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In kindergarten, Stiles and the rest of his class were given the task of making a diagram of their family tree.
It started with his parents, his mom and his dad, connected with a black marker and blood, never connected by marriage. They tried their hardest to stay together, to be the perfect well put together family for their son, but Stiles has never remembered his parents ever loving each other the way mom’s and dad’s are supposed to. It was mutual and even if they didn't love each other, they stayed close, tried their hardest to make sure Stiles had a good life - even if he was a little shit as a toddler.
He was four the first time he met Allison. His mom and her dad had taken them to a play area with a ball pit and a giant slide that Stiles was too scared to climb up on to his own. He watched all the other kids race up through the soft play, pushing into each other and laughing all the way back down again, jealous and terrified all in one. One of the older boys had laughed at him, pointed and pushed him towards the baby slide. Allison, who he had only known for twenty minutes at that point, had punched the boy right in the nose and sent him crying to his mom.
They’d been told to leave the play area after that, but not before Allison held his hand all the way down the big slide.
For years it was perfect. He had a sister and a cool ass step-dad that made his mom happy and taught him how to shoot a crossbow. He had weekends at his dad’s, riding in the police cruiser with the sirens on, and big family dinners at the holidays. Stiles loved his family, even if he had to restart his family tree three times because he kept drawing the lines wrong.
And then his mom got sick, really sick. Weekends with dad turned to days at the hospital, Allison at his side and Chris trying his best to help keep his mom smiling over photo albums and stories that she’d forgotten, even when they’d only just happened last year.
It didn't work. None of it worked.
Stiles was nine and his mom was dead and he didn't know what to do except cry.
For a while all he could do was feel sad. He and Allison didn't go to school for a few weeks and instead of going to his dad’s for the weekend, his dad moved into the spare room. It took Allison a while to be able to sleep on her own again, often crawling into Stiles bed or her dad’s. Claudia had been Allison's mom too, even if they weren't blood, but now she’d lost another mother and Stiles thinks it messed with his sister more than she let on.
Eventually things start to feel less, none of them really stop being sad, but they manage to pick themselves up and carry on. His dad made them go back to school in the spring, Chris stopped working so much and eventually Allison was back to sleeping in her own bed. His dad went back to living in his own house after the new year, but Stiles couldn't bring himself to leave Allison long enough to stay over on the weekends anymore.
Then, when everything started to feel normal again, Theo turned up.
According to his dad, after she ran off, Allison's mom had started a family with someone new. A fact that he knows keeps Allison up at night, and then into his bed to make her feel better. For years she had been missing, avoided all contact with the Argents. Allison had never gotten to know her biological mother before she died, along with a sister and a step-father she’d never known.
The sole survivor of the Raeken family was a scrawny eight year old, left at home while the rest of the family was hit by a drunk driver. And now, at the demand of a distraught Allison and a compassionate Chris, he was here in his house dressed in Stiles’ hand-me-downs that hung off his tiny body and sleeping in the spare room.
Stiles and Theo didn’t get on, that was putting it lightly. Neither of them had had a brother before, had never anticipated having one and therefore conversations were awkward. They treated each other like strangers on a playground, fighting over who got to be king of the jungle gym. Allison suddenly shifted all her attention to Theo, scared to let another family member slip from her grasp, but Stiles hated the way her grip on him had lessened.
Allison was his best friend. Their parents nicknamed them ‘the wonder twins’ when they were younger, never really connecting with other kids the way they did each other. Sure they both had friends, there was Scott and Lydia from school and Isaac from his boy scout group and Erica from Allison's kickboxing class, but no one knew him like his sister did. Stiles didn't want anyone else, but Allison wanted Theo, and it was all too much for a ten year old to handle.
For the first time since they met, him and Allison fought non-stop. Theo tried to stay out of it, but if there was a side to pick, he would pick Allison's every time. His home became a warzone, and he found himself staying at his dads more and more when the weekend came. Chris came to him first surprisingly, sat down next to him on the bed like the dad he is and held him when he cried out in frustration.
