#nutcracter | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

celestialvoid-fanfiction · 7 years

Text

Sterek The Nutcracker AU.

(The Nutcracker is my favourite Christmas tale, so I just had to)

Stiles is spending his Christmas with his extended family despite the growing tensions between certain members of the family – mostly his father and his grandfather (on his mother’s side). Stiles ducks away to hide in the library, sitting on the bench before the window and staring out at the rain that streaks the glass. The last time they were together as a family it was with his mother; and now that she’s gone, it doesn’t feel right.

His grandmother finds him hiding away and brings over a box. She tells him he can open his present early and, when he politely refuses, she insists. Stiles caves and opens the box, inside it he finds a wooden nutcracker.

He runs his fingers over the smooth wood, feeling the fine grooves in the grain and admiring the bold blue of the soldier’s uniform – something that he found interesting considering that most nutcrackers wore red. He opens his mouth to say thank you when his grandfather comes barging in. He sees Stiles with the nutcracker and starts shouting about how boys shouldn’t have dolls. He grabs the box from Stiles and tosses it across the room.

Stiles’ heart twists as he leaps across the room and pulls the nutcracker from the fire. He brushes the ash away and smothers the cinders that burn away at the wood. He ignores the howling voices behind him as his grandparents and his father fight. Instead, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a folded tissue. He presses it down and folds it into a triangle before fixing it around the nutcracker’s arm like a sling. He sets the nutcracker down in the box and carries it back to his room.

Later that night, Stiles can’t sleep. He collects the box and carries it downstairs, returning to his seat in the library and watching the stars dance across the sky. He heard the clock chime midnight but didn’t take his eyes away from the sky, the expansive darkness of the universe making him feel small.

It’s only when he hears shrieks of rage that he turns around and finds himself witnessing a battle between tin soldiers and mice, led by a king (Deucalion). The battle seems all but lost until another figure comes bursting into the fight. The nutcracker.

The mice retreat and the nutcracker follows. So does Stiles.

He finds himself in a land of ice that looks like a glass palace, the cold leaving him shivering as he follows after the fleeting figure of the nutcracker. Every step he takes seems to bring life to the cold earth, the blanket of snow melting away to lush green grass and blossoming flowers.

He steps into the light at the end of the tunnel and finds himself in a strange world. He begins to push forward, making his way through the war-devastated land and encountering those who live there. Along the way, he hears the legend of the prince who fought valiantly and the fae prince who would save them. They tell him of how the prince tried his best to fight off the prince’s army but he ran away and left his people to fear the wrath of the mouse king.

Eventually, he ends up at the castle and finds the nutcracker imprisoned, his broken arm pulled away from his body. He looks less animated and more like a doll. Stiles tries to fix him, but the nutcracker seems resigned to being broken.

Stiles refuses to give up on him. He half-carries, half-drags the nutcracker out of his cell and down the hallways of the castle until he finds himself cornered by the mouse king.

Stiles fights him off, refusing to fall down. But the mouse king gets the upper hand and Stiles is knocked down. The mouse king looms over him, sword raised and ready to be driven into the young man’s chest.

Stiles closes his eyes.

He hears the sword go through flesh but feels no pain.

Slowly, he opens his eyes and sees a shadowed man hunched over him, the sword driven through his back.

“No,” Stiles gasps, catching the nutcracker as he falls. He holds the nutcracker close, crying over him. He lets out a broken cry, bursts of light erupting behind his eyes and when he opens them again, he can feel the awakened power coursing through his veins. The mouse king is gone – obliterated – and so is the nutcracker. But, in his place, lies a man: Prince Derek.

The people of the land, realising that they’re free from the mouse king’s reign and that their princes never left them, rejoice. The festivities begin: singing, dancing, and joyous laughter.

From somewhere in the distance, Stiles can hear a clock chiming. He looks at Derek, meeting the young man’s gaze. He doesn’t need to explain because Derek seems to know, his face twisted with an expression of sorrow and loss.

Stiles looks around at the festivities and smiles. He turns back to Derek and asks, “Save me a dance?”

“I’ll be waiting,” Derek promised.

Stiles feels his body drifting back into reality where he finds himself curled up on the seat before the window, the glass misted with ice as snowflakes dance through the air outside. Stiles smiles and rises to his feet, noticing the empty box at his feet, the one that had once held the nutcracker. He picks it up, closes the lid and carries it back to his room before getting ready for the day.

