The first inklings of consciousness were soft, barely grazing the edges of the dark warmth Theo was adrift in. He wanted to stay, to bask in the comfort of it. Sleep had been anything but a refuge for longer than he cared to categorize, but especially as of late.
The barest hints of smells trickled in as he took a deep breath. His brows pinched. None of the usual bitter tang from residual wolfsbane or gunpowder hit him or were even discernible at all. He tried again, focusing intently on the scents dragging through his nose. Hints of fresh linen and dust were all he could pick out, but they too were dull, as if they were heavily diluted.
He huffed, rolling his eyes behind his shut lids. Maybe his other senses could compensate for whatever was going on with his smell. With a careful deep breath, settling his pulse though worry had started to push it faster, he stretched his hearing. Nothing but the gentle shifting of fabric on fabric as his chest rose and fell filled the space.
His stomach clenched, an icy rock sinking in it, twisting the rest of his guts around. Sheets. He had sheets, and whatever he was laying on was soft, comfortable, nothing like the threadbare, inch thick, saddest excuse for mattresses he was used to. Everything was wrong. He was a weapon, a thing, a pair of claws and a set of fangs she could point at a target; he didn't get comforts or luxuries.
That he was, chilled his blood and sent his pulse racing. Fallon was missing more than a fair share of screws, but she made sense, without fail, there was a rhyme and reason to her actions. For her to give him this, he had to have done something either spectacular or that cemented him to her, and there were only two things he could see doing that. His stomach jumped at the thought of either happening, bile climbing up his esophagus with ease.
As he went to move, hoping to at least vomit not on the bed, a sharp zing from his neck pulsed all through his skull, stabbing at his eyes and twisting them shut before settling at his temples. He swallowed back the bile on instinct, choking out a tight groan. The sides of his face pounded, a dull heat radiating through him, aggravating the pounding further.
"Fuck," he groaned, forcing himself to stay still.
None of it made a lick of sense.
First, he was in a bed, away from the constant hustle and bustle of whatever compound, without any guards or supervision, beyond whatever hidden camera she had strategically tucked away. There was always a camera. She loved documenting every aspect of her 'experiments' on him. Second, his senses were all out of whack, dulled like a bull's horns, leaving him in a desert where he was used to treading water. Third, he was in a fair amount of pain, which meant his healing supernatural healing factor was compromised.
He groaned, lifting a hand slowly to his face. This was another of her little shits and giggles trials. It had to be. She was always tweaking and refining her wolfsbane concoctions, mixing different strains both by cross-breeding them or after harvesting. Each method gave different results, which she delighted in testing on any number of creatures. This was her 'best' yet. His healing was compromised, his senses no better than a human's, and his animals sedated.
With a confused huff, he shifted again, teeth grinding loudly as he fought through the eruption of pain from his neck, determined to test his mobility. The more he moved, the faster whatever she put in his system moved through him. He flopped to his side, eyes wet with unshed tears, the whole of his body shivering. Agony radiated from his neck, shredding its way through his veins and muscles.
A shaky breath flew from him.
Beyond just the level of pain, was the deafening silence in his own head. The constant bickering snarls of his wolf and coyote at his pitiful reactions were nowhere to be found. There was no way, even under heavy wolfsbane poisoning, that they would sit idly by as he fought against such levels of pain. The coyote especially should have been snapping at him, scolding him with angry snarls. Yet, other than his own thoughts, he felt nothing. He could always feel them, as much as sometimes lately he wished the opposite.
Theo's eyes jerked open, only to squeeze shut at the bright onslaught of light. Several furious blinks later, he actually managed to keep his eyes open. His pulse picked up speed, heart trampling over itself as it thumped against his ribs with bruising force.
He couldn't feel them. At all.
A broken sob rattled his ribs as it broke out of him.
They were gone.
" You killed it, didn't you? " Liam's voice echoed in his head.
Everything from the night before, and the last three weeks, crashed down on him, sweeping through him as a tsunami would surge through a city, unforgiving and unyielding. His throat tightened, refusing to let out any of the screaming sobs that built in his chest, trapping them. He curled in on himself, his chin reflexively tucking tight to his shoulder. The same pounding, stabbing pain rocketed through him, worsened by the spasms taking over his body as he cried soundlessly.
