Archive of Our Own ^beta

Theo has been buried underground his entire life, he can barely remember what fresh, unspoiled air feels like. Can barely remember what it is to breathe unburdened by the weight of the earth above and his sins pressing down on him. 

And it’s dangerous, this new kind of freedom that comes with breathing unfettered, with running wild beside Malia in her coyote form, with witnessing Liam’s unrestrained smile. 

This is a new kind of danger altogether. 

It’s his heart thumping loudly in his ears, his blood becoming scorching, his senses turning fuzzy, head spinning, lips stretching in the unfamiliar shape of a helpless smile confronted with the never-ending optimism and joy of the McCall pack. Though he remains a realist at heart, his cynicism didn’t last long in the face of such hope. That’s a new aspect as well, a new danger he never saw coming. Hope was a forbidden, estranged thing that encompassed all the risks of manipulating every single person he came in contact with. 

But he can’t help it now. 

Not when they’re all treating him like a friend, more than an ally. Not when they’re inviting him -forcing him really- to attend their weekly pizza/tv night at Scott’s. Not when they all sleep beside him without setting any boundaries, someone’s limbs always finding their way on top of his. He can’t recall the number of times he got slapped in the face by Stiles’ freakishly long arms, or Malia kicked his shin, or Mason head butted him.

That hope is smothered only by the punctual reminders of his past, of who he is. 

Overall, none of the pack seems to hold any crippling resentment towards him. Sometimes, though, Corey’s gaze will get lost, and he’ll stay away from Theo for a few days. Liam gets closer to him, those times, refusing to leave Theo’s side no matter his protests. Other times, Theo will stumble, say something in relation to the Dread Doctors’ experiments, to his time in the sewers, and a cold will settle over the room. Scott will take on this semi-pitying, semi-sad expression that the chimera loathes more than anything. Stiles will narrow his eyes, as if trying to solve the mystery that is his pathetic life. He hates those moments. 

Lydia tries, and mostly succeeds in behaving normally around the chimera. But every once in a while, she’ll excuse herself from the room, nose wrinkling against the smell Theo gives off. 

He knows what it is; the others might not completely get it, but Theo does. 

He smells of death. Reeks of it, really. His heart, the very thing keeping him alive, is a stolen artifact from a dead body, Tara’s last hours indelible from the organ, no matter the thrumming of it, the pumping of blood allowing him to breathe. 

He smells of Tara’s death. Of Josh’s, Tracy’s, and countless others’. 

His scent is a testimony of his sins, and as a banshee Lydia is the first to be able to hear the stories, to feel the graveyard lingering on his skin, to hear the screams and the pleas and last wishes of all the corpses he trailed behind. 

Turning into a full wolf allows him to ignore that for a lapse of time. When he runs, when he hunts, it isn’t about power, nor regrets, nor making up for all the mistakes he’s made. It’s about instinct, survival, and a new found, absolute freedom. 

And each time he shifts back to a human -or as human as he can be with all his monstrous attributes-, the past is like a hand choking him, clawing at his neck and seeking to rip out his heart through his throat.

So it takes longer and longer to turn around and force himself back to Beacon Hills, back to clothes that feel itchy and constraining, back to pretending all is fine when with the McCall pack, to pretending he hasn’t manipulated, used and almost killed all of them. 

Maybe that’s why he doesn’t change back this time. 

It is not even a conscious decision, really. It’s not like Theo stops to think about it. He just… doesn’t stop. Doesn’t think. 

Runs, and runs, and turns his human part off. 

And he just keeps running. 

That’s how Liam finds him. Distantly, Theo hears him coming, but doesn’t think much of it. The recognition of his smell is enough to let his guard down, and so he remains where he is, sprawled on his flank across a stone, warmed by sunshine and content with the sounds of the forest. 

When Liam breaches the edge of the forest, he looks calmer than was expected (not that Theo knows what he expected). 

“There you are,” he says, and his voice is just as Theo remembers it, with this distance that comes with being apart for a while. Which is odd, because the chimera is pretty sure he wasn’t gone that long. 

