn't work like that. A siren's marks were like their eyes, when the life goes, so to does the light. Pandora had nothing to do with it. Thousands of siren's lived and died all over the galaxy just the same. Pandoran's who'd lived and died here, had children here, they didn't know any better. Most of them couldn't even read. They just knew the basics. Hyperion is bad. Blood is money. Everything can kill you.

He leaned a little closer and studied the cut on her belly. Since Eridium had come pouring out of veins of the planet siren's had gotten a boost. Some of them saw it as their chance to make it big. It was easier to steal if you could teleport or hold your victim aloft in the air. Unfortunately, being a siren on Pandora was a death sentence. Jack had something against them in a big way. Looks like she'd been picked clean too. It was probably a professional hit. Some people believed that if you ate the marked skin, or if you wore it, you'd get some of the siren's powers. Whoever cut her up knew what they were doing. They hadn't just hacked off a swatch of skin, they'd cut just outside marks to leave a thin outline of normal flesh, enough for people to know it was the real deal, but not enough to infringe on the supposed magical properties.

"Sucks to be you." Stiles stood and turned away from her. He wasn't really in the mood to scavenge people anymore. It was slim pickings this time of the week. He'd just have to make due with the scrap metal. He kicked at the ice. It would take him a few hours to get the cart out here. If the weather held he'd be able to make the trip before nightfall. If there was a whiteout he risked getting stuck out here. There was a CLAPTRAP unit nearby that would take him in if that happened. Not his first choice, but not his last. Stiles throws the shovel over his shoulder and starts walking.

When he makes it home the weather is holding. He likes his chances of getting back to the dumping ground. Stiles thinks he might even have time to make dinner himself. The house he shares with his father use to be a garage. Then Catch-A-Ride caught on and a lot of the garages just dropped off. When they bought it Stiles welded one of the bay doors shut from the inside. The other is tightly chained. He uses the side door to get in and out mostly. But it looks like it's cemented into the frame. All safety precautions.
Basically it's a one room house. Their bathroom is a little addition on the back. And they've wired up grills on a broken down vending machine they'd tipped on its side. The two of them had beds on opposite ends of the underground bays. It's tight quarters but it does the job. The things Stiles had to do to get the ECHOnet out here. The things.

He goes to the side door and leans his shoulder against it. To open it you have to lift up on the handle to set it on a small sliding hook he'd installed in the frame. He wiggles it a bit, looking for the right spot, then stumbles inside as the door swings open. He thunders inside and kicks the door shut behind him, then tosses the shovel aside.

He can't see his dad, but it doesn't look like he's left the house. His parka is hanging in an open locker across the room. Stiles strips off his extra layers and spreads them out over the rusty railings, then hops them. He lands with a thump on the dirty concrete floor. His own bed is closest to the door. His dad had protested that. As the father he wanted to be the first line of defense but Stiles put his foot down. His dad wouldn't be much help if someone came busting in. Not anymore.

He went down the stairs and skirted around the drum barrel he used as a dresser to head to his dad's side. He was asleep, heavily bundled in blankets and snoring. Stiles scooted closer. It wasn't possible to get alongside the bed, their frames had nearly bent to fit into the space. He leaned over the bed as best he could and tugged on the blankets until he could see his dad's face. It was bright pink. Stiles frowns and kneels on the edge of the bed so he can get the back of his hand on his father's forehead.

He's burning up. Stiles huffs and hurries out of their rooms to grab a rubber bag. He heads outside and starts grabbing handfuls of snow to shove in the bag. He can't get medicine right now. He doesn't have the money in his account to get a specific kind of hypo. And he hates wasting money on those basic health injections. What good is something if it just barely covers everything?

He pushes past biting pain in his fingers and stuffs the bag until it's bulging at the sides. It's the only way to break the fever. When the bag is full to bursting and Stiles can't feel his fingers anymore, he goes back inside. The sudden warmth is a shock. He shakes himself and vaults over the railing again, this time wasting no time and jumping again down into their bedroom. He runs through the narrow corridor and sees that his dad hasn't so much as twitched in his absence. His face is still bright red.

Stiles stretches over the bed to tuck the bag over his dad's forehead. The sudden cold makes him groan and shift, but he doesn't wake. Stiles rocks back off the cot and slides down the wall to sit. His feet catch on the other side, his legs too long to even stretch half way. Stiles scrubbed his face with his hands. His still cold fingers helped ease the ache building in his temples. He just couldn't afford his dad getting sick right now. Stiles threw his head back against the wall and listened to his father sleep. Looks like the scrap metal would have to wait until tomorrow.

****

Snow, ice, dead bodies. Miles and miles of this shit with no end in sight. Derek tumbled to his knees and panted. He wasn't sure what was worse, finding no one at all, or the possibility of stumbling onto a bandit encampment. He wasn't fit to fight anyone. At the rate his body was burning up he wouldn't be fit to walk much farther either. He'd been left out here to die. Twenty feet from a Bullymong dung pile with an empty pistol and his only bag of possessions. Derek dropped his hands to the ground and dug into the thick frost. His long nails gouged into the surface.

He stayed that way until his fingertips went numb and his head cleared. He'd learned his lesson. Never hire help. Hired help was only helpful until a bigger paycheck came along. Or until they got bored. Derek struggled to his feet and started walking again. The land ahead of him was the same blank landscape he'd been seeing for the past twenty miles. Every now and then he'd come across a body or an abandoned weapon. But nothing was salvageable. There was no food. There weren't any communicators or Catch-A-Ride passes. He needed to find somewhere safe.

He'd dropped off the map for a little while. Did a lot of wandering in Aegrus. While he was gone New Haven went to shit. The survivors had moved to Sanctuary. But if the rumors were true Jack was well on his way to destroying that too. Jack's influence was minimal in Aegrus. There were a few mercenaries who mentioned him in passing but Derek hadn't been there to dabble in politics or blood. He'd just wanted somewhere quiet. Mostly he spent time communing with nature, just trying to find a sense of peace.

It wouldn't come. No matter how hard he worked himself, no matter how far he walked, or how much he slept, peace wouldn't come. His rage simmered on the back burner of his mind until one day he just snapped. He came too knee deep in water, a fishing spear in one hand. He decided he couldn't be there anymore. He couldn't run away. He needed to run towards something. Even if that something was a long death at the wrong hands. As long as he was doing something.

So he'd left Aegrus. Went to the Dust to feel a warm sun that wasn't accompanied by humidity. He walked there too, carefully around the dunes, and hid in abandoned sand covered huts. He listened in and picked up rumors and news about Jack and Hyperion. He learned enough to get back into the game and sought out help. Slab's were no better than bandits and just as dumb. Derek should have known that. He'd lived on Pandora his whole life.

Derek tried to get his blood pumping. He flexed his fingers and shimmied his shoulders. When that wasn't enough he threw his head back and howled. He carried it as long as he could. In returned he heard Bullymong roar. Five or six of them. A Rakk screeched overhead. But it wouldn't attack him until he dropped. He still sounded like a predator.
For the next few miles it was just him and the Rakk's circling overhead. Their periodic screeches kept him awake, kept him walking. The cold slows him down. Makes him lethargic and average feeling. If he were on the top of his game he'd be thinking about those Bullymong he heard earlier. Instead he keeps his eyes on the horizon and his ears on the Rakk's. When he finally sees something that isn't flat land he's nearly delirious with relief.

There's ice shelves and crags. Derek sees a spot where he can ease down to lower ground. It's not until he drops to the soft dirt that he spots it. There's a jagged hole in the ice, as if something big had punched through. It's a Bullymong nest. Derek jerks himself straight and survey's the ice all around him. There's three other holes. But Derek was sure he'd heard more. He flicks his eyes back to the narrow shelf he'd crawled off of. The drop hadn't been anything going down, but to climb it? He wasn't sure he could do it quietly. It was a miracle that they hadn't heard him already.

Derek tightened the straps of his backpack and crouched low. Maybe if he moved quickly he could pass through unnoticed. To some of the creatures here he smelt enough like an animal to be invisible. He didn't have much interaction with the Bullymong. Skags he could handle. Stalkers on a good day. There was an opening in the ice a couple of yards away. If he kept close to the ice wall it'd take him longer but he would be less likely to disturb anything.

It's slow work. Each step is carefully calculated to disturb the least amount of ice and snow. As he got closer to the opening he could hear the Bullymong moving inside. Their flattened faces and pug noses made their breathing easily recognizable. Derek could still only hear three. The others had probably gone after his howl. They were heavily territorial animals and if they thought something was challenging them they'd try to cut if off at the pass.

Before him the opening shone like a beacon. Light reflected off the ice below making it impossible for Derek to see what was really beyond it. But still he crept closer. Every step forward was another inch closer to civilization. It had to be. There wasn't a hundred mile patch of land on this god-forsaken planet that didn't have someone's dirty fingers in it. Derek slid his arm out, reaching across the ice to feel for the opening. It was so close. Inches away. When he was finally able to close his fingers around the edge of the ice he breathed a sigh of relief.

A pained howl followed shortly after. Derek snarled and shifted into his Beta form. A rock had struck the tips of his fingers. It seems at least one of the Bullymong had waited outside the nest. Clever, more than he would have thought of them. Derek flexed his fingers and strained his ears. The others were running through their tunnels to their own exits, obviously ready to join the fray. Derek really had no choice but to rush them through the opening. Going back could only end in death. At least if he ran forward he had a chance. He could run.

Beside him a series of heavy crashes sounded as they leapt from their dens to the ground. Flurries of snow and ice drifted into the air giving Derek a slight edge. He crouched low and sprung forward. He darted through the opening. For a second he was blinded. The ground slopped forward until it hit the water line. The harsh sun glared off of it.

The precious few seconds he was blinded were enough to cut him down. The Bullymong that had hit him before surged forward and swiped one of it's large paws at his middle. The flesh of his belly tore in a jagged maw. He'd felt something like this only once before. A rabid skag, he had been five, maybe six. He almost hadn't survived, wouldn't have if he'd been human. The pain sent him into a white out. Too much. Derek skidded across the packed snow. His backpack was the only thing saving him from tearing his skin open to the spine.

When he came too he could hear the Bullymong panting. The others were still inside the den, growling at each other and throwing rocks and hunks of ice into anything they could reach. Derek couldn't find the strength to stand. His body shifted back against his will, to conserve energy. If felt like all the warmth in the world went with it. He could play dead. He hold his breath and pray that the beast didn't come any closer. That the savage show of strength was enough to satisfy it's sense of dominance.

That would be the cowards way. The passive way. Derek came back to society because he was sick of that. He wanted to die doing something. Didn't mind dying really. But he couldn't bare the thought of being a Bullymong's meal. Didn't want his final moments to be a game of opossum next to a pile of shit in the middle of nowhere. Derek grit his teeth and rocked to his side. He felt some of his innards shift. It was worse than he thought. He wrapped one arm tight around his middle, using his forearm to hold himself together.

The Bullymong snarled behind him and dropped down, digging it's front knuckles into the ground. It was daring him to stand. Propped up, half on his side, held by a shaky elbow, Derek gave himself a moment to breathe. He could pitch himself down the hill. If he kept his arms around his stomach he could survive that. He wasn't a threat to them anymore it might work. He heard crunching ice and closed his eyes. With his hands pressed tight to his wound he pushed himself down the hill.

Behind him the Bullymong roared and it's pack echoed its call. But Derek could barely hear it. His descent was not kind. Each impact felt like a million little hands ripping into his middle. He left in his wake a patchy trail of blood and gore. When the ground leveled out Derek didn't even have the breath to gasp. He let his arms fall away from his middle. He panted harshly, his torn belly puckering with each ragged inhale. His only blessing was that he was alone.

Overhead a Rakk screeched and Derek was reminded that he'd never been a lucky soul. He rolled over to his front. The snow cooled his burning wound. He forced himself to stand, knowing that the temptation to just lie there would overwhelm him. As he staggered to his feet he turned his eyes to the landscape in front of him. There were abandoned rail cars and cargo trailers. People liked to refit them as bunkers and way stations. One of them was cutting through a thick wall of ice. It had either been there for a long time, or someone had worked to make it a bridge.

It was all he needed to move forward. Bridges meant people. Derek pulled himself forward, focusing on small goals. Just make it to the ice pile. Just make it to the rusted barrel. Just make it to the patch of brown ice. When he was finally able to step foot on the shipping container he grinned. It twisted his mouth in a wicked way. He was sure he looked like a feral thing, no better than the rats that nested up in the Fridge.

Every footstep clanked, echoing in the confined space. The bridge cut a steep path up but Derek was determined. He kept one arm around his middle and the other against the metal wall. By now the top of his pants were tacky with congealed blood. The cold air was doing the favor of slowing the bleeding but it did no favors for his healing factor. The peak of the bridge was a blessing. Cold air cut across his face, taking his breath away. But down below was a building. Ice was built up around its sides but the bay doors were clear. Someone had to maintain that. Someone had to come out every morning and chip that away.

Derek stumbled down the snowy path to the snow covered building. It looked like a garage. There could be cars. There would be a Catch-A-Ride. Vending machines. He could get a medi-hypo. His arms windmilled out, no longer concerned with his gut. He tottered down the hill, picking up speed like an excited child. He was so close to help. He was so close. In the last few inches he slipped, kicked his own feet out from under him like a newborn pup. He pitched forward slammed into one of the bay doors. It rattled under his body. Sounded like chains.

****

A loud crash rattled the bay door. Stiles jerked up and scrambled to stand. It was just the one crash, not a steady banging. There were no roars or screeches. Nothing close enough to be a monster knocking at his door. He spared a look at his dad, still sleeping. He cautiously left his room and crossed to the chained bay door. There was no way he was opening it. But he'd installed a peep hole. As quietly as he could he pressed his face to the cold metal and peered outside. He couldn't see much. Something that could have been a foot. A person then.

Not what he was hoping for actually. People were tricky. They could plan, plot. They could stab and steal. Animals were easier. You couldn't live on Pandora and preach kindness to animals. Not if you wanted to keep all your limbs. Stiles drummed his fingers on the door. The rhythmic sound helped him think, focused his thoughts. It wasn't an animal. So people. Could be a Rat. If they got hungry enough they would walk out into the wastelands.

