[ Rather than telling Stiles to stop talking, though he can hear him from where he's getting geared up himself, Derek simply offers offhanded replies where they seem to fit the most. Otherwise, though, he goes through the motions-- despite the fact it's been something like eight years since he donned a suit-- and only makes his own complaint when he mutters (largely to himself) about how it used to be easier to get into the circuitry suit.
But after that, he goes quiet, chin tilted up as they get the chest plate in place and align the spinal interface. Out of the corner of his eye, he meets Stiles' gaze, though he doesn't say anything for a long time. As he accepts his helmet from the crew overseeing them, he moves to stand closer to his (albeit prospective) copilot, head bowed so he can put the helmet on and lock it into place. His shoulder presses close to Stiles', armor of the suit bumping in mute reassurance. ]
[ a voice comes over the communication not long after, as Stiles steps into the bootstraps that hold the leg mechanisms, gets a real look at the control panel. This part he knows--he's seen it in a thousand reenactments, studied it obsessively when he first started to consider the crazy idea of drifting someday. His fingers touch the controls as easily as Derek's might, until he's settled in.
preparing to initiate neural handshake in fifteen. fourteen.
Hazarding a glance across, he swallows down his nerves and mutters something to himself that suspiciously sounds like "well, no going back now" before the yellow fully drains out of his helmet and he's staring into what's about to become the drift. ]
With the familiar catch of the boots being held into place, Derek shifts his weight back and forth, side to side, as if getting himself properly settled where he stands. They're not going to be going anywhere, not with their first drift test, but it's hard not to fall back onto old habits, ensuring that he's locked in the Conn Pod rather than unsteady. Who knows what might creep up in the drift, after all. It's while he's distracted with the nostalgia factor that he spaces out as he goes through the motions of the controls, missing the better part of the countdown until he zones back in again.
five, four, three
And he can't help but look over towards Stiles, the yellow liquid cleared from his helmet and giving him an unobstructed view of his current companion. It strikes something in him, and even as they initiate the neural handshake he knows this isn't going to be easy. ]
[ The first thing is that the world just seems to go silent. It doesn't last long--maybe half a second--but it's startlingly different from Stiles' usual world, and wide brown eyes blink open as everything seems to take on a blue tone and he's running through memories. Suddenly, he's seeing things--what must be Derek as a young man, with his arm around a girl with brown hair, Laura, Cora as a toddler, his dad getting elected to Sheriff of Beacon Hills, meeting Scott at five years old, the first Kaiju attack on San Francisco, his mother, smiling and surrounded by kindergarteners.
For a minute, it's practically surreal. He can feel himself living Derek Hale's life the same way he must be living Stiles', but everything screeches to a grinding halt when he feels a sudden, agonizing burst of pain.
It's Derek, with Paige, in Loup Garou--claws wracking through the metal, rending flesh, Derek's hand on a knife, "I don't want to hurt anymore, please, Derek, please", and then the rising stem of panic so intense that he blinks out of it just long enough to achieve 100% compatibility. It's enough time to get them settled--to get Loup Garou's arms up, to punch a fist into a hand, to shoot Derek a look that's both terrified and thrilled all at once.
And any sigh of relief, any congratulatory notions from LOCCENT stop as Stiles is thrust into his own panic, pushed into the room where his mother died of complications and exposure to Kaiju Blue, of how they wouldn't let him see her in fear of him being infected. How his dad wasn't there.