Time seems to pass by without him noticing, his mind drawn back to that world of wonders, to Derek.

“Care for a dance?” a familiar voice asks.

Stiles bolts upright and looks at the man who is standing by his side, his hand outstretched.

Stiles blinks, confused. “Me?”

The young man – the nephew of Peter Hale – smiles and whispers, “I did promise I’d save you one.”

454 notes · View notes

celestialvoid-fanfiction · 7 years

Text

The Tale of the Nutcracker and the Boy With the Broken Heart

It’s Christmas Eve and Stiles’ grandmother gives him a gorgeous nutcracker that had once belonged to his mother. That night, Stiles finds himself caught up in a world of mystery and wonder as the Nutcracker comes to life and battles against the evils of the Mouse King, Deucalion.

The world outside was peaceful and quiet; the thin misty cloud rolling through the garden, consuming the trees and submerging them in a tranquil oblivion.

Stiles felt his mind drift as he stared out into the gardens, the grey silhouettes of large trees, hedges and rose bushes breaking through the fog. He watched as the droplets of falling rain struck the window, scintillating like diamonds as they caught the light of the setting sun that broke through the clouds. The rain bled together into glistening silver ribbons and coursing streams of water that trailed down the window.

Stiles pulled his knees up to his chest and let out a heavy sigh, letting his head lull to the side until his temple rested against the cool, misted glass.

There was a quiet squeak as the library door opened.

Stiles bolted upright, frantically wiping away the numb tear that caressed his cheek, sniffing quietly as he blinked back his tears and turned to look at the figure that stepped into the large room.

“Hey, sweetie,” his grandmother whispered as she crossed the room and sat down with him in the small alcove by the window. “Are you alright?”

Stiles nodded. “I’m fine,” he lied.

His grandmother looked at him sceptically but she didn’t push it any further. She sighed and let her weary brown eyes drift into the oblivion beyond the window.

“I miss your mother,” she admitted.

“So do I,” Stiles confessed, fighting back his tears. He felt his chest tighten, a strange absence leaving a gaping hole in his heart. He paused, listening to the muffled arguments from down the hall. “Grandpa blames my dad, doesn’t he?”

Stiles watched as his grandmother’s eyes filled with guilt, shame and pain as she muttered, “Ten years… I haven’t seen you in ten years because he refused to see your father…:

“And now that we’re here, they won’t stop fighting,” Stiles said dryly, looking across the room at the far door and listening to the trailing whispers of raised voices.

“Your grandfather and John… they never got along,” his grandmother explained. “Your grandfather thought your father wasn’t good enough for our daughter and he despised the thought to them being together. But they were in love; they got married and had you, and they were happy. That’s all that mattered.”

“He’s better now,” Stiles argued, his voice full of desperation and pain. Stiles felt his eyes fill with warm tears, his vision blurred by streaks of colour and flashes of light. He stammered over his words, fighting back his tears as he said, “He got help. He doesn’t drink anymore and he never gets angry. He’s a good man.”

He sniffed back his tears and rubbed at his cheeks with his damp sleeve.

“I know,” his grandmother said softly, reaching over and resting her hand atop of Stiles’. After a moment, she straightened her back. “Tell you what…” Her voice trailed off as she rose to her feet and shuffled across the room to where a large Christmas tree sat in the corner of the room, its branches decorated with ornaments that hung among the thin pine needles She crouched down and picked up one of the presents that sat beneath the tree, a dark blue box with a glittery silver ribbon wrapped around it. “I’ll let you open your present early.”

“But Christmas is tomorrow,” Stiles protested as his grandmother returned to his side.

“I know,” she said with a sweet but mischievous smile. “But this can be our little secret.”

Stiles smiled weakly as he took the box that she held out before him. He gently pulled at the ribbon, watching the silver bow unfurl. He opened the lid and looked at what was inside. Laying amongst the soft white tissue paper was an old wooden nutcracker.

Stiles gasped as he looked down at the nutcracker. He carefully reached into the box and brushed his fingers across the smooth wood, feeling the fine grooves of the grain and admiring the bold blue soldier’s uniform – a detail that struck him considering most nutcrackers wore red or gold – and the dark beard that was painted onto his square jaw. Stiles stared at his face, at the highlighted cheekbones and the glittering depths of the nutcracker’s aventurine eyes.

