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i.
Derek stands at the door to Stiles’ lab, and remembers the days when the police didn’t need a crime lab. Something crashes behind Stiles’ extensive collection of plant books, and Derek sorely misses when they could just send DNA samples to the state level, and poor deputies like himself didn’t have to deal with sleep-deprived ultra-geniuses at eight o’clock in the morning.
“I swear to all hell, Lydia, if you don’t boot up right the fuck now, I’m donating you to the community college,” Stiles is snapping at his mass spectrometer, glaring at a computer screen. He hasn’t noticed Derek yet, halfway through the doorway and wondering if he should have brought his sidearm. Just in case.
Stiles was department legend long before Derek transferred to Beacon Hills. Water-cooler gossip contained the usual, “He threw a botany book at me when I asked for the time,” and, “I heard he once bitched out the SO’s son on an army base because Stilinski didn’t like the army greens,” but Derek is sure he’s experienced far worse from Stiles before he’s had his morning tea.
Not coffee, no, he hated the stuff. According to Deaton’s assistant, McCall, Stiles brewed his own tea every morning, but he liked it rich as all hell, and sometimes it would take too long for Stiles to wait before he got started on his work for the day. Derek has never been sure what he hoped to accomplish from yelling at his equipment and kicking everything from the trashcan to evidence out of the way. Derek has never seen him do anything productive before his caffeine.
Normally, he’s already got it by the time Derek makes it into work, but it’s evident from the way Stiles is trying to touch-scroll on his clipboard that it hasn’t happened yet.
Drawing a deep breath, Derek clears his throat. Stiles freezes, then spins around in his chair, hair in absolute disarray, and Derek is pretty sure his labcoat is inside out. Derek is sure it’s turned inside out.
“To what do I owe this pleasure?” he asks, leaning back and looking the picture of nonchalance, and if Derek hadn’t been working with him for the better part of two years, he might be fooled. Stiles’ eyes are dangerous, and Derek isn’t sure if it’s aimed at him.
“I need the fingerprint analysis from Don Antonio,” Derek eventually manages, deeming the danger to his person minimal.
Stiles’ gaze goes steely. He pushes himself up to his feet and with all the drama of a petulant child, shoves his hands in his pockets as he walks to the other side of the lab, where his desk sits haphazardly against the wall. Derek has never been quite sure how Stiles graduated with three PhDs with his organization skills; he digs through five different piles of files to get the one Derek needs.
“Here ya go, chief.” He tosses it to Derek once he’s close enough, and no, Derek doesn’t not fumble in catching it.
“Thank you, Stiles,” he says sincerely as Stiles flops back into his chair and spins around in it a little.
“Hoo whee, first name and all. Someone slept well.” Stiles sneers.
Derek directs his infamous bitchface right back, opening the file to flip through it. Satisfied that Stiles hadn’t forgotten anything, he snaps it back closed, and opens his mouth to thank Stiles again, but the rogue scientist is across the lab again, having a heated, one-sided conversation with the sample cooler.
“Oh, you’re gonna be like that today, are you? Well, how would you like it if I unplugged you for a week? Let alllll that ice melt, hm? Would you work then?” Stiles runs a hand through his hair, only making it worse. “What do you mean, I wouldn’t do it? I would just borrow Deaton’s cooler for all the samples, and no one would ever be the wiser.” He titters and kicks across to the table behind him without even leaving his chair, typing something into one of his many computers. “And you, sir, are a right proper bastard,” he mutters, flicking the screen a couple of times. “Far overdue for an overhaul, I’d say. Would you like that? Getting shoved into a warehouse somewhere in Montana? Or worse, given to some poor high school near LA and worked until your death? You absolute fucking piece of—”
“Stiles, stop abusing your computer. Don’t you think you’ve caused him enough hurt?”
Derek nearly jumps out of his skin as McCall elbows open the door behind him, sporting his lopsided grin and Stiles’ very large puppy-printed travel mug (Derek thinks he remembers it being a gift from Isaac).
The change in Stiles is almost instant, perking up and making grabby hands at McCall, excited noises in the back of his throat.
