The Preserve was quiet around Liam, offering little resistance as he barreled through the underbrush. Thorns grabbed at his fur, but he hardly felt them as he tore through the blackberry patch, ignoring when he stepped on a particularly dried branch. His paw stung momentarily, though the cuts were healed before he finished his next stride, leaving barely a drop of blood on the forest floor.
He had been out for hours, racing through the trees like a greyhound around a track, trying to catch something he was never really meant to. His pace never faltered, not even when his legs ached, and his lungs struggled for air. Stopping was out of the question. Running was the one blessed reprieve, muting his wolf's desperate, mournful howling or the need to rip into his chest and fill the void sitting there with his own claws. Nothing else worked. Either it wasn't physical enough to engage him or the wolf would take over.
Snarling, he pushed forward, shoving the wolf's whines further into his mind. All his muscles burned at the redoubled effort, protesting unanimously, screaming for a break as the Preserve flew past him. His wolf was almost quiet, nothing but a gentle hum of instincts in the back of his head, reminding him of the gaping hole in his heart.
Only when his legs gave out did he stop. Not that he had much choice. Sprawled on his side, flanks heaving with the effort of getting oxygen back into his system, his legs shook even without an ounce of weight on them. Even moving them an inch or trying to steady them hurt. Liam took a deep breath, flopping his head onto the dirt with a solid thud.
Everything was quiet, blissfully quiet.
A shuddering breath rattled from his partly open mouth, leaving him near gasping for air again, eyes scrunching tight. The numbness that had come to cling to him incessantly lifted, letting a new wave of tightness take hold of his chest, compressing his lungs and starting a prickle behind his eyes and in his nose. He let out a low whine, shutting his eyes and flattening his ears to his skull. Wolves couldn't cry, but over the last six months, Liam almost proved that fact wrong.
Six months.
Half a year.
Half a fucking year.
Theo had been gone for half a year. A new whine pushed forward, sliding easily from his mouth, pitching up as his wolf chimed in, almost howling. He pulled his legs in, curling his body into as much of a ball as possible. Every minor adjustment or shift in his position burned. Not that he much cared beyond how each stretch further tamped down the wolf, giving him a few more seconds of silence, another heartbeat where he could let himself feel around the ragged edges in his chest, grab at them with both hands, and scream into the void that sat there, waiting to be filled again.
The longer he lay curled in the dirt, the more he began to shake. Little gasping chokes punctuated the tremors, barely forcing air back into his lungs before it escaped in another keening whine. Fur melted slowly away, followed by the cacophony of rearranging bones and sinew, leaving Liam covered in dirt from head to toe, burying his screaming sobs in the ground. He stayed there, emptying his soul into the forest floor until beads of blood splattered the dirt, his throat long past raw.
As his breathing steadied, he lifted his chest, resting on his heels. The rush of blood to his head made him sway, the world spinning for a moment. Liam shook his head, getting to his feet slowly, mindful of how sore his body was as he moved. Several careful stretches later, and he started back toward the parking lot, pace steady but controlled.
Dwindling sunlight filtered through the trees as Liam stopped at the foot of a particularly gnarled oak. His fingers ghosted over the triangle carved into it at waist height before he knelt beside the roots, fishing underneath one of the larger, more protruding ones. He pulled out one of the clothes stashes he restocked, biting back a whine as he opened the bag and slid on the clothes. They were his own, freshly washed before he had stored them. Most of the stashes were now. His hands shook as he gripped the empty bag, swallowing back the vestiges of tears that wanted to escape.
The time for crying was done. He had to get back soon. Everyone hated when he went out like this, citing it as too dangerous, with Fallon still out and about. If he was honest, Liam almost hoped she would find him one of these days and take him, but that was unlikely. They had barely caught her hide or hair across the entire country since the night they attacked the foundry.
He stuffed the bag in the pocket of his sweatpants, unable to smooth the grimace that had cemented itself on his face. It was his fault. All of it. Scott getting captured and Theo being used as a walking WMD; his fault. The supernaturals Fallon was using Theo to kill; his fault. If he had just been a second faster, or hell, not alone in the damn woods that seemed hell-bent on being the source of everything awful in Beacon Hills.
A frustrated snarl echoed through the trees as he started again, moving faster, fueled by the anger thumping through him. It always aggravated his wolf when he got like this, too tired to run but too angry to be calm. The animal part of him was just pent up and missing his anchor; it couldn't understand the guilt's transformation into anger. He barely did.
