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Assemblies were already bad before the whole werewolf thing. Something about being squished in between a thousand other sweaty, noisy teenagers didn’t really settle well underneath Liam’s skin. Maybe it had been the IED at the time, maybe it was just sensory overload, probably both. Now though? With the supernatural hearing and smelling on top of the IED, assemblies had become the worst part of school days for Liam. Beacon Hills administration only seemed to be putting more and more assemblies on the closer they got to the end of the school year. It made sense with graduation coming up in less than a month but Liam was so tired of the whole thing. Most of the time he would slip out the back door during the required assemblies and find some quiet place to wait it out. Commonly it left him on the lacrosse field, practicing until he wore himself out completely. But these days with the razor sharp eyes of Principal Martin surveying the crowds of students pouring into the gymnasium it was difficult to slip away. Liam lingered by the back of the crowds, craning his neck to try and spot Mason or Corey somewhere in the crowds. When Scott and Stiles were still around it was easier to find familiar faces. Just listen for the sounds of loud complaining and lo and behold you would find Stiles. But the older members of the pack were all gone off to college now so it was just the remaining younger members waiting to graduate. Liam ducked under a loose swinging backpack, pressing himself closer into the wall that he had chosen to hide on cursing out every possible student who was within eye-line under his breath. The wave of Digital Media kids finally made it past him and Liam straightened up, peering around for when the next wave would be coming. However rather than peering over the staircase railing into the main hall Liam found himself staring down the pointed orange heels of Principal Martin. Lydia would probably have called them sandstone orange or something like that. “Mr. Dunbar, I feel I shouldn’t need to remind you that attendance at this assembly is mandatory?” Her pointed voice echoed down from the stairs above, floating down like the words of a wrathful god. Liam groaned under his breath before tilting his head back even further to try and meet her eyes. “Yep, I got it, Principal Martin. Just waiting for my friends.” Despite the fluorescent light blaring out from behind her head, her eyebrow lifting up to her hairline was evident as ever. Heels clicked as she made her way down the stairs a little further, coming to rest just a step above eye level. “Everyone is sitting together with their fourth period teacher Mr. Dunbar. Which for you should be Mrs. Kelly, if I’m not mistaken?” “I feel like I should be mildly concerned about the fact that you know that right off the top of your head.” Liam shot back, trying to buy himself some time and prevent Principal Martin from dragging him into the gymnasium. Her red painted lips quirked at that and she descended the remaining stairs. “I wouldn’t have it memorized if your attendance track record was better. Now come with me, they are going to be starting any second now and you need to be sitting with the rest of your fourth period.”“I’ve been doing better this year with the attendance!”“Anything, Mr. Dunbar, is better than the seventy-two days that you missed sophomore year. You would not believe the amount of meetings I had to have with the district to convince them that you should be allowed to graduate to your senior year and not be held back to retake the previous years. You and several other individuals.” Principal Martin grimaced, nudging Liam by his shoulder blades to urge him towards the gymnasium. He could already hear the pounding noise of all the other students squished up together inside and his stomach rolled. Liam twisted a little trying to dislodge the hand pressing into his back but Principal Martin merely adjusted her grip, steering him straight for the doors. “Aww Principal Martin, come on, can’t I just watch the assembly from the sides with all the teachers like you?”She paused and looked down at him with an odd expression crossing her face, “are you a teacher here Mr. Dunbar?”“Am I—huh—?”“Are you a teacher or staff member of Beacon Hills High School, Mr. Dunbar?” “No?”“Well then, that answers that for you doesn’t it?” Principal Martin turned away with a determined gaze and continued on for the doors. Right as she did however, the band started up with their welcome song and a sudden crash of cymbals had Liam just about leaping out of his skin. Goosebumps flooded down his throat as if he had just drank soda too quickly and his body was trying to throw it back up. “Principal Martin please!” The panic must have been more evident in his voice that time because she did finally stop and peer down at Liam. “Mr. Dunbar, if this is just some ploy to get out of this assembly and go mess around on the lacrosse field, I will be assigning you detention for the rest of the week.”“No, no, it’s really not Principal Martin. It’s just—” he cut himself off gesturing helplessly at his ringing ears, hoping that she would be able to put the pieces together from there. “Just what?” Her arms were crossed now. Gel manicured nails tapping against the meat of her upper arm. “Well it’s you know—” Liam paused again and checked over his shoulder for who all was within earshot. Aside from a few teachers who were lingering around the edges of the open gym doors the hall was empty. “—it’s like a—wolf thing,” he finally got out, voice tripping up around the words. Principal Martin closed her eyes, sighing through her nose and bringing her hand up to scrub at the corners of her eyes. “Liam, I can understand that your little wolf-related-problem was a serious thing last year and maybe even the year before that, but you cannot keep using it as an excuse for little things like this. It’s just an assembly for Christ's sake! The students there are different now. They have moved on as most teenagers do with their trends, nobody in there is going to hurt you.”
She thought this was about the beating that Liam had taken the year prior at the hands of the hunters.