They’d always been close, a second dad and a full time parent when Stiles’ mom died. It was stupid, but Stiles had been scared the man would have picked Allison's side, that he’d been forgotten and kicked to the side to make room for Theo. Chris had never done anything to support his childish fears, always showering him with the same love and affection he always had, so he does his best to rationalise the whole situation.
“Allison's biggest priority has always been family. She loves you so much, kid, never doubt that.” Chris had said, pressing a soft kiss to the top of his head. “But that same love she feels for you, she also has for Theo. Theo, he hasn't had a very good life, he doesn't have anyone else other than your sister and Allison just wants to make him happy. I know it’s hard, but maybe you could try to think of it from his shoes. Must be scary being all on your own don't you think?”
“I guess.” Stiles had said between sniffles.
“I know you’re having a hard time, and I’ll talk to Allison about all these fights, but you gotta try to meet him halfway here kid.”
“It’s not just me.” He tried to argue, finding it unfair that he was the one being told to reign it in when there was a second, equally annoying party involved. “Theo starts it sometimes too.”
“I know, I know. But Theos is a bit younger than you and he doesn't really know who you are, you’re just the older boy who gets angry when he's not sure what he’s done wrong.”
Well when you put it like that.
“That sounds mean.”
“It is a little, but I don't blame you much.” Chris had given him a tight squeeze and a soft smile. “Why don't you try to get to know him, you might find you have more in common than you think?”
And god damn it Stiles tried. He tried more than he’s ever tried in his life to not immediately leave the room when Theo gets snappy with him. It’s a challenge to get the boy to open up instead of glancing at him suspiciously over one word answers, but by the time Allison gets back from her day out with Chris, they’re sat in front of the TV raging together at a level of Mario they’ve been trying to beat for the past hour.
“What are you guys doing?” Allison asks warily, coming to sit between them on the floor.
“We’re so close.” Theo squeals as he waits for Stiles to follow him over the moving bridge.
“Theo keeps making it to the end but I can’t do this jump.” Stiles grumbles, trying his best to focus on not hitting the gumba in front of him.
Allison reaches over him to try and grab the controller from him, “Do you want me to help?”
“No,” Stiles yelps, moving the controller out of her reach, careful not to hit any of the buttons. Allison backs off and Stiles pulls his bottom lip between his lips in thought. “Theo you do it.”
The younger boy stares back at him wide eyed, “What?”
“You’re better at it than me, you can do it.”
Meet him halfway, Chris had said, Stiles hopes this is far enough.
Theo met his gaze warily and for a moment, Stiles catches a glimpse of the terrified little boy Chris had tried telling him about. Stiles would give anything to see him smile instead.
huh.
“Okay.” Theo agrees, carefully taking the controller from Stiles’ hand.
He makes it look so simple, a quick run and a jump and they’re reunited on the screen, the finish line finally in sight. Stiles throws his arms in the air with a whoop and a cheer, making Theo jolt with surprise and Allison giggle. Stiles throws himself at Theo in excitement, tackling the younger boy with a wide smile, sending all three of them into a fit of excited yelps and infectious laughter.
“You did it! You actually did it!” Stiles beams at the other boy, who's gotten over the shock of being tackled and is now writhing under stiles bodyweight, fits of giggles making Stiles body jerk up and down. Allison joins in on their poor attempt at a pile-on which only makes Theo’s giggles louder and more intense. It’s a sweet, childish sound that finally makes Stiles understand why Allison had been so desperate to see her younger brother smile.
He tilts his head up from underneath Allison's arm to see Chris silently taking a video on his phone, a soft smile on his face as he watches them. His step-dad winks at him from the doorway, perhaps having a brother might not be so bad after all.
But he’d never really gotten to find out what life would have been like with Theo. Just as quickly as he came, Theo was gone. A suspected kidnapping the police had said. There was no lead, no trail and no idea what to do next.
The night he disappeared, everything was normal. They’d had chicken parmesan for dinner and fought over what movie to watch. They sat squished on the sofa with blankets and popcorn and Theos legs draped over his and Allison's laps. He complained about Theo’s cheesy feet but neither of them moved, Stiles hadn't wanted him to. Instead of sleeping in Stiles’ room like the three of them had planned, Theo had snuck out. He had a habit from his old life of walking out to the preserve at the edge of their street for reasons only Allison had known.