The ever-present rock in his stomach shifted, sending a pang through his chest as the blue truck appeared. His pace slowed in answer, feet dragging over the ground with each step. Leaving was the most challenging part, not because of how exhausted his body was or how far he usually had to go to get back. No matter how far or hard he ran, everything was always waiting for him at the edges of the Preserve, exactly where he had left it.
No one else dared touch the vehicle, even just to bring it into town. The chimera was beyond possessive of the vehicle, often threatening any of the younger members if they so much as looked at it 'wrong.' It made a little more sense now, given that he had found essentially all of Theo's belongings stuffed under the seats. Now he was only driving it to keep the chimera from murdering him if it fell into disrepair.
He stopped at the tree line, eyes narrowed at the Jeep parked beside the truck. Of course, Stiles would want to talk about his outburst. What more was there to say that he hadn't covered in the last six months? He was angry, and that was unlikely to change anytime soon. Peter knew what he had been getting into, trying to train him. Everyone told him it was a bad idea, even Malia.
He wrenched open the rear driver's side door, wincing apologetically at the force. His chest tightened, squeezing the air from his lungs like a vise grip wrapped around him, a pained wheezing filling the truck. Once upon a time, the first week after being brought home, he had melted into the waterfall of Theo's scent that would rush from the cab. But now, after nearly half a year, it smelled more like Liam than the chimera.
He hated it.
"What do you want, Stiles?" He asked, doing his best to keep the growl creeping up his throat out of his voice.
When no answer came, he pushed off the frame, turning with a heavy sigh. He froze, mid-movement, not expecting the human to suddenly be behind him, one hand white-knuckling the door as he caught Liam's eyes with his own, a renewed fire in the amber irises.
Stiles grinned at him, a half-quirk pulling at one side as he inhaled, "You ready to get our serial killer back?"
—
Liam leaped up the steps, landing in a heap on the McCall porch. Once again, his chest was heaving, struggling to get air in, but this time for an entirely different reason. The whole way to the house, he could barely keep from letting what little oxygenated air was getting into his lungs out in relieved sighs or bouts of disbelieving laughter that morphed into more tears running down his cheeks. Then, within a heartbeat, he was up, all but throwing himself through the door, drenched in sweat and face flushed what had to be a brilliant shade of crimson with how hot it burned.
"You found him?" He panted, locking eyes with Scott, ignoring the whole house between them.
The answering nod went straight to his knees, buckling them beneath him. A breathy laugh pulled from deep in his chest with a lightness he hadn't felt since before they took him.
"Did you run here?" Jackson asked from behind him.
Without turning or standing, Liam raised a thumbs up above his head, clearly visible to all. Several of the pack sighed and groaned while a few others hummed happily.
"Told you," Lydia said, patting Liam's shoulder as she moved past him. "Losers, pay up with your respective counter-bet."
Another light laugh peters out as he shifts his weight, leaning into whatever solid surface was behind him, letting his breathing and heart rate stabilize. The whole house feels electrified, heartbeats spiking everywhere and constant waves of refreshing relief rolling off everyone. It was jarring against the stale swampiness of the anxiety and fear that had become near constant in the house. Even Derek was getting swept up in the change in atmosphere, letting a ripple or two of his own slip through.
Stiles and Mason came racing through the door as Liam lifted himself off the floor, bathing the room in their awkward mix of hyperactive elation, eliciting an actual chuckle from him. It was the first in months, and it felt good. Mason was on him in seconds, wrapping him in a bear hug that might actually have hurt if he were human.
"We did it, Li. We found him," Mason said, voice pitching from the sheer emotion trying to escape through the words, loosening his embrace only to ground his hands on Liam's shoulders.
He nodded, eyes welling up again as his wolf howled happily, damn near singing. He hadn't felt this light or hopeful in a long time.
Eventually, the pack migrated to the living room, everyone squishing into it yet again, but this time no one seemed to mind the closeness. Liam sat with half his butt off the couch, allowing Corey and Mason to squish behind him, both boys essentially occupying the same space, contrary though that may have been to physics.
"How do we get him out?" He asked once most of the noise had died down.
Stiles made a face, mouth twisted and eyes half-squinting, "Well, that's a little bit of the tricky part."
"And the rest of the tricky part?" Liam asked, browline scrunching in confusion.
"Well, that'd be what we're gonna do with anyone there that isn't him." Stiles looked pointedly at Scott.
Killing was not the way of the McCall pack. The sentiment had been reiterated time and time again, to the detriment of many. However, if any of the hunters involved were allowed to disperse, the whole supernatural world would face a new kind of threat, one they couldn't prepare for or fight.
"We can't just kill everyone there, that's not an option, but I know we can't leave everyone alive," Scott sighed, a pained frown deepening in the worn ridges of his face.