They don't look like they're moving though. It could be dead, attacked by an animal. Stiles stepped away from the bay door and grabbed the shotgun he kept propped up there. There could be something salvageable on it. Stiles went to the side door and spared one last look in his father's direction. He couldn't die tonight. "This had better be worth it." He shoves his shoulder into the door and lifts. The cold is shocking. The wind shear had picked up considerably since he'd come inside. It tended to, hence the name of their little hell hole.

Stiles hugs the side of the building, careful to mind the slick patches of ice that always build. He cautiously peeks around the corner. Slumped against the bay door is what looks to be a man. His clothes are mostly dark. But there's a bright swath of crimson fabric peaking out of his collar against the back of his neck. The color strikes fear in his heart.
Crimson Lance went bad. A lot of them decided that they were above the law, above morality. That because they had the bigger guns they could carve a path of destruction where ever they wanted and rule the rubble they left behind. Some of them felt differently of course. There's always outliers. The Crimson Raiders were alive and well, hiding out in Sanctuary and screwing over Jack whenever they could. But Raiders didn't come out this way. No point to. It's why Stiles and his father moved out here. No one wanted anything to do with this place. Nothing worth mining, nothing worth building. It was basically death's waiting room.

Stiles rolled back and pressed himself to the wall. He held the shotgun tight to his chest and cocked it as quietly as he could. He might have to kill a man today. He was ready for it. It wouldn't be his first, or his last. Life was quick and hard on Pandora. You learned young that taking a life wasn't the worst thing you could do. It could even be a mercy. Hard to argue when someone tried to kill you on the regular. Still, he hated the clean up. After his Dad's accident he'd gotten a little blase about killing. It hurt his dad to watch Stiles' morals deteriorate but Stiles was too tired to worry about it anymore. He'd keep his family safe, even if they hated him for it.

So when Stiles turns the corner his gun is cocked and ready. He aims it straight at the guy's head and walks with his knees bent. He's ready to spring at a moment's notice. More than once his squirrly nature had saved him from a face full of buckshot. He advances on the man, cataloging his build and possible injuries. It's hard to make out blood on dark clothing but there's something tacky dried on his coattails. It's not bright enough to belong to a Bullymong.

"Identify yourself!" Stiles is shivering from the cold, biting wind, but his tone doesn't show it. "Identity yourself now!" He advances again and presses the barrel of the gun to the man's head. Just for a second, long enough for him to know Stiles means business. But not so long he could rear back and knock the gun away. Stiles had learned his lesson the hard way on that. When the man doesn't acknowledge the nudge Stiles strains his neck for a better look. He could be eviscerated or something.

He spares a look up the hill. The snow is constantly shifting because of the wind but he can still make out the man's staggering trail. It looked like a shambling man. Not someone in full control of their facilities. But it could also be a well planned trick. Either way the cold is getting to him. He can barely feel his fingers anymore. Stiles decides to just risk it. He surges forward and uses the barrel of his gun to tip the stranger on his side. It's hard. He's a lot of densely packed muscle.

Stiles tucks the gun under his right arm, still holding the barrel at the stranger. With his left hand he shoves until the man lolls to the side and finally onto his back. His whole stomach is torn to shreds. Stiles crouches over the man and starts prodding at the edges of the wound. It's ragged and fresh. The Bullymong roared so frequently Stiles had gotten into the habit of just ignoring them. But there was no denying this was their work. This guy had probably stumbled into their den by accident.

Stiles pulled his fingers out the wound and went to press them against the stranger's neck. It was a Crimson Lance scarf. But it looked like the emblem had been torn off. Promising. Stiles felt a weak pulse and stood. He could save this guy and ask for payment. Or he could leave him to die out here and clean up the mess tomorrow. It'd be easier to drag him to the water's edge than haul him inside and stitch him up.

Overhead a screech sounds. It's echoed by at least two others. Stiles pays more attention to them. Attacks from the sky are harder to block and Rakks move damn fast. His strategy with them is to duck under cover and hope for the best. Stiles looks over the stranger again. He's still alive and a death by Rakk is a slow one. They peck and pull at the skin, tearing their prey apart until they bleed to death. This guy is already well on his way. With his belly open like that they'll probably dive right into his innards and make it last.
Stiles growls to himself and tucks his shotgun into his beltloop. He grabs the stranger by his legs and starts dragging him to the side door. "I dare you to give me shit. I fucking dare you." The man is heavy and dragging him is slow work. More than once Stiles almost goes down on a patch of ice. He needs to lay out salt again. When he gets to the door he drops the man's legs and jimmy's the door open. It sounds like his father is still asleep. Which is for the best really. With a groan he yanks and drags the man the rest of the way in. He doesn't bother pulling him away from the door, just shoves at his side until he's near the turned over vending machines.

Stiles shakes himself off for a second, enjoying the almost scolding feel of the heat inside battling with the wind whistling through the doorframe. He snatches a bowl off the vending machine and hurries outside to scoop up some snow. It's the only numbing this guy is going to get. The severe temperature had already slowed the bleeding. All things said it wasn't as bad as it could have been. If he'd been ripped open by a Spiderant? He would've bled out between one breath and the next.

The best he can do for this guy is sew him up. He's not wasting anything else on a stranger when his dad is sick. He pulls the door shut and kneels next to the stranger. He digs his fingers into his pack and yanks. He has to brace his foot on the ground for leverage, this guy is no joke. But it's not going anywhere. And if he rolls this guy he risks dumping his intestines on the ground so he decides to leave it. Stiles swipes up the bowl and packs a little ice around the wound. He doesn't want to dump too much and give the guy hypothermia.

Ice packed, Stiles went to the ammo box they kept medical supplies in. He had a few empty syringes, some gauze, and a few suture kits. Those were easy enough to steal. He snatches up a suture kit and tears it open with his teeth because let's face it, sanitation isn't a priority around here. He kneels next to the guy and probes at the wound again. The edges are tacky with blood, but they don't look livid with infection. Stiles cocks an eyebrow. Animals weren't known for their cleanliness. Either this guy had an amazing immune system or he was damn lucky.

Considering Stiles dragged his sorry ass inside to help him for no reason it was probably luck. There was plenty of that to go around for people who weren't Stiles. "Alright big guy, brace yourself." Stiles was in no way a trained professional. Point of fact Stiles had never met an actual doctor. They existed of course. There were some at the Hyperion Moon Base for sure. And all the mutated rats up in the Fridge? Usually the work of doctors who wanted to be scientists. Point was, doctors were hard to come by for normal folk and Stiles had learned just enough to keep himself afloat. Stitches were not quite his specialty. He could amputate with the best of them but putting things together? That took a gentler hand.

It probably wasn't best for him to tie off the end with his mouth either, but whatever. Thread ready, Stiles pinched together a ragged edge and pushed the needle through. His eyes flicked up to the strangers face but he hadn't so much as twitched. Feeling encouraged, Stiles made quick work. He pulled the needle through as quickly as possible, keeping his stitches tight and trying for even. Around the middle he got a little wonky. He was trying to flick ice out as he went. And he was maybe a bit too generous with the stitches toward the end but he'd kind of wanted to finish off the thread. Otherwise he'd have to bend down and bite it off. He wasn't too keen to put his delicate face next to some strangers possibly festering wound.

Especially if said stranger turned out to be the bad kind of Crimson Lance. Stiles let the bent needle hang there. If the guy turned out okay he'd cut it off. He rocked to his heels and crossed to the lockers on the other side of the garage. In one they had a pile of rope and other miscellaneous junk. Stuff Stiles usually used on his scavenging missions. He plucked up a decent length of rope and crossed back to mystery man. It was a struggle, but he managed to yank the guy over to the metal railing. With a long, deep groan Stiles was able to hoist the man up. He gripped him around the middle and hugged him tight then heaved. By the time he'd wedged the guy against the railing he felt like passing out.

When was the last time he even ate? Stiles shook himself and started looping the rope around the stranger and the railing. He passed it over several times, making sure to cross it and secure his hands. Once he's sure his knot work will hold he backs away. The guys legs are free, but if he starts kicking around he'll tear out his stitches. That should be a good enough deterrent. Satisfied that the stranger is in order he turns to their little fridge. It use to be a medical vending machine, thus refrigerated, but Stiles and his father had gutted it and rigged it up as a fridge.

They survived mostly on fish. Occasionally they'd snare some rakk's. Fruits and vegetables were hard to come by. Mostly they traded with a moonshiner family. They kept their stils about five miles out. Just in case of explosions. The mother was sweet on Stiles and didn't mind sharing grains and potatoes if he gave them a bag of fish in return. They don't have much left in there right now, hence Stiles really needing to scavenge. But he figures he can throw some fish chunks into some grits. Not the most glamorous meal, but Stiles wasn't living in civilization anymore.

As he cooked he flicked on his laptop. It wasn't pretty. He'd welded together components from three separate computers and the shell was covered in scorch marks and bullet holes. All pre-Stiles. He kept one hand on his pot and the other on his keyboard. The ECHOnet was widely misleading. He tried not to believe anything he read unless he could pick out the accredited sources himself. So learning was slow going. Before he'd had a pretty nice set up with a historian. Now he had to make due with a shitty connection and triple checking.

To relieve some of his boredom he'd taken to making his own page. Nothing crazy of course. He wanted peace and justice on Pandora as much as the next sane person, but he wasn't a radical. What was the point of posting Anti-Jack propaganda if he was just going to bust down your door within the hour to kill you? So he keeps things educational and very much away from current events or people. He's trying to make an encyclopedia. Sir Hammerlock and his amazing mustache are trying to beat him out of the market.
By the time his fish and grits are done he's read through a pretty interesting journal about the Goliath phenomenon. They seemed to operate predominately on the medulla oblongota. They barely used their prefrontal cortex. Most of them couldn't read. Which, on Pandora, wasn't overly strange. But most of them never learned even given the opportunity. When their heads popped they worked like a chicken with it's head cut off. Their brain was still connected. Just severely hemorrhaged. So they kind of ran around super angry until their brain stem fractured. Or they got shot a couple dozen times in the chest.

Personally Stiles was more interested in learning about the overwhelming birthrate of little people. Seriously, Stiles felt like a freaking giant in some places. He hoped it wasn't some sort of latent radiation. That's the last thing he needed. Stiles shoved a spoonful of grits into his mouth and snorted. Like he'd be procreating anytime soon. He pulled the pot off the stove and spun to face the stranger. He shoves another bite into his mouth then jabs the spoon at him. "You got kids man?" Stiles comes a little closer and crouches so he can look more closely at the guy's face.

He's got a beard that's more scraggly than roguish but he's got nice cheekbones. He could have kids. Maybe there's a whole string of them across Pandora. There could be one in every town where there'd been a Crimson Lance outpost. "You've probably got a bunch of kids. Diseases too." Stiles raises from his crouch and takes another bite. He looks over the man thoughtfully. He was a traveler. His clothes were old but well taken care of. You know, besides the gaping tear around the abdomen.

It bode well for him being a Raider. Those guys did a lot of odd jobs and they had a good sense of community. They took pride in their appearance because they wanted to look approachable. Like the citizens could come to them for help. The Lance that went power hungry dressed like mercenaries. At least the ones Stiles had seen. Still, a little investigation couldn't hurt.

He set aside his pot of food and hopped over the railing. The guy's backpack was still accessible from this vantage point. He makes quick work of the paracord ties crossing over it's front and shoves them away. Then he's gleefully unzipping the pack and digging inside. "HOLY!" He screeches and yanks his hand out of the bag. He knew that feeling. Fuck did he know that feeling. Stiles scrambled away from the railing and raced over to their kitchen area in search of tongs.

That burning zing feeling, like a thrum of energy, that feeling like a thousand volts of electricity is zapping through your body, that's eridium. This idiot just has a raw hunk of it lying in his backpack. Who does that? Tongs in hand, Stiles races back around to the strangers back. With his pointer finger and thumb he holds a flap of the pack aside and looks. There's a pretty decent chunk of it in there. It bathes the whole pack in a soft purple glow. It looks like it's sitting on top of some socks. Besides that there's not much. He can make out a battered locket and a few bits and bobs. There's a HUD but it might be broken.

Stiles huffs and sticks the tongs into the bag. His tongue pokes out his mouth while he carefully works the tongs around the eridium chunk. He makes sure to clench down at tight as possible. If it slips out of his tongs horrible things could happen. Research was pretty clear on how long it took raw eridium to produce slag but as he had no way of knowing how long this idiot had been toting it around, he couldn't be sure. Stiles' dad didn't have the immune system to handle slag poisoning right now.

When it's free of the pack he holds his arms out, holding it as far away as possible. He clings to the edge of his house, trying to find a container to dump it in. He sees another tipped over ammo case. It's not the ideal choice but he doesn't have a safe on hand. As gently as possible he tips the chunk inside. He takes a moment to poke at it with the tongs, rolling it this way and that to really get a look at it. He's about to pinch it again when he thinks he sees a wisp of purple light furl off of it. "No! You do not--" Stiles flicks the lid of the ammo case closed with the tongs then secures the latch.

He picks the case up and tucks it into the locker he pulled the rope from. He buries it under his junk and shuts the locker. Danger averted Stiles let himself breathe. If things went south with this stranger he could at least hawk the eridium. Stiles tucks his hands into his pockets and goes back downstairs to check on his dad. He's kicked a leg free but the ice is still on his head.

Stiles wedges himself onto the bottom of his father's cot and puts the back of his hand against his father's neck. He's still hot but there's a noticeable difference. With any luck his fever will have broken completely by morning. Satisfied that his dad will survive the night, Stiles eases off the bed. He stretches his arms high over his head and twists at the waist to crack his back. "Oh yeah, that's the stuff." He sighs happily. It's not possible to see their guest from down here. He'd never gotten around to dismantling the metal tire rails. But he was confident in his ability to tie a man up.

Where he'd grown up he'd had to make his own entertainment. And between him and Scott it was either terrorize each other, or terrorize the town. For their parents' sanity they tended to take their energy out on each other. Stiles had once tied Scott to the outside of a saloon door. If it weren't funny enough to see him struggle to free himself, it was even more hilarious to watch drunk people struggle to open what should have been a light door. Laughs all around. So his rope work was up to snuff. A grievously injured adult was probably going to put up about as much a struggle as a furious eight year old.