“No, Principal Martin, this isn’t—”But that was clearly the end of the discussion for Principal Martin. She grabbed Liam by the upper arm and spun the two of them around, marching him into the gymnasium which was currently erupting into cheering as the band finished their welcome song. The wave of noise had his vision shuttering at the edges, the pounding in his head increased by tenfold and it was everything Liam could do to keep himself in control. The bright lights hanging high above the dilapidated bleachers beat down over him, blinding the top half of his vision. Above him, Principal Martin made a displeased noise before pushing Liam to sit down on one of the seats at the edge of the bleachers “Your class is all the way on the other side of the gym so just stay here until the assembly ends and then I will escort you back to your classroom myself,” Principal Martin explained, leaning over to shout right in his ear as she did, pinning him to the seat with a sharp glare, “If I find out you left during this assembly I will make good on that week of detention alright Mr. Dunbar?”Liam could only nod, head swirling with all the excess stimuli. Principal Martin didn’t look like she had believed him but did stand back up and join up with the other front desk staff watching as the assembly began to get under way. Mrs. Nichols, the vice principal, made her way to the center of the gymnasium, microphone clenched tightly in hand and her teeth threatening to break through the edges of her smile. The cheers rose in volume and Liam groaned, tipping his head forwards to tuck his ears between his knees in an attempt to quiet the noise, just a little. Mrs. Nichols raised a hand, the gym quieting in time with her. Liam took the opportunity of silence to raise his head once again and try to scan the bleachers for any sign of Mason or Corey. He didn’t want to admit it to himself but he was still looking for Scott and Stiles among the crowds, even now, a full year after they had left. “Good morning Beacon Hills Seniors!” Mrs. Nichols voice boomed out over her microphone and Liam could only wince at the electronic screech that it let out. He had been unable to spot Mason or Corey sitting on the opposite side of the gym bleachers and could only assume that they were somewhere on the same side that he was. Where though? Liam had no idea.“Good Morning!” The gym boomed back catching Liam off guard. He slammed his hands back over his ears forcing down another wave of head spinning dizziness. Thankfully Mrs. Nichols didn’t try and get a louder response out of the seniors and instead proceeded on into her presentation about the events leading up to graduation. There would be spirit week, the pep rally for the homecoming lacrosse game, the homecoming lacrosse game and prom. Then they would be into graduation and the school year would be over, it would be onto college for them all. Or whatever people were planning to do after the fact. Liam had yet to figure it out for himself yet. With the disaster of his sophomore year and skipping junior year he hadn’t been able to get any college credit classes or pass any of the AP courses with reasonable enough grades to put on a college transcript. Early and regular decisions had already come and passed for all the colleges in the area and Liam hadn’t submitted so much as a single essay for any of them. Part of him had wanted to. Just a few applications to see who would be interested in taking him but every time he sat down to work on one, everything just slammed into him and before long it was too late. Scott had gone off to college and left Liam in charge of the remaining pack and supernatural creatures in Beacon Hills. He couldn’t just leave them on their own to go off and do his own thing at college. Whenever people asked about his plans after high school these days he would just say he was taking a gap year to save up for college. His parents hadn’t been super thrilled about the idea but after he came clean about everything werewolf and hunter related, they had seemed to understand more. Granted, the version of things that Liam had told them was very much the PG version of the whole thing. They would probably be moving out of Beacon Hills so fast if they knew what all was actually going on. It had helped that Melissa and Sheriff had been around to form an adult support system for his parents. They had some sort of group chat to keep everyone updated on the supernatural happenings in the town. Similar to the pack group chat, Liam had joked when his mom told him about it one night. Liam was jerked out of his thoughts as something smacked into the back of his shoulder. Everything came streaming back in instantly. The bodies squished in all around him, the squeal of the microphone and the quiet giggling now echoing from behind him. Liam twisted around to see what had hit him and spotted a lone rubber sandal sitting on the foot rest of the bleacher row behind him. He followed the giggling to a group of seniors who were sitting a few rows back from him. One of which was missing a sandal. Liam scrunched his face at the group as if to say ‘what the fuck?”. The one missing the shoe covered up his laughter the quickest. “Sorry bro, my shoe fell off.” he whispered, slinking down to reclaim the fallen shoe. Liam rolled his eyes at the guy before turning back around. There was no way it had ‘accidently’ fallen off, but he was not in the mood or place to complain about it. As he faced back towards the center of the gym Principal Martin had moved several feet closer, her sharp gaze drilling into him. Once she caught his gaze she jabbed a finger at Mrs. Nichols, message clear. Liam nodded quickly, smiling awkwardly as he tried to re-find that perfect middle ground of dissociation and paying attention. However less than a second passed before the same sandal smacked into him again. This time into the back of his head. Liam whipped around, just barely restraining his eyes from glowing like they wanted to. The same group of seniors was giggling again, louder this time. The same rubber sandal sat innocently on the bleacher behind him. Liam inhaled through his nose a few times, trying to find his cool. His gums burned and pressure wrapped itself around his jaw like an invisible hand gripping it tight. Liam reached out and snatched the sandal off the bleacher before the one shoe-d senior could come reclaim his shoe again. He turned back around, hands clenched around the rubbery material. Somehow that did help his control. He knew it would be worse for him if he returned the shoe with claw marks in it. Liam took a few more breaths in and out the pressure on his jaw slowly began to ease up and the tingling in the tips of his nail beds faded back to a manageable level. Something moved in the corner of his eye and Liam glanced over, spotting Principal Martin now fully staring at him. Liam smiled at her with a flat mouth and shifted the shoe so it was hanging behind his leg and just out of her eyesight. She didn’t seem to buy the fake innocent act and whispered something to the teacher standing beside her who also looked in Liam’s direction. He changed tactics and returned his gaze to Mrs. Nichols who was going over the Spirit Week days. “As you can see, Monday of that week will be parent day. So borrow some clothes from your mom or dad or dress up in something that they wore during their time in high school. Tuesday will be camo day, if you own any type of camo wear that. Wednesday is graffiti day which is new for our school this year. If you have any sort of old tee-shirts that you want to get rid of, wear it that day and bring some sharpies and everyone will sign each other's shirts. That way you can get a cool memory of all your classmates as well. Thursday is animal day so you get to dress up as your favorite animals. The only limitation for that one is that if you cannot wear any sort of full face masks, we must be able to see who you are. Then for Friday we have school spirit day so everyone will be dressed up in the school colors.”Liam could only snort at the school's genius idea of doing ‘animal day’ for one of the spirit days. Had they all just collectively forgotten about the wolf related trauma that students at the school kept having to endure? Even the human students. Plenty of people who had been around for la Bête’s attack were still at the school. Something shifted behind him and Liam tensed up preparing for another sandal to smack him in the back of