"The leader, Faline or whatever her name is, needs to be a primary target," Stiles said, licking his lips nervously as he watched the alpha, heartbeat running wild. "She's the one that came up with the plant and how to brainwash the wolves. Without her, there's a slim-to-none chance anyone can replicate it."
A grim silence took over the room, all eyes expectantly resting on Scott. Liam dropped his gaze, worrying at the side of his lip with his canine. He would have broken, crumbled to pieces, under the weight of all the stares and expectations that came with them. How Scott had been doing this since he was seventeen blew his mind.
"I agree."
Chris stepped forward, shifting the attention away from the alpha, pulling all the strategic minds closer to the table. Their plan had to be perfect, down to the last detail. There was no room for error. Tracking her down had taken far too long for them to lose her again.
"Liam should be the one to get Theo out," Mason said, from behind Liam, putting a hand on his friend's shoulder.
"Wha- No, he's got no business going on this mission. He's a loose cannon," Chris stated, voice level and emotionless, leaving little room for argument.
Mason shifted behind Liam and cleared his throat, "His anchor is the only thing guaranteed to reach Theo, no matter whatever crap she's put him through. So if we're going for easier extraction, Liam has to be there."
This time, all eyes landed on Liam, watching as he stayed statue still. The lightness from the relief was gone, evaporated by the bomb his best friend had just dropped on his lap. Not only had Theo been spewing shit tons of bull all over him these last couple of years, but he had also been talking with Mason about the truth.
The rest of the planning session flew over Liam's head as he sat back, trying to mull over the newfound knowledge that the chimera felt the same way in silence. They were mutual anchors. Mutual anchors. Behind true alphas, they were one of the rarest phenomena in the supernatural world. To be that deeply bonded to someone, to ground them that same way they ground you, left little room for interpreting the way his heart had been aching long before Theo disappeared.
—
The Nevada night air nipped at Liam, biting through his hoodie with ease, carrying a new wave of scents. There were far too many to parse through or name individually. One scent stood out from the rest, almost sending him to his knees every time he caught the barest hint of it. Even a perfume shop couldn't hide Theo's scent. The awkward mix of bitter mustiness and decaying wood was unique. The only similarities between Theo's smell and anything else Liam had come in contact with were Corey and Hayden, before the bite, and the Dread Doctors. The caustic chemical haze surrounding their sewer lair was difficult to forget. About as hard as forgetting what their longest-living chimera smelled like.
Which, for the record, was impossible, but he had forgotten just how much it affected him. Going from six months without it to getting sucker-punched by it with every shift in the winds was more than a bit distracting. The constant pull of his wolf's attention every which way made standing still very hard. Even gluing his eyes to the well-lit fence beyond the sparse brush, watching the little blobby silhouettes moving around and beyond it, wasn't keeping him focused.
Another brisk breeze blew past him, stirring dust in its wake, making him splutter as his eyes burned from the dirt getting in them. The desert was as uninviting in person as it sounded in descriptions, too open for comfort and too noisy to be peaceful. At least in the Preserve, the trees muffled the sounds of whatever lived there. Granted, in terms of surveillance, other than the lack of stealth, the desert had served them better.
Weeks of periodic check-ins, verifying yet another lead from a less-than-reputable source that Chris had warned them might dead end yet again, eventually led to a more constant surveillance crew rotating between sections of the pack. They knew the base was somewhere in Nevada because the highest concentration of heartless bodies was in adjoining states, and three of the bodies came from a single, multi-species pack that hid in Death Valley. They almost gave up on this one, though.
Sure, it was a base; that much was evident from the ditches worn into the dirt by perimeter patrols following the same route day after day, but there hadn't been any sign of Theo or Fallon anywhere near it, not for a whole month.
Until Malia, of all people, caught the missing chimera's scent last week.
Three phone calls later, everyone had flocked to or was planning on flocking to the state in a matter of hours, converging in a small town a little over an hour away. Other members of the Argent family, distant cousins, Chris had said as he ushered everyone into the farmhouse, housed them, promising discretion and support. Allison's motto had reached far beyond just her father, seeping into many corners of the hunting world.
Liam shook his head, returning his attention to the dead swath of land before him. He was more than glad for the tens of other bodies littering the pack's line as he took a deep breath. Counting the number of scents, let alone the number of voices echoing on the night breeze from the mess of buildings some two-hundred yards away, was impossible, but he tried anyway, needing the distraction.
