do you wanna bang heads with me? do you wanna feel everything?

[rockysmash]

"Daisy...it's a lovely name. And she's a lovely girl."

Rocky had to breathe carefully through his nose to keep his heart rate in check as he reached across the table to accept his phone back. "Thanks, Dad."

Richard Pang-Devereaux grinned at his son as they sat at the Italian restaurant just down the block from Still Waters, having lunch as they did every week to discuss pack affairs and catch up on family gossip. Try as he might, Rocky was clearly nervous, telling him about the girl he was dating, one of the Inhumans that the news continually touted as such a threat.

He was in love, he reeked of it, and behind his reserved, thoughtful mask, Richard felt a swell of fond empathy for his eldest child.

"I have to admit, the loyalty you inspire in your sister is a little frightening." Richard quipped, features deadpan. "She won't tell me a thing about her, and this is the first time I've been able to get you to say a word about your personal life in...how long has it been since Martha?"

"Her name was Mary--and I don't remember. A long time." Rocky admitted reluctantly, his gaze flicking down to the tablecloth, and his half finished cup of coffee. "But I had the pack, and that was enough."

Richard hesitated, peering at Rocky. "And now?..."

Rocky couldn't make himself look up for a long moment, watching instead as a waiter came up and topped off his coffee. Nodding his thanks, Rocky took a long swallow, letting the hot liquid soothe his shaky nerves as he braced for the lecture to come.

If he was going to tell his father about Daisy, about what she really was to him...now was the time.

Lifting his gaze, Rocky leveled it at his father...watching him reach for his own coffee cup, freshly topped off.

Tasting the bitter explosion of the poison across his tongue.

"Don't drink that, sir."

Richard stopped, the cup midway to his mouth as he raised an eyebrow. The title was reserved for pack business, which was done with.

"Rock?..."

"Put the cup down. We need to leave now."

"Not until you tell me--"

"The Alpha does not question the black wisdom of the Beta, he gives his left hand free reign to protect his right." Rocky hissed quietly, his eyes flashing gold for a brief instant. He prayed, willed, silently begged his father to understand, to obey.

Richard watched his son closely, brow creased with a frown...then, as Rocky watched, his father's nostrils flared, and his eyes went wide.

"By the Goddess..."

Rocky kept his breathing controlled as the waiter returned, placing their check on the table.

"Give our best to your alien whore."

Rocky stood abruptly, facing down the Watchdog in disguise with wild gold eyes and fangs visible when he sneered at the other man.

"You know what I am. Know this: I'm an alpha wolf who can handle a little wolfsbane, and a pack Beta whose job it is to do whatever I want with you in the name of protecting my people. That includes Inhumans, and the people they work for."

He leaned in, holding the other man's gaze.

"And I know what you look like." he whispered. "So run."

He stepped back in that moment, and gestured to his father. Richard got up from his seat, dropped a few bills on the table, and wordlessly followed Rocky out of the restaurant. As he did, he caught sight of at least three other men watching them far too cautiously, but he didn't react.

He followed his Beta until they were standing in front of Still Waters, and only then did he let himself be a father instead of an Alpha as he grabbed Rocky's arm in just enough time for Rocky to sag into him for support.

"You're an alpha." Richard breathed, reaching up to grab his chin and make Rocky meet his gaze. Already, Rocky was sickly pale and sweating, his eyes still wild gold as he lost control of his shift. "You didn't drink that much. You shouldn't be this sick yet."

Rocky shook his head, staggering back a little until the wall of Still Waters would support his weight.

"Those were terrorists, Dad." he choked out as a wave of nausea gripped him, followed by a stomach cramp so painful it bent him over double with a wild snarl.

"And I don't think that was ordinary wolfsbane."

* * * * * * * * * *

Rocky wasn't aware of losing consciousness. One second, he was talking to his father on the street, and the next he was staring at his bedroom ceiling...specifically, at a crack that came after one especially wild night with Daisy.

Mine.

Rocky shut his eyes and bit back a howl of agony as the wolf stretched inside his skin, threatening to rip him apart as it fought a losing battle against the poison in his veins. His heart was beating inside his own head, and he knew using his preternatural senses would only make it worse.

After all, he'd been poisoned by wolfsbane before.

"You're awake."

Rocky rolled his head to the side. His father stood on one side of the room, thumbing through his cell phone--Rocky's cell phone, he could make out the Captain America sticker on the back of his phone case.

"And you're--going through my phone." Rocky croaked. "I'm not sixteen anymore, Dad."

"Oh, you're not? You could have fooled me, you idiot boy."

Rocky just stared at his father as Richard finally found the number he wanted and dialed it, bringing Rocky's phone to his ear.

"Your sister told me everything."

Rocky shut his eyes, cursing quietly to himself as the silence drew out...and Richard spoke once someone picked up on the other end.

"I'm very sorry, Agent Johnson, but you don't know me. My name is Richard Devereaux...Rock is my son, and right now I'm going to have to ask you to return to Boulder City. He needs your help, and he may die without it."

Comments

[rising_tide]

Daisy had been battling a headache almost all day. The relentless aching reached the point that she voluntarily went to Simmons for something to ease it, and patiently endured the poking and prodding without complaint before accepting a low dosage of some migraine medication. She popped the pills, chugged a small glass of water, then stumbled to her bunk to try and sleep off the misery.