The feel of Liam's neck in his claws. Scott's reluctant agreement to give them time. Everyone's panic after watching the recordings and the blond beta ran. The countless frustrated growls from above as people tried to teach Liam, and Theo had been begging him not to. Getting knocked out, again, and waking up in control.
A hollow whine pushed out of his throat, too human, too broken.
Somehow, he was alone again. Truly and utterly alone.
He closed his eyes, digging the bony edge of his palm into his temple while the other hand grabbed at his chest. Blunt fingertips bit dully through the sheet and shirt, trying to curl through muscle and bone, reaching for the gaping hole he was sure had to be there. Finding only solid, unbloodied flesh and bone, a too-human, strangled whine fled his throat.
Tears spilled down his cheeks, burning as they fell. He snarled as he cried, twisting, ignoring the poignant twinge in his neck and blinding pain that shot through him, to bury his face into the pillow. Flashes of anger ripped through him in tandem with the pain. He didn't deserve this. Tears were for people better than him, unselfish, kind people like Scott and Liam. They deserved to let their pain out, to let the weights lift from them, the catharsis that came from letting the emotions go. He didn't. Yet, there was no stopping the flow of tears or the pitiful sounds he only hoped were muffled enough.
He forced a deep breath into his lungs, digging his teeth into his lips to keep from exhaling it all at once. Instead, he pushed it out his nose, ignoring the staccato-like stutters. Years of practice made falling into a square rhythm easy as he inhaled, letting air glide in, counting all the while. For half the time, he held it, hovering in his lungs, and then exhaled, counting again, matching the first number. Once again he counted, forcing his lungs to sit empty for the half, just a few seconds despite feeling like an eternity, before repeating the process.
Every iteration, his body shook less and less, his pulse following suit and slowing down, returning to a normal four-beat rhythm. For a moment, he could actually breathe. This was normal. Coming back to a state of calmness, of control, was familiar. The tear tracks dried, sticking the pillowcase to his skin.
The one thing he couldn't settle was the anger seething beneath his skin, right where the coyote used to sit. It burned, brushing against the frayed edges of his nervous system, mingling with the pain-ridden nerves, almost spiking his heart rate back up. The pack should have left well enough alone and let him rot. He was an enemy, a dangerous one at that given how much he knew. The lot of them had to have realized that by now. Actually, what was really making his blood boil was that some of them did know better and had argued against doing anything other than putting him six feet under from the second they got here. He had wanted to scream his support for Isaac's words, but the coyote had shoved him back into a corner.
He rolled to his side, pulling an arm beneath his body to hold his weight. He shook with the effort of pushing his torso up. Every nerve burned as he moved, drawing another shaky breath from him. By the time he was sitting, legs dangling over the side of the bed, the balls of his feet skimming the floor, he was shaking again. Each of his limbs felt too heavy, as if weights had been tied around them. He lifted a hand, running it clumsily through his hair. Any precision maneuvering was clearly out of the question.
Giving his broken body a brief, but needed, reprieve, he looked around the room. The whole of it was quite mundane. The off-white walls and the sloping ceiling were the exact opposite of what he was expecting, though the overall aesthetic of the space benefited from it. A simple wooden desk and chair across from him was the first thing that caught his eye. He squinted at them, not because they would have been at home at a flea market, but rather the black hoodie slung over the chair's back.
Sighing again, he slid off the bed, keeping one hand fisted in the blanket in case his knees gave out. To his relief, he stayed standing. The tiniest of smiles spread over his lips. It was something. He released the bed and crossed the room, bare feet sliding over the wood, testing for give or squeaks before setting his full weight into the step.
As he got to the chair his breath hitched. One hand planted on the sturdy wooden back, he picked up the black jacket and rolled it around between his fingers. A faint whiff of fake spice rose from it. Another broken sound shuddered out of him, tears slid down his cheeks, ignoring his orders to stay put. It was one of his, but he had lost it before Liam got taken. Or rather, the beta had stolen it.
A careful chuckle slid into a sigh as he shook his head. "Can't really blame you, can I?"
Theo brought the cloth ball to his face. The soft, almost sweet scent of the beta swamped his nose. His arms tightened around it, crushing the fabric tighter to him, as though wringing every ounce of the familiar smell from its woven clutches. Weak as it was through his purely human sense, it was enough to slacken the coiled wires around the pit in his stomach. Slacken, but not released.