Liam walks towards him, one hand holding the strap of a backpack, the other tucked in his jean pocket, face completely unguarded and hair a mess from running. There’s dirt on his pants, but his blue shirt is immaculate and hugs his upper body in a way that Theo would damn in his human form. As it is, as a wolf, he watches him take stride after stride with a careful eye until he’s but a few inches away, his beat up sneakers brushing Theo’s hind leg. He remains still for a moment, blocking the sun, looking down at Theo. 

Annoyed -but not really, he feels more peaceful than he has in his entire life- Theo twitches his ears, accompanies the movement with a glare, and Liam chuckles, understanding immediately. He steps sideways, finding his new spot right beside Theo’s head, letting the sun bathe him again. 

The beta doesn’t say anything, and Theo closes his eyes, enjoys the warmth that comes with the weather. When Liam sets the bag next to them and sits down, Theo is almost asleep. 

The hand on his neck wakes him right the fuck up. 

“This ok ?” Liam asks, brush short of touch, and Theo settles on twitching his right ear again and grumbling lowly. 

Liam huffs out a laugh, fingers spreading in his fur. Theo loses track of time as surely as he has those last days. 

“Brought you some clothes,” he says as naturally as if they’re continuing a previous conversation.

Theo lets his tongue loll out just to show his appreciation, which earns him another laugh, which is worth it. 

The fingers start to thread through his fur, sorting the knots and picking out leaves and dirt carefully, and the chimera doesn’t mind the attention one bit. 

It’s a long, long while before his hind leg starts to go numb, and he slowly straightens up, sitting back. But instead of letting him go, Liam wraps his arms around Theo’s neck, and the chimera feels his forehead burrow there. 

His scent takes on a distressed note, and Theo presses himself backward some to support him, even though he doesn’t have any inkling of what might have caused that shift. They stay like that, unspeaking, Liam his own sun against his back, muscles relaxed despite his smell. 

“I thought you were gone,” Liam mutters in his fur. 

When Theo tries to turn his head and meet the beta’s eyes reproachfully, the powerful arms tighten around his neck, and he presses his head harder against him, effectively trapping him. 

Theo has a mind to fight him on it, but then Liam sniffles, the sound echoing through the wolf like a damn heatwave. 

“I thought you had left,” he continues, lips moving right against him, into him, the chimera feeling the words more than he hears them. “I thought you weren’t coming back.”

Theo growls in disapproval, which is as hypocritical as he can get-God knows he has given Liam every reason to doubt him, and to believe he would leave at the first sign of trouble. The grip tightens again, turning to almost painful, but he doesn’t bark, doesn’t move away, doesn’t risk disturbing the werewolf. 

“I wouldn’t blame you if you did.”

That’s a surprise. It sits uneasy with him, for some reason, although that’s what he should logically seek. 

“I know you’re not… used to having options,” Liam speaks again, sounding steady, but his voice doesn’t fool Theo; the slight tremble of his hands and arms betray what he’s feeling. “So I can’t get mad at you for wanting to leave. And I don’t want you to feel trapped ever again, especially in a place you don’t want to be.”

Too many things course through the chimera at his words, building and building, and he is so very happy he is not a human right now, that his features aren’t expressive enough, that Liam can’t see how his body would shake and bend under the confession. 

“But I would be mad at myself if I didn’t say it,” Liam states, voice hardening as he tilts his head, the movement ending with his cheek pressed in Theo’s neck and his mouth embracing air. 

“Beacon Hills is an option. If you want to stay. Our pack is an option.”

Pack. 

Pack. The thing Theo has been killing for for as long as he can remember. The thing he’s always been jealous of. The thing he tried to create, tried to twist and shape to his own liking, almost achieved once. 

Since Tracy, since Josh, he’s never let himself think about having a pack. He abandoned the idea when he killed them, when he left Tracy’s body in the sewers to rot. 

He abandoned a lot of things in those fucking sewers. 

The notion is almost as estranged as the one of family; then again, he supposes both are pretty intricate within the McCall pack. 

His animal form doesn’t falter as much as his human one, and once again, he is grateful for it, because he’d be running away or kneeling at the beta’s feet begging for things he could never have. 

Unaware of his predicament, Liam burrows his cheek further, keeps talking. 