When her phone woke her up, she didn't feel any better; if anything she felt worse, like flakes of rust were rushing through her bloodstream, scraping across every vein and artery. If she'd had anything on her stomach but a glass of water, she was pretty sure that it would've come right back up as soon as she lifted her head. Still, when she realized it was Rocky's ringtone, she did her best to make her voice sound normal when she answered, to keep him from worrying.

"Hey you," she started to say, but the voice that cut her off was not one she knew. It was deep, brisk, to the point--and she felt like a block of ice had been dropped into her stomach.

The nap and the medication hadn't helped because there was nothing physically wrong with her. Not with her.

She clenched her jaw against the rolling nausea and crossed the cramped space of her bunk to yank open a dresser drawer, grabbing the first pair of pants she put her hand on. "What happened?" she demanded, putting the phone on speaker for long enough to hop into her jeans.

[dressedinhumanskin]

"Apparently, my son believes it was the work of terrorists." Richard replied, shooting Rocky a glare as he tried to sit up in bed. "Someone attempted to poison us both with wolfsbane--he drank it, I didn't. It's working far too quickly, however. Rock is an alpha, he should be more resistant."

"I'm not dead, I'd say that makes me pretty damn resistant." Rocky croaked, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed before another stomach cramp had him curling in on his own lap.

Richard swallowed thickly, his heart in his throat as he clenched his jaw, his own eyes flashing gold in the low light of the room.

"The pack's strength is his only hope of surviving this, Agent Johnson--apparently, that now includes you, as well. Whatever resources you have at your disposal to expedite bringing you to my son? Use them. Now."

He hung up after that, and dropped the phone on Rocky's nightstand before crossing over to sit on the edge of the bed beside him, draping an arm across his shoulders.

He'd nearly watched a woman cost his son his life once before: he wasn't going to allow it to happen again.

"Tilly!" he called out, raising his voice to make sure she heard him through Rocky's bedroom door. "He's trying to get out of bed, come help me put him down!"

"I'm your Beta." Rocky snarled, lifting his head just enough to glare up at Richard with wild yellow eyes. "I have a job to do. Those men need to die."

"And I will leave you to your work, Rock...once I'm sure you won't do the same."

[ras_le_bol]

Terrorists. Daisy froze, for a split second, her lips moving softly over the word Watchdogs. Maybe she even spoke it aloud, softly, little more than a whisper, before she resumed grabbing at clothing and yanking them onto her body. It didn't make any sense--the only men who'd left that warehouse alive--other than Rocky and Quinn--were in SHIELD custody. How could they have found him, much less how to hurt him?

"I can--" But she got no further, before the sharp beep of the call ending cut her off. "Fuck," she swore softly, hopping into a pair of shoes as she hurried out of her bunk.

She had some gear to grab--and a plane to commandeer.

* * * * * * * * *

At her husband's call, Emetilda Devereaux held a hand up as her daughter tried to follow her, shaking her head before she jogged back into the bedroom with a glass of ice water in hand. "Rocky Frederick Devereaux, you best be listening to your daddy," she drawled, setting the glass down on the nightstand and leaning down to take her boy's face between her hands. Her baby boy--her little miracle, all grown up into a handsome young man with a heart so big and so full of love--his face pinched with pain and slick with sweat, was breaking her heart with his stubborn determination, the strength of his loyalty and dedication threatening to kill him. "Do I need to remind you I brought you into this world, and you don't get to take yourself out of it by acting the fool."

[dressedinhumanskin]

"I'm not being a fool, Mamma, I'm being a Beta." Rocky protested, sagging into her hand as she held his face, then turning his head to nuzzle her palm as the stomach cramps started to ease a little. "I don't have to--listen to Dad when I'm--doing my job..."

Richard looked over Rocky's head at his wife when Rocky trailed off and sagged further, losing his train of thought as he started to lose consciousness again.

"Help me lay him down, bien-aimé." he instructed softly. "Then we'll try to get some water into him...I called the Johnson girl, she'll be here soon."

[ras_le_bol]

Tilly sniffed softly, leaning in enough to press her lips to Rocky's forehead. "He says that like the two're mutually exclusive," she drawled, the ever present acerbic edge to her voice doing very little to mask the worry beneath.

She nodded a little to acknowledge her husband's voice, but held on for just another moment, willing her baby to hang on, willing his girl to get a move on, willing the goddess to hear the prayers of a desperate mother and spare her boy.

"She has a name, Richard," Tilly scolded without venom, shifting to help lay Rocky back down on the bed. She smoothed his hair down, fussing with the pillows and the bedding so he'd be comfortable. "If Rachel's right, best get used to using it."

[dressedinhumanskin]

"That's if she's right." Richard replied, easily bearing Rocky's weight as they got him settled in bed. Morbidly relieved that Rocky wasn't conscious so he wouldn't have to suffer further, he lifted his gaze to Tilly and clenched his jaw before he let himself drop his guard and speak his mind.

"Mated pairs are as rare to our people as alpha wolves are to our family." he reminded her. "And it's even more rare for any wolf, much less an alpha, to find a mate in a human."

Still, as they got Rocky settled, as Richard moved to sit on the bed beside his son's prone form and reached out to lay a gentle hand on his sweat-slick brow...he knew in his heart that Rachel was right.

Though it wasn't concrete, he'd known since Rocky had saved his sister's life as a child, an act of power unheard of in fifty years or more...

"If Rachel's right," he confessed softly, his features stricken, "she may be the only reason he's not dead yet...and if that's true, and if he dies...I will hold her responsible for what we will lose."

