Archive of Our Own ^beta

“Will you remember me, when you go back?” Stiles asks. He doesn’t mean to, he knows better, but the words slip out nonetheless.

“Of course,” Peter promises, squeezing his hands. “I could never forget.”

“But I will. You won’t have me anymore, you’ll be… not alone, but…”

“But I’ll be surrounded by a sea of loved one who don’t know me, who have no idea what I’ve been through and what I’ve done and you won’t be there to hold me through it. You’ll be a child and I’ll have to watch you grow up. Then, even when you do grow up, you won’t be the same. You won’t know about the supernatural you won’t know me. I know Stiles, I know what I’m doing, what I’m giving up, but I have to. You know what happens if I don't.”

“I know. I know.” Stiles kisses Peter’s hands, then his forehead. “I love you, and I forgive you.”

“What will I do without you?”

Stiles smiles sadly, his hand coming to rest on Peter’s cheek. “You’ll move on. I know you will, and I want you to.”

When the time comes, Peter leaves without saying goodbye. Time travel is hard enough without the goodbyes. The magic that is sending him back in time requires the sacrifice of his relationships here. It's worth it though, worth it to bring them all back, his family, Stiles’s father. They’d made the decision together. They hadn’t even been together when they’d started looking into it. So, with that in mind, Peter says the words that will take him back to the days before the Hale Fire.

Time travel is a strange, inconsistent thing. It doesn’t matter that Peter has planned everything out, that he picked a day to arrive and everything. There are details that one cannot account for, moments one cannot remember. Which is why Peter finds himself standing in Talia’s living room with her staring at him expectantly.

“Peter?”

“Uhhh,” He runs a hand through his hair. He has no idea when he is, let alone what they’re talking about. “Yes?”

“Are you okay? You were mid sentence and you just trailed off and started staring into the distance.”

Peter smiles thinly, “I’m fine, just realized that I have something I have to get done. I’ll see you later.”

He makes his way to his old room, the one Talia kept for him for the times he needed to be in the packhouse rather than his own apartment. He sits on the bed, staring out the window. She’d been a good alpha. Is a good alpha. He had never realized it, the first time she’d been alive, how much she had done for him, how she had provided for him. This time around he’ll appreciate it.

He checks the date on the old, slow computer that he has in his room. It had been top of the line, he remembers, one of the best available at the time and now it seems so slow and clunky. It’s amazing how quickly things change, but he can adjust. He had navigated this change in the reverse when he woke up from his coma. At least this time he has some ideas of where to start.

The date that he finds is the one he wants though, so Peter takes some deep, steadying breaths before he stands from the desk. He makes his way to his closet, finding clothes that he doesn’t recognize. It’s strange, to wear clothes that he knows should burn to a crisp in mere days and yet haven’t existed in years. All of this is strange, and he finds himself missing Stiles.

There’s nothing to do except move on.

His packmates wave at him as he makes his way downstairs and out the door. He smiles, but says nothing. What is there to say? He’s seeing ghosts. Everywhere he looks is someone who shouldn’t be breathing and yet is. He’s done so much, so much to get here and yet it seems unreal. He can’t trust himself to be around them, not yet, not with so much to get done, so much at risk.

He’ll reunite with them later, after he’s saved them.

Going to the high school is its own challenge. Though he’s younger than he was in the future, he’s still too old to be lingering outside the building. Still, there's things he has to attend to here. It hurts, as he parks several streets over and slinks around the building. The high school reminds him too much of Stiles, of the boy as he had met him. He hadn’t loved Stiles then, not the way he does now, but he’ll never forget where they began.

He shakes his head to clear it and begins his circuit of the school. Eventually, his eyes manage to catch on what he’s looking for. Casually, he lifts his phone and points his camera at the window, taking a few photos as walks by.

Then he pockets his phone and makes his way back to his car.

“Peter,” Laura greets him when he enters the house. “Where have you been?”

“Oh, you know, around.” Peter fights down the wave of grief and anger that surges through him at the sight of her. Her nose twitches, and he knows that she smells at least some of what he’s feeling. Still, he manages to muffle his emotions quickly, enough that she can’t be sure of what she’s smelling. “What are you doing here?”

Laura laughs, “What do you mean? I got home yesterday for Christmas break.”

“Oh, right. I got my dates confused.”

He smiles uneasily, before making the trip back to his room and locking the door. He stays there for hours. Not leaving until the next day when he’s sure that he can get down to his destination without interacting with his relatives.

He leaves the house through one of the escape tunnels hidden in the basement. He doesn’t want anyone to see him leave, it’s better that everyone thinks he’s still in his bedroom. Besides, this gives him a chance to scope the area out and confirm that the Argents have yet to lay the mountain ash lines that had once trapped his family in their own burning home.

The coast is clear, and Peter leaves Talia’s house secure in the knowledge that it will remain so. He’ll never allow them to burn again.

He’s had this planned for so long. Stiles and him had gone over every last detail and yet as he knocks on Adeline Argent’s door, he worries that they’ve made a mistake, that the matriarch won’t listen to him, that Gerard has already killed her or something has gone awry.

Then the door opens, and he’s looking at her. She looks just like he expected, just like the photographs and newspaper clippings Stiles and him had compiled showed her to look. Hopefully the information they’ve gathered regarding her personality and her control over the Argent clan are correct too. According to Chris, his mother had stepped back from her duties as matriarch by now, the illness coursing through her body taking too much of her time for her to continue as she had. She organizes hunts and handles the behind the scenes work, but she no longer goes out in the field. That being said, her word is still law, even with Kate acting in her stead.

“Hello,” Peter says. His mouth is dry. This is it, what makes or breaks his trip into the past. He has a backup plan, of course, but he really would like it if he didn't have to resort to it.

“Hello,” She looks at him, eyes assessing. “You’re a Hale, aren’t you?”

“I am.”

“And what brings you here? There’s peace between our people, is there not?”

“There is. I’m here because I want to maintain that peace, and I have reason to believe it's under threat.”

Adeline raises a brow. “Well then, I guess you better come inside.”

She opens the door wide enough for Peter to come in, but he knows better than to think that she trusts him. Semi-retired though she might be, there is no doubt wolfsbane on her person and mountain ash imbued in her home. If she’s smart, the door will complete the circle and when she closes it behind him he’ll be trapped. This is a test of him as well. If he’s smart, then he doubtlessly knows that by coming in he’s trapping himself. It’s unlikely that he would endanger himself like this if he wasn’t serious.

He watches her for a moment, and their eyes meet. She smiles mildly, her face completely unassuming.

Peter steps in and lets the door swing shut behind him.

“Welcome to my home,” Adeline gestures toward the living room. “Please, take a seat. Can I get you anything to drink?”

“No, thank you. I’d much rather get right down to business.”

“And so we shall,” Adeline seats herself in the recliner across from him. “Which Hale are you then?”

“Peter.”

“The Left Hand?” Adeline hums to herself. “That’s strange. I would’ve expected a visit from an emissary or a right hand before one from a Left Hand.”

“I’m afraid my alpha doesn’t know I’m here,” Peter admits. “In fact, she’s not even aware of the threat. I was hoping we could handle this one with discretion, afterall, I doubt you’ll want this public either.”

“Maybe if you start at the beginning.”

Peter grimaces. “I will, but you’ll have to promise to hear me out.”

“Very well.”

“Your husband and daughter are planning to kill the entire Hale family within the week. We’ve done no wrong, done nothing that would incite hunter retribution. They’re going to try and kill us merely because of what we are.”

“I see. And how did you reach this conclusion?”

“Do you know where your daughter is right now?”

“Kate? She’s on a hunt in Portland.”

“How sure of that are you?”

Adeline stands, her face clouded. “Very. I may not be as active as I once was, but I am still Matriarch of this family. Kate is in Portland.”

Peter stands as well, fishing his phone out of his pocket. He turns the screen toward Adeline, showing her the photograph on the screen, one that he’d taken just yesterday. “Then can you explain to me what she was doing kissing my underaged nephew just yesterday at Beacon Hills High.”

Adeline stares at the photo, her lips twitching. “I see. It's obvious that you know things I don’t, Mr. Hale, but perhaps you could explain to me how my daughters actions, though obviously reprehensible, are proof of a murderous plot.”

“Because she’s done it before. When I found out that she was taking advantage of Derek, I did a little digging. Your daughter had seduced two other young werewolves, all of which ended with their packhouse burning down. It’s easy to miss, they’ve been small packs, ones with few connections, but they were innocent Madame Argent. They were innocent.”

“Very well,” Adeline coughs into her arm, the first sign that she isn't faring as well as she appears. “Give me the names of the deceased. I’ll look into it and make a ruling.”

“There’s more.” Peter tells her, taking her arm and guiding her back to her seat. “Your husband is in on it. He helps Kate, runs the crews, and picks the targets.”

“I see.”

Peter has to admit, she takes the news well. There's a slight downturn of her lips, a furrow in her brow, but nothing more. She doesn’t deny it, or declare it impossible, she merely nods.

Peter takes his seat once more. “Madame Argent, I’ll be quite honest with you. I’m worried that the people you’ll have to look into this won’t be your own. You’re sick, you have been for a while, who knows which of your people Gerard has made his own. All they would have to do is let it slip to him that you know or make this investigation take a day to long and my family could burn while you check up on this.”

“I assume you have a suggestion?”

“I do.”

Adeline sighs, “Let’s hear it then.”

“I think you should send your son to check on it. I’ve done my research. Yes, he kills wolves, but he follows the code. I know you’ll want to send someone you can trust, but he’s the one that I doubt the least. Especially if I can go with him.”

“You want me to send my only son off with a Left Hand to investigate the crimes of his father and sister based on nothing more than your word?”

“I do, but I think you should also take into consideration that I know what I have to lose. You know my name, my rank. You know that I came here without my alpha’s knowledge and that if I acted against you she’d be put in a position where she’d have to bow to your every whim. You can rest assured that I am aware of how colassally stupid it would be for me to hurt your son.”

“And given your position it would likewise be foolish for my son to hurt you. Very well. He’s currently living in San Francisco, give me the information for the first pack and I’ll have him meet you there.”

Peter rises, pulling a written list from his jacket pocket. “Everything you need is in here, including my number. And Madame Argent, thank you, for listening to me.”

“If what you’ve told me is true, it's me who should be thanking you.”

Adeline pushes herself to her feet and begins to lead Peter to the door. “Gerard should be home soon, I really would recommend that you be on your way.”

“Of course, but one more thing before I go.”

She sighs, rolling her eyes faintly even as she hauls the door open. “Ah yes, because you haven’t given me enough to ponder yet. What is it then, Hale?”

“You don’t smell sick, you smell of arsenic.”

He slips out the open door, hoping that he’s made the right call. As he drives away, he can’t help but think of Stiles. He would’ve loved to know that Adeline hadn’t died of natural causes, that someone, probably Gerard, was slowly poisoning her. He would’ve loved to know that Peter told her, that he actually likes someone who isn’t family well enough to actively work against their death. Hopefully his insight into her condition builds trust rather than destroys it.

He sneaks back into his room and as his head hits the pillow wonders what his family thinks of his behavior. It's been years since he’s seen them, but he still remembers his relationship with them. He’d always been secretive, yes, but he’d rarely hidden away from them in their own home. That’s what he’d had his own apartment for. He knows he should leave, go back and stay in his own bed so he doesn’t seem so strange, but he can’t bear to do so. It’s one thing for him to leave in order to protect them, but if he were to go home and something were to happen he doesn’t know what he’ll do.

His pack is all he has.

“Where are you off to?” Talia’s husband, James, asks as Peter makes his way out of the packhouse the next morning.

“I’ve got some business I need to attend to out of town.”

“Anything I should know about?” Talia asks, walking up besides her husband.

“No,” Peter replies. “I’ve got it in hand.”

“Alright,” James shrugs. “Will you be back for the moon?”

“Of course,” Peter replies as he swallows the bile that rises as he recalls that his family had died the day before the moon. He hears his heart pick up in response, and he can’t help but feel annoyed at his younger body. In the future, he had more control over these biological responses, but he’s unfamiliar with his own body and it's harder to predict it these days. “I have to go.”

He can feel Talia’s concerned gaze all the way to the car.

He meets this version of Chris Argent in Genoa, Nevada in the burnt out ruins of the Falut Packhouse.

“Hale,” Chris nods as he steps out of the car. There’s a look of distrust on his face, but that’s fine. Peter’s seen it before and made due. It should be even easier without all of the death between them this time.

“Argent,” Peter smiles. “Do you mind if I call you Chris? You’re just not the only Argent I know and if we’re meant to work together then the last names will get old really fast.”

“How about we see how this goes and if it turns out you haven’t falsely accused my father and sister we can revisit the subject.”

Peter shrugs. “Fair enough, now, how do you want to approach this?”

“We’ll look over the scene then we’ll go interview people around town, ask what they remember from this time frame.”

“Let’s go then. The sooner we get this done the better.”

Peter steps forward, determined to lead the way and get this over with, only to meet an invisible barrier.

“Mountain ash,” He says, looking down at the ground to see a fine line of it, buried beneath the soot. It hadn’t been here when he’d come with Stiles, but that had been decades after the fact. This visit was a mere seven months after and Nevada wasn’t exactly known for the kind of heavy rain that would be needed to sweep away the magical dust.

Chris walks up beside him, running a foot through the ash and breaking the line. “Well,” he sighs. “That at least proves that there were hunters here. Now I just need to know who.”

“You do know who.”

Chris runs a hand through his hair, “They’re my family. I need proof.”

“Trust me,” Peter says, his mind on Laura. “Family can do terrible things. What do you need to believe?”

“I know they can do terrible things. Mom showed me what Kate’s doing to your nephew, she’s already going to be disowned for that, but if she’s found guilty of indiscriminate killing, of murdering whole packs without provocation, then she’ll have to be put down.”