Before he can really think about it, he's latched onto the memory, and his surroundings are a white hospital room, and a ten year old Stiles Stilinski is walking the hallways of the hospital, listening to the beeping of her heart monitor. It's the only sound in the room--and how it's suddenly slowing down. Stiles' eyes go wide and horrified and all the of the air gets punched out of his lungs--he's running, running for the room as fast as he can, lifting his hands--lifting his hands in real time, up into the air in a fighting position as they slam against the air--slam against the glass of her room, let me in, let me in, that's my mom, let me in-- ]
[ There's something interesting about the drift, something that Derek's always wondered about but never actually questioned-- the memories pass in a swirl of soft blue, sharp where the memory is the strongest, and he lets them pass by him one by one. A young Stiles riding shotgun in his father's patrol car, arts and crafts with a familiar face that almost shocks the veteran out of the handshake because he'd never made the connection, never realized, and there's--
Laura, Cora. His uncle after having just barely made it out of a fire that was started in a moment of weakness, when he could still feel the blood on his hands. (Garou's legs were battered, one barely held together after Knifehead's teeth tore through the thigh and left a smattering of sparks across Paige's thigh earlier on. He had to walk miles, upon miles, upon miles, but it was somehow easier than taking the emergency knife in his hand. Easier than having to hold Paige through her pain, until she asked him to finally end it so that she it didn't hurt anymore.)
Despite the whirlpool of pain, the honey and smoke that swirl together after he feels the burn of scars and wet, hot blood, Derek holds himself steady as they hear Mahealani over the comm link, repeating the somehow simultaneously droll and chipper AI voice as the neural handshake meets success. ]
[ And then Stiles catches sight of the RABIT and goes chasing after it.
He's seen people that've been poisoned by Kaiju Blue. They're everywhere on the coasts, slowly dying with no known cure. It's what brought Stiles here, and he knows it-- did a little snooping of his own, to be perfectly frank-- but it's a different thing completely to see it for himself. The blue of the drift gives way to something almost blindingly white, an exaggerated image of hospital sterility and the panic of loss. He can feel the bile in his own throat as if it's his memory, even as the tang of copper and the weight of ash linger with him.
But instead of waiting it out, instead of just trying to talk Stiles through it and standing back, he reaches out to the image that he sees-- ]
[ The beeping of the monitor's starting to slow down, and all Stiles can do is look left and right, look for his dad. He's not here, and Stiles is facing it at ten years old, looking at his mother through glass as her hand goes limp and the doctors are around her in hazmat suits, muttering about Kaiju Blue and death and Stiles hands hit the glass one last time and he lets out a hiccup and a sob, loud and painful and suddenly it's tunnel vision, and he's on the floor, wheezing so hard it physically aches, it hurts his lungs-- and he's wheezing in life, too, his vital signs spiking as his heart thumps so hard he can feel the echo of it in his head, and it's like breathing through molasses-- because his mother's dead, she's dead and he's all alone and she left him there.
Tears are streaming down his cheeks and he collapses to the ground and curls up in a ball on the floor, and the surroundings--and Derek--are barely background noise, because his whole world's just crashed down around his head and the doctor is scooping him up before he can say anything, and he's two seconds from throwing up, his mom is gone, she's dead, she was only trying to help and she's gone-- ]
[ It barely takes a moment for Derek to move, though he can't disconnect himself from the hookups until they're actually fully separated from the drift. But there's some limited capability there, and it's enough that he can move to where Stiles is hooked up, where he's not sure if he's still in the drift and with the memories that brought him spiraling through Wonderland. But it doesn't matter to him, as he drops heavily to his knees where Stiles has collapsed. He hefts him up, bracing a hand against his chest over the thin plate of the suit, almost as if hoping that if he presses close enough he'll be able to steady his thundering heartbeat.
Tucking Stiles against him while he waits out the technicians, silently willing them to hurry up so that Stiles isn't stuck chasing the RABIT, he reaches his free hand to find one of Stiles'. ] It's a memory, Stiles. You can't stay there, not when we need you here. So I need you to come back.
[ Funny, considering the press of his own memories lingering at the edges of the whitewashed ones that he's trying to bring the new ranger back from. And it hurts to watch, to see this kid that he's gotten to know since their dialogue going through so much loss as he once had. But all he can do is try to guide him through it, holding him steady as best he can. ]
[ Maybe it's the arms around him--maybe it's the pressure of his hand against his chest. Whatever it is, a part of the memory seems to slow, like the panic attacks that had wracked his body throughout his childhood. His father arrives in the memory, and the pained breathing changes from wheezing to soft, hiccuping sobs, mirrored in the real world as he shakes like a leaf and sobs into Derek's chest, because in his head he's screaming at his dad, where were you, she's gone, she's gone dad, she's gone.