Glancing up, he smiled at Tilly sadly.

"I live in fear that this could take two children from me, Till...Rachel's bound closer to him than she ever will be to anyone. What if she can't survive losing him?..."

[ras_le_bol]

"Our boy has a soft heart, but soft enough he'd romanticize a girl to that point?" Tilly blew a strand of hair out of her face, rested her hands on her hips and studied her son's pale, sweet face. "I don't know, chéri. I want to believe he's too smart for that."

She turned slightly towards the direction of the kitchen, heard the persistent sounds of chopping, grating, cutlery against pots and pans and bubbling liquids--and, beneath that, the soft, wet sniffles of her daughter's tears. "We don't lose him," Tilly replied starkly, in a tone that brokered no argument, as she bent down and wound her arms around her husband's shoulders, pressed her cheek to his. "Simple as that."

[dressedinhumanskin]

She really did make it sound as simple as that...then again, Tilly always had more faith than he did. Not faith in any one thing, just faith period: a universal belief that the scales would balance, that the good would overcome the evil...that the world would arrive to be the fair and wonderful place she was sure it could be.

Leaning into the touch of her cheek, he shut his eyes and reached up to squeeze her arm affectionately.

"You are a wise and optimistic woman." he mused, finally turning to face her so he could offer her a wan smile before stealing a kiss.

"Your husband is a lucky man." he half teased before patting her arm and finally standing with a sigh. "Come on. Let's see if we can pry Rachel away from the stove long enough to sit with him awhile until that Johnson--until Daisy arrives. Might do them both some good."

[ras_le_bol]

Part of it was that, but another part was sheer, unbending stubbornness. Tilda believed in having faith in a grand design; she also believed in planting your feet hard, sinking your teeth the bit and saying, no. Not this. Not today.

A contradiction, sure, but then she'd never claimed she wasn't a contrary woman.

"And he better not forget it," Tilly declared with a smirk, half-hoping her son would groan and tell them to stop being gross, as he surely would've if he'd been awake. "I'll go get her, take over at the stove." Maybe it was paranoia, but she didn't want Rocky left alone even for a handful of moments.

Squeezing Richard's shoulder one last time before she let her hand fall away, she moved from the bedroom towards the kitchenette, where Rachel was viciously stripping chicken meat from the bone, tossing the skins and gristle into a wastebowl. "Baby," she sighed as she approached, gently taking the knife from her hand. "Go sit with Rock for a while, kay?"

Rachel could only stare at her mother for a moment, struggling to swallow the lost and mournful howl in the back of her throat now that her hands weren't busy enough to distract her. She finally nodded, uncharacteristically quiet, and mechanically washed the chicken juice from her hands, not even bothering to dry them as she shuffled out of the kitchen. She passed Kieran, sitting at the kitchen table and watching her with a frown, Quinn sitting at Rocky's computer and staring at the screen as a video upload bar crawled to completion, then finally to the bedroom where her brother lay and her father stood sentry. "Daddy," she sniffled, unceremoniously flinging herself into her father's arms, her cheek against his chest and her teary eyes focused on Rocky's prone form. For a moment she felt like a four-year-old toddler again, caught in her earliest, curiously sharp memories of searing pain, her brother holding her tight, of her refusing to leave his bedside for weeks...

But he looked worse now than he ever had then, and that scared Rachel half to death.

[dressedinhumanskin]

Kieran watched Rachel pass him, still unsure what made him come, save for the stricken look his brother got when they learned that Rocky was ill...when he realized that Rachel would be affected, he found himself offering to drive Quinn without hesitation, then chopping vegetables in silence by Rachel's side while Mrs. Devereaux explained the severity of Rocky's situation.

Watching Rachel leave, Kieran sat there for a moment before standing with a sigh, moving to Tilly's side.

"Help ye with that soup, Madame Devereaux?" he offered quietly--just before a knock at the door sounded.

Frowning a little, Kieran turned to her and gestured that he'd get it. Heading for the front door, he checked through the peephole, briefly surprised to see a familiar blonde cherub on the other side.

Unlocking the door, he opened it with a curious frown. "Miss Erickson?..."

Keely stood, wringing her hands in concern as she looked up at Quinn's older brother, a Fire Unseelie that disturbed the hell out of her.

"Hi...uhm, Quinn texted me about Rocky? He said he would be here. I--I thought I should check on him..."

In the other room, Richard just held Rachel as tight as he could, trying to will what little power he had into his daughter, to strengthen her and give her the kind of comfort only an alpha by nature could provide...not a beta with enough tenacity to claim the title of Alpha for his own.

"I've got you." he whispered, rubbing her back and pressing a kiss to the top of her head. "And I did as you asked, little treasure. I called Agent Johnson...she's coming, all right? She'll come, and she'll help us save him."

He drew back a little after a moment, taking Rachel's tear stained face between his hands as he looked into her face.

"Until then, we'll take care of him. The pack will sustain him...and no one more than you, sweetheart. He'll beat this, and it'll be because of you, do you understand? There's no one else in the world he loves more than he loves you...now go. Be with him. Help him like you did when you were small, do you remember?"

[littlebopeeps]

Hearing the voice at the door, Quinn got up from the computer and shuffled up behind Kieran, unceremoniously shoulder butting his brother out of the way. "Hi," he said to Keely, butting at Kieran again and holding the door open for her. His tone was a bit flat, which seemed to make his accent even thicker than usual. "Prolly not proper t'invite ye into someone else's flat but if the fucker wanted veto power o'er that, shouldn'ta drank fuckin' poison."