his head. Instead there was the sound of the group behind him cupping their hands around their mouths and howling. Softly enough of course that none of the teachers could hear them, but for Liam it echoed all through his head. He whipped around to glare at the group, his control slipped a little and the burning glow filled his eyes. A few of them faltered at the sight, but the one missing the shoe appeared to be missing brain cells as well as he only picked up in volume at Liam’s clear distaste. The rubber sandal in his other hand bent under the force of Liam’s grip. He could distantly hear the sound of heels clicking across the linoleum towards him but Liam found he no longer cared about getting in trouble. However before he could do anything, something moved behind the group, further up on the bleachers a familiar face stood up. Gwen popped up, towering above the group and swung her leg over the bleachers, marching quite determinedly around them. The group faltered at the sight of someone else getting involved and their howls finally quieted into silence. They hadn’t caused enough of a disruption for Mrs. Nichols to have noticed and she continued on presenting up front. Gwen positioned herself in between Liam and the group, crouching down in front of them, frown evident on her face. “Do I need to remind you four about what will happen if I tell Principal Martin about what I caught you all doing in the boys bathroom last week?” she hissed quietly. Almost immediately their faces went white and eyes were averted down to the bleacher floors. The one missing the other sandal rolled his eyes a little but sat back and crossed his arms over his chest. “Do I?”“No.” One of the other boys snapped moodily. Gwen gave a determined nod before getting back to her feet and continuing down the bleacher stairs to sit beside Liam instead. He smiled at her as she dropped down beside him. “You didn’t need to do that. Thanks,” he muttered to her. Gwen shook her head, “No I did. Those guys are assholes and you shouldn’t have to put up with that.”Liam smirked at that, “what did you even catch them doing last week?” She giggled a little before responding, “Walked into the gym bathrooms and caught them trying to take a toilet off the wall for that tik tok trend.”Liam broke out in his own set of giggles, hand pressed over his mouth so he didn’t draw further attention from Principal Martin. “I have no idea what their plan was beyond getting the toilet off the wall but I figured that piece of information might come in handy since we are so close to graduation anyways.”He opened his mouth to respond when the bleachers behind the two of them creaked ominously. Liam twisted and startled at the sight of one-shoe-boy’s face suddenly much closer than he was moments before. “What the fu—” Liam barely got out before the boy's hand was reaching towards his other sandal still clenched in Liam’s hand. “Give me my fucking shoe back you bitch.” He snarled, hands scrabbling for the shoe which Liam tossed out of reach. It landed on the floor a few feet away with a loud thud. “Hey get off of him!” Gwen yelped, grabbing for the boy's shoulders and trying to haul him off of Liam. “Screw off wolf-fucker!” he shouted back, shoving her away by the stomach, sending Gwen falling backwards into the sharp edge of the bleachers. Somewhere in the back of his mind Liam could recognize that Mrs. Nichols had fallen silent at the front of the room and all eyes had fallen to the fight that had begun. But he honestly couldn't bring himself to care. Gwen landed on the bleachers edge with a painful crash and one-shoe-boy tackled Liam off the bleachers.
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They hit the floor, a rolling mass of fists swinging. Liam squirmed out of the way of the first hit and elbowed the boy back in the stomach which sent him curling in on himself away from Liam. Seeing the opening Liam began to scramble to his feet but before he got very far one-shoe-boy caught him by the leg, yanking him off balance and sending Liam crashing back into the floor. He felt the snap as his nose shattered against the hard flooring. Pain radiated through the front of his face and the pressure tightened out his jaw, fangs dropping through his gums. Liam kicked his leg back, feeling it connect with something solid and distantly hearing a cry of pain. He curled his hands into fist, trying to hide away the claws that were undoubtedly on full display once again. Liam kept his head tilted down as he began trying to force himself to his feet. The blood from his nose kept splattering loudly against the floor and it was all he could see. The small puddle of blood formed underneath him, increasing with each additional drop. A crowd had formed around the small fight, the toes of their shoes just barely visible on the edges of Liam’s vision. Hands landed on his back and Liam flinched away from them, trying to get the person off before a familiar voice finally reached his ears. “Liam! Liam! It’s me!”
Mason.
The tightness curling around his jaw loosened up a little bit but didn’t disappear entirely. Mason’s hands reattached to his shoulder and Liam felt his other senses begin to slowly trickle back in. He could faintly smell the aftershave that Mason always wore dancing around behind him. The spearmint gum that Corey always chewed was right behind him and Liam identified his hands as the second pair that landed on his shoulders helping pull Liam to his feet. He stumbled a little as they hauled him up together. The blood was gushing slower from his nose now, having slowed down just enough for his healing to begin to take effect. The once pulsating pain had soothed down to a more manageable tingling sensation that was flowing across the bridge of his nose and down the sides of his cheeks. Faintly Liam could hear the sounds of voices on all sides of him shouting back and forth as Mason and Corey hauled him out of the gym together. He could tell the moment they were out as the noise softened instantly becoming a thousand times more bearable. The rage was still bubbling up under his skin however and Liam had yet to get his fangs to retract back up into his gums. He just wanted to rip their hands free of his body and take off running. “—taking him—” “—locker room—”“—that way—” Mason and Corey’s voices faded in and out of his hearing, slowly rolling in and out like the rolling waves of the tide. A third voice had joined theirs. Gwen’s maybe? A sudden tug at his left arm had Liam snarling and trying to pull away from the force. “Come on Liam, work with us here,” Mason bemoaned and Liam tried to even out his breathing. They were just trying to help him. He didn’t want to hurt them. But all the same he just wanted it all to stop. They tugged him around a corner and Liam groaned as a bright light swung into his vision, blinding his limited sight momentarily. The overwhelming scent of sweat and other peoples bodies had faded out the moment they left the gym but Liam could still tell the moment they broke through the doorway to the locker room. Stale air and the scent of over used body spray hit his nostrils. The smell wasn’t so much of a comfort as a familiarity to Liam. Over time Mason and Corey had done what they could to help out Liam whenever he was having one of his werewolf or an IED episode.Shoving him under water as Scott and Stiles had tried, really wasn’t the best option as it turned out. They would do their best to get him out of whatever situation had set him off and to a quiet and darker space for Liam to calm himself down. The locker room was exactly that. Since Coach had closed up the locker room for the assembly the lights were all down to backup lighting. Leaving only the slight light flooding in from the windows high up on the walls and the few lights in the showers which turned on as they passed by. Liam could hear the humming of electricity kick on as they went past and swung his head off to the side to avoid getting another eyeful of fluorescent lighting. He could see the tips of Mason's shoes on his left and Corey’s on his right. They swung him down to sit on the cold tile floorings and Liam shut his eyes tightly. The tingling was still flooding up and down his fingertips and when he clenched his fists together he could feel the sharp points of his claws digging into the meat of his palm. Liam pinched his eyes tighter together and tried to haul together some semblance of control.
The sun.
The moon.
And the truth.