His wolf was stirring up all kinds of storms in him, mostly due to the proximity to Theo but not being allowed to charge in and rip the chimera from their hands. Hadn't he been prisoner long enough? It took all of two weeks for the pack to find him and Scott, plan an attack, and get them out. It wasn't fair. Patience might have been a virtue, but to Liam, it only served to set his insides progressively more on fire with every day he had been forced to stand by, watching the ins and outs of the base without intervening.
He took a deep breath through half-gritted teeth, swallowing back the wolf's frustrations only for the emotion-thick air to choke him. His half-aborted breath sputtered out of him in a short gagging fit of coughs. Scott's worry was the strongest, near palpable, and tinged with a bitterness he didn't often smell from his alpha. Not anymore, at least. When he was first turned, Liam thought fear was just an ingrained part of Scott's scent, a by-product of growing up with his best friend being a danger magnet and somehow still human amongst all the shit they went through. The years since then and now had proved him wrong as the heavy bitterness had lifted, a refreshing crispness finding its way back into the overwhelmingly honey-tinted scent that just was Scott when Isaac had moved back.
Stiles wasn't much better in terms of how overpowering his chemosignals were. Though the worry in Scott's was replaced with the human's ever-present anxiety and nearly overridden by the sharpness of his anger. A hint of a curve broke the schooled, stern line of Liam's lips as he glanced at his friend and mentor, grateful he was busy looking through infrared binoculars. Righteous anger rolling off this particular human was about as normal as the anxiety, but finding out Theo was the cause of it had thrown Liam for a bigger loop than he liked to admit. Even months later, he hadn't gotten used to it, but that probably had to do with the unyielding intensity of it.
Between the anger and fear saturating the air, his head started to pulse. The only ones not contributing to his growing headache were Isaac and Chris, which made sense since the hunter trained him. He huddled closer to the older beta, willing the calm in his scent to soothe the edges of his fraying nerves. Seconds ticked into minutes, but the buzzing beneath his skin stayed the same.
Liam sighed, shoulders deflating, "This isn't going to end well, is it?"
"Most likely not, no," Stiles answered flatly. A low hiss of pain followed on the heels of his shrug. "Ow! Why the pointy elbow to the ribs? We agreed not to lie to him? He asked; I answered."
"You really need to work on your tactfulness, dude," Scott sighed, his brows deeply furrowed.
The picturesque facade crumbled before Liam's eyes, exhaustion creeping into the alpha's eyes as worry lines cracked across his features, the suffocating fear around them worsening by the heartbeat. He's never felt his alpha be this afraid, not since anuk-ite, and even that was less unsettling because at least he knew it wasn't real fear.
Liam's mouth opened, You okay?, balancing on the tip of his tongue, only to be swallowed down when Isaac turned, blocking Scott from his view, slowly shaking his head.
"There are times for questions and times to let someone sit. This is one of the sitting times for him," Isaac said, a sad half-smile tugging at his lips as he looked at his mate. "He hates these kinds of things. Too many chances someone won't come home."
A pang of grief shot through the air, making Liam's eyes water at the potency of it. He nodded, wiping at the edges of his eyes. The whole pack understood the gut-curdling fear of loss. Everyone had lost something along the way in the last several years. He couldn't fathom the depths to which his soul would die if he and Theo were together, and he had felt him die in his arms.
Lydia's wail broke the silence, echoing across the desert, the spark setting off the powder keg that was the pack. He was moving before he fully processed the sound. Around him, the ground surged forward, alive with the rumbling of nearly two dozen supernatural creatures barreling through the desert, flanked by a not insignificant legion of hunters on four-wheelers. The pack had spread entirely around the fenced-off building group, cutting off exits and ensuring every last hunter got caught in their net. Liam hardly felt his feet skim across the ground, moving more on instinct than thought. All that mattered was how fast he could cover ground as he beelined for the chain link fence.
Thankfully, their plan counted on it.
With every stride, the pounding of his heart grew louder, eclipsing everything around him, narrowing his world to Theo's scent trail. His wolf sank into him, settling beneath the surface like a primed cannon waiting to be lit. He choked back the urge to tip his head back and howl. Surprise might not be entirely on their side, by sheer numbers alone, but announcing himself that blatantly probably fell under the umbrella of unnecessary risks better not taken.
Making it over the fence was easy. The others had drawn them away, creating the perfect hole for him and Isaac to slip through. When his feet hit the ground, he was off again, sprinting down the center of a less-worn path. Without warning, he spun down a tight alleyway between two warehouses, shoving his way through the bolted door at the end of it.
Once inside, he slid to a stop, head snapping from side to side. The trail was muddier, crisscrossing back on itself, like Theo had spent a lot of time in this building, moving to and from. He couldn't pinpoint a direction or one part of the trail from the other.