The warmth inherent to Liam was there, as was his overused deodorant, but that was it. There was nothing behind it. No chemosignals, no information, nothing beyond the base scent that had seeped into it from prolonged wear. Whether the beta had been happy, overwhelmed, angry, disgusted when he left it was a complete mystery.
It made sense, that with his were-sides gone, all the benefits that came with them would be too. Nature had an intrinsic, inescapable balance. Day and night. Life and death. Gifts and curses. One without the other went against every law, natural and supernatural. His existence had been pushing the boundaries, only evened out by the lower quality of his gifts and greater danger of his curses.
"Fair is fair, I guess." His half-hearted laugh was harsh and lifeless, a derisive knife stabbing through the air, landing firmly in his own ribs.
He turned away from the desk, sighing. The only other things in the small room were a dresser and old-timey reading chair. Perched precariously atop the tiny set of drawers was a black and blue duffle bag. His chest tightened as he dropped his hands to his sides, keeping a firm grasp on the hoodie in his left fist, and crossed the room.
He pulled the bag open, rotating it to put more mass on the dresser's flat top. The last place he saw his bag was the truck, and it had been quite the opposite of packed. As he dug through the shirts and sweats, the realization that Liam had undoubtedly figured out he lived out of the vehicle. He groaned wordlessly. That was going to be one hell of a conversation.
His eyes flicked around the room. It was devoid of photos or really anything other than the four pieces of furniture. Just a simple room, not unlike a hotel, or rather motel with the size of it, probably somewhere out of the way, a few counties removed from Beacon Hills minimum.
Another rock settled in his stomach, clattering against the others.
Regardless of the strange circumstances, and distinct lack of Scott-ness in the delivery of the message, he understood. The pack wanted him gone, out of their hair, away from the people they cared about, and he was happy to oblige. Whatever kindness or goodwill he had built up over the last two years had come to an end, culminating in a rescue he would have argued against, had he had the voice to do it. That was fine, honestly. It felt better, ending like this, with him being drop kicked on his ass.
He reached into his bag again, pushing the clothes aside, unfolding them as he dug around the small space. A wave of relief crashed through him as his hand closed around his keys. His truck had been one of the many things he distracted himself with, musing over what happened to it, who would be brave enough to take control of it, whether it was being taken care of at all or left to rot.
With a steadying sigh, he zipped the bag shut. A little smile crooked at the corners of his mouth. Out of the whole pack, he trusted what was essentially his home with one person. Liam. It never made sense, to him or anyone else, that the hot-headed, impulsive beta was the only other person allowed to drive it. Any other member would have probably been smarter, even Stiles for all the clumsiness that idiot still had yet to grow out of.
After his realization at Mason's, it made a little more sense, but not much. Anchors or not, destined mates or not, there was no reason on Earth he ever should have trusted his life and livelihood with the beta. None, whatsoever, and yet, the fact that Liam had been the one to take control of it made his heart skip a beat. It was stupid, and childish, but he couldn't get the smile off his face. The thought of stepping foot back into his home and it being riddled with the beta's scent only further deepened the smile, pulling his lips apart, letting a light as air, barely audible chuckle slide through.
A sharp ripple of dread lanced the giddy balloon as his attention fell back to the bag. He was leaving, getting the hell out of dodge before the pack had to say it, putting distance between himself and the people he cared about, the people he could hurt, the person he was going to hurt…
He grabbed the shoulder strap, sliding it down his arm, resting at the juncture of his neck and shoulder. There was no getting around how his chest tightened, squeezing his heart and lungs, leaving no room for air. Ever since coming out of the ground, he and Liam had been linked, tied together by an uncuttable, inflammable, essentially indestructible thread. Nothing more than a responsibility, a burden, the thing Liam had to keep track of to make sure no one else died at the start. Then, slowly, he became an asset, something they could use and rely on, and eventually, a partner, a teammate the beta relied on so heavily that he chose Theo, out of the whole pack, to be with him at the Zoo.
Snarling, he wrenched himself away from the dresser. His step faltered, not quite a stumble, as pain lanced down his spine. The back of his neck burned with each step he took toward the door, renewing the pounding in his temples and further singeing what was left of the nerves running throughout his arms. Still, he pushed forward. There was no way he was overstaying his welcome. He had lingered long enough.