The whole town had searched every inch of the woods twice over, his dad had led both of them, exhausted himself making sure no stone was left unturned. They found nothing.
Stiles might have hesitated to call Theo his brother, but he knows Chris hadn't thought twice about the idea of Theo being his son. He poured all of his effort’s into trying to find him, hired countless private detectives to scour the states for any trace of the boy, but in the end, all their efforts were futile. It took them less than a year to declare it a cold case officially, but unofficially he knows his dad looks for traces of their Raeken boy in every file that hits his desk.
Allison had always been different after that, she smiled and she laughed but the happiness never truly reached her eyes. They were still close, she was his twin after all, but she became more closed off, reserved. There were secrets between them now where there had never been before. Stiles hated it, but Allison had spent her entire life grieving the loss of family members - he can’t say he’s shocked with the person she’s grown up to be.
His teenage years were, for lack of a better word, batshit insane.
Missing children were quickly replaced with werewolves and banshees and the shock of his step-dad turning out to be an actual hunter of the supernatural. So much for inheriting the family business. He’s dragged into everything by the ankles with Scott McCall, Allison following after him just as quickly. For months it was non-stop secrets and sleepless nights and friends turned enemies turned canines. Life had never seemed so full of chaos.
And then it’s finally his turn to stain his hands red.
Stiles was sixteen and his sister was dead and it’s all his fault.
Chris doesn't say he feels the same, but him running off to France practically confirms as much. His family home felt like a graveyard, so he lets it stay that way. The house with the cherry red door is locked up, left empty as Stiles moves out to stay at his dad’s indefinitely.
He struggles, more than he did when his mom died. All he does is lie in bed. He doesn't talk, doesn't eat, barely sleeps without nightmares following him into the dark. He dreams of killing Allison over and over again, his hand on the hilt of the sword as it drives through his sister's stomach. Where once laughter erupted from his soft hands against her skin were now screams of pain as he twists the blade - once for his mother, twice for Theo, a third just for the hell of it.
He wakes, screaming her name every time, his dad rocking him gently in his arms. It takes him every ounce of control he has left not to call Chris in those moments, to hear his voice to remind him his entire life hadn't been one big nightmare he’d just woken up from. But he doesn't. His step-dad wants space and Stiles is more than happy to give it to him just so he can avoid his pitiful gaze, wishing it were Allison that lived instead of him.
He wonders if he can even call Chris his step-dad anymore. They were family, but what did they have to show for it? If not tied together by his mom or Allison, the Stilinski’s and the Argents had no reason to co-exist anymore.
So they didn't.
Life remained as busy as ever, kicking him while he’s already down. Scott accidentally adopts a child and Stiles is automatically dragged in to co-parent his best friend's fifteen year old beta. Kira struggles with her inner fox trying to kill everyone and everything, and Malia struggles to be human, something Stiles can relate to. He does his best to focus on everyone else's problems so he doesn't have to face his own crumbling mental state.
He can’t fucking catch a break thought, because just as easily as he disappeared, Theo walks back into his life like nothing had ever happened.
His dad fawns over him, doesn't let Theo stop talking until he gets the full story, even when it quickly falls between the lines of things he can't discuss in official reports. There was something off about his sister's brother though, something in his eyes, the way he held himself when he knew everyone was looking. Stiles takes it all with a grain of salt.
Taken and turned by a wandering pack, Theo had apparently spent the past few years out in the forests of Oregan doing god knows what off-the-grid packs do in their spare time. But something felt wrong. Stiles tries not to let his bitterness over Allison or the fact that Chris was still off in France and leaving him to deal with their fucked up family alone get in the way, but whatever happened to Theo in the years he was away, he is nothing like the kid his sister fell in love with.
Stiles doesn't trust him.