The mantra had worked quite well before Hayden had become his anchor. But once she had taken over as his center of control the mantra had stopped working as well. It could do well enough to keep him under control during moments when he was actually calm, but did little to nothing in the moments when he actually needed to retake his control. Scott had left long before Liam realized how truly un-effective the saying had become without Hayden around so it wasn’t like he could just ask him what to do. Granted he probably could text him, but it seemed like such a small thing. Scott had left him in control of the pack believing Liam to be in control of himself, and if he couldn’t even do that—A wave of pressure wrapped itself back around his jaw and Liam growled in the back of his throat. “Liam come on buddy,” he faintly heard Mason groan from beside him, “we aren’t gonna douse you in water but you have to calm down. Principal Martin is going to be looking for you any second now.”“I’ll go wait outside and see if I can buy you guys some time,” Gwen’s voice finally spoke up from the edge of the room. Liam hadn’t even realized she had followed them in. But if he focused hard enough he could just barely smell the warm vanilla of her perfume. “Yeah that’s probably a good idea,” Mason admitted and there was a click as the door shut behind Gwen. “Liam?” Corey hesitantly spoke up, “you doing alright?” The pair of them had set Liam down by a back wall of the locker rooms, cool tiles pressing into his back and the side of his face. Liam let out an annoyed growl and tried to push himself a little further upright on the wall. “Alright. Message received,” Corey muttered, moving away from Liam to sit with Mason on the opposite side of the locker row. “Come on Liam, you gotta focus. Use your mantra, that works right?” Mason’s voice was getting louder and louder as his hearing picked up in sensitivity. His claws prickled against his palms, drawing fine scratches down them as he dug the palms of his hands into his eye sockets, watching as colorful fireworks exploded behind his eyes. “The sun.” Corey started, keeping his voice softer, probably sensing Liam’s distress.
The sun.
“The moon.” Mason continued, taking note from his boyfriend and keeping his voice low as well.
The moon.
“And the truth.” The words slowly washed over his body, filling his ears and blocking out the electrical humming from right above him. “Come on Liam. Say it with us,” Mason pleaded. “The sun.” Corey began again. “The sun.” Liam forced himself to repeat, his voice was scratched over and cracked as the words tumbled out. “There you go. The moon.”“The moon.” “And the truth.”“And the truth.” “The sun, the moon and the truth,” Corey said, picking up speed as he went. The tips of his claws began to tingle once again. However this time it wasn’t the same aching tingle of forcing them to stay locked up. This time it was softer. The same feeling as when you finally regain feeling in a limb that you’ve been sitting on. Slowly, Liam pulled his hands away from his eyes and dared to crack open a lid to watch as the dark claws finally faded back into the clear keratin of his normal nails. “One more time Liam.” He shot an annoyed look at Mason over the tops of his knees but acquitted and repeated the mantra. “The sun, the moon and the truth,” in a final rush, the remaining pressure on his jaw let up and his fangs sunk back up into his gums. “There you go.” Mason and Corey both relaxed in unison. Corey’s head falling backwards and Mason’s falling forwards as the three of them just breathed for a moment. “Dude what the hell happened back there?” Mason finally asked, breaking the silence. Liam groaned, reaching up to gingerly pat around his nose and see if it was still bleeding or not. His fingers caught on the dried trails of blood running from his nose down over his top lip but the cartilage of his nose had repaired itself. “Some group of kids behind me kept being dicks and throwing a shoe at me so I just stole the shoe from them and then they started making howling noises at me,” Mason winced a little at that. “I think quite a few people all over the gym were doing that. We could hear some people doing it from where we were sitting.” Corey nodded along, “I don’t think administration really thought through a ‘dress as your favorite animal spirit day,” he grumbled. Liam couldn’t help but snicker at that. “Anyways, Gwen tried to get involved after that and make them stop it. She did for a little bit but then the guy who was throwing his shoe decided he wanted his shoe back. He tried to make a grab for it and then shoved Gwen pretty hard when she tried to intervene again. He called her some pretty bad stuff and I guess I just lost it at that point.”Liam sighed and pushed himself halfheartedly to his feet, flicking on a nearby sink and grabbing some of the paper towels to start cleaning the blood off of him. “Wait! Are you sure you want to clean that off just yet?” Mason hopped up quickly to stop him. Liam frowned looking back and forth between the wet paper towels and Mason’s reflection in the mirror. “I don’t really want to go walking around for the rest of the day with blood all over my face, so, yeah?” “Remember what happened right before spring break though?” Liam paused again, water from the paper towels now starting to drip down his hand. The week before spring break, one of the younger hunters who had stuck around in town and was on the lacrosse team had decided to try and take a lacrosse stick to Liam’s head right before practice. While the stick had made good contact and busted Liam’s head open, by the time Coach had gotten to the scene, the cut had healed and Liam had scrubbed off the blood. Since there was no evidence of anything happening, Coach had just yelled at the two of them to stop making out and get on the field. The hunter had gotten off with zero consequences and Liam was stuck with the horrific image of making out with said hunter in his head for the rest of the day. He sighed and lowered his hand, tossing the tissues into a nearby trash can. “Good point,” he muttered. Behind him Mason’s phone buzzed. “Alright, show time. Principal Martin’s coming, Gwen said she already got sent to her office for her own involvement in everything.”Liam sighed and wiped the remaining water off his hand, turning around to face the doors and probably a week's worth of detention. He heard Principal Martin’s heels coming down the hallway before anything else. Then the door slammed open and she appeared. Glasses tilted at an angle on the bridge of her nose, bangs frizzed out and red lips so tightly pursed Liam doubted she could fit a needle between them. “Mr. Dunbar! Did I or did I not, very clearly, outline to you exactly what would happen, if you stirred up trouble during this assembly?” She was pissed. “I didn’t cause this!”“Oh so Mrs. Naomi is responsible for this mess? Is that what you’re saying?”“No, no Gwen had nothing to do with this, she was just trying to help me!” “You know what, I really don’t care right now. Just come with me Mr. Dunbar, we will be sorting this out in my office.”Corey pulled a sympathetic wince as Liam sighed and trudged his way past him. “Good luck,” he muttered under his breath once Liam had passed. Quiet enough that Liam was the only one to hear it. The locker room door slammed shut behind them and Principal Martin took his arm, marching him down the hallways towards her office.