But it breaks when his hand catches, when Stiles finds something real, something anchoring to his real life, and he chokes out a gasp as he finds his footing again and stares into the distance, absolutely wrecked and still shaking. And somewhere, in the back of his head, there's a voice that's telling him, you fucked that up, Stilinski.
That's the last time he'll be drifting, and he just knows it. His brown eyes come up to stare at Derek for a second, and he looks lost. ]
[ The second that they're cleared, that Stiles is free enough that they don't run a risk of backlash, Derek doesn't hesitate to tear off his own helmet. Paige's voice echoes after him, Kate's laughter ringing in his ears, but he just focuses on Stiles, hand pressing to his chest again before it reaches to undo the clasps on his own helmet. The drift was hard and fast, a literal crash course, and he's surprised that he can still breathe, himself. But he doesn't say anything, not for a moment, and instead looks at those wide, wet brown eyes that stare up at him.
Brief as the drift was, he saw Stiles. He was in his head, and he felt that panic and devastation. Knew it, from his own experiences. Bowing his head forward, he presses their foreheads together, squeezing tight at his fingers even through the confines of their suits. Whatever it takes to bring Stiles back down and anchor him in the now-- and he's not going to let go, even if Peter comes in drawling I told you so. This is his copilot. He's not losing another one. ]
[ His fingers curling against Derek's are the first actual sign of movement from Stiles after the drift, or at least the first physical one. The suit makes it awkward but he finds a grip until his knuckles are white and stares at him for a second more, looking over his face. He saw more of Derek--saw what had actually happened to his co-pilot--and when he chokes out his first spoken phrase, it's heavy, like he's speaking around a lump in his throat. ] I'm sorry.
[ It's not exactly clear what he's apologizing for--the drift, or maybe what he saw. But it's soft as can be, followed by a quiet swear as his other hand comes up to shift into his dark brown hair, ruffling it frustratedly. He ruined his only chance at drifting, probably made Derek look like a fucking laughing stock in the process, because he couldn't keep a grip on his memories. Because reliving his mom's death after living Paige's with Derek (even in flashes) had been something he thought he could stomach and he couldn't. Cora had been right--he brought a lot of his own baggage into the drift, too.
He takes in a shaky breath, though, trying to stay with Derek. In, then out. It's a little easier to breathe when the helmet's off, that much is certain. ]
First drift is always the hardest. [ Quiet as he is when he says it, Derek honestly means what he says. As far as he's concerned, Stiles didn't ruin anything. Sure as hell they both made a huge mess of the drift, but at the same time? They initiated full synchronization before things were thrown off balance. And who's to say who caused it to fall out of alignment in the first place? Stiles might have been hit the hardest, but even the old hand went into it knowing that it couldn't have gone perfectly.
So he just sits there with Stiles, slowing his own breathing down and holding Stiles until he calms himself down completely. They'll have to get off the floor eventually, but he doesn't have any intentions of moving any time soon.
Even as he tries not to think about reliving his own memories on top of seeing Stiles', learning more about him than he'd initially anticipated. So that was what Cora had meant, when she said that there would be something more there. But it's true, he really can feel the understanding between the two of them, especially as he keeps close contact with the teen, for both their comfort. ] I am, too.
H-ha. Tell me about it. [ He manages a shaky laugh, at least, and lets the hand in his hair drop to scrub over his face, wiping tear tracks and snot and trying to pretend that he didn't just go through one of the most emotionally jarring moments of his life for the second time, just minutes after seeing flashes of what was probably Derek's most emotionally jarring memory.
At least they had crappy lives in common.