"I'll take the right; you go left," Isaac said, half-stumbling to a stop beside Liam.
With a nod, he took off down the hall, slower than before, trying to stretch all his senses while ignoring the raging battle beyond the walls. Gunshots and screams made it hard, ricocheting through his skull whenever he strained to find the familiar heartbeat in the halls.
Liam marched down the hall, a rigid set to his shoulders, scenting the air every few feet. This was definitely one of their older bases. Not only had wolfsbane and gunpowder baked themselves into the concrete floors, but the unmistakable heaviness of anger and fear had too. The longer he wandered the halls, the deeper he felt each breath cut into his emotions. What did these people have to be angry about? They were the killers, the psychos stealing innocents and using them as weapons.
A stray cross-bolt skittered across the ground, propelled by Liam's boot. He walked to it and knelt down, picking it up with his fingertips. It burned, skin sizzling ever so slightly, but he didn't drop it. Instead, he took it fully in his hand, curling his fist around it. He closed his eyes, fang poking at the corner of his lip as he squeezed, tightening his fist a fraction every second.
At the tiny crack, he opened his hand, dropping the pieces to the floor.
He let his breath out slowly, inwardly cursing at the shakiness of it. This was not his first infiltration, not even his first war with hunters. There was no reason for him to be struggling. His part of the plan was easy. Get in, locate Theo, and get them both the hell out. If he couldn't manage that, what good was he to the pack? What good was a beta that couldn't protect his own anchor?
His inhale through clenched teeth was cut short, air stopping mid-breath as his eyes snapped open, already glowing gold. Never in a million years would he forget who the brightly sour scent belonged to. It was the last thing he ever wanted to smell again, but where she was, Theo wasn't likely to be too far behind.
Deep in his chest, a rumble grew as his wolf seethed at the thought. Bile almost rose in his throat. That ended today.
Liam stood, chest still filled with the increasingly loud growl as he moved towards the nearest door. Whether it was open before he had shut his eyes, he didn't remember or care. He shouldered his way through it, scanning the room on instinct. His wolf bristled, as equally unhappy to find it void of Theo as him. Movement in the corner of his eye pulled his focus back to the room.
In the corner, farthest from the door, perched on her desk, was Fallon. A handgun glinted on the desk as she spun it without looking. Her wide, crazed eyes were squarely on Liam, making him shiver from their intensity.
"Long time no see," she chirped, lazily hooking the pistol with her index finger, still spinning it as she lifted it off the desk. "You lose something?"
"Where is Theo?" Liam asked, eyes flashing.
The hunter had the nerve to laugh, not a little chuckle or snort, a deep-chested laugh. Liam flew forward, wrenching her from the desk. Even as he gun thudded on the floor, she continued to laugh hard enough that he felt it through his iron grip on her ballistic vest.
"Who?" Fallon asked, a knife-like smirk cutting across her features despite the feigned innocence in her voice.
Liam snarled, fangs inches from her face, shaking. His wolf was rabid, howling about ripping out her throat, that it would be fair game for the pain she caused. Too many bodies were a direct result of her stupid crusade. Blood dripped from his palms where his claws had curled back through the fabric of her vest into them.
"Cut the crap," he growled, lifting her off the ground. "Where is he?"
Her laugh deepened the furrow of his brow and widened the taut part of his lips, further exposing his fangs. A far more animalistic rumble rose in him, courtesy of his wolf, who liked the smug look on her face even less than him. The barest hint of fear spun off her, though not a muscle in her face moved.
"Trust me, you don't want him back," she brought a hand to his arm, patting it. "His factory settings are a little temperamental. Not all that surprising since they weren't perfect in the first place, but teenage biology will do that–"
Bone crunched easily as cardboard in the hand Liam hadn't realized he raised. His wolf howled, a fizzling pride sweeping through him, dropping his hand in her jacket to lift the one in her throat higher. A roaring howl filled the room, the force of it shaking everything in the room. Red droplets landed on Liam's arm, drawing his eyes up.
The thick coppery scent of blood smacked into him as it welled around his fingers, spilling over them, drawing bright red wakes down either side of Fallon's neck.
He dropped her, stumbling backward, barely catching himself on the edge of the desk. His heart was racing, ready to beat out of his chest if the bile leaping from his stomach didn't get there first. Of all the times for his wolf to just settle itself right back into him, it had to have chosen then. He huffed through his teeth, anger still thrumming, though the lion's share had dissipated as soon as her neck had cracked.
