[At 5:45pm EST/2:45pm PST this video about all of the Dereks plays with this song playing in the background, set up like a fanvid. The song’s volume drops when applicable for dialog]
Caroline is telling Derek that she’s pregnant. Derek looks shocked, because it’s not supposed to be possible at all and the sound drops down when she tells him to listen; three heartbeats are heard, one of which is quieter and faster than that of the parents.
Cut to the two of them laying in bed and Caroline’s laughing and Derek’s got his hands on her swollen stomach, pushing lightly back at the foot kicking up at him. “Hey, punk, quit kicking your mother. We’re trying to sleep here, pal.”
Cut to Derek in a ridiculous panic, running around the loft like a chicken with his head cut off.
“Baby, I have it,” Caroline’s voice calls out and Derek stops abruptly, turning to see her across the room holding the overnight bag and looking all too calm for the fact that they’re about to have a baby. “I’m not going to explode, we have time. Calm down.”
He’d come out of his second one, now, his duffle bag nearly full, and was about to make his way into the third when a roar — and that goddamn skittering of spiders — caught his attention just before a high-pitched scream pierced the air, making Derek recoil and cover his ears out of reflex before he dropped the bag and took off running toward the sound. It had to be a newbie. Anyone else would’ve known not to scream.
He almost ran right past it before the sound of metal clattering on the pavement grabbed his ear and Derek skidded to a halt, kick-turning himself around and rounding the corner where he’d heard the sound. There was a second heartbeat. It was fast and loud and erratic and behind the sound of it, he heard a little girl crying. Son of a bitch…
Derek took a deep breath and shifted, eyes glowing red, fangs descended and claws extracted before letting out a short, but aggressive and probably painfully loud roar, drawing from his alpha spark to give it extra power. The creature hovering over what Derek quickly saw was a child wedged down between an abandoned car and a dumpster turned to face Derek, pausing as if sizing him up before it moved. Derek took the opportunity to bark out a rushed order to the little girl.
“Get in the car! Get on the floor. Get in and get down!”
Tim is standing right beside the elevator in the lobby of the free apartments and he looks fidgety and just this side of terrified, recoiling to hide behind a corner when he hears the bell ding and the doors of the elevator open.
“Tim?”
The sound of his coach’s voice calms Tim down and he peeks around the corner, just to check, relief washing over him when he sees Derek. The little boy scoots around the corner and wraps his arms around Derek’s waist, hiding his face against the older man’s chest.
Caroline is in the background, giving off the sounds of labor pains and the focus is on Derek, holding her hand and looking back and forth between his fiancee and the doctor. “Come on, baby, one more. One more, you’re so close, you can do it. I love you so much, I love you so much.”
There’s another scream of pain and then the cry of a baby cuts the air and Derek looks over sharply toward the doctor holding up their baby. “It’s a boy.”
Derek’s smile is almost painfully broad and he’s unashamed of the tears when they come as he kisses his fiancee, pushing sweaty blonde hair away from her face, when the doctors, a moment later, place their son in her arms. “Hey...hi, buddy...hey…” he whispers at the tiny bundle in Caroline’s arms. He can’t tear his eyes away from him.
“Do we want to stick with Lucas?” Caroline’s asking and Derek can’t look away from the baby long enough to acknowledge her, just sniffling and wiping at his eyes with the heel of his palms as he nods.
Derek had no sooner given the order to the kid before the spider-like beast lunged in his direction. He roared again as if to warn it back, but it didn’t falter the second time the way it had the first. Staying low, Derek readied himself to find a way under the creature, knowing that its only real weak spot was the soft underbelly. As much as his instincts told him to run, to try to dodge the thing, he stayed his ground, crouched as it roared back at him, lifting itself a little on its back legs as it drew itself into a pouncing position.