He hates that he’s right, hates that Scott didn't believe him, hates that Theo had never told him even the slightest bit of truth. Sure, lie to the world, lie to the pack, lie to his dad - for whatever reason, Theo lying to him of all people makes him fucking furious, desperate to see his sister again and ask her what to do. He wants to figure out where it all went wrong, when Theo stopped being family and started being the enemy. He wants to fix it, wants Chris to come home and help him unlock the cherry red door of his family home. He wants to see Theo back in his hand-me-downs that never fit him quite right, stealing his last MnM, shoving him off the couch, fighting over movies and who gets to hold the bowl of popcorn.
Stiles wants his family back.
And then Theo has the gaul to stand there and taunt him about the Nogitsune, about their dead sister, and Stiles takes it all back. Fuck the clothes and the popcorn and fuck Chris and every stupid thought he’s ever had of going back home. Fuck Theo and fuck all the shoddy attempts they ever made at trying to be a real family. Fuck all of it. Allison isn't here to tell him to play nice anymore and he’s so damn tired of pretending that everything is okay.
Stiles doesn't object to Kira splitting the sewers with her sword and letting whatever devil it may be drag Theo down to hell. He’s done nothing but lie and manipulate and kill, taking Scott's big open heart and driving a knife through it, taunting them all for falling for his lies. Theo’s done all that and more. He hates him more than he’s hated anyone in his life - but when he screams Stiles’ name, claws scraping against the earth crumbling beneath him, Stiles very nearly reaches down to pull him out himself.
Stiles is eighteen, Allison is dead and buried and he can’t help but think Theo is just another family member he’s put into the ground.
He tries to rationalise it, throws himself into digging up every dirty little thing Theo has done. Every kill, every lie, every secret he’d kept in the name of evil - but all that comes up is the story of a scared little boy who’d never really had a real home.
The Raekens were absent. He’d already known about the drugs and the alcohol and the seven homes in seven years. But what his dad and the paper files and Theo refused to tell him, were that the dots on the backs of Theos eight year old hands were cigarette burns, not chicken pox scars.
How had he missed something like this? Had Allison known?
He interrogates the location of the lab out of Hayden and immediately wishes he hadn't. Stiles almost vomits from the smell alone - he actually does when he sees the operating table. He spews right next to the stains of what he prays isn't Theos blood (but really, what else could it be?)
He reads everything he can get his hands on, even if his eyes are burning from the mix of chemicals and what he pretends aren't tears. He learns more about his sister's brother than he ever wanted to know. Knows exactly what almost killed him, what did kill him, and what brought him back. He knows that his heart isn't his own, most of his organs have been tampered with, that he spent his fourteenth birthday testing how much wolfsbane he could handle before his hand-me-down heart gave out.
Had Theo ever owned anything that was actually his?
And then he finds a file with Allison's name on it, the pages worn out and frayed more than any other. Stiles wonders how many times Theo had taken out their sisters file, how many times he’d sat and wondered how it happened, how exactly stiles had fucked up, how she’d looked like dying in Scott's arms.
He thinks about Theo, small and fifteen, all on his own, knowing the last of his family was dead, and Stiles can’t take it anymore.
He wants his baby brother back.
But - always a but, because nothing can ever go the way he wants it too - slowly Stiles finds himself slipping from time itself.
In his desperation to find Kira and dig all the way down to hell to fetch Theo out himself if he had to, he hadn't realised what the shadows in the corners of his eyes had been trying to tell him. He had been marked, caught like prey and pulled from the fabric’s of time and space, never to have existed.
“Get him out” Are his last, desperate words to Lydia, swept away in the wind, left to be carried off to where all the other forgotten things go.
Things like Peter Hale.
It really is a struggle not to brain himself on the concrete wall of the train platform when the only company he has is that of a deranged narcissist, but surprisingly, there's not much to do in abandoned underground bunkers except think.
“What’s got you so impatient?”
Oh, and answer Peters' never ending barrage of questions with as little detail as possible.
“I was kind of busy before the whole, getting kidnapped by ghost cowboys thing.”
“Hot date?” Peter asks with a crude wink.
“On my well to hell actually.”
“Huh, always thought that was my thing.”
Time moves strangely, they don't exactly sleep, but Stiles thinks he deserves a full uninterrupted forty-eight hours of shuteye before he even has to breathe in the direction of his next problem. But he knows that is probably not going to happen.