“Sir,” McCall nods his head to him, sharing a knowing smile and a nod towards his best friend; apparently they’d gone to school together, and got lucky with their transfers. Nodding him on, Scott makes quick work of getting the mug to Stiles, who is waxing poetic about McCall’s jawbones as he gulps down what is likely very-hot tea.
Derek snorts and ducks out of the lab with another thanks at the door. He thinks Stiles is too preoccupied in drinking his weight in caffeine to notice
ii.
The light in the hallway sparks on and off, and Derek’s stomach churns at the bullet holes in the ceiling. Someone that sounds like Erica is telling him to be careful through the headset he has on, but he can’t be sure, palms sweating as he grips tightly to the glock in his hands.
He goes over the mental map to Stiles’ lab in his head (right, left, right, right, left), and carefully trots down the hall, avoiding broken glass and shattered plaster. There’s a body at the corner, a security guard, but a quick check to his pulse rules him dead immediately. Derek says as much into the intercom quietly, barely moving his lips
“Hale, we don’t know who we’re dealing with,” the Sheriff tells him. “Make sure you get him alive.”
“Okay, Derek, Stiles’ lab is just up ahead.”
“I know my way to Stiles’ lab, Isaac,” he retorts, checking around the next corner before making his way down that hall too. “What’s my backup?”
“Boyd is on rear entrance, Whittemore on security elevator, Greenberg as far away from you as humanly possible.”
Derek hums his affirmative, definitely encouraged by the thought. “Where’s Reyes?”
“North staircase, boss. I’ll have your back immediately if anything goes down.”
He nods, though no one can see him. Crouching at the very edge of the last corner, Derek peaks around the wall and curses under his breath. He has full view of the lab through the sliding glass door, and Stiles does not look in great shape. The side of his face is smeared with blood (a head trauma, Derek’s mind supplies), and he has one hand handcuffed to the leg of his desk, where there’s a figure casually typing away at the computer.
From here, Derek can’t make out the identity of the figure, but it’s definitely a woman, and she must be bad news if Stiles is glaring at her like that. Or, it’s just the fact that—
“I haven’t had my tea yet, Blake. I do not have time for your godawful shenanigans.”
“Be quiet, sweetie. I don’t have time for your babbling.”
“‘Probably should have shot me first then, hm? Or at the very least ducktaped my mouth shut. There’s some in the top drawer of my filing—”
The woman crouches down and grabs Stiles’ chin lightning fast, turning her head just enough that Derek can see it. He swears again. “Isaac, it’s Jennifer Blake,” he whispers, almost missing Blake hiss at Stiles to shut it before returning to her work.
“What, like Jennifer Blake from the FBI?”
Erica snaps back for Derek, “No, Isaac, the Jennifer Blake from my little league. Derek, is she armed?”
Derek doesn’t answer for a moment, craning his neck to see better into the lab, Blake now pulling Stiles’ books one-by-one from the shelf and shaking them. On the desk is a handgun, just out of Stiles’ reach, and Derek is pretty sure he sees another tucked into the back of Blake’s belt. “Two firearms confirmed.”
“Stiles?” Isaac asks after a moment, as if scared to.
Derek inhales slowly through his nose, planning his assault. “He’s not in any immediate danger. Have EMTs on standby.”
“Will do, boss. You need me in there?”
“Not yet, Erica.”
Stiles groans dramatically and lets his head thump into the box he’s leaning against. Blake glares at him, but all sense of self-preservation Stiles seems to have is in the puppy-mug on the table next to Lydia, which he’s eyeing longingly. “Seriously, this is so cliche. Using your feminine wiles to try and get to my lab through Derek?” Blake lets out a harsh laugh as Derek almost makes an affronted noise in the back of his throat. Erica seems to find it vastly amusing.
“Stiles, sweetie, I don’t think anyone’s ‘feminine wiles’ would work on Derek,” Blake sneers.
“Oh shit, she’s pegged you already, Derek,” Erica laughs into the radio. “Or, y’know, not.”