“Funny isn’t it,” Peter asks, his hand coming up to touch the hollow of his collarbone where an engagement ring had once hung from a silver chain. “How we can love someone despite the wrongs they’ve done?” Peter drops his hand when he realizes that Chris is looking. “What will it take for you to acknowledge that she burnt these people?”

“Now that we’ve confirmed it was hunters I’ll need to see proof that it was her, that she was in the area when she wasn’t supposed to be.”

“I know where we can find that proof.” Peter turns away from the burn wreckage, sliding into his car. Chris climbs into the passenger seat, and as they pull out onto the road, Peter continues. “I was serious when I told your mother she’d done this before. Everything she’s doing is the same, including seducing a minor. It’s part of her pattern.”

Chris looks at him, eyes flinty. “You mean she raped a kid here too?”

“I do.”

“Who?”

“His name was Logan Taylor, sixteen years old, she was working as his track coach to get close to him.”

“So we’re going to the school?” Chris asks. “If they have photos of her we can put this whole thing to rest.”

“We’re going to the school.” Peter agrees. There’s a pause, and then: “For what it's worth, I am sorry. I know how it feels to discover that your loved ones aren’t who you thought they were.”

“What would you know about it,” Chris asks. “Your pack is the same as its always been. None of them have been going out and molesting kids. None of them have been accused of murdering innocents.”

“They haven’t, but that doesn’t mean they’ve done as they should. That they’ve lived up to the roles they embody.”

“Trouble with your alpha?”

“No,” Peter replies quietly, pulling into the parking lot. “Not this one.”

The two of them get out of the car in silence, pondering the words spoken. They manage to get so far as the front desk where the receptionist asks them to wait while she calls the principal before they speak to one another once more.

“Argent,” Peter says, not looking at Chris. “Whatever we hear, it's going to be hard on you. I think it's important that you know ahead of time that none of this matters. Family is what you chose, not those you are born to. Kate and Gerard only have power over you if you let them.”

“Where’d you learn that?” Chris asks, his voice is gruff, as though he’s suppressing emotion.

Peter shrugs. “A friend taught me.”

The principal makes his way out to the two of them, smiling at them as she leads them to her office. “I’m Mrs. Fahling, what can I do for the two of you?”

Peter smiles, taking a seat across from her and gesturing for Chris to do the same. “My name is Paul Smith, this is my co-worker Andrew Davis. We work for Mercy Meadows High School in Dyer and since we were in town for other reasons we thought we would drop in to ask you about a former employee of yours who we’re considering hiring.”

Fahling raises a brow at that. “You know, usually I get a phone call about stuff like this, not an in person visit.”

Chris smiles, “As Paul was saying, we were already in the area and I prefer a more personal touch than a mere phone call.”

“Alright then,” Fahling leans back in her chair. “Who were you wondering about? Ask away.”

This is the part that will seal Kate’s fate, and Peter can’t help the savage glee he feels as Chris runs a hand through his hair. The information he had given Adeline had included Kate’s alias here, as well as Gerard’s, but the only way that the Argent matriarch will believe it is if Chris is here to see it confirmed.

“Amy Gerbert. She would have been here seven or eight months ago.”

“Amy, I remember her. If I’m being quite honest, I’m surprised that you’re even interested in hiring her.”

Peter shrugs, spreading his hands out. “If I’m being quite honest, it's a very small school. We haven’t had very many applicants.”

“I have to encourage you to wait for a different applicant. Amy was well educated, she knew her stuff, but we discovered that she’d been engaging in inappropriate relations with a student.”

“Really?” Chris asks, feigning shock. “With who?”

“A kid named Logan Taylor, I’m afraid I can’t tell you anymore than that.”

“Of course, I understand.” Peter watches as Fahling leans forwards placing her elbows on the desk. The woman smells of excitement, and also faint embarrassment. It's obvious that she's a bit of a gossip and she shouldn’t have shared even the students name. “Before we go though, Amy also recommends we hire her father, Grant. She said he worked as an art teacher here, was he aware of her indiscretions?”

“I can’t be sure,” Fahling admits, reaching behind her and grabbing a yearbook off of the shelf behind her. She flips through it, stopping on a page that shows an art exhibit. “If you look here, that's Grant with the same student that Amy was pursuing.”

Her finger is resting on a photograph of Gerard Argent with his hand on a teenage boy’s shoulder. There is eye flare on the kid’s face, evidence that Logan was a werewolf. Evidence that Gerard was on an unsanctioned hunt.

Chris nods. “I see. Can I assume that there's evidence of Amy’s interactions with him as well?”

“Absolutely,” Fahling tells him, flipping the page and pointing to another photo. This one is of Kate Argent and her whole class, but she's standing beside the same boy. This time his eyes are averted, focused on Kate, so there's no eye flare, and the expression on his face is one of complete puppy love. “We didn’t think anything of this until we found the letter he wrote, the one in which he talked about how he wanted to run away with her. He’d passed away by then, but when we confronted Amy she and her father just up and left.”

“Wow,” Peter stands. “Thank you for letting us know. You’ve saved us from making a horrible hire.”

“It's my pleasure,” She rises as well and leads them out of the school. “Please feel free to come back anytime.”

“Thank you for your time,” Chris tells her and they make their way back to the car.

“So,” Peter asks as he drops Chris back off at his own car. “What will you tell your mother?”

“That you’re right. My father and my sister have been working outside the code.”

“And they’ll be taken care of? Before they go after my pack?”

“Their fate is in my mother’s hands. You’ll have to take it up with her.”

The ride back to Beacon Hills is excruciating. He exceeds the speed limit the whole way home, eager to see his family again. He hadn’t expected how hard it would be to be away form his family while Gerard and Kate were still out there. He knows they haven’t died, their packbonds are all still there and he can assume Adeline would have contacted him, but that doesn’t assuage his fears. Worse things than death can happen.

When he reaches the packhouse, he finds himself paralysed in his car. Despite his need to be around his pack, he isn’t sure that he knows how any more. It's been so long since he's had anyone but Stiles, even longer still since he’s been the man that his family expects him to be. The man they knew was a left hand, yes, he’d killed yes, but only to protect his family. The Peter they’d known, though intelligent lacked the saming scheming mind that had brought him back to the past. The Peter they wanted would never exist again.

He does though, he exists, so he gets out of the car and begins to make his way into the packhouse. As he makes his way inside, his packmates greet him with smiles and slaps to the shoulder. He’s prepared this time, ready to hide the scent of his despair, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t feel the confusing accumulation of emotion that wells within him as he looks over his family.

“Peter,” Talia’s voice cuts through the air. “You’re back! Can I see you in my office?”

“Of course,” Peter replies.

“I take it your business went well?” Talia asks as he closes her office door behind him.

“You’d know if it didn’t.”

“And is there anything that I should know about it?”

Peter snorts, “Trust me, you’re better off not knowing about it.”

Talia nods, the corner of her lips drawn to one side as she stares at him in assessment. “Are you sure, Peter? It’s just… you’ve been off this past week or so. It started before this trip you went on, but you don’t seem better. You’re hiding your scent from us.”

“It isn’t relevant to my work. You know I would never endanger the pack.”

“I never thought you would,” Talia tells him, stepping closer. “But Peter, you’re my brother. You can talk to me about more than just your duties as a Left Hand.”

“I know that.”

“Then talk to me. Peter, I'm worried about you.”

Peter looks at her, calculating. His actions here will set the stage for the rest of his life with her. He can’t be honest, of course not, but he can tell her soem, just enough to explain away some of his personality changes, some of the struggles he knows he’ll go through.

“I lost someone, recently. I knew it was coming, but it’s still hard.”

“What? Who?”

“You didn’t know him, but we were together. Now I’ll never see him again.”

Talia folds him into her arms, warm and maternal, but all Peter can think of what he has left to do. She’s a good sister, she is, but he doesn’t have time for her right now. He has to finish saving his pack, he has to save Beacon Hills and then after that he has to learn how to live with himself.

He’s helping Derek make dinner, and isn’t that a novelty, to see Derek again, only a teenager with no idea that he’s about to get his family killed, when his phone rings. There's no caller ID available, but he’s pretty sure that he knows who it is.

“I’ve got to take this,” He mutters to Derek. “Don’t fuck up dinner.”

“Peter!” His younger sister, Taryn gasps, scandalised, “Language.”

“Right,” He blinks. “He’s just a pup, isn’t he?”

With that he walks off, bringing the phone up to his ear. “Peter Hale, give me a minute to get away from my family.”

“Of course,” Adeline’s warm voice comes through the speaker, and Peter takes off at a jog. He runs into the preserve, putting as much distance as possible between him and his family. Its nearly impossible that they would have recognized her voice, but he needs to escape their werewolf hearing lest they overhear something they shouldn't.

“Ready when you are,” Peter tells her, taking a seat on a log.

“I’ll make this brief. Left Hand of the Hale Pack, as one of those who stood to be harmed by my husband and daughter, and the one who brought their wrong doing to my attention, I invite you to witness their executions. They’ve already been apprehended, and if you wish to come it will be tonight at midnight.”

“I’d like to be there.”

“I thought you may. Chris will pick you up from your law firm at eleven. But Peter?”

“Madame Argent?”

“While I intend to make this public knowledge among us hunters, to discourage further action of this nature, I would appreciate it if it didn’t spread among the supernatural community.”

“Of course,” Peter agrees smoothly. “I have no desire for more discontent between our people.”

“Good, I’ll see you tonight.”

Adeline hangs up, and Peter allows himself to feel at peace for the first time since he landed in the past. His enemies may not be dead, not yet, but he’ll have the satisfaction of watching them die tonight, at the hands of their loved ones.

“We did it, Stiles. We did it.”

No answer comes. It never will again.

The drive from the law firm to the execution is quiet, but Peter hadn’t expected it to be anything else. Chris may have had no lost love for his father, but Kate was his sister, one he loved. Still, Peter makes no attempts to hide the relief he feels. There’s no doubt that the man already knew Peter was eager for this night, even if he doesn’t know the whole reason why.

Peter steps out of the car only to have Adeline appear beside him and instantly interlock their arms. “Left Hand Hale, I’m glad you’re here.”

“Madame Argent,” Peter greets her as they make their way into the woods. They’re outside of Beacon Hills so it's not Hale territory, merely unclaimed forest.

“Please, call me Adeline.”

“Then call me Peter.”

“Gladly,” She hums. “Now, Peter, I understand that you only came to me because you were trying to protect your pack, but I think this could be the beginning of a long friendship.”

“How do you mean?”

“I mean that you told me my husband was poisoning me. We didn’t exactly catch it early, the rat has been doing it for months, but you told me with enough time that I may not die from it. That means I like you, and I’d like to keep our line of communication open after tonight.”

Peter nods, “Happily, so long as you don’t mind that I still won’t be telling my alpha about this.”

“You’re playing a dangerous game, Peter Hale. I can’t wait to discover what it is.” Her eyes are ripping him apart, looking for his secrets, but her smile is friendly, and Peter knows that she is willing to do as he asks.

“Oh, no.” He tells her. “I stopped playing games a very long time ago. I’m just doing what has to be done.”

She pats his hand twice and extracts her arm from his. “Go take a seat next to Chris. The evening is about to begin.”

Peter does as he’s told, picking his way across the field to sit next to Chris on a log. His wife, Victoria is on the other side, but Peter tries not to notice her. She’s a piece of work from what he remembers, not as bad as Kate and Gerard, but far less committed to the code than Chris and Adeline. No matter, he has Adeline’s ear now, and he can look into her for further issues later. For now, he’s going to sit back and enjoy the show.

“Shouldn’t you be with your mother?” Peter asks as he notices Adeline approaching the center of the clearing.

“No,” Chris replies, his voice gruff. “This is a matter for the matriarch. She doesn’t need anyone else.”

“I see.” Peter hums, but before anything more can be said, Adeline starts to speak.

“Argent clan,” She begins. “I can see in your faces confusion, many of you are wondering why I have summoned you here, why I’ve gathered so many of us near Hale territory. Some of you are probably even wondering if they’ve acted against an innocent, if we move to strike against them. No, no. We are gathered here for something much worse for this time it is some of our own that have acted against the innocent.

“I have brought you here to witness the punishment of Gerard and Kate Argent.”

The audience gives audible gasps, but Adeline plows on. Peter has to give it to her, she knows how to work a crowd.

“No doubt many of you are shocked, but yes. My own husband and daughter are to be executed tonight. Their crimes, you ask? Kate Argent is responsible for the statutory rape of three minors, but that is not all. She acted in conjunction with my husband who gave her his full approval and from there the two of them decimated two, nearly three, packs. These packs were innocent! The wolves in them had done no harm, and by killing them Kate and Gerard have left us vulnerable and endangered us. They very nearly brought war down upon our heads when their attempts to decimate a third pack were discovered. Had anyone else discovered them, there is no doubt in my mind that the Hales would have had the backing of the entire supernatural world to act against us.

“That’s right. My husband and daughter were foolish enough to target the Hales, a pack of great reputation and standing. They seduced a sixteen year old boy and planned to burn the entire pack, human and wolf alike, to death.

“For these actions, for the threat they represent to the relationship between hunter and wolf, they must die. But if that alone is not enough to sway you, there is more. Gerard Argent is responsible for my own attempted murder. He’s been slowly poisoning me, killing off the Matriarch of this clan.”

Peter looks to Chris at this and sees the white of his face. It seems that he hadn’t been aware of the roots of his mother’s condition. A quick assessment of the audience makes it clear that nobody had known.

“And so, for their crimes, I have decided that Kate and Gerard will burn like the innocents they killed, alive and awake.”

At that, several women drag a gagged Kate and Gerard out of the back of a van. They two of them are obviously awake, they’re eyes wide and darting around, but they don’t fight. They’re thrown into the middle of the clearing at Adeline’s feet where they lay.

“The criminals have been paralyzed, so that they will be unable to escape the flames, so they will feel the same fear that the wolves who were trapped by mountain ash felt. They will burn as their victims did, alone and unaided, watched by hunters.”

