Chapter Text
Mágoa (n.) A heartbreaking feeling that leaves long-lasting traces.
Liam feels an ache in his chest but he doesn't have the time to dwell on it.
“How do you know?” Lori asks. She's talking about Brett. Finding Brett.
The ache pulls at Liam's heart again.
How can he promise her brother will be safe if he can’t stop thinking that he needs to get finding Brett over with so he can look for someone else and his aching chest is too busy dragging him towards thoughts of Theo. Towards his overbearing fear that he will never see the Chimera again...or at least not see him alive.
Thoughts flood his mind with how he'll never hear Theo's smug annoying broken voice. Never get to say….to say thank you, he assumes that's what he wants to say to Theo at least.
They keep talking about finding Brett. Brett who takes priority because people like him. Brett who is a real werewolf and not an imitation.
They continue to talk.
Liam Dunbar and Lori Talbot. About Brett. Finding Brett. Brett Talbot who is not Theo Raeken no matter how much easier all this looking for him would be for Liam if he was.
“Brett is strong. He’ll be okay.”
Part of Liam feels like he should feel bad about seeing Brett, his friend as an object that he needs to overcome in his quest to find Theo...but in truth he does care about Brett. It's just that finding Brett seems a lot less pressing of an issue than finding Theo.
Something tells him Lori would disagree, that Brett is the priority, so he only talks about finding Brett. Finding Brett and following the smell of poison and rotting that he hopes rather morbidly is actually Brett and not another trap waiting to get them when they least expect it.
He should have known finding Brett alive was too good to be true.
“LORI WAIT!” LORI NO!”
Liam doesn’t even care that he’s standing in the middle of a busy street at this point as he’s howling in mourning over someone who he’d been pissed at the day before.
Maybe that’s why it hurts so much. Maybe there was a part of Liam that had assumed that he would always have Brett to fall back on. To look out for him in his own asshole-ish arrogant kinda douchebag way. He’d been so sure they’d find him. So sure because Brett is strong...or he was.
Liam doesn’t want to think of his friend in the past tense. Hell, part of Liam doesn't even want too think of Brett right now because he doubts that there’s a way for Brett to come back and he really doesn’t want to think about the fact that he’s howling for his dead friend in the middle of a crowded street fully wolfed out but the pain...fuck the pain…
Fuck it…
And he howls.
Howls for Brett. Howls for what he once had. Howls for what he's lost. Howls for Lori who lost her brother. Howls for Satomi and her pack who lost a strong beta. Howls for the injustice. Howls for his friend who survived being pursued by hunters only to die to oncoming traffic.
He howls a little bit for Theo Raeken too, who he prays to every god he's never believed in is alive because if someone as strong as Brett can be killed by a fucking car what hope does a Chimera have against whatever threat he's facing.
Mostly he howls because his heart is exploding with pain from how brutally it's just shattered within his chest. At the moment, to Liam, nothing else really matters so long as he can escape from the burning pulsating ache in his chest.
He doesn't care.
His friend is dead.
Everything's changed.
He can't bring himself to care anymore.
What's the point?