“Reyes, this is an active hostage situation, keep it for the donut party,” the Sheriff snaps, voice taught. Erica shuts up immediately; sometimes it’s easy to forget Stiles is even related to John, being so different as they are.
“What’s that supposed to mean, Blake? You should have seen him drooling all over you,” Stiles is saying, and if Derek weren’t already concerned someone else was going to shoot him, he might shoot Stiles himself.
Blake pauses her search to look down at him like he’s the most oblivious being to ever walk the earth. “Do you think it would have taken me this long to infiltrate here if I had Derek in my pocket?”
Stiles snorts. “Fuck if I know. The point is, you could have easily just asked to see how our lab differs from yours in DC, and badda bing, badda boom. You’re in. Catching me alone in the lab before anyone else is even here? Cliche.”
“I grow tired of this conversation, Stiles.” She crouches down again and clamps Stiles’ jaw in a grip that causes Stiles to make a sound of pain after barely a moment. And Stiles is a complainer, has to have everybody know about all of his aches and pains, but he actually has a rather high pain-threshold for someone as weak as he is, and this whole situation makes Derek seethe.
“Derek, what’s going on in there?” The Sheriff demands.
“I have a clear shot, do I have permission to take it,” Derek responds instead, raising his glock and aiming at the arm Blake has on Stiles.
The Sheriff hurriedly says, “Only if Stiles is completely clear.”
“Sir, if he has the shot, he should take it. Don’t let your personal connecti—”
“Don’t tell me how to do my job, Reyes.”
Derek blocks them out and focuses on Blake, and she’s speaking too low for Derek to hear her now, but Stiles looks absolutely pissed.
“Yeah, well, you let me know how that works out for you,” Stiles spits and then knees her in the face.
Derek seizes the opportunity and dives through the door, glock raised. “Hand where I can see them!”
Black tries to make for the gun in her belt, but Stiles uses all the leeway he has on the cuff to shove her to the side. From there, Derek easily kicks away Blake’s gun and cuffs her, knee between her shoulder blades.
Erica rushes into the room a moment later to get the cuff off of Stiles’ wrist, giving him a short hug. “Glad you’re alright, batman.”
Derek looks up and frowns, eyeing the blood. “We have EMTs coming, you should—”
Stiles waves them off and stumbles to Lydia, giving her a fond pat before picking up his tea and taking a great swig. He makes a face. “It’s cold.”
Derek could kiss that stupid pout off his face.
iii.
Derek would wager that he has almost as much trouble sleeping as Stiles does, so when he accidentally sleeps in an hour late and wakes feeling more than refreshed, he can’t find it in himself to even care that he gets a talking to from the Sheriff. And he likes Derek, so it’s mostly just a pat on the back and a “Don’t do it again”.
And judging on the fact that it is almost ten, and Stiles is usually in his lab by eight, he’d assumed he was in the clear to bring Stiles the last of the office bagels; if Stiles was bad at sleep, he’s atrocious about eating (evident in his skinny frame), so it’s office policy to bring the Sheriff’s kid food whenever possible.
“I wouldn’t go in there, if I were you.” McCall heads him off a hall down from the lab, door newly reinstalled from the Blake debacle two months before. McCall looks exhausted, hands shoved deep in his labcoat pockets.
“Why, what’s wrong with Stiles?” Derek tries to look over McCall’s shoulder, but he’s still too far from the lab to actually see anything.
McCall rubs his eyes and groans softly. “Stiles ran out of tea, and it won’t get here until tomorrow.” That’s a dire situation, indeed.
“I really need those tapes from yesterday,” Derek mumbles, then holds up the bagel bag. “You think he’d be more accommodating if I brought these?”
“I have no idea, boss.” McCall tosses his shoulders carelessly, shaking his head. “Deaton needs me downstairs, sir. If you’ll excuse me.” He ducks down and slips past Derek, shuffling down the hall to the elevator.
“McCall,” Derek calls. “After Deaton’s done with you, get some sleep, alright? The lounge should be open all day.” McCall mock-salutes as the elevator doors close.