With that, one of the women who had dragged Gerard appears beside Adeline with a red container of gasoline. Adeline takes it with a smile, pouring the liquid over her husband and daughter. She smells sad yes, but also victorious, and Peter can’t help but feel his own appreciation of her grow.

She lights the match, and drops it down on her loved ones. Then she turns and walks away, calling out over her shoulder, “I hope that all of you will remember this lesson and share it with your loved ones.”

Peter watches for a moment, enjoying the pained screams, but eventually the smell of burning flesh reaches him and images of the Hale Fire begin to rear their head in his mind. He stands abruptly, making his way back to the car and trying to forget the scent of his own face melting off, of his hair disappearing into the flame.

“You okay?” Chris asks, ducking into the car.

“Just peachy,” Peter tells him.

“...Right.”

“I should be the one asking you that, after all, it was your family that burned.”

Chris shakes his head. “No, it wasn’t. They stopped being my family the second they planned to kill an innocent pack the first time.”

Peter nods, and says nothing as the car pulls out of the clearing and back onto the highway. He doesn’t offer Chris any comfort, or say that he knows what it's like to watch your family burn. In this world he doesn’t. In this world, that’s a burden that Peter will have to bear alone.

“What will you tell your daughter?” Peter wonders. “I’m assuming she’s too young to know the truth about her grandpa and aunt.”

“That’s not any of your business,” Chris growls, fingers tightening around the steering wheel.

“You’re right, sorry. I guess I was just wondering if you’d even had time to think about it yet, afterall it all happened pretty quickly.”

“There aren’t any bodies.” Chris tells him.

Peter blinks. “Well, no. There aren’t. What's that mean though?”

“It means I can’t tell her they died. In a few days, my mom will report them missing. When that happens I’ll tell Allison just that, that they disappeared.”
“Will she ever know the truth?”

“How is that any of your business?”

Peter sighs as Chris pulls up next to his car. “Because I’m trying to decide if I should tell Derek the truth about his older girlfriend or let him think she was exactly what he thought she was.”

“Shit. I’m sorry.” Chris runs a hand through his hair. “I didn’t even think about that.”

“I didn’t expect you to, you’ve got your own problems to handle.”

“Still,” Chris says, placing the car in park. “At least my problems are-”

“Really,” Peter cuts him off, and holds out a hand to shake. “Don’t worry about that.”

“If you insist. It was nice meeting you, Peter.”

“You as well,” Peter tells him, opening the car door and stepping out.

He waits until he’s in his own vehicle and Chris has driven off to let the laughter bubble out of him.
. God, how many more times will he have to pretend not to know people, to act as though they’re strangers. Far to many, he’s sure. God. He left Stiles for this, for a life in which he’ll always be pretending to be somebody he isn’t.

No, no. He reminds himself taking deep breaths. He left Stiles to save his pack. He left Stiles to save his lover’s father. He left Stiles because if the Hale pack falls so does Beacon Hills. He left Stiles because his other option was to watch him be ripped apart by the guilt of letting his father stay dead.

He doesn’t know when exactly the laughter turns to tears, only that finds himself crying in his car, the first tears he’s shed since he arrived back in the past.

Once the tears dry, Peter makes his way to his apartment rather than the packhouse. It's his first time back in decades and he can’t help the disappointment that courses through him when he looks it over.

It's virtually unfamiliar to him. By the time he’d come out of the coma his apartment had been packed up and re-rented out. Since then he’d lived all over, most recently with Stiles.

Going to bed in a place that belongs to him but isn’t really his is an odd experience. Still, it's preferable to the packhouse. It gives him time to shower and wash away the scent of burnt flesh and negative emotions.

The next few days pass in a blur. He doesn’t leave his house, staying in his bed and staring at the ceiling. Nothing feels real. He feels as though reality is escaping him.

Then it's the day before the moon. The day his family died. He forces himself to stand and shower. His facial hair has grown in again, but rather than shaving it off as he had last time he’s been this age he shapes the same goatee he’s been wearing when he traveled back in time. It helps some, acts as a grounding force, though not nearly enough.

When he enters the packhouse, Cora barrels into his legs. She’s so small, young, that he almost doesn't recognize her. It's really only her scent, which she's aggressively marking him with that gives her away.

“Hey kid,” He greets her, rubbing his face against hers.

She wrinkles her nose, “Uncle Peter, gross! Your face is scratchy now.”

Oh. That had been why he kept his face smooth. He’d forgotten that it enabled smoother scenting with the little ones.

“It is, darling.” He answers, rising to his feet. “But you’ll just have to get used to it.”

“I think it looks dashing,” Laura declares, walking into the foyer and pressing a kiss to his cheek. He fights the urge to tense at her touch, to snarl and snap. The Laura who left him to suffer alone for six years is gone. Now she’ll never exist. He needs to pretend it never happened.

“Thank you.” Peter chokes out.

She beams at him. “Just so you know, Mom’s on a warpath. I’d avoid her as much as you can.”

Peter snorts. “Don’t worry. Your mother doesn’t scare me, not anymore.”

“Brave words. She does scare me though, so I will see you later.” With that, she ducks out the front door, leaving Peter and Cora alone in the foyer.

“Where’s your mother?” Peter asks Cora, looking down at her she finally relinquishes her grip on his legs.

“She’s with Derek,” she rolls her eyes. “He’s been all emo since his favorite teacher went missing earlier this week.”

“Is that so?” Internally, Peter shrugs. It's nothing more than he deserves for nearly letting a hunter burn them all to death.

Suddenly, from across the house, he hears his name.

“Peter, can you meet me in the backyard?”

He looks down at Cora who just raises her eyebrows at him.”You’re in trouuuuble.”

“Shut up.”
Making his way to the backyard is easy. The sympathizing looks from his packmates who know Talia is in a bad mood are less so. Still, he endures them until he finds himself standing side by side with his sister.

“Let’s walk and talk,” He suggests, grabbing her by the arm and leading her away from the house. “I don’t want the whole pack eavesdropping.”

“They should know better,” She says delicately, a thought that’s punctuated by someone inside scolding Cora for listening in on them.

Peter laughs. “Should, being the operative word.”

They walk for a while, enjoying the brisk air. The sun is shining. The birds are out. There’s nothing in the air to suggest that in the original timeline his family would die tonight.

“I was wondering if you could talk to Derek,” Talia says suddenly, breaking Peter out of his reverie.

“Me?” Peter asks leaning back to look at her. “Whatever for?”

“You two have always had such a special bond.” Talia begins. “Ever since he was a kid he’s looked up to you. I was hoping that you can talk to him about his teacher's disappearance.”

“No. I can’t.” Peter responds unthinkingly. Then, seeing Talia’s look he elaborates. “I’m in no position to deal with someone else’s loss, Talia. I can barely take care of myself right now.”

Not a lie, Peter isn’t so stupid to think that what he’s said is untrue, but not the whole truth either. The truth is that he and Derek may have had a bond, but that was in the past. Since then Derek slept with a hunter who killed everyone, abandoned him half dead in a hospital, killed him, and neglected his pack bond. Whatever he may have once felt for his nephew is gone. He doesn’t hate him, not anymore, but he won’t be his confidante these days.

“I’m sorry, Peter. I wasn’t thinking,” Talia apologizes. “Of course you should take the time to focus on yourself. Is there anything I can do for you? Would you like to talk about it?”

“No.” Peter snaps. Then he takes a deep breath and looks away from Talia. “I’m sorry, it’s just that he’s gone. Talking won’t change that so why don’t we just change the subject?”

“Alright, what would you rather talk about?”

“When are you telling the pack about the new baby?”

Talia stops in her tracks, scowling at him. “How did you know?”

He doesn’t tell her that in another life he’d spent this whole week at the packhouse where he’d seen the signs. Where he’d heard her puking in the mornings and eating strange things. He doesn’t tell her that once he’d had all of those clues he’d been able to detect the slight change in her scent. He doesn’t tell her that in his other life he’s spent six years in a coma planning to take revenge for the fire that had gone so far as to kill pack members who hadn’t even drawn their first breath.

“I have my ways,” he tells her, wiggling his eyebrows.

“I’m announcing it tomorrow, at the full moon.” She laughs, tucking her hair behind her ear. “I should’ve known that you’d figure it out on your own.”

“Well,” he muses. “I do have an unfair advantage. What with having seen it all before, I mean.”

She shakes her head. “Let’s go home. I’ll have James talk to Derek, see if he can snap him out of it. If not, I’ll just try to run it out of him tomorrow.”

When they reach the house, Peter seats himself on the rocking porch. He claims he enjoys the view, but the truth is that he likes the vantage point it provides of any approaching vehicles. It’s unlikely now, with the deaths of Gerard and Kate, that any hunters will be brave enough to act against them, but their accomplices have yet to be caught and Peter hasn’t made it this far by not being cautious.

He sits there on the porch all night long.

Inside, he can hear his packmates muttering amongst themselves, worried. His younger sister Rebecca sounds especially worried, asking her husband if they should do something. They don’t.

The night is clear. No one comes.

The next day comes slowly, but it does come, and when he hears the first sounds of movement within the house Peter finally manages to extract himself from his chair. He can go rest now, others are awake and it would be nearly impossible to light the house on fire right now.

He sleeps all day, waking to the pounding of fists on his door. Cora, telling him to get downstairs for some kind of announcement. He stumbles through dressing himself and makes his way downstairs, feeling wholly disconnected from the world. He’s done everything there is to do. He’s saved his family and now he has nothing left.

The rest of the evening passes by him. Talia announces that she’s having a baby. The pack celebrates, then runs together under the moon. After there’s a mass scenting event in the living room, for humans and wolves alike. Peter participates, but he speaks to no one. Instead he runs through the evening on autopilot, unable to do anything else.

He barely even remembers leaving that night. Doesn’t know how he finds himself on Adeline’s doorstep, let alone knocking on her door in the wee hours of the morning. But knock he does, and the door swings open to reveal Allison Argent, ten years old and wide eyed.

At the sight of the girl, something in Peter flips back on. Maybe it's the image of Allison alive, and the knowledge that this is part of the reason Stiles wanted him to come back. Maybe it's just the shock at someone besides Adeline opening the door. No matter what it is, Peter takes a step back.

“I’m sorry.” He says. “This was a mistake.”

“Peter?” Adeline asks, stepping around the door. She looks a little better, her skin less pale. “What brings you here so late at night?”

“I… nothing. I’m sorry to disturb you.”

“Nonsense. Allison, go back to bed. Peter, come in.”

He steps into the house, feeling even more tension that the first time he came here. He doesn’t know why he’s here. Maybe because she’s the person who knows him best, who knows the most about him right now. For all that they don’t really know one another, she’s the only one who knows what he’s done, knows what her family almost did.

“What is Allison doing here?” He asks. He feels numb as he takes the same seat he did last time. So much has changed since then.

“She and her parents are moving back to Beacon Hills, so they’re staying here while they house hunt.”

“Moving back? Why?” He feels a little more awake now, though not fully.

“Because,” A deep voice says behind him, making him jump. Before he can turn to see who it is though, Chris walks in front of him, taking a seat beside his mother. Peter tries not to flinch as he realizes that his face is the most familiar of all the ones he’s seen in the last twenty-four hours. “I was worried about retaliation against my mom, especially while she’s recovering.”

“Well you don’t have to worry about it from the Hale pack. I’m the only one who knows what happened. I won’t be sharing how close to death we came.”

“And I appreciate that,” Chris says. “But it isn’t just wolves I’m worried about.”

“But talk of this isn’t what brought you here.” Adeline interjects. “Peter, what's going on?”

“Nothing,” Peter tells her, rising to his feet. “I’m terribly sorry to have woken you all up. I misjudged the time.”

“You wouldn’t have come here for nothing on a full moon,” Adeline insists, trailing Peter to the door. “Are you sure you won’t talk to me?”

“There’s nothing to discuss,” Peter smiles thinly, shifting from foot to foot as he watches her pull the door open for him. “Thank you for your time, Adeline, Chris.”
On his way home, he walks by the Stilinski house. The light is on in Stiles’ bedroom and he has to dig his claws into his own palms to keep himself from screaming when sees the silhouette of a child in the window. It hurts, this proof that his lover really is gone to him forever. The boy in that building doesn’t know him, and now he never will.

When he finally reaches his apartment, Peter crashes in his bed. In the hours he’s awake, he finds himself staring at the ceiling unable to do anything except think of the future and those who die. He thinks he misses it. He doesn’t know how long he stays in his bed, but he’s fairly sure it's been multiple days. He can’t bring himself to care, falling asleep once more.

He wakes up, groggy and confused, to a voice from his kitchen.

“Peter, you have three minutes to come out here before I go in there.”

He blinks. Once, twice, getting his surroundings. “Chris?”

“Good, you’re awake. Two minutes.”

Confused, Peter wraps his robe around himself and stands. He’s moving and thinking slower than he should be, but he’s relatively sure that Chris isn’t here to kill him. The man smells faintly of wolfsbane, he is still a hunter, but not overtly so like he would if he were actively carrying some.

“Why are you here?” Peter asks, rounding the corner to find Chris drinking coffee from one of his mugs.

“Why did it take you so long to realize I was? I wasn’t exactly trying to be discreet. You’re a werewolf. You should’ve smelled me coming as soon as I hit the building and you definitely should’ve been aware of me as soon as I started to pick the lock.”

“I was asleep,” Peter grinds out.

“That’s no excuse. You’re a Left Hand. You don’t have room for mistakes.”

“Why are you here? If I make mistakes that’s on me. Nothing I am doing is threatening the Argents.”

“No, it’s threatening you. My mother has men watching you. You haven’t left your apartment in three days. That isn’t healthy, Peter.”

“So what?” Peter snarls. “Why do you care? I’m a werewolf for god’s sake.”

Chris sighs, “My mom likes you. You saved her life.”

“And she saved my pack, tell her we’re even.”

“Even if you are, I’m not going away. You saved my mother, Peter. That isn’t something I’ll forget.”