He's quiet for a couple seconds as he listens to the sound of Derek's breathing. It's steady, and his hand is still clasped hard against his, and it's not until he's seemingly reached at least a normal level of oxygen that he slowly unclenches his hand, barely leaving their fingers connected as he starts to sit up a little. ] This is the point where I'm imagining someone's going to carry me back to K-Science by the scruff of my neck. What a freakin' joke I am.
[ Seeing his last moments with Paige was like ripping open an old wound, and it's true that the memory is his most jarring, but it's sad to say that Derek's got his fair share of them at this point. Carrying Stiles' with him? Not exactly that much of a burden, as far as he's concerned, and he shoulders it rather easily after having seen it. Claudia Stilinski had had beautiful hair, thick and dark like her son's, and it had started to fall out before she shaved it all off. They had tried chemo therapy to combat the sickness, but Kaiju Blue wasn't cancer.
It was a monster that man couldn't fight with another monster, the way they had built the Jaeger Program.
Rather than pulling away from Stiles-- though he lets him sit up from him-- he brings his free hand up and rubs it against his own face, not trusting himself. Whether it be from empathy or his own baggage, he's going to wager that he didn't get out of that stonefaced, himself. Still, something like a scoff of a laugh leaves him at that, and he rests there with their fingers loosely connected. ] I'd like to see them try. Immediate, 100% sync on first test. You're new, I'm eight years out of practice-- the fact that we had problems isn't surprising.
[ His mouth turns up just a little, seemingly a little soothed by the thought. All in all, Stiles still feels like an abject failure, but the numbers aren't gonna lie--they reached 100% sync, an important milestone for any drift partners, and without a lot of trouble, at least at first. Maybe over time, he can ignore that memory, but his mother's death is still sore, nearly ten years later, and it's a time of his life that he doesn't want to remember.
But maybe with someone similar, he could learn to shoulder it again, instead of keeping it bottled deep inside of him.
Stiles runs his hands over his hair again, then lets it settle in his lap--he's starting to come back to himself. But he doesn't drop that connection, and even watches Derek when he wipes over his face, because it's kind of a weird feeling, to know that your own memories probably punched someone else in the emotions, too. ] A trial run's just a trial run, I guess.
[ Briefly contemplating getting up from the floor, he instead opts to sit there for a bit longer. There's nowhere else they really need to be-- the data will speak for them long enough that Derek feels they won't need to offer any reports yet-- and at this point, he doesn't think they're quite ready to be trusted with finer motor movements. So he settles, looking back at Stiles as they sit together. Everything is fresh in his mind, and he's not going to be able to sleep well tonight, but...
Well. The numbers really don't lie. Taking in a deep breath, he lets the corner of his mouth twitch the slightest bit in response to the very faint smile on Stiles' own face. ] Sounds right.
[ It's a small attempt at reassuring, although they're steady now. He's finding it easier to breathe, easier to remind himself that Stiles' eyes are amber like whiskey where Paige's were a cello's fine, worn wood. They aren't sitting there looking at old ghosts, although they might be remembering them together, sharing them now with someone they least expected. ]
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no subject
But after that, he goes quiet, chin tilted up as they get the chest plate in place and align the spinal interface. Out of the corner of his eye, he meets Stiles' gaze, though he doesn't say anything for a long time. As he accepts his helmet from the crew overseeing them, he moves to stand closer to his (albeit prospective) copilot, head bowed so he can put the helmet on and lock it into place. His shoulder presses close to Stiles', armor of the suit bumping in mute reassurance. ]
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preparing to initiate neural handshake in fifteen. fourteen.