The door opened silently, swinging easily on its hinges. Great care and precision guided him as he stepped out into the carpeted hall, ghosting his feet over the surface, testing each spot before setting all his weight down. Coyote in his head or not, years of being relentlessly chastised for leaving tracks or being too loud had engrained a need for stealth above all else.
Progress down the hall was snaillike. His skin itched between every step as he stopped to listen, trying to stretch his hearing down the stairs ahead of him. There was little point to the action, and he knew it. Human hearing was never going to tell him the things he needed to know. Heartbeats and breathing rates were only audible when up close and personal. Chemosignals would never be anything but a detriment now, giving everyone around him a clue into his head while he was left with nothing but their faces and words.
Once at the banister, he stopped, toes inches from the top step. As far as he could tell, there was no one downstairs. The minor ache in his ribs was ignored. The pack owed him nothing. Giving him a space to wake up in other than his truck was a million steps above what he would have expected. Sticking around to make sure he was okay or coddling him would have been too much to ask.
Carefully as possible, he descended the stairs, jaw clenched tight, holding back all the pained squeaks and grunts that sparked as his bag shifted, the strap grazing the back of his neck. At the last step, he paused, one hand on the railing, clawing at it with blunt fingers. The other rose to his neck, gingerly feeling around for the first time. His knees shook, threatening to buckle, as he grazed a crescent scab, fiery lances erupting from the wound, zinging down his spine, yet again.
"Shit," he whispered, squeezing his eyes shut, willing himself to stay upright.
Pain was nothing new. Even before the Doctors, he was more than good acquaintances with it. The slow burn of a fractured bone growing into a wildfire, the icy touch of steel or glass to skin, and the sparks that followed as it hit muscle, sharp cracks of a hand to his face that sent lightning through him as he hit the ground, he was used to it all. But Liam's claws in his neck were worse, maybe the worst of all.
He forced out a breath through his nose, shaking his head, hissing as a new wave of pain followed. This was the price for coming back. There was always a price. Equal and opposite reactions, and all. Nothing was free, especially life.
The whole of the living room stretched before him, devoid of anyone, though jackets and shoes were scattered around haphazardly. He scanned over the room again, moving off the last step and around the corner, glancing through the archway into the kitchen. No one was there, as he expected. If any of the idiots had been there, they would have burst into the room when he first woke up, drawn by his erratic pulse. They were stupid like that, always trying to help the less fortunate, consequences be damned.
Sporting a soft smile, he turned to what he assumed was the front door. There was the largest pile of shoes next to it, which was accompanied by a mirror pile of jackets, shirts, and flannels on the opposite side. Organized chaos, the pack's specialty. Without the coyote snapping at him, it was almost endearing. They weren't worried about having to grab everything and run at the drop of a hat, or the inevitable blow that would rattle their teeth and bruise their bones, a fulminate voice booming above him to never let it happen again.
His smile dropped, twisting into a wince that half-closed his eyes, feet freezing to the floor. The tightness of his jaw barely held back the whine inching up, trying to squeeze out through his teeth. Regardless of being alone, he refused to let himself stoop so low, to be that weak. His parents were dead, had been for nearly a decade, and they were never coming back. Rebirth mandated a few crucial steps that Theo made damn well sure were impossible.
They were gone. Gone and dead. Dead and burned.
The gentle jiggling of metal slammed him back to the present. His eyes skipped around the room before zeroing in on the knob as it turned. The pack was back and he was still here. His blood curdled, a sinking feeling in his stomach as he half-stepped, half-stumbled back. He had lingered too long, taken too much time to right himself and get it together. Maybe whoever it was would be understanding of the fact that he was at least at the door. He was trying to listen, to follow the unspoken directions, that had to count for something at the very least.
When the door swung aside, the last person he expected to see was Liam. Yet, there the blond wolf stood, one hand still on the door and an entirely unreadable look on his face. Between the pinched brows and tight line of his lips, Theo could tell he was less than pleased about something. What specifically, he had no idea, but if the shine in the blue eyes was anything to go by, it was more along the lines of emotional pain. Liam was like him, physical pain was insignificant, ephemeral at best. The real hurt came from their heads.
"You going somewhere?" Liam's voice was tight, as if strained by holding back other things.
Theo forced himself to stay still, resisting the urge to shrug. Without his supernatural side, masking his pain was impossible, and he couldn't lump yet another thing onto the beta's obviously full plate. He bit at the corner of his lip as he followed the line of Liam's eyes, his own widening a fraction as they landed on his bag.