Rachel nodded slightly, though she didn't think she'd really done anything. Rocky had saved her, not the other way around. He'd always been the strong one...

And now you have to be strong for him, she thought to herself, wiping at her cheeks and moving to sit down next to her brother, leaning down to nuzzle her cheek against his.

"I'm here," she whispered. "I'm here and Daisy's on her way, okay?"

[rockysmash]

Kieran glared at his brother, but said nothing--even when Keely followed suit and brushed past him to enter at Quinn's invitation. For a long moment she just stood there, staring into his face, searching for how he was truly feeling. With the fae, it could be hard to tell...

Except they felt pain soul deep. Sometimes even deeper than wolves could, so deep they couldn't admit to it.

Stepping forward, she reached up to wrap her arms around Quinn's neck in a solid hug, pressing her cheek against his.

"I wish I could make him better for you." she whispered in his ear. "But since I can't, I'll sit with you until he's okay again...you don't have to deal with this alone."

The touch made Rocky jerk, then draw a shuddery breath as he opened his eyes, wild gold and glowing, with no trace of human recognition in them.

"Rachel, careful." Richard warned quietly. "Wolfsbane strips control--"

Rocky growled, baring his fangs at Rachel as he sniffed at the air. When he got her scent, leaned up and sniffed at her nose, her cheek, he relaxed back into the bed, then shut his eyes and reached for her to pull her into his arms, tensing as a quiet, mournful canine whine off pain pierced the air of the room.

Richard grit his teeth, watching his son and daughter bond and suffer together...and quietly left the room.

She could help him more than Richard could.

It was hard to say how much time passed. Richard watched his pack, his family struggle to cope. The fae boys were part of it, despite what they might have believed (though Richard was watching the darker one closely around his daughter), and the petite blonde was a strangely quiet, steady presence as she simply sat, holding Quinn's hand or trying to make him eat some of the soup Tilly finished making.

He watched them cope...and between Rachel's sessions sitting with Rocky, he watched his son drift in and out of consciousness, sometimes lucid and others at the mercy of his wolf. Delirious with fever, he'd beg for Daisy or bite and snarl at those he couldn't recognize as pack. He watched his son slip away, second by second...

Until he was leaving Rocky's room at the same moment there was a frantic knock at the door.

He was there in an instant, opening it to reveal a small, windblown young woman with wild dark hair and oddly waxy features he didn't understand. She looked as if she hadn't slept in days, or like she might be sick herself...

"Agent Johnson, I presume." Richard greeted her stoically, stepping aside wordlessly to admit her into the apartment. "He's in his room with his sister. Go."

[rising_tide]

That Daisy managed to get there in one piece was probably a minor miracle. Her piloting skills with the quinjet weren't great, she'd forgotten to fasten her helmet before she'd gotten on her bike, she'd driven like a bat out of goddamned hell, breaking a dozen traffic laws between the Stark Industries building and Rocky's apartment...and with every passing second she'd felt worse and worse.

Daisy recognized the voice of the person that had answered the door, and if she'd been paying attention, could've spotted a few dozen facial similarities between father and son--but at the moment, he didn't matter. He got as far as He's in his room and Daisy was brushing past him, running straight for the bedroom, tossing her helmet aside, dropping a heavy bag full of expensive SHIELD lab equipment into Rocky's computer chair and shedding her leather jacket as she moved. Anything or anyone that wasn't Rocky, were just color and noise and things in the way.

Rachel lifted her head from Rocky's chest as Daisy came barreling into the room, pale and wild-eyed, and immediately disentangled herself from her brother's arms to move out of the way. Daisy's coat hit the floor with a soft thud of heavy leather as she moved into the room and immediately moved to Rocky's side, reaching for the hand resting on his chest. Awful as she'd felt all day, he looked worse than she could've imagined. "Oh, no, Bullwinkle," she breathed, pressing her lips together to fight back tears. "No, no, don't you do this to me."

[rockysmash]

The moment her hand closed around his, Rocky's prone, lifeless form came alive with pain.

His fingers clenched around hers without restraint as his breath hitched and he sucked in a ragged breath and let out a mournful lupine wail of pain as the beast clawed its way out of his psyche again and tried to take form in a body that couldn't physically handle the transformation.

Mate. Heal. Mine.

For a few long, terrible moments, he shifted between that haunting animal sound of agony and more human grunts and muffled shouts through clenched teeth and fangs at turns.

When he finally began to settle, his jaw went slack, his breathing slowed, and he grew silent. His eyes fluttered, head shifting restlessly against the pillow...

...until wild gold eyes finally blinked up at Daisy, his fingers curling more comfortably around hers as he focused on her very slowly. When her presence finally sank into his fevered mind, his sweat-slick face lit up with a smile.

"Hey, you." he croaked, then hazily registered that Rachel was still there through the foggy relief that came with no longer being in pain. Rolling his head against the pillow, he tried to find Rachel's face with a weak, wobbly smile.

"Rachel." he breathed, disoriented but visibly happy. "Rache--Rachel, look! Your cake...it worked."

[rising_tide]

Daisy held onto him as he thrashed and wailed, deaf to Rachel's cry of warning as she sat down on the edge of the bed and laid her hand on the side of his neck, gently running the bad of her thumb up and down the line of his jaw, soothing and steady while his body waged a painful inner war. His grip on her hand was so hard, she could've sworn her bones were grinding together, but she didn't feel the pain. His was too intense, white hot and raging, leaving her unable to focus on something as trivial as her aching knuckles.

