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argentum_ls
#3: Forever Knight
Summary: Derek learns that he's not as alone as he thought.
Word Count: 900
“…and so, mes amis, we once again find ourselves … here. Is it dark where you are? Is it cold? Do you long for the warm embrace of another…”
The voice was smooth and the sultry, as if the speaker didn’t know he was sharing his private thoughts with the world, as if he was naming the private thoughts of his listeners. Derek couldn’t help but be captivated. He sat in his car, the voice caressing him. It was late night, the sky shrouded with clouds. A crispness in the air had made him seek the refuge of his car’s heater, which blew warm, dry air on to his face, barely assuaging the chill the seeped in around the edges of the windows. To break the silence, Derek had turned on the radio. But the FM stations played only hard, driving beats, too much like a heart pounding in terror. So he’d descended to AM, turned the dial haplessly until catching a snippet of this voice. Then it became all he could, all he wanted, to hear. He’d had to tune carefully to find the best reception, moved his car around the clearing in front of the ruins of his house to improve it, but static still ghosted over the signal.
“There are times,” the voice continued, “where those ties that connect us, bind, constrict, cut our circulation and make us struggle to be free.” The speaker sighed, long and reflective. Derek could hear a faint clink, as if the speaker had set a glass on a table. “Yet, how we yearn for those bonds when they are gone.”
Derek pushed his car’s seat back as far as it would go, stretched his legs into the floorwell. Getting comfortable was out of the question; the best he could hope for was to fall asleep before his body cramped up. So hypnotic were the speaker’s words that for whole, connected minutes the werewolf didn’t smell the acrid, morient scent of ashes and pain and fear that suffused what remained of his house, his life. He was a creature meant to find solace and strength in the company of others, sitting alone in a car in the middle of the woods in the middle of the night. The wrongness of this ate at him, his loneliness making him act in ways he didn’t recognize as himself. He could, did, resist in small ways. But, always the idea lingered that he was getting what he deserved.
"How much worse when loosed the bonds of centuries," mused the voice, one which clearly bore a burden equal to Derek's.
He leaned the seat back, as close to reclining as it would go, pillowed his arms behind his head. The words washed over him. For the first time since returning to Beacon Hills, he wished he still had his cell phone. He’d had to give it up when he left New York, when he came back to California in search of his sister. A mere six years before he’d lost everything when his family was burned to death; a mere two weeks ago he’d given up everything he’d since been able to rebuild. He squashed those thoughts before they could turn into self-pity. He didn’t have the luxury of self-pity, not now. If he was going to survive, he needed to look toward a future that had to be better—if he could become strong enough to claim it. At this moment, though, he wanted nothing more than to call the radio station, talk to the speaker, share … what? What would he say? What would even make sense to someone outside his world?
It was such a small thing, petty, ridiculous, even, that he couldn’t call a radio station, wouldn’t know what to say if he did. But, of all the ample hurts he had to select from, this one dug the deepest. The leather upholstery creaked as he repositioned, trying in vain to ease discomfort that wasn’t entirely physical.
“And we have to ask ourselves, is here where you want to be? Do you seek to strengthen your bonds? Do you desire connection?”
Yes, Derek thought, disregarding the first question. Yes. But how? How to build without risking further destruction? He couldn’t take any more. He hadn’t lost control of his wolf since he was a young teen, but—increasingly he was tempted to give in and let it take over. Its needs were so much simpler.
“Let me guide you, gentle listeners. Let me show you where to go. On nights like this one, fear not the cold or the dark.”
He wouldn’t give in. His family might have been ripped from him, but that just made it more imperative that he not sacrifice what they had taught him. He didn’t know if he needed a guide, if a voice on the radio could even begin to take the role that his sister Laura had filled. But—as the play of cold and heat teased his skin, creating an odd comfort—he knew he would tuning in again tomorrow night.
“You can trust me. Because I … am … the Nightcrawler.”