"Yeah," he said, surprised his voice worked at all. "Got the message, loud and clear. I'll be out of Cali by night-fall."
Liam's brows furrowed, tight trenches lining his forehead as his mouth gaped. Heightened senses were very unnecessary to read the shock radiating off the man. Theo stiffened, his pulse rocketing again, sending blood thundering through his ears. All he did was say what the pack had made abundantly clear. They wanted him gone, so he was leaving. Simple as that. Reading between the lines was a gift he had honed out of necessity, and the pack was nowhere near as subtle as the Doctors.
"Wh-What message?" Liam asked, shaking his head and fully stepping through the door.
At the advance, Theo, instinctively, went to step back, but froze, foot half off the ground. He hadn't thought his heart could beat any faster, but somehow it sped up even further, damn near bursting through his ribs. There had to be other ways out of the house, but cataloging them was usually left to the coyote. His one way out was obstructed.
"Theo, you okay?" The beta asked, irritation falling away as his eyes went wide, probably finally catching his heartbeat.
Words flew before he could think, a harshness in his tone that once would have been replaced by a growl, "I'm fine."
The grinding slide of teeth over teeth had to be audible to the wolf, but he gave no indication he heard it. A fleeting tickle of gratitude curled in his chest, chased away by a flash of anger at the uptick of Liam's mouth, the beginning hints of a smile. Reading chemosignals was as natural to the supernaturals in the pack as breathing, a byproduct of their existence he loved. The whole world had unlocked when he honed the skill. Navigating any situation was a thousand times easier because he could tell when he hit a nerve, when his target was falling into his trap, and when to seal a deal. Now, he loathed it.
"You sure about that?" Liam's pout was audible in the softness of his tone.
"Fuck off, Dunbar," Theo snarled, lips peeling back and growl tearing out on instinct. It was purely human, not an ounce of power behind it other than his anger.
The soft sigh and head shake that answered him only added to the kindling flame beneath his skin. There was yet another reason to get out. Without his animals, he was nothing more than a joke, a two-bit punchline that even fourth graders found lackluster. What good was he anymore? Clawless, fangless, and as fragile as Stiles or Mason without their skills, the answer was simple: he was no good, to anyone.
"Just let me get to the truck, and I won't be your's or the pack's problem anymore." He hated how close to pleading his tone was.
"Theo, that's insane. Besides the fact that it's not safe for any supernatural out there, you're in no shape to travel, especially alone."
"I've managed on my own before," he huffed.
"Yeah, by living out of your truck," Liam scoffed, waving his hands around as he spoke. "But you can't do that anymore. You're-"
"Human again. I know!" His snarl was a little more forceful, a basiness to it that the previous one lacked. "I know, okay? Spent the last hour figuring that out."
As he sighed, his shoulders deflated. The strap shifted, creeping down the slant of his hunched shoulders, tugging at the scabs, white hot pain searing down his back and arms. His face twisted, teeth grinding again as he clenched his jaw, but he didn't make a sound.
A different warmth spread from his arm, radiating out, latching onto the pockets of embers. He braced for pain, waiting for the burning to leap to life and make him wish he were dead. Instead, the embers fizzled out, leaving empty space as their carbonized wake was washed away. Goosebumps pebbled across his skin, flooding out from where Liam's palm was flat against his arm, taking his pain.
The muscles in his jaw softened one by one, encouraged by the gentle waves seeping further into him, though that was all he allowed to relax. Theo opened his eyes, prepared for the beta to be close, but his breath hitched regardless. The bright blue of his eyes as they locked with his kept him frozen, lungs struggling against his unmoving rib cage. This close, he could take in everything that made up the wolf's face with ease, even as a human.
His lips twitched, trying to answer the soft smile the wolf was giving him. The world shrank down to them, and for the briefest of moments, Theo's chest stopped aching and his thoughts stopped racing. The man standing across from him, eyes shimmering just like they used to, was the purest thing alive, and so, so good. Too good.
Theo backed away, pushing the hand off his arm and dropping his focus to the floor, forcing a deep breath in and out. Control. He needed to stay in control.
"Thanks," he mumbled, closing his hand around the shoulder strap, letting the rough nylon bite into his tight grip. Steeling his nerves, he lifted his eyes back to Liam's face. "Still leaving, though. I, uh, I appreciate the save, score is all settled, even balances all around."