That in mind Stiles doesn't feel the least bit guilty trudging to his own bed and slipping in. He kicks off his shoes and throws his arm over his face. He yawns and licks his lips a few times before dozing off.

A pot clangs. Stiles shoot up in his bed, scared and confused. "What?" He tries to crane his head up to see where the noise is coming from but it's useless.

"Whoever you are, you're dead."

Stiles shirks back into his bed and gulps. The stranger was alive. And not at all grateful it seemed. Stiles scooted to the front of his bed and slipped out, then crept slowly to his father's side. He was awake but confused. He struggled to sit but Stiles held his hands aloft to stop him. He pressed a finger to his lips and silently pleaded with his father to stay quiet. His dad's brow furrowed and he frowned, but he wasn't in any condition to argue.

To make him feel better Stiles reached under his father's bed and pulled the pistol from the box he kept there. It had caustic rounds. He tucked it into his belt and made his way up. The guy wasn't just awake, he was coherent and angry. Stiles had hoped that he'd at least wake up burning with fever. For a moment he stays behind the stranger, trying to think up a clever speech.

"I know you're standing there. And I know you don't have an army waiting." The man growls his observation while staring straight ahead. Like Stiles isn't even worth the effort of turning his head.

Maybe he doesn't have an army in the wings, or a group of bandits on call, but he does have a gun. And he knows how to use it. His dad had taught him to shoot as soon as he could properly grip a weapon. A rite of passage on a planet like theirs. He hooks his fingers in his beltloops and adopts a Sheriff's stance, then he slowly walks up the stairs and over to his hostage. He keeps his pace steady and stays just out of kicking range. But he does bring himself directly in front of the stranger, staring down at him.

The man grits his teeth and stares up at him. He seems underwhelmed by his captor. "You tied me up?"

Stiles doesn't respond. One of his father's best interrogation techniques had been to simply wait the idiots out. Sometimes they gave away everything just because they got nervous. After the fall of Atlas the members of the Crimson Lance proved they were like just everybody else, just men. No one man was likely to be braver than the other, no matter their profession. To his credit though, the stranger didn't look remotely impressed by Stiles. He continued to stare him down as if Stiles was a mild annoyance. A pebble under his shoe. Not the guy who'd sewn his guts back in.

"Are you mute or just stupid?"

Stiles snorts and licks his lips. Okay, so this guy isn't going to crack. No problem. "How about benevolent." He waves his hand dismissively to gesture to the mess of the man's gut. From here it looks like it's healing nicely. "You noticed the ropes, did you fail to notice the stitches. Or are you blind?"

The man growls and tightly coils his muscles. Stiles imagines that if he were free he'd be preparing to strike. Stiles continues to stare him down. He has the upper hand right now. He doesn't have any reason to be nervous. It seems to deflate the stranger. His muscles relax and he lets out a long exhale. "I...appreciate the stitches." The stranger tips his chin forward and sullenly looks down at his stomach. His fingers are curling and uncurling at his sides.

"You want to tell me what you're doing out here?"

The man clicks his teeth together and composes himself. "I was looking for people."

"Not really the place for that." Stiles lets his hand drift back to rest on the butt of his gun. He's almost hyper aware of his father down in their room. Who is still awake and probably a breath away from storming up here. He can't let that happen.

The man glares up at him. "I wasn't recruiting." He sounds petulant, like Stiles should just know better. "I got left for dead miles from here. I just started walking."

"You got a New-U then?"

"Why?"

"I can't think of another reason a stranded guy would willingly walk into a Bullymong den."

The man snorts. "I didn't think about it."

Stiles refrains from saying 'obviously', just barely though. If someone had dumped him in the middle of nowhere he wouldn't have done any better. He had a way of getting himself into trouble. "Why'd they dump you?"

"I didn't pay enough."

"Eridium going cheap these days?" If only Stiles could bottle the heat from this guy's glare. He'd have enough to get him through the winter.

"You went through my stuff?"

"I dragged your sorry ass inside and saved your life. I think I have every right to go through your little man purse." Stiles cocks his hip to the side and dares the man to contradict him. When he says nothing Stiles decides to give him a chance. "What's your name?" His fingers fiddle with the handle of the pistol. "And what did you hire those guys for?"

"Derek." Here Derek pauses. He'd allowed himself to get caught at a ridiculous disadvantage. He was injured but healing. He doesn't know enough about this boy, or the sickly man behind him, to guess what their intentions are. Pandora was basically a crime planet. More people looked at you twice if you were honest rather than murderous. And on the same hand, people preferred to let their neighbors bleed out rather than stitch them up. Unless they were looking for a payout. So he lies, because there's nothing he can gain from being honest here. "I was trying to figure out what eridium is doing to the planet."

"In general?"

"The negative stuff. Not a lot of money in it."

"Jack doesn't want to hear about what doesn't pay." Stiles takes his hand off the pistol and folds his arms over his chest. "I have no reason to trust you. So how about this, you let me flip through your HUD. If I see anything that suggests you've lied to me I'll shoot you. If not, I'll let you go."

From down below Derek can make out a man choking on his own spit. Probably in shock. It was probably this kid's father. Also probably grievously injured or sick. Derek could smell the worry in the air. There was nothing incriminating on his HUD. He'd worn it while in the Lance and only once or twice since. The point of Aegrus was to get lost. So he agrees. "Take it."

"Password?"

"H64sg7y."

Stiles gives Derek a wholly unimpressed look. "That sounds like a default."

"It is." When he'd been in the Lance he'd treated every piece of equipment with respect. He took an amazing amount of pride in maintaining everything they gave him. And he'd never felt the need to change the default password. He didn't want to find himself mistreating the HUD because it was his. So the company issued password had stuck. After Atlas fell Derek just stopped thinking about it. He watched as Stiles activated the Hud and slid it on. The eye piece flared blue as it settled into place and pulled up Derek's recent log.
The HUD history was bland. It was old, actual Atlas employee standard issue. The picture coded in was of Derek, alibet younger. No stubble. He looked so fucking eager. It was kind of sad really. It seemed that Derek hadn't really gone past the basic grunt work before the company fell. There's a lot of empty space then the HUD is alive with Aegrus. It's not much, but it proves that Derek is telling the truth. Or at least a close enough version of it. Stiles slides the HUD off and holds it at his side, letting it dangle from his fingers.

"I'll untie you. But I'm cuffing you."

"I told you the truth!" Derek wants to snarl and snap this kids fingers. Who does he think he is? He has no reason to keep him here. "Just let me leave!"
Stiles stares down at Derek like he's a particularly dumb child. "Dude, you've still got a hole in your gut. I'd be pissed if I wasted my time just for you to die a yard from my house." Stiles walks away, stepping over the spilled remainds of his fish and grits. As he does it he sends a glare Derek's way. He didn't like wasted food. It's easy enough to snatch up a pair of his Dad's old cuffs and snap them around Derek's wrists, fastening him to the bar he'd been tied to. After that he loosens the ropes, if Derek wants them completly off he'll have to work for it.Then he heads down to see his dad.

His father, Skylar, is sitting up in bed. It's almost enough to make the scolding look on his face worth it. Stiles holds up his hand and flops down on the bed, throwing himself back until he's half on top of his father. "It's fine. He's not going to kill us."

"Stiles you don't know that."

"He's cuffed Dad. So unless you want to tell me your own equipment is faulty?" Stiles stares up at his dad with a smarmy face. He is nervous, but he doesn't want to worry his dad. He should cut him free. He should just push the guy outside and lock up. But Stiles is bored. So freaking bored. He hasn't seen any of his friends in months. The only reason he even knows they're alive is because they're kind enough to send him ECHO messages while gallivanting around. They're all out doing things with their lives, living wild and free. And he's here, stuck in the only boring place on Pandora. But it's for his dad.

Skylar sighs and brings his hand down over Stiles' head. It's not the same as it use to be, doesn't have the same comforting presence. He'd lost his two middle fingers on his left hand and his thumb on is right. It was what decided their move. How much use is a sheriff without ten fingers? "Stiles, what are you trying to get from this?"

"Nothing dad. You should go back to sleep." Stiles slips out of the bed and winds through the hallway to his own nook. He collapses back into his own bed. After a moment he kicks off his pants and cocoons himself in his blanket. He shouldn't hold a stranger hostage for excitement. But he's selfish. And impulsive. Stiles shoves his face into his pillow and wills himself to sleep. "I just want something to do."

From his position on the railing Derek can hear everything. Now he knows for sure that the sick man is the boy's, Stiles', father. The magnetic feel of the cuffs means they're forcefield cuffs. Not standard issue for typical Sheriff's but there's a badge hanging by the door. It's bent out of shape and clearly worn but it obviously didn't belong to Stiles. And he'd said the cuffs belonged to his father. It boded well for him getting out of here in one piece. And Stiles was bored. He sounded lonely and smelt like restlessness. He was probably just waiting for an opportunity to get out of Windshear Waste.

If Derek played his cards right he could walk out of this with help. He didn't have much to offer. His money went just after Atlas fell. It wasn't even the company's fault. That time in his life was a disaster all around. But he was sure there was something he could offer this kid. The promise of an adventure could be enough. A majority of Derek's Lance battalion had joined just to get away from their boring lives. Well that and the promise of a New-U contract. It was optional of course and Derek himself had declined. With his increased healing he'd never seen the point. And Atlas had made it clear that they could revoke the New-U privileges at any point.

Stiles seemed like someone who'd be interested in a New-U. Kids like him wanted to live fast and die interesting. By the morning he would be completely healed but he still needed to get to Fyrestone. That's where the last of his money was. He had an okay amount, nothing he couldn't supplement with odd jobs. But more importantly, his good weapons were there. At first he'd tried to make due with Atlas standard issue. In Aegrus he'd kept away from people enough that he could rely on his teeth and claws to defend himself. It was clear to him now that if he wanted to make it anywhere he would need to upgrade.

His father had a stash of weapons in an underground safe back in what use to be his home. They were a little dated maybe, mostly Dhal, but they were high powered. He'd modified most of them himself. As a human he'd sometimes felt the need to overcompensate. A lot of help it did him. What use were weapons if you locked them all away.
He couldn't help himself. Without something to occupy his hands and feet Derek found himself wallowing in the memories of his family. Pandora was no stranger to orphans. It welcomed them, made them. But he still felt all alone. Maybe because he felt like it was his fault. At some point his depressing thoughts lulled him into sleep.

The sound of Bullymong howls wakes him. Their vicious cries raise above the howling wind and carry down the pass to Stiles' garage. It wakes Derek. His body thrums with adrenaline. "Fear afterburn." Derek starts and whips his head to the side. Stiles is bundled in a thick blanket, sitting against his fridge. He's staring at Derek like he's the most interesting thing in the world. For some kid living in a wasteland, he might be.

"That's ridiculous."

"Whatever man, all I'm saying is, you're sweating bullets and you don't have an infection." Stiles smirks at him but when Derek doesn't react he drops his head to look down at his legs. The howling outside has tapered off. Without the animal noise it's just the wind battering at the bay doors. The garage is well insulated. Derek can't hear a single whistle from any corner. It explains how he's not freezing. Stiles has a series of well placed heaters plugged in and it seems that he's set up his space to circulate the air. It's clever.

"You from here?"

Stiles looks up at him in shock, not having expected Derek to be the least bit cordial. But he sounds curious. Probably because he's tied up and bored out of his mind, but Stiles will take it. He hasn't talked to someone new in a long time. "Nope, I'm from Frost Valley. Fishing village." He waits for Derek to nod, then licks his lips and dives in. "Dad was the Sheriff and my friends and I cleaned the catches. We had this great set up. We set up this table chain and rolled in a circle throughout the day so we wouldn't get sunburn. But it's the glare you've got to watch you know. Snowblindness is a thing and people don't think about it. I mean we'd get these mercenaries going through looking for a place to hide and they'd end up leaving the next day because of migraines.

"It was kind of safe, like for Pandora you know. My Dad's from here but my mom was off world. She came down on an extreme vacation and just stuck around. When I was little she would take me down to the water and throw me in. She'd actually pick me up and chuck me in. So I got use to the temperature pretty quick. When I got older it was like a game you know, how long can I go before it hurts. On a good day I could manage half an hour. It drove my dad nuts. He was convinced I'd go all numb and drown by accident. But my friends were always nearby you know. Small towns have to look out for each other."

Stiles pulls his knees up and rests his chin on them. He wrestles his arms free of his blanket burrito and holds his legs. "Did you come for Atlas or are you a lifer?" Stiles rolls his head until his cheek is resting on his knee and he can comfortably watch Derek.

"I've always lived here." Derek pulls his legs in and crosses them. He leans forward so the bar doesn't dig into his back and stares down at his lap. "My parents came from Themis."

"Strict planet."

"No, just peaceful. Quiet. My sister was born there but my parents came here when my mom was pregnant with me."

Stiles snorts. "Who chooses to leave a place like Themis to come here? With a baby on the way? Did she not want you or something? Because that's a thing that happens here. I think Hyperion requires you sacrifice a kid or something."

"No!" Derek wants to snap his teeth, dig into the kids neck and shake. He takes a deep breath instead. "No. They came for work. My mother was a scientist, bioengineering." By the time Derek had gone off to join the Lance she'd stopped working for the companies of Pandora. She'd wanted to leave. But Derek just had to join the Lance. "She wanted a more exciting job."

Never let it be said that Stiles doesn't know when to stop. He just likes to ignore that most of the time. But he understands the look on Derek's face, stranger though he is. Dead mother's tend to leave you with a certain look. Loved ones anyways. "Is it warm where you're from?"

"Fyrestone."

"Sounds hot."

"Warm enough I guess."

"Do you miss it?"

"Right now? Yeah. Tomorrow I might not." He can't think of anything else to say so they drift into silence. Stiles doesn't move to break it, though he keeps his curious eyes on Derek. He knows he should be conning Stiles into helping him. He just can't think of what to say. Derek yawns and arcs his back, stretching the skin on his stomach and tugging on the stitches. It's healed now. The skin is still pink and new, and holes around the thread are irritated but he doesn't look like he's gone toe to toe with an eviscerator anymore.