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Gwen was already sitting in Principal Martin’s office by the time Liam arrived. The boy from the bleachers was sitting there too, slumped into a seat on the furthest chair possible from Gwen. His shoe must have been returned to him at some point during the post fight as he now had both shoes. He had one hand supporting his head which was tilted off to the side, glaring off into nothing-ness. Gwen looked up as they entered and offered Liam a half smile at the sight of him. In all truthfulness Gwen had been a lot closer friends with Hayden then she had been with Liam and Mason. The two of them had run in the same circles in middle school and despite taking different sports in high school, they had remained pretty well connected. After everything went down with the Ghost Hunters Gwen had taken the time to apologize to Liam and then all for not listening more when they had been trying to help her. Liam had quickly waved her off, understanding that if it had been his own sister who had gone missing like that, he would have been desperate for answers too. When everything had started up with the hunters and Hayden had left, Gwen stuck around, slowly becoming a part of the small inner circle that he, Corey and Mason had formed over time. Gwen had never gotten the chance to really be close with the older pack members before they went off to college but Liam would sometimes include her on the updates that he sent to the pack group chat. “Have a seat Mr. Dunbar,” Principal Martin gave him a half gentle nudge towards the chair in between Gwen and the other boy before she took her seat on the other side of the desk. Liam sank into the chair with a sigh, itching slightly at the dried blood on the side of his face. It was beginning to become more of an irritant than anything, despite the valid point that Mason had made for leaving it there. Principal Martin must have spotted his face because she sighed and dug a wet wipe out of her desk, passing it over to Liam. “Please get the blood cleaned up off your face Mr. Dunbar.”On the other side of him the now two-shoed-boy let out a snort and slumped deeper into his seat. “Do you need a wet wipe as well Mr. Green?” Principal Martin asked, shooting him a pointed eyebrow. “A wet wipe?! I need a goddamn restraining order!” he yelped, jumping to his feet, hand falling away from his face, revealing the damages that Liam had done. The top half of his forehead and eyebrow were covered by a slowly darkening bruise in the perfect shape of Liam’s shoe. If he waited long enough Liam had a feeling he would be able to see the brand imprinting right over his eyebrow. “Oh get over yourself Trevor, you broke Liam’s nose. I don’t think you get to complain much about a little bruise.” Gwen snapped from the other side of him. Liam scrubbed at the corner of his nose, finally getting the wet wipe to come away with no new blood on it. “I broke his nose?! Look at him! He looks totally fine!” Trevor shrieked, hands now flying as he tried to point out every single injustice to himself in this situation. “Mr. Green! Mrs. Naomi! Have a seat please, both of you!” Principal Martin’s voice broke through the squalor. They both shot each other a sharp glare but did as they were instructed and sat back down. The exhaustion was beginning to settle into Liam’s bones as it did whenever he had an episode like this. He crumpled up the used wet wipe in his hands and tried to mentally prepare himself for whatever the corresponding punishment for this was. Their fight had been pretty public, no doubt recorded, and would be flooding around the school by the time the final bell rang. “Now, can one of you please tell me exactly what happened during that assembly. Many of our incredible staff members and student leadership worked extremely hard for that assembly to go well, and you three have managed to completely disrupt that with this little spat.” Principal Martin sat back with an incredible huff, her bangs fluffing even more out over her head as she did so. Her sharp eyes surveyed over the three of them in silence for a moment. None of them really knowing what to say. Liam had a feeling that anything he tried to say would be instantly disputed by Trevor. And Trevor didn’t have enough of a heart in him to find the truth. “Trevor started it,” Gwen finally spoke up, taking charge of the situation. “No I didn’t!”“Mr. Green! Not right now, you will have your moment to speak later,” Principal Martin motioned for Gwen to continue and she did. “Him and all his friends kept laughing and making jokes at Liam when he came into the assembly. Then Trevor took off his shoe and threw it at Liam two different times. On the second time Liam grabbed his shoe and just held onto it so Trevor would stop throwing it at him. Then they started making—erm—” Gwen’s gaze swung to Liam as if unsure how to proceed. They had never really gone through all the adults in the school who were safe to talk to about supernatural things. Honestly at some point Liam had just started assuming that they all knew to some degree, especially with everything that had gone down the previous year. He nodded at Gwen, encouraging her to continue. “He was making wolf noises. So I stood up to step in. I told all four of them to knock it off and then went to go sit with Liam. And that did help for a little while but then all of a sudden Trevor came up behind us and tried to grab his shoe back from Liam. He startled us both pretty badly when he popped up like that so Liam tossed his shoe on the floor. Trevor started swearing at us so I tried to pull him away but then he shoved me and I didn’t really see what happened after that.” Gwen trailed off her voice slowing down as she reached the end of the story. “That’s not true at all!” Trevor shrieked, back on his feet, “we weren’t talking about him at all, we were talking about the assembly!”“Sit down Mr. Green. What about the wolf noises? What was that?” “It was for spirit week, you know, favorite animal day. My favorite animal is—a wolf,” Trevor trailed off as well as he seemed to understand where his defense was taking him. “Oh really Trevor?” Liam snickered, “your favorite animal is a wolf?”“Fuck you Dunbar!”“Mr. Green! Mind your language! And you Mr. Dunbar, please keep your comments to yourself. You are a senior by now, you should know how to control yourself.”Liam looked away as a wave of shame washed over him. He should know how to control himself. Principal Martin had no idea just how right she was about this whole thing. His control was slipping. Before Hayden, the mantra had worked well at keeping him under control. And then there had been Hayden, his anchor, but now she was gone too. Leaving Liam out at sea, adrift in the current. He sometimes wondered if things were as difficult for her to keep a lid on as well. If losing him as her anchor had tossed her loose at sea in the very same manner. Sometimes Liam wondered if he had even been her anchor. She had been a chimera before she had been a werewolf. Perhaps it was easier to keep control over the creature locked up in your chest as a chimera. But she was a werewolf now so it wouldn’t matter either way. Scott had said that while all werewolves had anchors. Some didn’t find their anchors in another person and could find control on their own methods, but most werewolves needed some sort of person. But chimeras were different right? Maybe that made things different for Hayden. Maybe because she had been a chimera first she didn’t need an anchor at all. He could ask Corey, Liam supposed. Corey was a chimera after all but that seemed way too personal to ask him outright. “Now, Mr. Green, what on earth possessed you to throw your shoe at Mr. Dunbar?” Principal Martin’s tired voice filtered back into his thoughts and Liam was reminded of where he was. “I didn’t! It fell off my foot! I told him that too!” Principal Martin pursed her lips and leaned around her desk to peer at the shoes that Trevor was wearing. She squinted unhappily at the rubber sandals that he wore. “Perhaps in the future we should avoid wearing shoes that come off our feet so easily, hm?” Trevor nodded along with an overly enthusiastic nod as if he expected to have won Principal Martin's favor so easily. “Mr. Dunbar,” Liam looked up at the call of his name, “why did you take Mr. Green’s shoe and not give it back when he asked?”