Another twitch of calm spread through him as he stared at the body. The corpse. The corpse that he made. The dull thunk as the body hit the floor replayed, making him wince, not because she was dead or even because he killed her. He would kill her again and again, a thousand different ways, if he had to. She was a threat to the pack, to him, to Theo.
A musty bitterness tickled his nose, skyrocketing his pulse. His head snapped up, almost fast enough to give himself whiplash, feet scrambling into motion. He turned his head, breath catching in his throat as the scent grew stronger. A caustic edge bit into the other smells more than usual, but it still paralyzed his chest.
"Theo?" He choked out, ears straining, trying to find the chimera's heartbeat.
Huffs and groans were his only answer, but they had him moving toward the door without looking back. All that mattered to him and his wolf was that Theo's scent grew stronger and stronger each time he stepped to the door. Then, when he stepped out the door, he froze.
The chimera was not ten feet away, leaning on the wall with one arm cinched protectively around his middle. His wolf howled in his ears, almost instantly giving him a headache as he surged forward, arms circling around Theo, pulling him tight to his chest.
"You're okay," Liam mumbled into the crook of the other's shoulder, burying his nose there.
Everything faded; the whole world, even the ringing gunfire outside the walls, becoming barely audible background noise. A chorus of safesafesafe was the only thing computing beyond Theo's scent, literally enveloping him, sinking into every nook and cranny of his sinuses. It burned more than he remembered, but six months in hell was bound to do a number on every aspect of a person. He pushed the niggling thought away.
"More or less," Theo said, voice tight.
Liam loosened his grip, stepping back to open his eyes. He tentatively sniffed at the air, eyes bulging as the blood hit him. Immediately, his hand dropped to take the chimera's, black veins running appearing almost instantly. He swayed as sharp bolts of pain ran up his arm in steady streams. How had he not noticed the blood earlier?
Anger flared through him, snapping his wolf to life. Both bubbled beneath his skin, evaporating away the drips of calm.
Theo turned, showing Liam the partly closed wound. "It's fine. Just a scratch."
No matter how comforting the chimera wanted to sound, the tightness in his voice made Liam's chest cinch. Half a year in a new kind of hell, and Theo was still trying to protect him. He shook his head, a fond smile breaking the worried pout.
"You have no idea what that word is supposed to mean if you're using it right now," Liam said, unable to keep his punctuating half-chuckle to himself.
"Agree to disagree then." Theo stepped back, hand returning to hold his injured side. "Come on, Isaac's this way. He needs a little help."
Liam followed, more dazed than he would have liked to admit. He couldn't hear any of the fighting anymore, too focused on the overly steady pulse of the man leading him down the hall. Only when he saw Isaac limply hanging over a pile of broken chairs did he snap back to himself. He was across the room in four strides, leaning over the beta, frantically trying to check him for a pulse.
Theo stepped up behind him, barely two feet away, if the warmth at his back was any indication. He smiled, savoring the familiar presence. The last two years before this shit show, the chimera was damn near a constant in his day-to-day, always a step behind, ready to yank him to safety and take whatever bullet was meant for Liam into his own body.
Hairs on the back of Liam's neck stood up, itching.
As he turned, Theo launched forward, covering the last couple of feet before he could blink. Sharp pain stabbed through his side, lancing through his ribs as fingers twisted through muscle, collapsing his legs beneath him. The sloppy squelching as the claws withdrew was his only warning before he hit the floor.
"You're so naive; it's almost adorable."
Liam lifted his head, one hand cradling the geysering holes in his side while pushing himself off the floor with the other, staring at the man in front of him. It smelled like Theo, but that was where the similarities ended. Everything else about the person in front of him was just wrong. The posture, the look in his eyes, the quirk of his smile… Everything was different, sharper. Even the glint in the chimera's eyes was wrong. Liam was staring at the spitting image of Theo before he was sent to hell.
But that was impossible.
"What did she do to you?"
—
"What did she do?" Theo repeated, his grin widening, a touch of fang dropping into it. "Absolutely nothing. This was my choice. This, right here," Theo said, lifting his arms, gesturing to the compound around them, "is where I really belong."
Confusion radiated from the wolf, emphasized by the cruel twist in his expression. A little glimmer of pride flared at the glassy hurt brimming in the eyes still locked with his own. This pup had no idea what he was messing with. Never did.
"You can't mean that," Liam said, his voice shrink-wrapped around the words. "Theo, you're in there somewhere, and I need you to hear me. The whole pack is here for you."