"Here, let me look at that." Stiles crawls to him, shedding his blanket as he goes. When he gets to Derek's side he raises and eyebrow and gestures to his stomach. "I can look. My bro was suppose to be a vet. Taught me half of everything he knew." That doesn't exactly instill Derek with a great sense of confidence but he's already healed. There's not much Stiles can do to ruin it. So he leans back and exposes his pinkened skin. Stiles' reaction is instantaneous. The small smile slides from his face and his hand drops. "It's gone. It's just...gone." Derek expects him to back away or reach for a weapon. Instead his hands dart forward and tear at his shirt. Nimble fingers trace across his stomach and up his back. The feeling has Derek jackknifing away.

"Hey!"

"Shh! Don't wake my dad." Stiles yanks his hands away. For a second Derek thinks the whole bizzare incident is over but Stiles comes forward again. His eyes are calculating. This time he's slow, reaching out leisurely to trace the pink line across Derek's abdomen. His fingers pull lightly at the stitches and the tugging sensation has Derek almost shivering.

"Are you a siren?"

"Would it matter?" Siren's are worth a lot these days. Derek doesn't want to die because some dumb kid wants a quick paycheck.

"From a scientific standpoint? Yeah. Dudes can't be siren's dude. Not that I've seen anyway. But since eridium spilled out of the Vault the rules have changed haven't they. I mean, you were in Aegrus. You must have noticed what eridium is doing."

"I had noticed some things."

Stiles almost sneers at him, like Derek is some Slab. "It's feeding the planet. Eridium was always here. The way wildlife is interacting with it, it's like they're being fed. Like they've been limping along without it and now they're adapting again. Who knows what the long term affects are. Hyperion isn't interested in it if it can't be weaponised." Stiles drums his fingers across Derek's stomach for a second then pulls away. He doesn't look even remotely sorry for having invaded Derek's space. "But there's so much more than that."

Stiles stands and grabs a mangled lap top from his makeshift counter. He opens it up and slides to sit next to Derek. He doesn't seem to worry about their closeness. Derek isn't sure if it's because Stiles doesn't think he's a threat or if he's just so caught up he doesn't care. Stiles flicks through his numerous tabs and brings up a page filled with pictures of purple monoliths. "Pandora use to have eridium everywhere. There's monuments all over Pandora, most of them are underground now, but we can see where the space is for the eriduim. Over time something leeched it away. We're not sure if it was a natural occurrence or not. Or even if Eridium was natural. It could have been man made a long time ago and locked away. All we can really be sure about is that eridium is adaptable. It can sync with almost anything."

As Stiles speaks his hands gesture wildly. He speaks like he's giving a lecture to a room full of captivated students, not just one hostage man. Derek hadn't paid eridium much mind. It's influence in Aegrus was minimal. It was there, but mostly in it's natural, raw, state. Witch doctors used it to fuel their magic. He supposed it worked the same with sirens. Derek hadn't used any himself. There was another reason he carried a hunk of it around. When the time came Derek wanted nothing more than to drive that fist full of eridium down Kate Argent's throat. He wanted her to choke on it.

"Except humans, it reacts negatively to everyone but siren's."

"Witch doctors."

"Really?" Stiles is almost visibly moved by the new tidbit of information. His fingers begin to fly over the keys as he types. Derek can't make sense of it but it looks like a rambling list of theories and reminders. "I'd always wondered if there was another subset. Aegrus has the most diverse wildlife on Pandora and it shows signs of being the last hold out for the Eridians. Well the ones who weren't sequestered away for longevity reasons. The monoliths weren't just for show. They were planning something.”

Derek doesn’t know much about Pandora. He’d learned a lot about Themis and Promethia. The first because it was his parents birth place and the second because of Atlas. He’d never been interested in Pandora really. He’d just assumed the planet died a long time before Atlas got there. “That’s...interesting.”

Stiles rolls his eyes and taps mindlessly on the edge of his computer. “Dude, no need to front. You’re already captive.” He licks his lips and tips his head back against the railing.
“Okay so, it’s like why is Pandora here? There’s all these stories right about this solar system and how there’s such a high concentration of habitable planets all clustered together. It’s rare, like super crazy rare right.”

“I guess.”

“No, dude, it’s way rare. And each planet has their own story for how these planets got named but no one really knows. It was all just too long ago you know. Pandora is the most recently colonized but it was always Pandora. And way, way, way back in the day, back before the mass exodus there was Greek Mythology.” Stiles is clicking through tabs with one hand, bringing up pictures as he speaks. His other hand gestures and waves along to illustrate his point. It’s a little captivating. “Pandora was a girl that held a box full of chaos and she opened it. So assuming our kind really named these planets it stands to reason there was some super obvious point in naming this place Pandora.”

“It’s a hell hole.” No one with a choice stays on Pandora unless they’re too beaten down to leave. “Isn’t that a good enough reason?”

“Could be, but come on. Who takes the time to give a series of planets really nice, meaningful names then just says fuck it on the last one. Maybe Pandora is like that box. Maybe it held all this crazy stuff and the Eridians sealed it all away.”

“Then some vault hunters open the box?”

“And all the chaos comes out.” Stiles looks so satisfied. He’s probably got a million theories floating around in that little head of his and not a person to share them with.

“I’ve seen one.”

“One what?”

“An Eridian statue. When I first joined up, before I even got my HUD. We were making a weapons drop.” It’s not strictly true. Derek had waited patiently in the buzzard while his mentor’s went down into the monument to stash a weapons chest. But he’d seen a snippet of something that could have been Eridian. There weren’t any purple streaks, just deep gouges in the black surface that could have been glass or could have been empty. By the looks, they’d be filled with eridium now.

It was just the right thing to say. Stiles’ heartrate had picked up noticeably and a wash of hormones rolled off of him. It was almost like arousal. It was possible that crashing into the side of Stiles’ garage was the best thing to have happened to him. Stiles was proving to be amazingly intelligent. It was obvious he wanted to get out of Windshear Waste. With a Sheriff as a father it was likely that he could at least shoot a gun. He’d seemed confident with the pistol in his belt. And intelligent aside Stiles was someone Derek was confident he could best in a fight. Even injured he’d be hard pressed to lose against someone as slight as the boy next to him.

“I could show you.”

“There--what?” Stiles cut himself off mid-ramble and stared at him. His expression was shocked. “Take me?”

“I move around a lot but I could head that way again.” Kate, like most of the Lance that went bad, liked to hit up their old haunts. They liked to relive the glory days. Since Derek had started tracking her again he’d heard that she liked to hop around the warmer areas. But the monuments weren’t out of the question. Especially if there was a chance the old Lance members traded out weapons there.

Stiles pulls away from the railing to turn and half face Derek. “So what, you’re just going to invite me on your good will mission?”

“What do you think I’m doing?” Derek is exasperated.

“I don’t know man. But...I can’t anyway. Thanks though.” Stiles looks down at his laptop, forelorn, and slides it to the side. His gaze drifts to the room beyond the railing where his father is sleeping. He’d yet to see the man but he could hazard a guess that he was in no shape to live out in the Waste on his own. Or that Stiles believed he couldn’t.

“Afraid of adventure?”

Stiles scoffs and flicks his hand in a ‘whatever’ gesture. “I’m not scared man. I’ve just got responsibilities. You must have had some of those before.”

Derek wiggles his hands back and forth, still cuffed, in a so-so gesture. “A few.”

Stiles sighs and rakes his hand through his hair, ending the motion with a scratch to the back of the neck. “All my friends scattered when we headed out here. They’re all exploring the planet and I’m just sitting here, cataloging it all.”

“How do you get by?”

“Scraping, scavenging. I make a little research money on the side.”

“Do you have a New-U”

Stiles shoots him a look that is clearly unimpressed. “Do you even have to ask?” Stiles raps his knuckles against the metal railing. “We didn’t even buy this place. We just snatched it up and made it ours. It was the first dishonest thing my dad ever did.”

He finds it a little suspect. People like that are hard to find on Pandora. So hard they’re practically the thing of fairy tales. But Derek remembers the woman his mother use to be. The man his father use to be. Near the end they’d done things they’d never dreamed of doing from the safety of Themis. But Derek had always lived here. It had seemed like the natural progression. Maybe Stiles’ dad got shot up an entire village before settling down. Maybe that’s how he came to be the Sheriff of Frost Valley. People aren’t squeaky clean. They can start that way but that’s the thing about clean things. They get dirty, no matter how much you tend to them. Derek’s a fucking disaster, he’s such a mess he can barely find himself under it. And he’s about to make it worse.

“I can pay you.”

“I went through your bag dude. I’m pretty sure you’re broke.”

“I’ve got a New-U contract.”

“Good for you.”

Derek rolls his eyes. “No, you idiot, I have an unsigned New-U. I never cashed mine in.” All he can do now is hope Stiles takes the bait.

“Okay so,” Stiles draws himself up and taps on a finger, “one, you expect me to believe a New-U is worth a patch job. One that you obviously didn’t need. Which I’ll need you to explain by the way. Two, you just have a New-U sitting around that you haven’t cashed even though you clearly make poor life decisions. Three, and this is a big one, you’re just offering me a New-U and an escorted tour to a dangerous place because we’re such good friends now. Is that right?” Derek is about to answer when Stiles holds up his hands and shakes them, gesturing for Derek to keep quiet. “I live in the middle of nowhere but I wasn’t born on a glacier. I’m not an idiot.”

“I don’t want a New-U contract. It was optional and my family didn’t believe in it. I kept the contract but I never signed it and I never added my DNA.”

“You could sell that. For whatever you want just shy of actual contract price.”

“I don’t need a lot of money. But I’d like someone to travel with. I get lonely.” He does. Werewolves are inherently pack animals. His pack had always been small, just his family. His mother told him that she’d known another pack once but they never settled. Aegrus had made him feral. He needed to reign himself in if he was going to get Kate. He needed a clear head. A plan. Someone he could brush against to substitute for pack.

“Let me see it.”

Derek yanks his wrists and summons his most unimpressed look to level at Stiles. “Gee, just let me get into my bag. The bag you searched. Before you tied me up.”

Stiles scoffed. “Like you wouldn’t tie up a stranger you brought into your house.”

“I would have left them to die.”

“Not giving me a lot of confidence here big guy.”

Derek thunks his head back against the metal bar and shakes his arms. The ropes are still pooled in his lap and the buzzing of the cuffs is starting to numb his wrists. “It’s in Fyrestone. I have a safe there with my valuables. If you come with me, you can have it.”

“What’s to stop you from killing me when we get there?” Stiles looks him up and down, then levels his gaze at the handcuffs. “Or after I take off the cuffs?”

“I’m not going to kill the first decent person I’ve come across in a hundred miles.”

In response Stiles places his hand over his heart and his face softens. “You think I’m decent?”

“I didn’t say you weren’t an asshole, just decent. Control yourself.”

Stiles stands and drums his fingers against his hips, tapping faster and faster until he nods to himself. “Just stay here.” He smirks to himself and carefully skirts around the railing and quietly tip toes to the row of lockers near his father. He pulls out an ammo tin, some more rope, and a bag. He slings it over his shoulder and starts wringing his hands together, pacing back and forth in front of the broken digistruct machine. Derek can hear him muttering to himself about his father. Finally he seems to come to a decision.

He crosses to a clipboard hanging on the wall. There’s a grease pen dangling on a string. Derek watches as Stiles twirls and fiddles with the pen, writing a few words then tapping on the clipboard. When he’s satisfied with what he’s written he hangs the clipboard back in place and slowly walks to the edge of their bedroom. For a second he looks longingly over the edge, presumably at his father. Looking at his face, Derek is almost certain Stiles is going to change his mind.

Then Stiles shakes his head and takes a step away from the ledge. He runs his fingers over the strap of his bag and looks towards Derek instead. He knows that what he’s doing is stupid. Ridiculously so. His Dad needed someone to take care of him. Stiles had been pushing for them to move back into some type of civilization before winter hit. Last year had been nearly impossible. Scott’s mother lived in Sanctuary now. It would be in his Dad’s best interest to follow. If Stiles left he’d have no choice. It was for the best.

And he couldn’t stay here anymore. He was suffocating. Growing up, him and Scott had made all these plans to get out there and explore. They were going to planet hop and discover new life. They were going to live hard and crazy. Then Pandora went sideways and Stiles got caught playing the responsible adult. Going with Derek would be selfish and impulsive, and it was likely to get him killed. But at least he’d be doing something. He was going out of his mind just hanging around here.

Before he can psych himself out of going he climbs the stairs and crouches next to Derek. “We need to stop at Liar’s Berg. I need to use the terminal there to add a location to our fast travel.”

“I can give you my codes.”

Stiles holds up the keys to the cuffs. He waits until Derek is looking at them to continue. “I need to add a location onto my Dad’s account. If I go with you, I need to make sure he’s taken care of.” He dangles the key on his fingertip. “My dad was a Sheriff, he taught me well. If you try to screw me over I will kill you.”

Derek can hear his heart, even over the battering winds it’s loud and clear. It doesn’t skip a beat as he makes his promise. Derek has no doubt Stiles will do his best to kill him if he’s crossed. You don’t get to be a scavenger by trade without being willing to attack. But Derek is still confident that he can take Stiles in a fight. “I get it.”

They stare at each other for a few seconds. Then Stiles leans behind him and unlocks the cuff. He pockets them but Derek doesn’t mind. It’s not like Stiles could cuff him again. Not now that he knows. He rubs at his wrists and looks down at his ruined shirt. He had one other shirt in his pack but he didn’t make rounds in cold places. He didn’t have the clothes to head out in the wind. But if they waited for morning Stiles wouldn’t come. They’d have to leave before Stiles’ father woke up.

“Here.” Stiles throws a bundle at him. It’s a dark duster jacket with a torn collar. “I got it off a body but it looks your size.”

Derek raises an eyebrow and holds the jacket aloft. “I don’t suppose you know what he died of?”

Stiles snorts and pulls on his own jackets. He puts on a brown bomber jacket first and zips it all the way up, then throws a long duster coat of his own on over that. “I’m guessing a skag attack man, his legs were like gone.”

“Gone?”