“Lydia loves you, and you have that weird thing going on. You’re both too smart for the rest of us to follow your trail of thoughts, and she appreciates that a lot. Stiles would slap the shit out of you, but wouldn’t allow anyone else to. Scott is… well,” he chuckles, which sends a shiver through Theo, “you know him. You know he’s forgiven you a long time ago. And Malia would kill anyone who’d dare lay a finger on you. She says you’re the only one who understands her, her years as a coyote, and that she understands you.”

That’s the one that makes him want to cry, though there are no tears in his lupine eyes. Malia, with her fierceness and her anger and her loyalty, who acts before she thinks, who tried to kill him more than once in retaliation. Malia, who runs through the woods like it’s calling her back, who has found family with her pack when all was messy with her blood family. Malia, closed off and cold, but tongue lolling out when they’re wolves, howling to the moon, kissing Scott’s cheek and lips whenever she can. 

They have found a kinship that differentiates from anything Theo has ever found with a person, but then again, that’s what he’s felt with every member of the Mc Call pack, the strangeness of their welcome splitting his ribcage in two and rendering him raw. 

He didn’t think it was mutual. 

“And Mason, Corey, Alec, they fucking adore you. Here you have it. We want you to come back, and we want you to stay.”

Maybe Liam has planned this fucking speech for the hours it took him to find Theo. Maybe he just came up with it on the spot. Maybe he’s able to say all of this because the chimera can’t answer, or maybe he would have said it anyway, wanted to say it since he left. 

There’s a lot of variables, but none of them change the fact that he said it.

He said it, and Theo isn’t able to answer, but he wants to, though he doesn’t know what it is he needs to say. 

He nudges his arms away with a shrug, passing below to reach the bag and let out a small bark. Liam seems lost at his abrupt behaviour, arms spread wide in a peace gesture, eyes confused. Theo huffs, resolves himself to nibbling on the bag until realization dawns on the beta’s face. 

“Oh,” he says uselessly, and then he’s opening the backpack, fishing out the clothes he brought and handing them over to Theo. This last presses his snout to the back of Liam’s hand in quiet thanks before taking the clothes between his teeth, careful not to damage the fabric. 

Shifting back is weird, in that it’s not as uncomfortable as he expected. Sure, he feels uneasy with his limbs longer, broader, his skin on display in the time it takes to dress. But he feels newer, too. Healthier, somehow. 

He doesn’t let himself think about how much more vulnerable he is now, with his every feature on display for Liam to read. It’s been a while since he’s had to control his chemo signals, and the shifts on his face. Theo nervously runs his tongue on his teeth, breathes, and walks back to the beta. 

He remains unmoved where he’s left him, head tilted towards the slowly descending sun, eyes closed, looking so at peace Theo loathes to disturb him. That’s the reason he takes the time to study him, he tells himself. The stupid, stupid hair that he’s cut shorter. The powerful jaw, sharp enough to cut. The slight stubble marring his chin and jaw, betraying a few days of not shaving. He looks grown, Theo suddenly realizes. Not having seen him for a few days -weeks ?- makes it obvious, now that distance forces Theo to some hindsight. Liam has grown, gotten older and wiser and calmer.

And happier. 

This provokes something between his ribs, in his stolen heart, that warms him to the core, slipping through the cracks viciously. To avoid dwelling on it, Theo hurries forward, and manages not to flinch under the focus of Liam’s blue eyes when his attention is drawn to him. 

The sight must be odd, or anything else, because Liam’s irises take on another shade, lighter, and his lips are helplessly pulled up in a smile. And, as helplessly, Theo smiles back. 

“There you are,” the werewolf says for the second time today, and Theo knows he isn’t talking about his brief ten minutes break. 

Arms spreading to his sides in a mocking gesture, Theo aims for aloof when he declares grandly : 

“Here I am.”

Liam’s smile softens, imperceptible for someone less in love with the guy. Tempted to make a joke, anything to lessen the meaning of this moment, Theo bites his lip and simply settles back down beside the beta. It’s way less comfortable as a human than it was as a wolf, but their shoulders touch, and they’re almost pressed together from thigh to arm. 

Theo bends his legs leans his elbows on his knees and lets his hands dangle loosely in between. Liam watches him with his head tilted to the side. 