He makes a plan in his head of what he’s going to do when he finally gets let out of time jail, starting with Kira's sword and ending with him unlocking the cherry red door. The middle is a grey area filled with the mystery that has always been Theo Raeken, unpredictability bred into him, unidentifiable even under a microscope.
His sort of fool proof plan quickly falls apart as he materialises back into beacon hills, watches Parrish glow like the damn northern lights, has a gun held to his face for the third time, gets choked by a very fucked up version of his dead mother that he’s sure will revisit him in his next round of nightmares, and defeats their Nazi physics teacher.
It’s a very distressing hour and a half, but nothing prepares him for the pair of eyes that meet his when he finally makes it to the hospital.
Blue meets brown, brother meets brother, Stiles doesn't register his legs moving forwards until he’s already within arms reach of Theo.
“Are you hurt?” Stiles' heart jumps as he takes note of the blood staining his jumper and the edge of his chin, dirt clinging to cheeks. Even though he knows Theo has most likely healed by now, his mind still clings to the idea of the boy being a fragile human.
Theo studies him like he’s been taught to study everything. Watch, wait, predict the outcome, act accordingly.
“I’m fine.” He responds flatly, eyes never leaving Stiles’ gaze.
“Good.” Is all Stiles can think to say before he’s throwing his arms around Theos frail body.
He pulls their chests together and sinks his nose into the crook of Theos neck, pressing his face into the blood and the dirt of his sweater without a care. Theo goes stiff as expected. They haven't hugged maybe more than a handful of times when Allison was alive, and then a total of exactly zero post-mortem, so it’s not a surprise the younger boy doesn't move to reciprocate the hug.
Except - softly, Stiles feels a pair of arms reach up around him, fingers coming up to grab fistfuls of his shirt, Theos head coming down to mirror Stiles’ position in the skin between neck and shoulder. Theo holds onto him like the terrified child he has always been, scared that if he doesn't hold on tight enough then he’s going to be snatched right back up again like the night he disappeared.
Theo starts to shake and it takes Stiles a moment to register that the boy is crying in his arms. It’s quiet and controlled, like he’s been taught how to feel his pain as silently as possible, but Stiles feels the wet patches start to form on his shirt and he wonders if anyone has ever held Theo as he cried. Stiles sniffles and tries to reposition his head so he can breathe again, but Theo mistakes the movement as Stiles moving away and he honest to god whines .
“Please,” He whispers desperately, just loud enough for Stiles to hear.
Stiles doesn't dare try to move again.
The others must be staring, confused glances passed between them as the nurses work around them to shuffle everyone off into separate rooms. Stiles refuses to move even an inch, just stays rooted to the spot as long as Theo lets himself be held.
“I’m sorry.” The other boy whispers again, breath muffled into Stiles skin. Sorry for what exactly Stiles doesn't know, doesn't care. Not right now.
“I know” Stiles responds, his own breath coming out in stutters as the tears pool on his upper lip. It’s not forgiveness, not yet, but Stiles has seen the womb in which Theos maliciousness was formed, he understood that the evil in his heart had been stitched there instead of home grown. Theo might have made some fucked up choices, but there was never any room for him to do anything else with his life.
“I Know” Stiles repeats, hoping that Theo is listening to the steady beat of his heart and realises that he is finally home.
There's a scuffle somewhere off in the distance that has Theo’s head perking. Stiles swivels his own head enough to catch a glance of someone stood frozen down the hallway.
It’s Chris, who Stiles hasn't seen since he ran off to Europe, and Theo hasn't seen since he was ten and still human.
Slack jawed, wide eyed and covered head to toe in dirt, his step-dad watches them, arm in arm, brother and brother, like he doesn't believe any of it for a second. Theo tenses in his arms and Stiles makes the difficult decision to slowly wrangle himself from Theos grasp, hand coming to rest softly on the other boy's bicep just to keep them both tethered. He doesn't know what Chris knows about Theo or the dread doctors or if he’d even known Theo was alive before right now, and Stiles has a brief moment of panic because ‘ What if Chris only came home for Theo? ’
Chris makes his approach and Theo looks like he wants to make a run for it, Stiles doesn't blame him. His walk is quick and his steps thud against the linoleum so hard that Stiles hears it ringing with the blood rushing through his ears. Four, three, two, one, brace for impact.
