i just think ur brilliant in all ur theories, so quick question. How do you see a pre-fire Derek? U say a lot that Laura is this social, queen B type, how do you think Derek was perceived at school. and do you think if the fire was avoided, like they caught Cate's intentions ahead of time, do u think he and Stiles would still have this raw, unshakable connection? Would Stiles and Derek still be, Sterek?
I think about this a lot, actually. Whenever I see alive!Hale AUs, or alternate realities where the fire never happened. And there are two ways of thinking about this –– one is that your experiences, your history, your choices… so much of who you are is made up of what you’ve done. So if you take away such an essential part of Derek’s past, if you take away the fire and the betrayal and the loss and the guilt, he would be a very different person, at least on the surface. And so many of the reasons fandom fell for Sterek and saw them fitting together –– their shared understanding of loss, their guilt, the things they would recognize in each other and help each other through in ways no one else could hope to touch –– wouldn’t exist in that world.
And the other is that… I can’t picture any universe where Sterek aren’t meant for each other.
In all honesty –– and this isn’t just my shipper heart talking –– I don’t think that Stiles and Derek wouldn’t connect. I think they’d just connect differently.
We get a few glimpses of pre-fire Derek, first in “Visionary” where he’s shown to be athletic, popular, sporty, and self-confident. Now, this was “Derek as described by Peter” so the flashbacks could be suspect, but fact is that the Derek shown in “Visionary” is pretty on track with the one we see later in “117,″ so I think we can take it as truth. Sporty also makes sense with Derek’s general athleticism and fondness for showing off (his flips, sudden appearances, and leaps down flights of stairs throughout the series aren’t strictly necessary). And I think Derek would probably seek popularity and social contact for the same reasons he sought out Kate later –– to fill a void, to feel important and needed in ways he wasn’t getting at home. I think a lot of teen Derek’s personality, even pre-fire and pre-Paige, probably wasn’t as carefree as it seems on the surface.
Laura was always a big set of footsteps to follow in, and Derek did what he could to live up while always feeling a little bit like an outsider. The fact of hiding Paige instead of telling his family, the fact of thinking that turning her so he’d have someone to love and understand him completely was a great idea, seems to point to that, doesn’t it? And again, going to Kate later when he was looking for someone to cling to… Derek wasn’t someone who felt comfortable confiding in his family.
Most important for this question, though –– in “Visionary” we’re shown the type of person young!Derek’s attracted to…… and it’s someone exactly like Stiles. I mean… seriously, the show couldn’t have created someone who reminds me more of Stiles if they tried (let’s be honest, they probably were trying). Derek has always been intrigued by the outsider, the unconventional. By clever, sharp-tongued people who call him out on his bullshit.
And I think that first part of it –– being drawn to the outsider –– is probably because Derek’s always known deeply what it is to be an outsider. No matter how popular he was or how many trophies he won, he could never be fully honest with his friends… and he could never quite feel good enough for his family.
(He was always loved by them, I’m not in any way calling the Hales a bad family or particularly neglectful, but I do think that Talia’s attentions were often elsewhere –– with Alpha duties and with training Laura. If she sensed any issues going on with Derek she would drop everything to help him, but there was always a lot taking up her focus and sometimes –– being the type of person to internalize his problems, I don’t think that’s something that just started post-fire –– he would just… slip through the cracks.)
But anyway, the next major piece of evidence that Sterek would connect, even without the fire, is that we actually see Stiles interacting with pre-fire Derek for an entire episode during season four. And it’s a different sort of connection in a lot of ways –– Derek’s more cheerful, more trusting (which you can see just baffling Stiles repeatedly)
but in a lot of ways it’s also not.
Pre-fire Derek is undeniably different, and an no fire!Derek would be just as different. But I have no doubts that he and Stiles would be just as drawn to each other, even if their connection isn’t quite the same.
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