He managed to force out a chuckle and slide on a smiling expression, sinking into the familiar mask with an internal sigh of relief. Better late than never , he grumped to himself, side-stepping around the floundering wolf and continuing to the door, unimpeded. Distracting him had always been easy, and for once he found himself happy at the fact that Liam never learned how to see the darker side of people, no matter how hard he had tried to drill it into the wolf.
"You're running," Liam said, a coldness in his voice he had never heard before.
All forward momentum disappeared, draining the instant the beta's words hit him, lodging themselves deep in his flesh, tethering him to the spot.
"Liam," he sighed, head drooping forward, a dull pain spearing up into his skull. He winced, a frustrated groan seeping from him as he said, "I don't belong here. I'm not… I don't fit."
"That's bullshit. You're part of the pack, you just won't let yourself see it." Liam snarled, face twisting around the tears pouring down his red cheeks.
The reverb of the growl hit like a punch to the gut, knocking the air out of him and reigniting the sparks of pain up and down his body. His pained grunt resonated through his chest, as much of an answering growl as he could muster. Typical Liam, thinking he had all the answers, that life was a simple matter of what he wanted from it.
"This place doesn't need me, " he yelled, glaring daggers. "I'm dead weight you guys can't afford. A pack is only as strong as the weakest link, and I can't be- I can't." Tears broke over his lids, spilling down his cheeks. "The pack will be better off with one less inevitable problem on their plate."
Liam shook his head, eyes closing as he groaned, and, suddenly, looked very tired. "Who said you're a problem?"
"I was born one." Theo's tone was cut and dry, almost like there was no point in even fighting him on it.
And who would? The big bad chimera of death was a beacon of tragedy almost as renowned as the damn Nememton itself. The world had made its mind up about who he was a long time ago, he just had to live up to it. There was no point in fighting it or trying to go against the grain. He always ended up the same way: tossed aside like trash and alone. Always alone.
"That's a load of crap piled on by those Doctor bast-"
"Wrong." Theo cut him off, a dry, hollow huff following his words.
Liam's brows pinched together, shaking his head as he stepped back, arm falling away, momentum replaced with confusion. "What?"
"The Doctors weren't the ones who thought I was a problem," Theo replied, voice far calmer than it had any right to be.
He shook his head, almost hissing as a new round of pain spammed down his back, though a chuckle began to spill out of him, mirthless and cold. His father's sneering face forced its way to the front of his mind, twisting Theo's own expression into a mirror of it.
"They fucked with my DNA and engineered me into a bigger, badder problem, but they actually thought I was worth any amount of effort." An empty half-smile broke the neutral line of his lips as he met Liam's eyes again. "My parents said I was born one long before those nut jobs ever came into the picture."
As thudding footsteps came closer, he fought back the urge to bolt out the door. Wolves beat chimeras in races nine times out of ten, and he wasn't even a chimera anymore. He might have been able to get out the door, and just maybe he would make it off the porch before Liam could react, but that was it. Two to four seconds was all the head start he would get, and he didn't even know where the truck was outside. No, running was a bad plan, no matter how steadily his body was screaming it. Waiting for the opportune moment would serve him better.
"You're being stubborn," Liam growled, walking around to plant himself in front of Theo.
Their eyes locked as the beta's started to flare gold. A sliver of a dark smile crawled onto his face, a flicker of an idea growing brighter as he took in the whole of the man in front of him. The depth of Liam's frown and contorted snarl showing his still human teeth only fanned the growing smile on Theo's face.
"You're always the one with an issue, the problem that can't be fixed. And honestly, I don't know why I'm surprised anymore," Liam shook his head, stepping back, tone dripping venom with every word. "You never listen because you're too busy watching all the angles, waiting for a knife in the back or to put one in someone else. Why can't you ever just drop the bullshit and listen? Or, better yet, actually trust someone!"
Theo recoiled, words slapping into him as surely as though the beta had actually swung at him. The curve to his lips faltered, dancing between a dark smile and a too-human snarl. He settled for a razor-sharp smirk as he caught Liam's glare. It was half-way to animalistic and devoid of warmth, a purely rage driven expression. Gold winked at him from the depths of his fiery blue eyes, a warning sign.
