Please, Stay- A Stydia AU

Hello

Watching everything from a distance, being separated from her life, from her body was the weirdest thing Lydia had ever experienced. Lydia could only stand and stare as she watched Stiles stare at her helplessly from his chair.

"Please," he whispered, "please, Lydia..." His voice broke and her heart shattered at the impact of his words.

She held her hand up, feeling as if there was a wall of glass between them. But there wasn't.

And yet she couldn't reach him.

She stared at her unconscious body on the bed and slowly moved around to it. She looked oddly peaceful, even with the cuts on her face, the bruises on her arms. She looked like...

"Me," said a soft voice behind her. "You look like me."

Lydia's hand flew to her mouth in shock and she spun around. Sure enough, there he was. Tanner was standing in front of her. He looked older now, probably about twelve. But even with the eight year change Lydia would have known her baby brother anywhere.

"Tanner," she whispered, slowly reaching out. "You can't... You're not... Are you real?"

Tanner gave her a sad smile. "I'm real."

Lydia let out a strangled sob and stumbled forward. Her baby brother caught her and held her as she cried, her arms going around him.

Tanner hugged her close and whispered, "I'm okay Lyds."

"You're not okay! You're dead! I crashed! I crashed the car. It was me..."

Tanner pulled away from her enough to look her in the face. "Listen to me. It was not your fault." His eyes were sad but stern. "Lydia? It wasn't your fault."

"It was." Lydia nodded, her tears making it impossible to see Tanner clearly, and hardly at all. She stopped talking and quite nearly even stopped crying as the weight of her realization hit her. "You're not real. You're... You can't be. You're only four."

Tanner smiled softly, a slight playful spark on his face. "Lydia. I'm not alive. There are no rules."

Lydia looked back at Stiles sitting with her body, her stomach dropping. "I'm going to die." Stiles... She couldn't just leave him. He needed her.

"Not if you decide to fight." His hand rested on her shoulder. "Lydia... This is your choice. Stay... Or go."

She looked at Tanner, her eyes softening as she did. "I..." She looked back at Stiles. She didn't have much of a choice. Live, of course she had to live. But she felt tired, lost. And Tanner... She finally had Tanner. "How would I do it? Go back?"

Tanner gave her a small smile. "You have to fight, Lyds. It's not going to be easy. You're going to have to fight to wake up."

Lydia slowly walked to her body and crouched beside it, taking in every cut, every bruise. Then her eyes lifted to look at Stiles who was bent over her form, biting down so hard on his lip that she was surprised it wasn't bleeding.

His body language was obvious to her. Please, don't go. Please, stay with me. Please, I need you. Please. Please, please, please. I can't lose you too. Please, stay.

Her heart broke as she looked at her baby brother. Her eyes filled with tears as Tanner slowly bent down beside her. "It's okay, Lydia," he said quietly. "It's okay. You can say it."

"I have to try to stay," she finally whispered.

"No try." Tanner's hand cupped her chin, holding his eyes to hers. "That's making leaving an option. You have to have the fight to stay."