Derek sighs and shakes his head, rubbing a hand over his jaw thoughtfully. After a moment of thought, he presses on and braves the rest of the walk to Stiles’ lab. It truly looks horrible compared to usual; Stiles, while cluttered, is usually neat enough to not have papers on the floor, but he seems to have given up all pretense of organization for the day.
Stiles is bent low over a microscope, grumbling loudly to himself and ordering the sample to obey his commands and match something from one crime scene or another. Even from here, Derek can hear the music blaring from the thick headphones he has on. His hair is precinct legend too, but it seems even worse than normal: flat and floppy rather than it’s usual gravity-defying. It actually looks a little... sad.
Derek takes a deep breath and pushes the button for the door. Stiles doesn’t look up as it slides open, nor when Derek enters and sets the bag of bagels on the table nearest to his hands. Completely absorbed in his work as he is, muttering under his breath so fast Derek can’t actually understand him, Stiles also doesn’t notice when Derek starts going through the absolute mess that is his desk.
He finds the tapes near the bottom, neatly labeled (you’d think Stiles would have the messiest scrawl anyone’s ever had the displeasure of reading, but it’s actually quite elegant) and signed out in Stiles name. Derek smiles. Just a little.
Stiles is still resolutely concentrated on whatever’s in his microscope, so Derek does his best to slip out unnoticed. He thinks he succeeds.
iv.
“He’s lost it.”
Derek looks up from the file he’s reviewing for Erica, to a stricken-looking McCall standing over his desk. A glance at the clock tells him that McCall and Stiles should have left for lunch nearly thirty minutes ago. “What was that, McCall?”
“Stiles. He’s lost it.”
Derek frowns and closes the file. “What do you mean?”
“He’s...” McCall waves his hand vaguely, hair frazzled. “I don’t know, boss. He hasn’t slept in, like, a week, and he hasn’t had his tea, and his lab is an absolute wreck—”
“Scott, isn’t his lab... usually a wreck?”
“Not like this, sir.”
“Aren’t you on the science genius security detail?” Derek leans back, clicking his pen a few times. There were only a couple of people that could truly control Stiles, and to Derek’s knowledge, McCall was definitely one of them; they’d known each other for years, after all. “Why come to me?”
McCall gives him an exasperated expression, and turns on heel, walking off. Isaac, having watched the whole exchange, shrugs quickly and returns to his computer screen. “Don’t look at me, boss. I have no idea what just happened.”
But Isaac is smirking, so Derek is entirely unconvinced. He mutters as much as he rises from his desk and runs a hand through his hair. Isaac cheekily waves him off to the elevator.
Derek punches the button for the third floor with his elbow, ‘cause it’s an elbow-punching kind of day, and as he leans against the back wall, he realizes he’s been doing this a lot. Taking care of Stiles when no one else wants to.
Just the week before, Erica had come to get him to reel in Stiles mouthing off to one of the FBI agents they were attempting to get along with (Derek actually thinks he has every right to be suspicious, after the whole Blake incident). A couple of weeks before that, the Sheriff himself had asked him to get Stiles “undistracted” by the plants at the crime scene, and focused on the body.
Scratching his cheek, he wonders if there’s any significance there.
He sticks his hands in his pockets as he exits the elevator and makes his way to the lab. He has to stop outside, though, and frown. Stiles has tacked papers all over the glass door, blocking anything that’s going on inside, and he’s definitely moving large objects on the other side. From high school stories of Erica, he knows sometimes Stiles just has to rearrange things, force change so he doesn’t go out of his mind, but in the three years he’s been working with Stiles, never has he moved anything in his lab.
“Stiles?” He raps his knuckles on the door, angling his head. Stiles doesn’t answer, specifically, but Derek is sure he hears a grunt just before something scrapes loudly against the floor. Derek sighs inwardly, shaking his head.
One look at the automatic button is enough for Derek to realize Stiles has more or less yanked it out of the wall, and Derek knows how heavy these doors are. He does not look forward to this.