If he timed it wrong, he was as good as dead and that kid was on her own. If he got it just right, he could spring forward and slash open its stomach on his way between its legs and out the other side. He managed to time it well enough to accomplish the necessary task, but he wasn’t fast enough to avoid being bitten. A surprised and pained howl issued itself and Derek’s stomach turned at the hot, sticky blood that rained down over him as his claws tore open the belly of the beast before he skidded out from under the thing and out the other side, collapsing onto the ground as the spider-thing crumbled in a bloody heap with a heavy thud just behind him.
Sighing, Derek looked over to where the little girl had been wedged down between the car and the dumpster. She was gone, now, so Derek approached the vehicle slowly, shifting out of the wolf again, eyes fading back into their normal green hue. “Hey,” he called out. “You okay, kid? You still there?”
"I'm not gonna hurt you, kiddo. I just want to know that you're okay. Okay?" he asked gently, keeping still; making no further attempt to move closer to the car. He knew she was there; he could smell her fear and hear her heartbeat, but she didn't necessarily need to know that, just yet...if at all. "I promise, sweetie, I'm not going to hurt you. You don't even have to come out...just tell me you're okay," he said in the same quiet voice.
Mika wiped her face with her hands and peered up to the window again. He was just standing there. He saved her life. She took a deep breath and unlocked the car door nearest to her before opening it up just enough for her to squeeze through if she wanted to. The first monster was dead on the ground and it made her feel a little braver about coming outside too.
She stretched out one ginger step at a time, opening the car door a bit wider as she moved so that she was still safely behind it when she fully out of the car for few moments before she worked up the courage to step away from that too. Not towards him, just in view so he knew she was okay and she knew he was okay too after saving her. And so she could get a better look at what he was.
“What are you?” She asked softly.
Derek's eyes turned downward at her question and his brow creased slightly. If he lied, she'd know it, he had a feeling. If he told the truth, it could be even worse. What Derek didn't want was for her to run off and end up face to face with another one of those things.
So, he cleared his throat and answered her honestly. Nobody was going to care if she told; his life was broadcast every Monday night, anyway. He just didn't want to scare her even more. "I'm a werewolf," he admitted, quickly tacking on, "but I don't...I'm not like the ones in the movies. I'm not going to hurt you. I don't want to and I won't."
Tim’s curled up against Derek on the couch and he’s fallen asleep there, his head on his coach’s arm.
“Derek,” Laura whispers, nodding down at the little boy sitting between them on the couch. She exchanges a grin with her brother and watches as Derek shifts to lift the boy up without waking him.
Derek carries Tim to the extra bedroom, holding the little boy close to his body and reaching down with one hand to draw down the blankets before laying Tim down on the bed and tucking him in.
“Coach?” the little boy’s voice surprises Derek because he’d been sure Tim had been sleeping as he’d started away from the bed. Tim reaches out and takes a piece of Derek’s shirt in his hand. “Would you stay until I fall back asleep…?”
A small, fond smile graces Derek’s lips. “Yeah, I can do that, champ.”
Lucas is two months old and it’s Derek’s turn to get up in the middle of the night. He rolls over to give Caroline a kiss on the forehead — a reassurance that he’s got this — and he rolls back again, pushing himself out of bed and padding down the hall to the nursery.
“Hey you…” he coos quietly, approaching the crib and reaching in to pull Lucas out of it. “Shhh, shhh, shhh, hey…” he whispers, holding the baby close to his chest and starting to rock his weight back and forth from one foot to the other. “You wanna hear a story? Huh? How ‘bout if Daddy tells you a story and then you go back to sleep because Mommy’s real cranky tonight and Daddy’s the one she’s gonna take it out on in the morning, you know, little man.” His tone is playful and he’s really only talking because he knows that the vibration of his chest tends to calm Lucas’s cries. It’s already starting to work and the baby is quieting.
“Once, there was a couple who wished so hard that they could be a family that the City decided to make it come true. Nobody thought it could happen, but then Lucas came along and surprised everybody. You know you’re the best thing that ever happened to me, kid? Because you are. And you can cry,” Derek says, his voice low in timbre and volume to lull the increasingly calming baby back to sleep, “that’s okay, you’re allowed to cry all you want and that won’t change the fact that you’re the best thing. The single best thing. You could cry forever and I wouldn’t trade you for the whole world, Lucas. ...but, you know...Mommy and Aunt Laura and I really would like to get some sleep, so if you could wait until morning...I’m just saying.”