The older man stops right in front of them, just for a small moment to confirm that this is real .
“ My boys. ”
Chris throws his arms around both Theo and Stiles, wrapping all three of them in the dirtiest hug Stiles has ever experienced. ‘ My boys’ rings in Stiles' head over and over again, reaches down all the way to his ribcage and echoes with the sound of his heartbeat. ‘ My boys’ his step-dad cries, tears threatening to spill over his waterline. His boys , Stiles thinks as Theo curls himself into Chris’s shoulder and Stiles presses himself into the scent of metal and gunpowder.
“Everything alright here?” His dad suddenly materialises beside them in an equally dishevelled state. “Theo?”
“Sheriff.” He responds as he releases himself from Chris’s hold, “Here to arrest me again?”
Again? Stiles almost feels disappointed for missing that interaction.
“You causing trouble?”
“Always.” Theo half smirks.
Stiles has no idea what went on between Theo and his dad, why he’s suddenly sheriff instead of Noah or what led to them joking about Theo being locked up. Actually, Stiles has a whole catalogue of questions about everything that's happened in the past twenty-four hours alone that he’s desperate to get the answers for. But as he watches his dad pull Theo into a tight hug and feels the soft tug of Chris pulling on his arm to twist him into a hug of his own, he thinks all that can wait.
Well, at least until they’ve all been checked out by the nurses and quickly discharged for a rendezvous at the McCall house. Stiles is given a full debrief of the past few weeks with way too many interruptions of all sorts of different winding paths that led them all to remembering him. But at the centre of it all seems to be Theo. He’s surprised to find it was Liam that freed Theo from his eternal nightmare, and even more surprised to watch the way the betas eyes wander over to Theo every few minutes when the chimaera is busy ignoring everyone's attention. Interesting. (Stiles shelves the thought to interrogate Theo with later)
However, everyone seems to be under the impression that, now Theo is no longer needed to get Stiles back, he is to be sent back down to hell to continue receiving his punishment.
“ No !” Both Stiles and Liam shout at the same time, Chris and his dad not far behind, even Scott seems to furrow his brows at the idea.
“He stays.” Stiles demands, putting his metaphorical foot down.
“But he” lied, manipulated everyone, tried to kill Scott and steal the pack from him - Stiles doesn't need to hear it.
If Stiles wasn't only slightly terrified that the Nogitsune left him slightly less human, he’d almost consider it a growl when he cuts off whoever had been speaking, “He’s my brother, he stays.”
And stay he does.
The chimaera tries to argue that he doesn't need a place to stay, and Stiles doesn't doubt that Theo could find any damp forgotten place to lay down his head for the night, but the other boy gives no argument when Stiles grips him by the shoulder and tell him to come home . An all too familiar key being placed into the palm of Theo’s hand.
The cherry red door welcomes him with a soft creak as finally, Stiles returns back home.
It’s odd at first, Stiles and Theo living under the same roof again. For one Liam is constantly there, like, it’s almost a problem at this point because everywhere he looks parts of Liam have been left scattered about the house. Chris, who eventually decides to stay instead of fleeing back to France, has started to make four portions instead of three at meal times because Theo ends up halving his food each time to feed Liam's never ending pit of a stomach.
His strange relationship with the beta aside, Stiles finds that he and Theo still struggle with learning how this whole brother situation works. Stiles tries to treat him the same way he was with Allison, but that just leads to arguments about space and privacy. Theo had lived his entire life keeping secrets, Stiles had lived wearing his mind on his sleeve. Stiles wants to talk but Theo just wants to shut down. It’s infuriating.
Meet me halfway motherfucker.
It comes to a head only two weeks later.
“Stiles shut the fuck up I swear to god.” Theo groans from where he’s trying to read a book on the couch.
Stiles had seen him quiet and peaceful and decided this was a perfect time to attack him with a nice conversation about the stupidity he’d seen in class today.
“Thought you were an atheist?”
Theo groans “I got more silence in hell than I do with you.”