Her fingers will still stroking his jaw and cheek when he went still, calmer and steadier, and her lips curved into a soft smile when his eyes opened and blinked up at her. "Hey you," she breathed, in reply, lifting their joined hand to press her lips to his knuckles. "I heard you had a touch of the poison. Didn't realize that was going around."

She jumped a little as Rachel burst into a laughing cry, crawling up onto the bed to lay her head on Rocky's shoulder and sob. "Y-you b-butthead," she hiccuped, deliberately wiping her nose on his shirt. "D-don't ever d-do that to m-me again!"

[rockysmash]

Rocky simply slid his free arm around Rachel's shoulders as she cuddled up against his side, keeping his hand securely in Daisy's. With her here, he could feel the blissful emptiness in her, the lack of pain or poison or anything but warmth and safety and pack. Rachel was full to the brim with that, but she was struggling with her own pain as well.

Daisy balanced those scales. With her hand in his, the pain stopped. He could pull on their energy, werewolf and human, and wrap it around himself like a blanket to keep the thing in his veins from eating him alive.

...the part that sucked was that the sudden absence of pain brought with it the sudden onset of total exhaustion...and he couldn't pass out, he had a job to do...a job he couldn't do...

"Not goin' anywhere, Rache." Rocky soothed, rubbing her back and pressing a kiss to the top of her head. For a long time, he just held Rachel against his side, and held Daisy's hand...until he started tugging at it, encouraging her to crawl into bed and curl against his free side.

He waited until he couldn't hold back exhaustion anymore--until the terror that Daisy would leave left him, until the certainty that he would live settled over him--before he turned his head to Rachel and whispered to her, only just loud enough to be heard.

"Daisy's my voice in the pack. I need you to be my witness."

Which would give Daisy to act on Rocky's behalf...to speak for him, to step in as pack Beta if needed, and most importantly, it would give her the power to tell his father what to do.

To keep his family safe from the Watchdogs...and he couldn't question it if Rachel told their father that Rocky said it.

Giving her shoulder a weak squeeze, he rolled his head towards Daisy, his wild gold eyes raw and open with a mixture of fear for his family and relief that he didn't need to be afraid.

"Take care of 'em." he whispered as his eyes fluttered, his body slackening as he slipped into sleep. "They're...your people...too..."

[rising_tide]

Rachel's mouth dropped open, and she lifted her head slowly to stare down at Rocky, blinking at both him and Daisy, who was obliviously resting her head against Rocky's chest, eyes closed as she listened to him breathing. She closed her mouth slowly and waited until Rocky started to drop off to sleep before she rolled off the bed and moved to the doorway of the bedroom. "Dad? Dad. Rocky made Daisy his voice. I heard him say it."

"What?" Daisy asked quietly, lifting her head and blinking down at Rocky. "Rocky?" She looked up at Rachel in confusion even as she smoothed Rocky's sweat-soaked hair. "What did he mean? What does that mean?"

[dressedinhumanskin]

Richard was on the couch with Tilly tucked against his side when Rachel stuck her head out of the bedroom to drop that bombshell in his lap.

A human was now the voice of their Beta, with an iron clad witness. What Rachel lacked in Rocky's brute ferocity, she made up for in her own voice: her word was beyond question.

And once the flash of rage faded, Richard understood the tactical nature of Rocky's decision.

Turning to kiss Tilly's cheek, he rose from his seat and headed slowly towards the bedroom, his features grim, but otherwise inscrutable as he moved to Rachel and kissed her forehead.

"Go sit with your fae boy." he instructed gently. "I need to speak to the Johnson girl alone."

Once he slipped into the bedroom, alone with Daisy, Richard said nothing for a long time. He just stared at his son, now fast asleep, and tested the change in the air. The room still smelled sickly and sour, but that underlying rot was gone. Rock's sleep was a healing one...a sleep he'd awaken from.

"Not all werewolf packs have Betas." he finally began softly, moving across the room to settle in a chair near the foot of the bed. "Those without have Alphas with absolute authority...a Beta answers to his Alpha, but in matters of protection and enforcement of law, the Beta is the true power. If Rock believes I am about to do something rash, that means he has the power to, as he loves to put it, tell me exactly how many corners to fold it into, and precisely how far to shove it. With impunity, I might add...and any mated pack member with title has the right to name a voice, someone that will serve the pack in their stead when they cannot."

He paused, lowering his gaze to stare at his hands as he wrung them methodically, elbows resting on his knees.

"In naming you his voice, he has given you the power to speak for him in our community. He has given you the power and responsibility of protecting those he loves most in the world...and he's given you absolute power over me."

Lifting his head, he regarded Daisy soberly, then offered up a wan smile as he spread his hands.

"I know my son...and I know he doesn't think I'll accept this declaration--that he has claimed a true mate. That said...I also know that this was the most effective way of protecting you from me. Until he can talk to me, explain to me...that this isn't anything like the last time he fell in love."

[rising_tide]

As Richard studied Rocky, Daisy found a momentary escape from the tense silence by ducking into the bathroom for a hand towel and a washcloth dampened with cool water. While he explained more of the finer details of werewolf politics, she blotted the sweat from Rocky's forehead and cheeks, then gently laid the folded washcloth on his forehead.

Stupid, but Daisy knew she hated being sweaty and gross when she was sick.