“Yeah, like chewed up ham bones. We don’t get a lot of those around here so I’m just guessing but...” Stiles rolls his shoulders in a so what gesture and picks his backpack up again. “We headin’ out or what man?” Stiles strides quickly to the door and leans against it. At first Derek wonders what he’s thinking, but then he sees Stiles palm the door and lift. He holds the door open just a little. The two foot opening is enough to let in a barrage of cold air. The wind whips inside and has Derek shivering almost instantly. The motion tugs at the string still buried in his gut. He’ll have to dig those out later.

Stiles sweeps his arm outside, gesturing for Derek to go first. Derek closes up the borrowed coat and tries not to think about where it came from. It smells mostly like mildew but there’s a baser smell that could be blood. A lot of things on Pandora smell like that. Derek flips up the collar and pats his bag. The eridium is missing but he knows Stiles has it, probably in the ammo tin. There’s no way a scavenger would leave behind something so valuable. Derek slides past him out into the cold air. There’s little flurries of snow whipping around, but it’s not quite a white out. He turns to look back at Stiles, who holds up a finger and ducks back inside.

So as to not wake the sheriff, Derek holds the door with his foot. When Stiles comes back he’s tucking his mess of a laptop into his bag. He nods gratefully at Derek and takes the door, quietly shutting it behind him. Derek steps off the porch and allows Stiles a moment to say one last goodbye to his father. They’ll probably never see each other again. It’s just the Pandoran way.

When Stiles steps away Derek ignores the way he rubs his arm across his eyes. There’s too much wind to smell salt on the air, but he knows. Derek had done the same more than once. But the best thing they could do was carry on. The farther Stiles got from his house, the easier it would be. “Come on, there’s a station around back.” Stiles sniffles once then clears his throat. Derek keeps his distance and turns his face down to hide from the wind. As he turns the corner Stiles is huddled into a heavily burned fast travel station.

His fingers are tapping on the touch screen furiously. “I need to make a stop at Liar’s Berg. They have an expanded terminal and I can add a stop to my dad’s account without his fingerprint.”

“Frost Valley?”

“There’s no fast travel there. Sanctuary.”

Derek snorts. He’d heard of Sanctuary. There was a Raider’s headquarters stationed there. The last he heard, the idiots who opened the Vault were hiding out there too. Some of them at least. If there were a place on Pandora Jack hated more, Derek wasn’t aware of it. “You do know the name isn’t a promise right?”

“I’m not an idiot. We have friends there.” He smacks the side of the station and gestures for Derek to come closer. “Can you get there?”

“I have every town logged before Atlas fell, and a handful in Aegrus.” Derek comes in close and looks down at the screen. Stiles only has a few towns in his log. There’s not even a scrollbar. It’s a little sad actually. Adding locations on your Fast Travel account usually cost about as much as the change in your pocket.

Stiles logs out and stands back. He crosses his arms over his chest and tucks his fingers into his armpits. “You first.”

“Worried I’ll sneak in and kill your dad?”

“Maybe.” Stiles cocks his head back and gives Derek an unimpressed look. He couldn’t care less if he’s offended this guy. When it’s just the two of them it’ll be different. He can defend himself. He stares pointedly at the fast travel station until Derek steps up and punches in his information. Derek doesn’t offer any parting words as he’s digitized. There’s a second, when Stiles is poised over the touch screen, when he wonders if he’s making the right choice. Derek is gone. Stiles could go back inside right now, hop in bed, and be done with it. But Derek can get him to the Eridian monuments. He can show him Pandora. If he leaves now with Derek he has a chance at living.

And that’s enough to have Stiles selecting Liar’s Berg. Fast travel is a peculiar thing. It’s not painful. But it’s terrifying and not for everybody. When it starts it feels like you’re body is getting lighter and lighter. Then you start to feel like you’re suffocating. When you arrive at your destination there’s a few seconds where you’re body settles and it feel’s like you’ve taken a very long elevator ride. The first time Stiles and Scott had fast traveled, they’d been nine and the second they stepped back from the machine they threw up on it. Stiles was an old pro now.

He turns away from the machine and spots Derek crowded against a vending machine. Stiles hadn’t found a weapon on him but Derek did say they needed to make a stop. He probably had a decent stash of emergency weapons somewhere. Lancer’s liked to be prepared. Stiles should probably buy some more pistol ammo before they go. He favored the shotgun, it was a Tourge and the first purchase he made after moving out to the Waste. But it was easier for his Dad to shoot that than the pistol these days so he’d left it.
He taps the gun at his hip, rubs his thumb over the hammer, and sighs. With Derek still occupied Stiles accesses the terminal again to log onto his Dad’s account. His father has a few more cities than he does. At the bottom of the list is Wam Bam Island where he and his mother had honeymooned. They were suppose to take Stiles for his thirteenth birthday. Maybe he could get Derek to take him.

Adding Sanctuary wasn’t easy. You needed a referral from someone who already had the location. As soon as Melissa had moved there she’d sent Stiles and his father an invitation. But his dad had stubbornly refused to accept. Skylar felt like what had happened was partially his fault. He’d wanted to stay as far away from his old life as possible, even if that meant cutting Melissa out of his life. Which was absolutely ridiculous so Stiles felt no guilt in accepting the pending request. He starred Sanctuary and moved it to the top of his father’s travel list then logged out. When he added it to his own he left it at the bottom. If he moved it he’d be tempted to stop in. Stiles wasn’t sure if Melissa would be overjoyed to see him and ask him to stay, or if she’d yell at him for taking off on his father. He just really didn’t want to know right now.

Finished with his family obligation Stiles resolves to himself to not think anymore about home. He shoves his hands into his coat and crowds against Derek, who’s still growling at the vending machine. “Just buy one of everything dude.”

“I don’t need one of everything. I need sniper rounds.”

“Liar’s Berg is shit for ammo man. The bandits around here like to buy them and grenades in bulk to pick off the Bullymong.”

“You sound almost sad about that.”

“Shouldn’t you? Mr. Wildlife expert.” Stiles shrugs his shoulders and tries to hip check Derek away from the machine. “If you kill them off too fast it upsets the ecosystem.” Stiles nudges his way in front of Derek, who grunts but grudgingly steps back. He buys himself a few boxes of pistol ammo and shoves them in his bag. Just as he’d thought, there’s no grenades. Which is a shame because Stiles has a killer mod. They’ll have to go somewhere a little less back water to get a decent selection. “So where to dude?”

“Derek.” He growls and shoves Stiles by the shoulder, making him clip the edge of the machine. “I need to go to Fyrestone. Just log in and I’ll give you a copy of my codes.” Strictly speaking you’re suppose to buy your locations but it’s ridiculously easy to add new locations for free. There’s a lot of loop holes and the security system was probably made by a small child. Fast Travel was the one thing on Pandora no one had capitalized on. It was the one beacon of hope and uncorrupt light on an otherwise bleak planet. Probably only because people would rather drink themselves to death at home than pay an arm and a leg to hop somewhere else to do it.

“Okay, okay. No need to damage the merchandise.” Stiles curls his shoulders in and shuffles along to the fast travel again. He logs himself in and steps back for Derek to do his thing. Stiles knows it’s easy to swap codes with people for free locations but he’d never done it. If he started adding locations he’d want to go there. He’d want to go out back and just take off for the afternoon. But the afternoon would turn into a day, then a week, and Stiles knew he wouldn’t want to ever go back. So he’d left his list depressingly short and tried not to look at the map.

While Derek worked Stiles wedged himself closer to the machine to shield from the wind. It was a little better here but he couldn’t wait to get somewhere warm. He’d never been anywhere warm before. “What’s it like in Fyrestone?”

“Hot, dry.”

Stiles rolls his eyes and kicks at the snow. He doesn’t want to bring it up, but the longer they stay the more likely it is that they’ll get jumped. Liar’s Berg isn’t known for its welcoming commity. Stiles only saving grace was the story that followed him around. Most people who frequented knew him as the trigger happy kid that shoved a grenade down a Bullymong’s throat then blew up the lift. It wasn’t nearly as cool as it sounded and Stiles very much did not mean to get that up close and personal with a Bullymong. It was an adolescent anyways but stories had a way of blowing up. “Well yeah, but is it quiet? Is there a Catch-A-Ride?”

Derek huffs and steps away from the terminal. “No Catch-A-Ride. There’s not a lot left of it.”

“So it’s dead? Look at that, we have something in common.” Frost Valley had crumbled. The town still stood, but no one lived there anymore. Not anyone who’d call it a home. Last he’d heard, it was overrun by Rat’s and bandits who treated it like a dump. A lot of little towns went down that way. “What was it like before then?” Stiles flicks his eyes up to Derek. His companion looks stressed, like he’s a breath away from punching Stiles in the throat. He’s use to that though so he’s not easily deterred.

To Stiles’ surprise Derek answers him. “It was a mining town, mostly Dhal employees. My mother commuted to work.” Derek runs his fingers along the cold edge of the terminal one last time then backs away. “Go ahead, I’ll be right behind you.” He gestures at the machine with his head and stares Stiles down until he scoots out of his hiding place.
Fyrestone is starred. There’s a long list of places. Places he’s never been to, never heard of. It sends a giddy thrill through him. There’s an actual scroll bar on the side. There’s more places listed here than Stiles had ever hoped to see. He reverantly runs his fingers across the name and hits accept. As the feeling of disipating washes over him Stiles smiles. He doesn’t have to be resigned to his life anymore. He can get excited. He can have his own adventure.

Fyrestone is hot. Sweltering even. Stiles doesn’t think he’s ever been this hot. Not in his entire life. And the warm, happy feeling he’d gotten during his departure had swiftly left him. Once his body cataloged the new feeling of overwhelming heat, he was able to focus on the town itself. And it was depressing. To say the least. The entrance to Fyrestone is a mass grave. There are dozens of them, in haphazard rows. The flowers planted in them are shriveled and dead. The crosses are made with salvaged, bone dry wood.

Over the entrance where Fyrestone use to read there’s a wooden sign. It’s nailed on crooked and it says ‘Jackville’. Stiles heavily suspects it’s written in blood. The heady feeling of being free leaves him. He feels heavy. He almost aches for Derek. This kind of shit happens all over Pandora. It’d happened to him. But Stiles hasn’t had the time to see it over and over. Hasn’t desensitized to it yet. When he hears the digital chiming of Derek materializing behind him he looks away, towards the sand dunes. Away from the graves. Away from what Derek’s life use to be.

It seems that Derek doesn’t need a minute to collect himself. He pointedly marches past the graves, not sparing a glance at a single one, and goes into the town. Not wanting to be left behind, Stiles jogs to catch up. He’s careful to walk between the graves. There’s signs of life, a small campfire burned down to embers near a tent. It sends Stiles scrambling to Derek’s side. He ducks his hand under his duster and holds onto the handle of his pistol. “We’re not alone.”

Derek grunts and keeps walking. There’s not much to Fyrestone but Derek seems dead set on getting across it. Stiles tries to match his uncaring attitude. It could be that Derek heads through here often. The squatters could be people he knows. Not everyone on Pandora is a criminal. They come to a nondescript stone house. The paint has been battered away by the sand and wind. Derek leads the way in and predictably it’s trashed. Bandits have made their way through, graffitied the walls and pitched campfires in the bedrooms.
Derek strides past it all. He stops in the kitchen and holds up a hand for Stiles to stop. He crouches down and Stiles watches in awe as his fingertips sprout thick brownish claws. Derek digs them into gouges already set into the floor and twists. The floor groans slides apart under Derek’s feet, revealing a narrow staircase. “Stay here.” Derek doesn’t bother looking at his companion as he heads down.

Derek’s father was a weapons expert, an independent contractor. Living in Fyrestone meant most of his work went to Dahl. In Derek’s opinion they were the greatest force of good on Pandora. They offered free HUD’s to settlers, they attempted to keep the planet clean, and they graciously allowed their workers to strike without killing them. Their benevolence was probably why Hyperion had nearly wiped them off the map.

In the bunker there were weapons lining the walls. His father’s handy work was something that had always filled him with awe. He hadn’t needed teeth and claws to be deadly. Derek runs his fingers over a short barrel shotgun. It looked similar to the one Stiles had propped up at his house. Unlike Stiles’ this one had a corrosive mod. Derek doesn’t like shotguns, the wide spray of pellets and gunpowder agitates his heightened senses. But he finds himself clipping it to his belt regardless.

What he really came here for is the sniper rifle. His father only made a few. He felt like a sniper rifle in the wrong hands was too dangerous a weapon. So he tinkered, and built, and hid them away from the people who’d want to buy them. The last weapon he’d ever made was a sniper rifle. He’d taught Derek to shoot it before he left to join the Lance. He and his father spent hours at a rock outcropping shooting down spiderants and garbage piles.

Upstairs Stiles is shifting his weight back and forth. He’s almost dying with curiosity but he refuses to go downstairs. He’s known Derek less than a day, not long enough to know if Derek will kill him for an imagined slight. So he stays upstairs and keeps his ears and eyes open. So far he hasn’t heard any other signs of life. It could mean that the bandit who’d been here before has moved on. Or they’re passed out drunk somewhere. Stiles really doesn’t want to run into anyone just yet.

Exploring Pandora had always been abstract to him. Growing up him and Scott thought they’d just skirt around danger, maybe follow behind some big bad and explore the path they cleared. Now Scott is out there somewhere forging his own path and Stiles has to rework his plan around a stranger. He’s not entirely sold on Derek being a wildlife researcher.

There’s a howl outside and Stiles pulls out his pistol. He whips it in front of him and holds it barrel down, but he’s alert. His knees are bent and ready to spring. Stiles had never seen a skag in real life but he’d heard recordings of their howls. “Derek.” He edges closer to the hole in the ground and hollers down. “Hey man, I think we have company.” Stiles strains his ears and he can pick up a definite pattern of furiously moving paws. He imagines he can hear the click, click, click of the skag’s claws against the stray rocks as it barrels closer. They have an amazing sense of smell.

Stiles doesn’t smell like death and rotting meat. He smells alive, healthy. He’s a well wrapped skag snack waiting to be picked off and Derek doesn’t seem to care at all. “Come on man, a little help!”