“I didn’t want to be hit by it again, he nailed me in the head with it the second time he threw it.”“I didn’t throw it!”“Fell. Threw. It does not matter at this point!” Principal Martin waved her arms, dispelling the argument before it could go any further. “Now classes are about to begin again so we are going to wrap up this meeting. Mr. Dunbar, I will be enacting that week of detention as we discussed prior to this. It will be both after school detention and lunch time detention.”“Wait but I have practice after school this week. The homecoming game is only in a few weeks,” Liam protested. “You should have considered that before getting involved in this, then I’m afraid. Just be glad I’m still allowing you to remain on the lacrosse team at all.”Beside him Trevor had broken out into snickering, his giggles badly hidden behind his fist. Liam shot him a glare. The branding from the bottom of his shoe was just beginning to become visible over Trevor's eye. “Mr. Green you will be also serving after school and lunch time detention for this week as well, due to your own part in the fight.”“What!? But that's not right—!”“I won’t hear any more of it. Your detention will begin effective today at lunchtime in which you will be first and foremost apologizing to everyone who worked so hard on that assembly and then you will be helping out the Coaches clean out the gym storage.”Liam groaned, tipping his head back to fall against the back of his chair. He had seen what the gym storage room looked like on only one other occasion when Coach had run out of spare equipment and given Liam and Nolan the keys to go get some more. They had barely gotten the door a foot off the ground when things had started tumbling out around them. They shut the door pretty quickly and told Coach that the lock had rusted through too much to get into. “The remainder of the week will be determined based on what our faculty need done around the school. Is that understood you two?”“Yes Principal Martin,” both Liam and Trevor muttered in unison. “Now Mrs. Naomi, while I applaud you stepping in to help out your friend, I cannot let your refusal to give Trevor his shoe back go unpunished. So you will be helping Mr. Larcy in the library during our after school study period for the next three days.”“How is that fair? If we had given Trevor back his shoe he would have just thrown it at Liam again!” Gwen demanded. “Oh now you want to complain about fairness,” Trevor mocked under his breath. “I don’t want to hear another word about it, this is how we will be resolving this situation and that is final.” Principal Martin caught them all in another sharp look before she gave a final nod and relaxed a bit more back into her desk. “Alright, you three can return to your fourth period. Mr. Dunbar and Mr. Green, I expect to see you both back here at lunch time.” They all gave one final nod of agreement before slowly leaving the room. Trevor stormed out of the room, muttering swears under his breath as he went. As the door swung behind him Liam could see Mason and Corey waiting together on the other side of the front office doors. He couldn’t help but grin at them through the glass as they re-entered the quiet hallways. “Trevor doesn’t look too happy about that meeting,” Mason joked as they approached. “Yeah, he got a week of after school and lunch detention,” Liam confirmed, still grinning slightly, “but so did I, so not great.”“But he totally started it!” Corey protested. Gwen shrugged from beside him, “Didn’t change much. I think Principal Martin is just trying to make it seem like she’s a neutral person between the supernatural students and the human ones here. Make it seem like she’s handing out equal punishments and not favoring one side over the other.”“She’s sure not doing a very good job of it,” Mason scoffed, “now I don’t want to go see her for this kind of stuff. I mean at least she didn’t try and expel you or something,” he offered bumping shoulders with Liam.Liam nodded his agreement, if he had been expelled he would be for sure kicked off the team and have his position as captain revoked. “Yeah but I’ll be missing practice all this week too,” Corey winced a little as he came to the same realization. “I guess we’ll just have to practice after you get out of detention or something?”“You really want to hang around school for an extra hour after practice is over?”Corey bit at his lip, contemplating the question, “No. Not really.”Liam nodded, “I figured. It’s fine. I’ll just let Nolan know and he can keep me updated.” Above them the bell began to ring again for the beginning of fourth period and the sound of doors slamming quickly reached their ears. “I’m gonna leave before it gets much busier, see you all later,” Liam said, turning to head off to his fourth period class. Behind him Mason, Corey and Gwen began to split off in their own directions as well.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Hours later Liam finally crashed back into his bed at home, exhaustion flooding through every fiber of his body. The day had very quickly gone from tiresome to exhausting. Trevor had been the worst of partners to even attempt cleaning out the gym storage with. He had decided within thirty seconds of working, that it was too much effort all together for him and had sat off to the side while Liam did the majority of the work. When Coach came to finally release them from after school detention, Liam was covered in sweat and about ready to start pulling out the claws and fangs on Trevor to get him to work. Coach however had prevented that from happening and had sent the both of them home. They had barely gotten any progress on cleaning out the storage unit but things no longer fell out of it when you pulled the door open which Liam counted as progress. Mason, who had been his ride to school that morning had long since left, shooting Liam an apologetic message that he was not about to wait a full extra hour just for Liam to get out of detention. He couldn't blame him for that in any regard. In the end Liam had called his mom to pick him up on her way home from work that evening. Thankfully she had agreed and picked him up just as the evening shadows were beginning to fill the entire lacrosse field. The ride home had been quiet after Liam explained his reasons for the late pick up time. His mom had claimed to understand but Liam could see the shadows of her disappointment in the reflection on the front window as they drove. His stepfather was spending another late night at the hospital so it would just be the two of them for dinner that evening. She had dropped him off at the house and then gone to pick up take out for the two of them that evening. For the longest time Liam didn’t move, keeping his face pressed into the messy pillows and blankets that made up his bed. It wasn’t possible but here, pressed into the sheets he could almost swear he could smell himself as he grew up. Five years old, playing with his stuffed dog on the bed. Ten years old having his first sleepover with Mason. Twelve years old tossing and turning with fever. Fifteen years old sobbing as his newly formed claws punched holes into his pillows. Seventeen now, and crumpling under the weight of what was expected of him. Liam groaned, shifting around his arms so he was no longer laying on his elbow weirdly. He ended up flipped around on his stomach staring up at the glow in the dark stars that he had stuck up there when his stepdad had surprised him with a pack for his eighth birthday. He had neglected to turn on the light and they were still faintly glowing from the sunlight that had poured into his bedroom earlier in the day. His phone buzzed suddenly from the bedside table, vibrating across the resin coated plaster board. Liam flailed a hand out and around until it made contact with the phone. He lifted his head just enough to blind himself as the phone registered his face and turned on. Scott was texting the group chat. Liam clicked on the message and hauled himself up a little further for the scanner to recognize his face and let him into his phone.