“Fine, fine. You’re worried about me. What do I have to do to get you to leave?”

Chris shrugs, taking a seat at the kitchen table. “I’m sure we can think of something. Tell me, when’s the last time you went to work?”

The mug in Peter’s hands shatters, coffee exploding all over. He looks down at it in disinterest, his heart and mind racing. He can’t go back to work. He hasn’t worked as a lawyer in more than a decade, and he’s certainly unwilling to relearn everything he would have to. On top of that, he doesn’t want to anymore. He’s grown rather fond of working outside the law.

“I’ve decided to give up my career in law,” Peter announces, wiping coffee from his shirt. “I’ve found that it disagrees with me.”

“Really? Because everything that I’ve found about you seems to point to the opposite. They say that you’re nearly undefeated in court.”

“Checked up on me, did you?”

Chris smiles, “I told you my mom likes you. You don’t think that comes without consequences do you?”

Peter sighs. “Fine then, leave and tell your mother this: I admit, I’ve had a bit of a rough span, but I’ll be up and about soon enough. If she’s still concerned by the end of the month she can send you back for another chat. Now, I’m going to go take a shower. If you’re still here when I emerge, I think I’ll use those lawyer skills to prosecute.”

He turns his back and walks off followed only by the soft words Chris utters to himself. “There we go.”

After that, he makes a real effort to try and fit in to his new life. He quits his job at the law firm, not that he really needs too. The only reason he hasn’t been fired already is that his name is on the side of the building. That done, he sets to work establishing his new business one in which he deals in the sale and procurement of rare occult books and artifacts. It’s a change, but it allows him the chance to hit the road and distance himself from his pack a little more.

The distance is necessary too. He can feel his pack’s concern everytime he walks into the pack house, and he can’t stand it. He’s doing better now, he is, but how can he ever pretend to be the man they expect to see. He hasn’t been that Peter in much longer than any of them could ever understand.

So he avoids them. He attends large pack events, and the occasional family dinner, but he isn’t around as often. It doesn’t hurt, not really. He’s lived on the edge of a pack for so long that he barely notices. It feels far more comfortable than being close to them had.

It’s better this way. He’s sure of it. Which is why he’s so surprised when after a month he wakes up to the scent of wolfsbane and gunpowder and Chris approaching his apartment.

Sighing, he rolls out of bed and starts the coffee. He’s only just managed to change out of his pajamas into a V-neck and jeans when he hears footsteps outside of his door. Briefly, he debates making Chris work for it, but he quickly abandons that idea in favor of opening the door.

“Really?” Peter asks, arching a brow. “Same strategy twice?”

“In my defence, if you weren’t doing better it would’ve worked again.”

“Hmm,” Peter hums. “Come in, the coffee’s almost done brewing.”

Chris takes a seat at the kitchen table, and for a few moments they share a comfortable silence. Peter reads the paper while Chris looks around, getting his fill of the space.

“So,” Peter starts as he pours the coffee. “Why are you back? Surely, Adeline realizes that I’m in a better place.”

“She does,” Chris acknowledges, taking the cup Peter offers him. “But you have her attention now. Good luck getting rid of it.”

“I see.” Peter scratched the stubble on his chin. “Very well, i suppose I’d better pay her a visit sooner rather than later and see if that clears up any of her questions.”

Chris sips his coffee before answering, “I’m sure she’d love that.”

“Before you do, maybe you can answer a question I have. It’s been bothering me for a bit now.”

“What is it?”

“Did you and Victoria ever find a house?”

Chris laughs, “I have to admit, that’s not what I expected you to ask. Yes, we found a house. We’re starting the move tomorrow. I’d ask if you'd come help with the heavy lifting, but to be honest I doubt Victoria would find your abilities worth it.”

“No,” Peter snorts. “She doesn’t seem that fond of my kind.”

“Not particularly,” Chris admits.

“That leads me to my follow up question, actually.” Peter stops to drink some more coffee, gathering his thoughts. “Why does your mother care what happens to me? Yes, I saved her life, but I also forced her into the position that resulted in the death of her husband and daughter,”

“You did,” Chris agrees. “But that’s why she respects you. You had the balls to come to her with that. Better yet, you were smart enough to keep it between the two of you.You saw what had to be done and you did it. That’s a trait all Argents appreciate.”

“Yes. I’m beginning to understand that.”

Chris drains his mug before standing up. “It was a pleasure to talk to you again, Peter. I’ll be seeing you around.”

In the months that follow, change continues. Everyday the gap between the world he knew and the one he’s created grows. Talia’s stomach swells, filling with a pup that never managed to pass its second trimester last time. He visits Adeline crafting a friendship built on mutual respect. Derek slowly gets over Kate, showing interest in a girl from his own grade.

Things are changing. Healing.

The world is moving on and soon only Peter will remember how bad things were. How bad they could’ve been. That’s probably what possesses him to start making small changes, to ensure that not everything he used to know will cease to be.

“I’m going to make a suggestion,” Peter tells Adeline as they sit in her parlour for tea. “And you may not like it, but I want you to hear me out.”

“Go ahead,” She tells him. “This won’t be the first conversation we’ve had along those lines.”

“No,” he chuckles, “It won’t. This isn’t like that though. I just think you should change your code.”

“Change our code? The same code we’ve followed for centuries?”

“That’s the one.”

“And what should I change it to?”

A soft smile makes its way to Peter’s lips, one that doesn’t quite hide the sadness he knows is lurking on his face. “I think it should be ‘we protect those who cannot protect themselves.’ It would suit you much better.”

“I see,” Adeline murmurs and that is the end of that until two weeks later when Victoria Argent grabs his wrist as he walks past her in the grocery store.

“Can I help you?” Peter asks, looking down at the grip she’s kept on him. He could break out of it, but it would draw more attention than its worth..

She scowls, her eyes narrow. “You may have Chris and Adeline fooled, but not me. I know what you are, Hale. You’re a rabid dog, like all of your kind. I don’t know what you’ve said to Adeline to make her think about changing the code, but I do know that one day you’ll make a mistake, and when you do, I’ll be there.”

“I guess we’ll just have to wait and see,” Peter tells her with a faint smile.

That night he runs through the woods and kills every rabbit he comes across. He feels ragged and uncentered. His anchor is escaping him, his memories of Stiles unable to keep up with the demands of his wolf now that he no longer has the man left to create more with. It worries him that one interaction with Victoria is able to make him so angry.

He hasn’t felt so lost in years.

“I’m scared,” He admits to Adeline. He feels bad that he’s talking to her and not his alpha, but Talia is busy. The baby is due any day now and he doesn’t want to be the one who needs her in these days of preparation.

“Why?” She asks. They’re seated together in a park outside of town, feeding the ducks. “What is there to be scared of? Your relationship with hunters is better than ever, so it can’t be that.”

“No. it isn’t that.”

“What then?”

Myself. He wants to say. What I’ve become. I feel myself unravelling. The Peter I used to be is slipping away and I’m becoming the same man I was after the fire, filled with anger and oh so alone. I’m scared of what time travel has done to me, of who I’ve become in the absence of Stiles.

He says none of that.

“I’m scared that this is too good to be true. That something will have to give.”

Something already gave, he doesn’t tell her. His happiness. He didn’t realize how miserable he’d be in the past, how lonely. He sees Adeline more than his own pack, but he doesn’t see her often either. He’s barely getting by, to the point that if he missed one planned trip home he’d be an omega.

It's a choice though. He could go home anytime, he knows this. The problem is that at home there are questions waiting for him, questions about who he is now, what changed him. So he makes his choice, he avoids his alpha and his pack.

It hurts to be around everyone.

Talia’s baby comes on the six month anniversary of the fire that never happened. Peter is the only one who knows the significance of the date, but he can’t help but feel it's a sign. If it weren’t for his sacrifice, his little nephew would never have been born. As he holds him in his arms, Peter feels like he’s breathing for the first time in months. The baby proves to him in a way nothing else really has that saving his pack was the right thing to do, even though it cost him everything he had.
“I know this is a strange request,” Peter says looking down at the baby in his arms. “But if i'm not overstepping myself, could you name him something polish?”

“Polish?” Talia asks.

“Please. I just… I think that my lost love would have liked it.”

“Okay,” Talia agrees. “Polish it is.”

Talia doesn’t ask anymore questions, so Peter stares down at the baby for a moment longer. He strokes its cheeks, fully aware of the way Talia and James are watching him. “I wish you could have met him. He’d have been ecstatic.”

Peter sighs and passes the baby back over to his sister. Then, wordlessly, he leaves the building. Nobody stops him. They don’t know how.

He’s just reached his car, hand on the handle, when a voice calls out to him from across the parking lot. Rolling his eyes, he turns to see Chris leaning against his own vehicle. Sunglasses obscure most of his face, but Peter can see the smile on his lips.

“What’s up with the sunglasses?”

Chris shrugs. “You don’t want your pack knowing that you spend time with us. You hide your tracks everytime you go to my mom's house. I figured you’d appreciate a little effort to conceal my identity.”

“Well, hopefully everyone inside is distracted by the baby, because they definitely could have heard that. Why are you here?”

“They don’t know who I am from my voice alone. I’m still pretty new in town.” Chris stands up straight, opening his passenger door. “I’m here to take you to mom’s house for dinner. She heard about the baby.”

“I’d rather not, I’ve got plans tonight.” Peter tells him, thinking of the bottle of wolfsbane whiskey that's lovingly stored away in his closet.

“I don’t really care.” Chris informs him. “Mom wants you to be there and you know as well as I do that if your plans were actually important she’d already know.”

Peter hesitates for a moment, eyes flickering between the open door of the car and Chris’s face. Then he shrugs and ducks down into the seat. The whiskey will still be there once he’s done at Adeline’s and it sounds like he’ll actually eat tonight if he goes with Chris.

“That was easier than I expected,” Chris admits as he sits behind the wheel and rips off his sunglasses. “I was prepared to use force you know.”

“I figured, “ Peter replies dryly. “Your family often is. Now, let's get out of here, I can hear my pack starting to wonder why I haven’t left yet and at any moment someone will peek out the window to see who I'm talking to.”

“You Hales,” Chris says, peeling out of the parking lot. “Always snooping.”

“Imagine how I feel,” Peter answers, looking out the window. “They’re far too interested in my life to make keeping secrets easy.”

“You know that my mom didn’t tell you not to let Talia know the truth. That was a choice you made.”

“Oh trust me, I know. But I also know that she’s better off not knowing just how close to death our pack came.”

They drive in silence after that.

When he enters Adeline’s house, he’s surprised to find her entertaining both Victoria and Allison. The little girl is sitting at her grandmother’s feet chatting animatedly but she stops to look up at Peter when he comes to a halt just inside the doorframe. Victoria, seated across from Adeline, merely scowls and turns a page in her magazine.

“I see you have company,” He says, walking over to Adeline and dropping a kiss on her forehead before taking the arm chair besides hers. “I guess that clears up why you sent Chris to fetch me, although not why I’m here.”

“We’re having dinner together.” Adeline informs him. “My lovely son and his family were already here when I got the news that Talia had her baby, but I wanted to hear all about it as soon as possible.”

Peter offers her a tight smile, eyes flicking over to Victoria. “There’s really not much to say. He’s a healthy baby boy, but she hadn’t even named him when I left. We won’t know if he’s human or not for a long time.”

Adeline waves a hand dismissively, “I don’t care about that. He’ll be what he is. Tell me though, how is Talia? Was it a difficult birth?”

“For her? No. For everyone around her? Absolutely,” Peter laughs, not telling them that it had been hard on him to watch her bring a life into the world that wouldn’t exist if his old life did.

Chris chuckles at that, taking a seat besides his wife, and Allison gets up to go sit in his lap. Peter watches them, wondering if they’d been this close in the first timeline, the one in which they’d still be living in San Francisco. Then his eyes catch on Victoria’s and he forces his gaze away and back to Adeline who is still speaking.

“Talia’s one of those mothers then? The ones who make birth everyone's problem but their own.”

“Absolutely.”

The oven beeps then, interrupting their conversation. Peter stands quickly, making his way to the kitchen and removing the food before Adeline can even rise to her feet. He’s only been here for a few meals, but he makes a point of helping Adeline out in the kitchen. She’s in her late sixes, so no to old in the grand scheme of things, but the poison wreaked havoc on her system and it's obvious to Peter that there will be long term health effects. So he does as much as he can when he’s around.

It's nice for other reasons too. He’s always been a provider, although usually through atypical means. He enjoys having someone he can provide for who doesn’t have pre existing expectations of what he should do and how he should act.

As he removes the food, he notes that Victoria has followed him to the kitchen and is watching his every move. He sets the table, then lays dinner out under her watchful eye. He isn’t sure what she thinks he’s going to do, but it's obvious that her bias against werewolves is something she’ll never get over.

“Dinner is ready,” Peter announces, raising his voice so he can be heard from the next room. As he does so, he watches Victoria's hands drop to her belt. Armed then. It seems that the promises Adeline no doubt made about her safety aren’t enough for Victoria. Very well. He’ll give her something to be scared of. It won’t be him though.

As they take their seats around the table, Peter offers a cautious smile to Allison who beams back at him. If he’s right, she still doesn’t know about the supernatural. Her mother’s prejudice has yet to reach her.

“Your name is Allison, right?” He asks, seeing Victoria's grip on her knife tighten from the corner of his eye.

“It is.” Allison tells him happily. “And you’re Mr. Hale.”

“Yes, but you can call me Peter.”

“No,” Victoria snaps, her face flushing. “Allison, you’re to call him Mr. Hale. He may be a friend of your grandmother’s but that doesn’t make him your friend.”

“Victoria,” Chris reprimands quietly.

“No,” Peter says, a wide smile on his face. He hasn’t had fun winding someone up like this in a while. “It’s fine.”

“It isn’t,” Adeline interjects. “You are both guests in my home, and I will not tolerate poor behavior in regard to one another.”