Deep in his chest, something twinged at the words, recognizing their weight. Little flickers of excitement tickled the edges of his gut. He snarled, swiping at his own skin, brushing away the itching as if it were sparked embers from a fire. Pack meant nothing. He was fine on his own, always had been, and always would be.
"And why should I care? Even a true alpha's half-baked, useless leftovers aren't worth much, contrary to what I used to think," he retorted, a hint of a growl seeping into the words.
He took a quick breath, burying the emotions that had crept up, steeling himself against them. Winning required focus, uninterrupted and unimpeded focus on the singular goal.
Stupid, useless emotions always getting in the way of his goals. He steadied his hand, hiding the movement by sliding out his claws. Anger raced through him, yanking painfully at the bars of his wolf's cage. Then, just as forcefully, he threw as much of it as he could manage into a box and stashed it alongside his wolf, effectively blocking them both out. They were the opposite of necessary for survival. A direct antithesis to it, in fact.
"Besides," he said, smirking as he tilted his ever so slightly to the side, "a monster doesn't need playmates."
"Snap out of it. You're not a monster," a growl slipped into Liam's voice. "If the Dread Doctors couldn't change that, then she sure as hell couldn't." The beta lifted himself from the floor, the last vestiges of the once bloody wound closing as he stared daggers at Theo. "And you care that we're ALL here for you, even Stiles."
The wolf in him sprang forward, almost pushing a whine from his throat, howling in excitement and thrashing against his stranglehold on it with a strength he had not seen since before the coyote took over. He snarled, lip twitching with the effort of shoving the animal back, putting it back in the box it crawled out of. It was a useless creature, blinded by a necessity for connections, not unlike the beta across the room from him, judging by the set of his eyes and the hurt brimming in them.
A smirk curled over his face, sharp as the claws dropped from his nail beds, "I wonder which will get you killed faster — your loyalty or your anger?"
Theo stepped back, grinning as the beta's eyes flashed and his breathing stuttered, barely containing a roar. Toying with him has always been easy. He dropped down, half crouched, fangs dropping as his shift crept forward, turning his smirk into more of a snarl.
With a resounding roar, Liam charged.
Theo snorted, rolling his eyes, "Pathetic."
Theo hardly had to put any effort in, catching a flying hand here and there, redirecting the momentum elsewhere, more often than not, sending Liam face-first into the nearest wall. A decade of experience fighting for his life gave him a considerable skill advantage even the beta's anger couldn't surpass.
"Come on, Liam, I taught you better than this," he jeered, grabbing the other's arm again, twisting it as he landed a vicious kick to his sternum.
He let go, letting Liam fly across the room. The desk splintered as the wolf crashed through it, sickeningly loud crunches nearly covering Liam's sharp gasp. A smirk danced across Theo's face.
"Poor little wolf, can't even take down a cheap supernatural knockoff. Kinda glad I didn't end up with you in my pack. You'd be a sucky beta," he said, picking up a particularly pointy chunk of wood.
Looming over Liam's bloodied, near-collapsing body, he twirled the wood, watching as the wolf below him tried to push himself up. A twinge in his chest made him wince, taking half a step back, wood clattering to the ground next to him. His internal wolf was shrieking, bloodying in its attempts to claw its way out of the box he slammed it in, desperately trying to get to the wounded beta in front of him.
Footsteps echoed down the halls, a rhythmic pounding he knew wasn't Fallon's hunters. She got them trained and organized, but unifying shit like running in sync was beyond anything the lunatic did. The sounds of snarling breaths and frantic heartbeats grew closer. There were too many to accurately count without seeing them, but in those kinds of numbers, that also meant there were too many for him to fight.
He looked at the door over his shoulder, eyes narrowed, gauging how close they were. Too close. Whichever way he went, they would see him now. His gaze flicked back to Liam. Irritation bubbled in his gut as he stepped over the unconscious wolf, crouching over his head, claws resting on his neck. The jugular vein pulsed into his claws, tempting him. All it would take was a flick of his wrist. Just one little motion and the beta would dead long before the rest of the pack could reach them.
The perfect distraction.
Without warning, his own wolf railed against him, fighting harder than he had ever felt. He snarled, claws hovering over Liam's throat, tips brushing against the skin. This was the right move. Slicing open the beta's throat would give him the necessary time to get out. Scott and Stiles would be too caught up trying to save their precious baby beta to care where Theo went. But the wolf in his head froze his hand, leaving it impotently resting over the thin skin, mocking him.
Stiles slammed through the door, his battle bat awkwardly brandished in front of him, ready to cave someone's head in, only to skid to a stop, eyes widening. He snarled wordlessly, tightening his grip again, pressing his claw tips as far into the skin as his wolf would allow. Derek nearly toppled the frozen-in-place Stiles not five seconds later, barely sparing the room a second glance til he spotted Liam in Theo's claws.