Scott had been planning for months to come out to Beacon Hills that summer for two weeks right at the end of the school year. He would be arriving right around Liam’s graduation and would most likely be at the actual graduation. Provided that Liam was allowed to graduate, which, with the current path that he was on, was running with a thread of doubt.
Some people (read Stiles) were too busy and couldn’t make it but decided to make it everybody else’s problem. Liam huffed out a laugh as his phone began to vibrate much faster as a flood of messages poured in in response to Stiles.
Liam hauled himself further up against the pillows to rest against the headboard of his bed and watch his friends bicker back and forth.
Liam leaned forwards, frowning as well. Last he had heard, Malia would be in the middle of a four week long wilderness training hike when Scott was supposed to be coming up and couldn’t make it. Scott was actually the only one who would be able to make it in the first place. Stiles with his summer internship. Malia with her training. Kira off in New Mexico still and Lydia flying over to Washington D.C. to spend the summer with Stiles.
Looks like Malia would be joining the crowds now however. That changed things a little bit. Liam wasn’t upset that Malia was coming. The two of them got along just fine, but he had been expecting it to be just Scott for the whole two weeks. At least he would get just the first week with Scott. There was a full moon set for the second week of the trip, something Liam had been planning to exploit Scott for more tips on his control.
Liam looked back down as the sight of his own name flashing by in the messages drew his attention.
Downstairs the front door slammed open and Liam could hear the awkward shuffling as his mom entered the house, her hands full of take out boxes. He tossed down his phone and went to help her out, not wanting to make things even harder for her with everything that had happened.Hours later when the sun had long since sunk down below the horizon and darkness had fallen over the backyard Liam’s phone began to ring. He could hear it bubbling around in the pillows where he had left it and winced a little at the familiar ringtone. With Scott leaving, Sheriff Stilinski had given him his phone number, both his personal number and his office number and told Liam to contact him if he needed anything. However, what had ended up happening was he would call Liam whenever something happened that was just slightly off of the normal track for him to come check it out. Liam knew it was all in good faith. They had had more than enough things slip by under the radar because nobody had checked it out for something supernatural related. But seriously this was beyond annoying to deal with. His mom must have spotted his expression because she put down the box that she was emptying into a leftover container arch an eyebrow at him. “Something wrong?”“No it’s fine, Sheriff Stilinski is just calling.”“He is? On your phone?” She pulled her own phone out of her back pocket to check that Sheriff Stilinski was not calling her for some strange reason.“Yep.”“I don’t hear your phone ringing though?” Liam smiled a little at that, “it’s upstairs.” Her eye’s shot wide in remembrance and she nodded quickly before making a shooing motion with her hands. “Well go pick up. Don’t let him go to voicemail.”Liam chuckled at that and pulled himself out of the wooden chairs, dropping off his plates on the kitchen counter before hurrying up the stairs before the line dropped. He had only missed one of Stilinski’s calls once. But somehow in the five minutes it took for him to find his phone and call him back Stilinski had managed to call Melissa McCall, Jordan Parrish and had been in the process of calling Scott when Liam finally called him back. He really didn’t want a repeat of that. “Hello?” the line crackled a little as Liam picked up his phone, pressing it in between his shoulder and ear beginning to tug on his shoes. Whenever Stilinski called him for something like this it was almost a guarantee that he wanted Liam to come by the station. “Hey Liam, are you busy right now?”“Nope, what's up?”“Do you think you can swing by the station? Some officers brought something in a few hours ago and I think you should check it out.”“Yeah for sure. I’ll be there in like fifteen minutes.”“Thanks Liam. See you soon.” The line cut with a click and Liam sighed, tugging his shoelaces tighter and grabbing his wallet as he left his room. The stairs creaked under his weight as Liam bounded down them. His mother was now sitting back at the dining room table, magazine splayed out before her.“Can I borrow the car? Sheriff wanted me to check something out, down at the station.”“Ok, just be back by midnight and be safe.”“Will do! Love you mom!” Liam snagged the keys out of the key dish in the entryway table, disappearing out the door without a second word.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Sheriff Stilinski was waiting for him outside his office as Liam entered the Beacon Hills Police Precinct. He could smell the faint waves of unsettlement rolling off the Sheriff. Parrish nodded at him from his desk, knee deep in conversation with a different officer as Liam passed. He tried to force himself to swallow down the odd waves rolling through his stomach at the memories of the last time he had been in the precinct. Stilinski had been there. So had Theo. His brain supplied unhelpfully. Sheriff Stilinski pushed his office door open and motioned for Liam to follow him inside. “Thanks for coming Liam.”“Yeah no problem, what’s going on?” The expression on the Sheriff’s face was damn near unreadable as if he just didn’t quite know how to explain what had happened. The door shut behind them with a solid snap and Stilinski motioned for Liam to have a seat at the one side of his desk. He did. Pulling out the chair with a scrape against the flooring and settling awkwardly into the stiff fabric. It reminded him of those chairs in hotel rooms that were set up next to the bed. Only one of course. Never two chairs in any one hotel room. Mason had made a joke about them being symbolic for cuckolding and Liam had never been able to look at the chairs ever the same again. Sheriff tossed himself into the spinny chair on the opposite side of the desk, shoving the burger wrapper which had probably been his dinner off to the side, and grabbed a set of keys from one of the desk drawers. “We got a call about two hours ago about a car that had crashed off the interstate highway entering Beacon Hills. The caller said the car was still running and had just gone off the side of the road into a ditch. I assumed someone had fallen asleep at the wheel and sent an officer out there with a tow company following behind to get the car out of the ditch. My officer reported back as soon as they reached the crash site and they had found that the person inside had not just fallen asleep at the wheel. They were dead at the wheel.”Liam just barely restrained himself from groaning about zombies invading Beacon Hills outloud and nodded along instead. Sheriff swung the keys around his finger a second time, glancing down at them, contemplating how to continue. “A team was sent down shortly after to