Finally, Derek headed back down the stairs to the twenty-eighth floor and pushed the key card into the slot of the door leading to the room he’d shared last night with Mika. When the door opened and the first thing he saw was Mika pointing a gun at him, Derek lifted his eyebrows. “She lives,” he joked, holding both hands up. “Could you not…?” he asked, nodding at the gun. “You sleep okay, kid?”
“I forgot where I was.” She admitted, “I don’t even remember falling asleep. Where are my shoes?” Mika looked behind her, realizing that Derek must’ve taken them off for her some time during the night.
Once Mika lowered the gun, Derek made his way into the room further, shutting the door behind him and holding out the clothes he’d brought back to her. “You konked out on me when I was carrying you up here, after you hid between the vending machines,” he told her. “Your shoes are under your bed...and I found these in the gift shop, so...you can take a nice, hot shower and put on some clean clothes. And then, we really, really need to feed you, Munchkin.”
“Oh.” She bit her lip and smiled sheepishly, rocking back on her heels for a moment before taking a skip and a hop back to the bed to retrieve her shoes from underneath the bed.
Tim went on fighting sleep for a few more minutes before he couldn't, anymore. His hand found Derek's and little fingers curled around the side of it as his eyes finally slipped shut, like he was afraid that as soon as he looked like he was sleeping, Derek would leave and Timmy wanted to hold his coach to the promise to stay until he really was asleep. "Thanks, Coach..." he echoed in a tiny, sleep-choked voice, shifting onto his side and pulling Derek's hand against his chest like any other child might do a teddy bear, his other hand clutching at his coach's wrist before the grip slackened when sleep finally took him.
He had expected Tim to want him to stick around, and Derek was just fine with that, but what he didn’t expect was to feel a small hand wrapping around his, and he watched in confusion when Timmy started to doze off while holding onto him. Derek couldn’t help but feel his expression melt into something more content, and by the time Tim had fallen asleep Derek was wearing a small smile. He watched and waited, listening closely for Tim’s faint heartbeat, and he heard it slow down to a comfortable rhythm as his body finally calmed completely.
Derek pulled his hand away but watched Tim for a few more minutes, running his hand over the young boy’s hair in the same way he had done when he was awake, and when he was satisfied that the nightmares hadn’t immediately returned Derek leaned down and kissed the top of his head. He stood up, and with one last adjustment to Tim’s blanket Derek finally turned to leave his room, watching him from the doorway for a few seconds before finally shutting off his light.
Lucas is crawling across the floor to Derek and Derek is grinning like an idiot. “Look!”
“I saw him to do it earlier,” Laura says, sounding amused.
“Yeah, but look, though!”
Cut to Derek laying on the bed on his side and Lucas standing, his tiny fingers gripped tightly around Derek’s first finger. Derek starts to take his finger away and Lucas wobbles and drops onto his behind on the mattress. Derek lifts him up onto his feet again and the process repeats a few times before Lucas finally takes a step. Derek and Caroline are cheering him on as he stands there, wobbling, for a moment before he takes another step forward.
“Baby, he’s walking!”
“I see it, Derek! I see it!”
Mika is screaming and the ogre is trying to drag her toward itself. Before Derek could even finish calling out to her to get inside, the giant cut the two of them visibly off from one another and without being able to see what was happening to her, only being able to hear her scream, Derek panicked and let out a frantic howl for Tate and Scott. It was pathetic and broken with the pain he was still feeling even as he dragged himself to his feet and forced himself to sprint forward.
Derek had just enough momentum to scale the hand and catapult himself over it, careful not to land on Mika on the other side. The impact of his landing forced him to tuck and roll before he whirled back around on all fours and threw his hands out, extending his claws before slashing them into the monster's green skin as he let out another howl for his pack member; for his rival alpha. For anyone who might be able to help right now because even Derek with his infinite werewolf-elitism and arrogance knew that he and the kid were in trouble right now.