Hazarding a glance across, he swallows down his nerves and mutters something to himself that suspiciously sounds like "well, no going back now" before the yellow fully drains out of his helmet and he's staring into what's about to become the drift. ]
no subject
With the familiar catch of the boots being held into place, Derek shifts his weight back and forth, side to side, as if getting himself properly settled where he stands. They're not going to be going anywhere, not with their first drift test, but it's hard not to fall back onto old habits, ensuring that he's locked in the Conn Pod rather than unsteady. Who knows what might creep up in the drift, after all. It's while he's distracted with the nostalgia factor that he spaces out as he goes through the motions of the controls, missing the better part of the countdown until he zones back in again.
five, four, three
And he can't help but look over towards Stiles, the yellow liquid cleared from his helmet and giving him an unobstructed view of his current companion. It strikes something in him, and even as they initiate the neural handshake he knows this isn't going to be easy. ]
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For a minute, it's practically surreal. He can feel himself living Derek Hale's life the same way he must be living Stiles', but everything screeches to a grinding halt when he feels a sudden, agonizing burst of pain.
It's Derek, with Paige, in Loup Garou--claws wracking through the metal, rending flesh, Derek's hand on a knife, "I don't want to hurt anymore, please, Derek, please", and then the rising stem of panic so intense that he blinks out of it just long enough to achieve 100% compatibility. It's enough time to get them settled--to get Loup Garou's arms up, to punch a fist into a hand, to shoot Derek a look that's both terrified and thrilled all at once.
And any sigh of relief, any congratulatory notions from LOCCENT stop as Stiles is thrust into his own panic, pushed into the room where his mother died of complications and exposure to Kaiju Blue, of how they wouldn't let him see her in fear of him being infected. How his dad wasn't there.
Before he can really think about it, he's latched onto the memory, and his surroundings are a white hospital room, and a ten year old Stiles Stilinski is walking the hallways of the hospital, listening to the beeping of her heart monitor. It's the only sound in the room--and how it's suddenly slowing down. Stiles' eyes go wide and horrified and all the of the air gets punched out of his lungs--he's running, running for the room as fast as he can, lifting his hands--lifting his hands in real time, up into the air in a fighting position as they slam against the air--slam against the glass of her room, let me in, let me in, that's my mom, let me in-- ]
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Laura, Cora. His uncle after having just barely made it out of a fire that was started in a moment of weakness, when he could still feel the blood on his hands. (Garou's legs were battered, one barely held together after Knifehead's teeth tore through the thigh and left a smattering of sparks across Paige's thigh earlier on. He had to walk miles, upon miles, upon miles, but it was somehow easier than taking the emergency knife in his hand. Easier than having to hold Paige through her pain, until she asked him to finally end it so that she it didn't hurt anymore.)
Despite the whirlpool of pain, the honey and smoke that swirl together after he feels the burn of scars and wet, hot blood, Derek holds himself steady as they hear Mahealani over the comm link, repeating the somehow simultaneously droll and chipper AI voice as the neural handshake meets success. ]
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He's seen people that've been poisoned by Kaiju Blue. They're everywhere on the coasts, slowly dying with no known cure. It's what brought Stiles here, and he knows it-- did a little snooping of his own, to be perfectly frank-- but it's a different thing completely to see it for himself. The blue of the drift gives way to something almost blindingly white, an exaggerated image of hospital sterility and the panic of loss. He can feel the bile in his own throat as if it's his memory, even as the tang of copper and the weight of ash linger with him.
But instead of waiting it out, instead of just trying to talk Stiles through it and standing back, he reaches out to the image that he sees-- ]
Stiles, I need you to come back to me.
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Tears are streaming down his cheeks and he collapses to the ground and curls up in a ball on the floor, and the surroundings--and Derek--are barely background noise, because his whole world's just crashed down around his head and the doctor is scooping him up before he can say anything, and he's two seconds from throwing up, his mom is gone, she's dead, she was only trying to help and she's gone-- ]
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Tucking Stiles against him while he waits out the technicians, silently willing them to hurry up so that Stiles isn't stuck chasing the RABIT, he reaches his free hand to find one of Stiles'. ] It's a memory, Stiles. You can't stay there, not when we need you here. So I need you to come back.