She straightened when he paused, tucked her hands into the back pockets of her jeans and waited...the only indication of her feelings the slight tightening of her jaw, the slight drop of her shoulders for a brief moment before she drew them back up again.

Okay. Fine. That was fine. Not the first time she'd been measured and found sorely lacking, and it probably wouldn't be the last. She'd kind of hoped his family would like her. But oh well. Rarely does anyone get the things that they want.

The tense silence stretched on a little longer before Daisy finally broke it. "He doesn't talk about it," she admitted. "Her. Whoever she is. But I'm here. She's not. Simple enough way to tell that I'm not like her."

[dressedinhumanskin]

Watching her with his son, Richard saw it before she said it: saw the gentle way she touched him, the careful way she nursed him with the simple act of mopping his brow. Rock's color was already improving, and Rachel was steadier now that she seemed satisfied that her brother would live.

"Her name was Carol." Richard replied, watching Rocky as he stood and crossed over to his bedside. Slipping his hands into his pockets, he stared down at his son's features, peaceful in repose, and was reminded of watching him sleep in his crib when he was still a baby.

"He loved her more than she deserved," Richard mused, "considering she tried to kill him."

Lifting his gaze from Rock's face, he watched Daisy's reaction to that news closely, gauging her response to that revelation.

[rising_tide]

For a moment, Daisy was sure she couldn't have heard that right. Bafflement came first--how could anyone who knew Rocky, who liked him and was liked by him, who he loved possibly want to hurt him?

Rage came second, teeth clamping together with a quiet clack, arms moving to fold tightly across her chest. She thought maybe now she fully understood Rocky's reaction to seeing the things Ian Quinn had done to her. She'd never seen the girl's face, but for a single, mad moment, she wanted to blot her existence from history and wipe any trace of her from the face of the planet.

"I'm trying, very hard, to remind myself that you don't know me," she managed to reply, forcing her jaw to relax. "I'm trying to understand where you're coming from, and I can even see how this...is kind of my fault. But there are some very, very vulgar words running through my head that you'd compare me to someone who would ever try to hurt him."

[dressedinhumanskin]

Watching her, the way her emotions played across her face and through her body language...the way her scent shifted...

It was suddenly, painfully hard for Richard not to smile.

"I'm not comparing you to that girl, Agent Johnson--Daisy." he corrected himself, his expression finally softening. "Rock never told her about us. When she found out, she put a silver blade in his belly. I'm telling you this because Rock is pack Beta. When harm comes to his people, he responds without hesitation, and with extreme prejudice. Where his people are concerned, my son is capable of unspeakable depravity, and keeping his actions discreet...he loved this girl, she turned on him...and that vicious, gentle beast had to call his father to save him."

He wipes a hand over his mouth pensively, then with a sigh he moves to stand before Daisy, resting a hand on her shoulder.

"And now I know that you're here to do that for me." he concluded quietly. "My daughter told me that you and my son are a mated pair. I'm not entirely sure that's possible, but he's certain enough to have claimed you, to let you claim him in return. I called, and you tore across the distance without question to be with him. I've watched you mop his brow, I've watched you stand up to his father...and I've smelled your lust for blood, knowing someone hurt him."

After a beat, he smiled gently.

"You may be human, but you have an alpha's spirit...and I think, perhaps, that you may be the second person to truly understand the heart of this pack."

As he said it, his gaze drifted to Rocky's prone form.

To the heart, the soul, of everything that Richard Pang-Devereaux held sacred in this world.

[rising_tide]

Daisy's brow furrowed in confusion, though it only took a moment or two for it smooth, realization and exasperation chasing each other across her face. "Because he wouldn't fight back," she murmured, running a hand over her face. "Of course he wouldn't." That would be just like Rocky.

Lapsing into a pensive silence, she sat down on the edge of the bed and took Rocky's hand and held it between both of hers. "The people that did this to him are members of a terrorist group," she explained quietly. "They call themselves Watchdogs, and they think they're eliminating threats to society: Inhumans, powered individuals, any group or person they consider deviant and threatening. Your son...saved my life. He and Quinn. A group of them attacked me and injected me with a toxin engineered to neutralize Inhumans. It kills in large doses. You may have your doubts about what Rocky and I are to each other, but. He heard me. He felt me dying and he crossed six states with Quinn to save me. Our biotech engineer said that toxin should've stopped my heart, but it didn't. He kept my heart beating. So if that's not this, mating bond thing, then I'm genuinely curious as to what it actually is."

[dressedinhumanskin]

"He felt--" Richard cut himself off, brow furrowing in confusion. What she was talking about...first off, Rocky hadn't said a word about it, but he wouldn't. As a Beta, it was his right, no matter what Richard thought of as his father. Secondly, he'd heard stories about it from his grandmother, how a genuine pack bond worked, how it could mix with other magics to become something unique to a pack...something that could make a pack unstoppable.

His head tipped curiously as he regarded her in a new light. She still looked haggard, a little pale...less than when she'd shown up, but the evidence was still there.

Crossing over, Richard crouched in front of her and raised a hand to gently catch her chin, tipping her head this way and that to better look her over.

"You've been in pain." he realized aloud. "Today, you've suffered with him."

Rachel was no fluke...and if they were truly mated, Rock wouldn't be scarred next time. If he learned more about how to use his gifts, he might even be able to mend the damage done so long ago.

Releasing Daisy, Richard's mouth twisted up at the corners, not quite a smile but very close.

