Chapter Text
If Stiles were a boy, she would've been celebrating her sixteenth birthday with Scott. She would've taken Driver's Ed last semester, and Dad would've handed over the keys to their old Jeep, so she'd be driving around with Scotty right about now, celebrating their newfound freedom.
As a girl, Stiles' birthday is shaping up rather differently. She won't see Scott - won't even see her dad - for at least a couple months, and in fact, she hasn't seen them for a week, since she reported to the intake facility. They did allow her a phone call, but she and dad spent the entire fifteen minutes pretending they weren't both miserable, and studiously avoiding mention of how her week had gone - he didn't want to talk about invasive medical procedures any more than she did, Stiles presumed.
She'd gotten the green light three days ago - no pregnancy or STDs for her, and all her parts were in working order - but they couldn't hand her off until her 5,844th day of life.
Apparently, those three days make a big difference in whether she's old enough to use as a breeding machine. Go figure.
She's almost glad to be released, even though what comes next scares the ever-loving bajeezus out of her. She's been bored out of her freaking mind. The nurses at intake are surprisingly nice people - all human - and she'd been allowed tv and reading material. Stiles just doesn't do well cooped up. It doesn't bode well for the next few years of her life.
She won't be a slave by any means, but she will be...restricted. Apparently contact with non-werewolves has proven to be "disruptive" to the program, and she won't be allowed to do anything that places her at even remote risk of miscarriage - they've gotta get their money's worth, after all. Two years of her life only gets them two successful pregnancies if they're lucky. If they're going to save themselves from the genetic bottlenecking they caused by being elitist fuckheads for the last couple centuries, they need her - and every other eligible human woman - to give them as many kids as possible during their term.
At least her IQ and blood type bagged her a private gig, and she'll be living in somebody's home. Otherwise, she might have been here the entire term.
She still can't decide which is better: being bred by a series of strangers who can't afford to house her for two years, or being stuck with a single guy whose virtues include rich and fertile. Depends on who the guy is, but apparently no one thinks she needs to know until he collects her like a dog at the pound.
Which is why she's jittering away in a waiting room at 6pm on her sixteenth birthday, instead of playing skeeball with Scott and forgetting to use her turn signal.
At least she knows he won't be fat and ugly. Werewolves don't really do fat and ugly, as far as she can tell - if they're actually gross and inbred, you sure as hell can't tell by looking. Back before the program started, she used to drool over how hot they were, but in the last year, she's been a little too busy freaking out over having her future hijacked to think about it.
But she'll be able to afford college now. Dad couldn't have sent her on an assistant deputy's salary, and Stiles has this...problem with focus which means goodbye, academic scholarship. But the only good thing about this stupid program is that even though it's compulsory, they do have to compensate her, and with a private assignment, she's heard that this guy...if he likes her, he could help her even more. Pull strings with a good college, cover her full education, even get her dad a raise - he can't be promoted any further, he's hit the ceiling as a human....
Stiles jumps as the door to the room bangs open and a wolf barges in, Stiles' case worker right behind him. "Get your things," the wolf says. "We're leaving." And then he's gone as quick as he came, the door swinging back and forth on its latch in his wake.
Stiles stares at the space where he'd been with a slack jaw.
"Well," his case worker finally says. "I was going to introduce you. That was - "
"Derek Hale." Derek Hale, local celebrity. Derek Hale, target of radical humanists. Derek Hale, who left town after their trial years ago.
Stiles' breeding partner was Derek fucking Hale.
"Yeah," Stiles' case worker says, sounding less than impressed. "I think you'd better hurry - I wouldn't put it past him to just leave you here."
She totally has a point, so Stiles grabs her bag and runs after him, still quietly freaking out in the privacy of her own mind. She barely gets all her limbs inside the vehicle before it's peeling away from the curb - Stiles swears and yanks on her seatbelt so hard it jams up on her.
"Jesus, what are you, on fire? Slow down!"
He glares at the road. "Werewolves don't have car accidents."
That's complete and utter bullshit if she ever heard it, and Stiles knows bullshit. "Yeah, okay." She grabs onto the door handle so tight her knuckles whiten as he zips around another car. "But there are humans on the road without your reflexes - you may not be part of the accident, but you'll sure as hell cause one."
Like a big petulant baby, Derek gooses the gas just to spite her. Stiles fumbles her seatbelt on just in time for him to fishtail around a corner without decelerating first.
Stiles squeezes her eyes shut, and fervently pretends she's not in a car with a maniac.
By the time they skid to a stop, Stiles is probably putting off so much fear and adrenaline she hopes it's choking Derek in the close confines of the car. She can't bring herself to open her eyes right away, even though they've stopped. It's not until he drops keys into her lap that her eyes startle open.
"Fifth floor. Get out."
They're in a parking garage under a building. "You're not coming in?"
"No. Get out."
"But - " Derek's eyes flash blue and his fangs start to drop. Stiles scrambles to open the door - she's not quite clear of it when he reaches across to yank it closed, so she's forced to dance out of the way or be squished. He tears out of the parking lot and leaves her standing there. "Hi, Derek, I'm Stiles. Nice to meet you."
Derek's building has a cage elevator, so Stiles can actually see inside every loft on floors two through four. Eerily, they're all empty. Not just empty, but as far as she can tell, completely unfinished. uninhabitable.
When the elevator stops at the fifth floor, it's not much better. Concrete floor and exposed pipes - less industrial chic, more just plain industrial. There a hole in the wall big enough to walk through, but she wouldn't call it a doorway - it looks like Derek literally punched through to the other side, then hauled the bricks away. Except, nope - she walks through the opening and sees a pile of rubble in the corner.
Charming.
There is...what she would dubiously call a kitchen, if it had a fridge or stove instead of exposed hookups. The cupboards are completely empty. Thankfully they fed her dinner at the center, and there is a working toilet.
No lights, though. Or at least, no lightbulbs.
There is one piece of furniture in the space she can access - a bare mattress on the floor in the corner of...what could be the living room. She found one locked room, but she can't imagine it's any better equipped than the rest of the place.
He's stinking rich and they're practically squatting.
It's getting dark and there's nothing to do, but she finds that she's crashing from the day's adrenaline and stress, so she curls up on the naked mattress and pillows her head on her arm. She drops off almost immediately into a deep sleep.