Derek is torn away from his memories by Stiles. His heart is going crazy, like it’s going to beat out of his chest. He growls and shoulders his father’s sniper rifle. He takes a pistol and a few grenades as well, tucking them into his bag with care. Up above he can hear the sounds of a skag getting closer. Giving one last look to his safe haven, Derek says a quiet thanks to his family. He still has a small pack out there, scattered to the far corners of the galaxy. It wouldn’t be right of him to clear the place out. And maybe some day he’ll come back for a gun and find family instead.

He heads upstairs, plucking at the string in his stomach along the way. His bedroom has long since been over run but he bypasses Stiles to head in there anyways. There’s a tell tale grinding of stone behind him that signals the vault is closing. Derek’s father had coded it well. Only a Hale could open it. Only a Hale could keep it open.

“Maybe it’s because I’m a cold weather guy, but shouldn’t we be freaking out more about the rabid animal running our way?”

“It’s not rabid.” Derek pushes aside his ruined bedroom door and strips off the jacket, then the shirt. Stiles makes a choking noise behind him but he ignores it. Stiles had probably seen more when he dragged him out of the cold. Derek runs a claw over the stitches, cutting each piece in two. When they’re all cut he pinches the pieces between his finger and thumb and plucks them out. The sensation of string sliding out of his skin racks his body with shivers.

“How do you know?”

Derek furrows his brow and starts kicking aside the random junk bandits have left behind. A piece of wood hits the far wall and splinters into two. It’s more satisfying than he’d like it to be. “Know what?”

“That it’s not rabid.” Stiles spins on his heel, reacting to the sounds of heavy breathing just outside the window. The skag is circling the house. “It could totally be rabid man.”

“This one’s not. I’d smell it.” To prove his point he takes a deep breath. The window is broken in the corner and it’s no difficulty to pick up the sour rot smell of skag. It’s not rabid. Those smell sick, like stomach bile and urine. This one is just a run of the mill skag. Probably not even an adult yet. “Just don’t piss it off, we’ll be fine.” Derek kicks at his old dresser and starts tugging out the drawers. Thankfully there’s still a few shirts.

He pulls on a dusty long sleeve, grayed with age, and plucks up a few others to shove into his bag. He doesn’t have any jeans left. He smooths the aggravation off of his face and shoves past Stiles. Who is still too frantic about one little skag. It was probably a mistake to bring him. If he can’t handle this what will he even be like in a shoot out?

“Hey! Derek, come on man, talk to me. What’s our next stop? What are you interested in right now. Because I was thinking we could explore Eridium Blight. I’ve heard that eridium is going some crazy things to the--” Stiles slams into Derek’s back. He shakes himself as he staggers backwards. Derek is built like a tank, not surprising really. He’s a little touched to note that he’s still holding onto the duster coat he’d given him. “Why’d you...stop...” Stiles let’s his question hang in the air. The skag Stiles had heard running around outside was about a yard from the front door. And Derek was just watching it. He didn’t even have a weapon drawn.

His heart is jumping in his chest but he defers to Derek’s judgement. Stiles knew Bullymong. He knew Rakk’s. But he was in Derek’s territory now, the sunny side of Pandora. He’d just have to trust him. It didn’t stop him from tightening his grip on his pistol, but it did keep him from firing. The skag was young, larger than Stiles was comfortable with but he’d seen bigger on the ECHOnet. Maybe that was why Derek wasn’t stressed. The skag seemed to be hesitating, pawing the dirt and itching to step closer but never coming.
He thought that their plan was to wait it out, for sentimental reasons. Derek was suppose to be some wildlife expert. Stiles was under the impression he’d been living off the land in the depths of Aegrus. He could be against violence to animals. What happened was far stranger than anything Stiles had ever seen before. Derek’s eyes began to glow. Not unlike he’d seen in siren’s. But there were no known male siren’s, and never any with claws, or such an advanced passive healing factor.

Derek’s jaw dropped open and he roared. It was a deep, rumbling noise that tore through the air and sent the skag running. It scrambled, tripping over itself to get away. Stiles had stumbled back in shock, not having expected such a noise so close. “What...dude...” Stiles rounded to Derek’s side and tried to get a better look at his face. His eyes weren’t glowing anymore and his mouth looked just the same as always. It didn’t look like it could unhinge and howl. “Dude...what are you?”

Derek’s face is set in a scowl. His whole body looks tense, wound up and ready to pounce. But his unapproachable vibe doesn’t seem to shake Stiles. “Not human.”

“Well obviously dude, but what are you? You’re not...Hyperion didn’t do this?” Hyperion tested on a lot of people, anyone they could get their hands on really. A lot of their experiments ended up in the Fridge but not all of them. Other’s escaped and weaved a path of destruction wherever they wanted. Most experiments yielded super strong, highly aggressive men with poor impulse control. After so many failures it’s not a reach to believe that some would be successful. That there’s someone out there that Hyperion is proud of.

Derek growls stalks out of the house. Behind him Stiles jolts into action, using his long legs to keep pace. “Hyperion didn’t do this. This is the way I am. They way my family is. We came to this galaxy like this. I’m not...” Derek stops and turns to face Stiles. His face is alight with fury. “I’m not some monster science experiment. I’m a wolf.”

Stiles gapes at him. Folklore from the old solar system had gaps. There were parts that faded away, lost to the stars forever. But there were stories that passed through families, warping and changing until they were something else entirely. Stiles had heard of werewolves though. Scott’s family had a story about them. They got carried to different worlds on the back of a moon goddess. She jumped to all the moons in all the galaxies and spread her children wherever they could live. Somehow he didn’t think Derek was the type of guy who’d appreciate that story.

“Okay man. I was just...” Stiles sighs and scratches the back of his neck. “I really hate Hyperion okay.” They’re part of the reason Frost Valley got wiped off the map. Hyperion loaders didn’t come themselves but they drove others into their little slice of paradise. “So, werewolves are really a thing then?”

“We’re older than siren’s at least.”

“Cool, cool.” Stiles kicks at the dirt and tries to make himself unassuming. Inside he’s dying to ask more. He’s not entirely sold on Derek being a werewolf. But there’s a possibility. He could examine a species that was thought to be mythological, or extinct at the very least. The more people delve into the history of Pandora and the Eridian’s, the more it seems that there’s more to the world than science. Or science as they all know it. And more than that, Derek is still his only ticket around Pandora. He knows his way around a gun but he’s far less likely to die if he has Derek’s muscle to back him up.

“We need to get moving. We don’t want to be here when it gets dark.” Derek looks ahead, seemingly at the horizon. The sky is already changing from bright blue to pinks and oranges. They must be on the other side of the planet.

“Where to?”

“I promised you the monument didn’t I?”

“Eridium Blight?” Stiles is shocked. He doesn’t believe he’s heard right. There’s no way Derek is already making good on their bargain. That’s not how these deals are suppose to work. But then again, Derek had been left for dead by his previous crew. He might not be so well equipped to handle Pandora dealings.

His floundering spurns Derek into action. He doesn’t bother telling Stiles to come along, just starts walking toward the edge of town. The graves seem even sadder in the dimming light. Stiles wonders how many of them belong to Derek’s family. His face gives nothing away. Derek keeps his eyes fixed on some point past the grave site until they pass. Then turns to the fast travel station with less tension in his shoulders. Better able to move along with his family behind him, out of sight.

When Stiles starts digitizing he hears the distant howl of the skag Derek scared away. Derek’s answering howl is lost in the mechanical chirping of the machine.
Eridium Blight is nothing like the pictures Stiles has seen. It’s brighter. More alive than he’d ever imagined. There’s a pulse in the very ground. And everything is awash with a soft purple glow. Eridium is at home here. It’s not fighting its way into the wildlife, it’s merging with it. It’s filling all the gaps no one realised were there.

Stiles staggers away from the terminal and drops to his knees. He’s never felt anything like this. It’s not like touching a raw piece of eriduim. It’s like sucking on a live wire. It thrums through his body and vibrates his bones. Before he knows it he’s gasping and pressing his forehead into the warm ground. The sand is soft, plush, like volcanic ash. It’s Derek’s hand on the scruff of his neck pulling him back.

He digs his fingertips hard into the sides of Stiles’ neck and holds him upright. Stiles is still struggling to take in air. Every breath feels like a million little embers digging into his lungs. His vision starts to darken around the corners. He has no idea what’s going on. His mind is racing, ‘not like this, I haven’t seen anything’ then it’s a litany of please, please, please. He can distantly feel Derek digging around in his bag and it lights a fire in his belly. How dare he stand there and watch Stiles die after all he’d done. Was this the plan all along? Did Derek sabotage his fast travel?

Stiles wants to rip himself away from Derek, even if it’s his dying move. He those traitor fingers off of his neck. He wants to breathe. Stiles tries to pull himself away, urging his feet forward even as his head dips back into Derek’s palm. His bag is being yanked back and rifled through. It’s so hard to get traction, like he’s walking through sludge. His weak fingers scramble and pluck at the strap of his bag, trying to pull it off. He just wants to get away from Derek.

There’s a forceful tug and Stiles is powerless against it. He goes tumbling back, slipping from under Derek’s hand onto the ground. He lands over his pack and his head cracks against the ground. It gives him a second of clarity and his busy mind struggles to figure out what’s happened. The thrumming feeling that had buzzed throughout his whole body before seems to slip away, concentrating in his hands. With it goes his inability to breathe. His vision starts to clear.

Above him the sky is a hazy purple, like the eridium has diffused into the atmosphere itself. Stiles allows himself a second to appreciate its beauty before reality slams back to him. With a roar Stiles springs up, rocking and shambling onto his knees. Derek is there, a safe distance from him. His face is hard to place, confused maybe, scared? “What did you do?” Stiles growls out his question. His voice sounds foreign to his own ears, gravelly.

“Look.”

“Look? LOOK? You...you poison me and all you can say is--”

Derek stomps forward, face fierce and concentrated. Stiles rears back, struggling to get to his feet so he can run. But Derek is quicker. His hands shoot out and grasp Stiles’ wrists. Wrists that are almost numb they’re shaking so hard. The live wire feeling is still there. How did he ignore that? Stiles is afraid to look. It’s easier to see the anger on Derek’s face, the confusion. He can almost ignore the soft purple glow cast over his face. The glow that is almost certainly coming from Stiles’ still numb hands.

A whimper falls from Stiles’ lips. He’s entirely unprepared for this. He’d seen what eridium poisoning could do. He didn’t want to lose his hands. He couldn’t lose his fingers too. He feels like he’s going to shake apart. This time when his lungs burn and darkness creeps into his vision he knows it’s all his own doing. Panic attacks. He’s having a panic attack.

Derek isn’t sure what to do. He’s seen something like this with the young witch doctors in Aegrus. Eridium was rarer there than anywhere else and the superstitious natives had their own stories about it. About what it had been like before Eridium got locked away in the vault. He’d seen one boy, a small boy who looked half starved and entirely defeated. He touched a puddle of eridium near a fissure. Derek had almost ran to him but in the end there was no need. The people in his village came running and watched as he shook apart.

The boy had a fit and dropped to the ground like he’d died on the spot. A village elder came to him. Derek’s sensitive ears heard the elder speak softly in a language he didn’t know. He thought he’d seen death. His first in Aegrus. But the unthinkable happened. While the elder tried to console his villagers the boy’s eyes opened. They glowed brighter than any wolf Derek had ever seen. Bright purple like the eridium lines in the monuments and statues.

Derek had acted on instinct. At first he’d though Stiles was reacting to the eridium mist in the air. It carried in the ash and coated everything here. For someone who’d been isolated from exposure Eridium Blight could be overwhelming. But his breath didn’t come and when he dropped to the ground Derek felt the same buzzing energy from Stiles that he’d felt from that boy. Derek had grabbed Stiles by the neck to keep him from hurting himself then he’d started digging through his bag.

The hunk of eridium in his pack was practically singing. It’s energy couldn’t be contained by the rusted out ammo box. Even with Stiles feebly struggling to get away it wasn’t difficult to unearth it. Chunk in hand Derek acted on instinct and shoved it into Stiles’ hands. The effect was instant. The wild pattering of his heart slowed, almost to a stop, before evening out. Stiles dropped like a sack and cracked his head on the ground but his body wasn’t falling apart anymore. His smell was creeping back from the sour edge of slag to something more normal.

Held tight in his hands, the eridium drew the wildness out and concentrated it. Derek was at a loss for words. He stumbled onto someone who could be a genuine help. Kate was no siren but she was a force to be reckoned with and she’d proved herself more than capable of handling werewolves. But now Derek had something unexpected. If he could somehow teach Stiles to harness his ability he stood a real chance at getting his revenge. He might be able to go beyond Kate. He could go after everyone who’d helped hurt his family. And Stiles would help him do it all for a little exploration. Derek could play tour guide. He could keep up the guise of a wildlife expert.

When Stiles was finally aware enough to understand Derek hadn’t attacked him, he worked himself up again. Derek felt like smashing his head into a rock. “Stiles? Stiles, stay with me.” He rubs his thumbs over the boy’s wrists. His heart rate is climbing again but the sickly scent of slag isn’t coming from his pores. Instead Derek is assaulted with a wash of neurotic smells, anxiety and fear. “Breathe Stiles.”

When Derek was young he fought all the time with his little sister Cora. She’d get so frustrated at his ability to shift with ease. She’d work herself up into fierce tantrums that stole her breath away. While her face turned red and puce his mother would kneel down and gently blow across her face. Something about the simple action always gave Cora her breath back. Derek tried it now, at a loss for anything else to try. No one in the Lance had ever panicked like this. Not long enough to survive anyways.

As Stiles’ face turns pink from exertion and his breath ratchets up Derek blows. He sweeps his face from side to side, cooling Stiles’ heated cheeks and ruffling the wild fringe of his hair. It takes several passes but it seems to work. His heart rate starts to slow and his smell winds down, the anxiety and fear becoming more of a background scent. A small trace on the wind rather than a smog.

Stiles comes back to the world in gasps. He greedily sucks in air, his body desperate to right itself again. Even the smell of ash and slag is welcome. It means he’s okay. His body is winding down. Now that he’s prepared for it, it’s easier to look at his hands. The eridium that he’d stolen from Derek is clenched in his fists. Purple is creeping over his hands in tendrils, bright swirls of light across his dirty skin. He looks like a siren. But there are no male sirens. The gene is on the X chromosome. You need two in order to be one. So no males. Y negates the whole thing.