"My wife is going to have kittens when she hears about this." he breathed, looking at Daisy with newfound warmth. "Rachel's strong in her own right, and they're so close--it could easily have been a fluke, but you're human. This is proof...this means it's true. He's really an alpha."

[rising_tide]

The lifting her chin and peering down at her, it was a very parental gesture that took Daisy by surprise. She blinked, then moved a shoulder in a half-shrug and nodded, a little embarrassed. "I'm not as...I'm not as good at it as he is," she admitted, biting at her lip. "I thought it was just me, like I was just coming down with something. I didn't realize what it was until you called me. If I had, I'd have come sooner."

In an almost absent gesture, she lifted Rocky's hand to her face just so she could butt her lips against their joined fingers. It made her sick to think what could've happened if he'd been alone. Her brow furrowed in confusion; he seemed...well, she didn't know Richard well, but she got the sense that for him, this was close to ecstatic. "I...guess I didn't realize that was in question," she admitted, lowering hers and Rocky's joined hands.

[dressedinhumanskin]

He flat out smiles at that, a quiet chuckle escaping him as he watches her brush her lips over Rocky's limp hand. Rocky responded with a sigh and a soft moan as he rolled over in his sleep, wrenching his shoulder into an awkward angle so his hand didn't leave hers, and he could somehow try to press his face against Daisy's hip at the same time.

"It's a complex situation--one I'll gladly explain when Rock wakes up." Richard assured her. "In the meantime, this bond you share can be used to help him heal. The pack bonds an alpha forms give him power, and the mating bond enhances that. Proximity strengthens bonds, physical contact deepens them...directly sharing energy with skin to skin contact." He held up a hand with a playful smile that she likely recognized as belonging to Rocky.

"Innocent contact--holding his hand, touching his face, and I only say that because Rachel and Tilly--Rock's mother--are going to want come in here and visit a bit. Now that you're here, he's strong enough to start fighting the poison, but you have a human immune system that can't fight it because it's not in your bloodstream. Lie with him for a couple of hours, and you should start to feel better. While you heal him...he'll heal you."

[rising_tide]

For perhaps the first time since she'd walked through the door that day, Daisy's smile was warm and real, free of strain or stress. "I'm not going anywhere," she promised, to both Richard and Rocky, shifting on the bed so that she could pillow Rocky's head in her lap, stroke his hair and his face with one hand and keep hold of his hand with the other.

For however long that would last, since in her experience (and she had a lot of experience at this point) Rocky slept like a restless golden retriever dreaming of chasing cats.

[rockysmash]

"...mine."

The muffled snarl came from Daisy's lap as Richard looked down to see a single golden eye popped open to glare at him warningly while Rocky shifted to hug Daisy's hand against his chest.

Richard let his smile fade and his eyes shift, a warmer honey than Rocky's bright gold, then lifted his head, looking down at him as he bared his throat in a sign of trust and submission.

"Yours, mon petit loud."

Rocky peered at him for a long moment, then that golden eye vanished again as he pressed his face against Daisy's leg with a low, rolling growl of contentment.

Letting his eyes change back, Richard smiled and looked up at Daisy again, shifting to get to his feet.

"There's chicken and dumplings if you're hungry--homemade." He offered, reaching out to lay a hand against her cheek, a brief but warm touch that served to scent mark her--a welcome from one packmate to another. "I'd offer you some...but Rachel will probably bring you some when she comes back in to say hi. Until I send her in, just rest. We have a lot to discuss once you're feeling better."

[rising_tide]

Daisy had to stop and think about it for a moment, to remember when the last time she'd actually eaten was; she vaguely recalled Simmons forcing her to eat a few saltines and sip some ginger ale before she would give her any medication. And now that she was thinking about it--and the malaise she'd been battling was starting to fade--food sounded pretty good.

"I could eat," she finally replied with a shy sort of half-smile, tightening her hold on Rocky, unwilling to let go of him just yet. "In a little bit. I'm okay right now."

[dressedinhumanskin]

Richard felt a paternal little twist of affection at that shy little smile, and returned her smile with one of his own.

"I'll tell Rachel. She'll ignore me." he explained good naturedly, reaching down to run a hand over Rocky's hair for a moment before he turned to leave the room.

Once he was out in the living room again, Richard let out a breath he hadn't been aware of holding as he faced everyone in the apartment.

"Rock will be fine." he assured them, letting his gaze settle on Tilly as his smile grew. "And the girl...she confirmed what we suspected all along. Rock is an alpha."

[ras_le_bol]

Unsurprisingly, Tilly and Rachel weren't shocked, given that they'd heard most of what was said, but Quinn sagged visibly in Rocky's computer chair and scrubbed his hands over his face in relief.

"You suspected," Tilly replied with a wry smile. "I knew. Mothers know these things. Rachel, honey," she called to the kitchen, where the steady thwack of a knife against a cutting board and the sweet tang of cut fruit in the air told her that her daughter was putting together a fruit salad. Was, more than likely, already putting a tray together to take in to Daisy. "Just calm down, I promise you we ain't lettin' the girl starve."

"She said she was hungry," Rachel protested with a huff, continuing to expertly slice and cube a mango.

[dressedinhumanskin]

Keely let out a breath she didn't realize she'd been holding, leaning over to hug Quinn as he slumped in relief. In the kitchen, where he was aiding Rachel again, Kieran let himself smile a little as he reached out to curl a damp hand over Rachel's, giving it a gentle squeeze.