“I can go grab the sword if you’d prefer?” He tries to joke, but he regrets the words as soon as they come out of his mouth.
Theo freezes from his spot on the couch, fingers gripping the pages of the book a little too tightly.
“I don't mean it” Stiles tries to back pedal. He reaches out to place his hand on top of Theos arm, “Hey I’m sorry I-”
“Don't touch me.” Theo jumps and suddenly Stiles feels a sharp pain in his forearm, yelping out at the shock.
Theo had grabbed him with his claws out. Stiles hadn't even noticed them beneath the book. Immediately Theo snatches his hand away, eyes going wide as blood starts to trickle down Stiles’ arm. The next thing he knows Theo is running out of the house, door slamming behind him.
Stiles sighs, wraps his arm, and waits five minutes before driving over to Liam's house.
Liam is entirely unsurprised to see him and just points him in the direction of his bedroom where Theo has been hiding for the past twenty minutes without a word.
Theo sighs as he hears him open the door “You couldn't have called?”
The chimaera is sat on the floor with his back to one of Liam's bookshelves, curled up with his arms resting on his knees. Stiles wonders if he’ll ever stop looking like a scared little kid.
“Would you have answered?” Stiles retorts and Theo doesn't respond so he gets his answer.
Stiles sits down opposite him, back resting against the edge of Liam's bed, legs stretched out in front of him just to the side of Theos feet. He rests his stinging arm in his lap, tries his best not to hiss when he moves it in the wrong way. Theo can probably smell the blood of his poorly bandaged wounds and does nothing but stare at the injury.
“You’re shit at first aid.” Is what Theo finally says to him.
Stiles snorts, “I’ll live.”
Theo stares for a moment longer before getting up and heading over to the corner of Liam's room where the desk is, reaching down to the bottom draw and pulling out a first aid kit. He’d comment on the strange placement before remembering he’d been the one to put it there during their time with the benefactor. Theo sits back in his original spot, just inches closer to Stiles. He holds out his injured arm to Theo and lets him get to work unwrapping his truly poor attempt at trying to stop the bleeding.
When the white fabric is finally removed from his arm and the open air hits his wounds, Theo’s breath catches in his chest.
“I think I should-”
“If you say you’re moving out I’m going to handcuff you to the fridge”
Theo shuts his mouth and quickly turns his attention back to Stiles' arm.
“Do you remember when you first moved in, how me and Allison would fight non stop.” Stiles asks as Theo pulls out an antiseptic wipe. “Did she ever tell you why?”
“You were a brat who wanted attention?” The younger boy says before pressing the wipe to one of Stiles cuts. He hisses as the alcohol swipes over his skin but Theo doesn't release his grip on Stiles wrist.
“I mean, yeah, obviously. But me and Allison never really had secrets, I’m a nosy fucker and I like knowing things.” Theo gives him a look as if he’d just told him the sky was blue and Stiles rolls his eyes. “But she wouldn't tell me a single one of your secrets, especially not if you had asked her not to tell anyone.”
He applied some sort of cream next, the stinging spreading into a generic pins and needles feeling.
“I don’t do well with boundaries, I know, but I want us to talk about all these different things between us. Like the doctors and killing Scott and whatever. But you don’t talk about anything, ever, and I don’t know what to do with that.”
Stiles had never known what to do with silence except fill it, and Theo had been taught that silence was good, that he was to be kept out of sight and out of mind. Even with the Raeken's, being too loud meant pain and there was no one to talk to about all of that when you spend your whole life constantly on the move.
Theo takes a new roll of gauze and starts to slowly wrap it around Stiles' arm.
“In hell,”
Well fuck we’re doing this.
“The first time I woke up in one of those freezers in the morgue” Fucking hell we’re really doing this “I didn't know what was happening. I thought something had gone wrong, that maybe the sword had just sent me across town instead of underground. I walked around for a bit, tried to find a way out, but there just wasn't one. The doors didn’t open and all of the windows were boarded up and I was just stuck.”
Stile can’t help but think back to the train station, at least for a time he’d had Peter and his truly horrifying social skills to stop him from going completely insane. Theo, as per usual, had no one.