“You know I would never purposely cause you trouble, Adeline. Would you like me to go?”
“No,” She tells him. “Let’s all just enjoy our meal together.”

“Of course,” Peter replies, taking a bite.

As they eat, Adeline takes control of the conversation. They discuss the baby, how Talia’s other children feel about it, and how surprised everyone was when Talia announced it. Chris talks about how his business is thriving with his move to Beacon Hills, and Peter makes vague references to his own work though nothing concrete. He doesn’t want a family of hunters, even if he trusts two of them, to know all of his life.

“And what have you been up to since the move?” Peter asks Victoria, smiling innocently. “You work with Chris, don’t you?”

“No, actually. I’m not working right now. Lucky me though, it leaves me plenty of time for recreational trips like hunting.”

“Is that so?” Peter answers. ‘I’m not a huge fan of the hobby myself, all those cute, innocent animals. I just don’t think it's right to kill them before their time.”

“That’s enough,” Chris says quietly.

“You’re just thinking about it all wrong,” Victoria tells him with a nasty smile. “I don’t hunt innocent animals. I work more along the lines of putting down a rabid dog. Some animals are just better off dead.”

“Quiet,” Adeline commands, her voice filled with authority. “I won’t have any more of this in my home. Victoria, get out.”

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me. Peter is a friend of the Argent Family and you are purposely antagonizing him. I won’t ask you to pretend to like him, but I will ask that you do away with the snide comments. Especially in front of your daughter. Now, go.”

Victoria storms out angrily, leaving Chris staring after her and ALlison looking down at her plate.

“I’m sorry about her.” Chris sighs, running a hand through his hair. “This whole thing is new to us, but it's harder for Vic. She never considered that there could be more to one of your kind.”

“What do you mean?” Allison asks suddenly. “By one of his kind?”

Chris’s eyes are wide, and he stammers quietly for a moment before Peter takes pity on him. “He means gay people. Do you know what that word means? No? It means that I like boys, not girls.”

“Oh,” Allison nods sagely. “I like boys too, Mr. Hale. So don’t worry about that.”

He chuckles quietly, making eye contact with Chris who mouths his thanks. “Well thank you, Allison.”

Chris and Allison scarf down the rest of their dinner before excusing themselves. It seems that they don’t want to leave Victoria waiting on them for too long.

“It was rude of you to put me in that position.” Adeline murmurs later, when they sit in front of her glowing fireplace.

“I’m sure I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Peter answers, glancing over at her from the corner of his eye.

She rolls her eyes in response. “Please, Peter. I know as well as you do that you intentionally goaded Victoria into saying those things. I’ll be the first to say she was more than willing to say them, but you addressed her knowing where it would end.”

Peter shrugs, “It’s not as though you like her. She was Gerard’s pick for Chris, not yours.”

“And how do you know that?”

Word of mouth from conversations that never happened.

“You have your people and I have mine.”

“Fair enough.” There’s silence for a moment, and the Adeline continues. “Thank you.”

“What for?”

“Helping Chris. He isn’t ready for Allison to know the truth. Now that Kate is dead it’ll have to come sooner rather than later of course, she’s the next matriarch, but Chris wants her to have a normal childhood.”

“It was no problem, I didn’t want her to think that what her mother was saying was a valid opinion. Besides, Victoria seems like the kind of person who’d be uncomfortable with gay men.”

“And what makes you say that?”

“I’ve had a lot of experience with her kind.”

Adeline hums. “And by that you mean hunters or homophobes?”

“Well, both, but in this case I meant homophobes.”

“Hmm. So what I’m hearing is that I need to start looking for some nice young men to introduce you to.”

Peter chokes on his water at that. “God no. I’m not in any shape for a relationship. I lost my last partner, right before I met you. I’m still working through that.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” She offers and Peter finds that for the first time he does.

He doesn’t know why he’s ready to share Stiles with Adeline, but he is.

“There’s a lot I can’t tell you.” Peter admits. “But he was the love of my life. He saw me at my worst, understood me, and he still loved me after. We always knew that our relationship was on borrowed time, but we committed to one another anyway.”

“What was his name?”

Peter shakes his head. “I can’t tell you that.”

“Then tell me about him. Tell me what you loved.”

“His laugh. He didn’t care what anyone else thought, he laughed at everything he found funny whether or not others felt the same way. On more than one occasion I watched him laugh at threats to his life. And he was a sassy little shit. You wouldn’t believe the comments that came out of his mouth. He always claimed that sarcasm was his only defense against the supernatural.”

Adeline covers his hand with her own. “He sounds lovely.”

“He was.”

They share the fire for a few moments more, neither of them quite ready for him to leave. Peter because of his dread of returning to a cold empty apartment, and Adeline because she worries about Peter and the fact that he’s obviously been struggling. Still, she’s the head of a hunter family and he’s the Left Hand of a werewolf pack, there’s only so much she can do for him.

“You’ll call me when you get home, won’t you?” She asks, slipping her feet into her slippers and standing to guide him to the door.

He shrugs, “If you want me too.”

“I do.” She tells him. “You may be a werewolf, but that doesn’t mean you won’t run into trouble on the way home.”

“Especially since your son left me to walk home,” Peter adds dryly, looking over her empty driveway and being reminded that his car is still at the hospital.

“Well, shit.” She gestures back toward the living room. “Come back inside and spend the night then. Chris will drive you home in the morning.””

It's an odd feeling, sleeping in the home of the mother of a woman you once killed. It’s a stranger feeling still to realize that he feels comfortable enough to do so, that at some point he’s befriended Adeline. It frightens him, how different things already are from the past, but this is how it is meant to go. Things are meant to change.

He dreams of Stiles that night. Of hands stroking his face and his voice whispering of love. In his dream, Stiles is exactly as he left him, a man who knows what he’s facing.

“This is good, Peter,” Dream-Stiles tells him. “This is what we wanted. Things can’t be the same, they shouldn’t be.”

In the morning, Peter rises before Adeline and makes his way to the kitchen. He can’t be sure how late she’ll sleep, or when Chris will be there to pick him up, but he may as well do something nice for her in return for being allowed to stay the night. Whistling to himself, he begins to root through her fridge pulling out the ingredients necessary to make omelets.

He’s only just finished plating the first one when Adeline enters the room, dressed in a red pantsuit.

“You look nice today.” He tells her. “That one is for you.”

“Thank you,” She responds. “You didn’t have to do this.”

“And you didn’t have to let me stay the night. Now, what are you up to today?”

She grins, her face sharp and wolflike. “Today I’m meeting with the police to see if they’ve heard anything about my husband or daughter. I’m terribly worried about them, you know.”

“I’m sure you are,” Peter laughs, finishing his own breakfast and taking a seat across from her. “Do you have a plan for their bodies to be found?”

“Of course.” Adeline tells him, “But you’ll have to wait to see it on the news like everyone else.”

“Oh, come on. At least give me a hint.”

The doorbell rings before she can answer, followed by the sound of someone entering the house. Peter can already smell that it's Chris, so he doesn’t bother turning to look as he enters the room, instead narrowing his eyes at Adeline.

“Fine dear,” she concedes standing to take their plates to the dishwasher. “You’ll want to pay extra attention to national news in a month or so.”

“Thank you,” Peter says, rising to go meet Chris in the doorframe of the kitchen.

Chris looks between the two of them, lips curving at the edges. “Are you two plotting together?”

“Not this time,” Adeline assures him.
“Thank god,” Chris mutters. “I don’t think Beacon Hills would be left standing if you worked together.”

“Of course it would,” Peter reassures him. “However, whoever we were working against probably wouldn’t be.”

“Probably not,” Chris agrees. “Are you ready to go?”

“I am.”

They make their way back out to the car, waving their goodbyes to Adeline as they go. As Peter gets into the car it's with the sinking realization that he’s heading back to his empty apartment where he’ll be haunted by his own thoughts.

“I’m sorry about last night,” Chris says after a few moments. “About Victoria.”

“It’s fine,” Peter tells him. “She’s hardly the first one to say those things to me.”

Chris sighs. “That’s just it. Nobody should say those things. I’ll admit, I used to think the same way, but it isn’t right.”

“I’m not the one who needs to be convinced of that,” Peter reminds him. “Listen Chris, it's obvious that you’ve changed your mind about my kind, that you really do believe in the code, but for lots of your men the code is merely a suggestion. They can take it and make it fit whatever situation they need it to.”

“Is that why you asked my mother to think about changing it?”

“It is.”

Tapping his fingers against the steering wheel, Chris nods to himself. “Tell me something, Peter. When you found out what my sister was doing to your nephew, what she planned to do to your family, why didn’t you kill her then? You had the evidence. You would’ve had the right.”

“I’m a left hand,” Peter begins, staring out the window as Chris pulls into the parking spot next to his car. “I’ve seen death, I know what comes with it. If I had killed Kate, I would have been in the right, yes, I would have even enjoyed it, but things would never change. I could have stopped her myself, but by having your matriarch do it I’ve saved other packs from those who would have wanted to avenge their idols.”

Chris laughs weakly. “You’re right, of course.”

“I know.”

He leaves Chris there in the hospital parking lot, sitting along in his car. If the man isn’t ready to face the new realities of his life that’s a problem for him and him alone. Peter has his own issues.
When he reaches his apartment, the first place he heads is to the back of his closet where he grabs his whiskey. He looks at it fondly, walking to the kitchen where he cracks it open. He looks at it for a moment longer before taking a steadying breath and upending it into the sink.

There is no more room for self pity. Stiles is gone, yes, but his pack isn’t. His pack is here, whole and alive. With their survival, Beacon Hills will be able to avoid many of the tragedies that would one day come to its woods. The Hale Pack will protect Beacon Hills, which will in turn protect Stiles and his family.

He showers next, washing the scent of wolfsbane and hunter from his skin and making himself more presentable. Slowly, as he puts himself together, he goes over his recent interactions with his family. No doubt, they know from his behavior that something is wrong. It's unlikely that Talia has shared the information about his love life, though she has certainly conveyed to the pack that she knows what is wrong. That’s fine. He can work with that.

Once he’s sure that he has scrubbed himself free of any sign of where he’s been, Peter begins to make his way to the pack house. Talia should already be back home, eager to get away from the hospital even though it had been a member of their pack who handled the delivery. It’s only right that he makes his appearances today, holds his new nephew and tries to reintegrate into his pack.

When he pulls up to the house, he spots Cora sitting alone on the porch. The girl has always preferred to be alone, so he thinks nothing of it until he’s out of the car and able to smell the scent of
. He arches a brow, making his way over to her.

“What’s going on with you?”

“There’s a boy at school, his mom died last year. Today some of the other kids were bullying him about it, but when I tried to help him he got mad at me!”

Peter swallows hard, hands tightening on the railing of the front steps. “What’s his name?”

“Peter,” A warning voice comes from inside the house. “You can’t harass a ten year old.”

“I won’t,” He promises. “Now, Cora, what was the boy's name?”

“He goes by Stiles. I can't pronounce his real name.”

Peter nods slowly. “Is his last name Stilinski?”

“Yes,” She answers.

“I’m gonna tell you a secret,” Peter starts, sitting down beside her. “One you can't share with anyone at school.”

“What?” She asks, her eyes wide. She loves secrets.

“You know his mom died, but do you know how?”

“No,” Cora admits.

Peter runs a hand through his hair, and takes a deep breath, pushing his own chemosignals down. “When Mrs. Stilinski got sick, it affected her brain first. She forgot things, and got confused a lot. That means that in her last days, she didn’t know who Stiles was. She thought he was trying to kill her and sometimes she tried to kill him first.”

“Really?” Cora wonders. She looks fascinated and Peter has to bite back the growl that wants to escape him at the thought of her enjoying Stiles’ pain.

“Really. And now, because of that, Stiles is probably having trouble trusting people. If your mom tried to kill you and you covered it up, would you want to accept help from people, even after she’s gone?”

“No,” Cora admits. “But he didn’t have to be mean about it.”

“No, he didn’t, but you have to be kind.”

“Why can’t I just ignore him,” She grumbles.

Peter chuckles, “Because he needs help, Cora. His mom is gone, and he’s struggling. Even if you aren’t his friend your kindness could make a difference in his life.”

“Fine,” Cora agrees, pushing herself up off of the steps. She no longer smells of discontent, though she isn’t happy either. “I’ll still be nice to him.”

“Good.”

“But Uncle Peter, how did you know all of that? If it's a secret?”

“I’m a left hand, knowing secrets is what I do.”

With that, Cora runs off into the woods and Peter forces himself to his feet once more. He hadn’t anticipated a conversation about Stiles to be his first interaction with his family after deciding to move forward, but maybe it will be a good thing. Now he knows that the boy has at least one more person in his corner than he had last time.

“Thank you,” Talia says from in the house. Peter closes his eyes and listens for a second, before turning toward the living room she’s in. “I was worried she’d go take it out on that boy tomorrow, but now she shouldn’t.”

“It’s no problem,” Peter mutters, entering the room to see Talia laid out on the couch with the baby in her arms. “What did you end up naming him?”

“Mikolaj,” She informs him, her voice tender as she looks down at the infant in her arms. “It means people’s triumph.”

“Yes,” He laughs to himself. “He certainly is that.”

“Peter,” Talia says, her voice quiet.

“Talia.”

“How are you? And be honest with me.”

“I’ve been better,” he admits. “But I’ve also been much, much worse. I think things are looking up for me.”

“Good, because I need you at your finest. Adeline Argent called this morning. She wants to negotiate a new, formal treaty between the Argent clan and the Hale pack.”

“Yes,” Peter says faintly. “I can imagine that she does.”

“She wants to get started as soon as we possibly can, but seeing as how I’ve just had a baby, I’m sending Laura, James, and you in my stead. Between the three of you, I’m sure that we can make sure that this agreement isn’t hiding any nasty surprises.”

“Right.” Peter says, nodding slowly as his mind leaps from thought to thought. “What time did Argent call you?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Around nine?”