A sweet smile lifted the corners of his mouth as he looked up at his grandmother with tear-filled eyes.

“It’s perfect,” he whispered. “Thank you.”

“He used to be your mother’s,” his grandmother told him.

Stiles looked down at the nutcracker again, looking down at the face that seemed so real.

He opened his mouth to say something when the voices from down the hallway grew louder, closer.

“I’m only here for Stiles!” he heard his father shout. “And he doesn’t seem to want to be here and you clearly don’t want us here, so we might as well leave.”

The doors to the library flew open wide with a loud bang. His father barged into the library, followed by Stiles’ grandfather.

His grandfather’s eyes fell on the box in Stiles’ hands, on the nutcracker inside of it.

“What is that?” his grandfather growled, his icy blue eyes burning with rage as he glared at the present. “You gave him a doll?”

“It’s a nutcracker,” his grandmother corrected. “Claudia’s nutcracker.”

“It’s a doll!” his grandfather bellowed. “Boys don’t play with dolls. Do you want him to end up like one of those… one of those queers?!”

The old man lunged forward and wrenched the box out of Stiles’ hands. He hurtled it across the room.

The box struck the mantle, toppling to the ground with a loud crack. The nutcracker rolled out of the box and into the crackling fire. The wavering flames consumed the tissue paper and dragged their way towards the nutcracker.

Stiles felt his heart lurch into his throat, his gut twisting as he leapt to his feet and sprinted across the room. He dropped to his knees and pulled the nutcracker from the fire, frantically brushing away the ash and smothering the cinders that glowed against the charred wood.

Smears of black covered his bold blue uniform and his arm hung limp by his side; dislocated from his shoulder.

Stiles felt tears well in his eyes. He pulled the box from the ash and pushed the tissue paper into the flames. He cradled the nutcracker close to his chest, feeling his racing heart slam against his ribs. He ignored the howling voices behind himself as his father and his grandfather began to fight again while his grandmother tried to calm them down. He laid the nutcracker down in the box and carefully carried him out of the library.

He snuck out of the room, unnoticed, and made his way back to his room.

He shut the door behind himself and laid the box down on the soft blanket that covered his bed. He rummaged around the room, trying to find something he could use to repair the nutcracker. He spun around in circles until his eyes fell upon the box of tissues that sat in the corner of the room. He pulled out one of the tissues and folded it into a triangle before tying it around the nutcracker’s broken arm.

He sat back and admired his work. He let out a heavy sigh as he looked into the nutcracker’s glittering aventurine eyes. He let out a heavy sigh and whispered, “I’m sorry.”

Stiles tossed and turned, kicking at the sheets that coiled around his legs.

The arguments had died down a few hours ago and his grandmother had managed to convince his father to stay overnight at spend Christmas with them and their guests, but even as the quiet had settled and the house had been plunged into the dark of the night, Stiles was still restless; he couldn’t sleep.

With a heavy sigh, he kicked his feet free of the sheets and swung his legs over the edge of the bed. His feet landed on the soft carpet of his room. He rose from the bed and collected the small blue box with the nutcracker in it. He made his way out of his room and down the hallway towards the large library.

It was an extravagant room, the walls covered in large mahogany shelves that were full of old hardcover books, leather bound journals and other books that looked like antiques, all bound in magnificent colours of scarlet, burgundy, deep green, gold, and grey. The spines of the books were decorated by gold or silver lettering that read the titles, adorned with small metal studs and a few were even fastened with small hinges that looked to be made of brass or silver.

The shelves covered all the walls, large ladders on casters were scattered about the room where the occupants had last left them. Higher up, there was a small platform that stretched around the room, a mezzanine that allowed them to access another storey of bookshelves that the ladders couldn't reach. High above everything was a dome-like sky light, the slightly misted glass allowing the golden light of day to fall into the large library.

On the far side of the room was a small fireplace with a marble mantelpiece. Atop the mantelpiece sat a few of the sturdier-looking books, some candles and little reindeer ornaments that his grandmother brought out ever Christmas. The stockings hung over the fireplace in the living room, but the mantle of the library fireplace had a garland strung across it.

Stiles crossed the room over to the seat in the large bay window, crawling up onto the plush cushions and curling up in the corner. He set the box with the nutcracker in it beside himself and pulled his knees up to his chest.

He watched as the stars danced across the sky, shimmering as they drifted across they inky blackness.

He felt the cold air from outside seep in through the window, misting the glass.