He wanted to spare Mika what he looked like in wolf form, but he felt stronger and more in control that way, even if it might very well have been all in his head. She would be all right; she knew that he wouldn't hurt her, and that was what was important right now.
Cut to Sirius’s animagus form launching itself at the ogre. Cut to Scott McCall, half-transitioned, joining the fray, jumping onto the ogre’s giant hand and sinking his claws into it. Cut to Tate Langdon, eyes glowing blue, as he e leapt onto one of the howling beast's hands and sunk his claws into its forearm, dropping his full weight down as he swung himself back to the ground. He caught a glimpse of the mess of blonde in the ogre's now thrashing makeshift cradle as he moved to strike again. Cut to Derek letting out another angry roar. He sprinted forward and leapt up onto the beast's arm, using that as a springboard before launching himself right onto the monster's face, sinking his claws into its left eye and ignoring the sick feeling in his stomach at the squelching sound before the beast roared and lifted its fist away from Tate as the teenager landed on the ground, ready to strike again, and opened its hand to grab Derek. "Nope," he growled, lifting his legs and bending his knees to give himself leverage before throwing his weight down and dragging his claws through the monster's eye and falling heavily to the ground, tucking and rolling off to the left when there was nothing left to hold onto.
He slammed clumsily into Tate and reached out to grab the kid before the momentum would knock him backward off his feet, pulling them both into a standing position again. "Thanks, Tate," he huffed out as sincerely as his adrenaline-rushed lack of voice would allow. He ducked, dragging Tate down with him and hovering himself over the kid, acting as a body shield, when the ogre's arm flailed back down and the hand he'd been dragging Mika with rushed toward its bleeding eye socket.
Sirius heard Derek's order for him to leave. As if he was going to let go of this thing now, not when it could just as easily turn on him.
He almost regretted his decision when Derek pounced on the thing, and he could hear a disgusting squish before the Ogre screamed out in pain. Only then did Sirius pull, taking a large chunk of green flesh with him as he ripped at the back of the things neck, and he fell to the ground in a twisting mass before landing on his feet.
He spun, facing the monster with a growling, bloodied muzzle only to watch it stumble stupidly in a small circle, its footsteps vibrating through the asphalt as it's free arm pinwheeled in the effort to keep its massive weight upright. It was slow but it's attacks stopped, obviously more distracted with it's missing eye than the meal it had lost, and the more distance it gained from them the safer Sirius felt. He waited until it was about a block away before transforming back, his teeth, lips and chin covered in dark, rancid blood.
He was breathing heavily, his muscles and jaw aching from the exertion that it took to hold on, but he slowly walked back to the door to pick up his wand before slipping it into his pocket and turning back to face the rest of the group. He wiped his mouth with the back of his sleeve but it barely helped mop up the mess, not that it really mattered right now. His attention turned to Scott and Tate, a few moments of silence passing before he finally said "thanks. For coming, I mean, that thing would have eaten us alive." He weakly threw his arm to point in the direction of the beast but it fell back to his side quickly as he said louder, "Ogre. Nasty fuckers, aren't they?"
As the song winds down, there’s just quick shots of Derek and Lucas; Derek and Mika; Derek and Timmy...baby bottles and pacifiers; pony stickers, braiding hair, and playing dolls; cheering and hugging after Timmy catches a foul ball that goes rogue into the stands.
And then the screen goes black.
[tl;dr: woobiewolf, theworstalpha, and lookmaimmawolf becoming parents/guardians, kicking ass, being adorable dads, and basically making ovaries burst all over New York and L.A., with cameo appearances from Lucas, notlikeidied, deadashale, pieceoftoast, ohhhaleno, both of the Mikas when they’re seven and eight years old, werewolf!Tate Langdon, Scott McCall, and seriousmarauder, posted with permission from Paley to use her Derek in the mix.]