Immediately after he left then, Adeline had already made this decision and decided not to tell him. That alone is enough to let him know that he’ll be expected to act in his official capacity during negotiations, that she wants to do this right and go through his alpha.

“I see. Did she mention anything about her missing husband or daughter?”

“No, do you think she might blame us?”

Peter shakes his head. “No, Madame Argent is crafty, but even she wouldn’t ask to renegotiate a peace treaty if she blamed you for their deaths. She’s one of the honorable ones.”

Talia hums. “You know she asked for you to be there. I would have sent you anyway, but she asked for you by name.”

“She’s a smart lady, one who knows exactly what I do for this pack,” Peter says. “Did she say who she’s bringing with her?”

“Only that her son, Chris, will be there.”

“That’s good to know,” Peter tells her. “He’s almost as sharp as his mother, and certainly more physically able.”

“Do you think I should be there? I mean, technically I could be.”

“No, no.” Peter shakes his head. “We’ll be fine. I know more about the Argents than they realize I do. Besides, I know as well as you do how important it is for a new pup to spend the whole week with their mother, and you can’t bring him to the meeting."

“You’re right, of course. I’m just nervous about this whole thing.”

“I’d be concerned if you weren’t. Now, when is the meeting?”

“Tomorrow, dusk. You’ll meet in the abandoned distillery. She wanted to do it today, but I figured even with Laura’s plane coming in today you needed time to get her up to speed on the situation.”

“True, and it gives me some time to scope out the situation on my own.”

“You know the drill,” Talia tells him. “Take whatever help you need.”

“Of course,” Peter tells her, but when he leaves the packhouse he’s alone.

He waits until he’s back in Beacon Hills proper to call Adeline who picks up on the first ring.

“Really? New peace negotiations?”

“Hello, Peter. I’m doing lovely, thank you for asking. How are you?”

“Oh please, I know how you are. I saw you this morning. Now, what are you up to?”

“Nothing bad, in fact I think you’ll be a fan of what I propose tomorrow.”

“Is that so? Any chance you want to tell me now?”

Adeline snorts. “Of course not. If this re-negotiation is to hold any weight then I can’t be talking about it with you ahead of time. I know that you’ll hold a great deal of power tomorrow, especially with your sister unable to attend, but it is important for the sanctity of the treaty that we both act in our official capacities.”

“I figured you’d say that,” Peter admits. “Still, it was worth a shot.”

“If you say so. Still, since I like you I’ll let you know this: I plan to let your pack know about Kate and Gerard. Not what they planned to do to your pack, but their history with the other two packs.”

“I see. Thank you for the warning. On another note, How was your meeting with the police?” Peter asks, pulling into his apartment’s parking garage. “Any new information?”

“No, tragically they haven’t learned anything new.”

“I’m so sorry to hear that,” Peter tells her with a smile. “I hope they find them soon.”

“As do I.”

When their phone call comes to an end, Peter takes a deep breath, settling into a state of mind he hasn’t really used in months. It’s time for Peter Hale time traveller to take a backseat to Peter Hale Left Hand. Right now only the latter identity is helpful. He needs to prepare hispack for tomorrow and even if Adeline is doing nothing wrong it's his job to ensure the Hale’s have everything they can use.

There's no way for him to get into Adeline’s house, especially not on such a short notice. She’s lived there for years, slowly building up more and more defenses against the supernatural. Chris and Victoria, however, have only had their home for five months. Though they've no doubt covered the basics of mountain ash and wolfsbane stores, there's been no time for them to cover everything.

When he arrives in that part of town, his first stop is at the coffee shop a block down from their house. Once there, he orders a black coffee and settles in to wait. The coffee shop is a convenient distance, not so close that it would be suspicious if he was spotted, but close enough that he’ll be able to hear if any Argents are home. If they speak at a reasonable volume, he won’t be able to make out what they’re saying, but that’s fine. He just needs a few minutes to determine if they’re home.

He waits a few minutes, not hearing anything from the Argent house. He’s just about to drain his coffee and make his way out of the shop when he hears the familiar low grumble of Chris’s truck and the shrill tones of Victoria’s voice. Sighing, he settles back in to listen. He hears them park at their house, and two sets of feet hitting the gravel. Allison’s not with them, then. Probably for the best, seeing as Victoria is yelling loud enough for Peter to hear her.

“Damn it, Chris. I’m her mother. I should have a say too!”

Chris isn’t quite speaking loud enough for Peter to pick up everything, though he hears the words married and Matriarch. Seemingly the fight involved whatever Adeline is up to now.

“Fine! You want to associate with those animals, then do it. But I won’t be married to a man who does.”

This time Chris speaks too softly for Peter to hear anything at all, but Victoria’s answer comes even louder than the last.

“You can expect the divorce papers in the mail; I’m going back home. As for Allison, we’ll work something out later.”

The door slams and the car starts, but Peter can’t quite tell who went to the house and who left. Either way, he has enough to know that there won’t be an opportunity for him to make it into the Argents’ house tonight. There’s no way they’ll both be gone at the same time. Not after a fight like that.

Sighing, Peter finishes his coffee and makes his way back to his car. He got something out of this at least.

He meets Laura and James in his apartment the next day. It’s the only place that the other wolves can’t potentially over hear anything that is also warded against threats. They only have a few hours to talk about what to expect from this meeting so Peter is quick to share everything he knows: Adeline Argent is honest and fair, her son Chris takes after her, Adeline has seemingly recovered from a life threatening illness recently, and six months ago she had her husband and daughter killed for the unsanctioned murder of two packs.

“Oh, and one more thing,” Peter adds looking over at his niece and brother-in-law, “Whatever this is about, it's big enough that Victoria Argent left Chris Argent last night. She’s going home to her own family.”

“And that's the Mays family, right? The hunters on the east coast?”

“That’s right,” James tells her. “But don’t worry about that. Based on what Peter’s told us the fact that Victoria was angry enough to leave seems to imply that Adeline is actually approaching us in good faith.”

“That would be my assessment as well,” Peter agrees. “Now, before we get going, are there any more questions about what's expected of us tonight?”

“Just one,” Laura says. She looks nervous. “What do we do if it's an ambush?”

“It won’t be.” James tells her, dropping a kiss to her forehead.

“But if it is.”

“Then I’ll rip their throats out while you and your father return to the pack and let them know what happened,” Peter can’t help the smile that screeps across his face as he speaks. The memory of killing Kate comforting him more than the worry of killing Adeline or Chris concerned him.

“Okay,” Laura nods, taking a deep breath. “Okay, let's do this.”

They make their way to the distillery, Peter going ahead to scout the location before allowing James or Laura near it. Just in case, he leaves them just far enough away from the distillery that they won’t be able to hear him, then he takes off at a quiet jog.

When he reaches the actual building, he finds that only Adeline and Chris are waiting for them. Both are armed to the teeth, but there are no ranged weapons, a sign of their commitment to keeping the peace. All is as it should be, so he steps in quickly.

“No third?” He asks, eyes darting around the interior of the building. “You’d have been well in your rights to bring one.”

“I’m aware,” Adeline responds. “And If I was meeting with Talia I would have, but I thought to spare her daughter the anxiety.”

“How kind of you,” Peter laughs. “I’ll go get them then.”

He ducks back out of the building, retrieving his family and appraising them of the situation. Along the way, he coach’s Laura in the proper reactions and what not to share, even though he knows her mother has already done so.

They enter with Laura at the front, Peter a step behind to her left and her father mirroring Peter’s own position to her right.

“Matriarch,” Laura greets her, extending a hand.

Adeline shakes it firmly. “Alpha-in-line. Please, let us be seated.”

With that, Adeline gestures to the table that’s been set up in the center of the large room. It has three chairs on each side, highlighting Adeline’s choice to come with only her son. They take their seats cautiously, Adeline and Laura taking their chairs before anyone else.

“I’m sure you’re wondering why I’ve called this meeting,” Adeline begins, folding her hands before her. “To be quite honest, this is something that I’ve been thinking about for months now, but my decision was solidified the night before last.”

The night before last can only mean one thing. Adeline decided this was a necessary meeting while he was in her home, though he can’t be sure if it was because of the incident at dinner or his confessions after. Nervously, he casts his mind back, trying to think of what he could have done that would require the negotiation of a treaty.

“I’ll be perfectly frank with you now, the reason that I want to negotiate this deal is my granddaughter. As you may or may not be aware, I’ve recently had to execute her grandfather and aunt, Gerard and Kate Argent for the unsanctioned murders of two packs. The both of them are no longer able to fill Allison’s head with lies about your kind, I find myself worried about what she could pick up from the others in our community. As such, I’d like to negotiate an agreement in which Allison will spend the summer with you every year until she is eighteen. That way she can learn what your kind should be like.”

“I see.” Laura hums. “And what would you expect from us? I strongly doubt that you’re sending the heir to your position into our home without some kind of guarantee.”

Adeline smiles. “Of course not, in return I want Peter Hale.”

Peter lifts a brow, “I’m afraid that you’ll need to elaborate, Madame Argent.”

“Happily,” She smiles. “For the months that my darling Ally lives among the wolves, I want Peter to live among hunters. He’ll still be free to go about his business, both professionally and as Left Hand, but when he does, I’d like my son, Chris, to go with him. You will have complete access to my granddaughter, but only if Chris has the same access to Peter. You have my guarantee that Chris won’t interfere unless Peter is killing indiscriminately.``

“And why us?” James asks, fingers tapping against the table. “Why Peter?”

“Because I know that your pack won’t kill Allison without reason. Afterall, your Left Hand was kind enough to let me handle Gerard and Kate when he found out about their crimes.”

“Peter knew?” Laura asks, shock evident in her face. Internally, Peter sighs, promising to make her workin on her poker face later.

“Absolutely,” Chris chimes in. “He was the one who told my mother the truth of what my father was doing.”

“I see,” James says quietly. He sounds thoughtful, a sign that Peter is going to be ratted out to his alpha later. He buries the urge to roll his eyes and swears to gripe at Adeline later for not letting him know she’d be sharing that tidbit.

“I have a question for you, Madame Hale.” Peter folds his hands in front of him, staring across the table at Adeline. “I can assume that you’ve gotten Chris’s permission for this as he’s here now, but what about the girl’s mother? She’s no fan of my kind, especially if she’s willing to leave the Argent clan behind for this.”

“You’ve been paying attention,” Adeline acknowledges, her smile growing. “Good. You’re correct, Victoria isn’t a fan of the plan. However, she knew when she married my son that any daughter she may have could become my heir and that my word would hold more sway than her’s. Plus, I’ve made it known to her that if she should work against me in this she’ll be found guilty for the murders of Gerard and Kate Argent.”

“Well done,” Peter murmurs. He can appreciate her work, from one professional to another. “Another question then, has Allison Argent been made aware of the existence of werewolves yet?”

“No,” Chris admits. “Not yet. That responsibility would fall to your pack, with of course, the assumption that if you mention hunters to her you do so in a positive, understanding light.”

“And how do you expect us to do so,” James wonders, “When you act off of a code that assumes we hunt your kind?”

“Actually,” Adelin interjects. “The Argent family operates under a new guideline, ‘we protect those who cannot protect themselves.’”

Peter is sure that his packmates hear the way his heartbeat picks up pace at that, but there’s nothing he can do to hide his surprise. He hadn’t heard anything about the change.

“What a lovely sentiment, when did you make the choice to change it?”

“Not long ago,” Adeline answers. “It was time for a change, to distance ourselves from the actions of the past.”

“I see.”

“We’ve gotten off topic though,” Chris interrupts. “Will you teach my daughter?”

“If you would allow me the courtesy of council with my Right and Left Hands?” Laura replies, rising to her feet.

“Of course,” Adeline answers. “Let us reconvene in, say, thirty minutes?”

“Let’s,” Peter agrees, standing in time with James.

They follow Laura out of the distillery, getting far enough away that human ears won’t be able to pick up on what they have to say. When she comes to a stop, there’s a moment of silence before she rounds on Peter, holding a finger to his face.

“What the hell, Uncle Peter? You didn’t think it would be important to mention that you’ve dealt with the Argents before?”

“No,” He says, swatting her hand out of his face. “This may be hard for you to understand, Laura, but your mother and I have an arrangement in which I only tell her things that she absolutely needs to know. I’ve been your mother’s Left Hand longer than you’ve been alive. I started training for this when I was even younger than Cora. So trust me when I say that if Adeline Argent had been pursuing any other goal, my previous interactions with her would not have mattered. Even here, all it means is that we have some small ounce of her trust. It doesn’t hurt us at all.”

“Fine, okay,” She mutters. “But what about the rest of it, why does she want you to live with her son?”

“I imagine because I have to live somewhere, he’s one of the most werewolf friendly hunters, and his wife just left them so she wants him to have someone around.”

“Not to mention he just moved here,” James adds. “So his house is probably the most werewolf friendly of all the hunters in the area.”

“It is,” Peter agrees cheerfully. Then, when he gets a strange look from Laura he holds his hands up in innocence, “What, I investigated them all last night.”

Laura turns on her heel, pacing. “Fine then, which way are we leaning? Should we do it or not?”

“No,” Peter tells her. “You make a choice first. Your mother sent you here as a learning opportunity so tell us your gut instinct and your dad and I will tell you if we agree or not after. If the three of us still can’t come to a decision after, then we’ll call your mom.”

James reaches out with a steadying hand, stopping Laura in her tracks. “Peter’s right, you’re going to be alpha one day. You need to start practicing making these decisions.”

“Okay,” she takes a few deep, steadying breaths. “I think it's a good idea. Allison is ten and she doesn’t even know werewolves exist yet. We have a chance to help shape the future matriarch of one of the world’s biggest hunter families.”

“But what would we be risking?” Peter asks.

Laura brings a hand up to bite her nails, only to catch herself in the act. “You think it's a bad Idea.”

“That’s not what I said. I asked about potential cons.”