He gets a grip on the edge of the door and gives it a good tug. It screeches a little, but opens somewhat, and after another few tugs, he gets it open enough to look, and maybe squeeze, in. He sticks in his head and takes in the tornado-esque fallout of Stiles’ boredom and exhaustion.
Stiles’ desk is in shambles, missing a leg and files everywhere. His bookshelf is now against the back wall, his fridge haphazardly propped up against the bottom shelf. His boxes of smaller lab equipment are scattered all over the room, some leaking their contents to join the mess that is the floor. His favorite microscope is set up on top of one of his computers, plugged in and everything. Lydia is across the room from where she had been a day previously, and Derek doesn’t even want to think about how Stiles managed to move her.
Currently, Stiles has yanked one of his tables onto its side in the middle of the room, flopped down behind it. He’s got his laptop perched on his thighs, and McCall really hadn’t been kidding about Stiles not having slept; he looks horrible.
“Permission to enter the warzone?”
Stiles looks up, and doesn’t even greet him with his usual sneer, instead flapping his hand in the general direction of his head. “Go on, tell me I’m nuts.” He starts typing something out on his laptop, his glasses pushed uselessly up into his hair.
Sighing, Derek works the door open a bit more and manages to wriggle himself into the room. “No, I’m just a bit curious as to the functionality of a lab with no central filing system.” Stiles snorts. “Stiles, have you had your adderall?”
He flaps his hand again. “No. It’s been... a few days. Why.”
“Where do you keep your emergency bottle?”
Stiles grunts. “Desk.” Derek sighs again and carefully steps over debris to the desk, wondering how it’s even still standing. Two of the drawers are missing, so Derek opens the remaining, and Stiles’ adderall is just sitting on top. He checks the expiration date, then looks to Stiles.
“If you had it here, why haven’t you taken any?” He frowns.
“It was messing with my stuff.”
“Your stuff?”
“I couldn’t concentrate.”
“Stiles, that’s the lack of sleep.”
Stiles huffs and bends closer to the laptop screen, squinting. Bringing over the bottle, Derek gently knocks Stiles’ glasses onto his nose, and Stiles blinks several times quickly. “Oh.”
Derek holds down the bottle, Stiles reluctantly taking it from him and popping two into his mouth. “McCall was worried about you,” he says conversationally, starting to collect the papers from the floor nearest Stiles. Stiles grunts again, but has the decency to look a little guilty.
“He’s a worrier.”
“Why haven’t you been sleeping?”
Stiles shifts... shiftily. “‘Couldn’t. The case with the diplomat—”
“Martin.”
“Yeah, Martin, it’s... fucking with me. I don’t know, Derek.” He sucks in a breath and rubs his eyes under his glasses. Derek pauses his endeavor to clean and watches him for a moment, watches his shoulders slump.
“Do you... want to talk about it?”
“Not particularly.”
“Too bad.” Derek sets the papers he’s holding on the nearest counter and sits next to Stiles against the table. “Is it the evidence? I know we gave you quite a bit to deal with.”
He shakes his head. “No, that’s all been fine. I’m done processing everything but the blood now,” he nods to the only upright box in the room. “I don’t know, I just have a bad feeling about the whole thing.”
“Bad feeling how?”
Stiles shoots him a sideways glare. “Just a bad feeling, Der. Like we’re missing something.”
Derek hmms thoughtfully, looking up at the ceiling. “It did seem to fall into place too easily, didn’t it. Is that what’s been keeping you awake, or something else?”
“I feel like it’s something I’m missing.”
“Stiles, you can’t be expected to catch everything one hundred percent of the time.”
“But I am, and I just want to get this right, Derek.”
"Stiles," Derek sighs. “You’re going to miss more going on like this. You need sleep.”
And Stiles looks seconds away from arguing, but as he opens his mouth, he’s interrupted by a yawn, and Derek considers his battle won. “Ugh, fine,” Stiles grumbles, rubbing his eyes again.
“C’mon, I’ll drive you home.” He gets back to his feet, and takes Stiles’ laptop to help him up too.
