Broken Family Tree

18 - Deep Breaths [rewritten]

"What do you mean he can talk?" Scott said, going over to Derek, who looked at him in surprise while Scott sported a look of confusion and disbelief.

"Di-didn't-didn't you hear him? He just spoke!" Derek looked at everyone else for support, and Malia and Theo stepped in.

"I heard him, too," Malia said, Scott focusing his gaze to her.

"Me too," Theo said, "and strangely clear. He said that Thomas did it to protect him. It was an accident, or something. I'm not sure what that's supposed to mean--I mean, how do you accidentally separate wounds like that?"

"I know you're not lying, so I'm still on the 'he can talk' part," Braeden said, placing her hand over a still-shocked Derek's racing heart.

"Every time we think we know everything there is to know about him, we learn something new," Scott grumbled, stomping away into the woods.

"Where're you going?" Stiles called out.

"To clear my head!" Scott continued into the trees, not looking back. Thomas watched him go until he was certain he was far enough away, and then changed back. Painfully. When he was done, he was back to his muscular, naked self, sitting crisscrossed on the ground.

"I don't get him," Thomas said. "Why does he have such a problem with me?"

"We're still trying to figure that out," Peter answered, tapping the top of Thomas's head. He looks up at Peter in question.

"Shower," Peter whispers. With no complaint, Thomas stood up and followed him inside, but not before he looked back at everyone else crowded around Derek, who seemed to have been permanently silenced.

~○~○~

Inside in the shower, Thomas cleaned every part of his body, careful to follow Malia's and Melissa's instructions concerning bathing. He had gotten an earful from Melissa when she heard Thomas's telling of how he had been cleaning himself before and didn't want a repeat. The thought alone made Thomas shiver in spite of the warm water running down his body. Finishing the last of his rinsing, he stepped out of the shower and dried himself off, leaving his short hair for last. When he was done, he shook his head slightly, feeling the air rushing through the short locks. He didn't exactly miss his long hair, but the new weight had been disorienting for him at first, and even now it still felt weird to him. Looking at himself in the mirror, he conceded that the haircut wasn't that bad, even if he could see every scar on his face clearly, not hidden by a curtain of his matted hair. His gaze continued down to the rest of the marks on his body, both deep and shallow, given to him by the hunters he'd find near his home that killed for sport, and his mother the huntress that killed for pleasure. As he stared deeper into his own reflection, he recalled the times he would be so hungry, he would eat any animals he could find, raw, and be sick for days; the times he would be in so much pain from training, he'd beg for his mother to stop; the times he would be left to fend for himself, alone, in that house in the woods; the time he killed his first human being--

The moment that memory resurfaced, his heart started racing like it hadn't raced before. His breathing got heavier and his vision started to blur. Grabbing the sink for support, he only succeeded in breaking the two sides he grabbed hold of. He held up the chunks of ceramic in his hands before collapsing onto his side. He could feel a tightness in his chest, squeezing his insides tighter and tighter. He tried to regain control of his breathing but he couldn't, and instead closed his eyes in the hopes that whatever was going on would end soon. So much had changed for him in almost two months: he found out he had other family members, was given medical treatments, had a real bed to sleep in, was given good food to eat, was given his first toy in his entire life, was being taken care of and taught by a pack that mostly accepted him--when before, he had the floor to sleep in, wasn't given any attention except to check how he was doing training-wise, was given one can of food a day, and was always alone with no one to talk to except the animals. And the nights were cold, barely able to cover himself with a horribly threadbare blanket that smelled like skunk.