“Witch Doctors. You said you’d seen witch doctors in Aegrus do something like this right?”

“A few.”

The wheels are already turning in Stiles’ head. His mother had been new to Pandora but his father had always lived here. Who knows what could have been lying dormant in his genes. The outpouring of eridium from the vault could have latched to his body because he was still young. His brain chemistry was still changing. His body was more receptive to changes in the environment. Without seeing how eridium effected his father it was impossible to be one hundred percent sure, but it was a theory. Now he absolutely had to see the Eridian monuments.

Going by the expression on his face, Derek guesses Stiles is coming to terms with his mutation. He’s adapting fast which either means he’s remarkably resilient or he’s pushing away the implications. If the latter is true Derek doesn’t want to be around with the meltdown comes. “You’ll be fine, but we need to get moving.” Motion is life on Pandora. When people get stagnant, they get shot. He’ll carry Stiles if he has to. He’s become too much of an asset to leave behind.

The situation is not lost on Stiles. Eirium Blight isn’t a stop for people who are faint of heart. Every second they sit there is a second they’re risking their lives. And as it stands, neither of them a New-U in their names. He sniffles and pulls his wrists from Derek’s grasp. “Let’s move.” Stiles is thankful that Derek wastes no time moving on. He’s able to follow behind at arms length. The eridium is still clutched in his hands. Frankly he’s afraid of what will happen if he let’s it go.

Together they wander just off the side of the road, walking against the wind and ash. There’s a Catch-A-Ride station a little ways ahead. Stiles is beyond ready to get into a car. The lack of sleep is catching up to him, spurned on by his little fit. He’s not sure how much farther he can walk before he drops. When the beaten down awning is before them Derek continues past it. He doesn’t seem to ever get tired. Stiles huffs and totters over to sit on the steps leading up to the digistructor. “Hey...”, he licks his lips and takes a deep breath, “hey Derek, where are you going?” Stiles hands are both wrapped around the eridium so he uses them both to gesture vaguely at the machine.

Hearing Stiles call out to him, Derek turns. His eyes trace over the Catch-A-Ride station and over Stiles. Who is sitting red faced and tired on the steps. His hands aren’t glowing so brightly anymore but the smell of eridium has seeped into his pores. He’ll probably smell like it for weeks. No matter where they fast travel to. Derek slumps his shoulders and sighs. “I don’t have an account.” He’d never needed one. The Lance had provided vehicles before it fell. Before and after that he’d had no need. Werewolves were built for endurance. There wasn’t a place he wanted to go that he couldn’t walk to.

Stiles scoffs and kicks at the stairs. “I have an account.”

“You have a Catch-A-Ride but not a New-U?”

“Totally not the same thing dude. I’d rather have a car than sell my soul for a chance at a...second chance.” Stiles screws up his face and starts mumbling to himself. Derek can make out more than one snarky remark about his own intelligence but he ignores it. Stiles is just a kid. “You can drive right?”

Derek grits his teeth but says nothing. Instead he stalks towards Stiles and up to the platform. “What’s your log in?”

“RadiNation.”

Derek fights to keep his face neutral. If Stiles’ password has a single ‘x’ in it he’s going to lose faith in him. He’s not sure he can ride around the planet with a kid who puts gratuitous x’s in anything. “Password?”

“Gh9wq18er.” Humorous log in name aside, Stiles isn’t an idiot. Everybody and their brother wants a Catch-A-Ride and there aren’t nearly enough people out there smart enough to hack their way to a free account. A lot of bandits resort to stolen log in information. That’s why Stiles keeps his password random and on a short one week life span. He’d change it whenever he got bored back home.

Derek is suitably impressed by the random password. His parents had always preached the importance of a keyboard smash when creating one. There was just no rhyme or reason to it. No way to randomly guess it. He punches in the password and skims through Stiles’ account. He only has access to one Outrunner. An older bulky model with a roll cage. There’s a lot of skins, which surprises him. They only cost a dollar a piece but he’d expected someone with Stiles’ background to only spend money on the necessities.

“Something blue please!” Stiles is huddled under the railing, his hands clasped around the eridium and resting on the dirty cement.

“Why?”

“Because you’re using my account. Because blue is my favorite color. Because blue will calm me in the face of adversity.” He rolls his hand in a ‘so on’ gesture. Derek’s always been partial to green and there’s an amazing pearlescent he spies half way down the list. But it is Stiles’ account and Derek does plan on recklessly using his abilities so he selects a powder blue and taps deploy. Stiles waits until the vehicle is ready to get up and climb the stairs. He spends a second looking between his hands and the gunner seat. There’s no way he can climb in with his hands together.

Derek rounds to his side and grabs his wrist. The hunk of eridium flares and Derek keeps his eyes off of it. “You can let go.”

“Yeah? Just,” Stiles wiggles his shoulders and shakes his wrists in Derek’s grasp, “let go. Just like that.”

Derek sighs and tugs at Stiles’ wrist. “You’ll be fine. I wouldn’t have helped you back there just to let you die.” He tugs again and Stiles hand slips away from the eridium. Now that his hand is free the glow fades until his skin is as pale and white as ever. It doesn’t look like he’s ever had the bright purple bands at all. It seems to console Stiles enough to have him dumping the eridium into Derek’s still outstretched hand.

They’d left the ammo box back at the fast travel station. It’d gotten lost in the shuffle. But Derek hadn’t bothered boxing it before. Eridium had little effect on him. Slag could be dangerous but eridium itself was nothing. He slips it into his pack where it clacks against the butt of a gun. He watches as the purple fades from Stiles’ other hand, receding to his finger tips then blinking out all together. The smell is still coming out of his pores, just as he expected. Derek points at the gunner seat and stares Stiles down until he climbs inside.

Once Stiles is safely inside Derek climbs into the drivers seat and turns on the Runner. It’s not the smoothest running vehicle he’s been in but it’ll get the job done. And it should cut their travel time in half. The road to the monument isn’t paved. It’s best to get their by buzzard but there’s no chance of getting one of those. Not unless Derek wants to bring a whole army of trouble onto their heads.

As Derek backs off the ramp he hears the heavy breathing of a bullymong slumbering near by. Derek is careful to give it a wide berth but it doesn’t stir. Making it’s den near a terminal must have desensitized it to the sounds of rumbling engines. Driving is therapeutic in the same way walking is. There’s a long stretch of nothing ahead of him and only his thoughts to accompany him. In the gunner seat Stiles is a hum of warmth on his periphery. He’s not pack, not even close, but it’s nice to be close to someone again. With Stiles now asleep it’s almost like being alone.

Overhead the sky is overcast. The soft flurries of ash falling everywhere blanket the ground and soon cover Derek in soot until it’s all he can smell. The first time he’d been here the vault had been closed. The sky had been bright and blue like the skies over Fyrestone. The monument had awed him by it’s sheer size. The obsidian statues of the slender Eridians made him feel minuscule. Some of the Lance talked about the empty spaces in the statues, discussing whether they were breaks caused over time or if something had once filled the space. Had the situation been different, Derek would have loved to see the eridium crawl into the cracks.

He imagines Stiles will be awed by it. He seemed like someone who was starved intellectually. Not something a person feels often on Pandora. Sometimes Derek feels like the average IQ of the planet is in the single digits. The curse of having parents from Themis was an educated background. Derek lets his mind wander during the drive, trying to think of how he can coerce Stiles into helping him. The out and out truth is not the path he wants to take.

Stiles had some sort of moral compass, made obvious by his decision to stitch Derek up rather than let him bleed out. He’d also proven himself to be open minded. It was rare that people simply accepted that Derek was a werewolf. So few people even knew what werewolves were anymore. And as useful as Stiles’ new powers could be, there was the fact that Stiles needed training. Derek made no illusions about finding Kate quickly. She was ruthlessly intelligent and hell bent on staying free. Better men had tried and failed to capture her. While he tracked her down he could train Stiles up and gain his trust. If he could foster some sort of mentor, mentee relationship Stiles would be more likely to help him.

Seeing the monument was the first step in that direction. It served two purposes. One, Kate could potentially have a stash of weapons hiding there. And if she didn’t there were likely to be other Lance members hiding weapons there. If nothing else they would be able to steal a few shields. Derek didn’t like wearing them. The energy field made his senses go haywire. But Stiles was in dire need of one. And two, Stiles had a burning desire to know more about the history of Pandora. Derek didn’t mind playing tour guide if it meant he gained something over him.

Before Atlas fell Derek had been a different person. A brighter person. But Pandora was chaos and pain and it ate people up for fun. Then spit them out and watched them writhe. He wasn’t in a position where he could let wrongs go. He needed revenge. He needed Kate’s blood on his hands to feel like his life was worth something. It wasn’t what he wanted for himself. It wasn’t something he’d ever imagined could happen to him. But he’d been a foolish child, eager to see the best in the world and its people. He would never be that stupid again.

Eridian monuments were scattered throughout the planet. Whatever civilization had lived there before humans had been prosperous and magic oriented. The going word was that they achieved a scientific enlightenment humans couldn’t hope to grasp. But Derek felt that there was something more to it. The most well known of the monuments was just after Heroes Pass. It’s where the vault opened and the eridium poured out. The place Derek was going to was less known but equally breathtaking.

It was close to the volcano. You could either land on top of the rock face with a buzzard and repel in, or you could go by foot and enter through the base. The entrance at the bottom looked like a bottomless crag but it was all a trick of the light. If you kept to the far left side you could edge in and walk the narrow path to the bottom. There it opened up as a vast cavern covered in writing. The Eridian language was a rare thing to see.

“Whoa dude...are we going into that volcano?” Stiles woke up disoriented. His body still felt strange, like he was ready to fizzle out of his skin. But when he looked at himself he didn’t see any strange markings. And he didn’t feel any symptoms of slag poisoning. Until he got away from Eridium Blight he would push the worry away. His body could be overreacting to the massive amounts of eridium in the air. And the continuous flow of volcanic ash swirling in the air. Eridium Blight was not fit to house people.

Derek shifted the car to neutral and twisted back to look at Stiles. The boy was grasping the rim of the gunner rail and leaning forward. His neck was craned up to better see the smokey rim of the volcano. Even as far back as they were they could feel the heat wafting their way. “No.” Derek doesn’t bother with anything else. He’ll let the path do the talking for him. He turns the car off and hops out. To get to the crag they need to walk across the rocks rather than the dirt path. “Try to keep up.”

Behind him Stiles ambles along, tripping here and there over rocks and faults. To his credit he does manage to keep pace. He’s never more than an arm’s length away. The heat has them both sweating, shirt sleeves pushed to their elbows. As you go down into the crag some of the heat abates. With the help of well placed vents the heat is funneled out from the cavern. By the time they reach the crag Derek is almost desperate for a single breeze. Beside him Stiles is doing no better. His whole face is red with excretion and Derek feels one well placed wind will knock him out of commission.

He draws up short and braces his hands on his knees. “I thought...”, he pants for a few seconds, “I thought we were going to see something Eridian.”

“It’s through there.”

Stiles snicks and points loftily towards the dark craig. Bathed in a purple haze, the fissure looks like a gaping wound. There doesn’t look to be any safe way down. “There? There’s easier ways to kill me Derek.” He straightens up and shakes himself, trying to unstick his sweat soaked shirt from his back.

Derek runs a hand through his hair and takes a deep breath. “There’s a ledge. If we stick to the left side we can walk down.”

“And if there’s a break in the path?”

“Then we improvise.” Derek twists his upper body to get a better look at the entrance. “Didn’t you want to do something exciting with your life?”

The first thing to cross Stiles’ mind is ‘well, yeah’ but he doesn’t say anything. Derek doesn’t know him, doesn’t owe him anything. He has an incling that he’s being played and he’s not sure what the price is. But for now he’s willing to ride the ride. He just wasn’t prepared for that ride to take him down into a deep dark hole next to a volcano. It’s starting to look like the set up for a weird bandit hazing.

This is exactly how he’d ended up playing chicken with the baby bullymong. This is how he ended up naked on an iceberg. This is how he and Scott got into all the shit they got into before the world went to hell in a handbasket. Someone dangled something exciting in front of him and believed he wouldn’t have a part of it. Stiles wasn’t a coward. He knew when he saw the looming black volcano ahead of him that he would go wherever Derek took him. It just wasn’t in his nature to resist.

So when Derek took the first step into the fissure Stiles was just a few paces behind him. As they descended the hot, stagnant air around them nearly pulled the breath from his lungs. Derek doesn’t seem phased at all. He hugs the wall and traces his path in front of him with his palm. Derek’s eyes are better suited for the dark and he can already see the faint purple glow coming from the cavern. The last time he’d been here the path down stayed pitch black until you got to the actual cavern. The only natural light at the time had been what filtered down through the broken opening in the top. The weak light from outside would filter in and diffuse around the glass like panes in the statues.

As they creep closer and Stiles starts to see the purple lighting he crowds closer to Derek. His body stops clinging to the wall, his curiosity outweighing his fear. By the time he can see the bottom on his own he leaps off the narrow ledge and lands in a crouch. Stretched out in front of him is a statue. The figure is Eridian, with slender limbs and a wide chest. It’s made from obsidian, cut across with ribbons of eridium. It stretches so high above him that Stiles needs to crane his head up to make out the shape of it’s head. And even then he can only clearly make out its chin. The scale of it is unlike anything he’s ever seen in his life. Standing there he feels insignificant.

He brings his hands to his mouth. Tears prick at the corner of his eyes and Stiles is helpless to stop it. He never thought he’d get to see anything like it in person. It’s beautiful. Stiles takes a deep breath and steps into the cavern. Derek is an afterthought behind him. Stiles walks slowly to the edge of the rockface and paces at its edge. Down below the rocks are cut into massive cubes. The height and placement is irregular but it’s possible to use them as stairs. It’s just as intimidating a sight as the statue that looms in front of him. He can’t imagine the time it took to carve out every nook and crany of this place.

“What did it look like before?”

“Darker.”

Stiles scoffs and toes the edge of the ledge. He’s on the cusp of an amazing discovery. All the data on the ECHOnet means nothing in the face of actual research he can do himself. There’s always something missing. Someone’s always typing up reports to suit their own needs. Stiles wants to know everything about Pandora, about eridium, and Eridians. He wants to know who named the system and what’s in the other vaults.