“She, she would know more about werewolves than any of her predecessors. She could use it against us in the future. Not to mention what they’re asking you to do. Would you even be willing to live among them? They’re killers.”

“Trust me,” Peter drawls. “I know better than most what they are. But don’t think about my feelings right now. Think through the problem.”

“Ok, well if you are living with one of them, that would place one of our pack members in potential danger. Not to mention that if Argent goes with you on your Left Hand business he’ll have a major insight into our pack’s inner workings.”

“True.” James allows, “But don’t forget we have the power to suggest changes. You and Madame Argent are on the same footing here, you don’t need to leave all of the power in her hands.”

Laura makes her suggestion after that, and after a few tweaks from Peter and James they make their trek back to the abandoned distillery. He isn’t sure how confident Laura is feeling about the deal, but he can see a mild concern in James’ eyes. He feels one too, but for different reasons. He doubts Adeline will take advantage of this arrangement, but he is far from confident about the position it puts him in. This arrangement means that he loses a lot of his freedom, admittedly, only for two months a year, but for someone who works in the fields he does that's concerning.

As they take their seats once more, Laura sits tall. “Madame Argent, here is my counter proposal. We agree to the arrangement, but only if Chris Argent is not directly involved with Left Hand business, if he goes along, he waits in the car or hotel room. In return, Allison is more than welcome to go home once a week to see her father, or her father can come visit her at our home at any point he would like. In addition, I would like it to be clearly stated that Peter has the right to visit our pack, especially on the full moon.”

There’s a pause, one in which Peter watches one of Adeline’s fingers tap against her knuckles. “Very well, I agree to your terms. Now we just need a date for our agreement to go into effect.”

“How about a week to the day after Allison’s school ends?” Laura suggests. “And we will switch back a week before she begins again?”

“That’s fine. I’ll have a written version of this drawn up and sent to your alpha tomorrow.”

Laura nods. “Thank you for your time, Madame Argent.”

“No, thank you.”

When they return to the packhouse and tell Talia the news she is… less than thrilled by the agreement. Still, once she sits on the matter she agrees that this is the best possible outcome. It provides the Hales the opportunity to prevent the development of a bigot matriarch, even if it places Peter in an uncomfortable position.

“James, Laura,” Talia begins, handing Peter the baby. “Would you leave Peter and I for a moment?”

It's late, and Peter can tell from the heartbeats around the house that everyone except for Laura and James are asleep. Still, he closes the door to Talia’s office, effectively creating a soundproof room. He cradles Mikolaj close, smiling down at the boy.

“How are you feeling about this, Peter? If you’re uncomfortable with this agreement we can back out.”

“No, we can’t.” Peter tells her, taking a seat. “This is a good opportunity. You know that as well as I do. We can’t let it go.”

‘Fine, so we can’t back out.” She admits. “That doesn’t mean we can’t make it better for you. You’ve been struggling lately, I don't want this to make it worse.”

“It won’t,” Peter assures her. “I’m doing better, Tally. I am, and I honestly think this will help. It’ll be a nice distraction.”

“If you’re sure.”

“I am,” he promises, handing Mikolaj back to her. He kisses her on the cheek. “It’ll all work out. You’ll see.”
Time moves quickly after that. Peter feels as though he barely has time to get his affairs in order before it's time for Allison to move in with the Hales and for Peter to move into Chris’s guest room. It had been decided prior to the day of that Chris would come to drop Allison off and stay there with her when she learned about werewolves. After, and only after, Allison felt comfortable being left alone with them would Peter and Chris make their way back to hunter’s home.

“Alright, Allison.” Chris says once it's just him, his daughter, Talia, and Peter in Talia’s office. “There’s something you need to know, before you start your stay with the Hales.”

“Is it a real explanation of why I’m staying here?”

“In a way,” Peter tells her. “We’re going to tell you a secret about our family. You’re living here this summer so you can learn more about it.”

Allison crosses her arms. “What’s the secret then?”

“We,” he points between himself and Talia, “are werewolves.”

“Werewolves aren’t real.”

“Or are they?” Peter asks, shifting his face into his beta face.

“Oh my god!” Allison exclaims. “Where are your eyebrows?”

“Really?” Chris whispers to himself. “That's your first question?”

“Shush, Dad! I want to talk to the werewolves.”

“Alright then,” Chris says standing. “Ally, say goodbye. Peter and I have to get going.”

“Bye Peter, it was good seeing you again,” Allison smiles at him before throwing herself to her dad's legs and saying her goodbyes to him. “Bye, Dad. You’re visiting on Saturday, right?”

“I’ll be here,” Chris promises before making his exit with Peter.

“I’m sorry about your wife,” Peter tells Chris as they get into the car together.

“Ex-wife,” Chris corrects him. “And it’s fine. We’d been fighting for months, ever since I made the call that you were right and we had to execute my father and sister. My mom’s decision to send Allison to your pack for the summer was just the straw that broke the camel’s back.”

“Still,” Peter says, staring out the window. “You loved her, it can’t have been easy.”

“It isn’t, but it could have been worse. In the end, all Victoria really did was show that she hated your kind more than she loved me, and i’m not sure I wanted to be with someone like that anyway.”

The guest room that Chris shows him to is nice enough, so Peter instantly begins unpacking. He’ll be here for two months and there’s no point in living out of bags. Chris has already shown him where everything is, as well as let Peter know where to find him if he needs anything, so he isn’t concerned about being interrupted either. So, for now. Peter puts all of his focus into unpacking, not thinking about how he got to this point in his life. When he’s finished, and there’s nothing left to distract him, he wanders out to the kitchen.

There, he comes across Chris in a bright pink apron. He’s moving around the kitchen in a half dance, singing to himself softly, and Peter can’t help but give a small chuckle at the sight. At the noise, Chris snaps his head back around to see Peter, his dancing coming to a standstill.

“I like the apron,” Peter tells him, watching the way Chris’s eyes flick down at it and then back to him.

Chris clears his throat. “It was a gift from Ally, one that she insisted has to be used every time I cook.”

“I see, is it just for you, or if i cook something will I be required to use it as well?”

“Oh you have to use it too,” Chris informs him, a sparkle in his eyes.

Its strange really to see Chris like this. When they first met, in the last time line, he’d never had his biases about werewolves corrected. They’d solidified by the time they met, encouraged by his wife and the fact that Peter himself had killed his mother. In this timeline, Peter had met the man on a journey to confirm whether or not his family was filled with killers, and yet, this version of Chris is the happiest he’s ever seen him.

Sure, he misses his daughter, Peter can smell that much, but the sadness is superficial, not the same bone deep emotion that had clung to him in the future. Briefly, Peter wonders how differently he must smell now to the version of him that had been around months ago. Surely the sadness clings to his bones in the way it once did Chris, that isn’t something he can escape.

“You want a beer?” Chris asks, nodding to the fridge. “Dinner will be done in about ten minutes.”

“Sure, you want one too?”

When Chris nods his assent, Peter grabs two drinks from the fridge, shifting his claws and using them to crack the tops off. Then he passes one over and takes a seat at the kitchen table, leaning back to watch Chris work. Though the singing and dancing has stopped, it's evident that the man is enjoying himself. He seems at home in the kitchen, something that Peter has often wished he felt.

“Where’d you learn to cook?” Peter asks, as Chris divvies the meal between two plates.

“When Allison was young Victoria and I decided that at least one of us had to figure it out, so I managed to teach myself. Don’t get me wrong though, there were a lot of poorly done meals in the learning period.” Chris sits down, giving the other plate to Peter. “What about you? You cook?”

“No, not dinners” Peter says with a snort. “My last partner, he tried to teach me for a while, but he gave up soon enough.”

“I’m sure you’re not that bad, you probably just need more practice.”

“Probably,” Peter agrees. “We didn’t spend that much time on it. We had… other matters to attend to.”

“Then that’s what we’ll focus on this summer.”

“What do you mean?”

Chris shrugs, “Well, Ally is with your pack to learn something right? There’s no reason you shouldn't learn something too while you’re here.”

“Alright then, but don’t expect a quick improvement. I personally think I peaked with my ability to make breakfast foods.”

“We’ll see.”

After that, the two of them settle into a comfortable routine. During the day they tend to their own matters such as work, or seeing the pack of Allison, but in the afternoons they always meet in the kitchen where Chris explains some recipe or another, guiding Peter through it. It’s nice, and though he’s reluctant to admit it, Chris becomes Peter’s first friend outside of Adeline.

The schedule was bound to experience change though, and in the second week of living together, some business that requires Peter’s attention in Montana makes itself known. He thinks briefly about handing it off to someone else, but he doesn’t have anyone he trusts to get the job yet. He hasn’t started to plan his replacement, none of the children in the pack have demonstrated that they have what it takes, and he won’t be responsible for breaking a child who can’t handle what a Left Hand does.

“Something’s come up,” Peter tells Chris as he sips at his wine that evening. “I have to be in Montana tomorrow, meaning that I need to know now if you’re coming with me.”

“Work or Left Hand business?” Chris asks, tasting dinner and then adding more salt.

Peter arches a brow, “Does it matter?”

“No, I guess not. It doesn’t interfere with my day with Ally, so I’ll come along.”

He thinks it should be awkward, taking Chris with him on a trip to threaten a man who’s spreading rumors regarding Talia’s abilities as an alpha. It isn’t though, this Chris is different than the last one. Peter is different from the last timeline.

“Why don’t you hate me?” Peter asks that night as he crawls into his twin sized bed in the room they’re sharing.

“Hate you? Why would I?”

Peter rolls on his back, staring at the ceiling. “You may not have liked your father, but I’m the reason he’s dead. Your sister too. Why are you willing to share your house with me, come on this trip with me? Is it the treaty?”

“You aren’t the reason they’re dead. They did that to themself when they decided to break the code. All you did was tell my mother. Hell, you didn’t even order their deaths, she did.”

“Yes, but she’s your mother. You have to love her, you don’t have to be my friend.”

“No, I don’t,” Chris agrees. “I’m your friend because I like you. We get along and you aren’t to blame for the death of my sister or father.”

“If you say so.”

“I do.” There’s a pause, then Chris continues. “Would you have blamed me? If you were in my shoes?”

“I don’t know,” Peter admits. “I would have blamed your whole family if Gerard and Kate had been successful in killing my family though.”

“Yeah,” Chris says with a light chuckle. “I would have blamed myself too.”

They’re quiet after that, alone with their thoughts.

In the morning, they make no mention of the night before. Peter tells Chris how long he’ll be gone, before making plans to meet back up with him for lunch. He leaves the man alone in the hotel room, sleep still shining in his eyes.

Work is easy. He finds the man, well, kitsune, and makes some very pointed threats and explanations about his words could harm the Hale Pack’s reputation. It's easier than things used to be; he’s had enough experience with kitsune to be able to perfectly detail all of his weak points. By the time he’s through, the man has gone white with fear and Peter has the widest smile he’s worn all week.

He loves his job.

“What’d you do this morning?” Peter asks, waltzing into the cafe they agreed to meet at.

Chris pushes over a mug of coffee, just as Peter likes his, still gazing at the menu. “I went to the local shooting range, made some new friends. I may have a new contract for Argent Arms.”

“Wow, I didn’t think I was gone that long,” Peter admits.

“Oh,” Chris looks up, his smile predatory. “You weren’t.”

“Just that good at what you do, I see.”

“Damn right.”

The waitress comes over to take their orders and conversation turns to more casual matters. Chris shows him the pictures Allison sent and Peter shares stories from when he was Allison’s age running around on that very same preserve. Eventually, their lunch comes and Chris and Peter are focused on their food more than conversation. It’s nice though, there’s no expectation of more.

When she comes with the bill, the waitress hesitates, bouncing up and down on her toes. “I’m sorry if this is inappropriate, but I have to ask, how long have you two been together?”

“Oh, we’re not-” Chris begins, but Peter cuts him off.

“You’ll have to excuse him, he’s still new to this whole thing. Only a few weeks.”

As she leaves, Peter looks up to find Chris staring at him.

“Oh what?” Peter asks with an eye roll, “It’s just a bit of fun. Besides, if people think we were just some gay couple in town they’ll never believe anything they may hear about Chris Argent and Peter Hale being in the same town. After all, you’re a straight hunter and I’m a male werewolf.”

“I’m not you know.”

“Not what? A hunter? Yes, you are.”

“Straight,” Chris tells him, his expression bemused.

“Huh,” Peter replies. “The more you know.”

They pay the bill and make their way back to the airport, the topic forgotten as they enjoy the brisk Montana air.

Two days after his return to Beacon Hills is the night of the full moon. It’s Peter’s first since he started living with Chris, and he can’t help the charged energy that he knows follows him all day. His wolf is close to the surface, ready to run with its pack.

“Jesus,” Chris says when Peter gets up to pace for the third time in as many minutes. “Just go see your pack already.”

“I said I’d be here for dinner,” Peter objects.

“It’s fine,” Chris promises, a smile creeping onto his face. “Seriously, just go.”

“Thanks,” Peter yells over his shoulder, already running out of the house with the sound of Chris’s low chuckle following after him.

Upon arriving at the packhouse, Peter is met by Cora, Derek, and Laura running out to greet him. Cora barrels into his legs, Derek and Laura stopping just short of that. After a few seconds, he watches Allison stumble out the front door, a tumble of dark hair and long limbs.

“That’s not fair,” Allison calls out, “You could all hear someone coming and didn’t tell me.”

“Sorry,” Laura tells her, a twinkle in her eye. “You snooze, you lose, Ally. Anyway, how’ve you been, Uncle Peter? How’s life with a hunter?”

“Why don’t you tell me?” Peter asks, pushing past them to make his way inside. “You’ve had Allison here the whole time I’ve been with Chris.”

“Oh please,” Derek says rolling his eyes. “Allison’s ten and didn’t even know about werewolves. You’re living with a real hunter.”

“Eleven,” Allison corrects with a huff, crossing her arms.

“It's like living with anyone else,” Peter informs them. “He hasn’t even been out on a hunt while I’ve been staying there.”