Theo's snarl turned to a smirk, claws pressing further into Liam's skin in warning. Derek's drop into a protective crouch between him and Stiles was flawless. The blue-eyed beta's warning growl barely registered with Theo, whose full attention was on Stiles as he stepped around Derek, bat dropping to his side.
"Stiles, get back here. STILES!"
Theo didn't move, simply watching as Stiles took one step after another, the rabbit-like pace of his human heart the only indicator he did, in fact, realize how crazy he was being. Then, finally, he stopped several feet away, the head of the bat resting on the floor, eyes still locked with Theo's own, searching for something.
"Come on, man, snap out of it." Stiles stepped toward him, half lifting the bat.
Theo snarled, recoiling, loading his weight to spring away if necessary, "Back off, Stiles, or I'll rip him apart."
To emphasize his words, he tightened his grip, only fractionally and not even enough to break the skin, thanks to the panicked snarling of his own wolf. Why couldn't the stupid animal understand this was the only way out? The pack needed something to focus on, to blindside them and get them to pool all their attention somewhere that wasn't him. He growled wordlessly, eyes briefly screwing shut as he fought back the urge to let go of the beta.
"W-we both know you won't do it, that you can't hurt him. You've never been able to." Stiles' breathing is shaky, stuttering as he glances between Theo's eyes and his hands, one wrapped around the beta's throat and the other hooked around his chest.
"You sure about that?" He asks, shifting the unconscious wolf to support his chest with both arms, allowing the bloody lines through his shirt and abdomen to be easily seen.
"For fuck's sake, Theo," Stiles's voice hitched as though his throat had cinched around the name. "Stop. Just stop. This is Liam we're talking about; the kid you said you wanted for the anger issues but taught to control them instead, the kid who brought you back from Hell and fought to keep everyone from sending you right back, the kid you've nearly died ten times trying to save." The human wet his lips, taking in a measured breath that failed to steady the exploding heartbeat raging in his chest. "Even I know you're not the monster here, so stop pretending like you are."
A startled grumble slipped from him as a smoldering wave of heat rolled into the room, Parrish following it. His sulfury-burning scent clogged Theo's nose, hiding the approach and entrance of Lydia and Kira. Nevertheless, he couldn't stop the near-roaring growl that burst out at the sight of the kitsune and her new sword. A shudder ran down his spine as the weapon glinted in the shoddy light.
Theo continued to bristle as each person entered, lips pulled back in a near-permanent snarl. He crouched lower over Liam, dragging the unconscious body more tightly into him; whether it was the coyote threatening the pack or the wolf defending its bond, he had no clue. None. But the confusion did nothing to slacken his grip around the column of the beta's throat.
"Theo, put him down," Argent said, gun leveled at him, safety off.
The heat in his glowing eyes stayed the same as he looked around the circle. Some faces he knew intrinsically, while others had just been photographs, not worth remembering whole biographies when the chances he would meet them had been below ten percent.
He looked straight at Stiles, a deep guttural growl filling his chest. The circle tensed around them, but the human didn't even deign to blink in response. The coyote was relishing challenging the pack's honorary second alpha, more than eager to see just how far it could push. As threatening as the hunter beside Stiles was trying to be, no one wanted him dead, not even the hunter himself. The room would have been saturated with a far more sharp scent. As it was, the wolf in him was whimpering at the whirlwind of scents, begging to stand down, hating how he was the center of all the anger and sadness floating around.
His shift faded, teeth and claws receding slowly before he dropped Liam. Blood dripped into his hair, sliding sluggishly from his hands as he raised them, though the coyote snarled inside. It hated surrendering, almost more than the thought of dying. Almost. His eyes never left Stiles' as he stepped back, putting a few feet between him and the destroyed desk before he sank to the floor, sitting on his heels.
He bit back a snarl as the circle around him broke into movement. The coyote was raging, beyond furious at the complacent display, while not seeing any other way out. Losing was not the beast's strong suit, nor was it Theo's in general, but mainly the coyote seemed to have a harder time with it.
Stiles started walking towards him, accepting a pair of reinforced cuffs from Argent. He refused to break the staring contest until he stepped behind Theo, gingerly taking his still blood-soaked and tacky wrists and securing the cold metal around them.
"Be careful," Theo grumbled as he stood, eyes dropping to Liam's bloodied face. A barely perceptible wince flashed across his face as Scott and Mason lifted him between their shoulders, "I won't let go so easily next time."