The chimera knows what’s coming long before Liam gathers the patience -or courage- to utter the question out loud. 

“Why did you leave ?”

It doesn’t offend him, far from it, because the question isn’t asked accusingly. It’s simply that : a question. Liam doesn’t blame him, he wants to understand. Theo just isn’t sure how to explain all the implications that come with being a chimera, being a wolf, being him. 

“Maybe I just wanted to feel like that, for a while.”

“Feel like what ?”

Theo sighs heavily, throwing is head back to look at the sky, unblocked by the steel drawer of the hospital morgue.

“Infinite.”

The werewolf is still staring at him. 

“I am defective by nature,” he starts to explain, not sure why it matters that Liam understands his reasons, but sure it does matter. “An abomination. That’s what they sought to make me, and they succeeded. Quite brilliantly, if we’re honest.”

“You’re not…”

“Face it, Liam. I am faulty. That was their goal, that was the dream. I’m a success only because I am a defect. Do you understand now ?”

The man keeps silent for a moment, a moment where all feels the furthest thing away from infinite; it is unsteady and slippery to sit here, not looking at him, but looking up. Always looking up. 

“Alright,” he eventually speaks up, drawing Theo’s attention away from the falling sun. “Maybe you are defective. Then own it.”

“I do,” Theo replies, confused. “I just thought… I believed, for a moment, that I could…”

The sigh that escapes his lungs is rattled, more than he expected, and to his surprise he has trouble to breathe. 

“I thought that I could be more,” he finally manages. 

“You are,” Liam retorts, not a hint of hesitation, no lie detectable in his words, or voice, or heartbeat. “You are more than what you were made for. You are more than what they made you.”

It is all he has ever wanted to hear, yet he cannot help but feel annoyed, suddenly. 

“And what is that ?” He snaps. “My dead sister’s heart ? The nightmares from Hell ? The Dread Doctors’ added pieces ? All the corpses I left behind ? My lies ?”

“A good man.”

Theo chokes on nothing, eyes snapping back to Liam’s kind expression. 

“You’re a good man,” the beta pushes on. “And you’re trying to change, you have been changing. You are your own determination, and strength, and loyalty.”

Theo makes a sound, ripped and wrecked and undignified, a sound he doesn’t wish to acknowledge as his. 

“You are,” Liam continues with a glare, but the effort is lost when paired with the softness his features hold. His fingers move to circle Theo’s wrist, grounding him in the truth of his words. 

“You are loyal and brave and growing. You can be funny and even kind, and all those things, you did not get from the experiments that you went through. Those qualities are yours, and yours alone.”

The grip on his wrist is short of painful but it helps.

“You can’t… You can’t just say things like that,” Theo manages to laugh wetly, croaked and incredulous and just falling on the verge of hysterical. Liam tilts his head sideways, watching him, unaffected by Theo’s obvious emotional crisis. The chimera does not like this new dynamic, Liam being composed and unbothered while Theo loses every piece he’s ever held close to Tara’s heart for as long as he can remember, while Theo’s composure and his whole world are crumbling. 

“I just did.”

Yeah, and that’s the problem, the big issue Theo is struggling to grasp. He wants to hold all the implications as much as he craves to outrun them. It’s a confused mess, is what it is. 

People only feel one emotion at a time. That might be the dumbest thing he’s ever said. 

Amazingly, being shocked into silence doesn’t stop Theo from craving, craving, and craving some more, and maybe it’s too evident on his face, painted obviously between the crease of his lip and the flare of his eyes, because Liam simply smiles again. 

And then he leans forward. 

“So you’re not leaving ?” He asks, and honestly how can he stay so close and still have breath to talk ? Is Theo the only one who can’t catch air, who can’t feel his heart anymore ?

“No,” Theo assures, lower than a whisper. 

“Even now ?” 

The meaning of his question becomes clear soon enough, when he leans closer still and his lips brush his, not even a kiss, just a promising caress. Though his instincts are blaring, though his limbs urge him to run away and never turn back, Theo fights through it. He fights through it, so that he can be honest when he answers : 

“No.”

And to prove his point, Theo fists a hand in Liam’s stupid hair and pulls him in, lips already parted to welcome him.