Grinning as the room relaxed, Richard walked over to Tilly and pulled her into his arms, kissing her warmly.

"Let her fuss. The Johnson girl strikes me as the type to downplay things." Richard insisted. "Fitting that this pack's future Alpha should have a mate as stubborn and clueless as he is. C'mon--I want some of that soup you and Rachel were making..."

Rocky slept for the next two hours, hardly moving from his place with his head buried in Daisy's lap. When he did stir, it was with a foggy sort of confusion as he opened his eyes and tried to get his bearings with a flare of his nostrils and a squint into the semidarkness of the room. He was pale and haggard looking, but his eyes were bright and the fever was gone, as well as the pain.

He was at home...and he wasn't alone. He just didn't remember how he'd gotten there.

With some difficulty, he managed to tip his head to look up, blinking the rest of the room into existence.

"...Daisy? That you?"

[rising_tide]

Daisy didn't answer right away, though one hand was still tightly curled around his, the other still buried in his hair. She was tipped rather awkwardly against the headboard, dozing. When he stirred a little more, so did she, blinking her eyes open slowly. "Hmm? Hey."

She rubbed at her eyes, carefully eased up from the headboard with a wince. "S'okay, baby, I'm here."

[rockysmash]

Her presence was confusing, but not unwelcome. Giving her a sleepy smile, he turned to nuzzle her leg...then remembered his dad.

Tensing in her lap, Rocky immediately tried to sit up, but regretted it instantly as his head throbbed dully and his body ached.

Yeah, that definitely fit in with the last thing he remembered: telling his father not to drink his coffee.

"My dad," he grunted, resting his elbows on his thighs and holding his head in his hands while he waited for the aches and pains of his poison-ravaged body to fade, "someone tried to kill us. Did he listen to me? Is he okay?"

[rising_tide]

"You don't remember?" Daisy realized aloud, her sleepy mind doing its best to keep up. She moved with him as he sat, hands resting on his shoulders. God, his t-shirt was gross. When the fever broke, she realized, and he'd had to sweat it off. Now the fabric was patchy, dry in some places, damp in others. He needed a shower...and probably something to eat.

"Hey, s'okay," she assured him, craning her head to see if she could peer out through the bedroom door, catch one of his parents' or his sister's attention. "He's fine. Fit as a fiddle. You're gonna be okay."

[rockysmash]

Rocky sagged with relief, but then frowned, trying to think back to the restaurant. He remembered the taste of wolfsbane, telling his father not to drink it...

"I remember being poisoned, telling Dad not to drink the coffee...it gets fuzzy after that." he admitted, finally realizing he was a grimy mess as he rolled his shoulders, the sour smell of a sickroom making his stomach twist nauseously.

He was just drawing back to peel off his shirt when a soft knock at the door came, just before Richard stuck his head into the room.

"Rock?..."

Rocky pulled his head free of his shirt and looked up sharply. "Dad?..."

With a sigh of relief, Richard crossed the room nearly too fast to be clocked by human eyes, and an instant later he was bending over to embrace Rocky, who hugged him back tight, eyes shut as they pressed their cheeks together, openly scent marking each other.

"Welcome back to the land of the living." Richard laughed, drawing back to lay a hand against Rocky's cheek. "How do you feel?"

"I think I feel the way humans probably do when they get sick." Rocky groused, making a face at his father before reaching for Daisy's hand and glancing at her with a weary smile.

"Dad...this is my mate, Daisy." he introduced.

Richard chuckled a little at that, glancing over at Daisy with unabashed fondness for his son etched on his face. "Yes, we've met."

"She's awesome, isn't she?"

"Yes, Rock."

"Pretty, too, right?"

"She's sitting right there, son."

"I don't care. She knows all this already, I love her--right, babe?"

[rising_tide]

"Mmhmm," Daisy replied, shaking her head in amusement and reaching up to smooth Rocky's hair back from his forehead. Though in spite of her reply it was clear she was only half-listening to the conversation; all of her attention was pretty much exclusively focused on Rocky.

"Got a gorgeous bone structure, too," Tilly drawled from the doorway, breezed in to set a TV tray down on the dresser before she moved to her son and wrapped him up in a tight hug. "My boy's got good taste in ladies. Just like his daddy." She pulled back just enough to kiss his forehead--three times in quick succession, as she nearly always did--and cradled his face between her hands. "It's good to see your eyes, my baby."

[rockysmash]

Rocky let go of his father to reach for Tilly as she approached, enveloping her in a hug before she drew back to rain kisses on his face, the way she always did.

"Je vais bien, Mom. I'm okay." he soothed, kissing her cheek in return before he drew back and started to shift so he could swing his legs off the edge of the bed with a grunt of discomfort. "Or I will be, when I get a shower. I reek of wolfsbane and sick room."

"You nearly met the Goddess today, young man. Take it easy." Richard warned, finding Tilly's hand when she finally released Rocky long enough to let him try and move.

"I plan to." Rocky assured him, glancing back at Daisy for a second before turning back to his father. "Me 'n Daisy are a mated pair...until I'm well enough to serve you, sir, she speaks for me."

Richard waved him off with a smile. "You took care of that while you were still delirious with fever. Rachel witnessed."

Rocky breathed a sigh of relief, tipping sideways so his head fell into Daisy's lap again. "I love my sister. And I love my aconite-dopey brain." Tipping his head up, Rocky wrapped his arms around her waist.

"You officially have the power to boss my dad around. Don't let him bully you into doing didley dick if it's hinky."