“I can drive, you know.”
“Not like this, you can’t. Don’t you know driving tired is worse than driving drunk?”
Stiles grunts disbelievingly.
v.
Derek’s stunt last week has made him a district phenomenon, and that’s the only reason Derek can think of to explain the fact that he’s suddenly in charge of bringing Stiles his tea when McCall phones in sick. Isaac had guffawed when Deaton had handed Derek the puppy mug, so he makes a mental note to put fish sauce in his coffee later.
And normally, McCall’s absence would make Stiles grumpy at best, but it doesn’t seem to be bothering him all that much this morning. Stiles is at his computer, and it looks like he had been typing up the report for the diplomat case, but he’s leant into his palm and dead to the world.
Derek suppresses a smile and makes his way across the lab, pleased to see that Stiles had spent the weekend tidying it up after the, ahm, incident the week before. Aside from Lydia’s new place closer to the door, everything is back where it should be, as organized as someone like Stiles can manage.
Stiles lets out a little snuffle when Derek leans against the desk next to him, but does not wake, leaning further into his hand. Derek sets down the cup and crosses his arms over his chest, watching Stiles’ eyes move behind his eyelids. Stiles had fallen asleep in the car, before, but it hadn’t looked all that comfortable, cramped against the door and cheek pressed to the window. Now, Stiles looks almost peaceful, face relaxed and silently snoring.
Derek quickly tramps down the smile that had snuck up on him, and holds the lip of the cup under Stiles’ nose tauntingly. It twitches a couple of times before Stiles starts to come to, blinking rapidly in the bright lights of the lab.
He makes a sleepy, confused sound, looking up to Derek squintingly. Then he notices the cup in front of his face and snatches it out of Derek’s hand with a muffled word of thanks before he’s downing it.
Derek almost feels bad for breaking the peace of before.
vi.
“Well, that was fucking useless,” Stiles mutters angrily, shouldering open the door to the precinct. Derek snorts and follows him inside, grunting in agreement. An all-night stakeout proved quite fruitless when the perp didn’t even show up at the location, putting the whole case right back at square fuckin’ one.
And if that wasn’t bad enough, Stiles had insisted on coming along so he could use his magical science-y abilities to figure out if the perp could have been exposed to anthrax recently. Derek isn’t sure how someone can deduce that from watching a video feed, but he trusts Stiles, he supposes.
Point is, Stiles had been there the whole night, and while for once his babbling proved useful in keeping him awake, Derek feels a little bad making the scientist return to work regardless. He tries to push away that prick of guilt, because, again, Stiles had insisted. It’s hardly Derek’s fault.
Isaac whistles when they walk in, wincing in sympathy. “I’m guessing it didn’t go well.” He leans against the cubicle wall, sipping his coffee.
Stiles grumbles. “Not even close. We watched an empty street for eight hours.”
“We need to recheck our information on Colonel Reynolds,” Derek tells him, setting his bag in his chair. “Stiles, can you finish the video enhancements today?”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever, Der.” Stiles flaps his hand at him and heads towards the elevators, yawning.
Isaac sends Derek a cheeky, offended look. “You never let me call you ‘Der’.”
“You don’t get me results like Stiles does,” Derek responds easily, shuffling the papers on his desk so he can sit down.
“Is he wearing your jacket?” Isaac asks over the lip of his mug, watching Stiles board the elevator. Derek looks up and follows his gaze, realizing that, yeah, Stiles hadn’t returned it form the night before.
And Isaac is wiggling his eyebrows at him now, disgustingly. “He was cold.”
“And he’s wearing your jacket.”
Derek sighs through his nose, shaking his head. “Yes, and?”
“Nothin’, nothin’.” Isaac sits back down and snorts into his mug, draining it. Derek glares across the aisle at him, but he doesn’t seem to notice.
And though he’d never admit it, Derek really does need his jacket back; the vent right above his desk has posed a problem ever since he’d been promoted. But as the elevator doors close, Derek sees Stiles snuggle into the jacket, and Derek decides he can wait until Stiles has had his caffeine.