He heard the grandfather clock across the room chime, the sound startling him and making his heart race, but he didn’t take his eyes away from the night sky. His gaze was locked on the expansive darkness beyond the windows, the immeasurable universe that left him feeling so small, and the longer he looked, the smaller he felt; as if he were shrinking away from the windows and away from the world around him.

It was only when he heard a loud shriek did he turn around, his eyes growing wide as they fell on the sight before him: the violent battle between tin soldiers and mice that were the size of men.

The soldiers’ heavy boots thumped against the wooden floorboard as they marched towards the mice. The rodents charged forward, tackling a few tin soldiers to the ground and biting into their limbs while other tin soldiers were knocked to the ground and trampled by the rampaging creatures.

Behind their ranks, a large grey rat stood proud, his mouth pulled back in a cynical smile that exposed his jagged, rotting teeth. Patches of his ratty fur had been torn away, exposing flesh and scars, but the most noticeable thing about him was his pale grey eyes that caught a glint of red in the light and the small crown that sat, lopsided and crooked, atop his head.

Stiles watched as the mice rose up on their hind legs and slashed at the soldiers with their claws or grabbed a hold of their necks and wrenched them to the side with gut-wrenching cracks, letting the bodies of the tin solders crumble to the library floor.

The library became a slaughter house: soldiers were impaled by small swords and torn to shreds by the army of mice, their limp, lifeless bodies tossed aside as the mice tore through their ranks.

Stiles froze. His heart thumped in his ears as bile rose into his throat.

His mind screamed at him to run, but his body felt numb. His feet began to move beneath him as he slowly walked forward, drawn towards the onslaught as if it were a twisted nightmare.

A mouse ran towards him, it’s arms raised high and its teeth bared. It screeched and growled as it drew closer, saliva dripping from its mouth like a feral creature. It halted midway, its body frozen in shock as a small droplet of bright red blood dripped from its mouth. Stiles’ eyes fell to the pointed end of a sword that was protruding from the mouse’s chest. Its limbs jerked as the sword was torn free of its corpse and the dead mouse collapsed to the floor.

Behind him, a soldier in a bold blue uniform stood victorious.

Stiles slowly lifted his gaze, his eyes falling on the soldier’s wooden limbs, one arm resting in a sling, and the charred fabric of his uniform. He looked up at the soldier’s face: he had short black hair and a shadow of a beard dusting his firm jaw. His wide-set eyes were pale beneath his dark brows, his sparkling irises shifting colour in the light; from hazel to pale aventurine, to a shade of light blue – clear, bright and focused, darkened by the lingering shadows beneath them.

The Nutcracker.

He was calm and composed and focused as he looked down at Stiles.

“Run,” he said, his voice deep and husky as it rolled through Stiles, melting the ice in his veins. “Run and hide.”

He didn’t wait to see Stiles’ reaction; he adjusted his grip on his sword and ran back into battle.

Stiles flailed about, stumbling backwards. His feet hit the ground. He used a hand to steady himself, leaping to his feet and tearing into the darkness. His legs pedalled beneath him, staggering and aching as he struggled not to stumble or trip as he sprinted away from the massacre.

He ran towards the large tree and skidded to a halt below one of the lower branches.

Realisation struck him as he looked at his reflection in one of the glossy baubles: the mice were not as large as men; he was as small as a mouse.

He sprinted into the shadows beneath the enormous Christmas tree and crouched behind one of the presents, peering around the edge of the box as he watched the Nutcracker charged into battle, wielding his sword with precision and skill despite only being able to use one arm.

“Deucalion!” the Nutcracker howled above the deafening calamity of the battle.

The old rat with the crown on his head spun around, his face contorted with rage as he looked down at the Nutcracker. He let out a deafening screech and the army of mice began to retreat towards the hole in the skirting board.

The Nutcracker tightened his grip on his sword, kicked up his heels and ran after them.

“Hey,” Stiles shouted across the room, scrambling to his feet and sprinting out from the shadows beneath the tree. “Wait!”

Stiles felt his legs ache in protest as he ran faster, tripping over the hem of his pyjama pants as he sprinted across the library. His bare feet slapped against the polished hardwood floors as he forced himself to run faster after the fleeting image of the Nutcracker and into the darkness beyond the hole in the skirting board.

[~AO3~] [~Support Me Through PayPal~]

41 notes · View notes