“The first time it was Tara. She was, well she was dead. I didn't know what was happening until I was down on the floor feeling the worst pain I'd ever felt in my entire life, half choking on my own blood. She’d dug her hands through my chest and she.” Theo pauses, breaths shaky and eyes glued to the wrapping of Stiles arm. “She ripped out my heart.”
His stolen heart.
“Then it was Allison, then Chris, then you and your dad. Hold that.”
Theo grabs Stiles' free hand and places his pointer finger on the end of the gauze while Theo routes around the kit for some tape.
“I had some problems with my heart as a kid, it meant I wasn't as useful to the doctors as they wanted me to be. But I guess they saw it as a challenge. They never told me whose heart they took and I used to have nightmares about it being one of yours. That you or Allison were dead and that I was the reason.” Stiles thinks of an eleven year old Theo, crying himself to sleep because he thought he might have stolen the life from his family.
Theo, Stiles, was there really any difference between them anymore?
“I never fought back, when you tried to take it, any of you. I let it happen every time. Sometimes I tried to run just to escape the pain, but most times I just sat in that freezer waiting for one of you to come and get me.”
Waiting for them to rip out his heart .
Theo finally lets go of his wrist and Stiles takes a moment to inspect the others handiwork before searching for Theos gaze.
“I’m gunna hug you now, try not to claw my arm off this time”
“Funny” Theo rolls his eyes before Stiles leans forward to wrap his arms around the chimaera.
Theo doesn't take to being hugged any easier than the first time, he still freezes as soon as anyone touches him and will never under any circumstance seek out other people, (apart from Liam?) but he still reciprocates every touch like he’ll die without it. He buries his nose into the crook of stiles' neck and inhales a deep, shaky breath. He’s never truly understood the whole pack smell thing that Scott has tried to describe to him, but he can physically feel Theo relaxing under his embrace with each long inhale. Stiles stokes his thumb across the exposed skin at the back of Theos neck and decides to throw all balls to the wall, go big or go home, might as well take it one step further down the trauma trail.
“I saw the lab.”
Theo immediately pulls back from Stiles arms in what he hopes is shock and not anger, “You what?”
“I really did hate you after everything you did. But I guess Allison had beat it into me too hard to be nice to you. I felt like maybe we’d made a mistake, so I went to try and find things to convince myself you deserved it.”
“In the hospital-” Theo says suddenly, mouth parted slightly in shock, like he’d thought Stiles had found a magical way to control his own heartbeats.
“I really wasn't lying Theo. You were a kid, it’s not your fault they only taught you how to be a prick.”
Theo smirks finally and Stiles thinks that's enough emotional exploration for one day. They have the rest of their lives to learn how to be the family Allison had always wanted them to be, for now they just get to be Stiles and Theo. Stiles can wait as long as Theo needs.
“Now about you and Liam?”
As long as Theo doesn't murder him first.
They hear something thud downstairs and Theo gives Stiles a three second head start before he swings to punch him in the arm.
When Theo turns seventeen, Stiles is threatened that under no circumstance is he allowed to throw him a party.
Theo really should have been more specific, because a sleepover isn't technically a party, but the chimaera doesn't stop to listen to Stiles’ defence before he’s tackling him to the carpet in front of the whole pack dressed in their pj’s. They do presents and cake and Stiles can tell that Theo is slightly overwhelmed by all of it. With a silent text to Chris, Stiles puts the second part of his plan into motion.
Chris beckons Theo out of the living room to “help order the pizza” and Stiles instructs Liam and Mason to go and actually order pizza while the rest of them fight over what movie to watch. It’s during a heated pineapple on pizza debate that Theo finally comes back into the living room. Stiles smirks as the other boy slumps down on the couch in between him and Liam, eyes still red rimmed and sniffling as quietly as he can.
“Fuck you Stilinski.” Theo grumbles quietly.
Stiles laughs, assuming his discussion with Chris had gone well, “Back atcha Argent.”
Stiles is eighteen, Theo is seventeen, and Allison will forever remain sixteen, but finally all three of them are home behind the cherry red door. The Stilinski’s and the Argents.
God help his future kids with their family tree's.