A race of beings intelligent enough to lock the entirety of an element in a vault is smart enough to have done it more than once. They’d be smart enough to create elements. The possibilities are limitless. As kids he and Scott dreamed of getting out of Frost Valley. Everyone did. And they all wanted to go for their own reasons. Scott wanted to find love. He wanted to get out and meet a girl then take her to every continent and make a life for himself. But Stiles could take or leave love. He wanted to learn. He had a burning urge to know everything and on Pandora? That was a low priority. The only way to learn anything was to research it yourself; to get out there and dig yourself elbow deep into the history of a place.

“Can we get down?”

“We’ll have to make a few jumps. If you land wrong you could break an ankle.” With that Derek jumps down to the closest obsidian cube. His boots thunk and echo through the cavern. Stiles hears Derek’s footsteps and peeks over the edge to see where he’s going.

There doesn’t look to be an obvious path. Not even to Derek, who’s been here before. Stiles watches his pace the edge of his cube, eyeing up possible paths. Not wanting to be left behind Stiles swings himself over the ledge and lands in a crouch where Derek had before. He surveys the cliffs in front of him and tries to calculate the best route. To his left there’s a set of cubes that wind in a curve but half way down there’s nowhere else to go. Unless Stiles fancies a swim in a lake of slag.

He reluctantly follows after Derek, carefully ambling over the cracks in the cubes to get to where Derek is pacing. “We have to jump. Try to roll when you land.” Something tells Stiles that Derek isn’t particularly bothered by the prospect of a broken ankle. Judging by the heal rate on his gut wound he could probably heal a bone in a few days. Stiles wasn’t willing to bet his life that his new found affinity for eridium would afford him the same. Because a broken bone down here would be a death sentence. Because even if Derek were so inclined, there would be no way he’d be able to carry Stiles up and out of the cavern.

Stiles waves out his arm and rolls his wrist. “After you.” He smirks at Derek’s long suffering face. He has zero intentions of going first. Mostly because he’s not sure how he’d get back up alone should Derek decide to abandon him.

Derek rolls his eyes at Stiles and paces the edge of the cube one last time. It looks like there’s been a small shift in the rock since he’d been here last. But even through the smell of ash and eridium he can smell that someone’s been through here recently. There’s blood soaked into the cracks, a week old maybe. But it’s coming from farther down and in this direction so this has to be the best way to go. He hadn’t seen another obvious route from the top. He’s guessing that Stiles hadn’t either. It’ll be no problem for him to make the jump and baring any catastrophic incident he’ll be able to lift Stiles back up later. But he’s not confident that the shambling teenager can make it down in one piece.
He jumps down without any fanfare and lands in a crouch. When he stands up again he looks up at Stiles. He’s staring over the edge down at Derek. He doesn’t look the least bit confident. “Just jump Stiles.” He steps back, to the far corner of the cube so Stiles has room, and waits.

With a deep breath Stiles walks to the back edge and gets a jog going. He doesn’t want to sprint off and miss the cube under him entirely. He makes it all the way to the edge and pulls up short. His boots scramble at the edge as he skids but he manages to stay up. A little bit of windmilling later Stiles is calm and a safe distance away. He’s not scared. Just healthily cautious. Stiles claps his hands together and reevaluates himself. He pointedly does not look in Derek’s direction but he can definitely feel his eyes boring holes into his skull. Whatever, not everyone has a ridiculous heal factor. Some people have to think to survive.

The drop is about ten feet. Not a huge deal really. Stiles had fallen off of taller stuff as a kid and lived to tell the tale. He’d fallen off taller stuff and done it again on purpose. He didn’t need to go barreling off the edge. He could just gently drop down. Easy. Stiles sat down on the edge, sparing only a second’s glace at Derek. Who was looking more and more pissed off by the second. He let his legs kick back and forth, hitting his heels on the warm stone. He’s nearly six feet himself which means it’ll be just under a four foot drop if he can dangle himself by his fingers. He can handle that.

Stiles tips himself and starts edging down the ledge. The toes of his boots easily find purchase on the chiseled surface and he’s able to lower himself. By the time his finger tips are holding him it’s only a three foot drop. He casts a quick look down then lets go.

“Do you plan on getting to the bottom some time today or do you want to die of old age first?”

Stiles scoffs and waves Derek off. He got down just fine. And now that he’s got a plan he’ll be able to handle the rest of the jumps the same way. He’s nothing if not adaptable.
“Well I’m down here aren’t I?”

Derek doesn’t bother with an answer, pointing instead at the dozens of yards they still have left to go. Aided by the light of the eridium Stiles can see a heap of chests piled at the statues feet. “Just keep up.” With that Derek makes his way down to the next cube. They move quicker now. The ground has mostly leveled out but there’s a few big drops. Each time Derek swiftly jumps down and lands with a graceful spring in his step. Stiles wiggles down behind him, stretching and dropping down only after he’s pointed his toes to be closer to the ground. It’s a pointless gesture but it makes him feel better.

By the time Stiles makes it to the base of the statue Derek has already established a base of sorts. He’s standing on top of the biggest chest. It’s opened but his feet straddle the incline effortlessly. It looks like he’s sniffing the air. Stiles takes a cautionary look around but he doesn’t see much. While the cavern is well lit enough to have guided their way down, there’s plenty of dark corners for bandits to hide. The dark obsidian is the perfect cover. Werewolves are suppose to have good eyes though right? “See anything man?”
Derek doesn’t look his way. His eyes are trained at a point just beyond Stiles’ shoulder. He takes another deep breath. The smells of the cavern are wisps of information hidden deep under the stinging smell of eridium and the heavy blanket of ash. The blood on the rocks had been easy. It was nearby and kept warm by the neighboring volcano. Down at the base where the eridium is most heavily concentrated it’s hard to pull out just who’s been here. The crates smell like gun oil and corossive acid. The Lance’s biggest enemy these days were Hyperion. Jack didn’t like sharing his sandbox with other evil doers. He wanted Pandora to himself. Anyone identifying as Lance, or Raiders, quickly found themselves on a wanted list.

He doesn’t see anyone. But he does see a live grenade lodged in the rocks some fifty yards from where they’d climbed down. It was an electrical mod, still sparking weakly. Malfunctions on electrical weaponry were common but most puttered out when the charge went. That grenade had to be fresh, hours old at most. Derek hadn’t smelt anyone else from the car, or on the path. It’s possible that someone had covered themselves in ash to mask their scent. Derek only knew of one person who would be so careful.
“Uh, hello? Puny human over here doesn’t have super vision. Care to tell little old St--”

“Shut up.” He doesn’t want Kate to know Stiles’ name. Right now he’s just some scrawny kid tagging along behind Derek. An easy kill. If they make it out and she has his name she’ll start looking into it. The less Kate knew about Derek and his company the better. “Get out your gun and shut your mouth.”

Taking note of Derek’s tone Stiles pulls out his pistol and holds it in the ready position. He still can’t see anyone but he trusts that Derek will take him in the right direction. He’s taking out a gun as well, a sleek green plated sniper rifle. He holds it aloft at his side but Stiles can see how tightly he’s griping it. The two of them sweep their eyes across the room but no one comes forward. Stiles isn’t sure how long they’re going to remain on alert. Sometimes out in the Waste Stiles has to keep himself hypervigilant for hours. It was the only thing his ADHD was good for. The lack of filter kept him from being surprised, most of the time anyways.

Time passes but it’s barely noticeable. Neither of them speak and Stiles takes his cues from Derek. Eventually the grenade shorts out and the atmosphere relaxes. Derek is obviously still on alert but he shoulders his weapon and turns to the trunks of weapons. “Were you expecting someone?” Stiles, who does not have a ridiculous heal factor, keeps his pistol out. Though he lets his arm rest at his side. Derek had seemed too tense to be reacting to just a possible threat. It was like he was worried about something or someone in particular.

In response Derek grunts. The trunks and cases are lack luster in terms of weapons. Most of it is pilfered half destroyed Hyperion garbage. The only boon is the wealth of ammo. It’s piled everywhere, dumped in every nook and cranny like spare change and lint. Derek took everything he needed and in a fit of petty rage he chucked what he didn’t need over the ledge into the eridium below. Stiles huffed behind him but made no comment. The pistol ammo was safe.

Realizing he wasn’t getting anything Stiles scoffed and starting kicking at the edges of the trunks and safes. He found a small stack of bills, all big, and stuffed them in his pocket. He didn’t even bother counting. Any money was more than what he was use to. Stiles knew that Derek was using him for something. He’d had the passing thought that maybe Derek was trying to establish a pack. Melissa’s stories had always shared a similar thread: The wolf dies, the pack survives. Having never seen a werewolf himself he hadn’t thought of it when Derek healed. But he’d heard enough of Melissa’s stories to know what they should look like. He had no reason to believe Derek was lying to him.

And Derek’s family was dead, buried in a mass grave out front of what use to be his home. His pack was gone. Stiles had seen a fair few people who drove themselves into the ground for revenge. It was the life blood of Pandora. Stiles was smart enough to realize that he was probably being used to help Derek catch whomever had killed his pack. Before hitting Eridium Blight he’d been a body. Someone for the wolf to draw on. But now? Stiles looked down at his hands, pale now and dirty. He clenched and curled his fingers but there was no shadow of eridium under his skin. Not visibly. Now Stiles was an asset. He could be a weapon.

He could be. But he didn’t have to be. Stiles could learn. He could piece together the puzzle forming in his head and give power ups a go. He could see the world on Derek’s dime. And if they got somewhere past uneasy companionship maybe Stiles would make himself useful. But at any moment Stiles could cut and run. Being a Sheriff’s son had taught him many things. Mostly it taught him that you had to be one step ahead or you’d have one foot in the grave. So Derek was useful for now. Derek was safe for now. But that could change at any minute. They weren’t friends. Stiles needed to keep that in mind.

“We should leave.”

“We can stay. The monument can be a lot to take in.” As he speaks Derek runs a finger across the obsidian. A hair thin line of eridium buzzes under his finger, almost like a kiss. He’d smelt Stiles cry when they made it to the entrance. He can’t remember the last time he’d been so passionate about something. And if Stiles is going to stick around, if Stiles is going to become a weapon against Kate, he needs to soak up as much awe as he can. Because things are going to get hard. Dangerous. Stiles hasn’t mentioned the New-U and Derek is secretly glad. He isn’t sure if it’s still valid, or if it won’t just be voided after it’s entered.

For now Stiles will be a part of his pack. And bit by bit that will eat him alive. Because everything Derek touches turns to ash. Stiles will be no different. It’ll be good for him, to have this moment to hold on to when things get hard. He’ll probably never feel the same overwhelming joy again. Derek turned away from the statue to look at him.
Stiles was standing like a sheriff, fingers tucked into his belt, hip cocked. “I’ve seen it. I can see it again.” He tips his head to the side, gesturing for the rocks and the way out. “I’m excited to see where we’re going next.” Not wanting Derek to steer the conversation anywhere else, Stiles starts walking away from the statue. Honestly he could stay. He could stay for days and days and not be satisfied. But he understands that he can’t be here. It’s a Lance hide out. And Derek wants him to enjoy himself. He wants Stiles to be endebted to him, to remember this moment when times get rough.

And he will. Without Derek he probably never would have seen this place. It wasn’t listed on the ECHOnet as a known Eridian structure. Someday he’ll have to come back. And he will come back. With or without Derek. He wants to show this place to Scott, to Melissa. He wants to take his dad down here and give him a guided tour of every purple lit crack. To do that they have to leave, move on.

Somehow it’s quicker getting back up. Maybe it’s because Stiles isn’t overwhelmed by what he’s seeing. Maybe it’s because they know where they’re going this time. But whatever it is, it feels like no time at all before they’re ambling up the narrow ledge towards the volcano. Down in the cavern the heat was present but no oppressive. It was like an afterthought. It was hot outside but they’d been somewhere else. The closer they got to the top the hotter it got until Stiles felt like he was going to slip off the ledge from the trail of fluids they were leaving behind. Derek marched on in front of him, seemingly untroubled. Stiles figured it was because he’d been from Fyrestone. Stiles had never been anywhere warm until Derek. It was a hard adjustment to make.

Level ground was a godsend. Stiles greedily gulped in air, sucking down ash but not being deterred by it. He hadn’t realized how stale everything was until he was away from it. Derek gave himself a moment to breathe as well. His face was tipped up, catching the wind. Stiles fought the urge to sink to his knees. He was exhausted. If he went down he wasn’t getting back up. And it he was tired he couldn’t imagine how Derek must feel. He’d come off of mortal injury straight into a nine hour road trip. Stiles pulls himself upright again, stumbles for a second, then shakes himself off. “Where to?”

“The Dahl Headlands.” Derek licks his lips. “There’s an Inn there.” Derek can’t go anymore without sleep. Werewolf or not he needs rest. Dahl may not be a driving force anymore but it’s holding its own against Hyperion. If there’s any place they’ll be safe for the night, it’ll be at Lucky Zaphord’s Inn. So long as visitors keep to themselves it’s okay for anyone to pass through.

He doesn’t feel like driving so he climbs into the gunner seat. Stiles is the one with the account so he must be able to drive. The seat is damp pock marked foam but it feels like heaven. Derek lets himself sink into the seat with a sigh. He can hear Stiles climbing into the drivers seat. He allows Stiles his moment, knows without looking that the kid is looking over the volcano in awe. When the car hums to live Derek lolls his head back and lets the vibrations carry himself to sleep.

Never having been on this side of the planet, Stiles pulls out Derek’s old HUD. It’s a little outdated but Eridium Blight is entered in. Stiles just needs to make it back to a fast travel station. His runner can handle off roading just fine. It’s other people he’s worried about. Since heading out of Windshear Waste he hasn’t seen another living person besides Derek. Not a single bandit or rat. No one. Pandora isn’t a quiet planet.

They’re bound to run into someone soon. And with Derek asleep in the gunner seat Stiles doesn’t have much of a way to defend against a surprise attack. The gun mount on the fender has an okay left to right range but practically no up and down. If a buzzard goes by they’re dead in their seats.