[ Funny, considering the press of his own memories lingering at the edges of the whitewashed ones that he's trying to bring the new ranger back from. And it hurts to watch, to see this kid that he's gotten to know since their dialogue going through so much loss as he once had. But all he can do is try to guide him through it, holding him steady as best he can. ]
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But it breaks when his hand catches, when Stiles finds something real, something anchoring to his real life, and he chokes out a gasp as he finds his footing again and stares into the distance, absolutely wrecked and still shaking. And somewhere, in the back of his head, there's a voice that's telling him, you fucked that up, Stilinski.
That's the last time he'll be drifting, and he just knows it. His brown eyes come up to stare at Derek for a second, and he looks lost. ]
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Brief as the drift was, he saw Stiles. He was in his head, and he felt that panic and devastation. Knew it, from his own experiences. Bowing his head forward, he presses their foreheads together, squeezing tight at his fingers even through the confines of their suits. Whatever it takes to bring Stiles back down and anchor him in the now-- and he's not going to let go, even if Peter comes in drawling I told you so. This is his copilot. He's not losing another one. ]
That's it-- just breathe with me, all right?
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[ It's not exactly clear what he's apologizing for--the drift, or maybe what he saw. But it's soft as can be, followed by a quiet swear as his other hand comes up to shift into his dark brown hair, ruffling it frustratedly. He ruined his only chance at drifting, probably made Derek look like a fucking laughing stock in the process, because he couldn't keep a grip on his memories. Because reliving his mom's death after living Paige's with Derek (even in flashes) had been something he thought he could stomach and he couldn't. Cora had been right--he brought a lot of his own baggage into the drift, too.
He takes in a shaky breath, though, trying to stay with Derek. In, then out. It's a little easier to breathe when the helmet's off, that much is certain. ]
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So he just sits there with Stiles, slowing his own breathing down and holding Stiles until he calms himself down completely. They'll have to get off the floor eventually, but he doesn't have any intentions of moving any time soon.
Even as he tries not to think about reliving his own memories on top of seeing Stiles', learning more about him than he'd initially anticipated. So that was what Cora had meant, when she said that there would be something more there. But it's true, he really can feel the understanding between the two of them, especially as he keeps close contact with the teen, for both their comfort. ] I am, too.
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At least they had crappy lives in common.
He's quiet for a couple seconds as he listens to the sound of Derek's breathing. It's steady, and his hand is still clasped hard against his, and it's not until he's seemingly reached at least a normal level of oxygen that he slowly unclenches his hand, barely leaving their fingers connected as he starts to sit up a little. ] This is the point where I'm imagining someone's going to carry me back to K-Science by the scruff of my neck. What a freakin' joke I am.
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It was a monster that man couldn't fight with another monster, the way they had built the Jaeger Program.
Rather than pulling away from Stiles-- though he lets him sit up from him-- he brings his free hand up and rubs it against his own face, not trusting himself. Whether it be from empathy or his own baggage, he's going to wager that he didn't get out of that stonefaced, himself. Still, something like a scoff of a laugh leaves him at that, and he rests there with their fingers loosely connected. ] I'd like to see them try. Immediate, 100% sync on first test. You're new, I'm eight years out of practice-- the fact that we had problems isn't surprising.
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But maybe with someone similar, he could learn to shoulder it again, instead of keeping it bottled deep inside of him.
Stiles runs his hands over his hair again, then lets it settle in his lap--he's starting to come back to himself. But he doesn't drop that connection, and even watches Derek when he wipes over his face, because it's kind of a weird feeling, to know that your own memories probably punched someone else in the emotions, too. ] A trial run's just a trial run, I guess.
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Well. The numbers really don't lie. Taking in a deep breath, he lets the corner of his mouth twitch the slightest bit in response to the very faint smile on Stiles' own face. ] Sounds right.
[ It's a small attempt at reassuring, although they're steady now. He's finding it easier to breathe, easier to remind himself that Stiles' eyes are amber like whiskey where Paige's were a cello's fine, worn wood. They aren't sitting there looking at old ghosts, although they might be remembering them together, sharing them now with someone they least expected. ]