“How can you be sure?” Laura wonders. “You’ve never lived with anyone else, not since you were a kid living here.”

Her words tear at the grief he’s been working around for weeks. It’s like a punch in the gut, the way his entire mind is overtaken by an overwhelming sadness. It’s brief, but it's sudden, enough so that he can't suppress it and his nieces and nephew get a nose full of his new chemosignals.

Laura stops in her tracks, “Uncle Peter, I-”

“Let’s go see the pup,” Peter says loudly, distracting Allison from the change in mood. He may not be able to do anything about the fact that the rest of the kids know something is wrong, but he can at least keep Chris’s daughter from his shady past.

Eventually, the night moves past Peter’s pain. The grief shrinks, and Peter focuses on his pack. He wrestles with the kids on the living room floor and runs through the woods with them. When Allison can’t keep up with the wolves of the pack, he drops back to take her to the clearing where the humans of the family are spending time together. They all ran, dropping out at various points in time, but it seems no one had explained to Allison what she was supposed to do at that point. He leaves her laughing, chatting with his younger sister, and takes to the forest again.

There’s something soothing in running with his pack, in being just a normal wolf. As he runs, he allows his past to fall away, to forget about time travel, and consequences. As he runs, he’s merely a Left Hand, loyal to his alpha.

It's a good thing to be.

Life had been good, even before the full moon, but after Peter realizes just how good it really is. The reason the grief about Stiles had been so strong and shocking when Laura mentioned living with someone was because it had been sudden. He misses Stiles, of course he does, but the grief has changed. It isn’t all-encompassing anymore, something that he hadn’t even noticed until he felt it once more.

“How are you,” Adeline asks as Peter takes a seat across from her. They’re meeting for lunch for the first time in weeks, nearly a month and a half into the summer arrangement between their families. “I trust your living situation is still satisfactory?”

“You know it is,” Peter replies, before turning and ordering a merlot. He may not be able to feel the effects of alcohol, but that doesn’t mean he can’t enjoy it. “Now, what’s been happening in your life?”

“Nothing much,” Adeline admits. “Though I’ll be stealing Chris from you for a few days.”

“Oh, why's that?” Peter asks. “Does Chris know? He hasn’t mentioned it.”

“I need him to go hunt a kanima for me,” Adeline informs him, her eyes searching. “And no, I was planning to call him after our lunch to let him know, though its interesting that you instantly assumed he’d have already told you about it.”

“Well we do live together,” he reminds her. “It's only polite to keep each other informed of our comings and goings.”

“Yes, I did that with Gerard when we first got married.” She pauses, wine glass halfway to her mouth. “Peter?”

“Adeline?”

“I just said I did that with my husband.”

“You did,” Peter agrees, raising a brow as he sips the wine the waiter delivers to him.

She taps her fingers against the table, mulling over her next words. “Peter. Are you in love with my son?”

Later, Peter will deny it, but her words take him by surprise, enough so that wine comes spewing out of his mouth, staining the white table cloth. Adelin smirks, handing him a napkin.

“I don’t believe that’s an answer.”

“No.” Peter says faintly, dabbing at his mouth with the proffered napkin.

“No, that isn’t an answer or no, you aren’t in love with my son? Because if i’m being quite honest, now that I think about the two of you do seem to be in a rather committed relationship. The two of you live together, you eat dinner together everyday, I’ve seen you both go out in town and enjoy time together in what one might call a date.”

“We aren’t dating,” Peter tells her. “Both parties have to know its a date for it to be a date.”

“But you want it to be. If it wasn’t true, you would have said so by now.”

“I-I had never-” Peter stops, taking a deep breath. “Yes, I am in love with your son, though I have to admit I didn’t realize that I was until you said the words.”

She rolls her eyes, “Men. I shouldn’t have expected you to be in touch with your emotions.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Peter tells him. “I’m not planning to do anything about it.”

“Why not?” She asks, her eyes narrowing. “Is it the hunter thing? Because honestly, you think you’d be past that by now. The age thing? Sure, you are a little younger than him, but hardly inappropriately so.”

“Trust me,” Peter says, barely containing his laugh. “It isn’t the age difference. I don’t even remember there is one.”

“Ten years or so, if i’m right. But if that isn’t the issue what is? I’m almost certain he’ll welcome your advances, though he’ll never make the first move.”

“There’s things about me that Chris doesn’t know, things I would feel the need to disclose before entering a committed relationship.”

“Are they the kind of things that could affect a relationship?”

Peter bites back a wild laugh. “Yes, yes they are.”

“What could you possibly be hiding that’s that big?” Adeline asks, her hand finding his. “Peter, you know as well as I do that before I asked you to move in with Chris I used my sources to learn every little thing about you. I’ve shared the more gristly parts of your job with Chris if that’s it.”

“It isn’t,” Peter tells her, pulling his hand back. “Trust me, I know he could take that. No, this is something that your informants couldn’t dig up if they tried.”

“Fine, then. Keep your secrets from me. But Peter, I really think you should tell Chris. What if he’s your chance at happiness. Don’t you want that?”

Damn it all to hell, Peter thinks, ordering his lunch. He really, really does. He just isn’t sure he can have it.

When he finishes lunch with Adeline, he shoots Chris a text explaining that he needs to spend the night with his pack and he won’t make it back in time for dinner. The response he receives is understanding and kind, a fact that fills him with an angry sort of sadness.

He runs in the woods that evening, thinking back to the days when it was just him. He can’t exactly say he misses the loneliness of being on the edge of a pack, but god had it been easier. Even now, he can hear his pack, smell their worry for him.

He goes to his room without talking to anyone.

The next day he leaves before anyone can speak to him, making his way to the park that Stiles had taken him on their first date, a picnic. Apparently his parents had taken him here a lot, and he’d wanted to share it with Peter.

He knows he won’t see Stiles here today, not now with his father in the depths of his alcoholism and his mother less than a year in the grave, but it feels nice to be close to him. It reminds him of how he ended up in this position, this ridiculous position of loving an Argent.

Peter lays down in the grass, staring up at the sky through the gaps in the tree branches. “Come on, Stiles. Give me a sign.”

Nothing happens, and so Peter stays there for hours, only moving to text Chris that he’ll be missing dinner again. When his phone buzzes with a response, he doesn’t look at it. He doesn’t know that he wants to.

He sneaks back into the house in the wee hours of the morning when he knows Chris will be asleep. It’s the move of a coward, he knows that, and yet it's all he has in himself to give at the moment. To do anything more would be too much, would require him to share parts of himself that he hasn’t shared with anyone except Stiles, to share things that no one in this timeline knows.

In the morning he sleeps in late, hoping that when he wakes up Chris will already be out for the day. In a way, he gets his wish, because when he looks at his phone in the morning he finally reads the text that Chris had sent him yesterday.

Secure in the knowledge that he’s alone in the house, Peter spends the days Chris is away lounging around the living room and avoiding serious thought. When his mind drifts in a direction he’s uncomfortable, he dives into research, looking for supernatural creatures he’s completely unfamiliar with. He has an unfair advantage, what with his mind having lived more than a decade than his body has, but he still manages to find a few new things in Chris’s books.

The day Chris is due back, Peter manages to find himself out of state on business, purchasing an old grimoire from a Baba Yaga willing to part with it for a werewolf claw. Peter doesn’t hand his own over, he isn’t a fool, but he’s been doing this long enough that he holds onto the occasional trophy from his Left Hand jobs for just this.

The job only requires a day. Peter takes three, ignoring the concerned texts and calls that begin to blow his phone up on day two.
It’ll worry people. He knows it will. They’ll want to know why he wasn’t answering, why he chose to disregard their concerns. So he throws his phone in a river so that he can claim it got destroyed without actually lying.

When he steps off the plane, Peter is trying to decide where he’ll go tonight. It’s still early enough that Chris should be awake, but he doesn’t necessarily want to sleep in the packhouse tonight so it may be better to just meander around town until the hour is late enough to sneak in the house. He hasn’t reached a decision when he rounds the corner to the baggage claim and stops in his tracks.

“Chris, what are you doing here?”

“You aren’t exactly low profile,” Chris tells him. “I had some hunter buddies let me know when you were on your way back.”

“But why are you here? I could’ve seen you at home.”

“No,” Chris says. He sounds tired. “You wouldn’t have, because you’ve been ignoring me.”

“No,” Peter replies, trying to be slightly obnoxious. “I’ve been out of town, there’s a difference.”

“Oh please. You were avoiding me before I went out of town and then you took a job when I was due back so you could keep doing it. Don’t lie to me, Peter.”

“I’m not lying,” Peter lies. “I really did have a job in Washington. Besides, why would I avoid you?”

“Because you have feelings for me,” Chris announces, stopping Peter in his tracks as he tries to brush past Chris. “That’s right, my mom told me about your little talk. I would have much rather have heard it from you though.”

“Not my finest moment, forgetting about Adeline,” Peter muses. “I really should have considered this possibility that she’d tell you.”

“I have to agree with you there.” Chris agrees, voice hard as steel. “Now come get in the damn car with me so we can talk about this.”

“What is there to talk about?” Peter asks, looking into Chris’s eyes. “Yes, I have feelings for you. I’ll get over it.”

“Jesus, Peter. What is wrong with you? Did it never occur to you that I have feelings for you too? That I don’t want you to get over this?”

“Did it occur to you that just because I have feelings for you it doesn’t mean I’m ready to share all of my secrets with you?”

“So don’t tell me,” Chris huffs. “Just be with me. We’ll figure the rest out later.”

“Trust me,” Peter laughs quietly. “This isn’t the kind of thing you can casually bring up later in a relationship. This is something you have to know before.”

“So tell me,” Chris begs, reaching out to grab one of Peter’s hands. “Peter, just tell me.”

“I don’t know how,” Peter admits, voice breaking. “I don’t know how.”

“Okay, okay. So we go home for tonight, we sleep on it, and tomorrow we talk all of this out. Just stop avoiding me, please.”

“I will,” Peter promises. “Let’s go home.”

Sleep doesn’t come easily for Peter that night. Instead he lay in bed, staring up at the ceiling and trying to think of how to explain himself to Chris without coming off as a crazy man. The truth of the matter is that he has no proof that what he says is true. He’s already changed all of the events that he came back to change and they’ve long since entered the period of time when he should’ve been in a coma. He doesn’t have any upcoming future knowledge that he can use to back up his claim. Chris is just going to have to believe him on his word alone.

They reconvene in the kitchen where Peter stares down at his bowl of oatmeal and pushes his spoon around aimlessly. He’s too nervous to eat.

“Are you ready to talk to me?” Chris asks, their eyes meeting over their sad excuses for breakfast.

“As I’ll ever be,” Peter admits. “But you have to promise to listen to everything I have to tell you, and that you will never share it with anyone, even if you never want to see me again.”

“I’ll want to see you again,” Chris tells him. “You can’t scare me off.”

Peter snorts. “We’ll see. I still need that promise though.”

“I won’t tell anyone, I promise.”

“Okay then,” Peter says, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms. “I’ll give you the cliff notes version. What do you know about time travel?”

“That it isn’t real.”

Peter shakes his head. “Try again.”

“You’re telling me that you time travelled? I’m gonna need a little bit more information than that.”

“And I’ll give it to you, but be forewarned, it gets ugly.”

Chris just nods, leaning forward to brace his arms against the table. “Come on Peter, just tell me what's really going on.”

“I’m from a different timeline, one in which your sister and father were successful in burning my pack to death all of those months ago. I survived, but there was a cost. I was in a coma for six years, packless, and when I woke up I wasn’t sane. I bit an unconsenting teenager and tried to grow my pack. Long story short, the influx in supernatural meant that Beacon Hills gained a lot of attention and eventually the nemeton activated making the place a hellmouth. In the long run well, it wasn’t just my first pack that died. We buried enough people that coming back in time to stop it all was actually the most sane decision, no matter what it took.”

“Lots of holes in that story,” Chris notes, watching Peter.

“I know. I just told you the most important parts. Trust me when I say there’s much, much more.”

“I want to believe you, I do, but time travel just isn’t real.”

“It is when you have a spark on your side.”

“A spark?” Chris asks, “Where did you find a spark? Let alone one who cared enough to help you?”

“He was my partner,” Peter admits, “And sending me back in time saved his dad.”

“Okay, say that it is possible with a spark, that still doesn’t explain everything. You said you weren’t sane, but I’ve been around you for months and you seem fine to me. An insane person couldn’t form a plan to time travel and fix things.”

“Oh that, I haven’t been crazy in years. I got better after I died.”

“Died?”

“Died,” Peter confirms. “I got over it with the help of a banshee though, don’t worry about it. I’ve been alive again for years.”

“Okay.” Chris says quietly, “Okay.”

“Okay? What does that mean?”

“It means that everything you’ve said is just crazy enough for me to think you couldn’t have come up with it if it hadn’t happened. I mean, a spark, banshee, resurrection, and time travel. If you were lying you would’ve come up with something much more believable.”

“True. There’s one more thing though,” Peter says.

“What could possibly be left?”

“I would feel guilty if I didn’t tell you, so I guess I should mention that in the alternate timeline I did kill Kate and assist in killing Gerard. Multiple times even.”

“I figured as much,” Chris admits. “You are a Left Hand. That part isn’t a surprise. Is that everything.”

Peter thinks on it, fingers tapping against the hard wood of the table. “Yes, I think so.”

“Alright, give me, give me a bit of time to process it.”

Peter nods, but something in his face must give him away because before he knows it Chris has caught his chin in one hand, forcing eye contact.

“Hey,” Chris says, his voice quiet. “I need time to process what you’ve told me, but it won’t change anything. My feelings haven’t changed.”

“Yet,” Peter mutters under his breath.

“At all,” Chris corrects him.

They hold eye contact for a moment, Peter’s eyes searching and Chris’s steady. Eventually though, Peter finds what he’s looking for, lunging forward to press their lips together.

“I love you. I love you.”