His smirk widened. This was something he knew, something familiar. Pushing people to the edge, finding the chinks in their armor and pressing until they broke. Getting Liam to this point was inevitable. It was a Herculean feat that it had taken this long for him to find the right thing to turn the beta against him, finally severing that damn thread dragging Liam down with him.
His eyes stung and his chest was almost too tight to breathe, but that didn't matter. This was their one shot, the one time he might be able to shake some sense into the beta and get him to let go, and he's not about to squander it or step down from a fight.
Theo's lips curled, pulling to one side as his eyes narrowed, letting muscle memory take over. The coyote was gone, but imitating it was easy enough. After six months under that beast's paw, he was more than acquainted with its expressions.
"I'm always stubborn, Dunbar. And, as it so happens, I'm always right. So, if you're done with this little tantrum of yours-"
Liam growled again, cutting Theo off as his hands curled at his sides, "Cut the crap, for once in your life, and get your head out of your ass. You're not the villain. You're not the damsel in distress."
"I'm not?" Theo scoffed, eyes widening in mock surprise. "Shit, I mean, you could have fooled me with the six month wait for you to rescue me."
The humorless laugh fell past Theo's lips, deepened as the flickering of the beta's eyes slowed, gold lingering longer. Some kind of sadistic pride curled in Theo's chest. No one else could bring the wolf so close to the edge and keep him dangling there. All the weak spots everyone else tiptoed around, he had found by trial and error, stabbing a knife into each and twisting till he knew exactly what to say or do to send the beta hurtling over the side of a cliff. It's about as easy to rile Liam up as it is for Theo to fall back into old ways, allowing razor sharp words to cut into Liam's core.
"We both know you would have been better off just letting me go, but you just had to pick me as the one responsibility you actually follow through on."
The slow blanching of the beta's knuckles as his fists began to shake told him he was close, nothing but a hair's breadth from toppling the last safeguard holding Liam's dominoes upright. One or two more quips should be all he needed to push him over. A deep rumble filled his chest, the start of a full-chested laugh, though instead of bright and merry, it was distorted and calloused, almost as sharp as his words.
"Not being the standing alpha. Not your grades or your control, no." Theo sighed, dropping his bag to the ground, letting his arms open at his sides and flop back against his legs, "You pick the serial killer."
And that was the straw that toppled the dominoes. Liam's growl reverberated through the scant space between them, his ears lengthening as his brow ridge thickened and flattened, fangs dropping in tandem as his claws grew. The fake smile on Theo's face morphed into a knowing smirk as he side-stepped away from his bag, further into the open space of the living room. If there's one thing he knew how to handle, it was an angry Liam.
"Come on, pup, show me what you've got," he snarked, head cocking to the side, a cutting edge to the smirk.
Before Theo could utter another word, or even process the betas reaction, Liam had crossed the room and was thrusting one clawed hand toward his chest. A brief flash of fear catapulted him back, but it was too little too late. The wolf grabbed onto his shirt, claws slicing through it and back into his palm, if the warm wetness seeping into the fabric was any indication. Knuckles pressed roughly into his chest, forcing him further back. Noting the soundless snarl pulling the wolf's lips up, revealing all of his teeth, he went easily. The sudden meeting of the wall and his back jarred his neck, but he didn't even feel it. Nothing but the overbearing pressure of Liam's fist on his chest, pinning him in place registered.
A renewed smirk slid into place. Familiarity emboldened him as he opened his mouth, only to be cut off, yet again. The whole of his body shook as the beta roared. His smirk grew into an evil smile, baring enough teeth that the wolf retreated an inch, his raised fist lowering.
"There he is!" Theo said, a triumphant note to his growl. "That's the beta I was looking for, anger and all."
"Why are you doing this to me?" Liam's fangs muffled his words, but the hurt and anger were prominent enough. He curled his fist tighter in Theo's shirt, his own chest heaving as he fought to steady his breathing. "I don't want to hurt you, don't make me hurt you."
"You won't." Theo's words fell out of his mouth faster than he could stop them, "I can take anything you've got, little wolf."
The tone was sure and steady, the same he had used a hundred times before, accompanied by the devilish smirk that always was hot on the heels of those words. It was a habit, engrained after a dozen times, and etched in stone after the fiftieth. Maybe it was stupid, especially given he wouldn't heal, at least not within a few minutes. But he couldn't find it in himself to care. This was what he was good for, all he was good for anymore.
Liam growled again, fangs on display as his free hand slammed into the wall, inches from Theo's head. A little voice in the back of his head was screaming at him to keep his mouth shut, to cut the antagonistic bullshit and start trying to get out. He knew exactly what he was doing, how close they were to mirroring that day at the Zoo. Other than a startled laugh as the beta retracted his fist only to slam it back down moments later, Theo didn't react. Passivity was another skill of his. Even, the ache building in his chest from the beta's fist pressing harder and harder didn't elicit a reaction.
" LIAM! " The alpha timber of Scott's roar shook even Theo's bones.
The beta's hands drop away in an instant, somehow twisting to look to his alpha without creating any space between them. Air rushed into Theo's lungs, triggering a spasm in his dried out throat. His shallow coughs brought Liam's head back around. A high pitched and wounded noise made its way out of the beta as his eyes froze, locked on Theo's chest. He glanced down.
Below the red patch staining his gray shirt, visible only through the holes Liam had made, were three long lines weeping thin rivulets of blood. They were shallow, barely deeper than if a human had scratched him, and would scab over easily. In the grand scheme of things, it was a minor injury.
His mouth only began to open when Liam's eyes snapped up to his. The gold faltered, blue bleeding through, a glassy sheen flooding his eyes as tears built along the edges of his lids. Scott's hands appeared over his beta's shoulders, clawless fingers digging into the muscles. When Liam's head swung to the side, eyes screwing shut and a pained snarl ripping from his lips, the alpha's grip tightened further, shifting him backwards and forcing himself in front of Theo in a smooth motion.
"Stupid puppies, can't fucking respect beauty sleep," Isaac grumbled from somewhere behind the wolves, voice still thick with sleep.
Moments later, the older wolf's hand curled around Liam's arm, guiding the younger beta toward the door. As a new snarl tore through the room, clearly coming from Liam, Theo's chest tightened. All the pain and anger in the sound were because of him, because he had pushed and poked at all the parts he knew would get a rise out of him. A brief flash of pain lit up his pectorals, the scratches having been tugged at as he tried to step around Scott, only for the alpha to throw a hand out, stopping him in his tracks.
"I can help," Theo said, turning his head carefully, watching the tightness on the alpha's face.
"You can't, not like this," Scott said, head unmoving, eyes pinned to the seething mass that was Isaac trying to throw a snarling Liam out the door.
Theo sneered, shoving his arm down, pushing past him, "This is the one thing I can do."
"Not anymore," a desperate pleading tone to the alpha's voice as he grabbed Theo's arm, wrenching him back.
A seething hiss rushed through Theo's gritted teeth, his neck and back exploding as his body jerked in Scott's hold. He curled forward, his lungs struggling to pull in air, too stunned by the electric burning lingering beneath his skin. The same calm warmth flooded from where his wrist was trapped in the wolf's hold, erasing all the prickles and twinges loitering in Theo's chest. When his breathing eased, Scott released his vice-like grip, though he kept his hand hovering half-way between them, ready to latch on again if Theo tried to run.
"Look how he reacted to just scratching you," Scott said, pointing at Theo's chest, where the red stain was still growing. "What if he hurts you worse? Or kills you?" Scott took a deep breath, closing his eyes as he shook his head. "You've got limits now, this is one of them."
And with that, the alpha launched at the door, following his mate and beta to the woods, leaving the door open behind him. Theo's lip curled in a sneer as he turned away, facing back toward the stairs, hands balled at his sides. Sharp tendrils of rage crept through him, tightening his fists and twisting around his chest, snaking through his ribs, finding every nook and cranny possible to hide in.
He was a failure.
The one thing he had been able to do better than anyone else, was no longer feasible. Taking a lick and keeping on track was his whole schtick, it was what made him and Liam work. The beta was fierceness of the sun, and a temper to match when it flared, wrapped in the flesh of person, barely contained, blinding and blisteringly hot, burning up anyone that got too close; dangerous to a fault, but Theo had never cared. He would suffer the burns a thousand times and then a thousand times again before he ever thought to leave.
Now, he had no choice. Staying too close was death, for both of them. A high, keening whine slipped from his lips, filling the space more than any human sound should. He turned back to the door, striding out, vision blurred by the tears teetering on his lashes, needing to move, to go anywhere but back upstairs.