retrieve the body and they found that the person’s body was that of a completely blind person. Now with partial blindness, sometimes driving licenses are granted if the person is able to pass all the tests. But this person who was driving was fully blind, no possible sight. We haven’t been able to get a positive ID on the body quite yet but it will be a while until we can hear back from the morgue. The tow company just brought in the car and I wanted to see if you could get any sort of scent or chemosignals off of it?”Chemosignals, aww fuck . Liam was no good at those. Scott was better than him. Malia could do it in her sleep. Theo was scary good at them. And for half a beat, Liam found himself wishing that he could just pull out his phone and shoot a text off to the wayward chimera. To ask for his help once again. But he couldn’t. Liam hadn’t seen or heard from Theo since that night at the hospital. It was like he had just vanished off into the shadows of the world. If Liam was being honest with himself Theo had probably taken off at the first sign of things settling down around Beacon Hills. He wouldn’t blame him. Well maybe he did. “Liam?” He jerked his head up, making eye contact with Stilinski far too quickly to be natural and quickly nodded, trying to make it seem like he was paying attention. “You don’t have to if you don't want to. I can get Parrish to do it after his shift ends.”“No, no, it’s fine. No point in giving Parrish more work, I got the time. Where’s the car?” “Before that, I wanted to show you some of the pictures that were taken at the scene just so you know what we are working with here.”Liam nodded, stretching himself over the desk to grab the offered file from the Sheriff’s hand. He flipped the file open and was faced with a picture of the highway off ramp that led into the heart of the city. “Surveillance cameras as far back as we have jurisdiction show the car coming down from a few county’s over. They were making good speed and tripped more than a few of the speed trap cameras which clocked it at a top speed of 115. Whoever was driving was heading somewhere, and quickly. They didn’t take any other off ramps as far as we know so whatever they were looking for was clearly here. They were also driving smoothly until the crash itself so unless someone else was driving or they were being led by another sort of sense there’s no way a fully blind person could make the trip.”Liam turned to the next picture which was of the off ramp that the car had crashed on. He could see the faint glow of its taillights in the corner of the picture but the main focus of the image was on the skid marks. “With most cases of falling asleep at the wheel, there are no skid marks because the person is asleep, but with this case. The skid marks start out pretty faintly and far back and then disappear as if they fell asleep and lost strength while skidding.”He squinted closer at the picture, looking for what Stilinski was talking about. True to his word, the skid marks were darkest furthest away from the camera and got fainter and fainter the closer that they got to the camera. The image behind it was the same thing but taken from the opposite angle. Lines of burned tire rubber scorched across the tarmac, creating near perfect arrows leading to where the car must have crashed. Liam flipped to the next picture and it was of the car that had crashed. A small little green hatchback with its front bumper smashed into the gleaming metal guard rail that surrounded the highway. He flipped through the remaining images. One of the front of the car, headlights blaring into the camera lens and for a moment Liam was standing in the middle of a highway. Standing over two bodies while a SUV went swerving around him. The remaining pictures were focused on the damage to the car and the body inside. It was a young woman, blonde hair splayed out all across the dashboard and head cracked in with the force of slamming into the steering wheel. Her eyes were the most striking thing about the whole image however. Bright while and clouded over like the moon shining out behind a stormy cloud cover. If they had had pupils Liam would have sworn they were staring right through him. He shuddered a little and shut the folder, passing it back to Stilinski. Sheriff tucked it into the drawer beside him and turned back to Liam with a sigh. “I’m guessing I would be too much of a lucky man to ask if you recognize her at all.” Liam shook his head and Stilinski nodded as if he had expected the answer. “Figured not. She’s not coming up with any records in Beacon Hills and the surrounding counties are taking a while to get back to us with their records. I have no idea if she’s a supernatural creature or not, which is why I called you down here to see if you could help us figure that one out. I don’t know if you guys have some sort of secret supernatural scent that you give off and she might have left in the car?” Liam almost felt bad about dashing the Sheriff's hope, “not really. The best I can try and do is gauge her emotional state when she was in the car or any other substances or things that might have been in there with her. If she was having any sort of heightened emotional reaction at the time, I’ll be able to tell.” Stilinski sighed again but seemed to accept his answer. With how long he had been around the supernatural Liam half expected him to already know that. Hell he had been involved with this whole situation long before Liam was dragged into it as well. Maybe that had been something that Scott had been able to pick up about people. And now with him being gone Liam would be expected to follow suit. He swallowed weakly in the back of his throat and stood to follow Stilinski out of the office. The officer talking with Parrish was gone now and Parrish had his head tucked into his work, filling out various papers that flew past his eyes too fast for Liam to determine what they might have been for. Stilinski led him around the rows of desks and through the various offices in the precinct until they reached the back door which led out into the tow yard. The door clicked loudly as Stilinski unlocked the door and ushered Liam out before him. A breath of cold air wrapped itself around Liam as soon as he stepped outside. Despite it being only May the nights were still chilly. Overhead lights clicked on as they stepped out into the yard which was separated off by a chain link fence. Off to one side Liam could see the parking lot for all of the county provided police cruisers. He couldn’t help but smirk to himself as they passed the rows of identical cars by. One of the cars had dark scratch marks and some mild denting right above the license plate as if someone had backed into a pole. Or a Ghost Hunter. His mind supplied once again. Liam furrowed his brow, forcing his gaze away from the cars. What was up with his brain right now? It seemed oh so content to keep bringing up old memories that Liam had no interest in remembering. The chain link fence rattled louder as Stilinski unlocked the heavy padlock on it and pushed it open. Prongs scraping at the ratty grass growing through the gravel. Liam peered around on the inside of the fence, searching for the car. “This way.”Stilinski led him off to the left of the tow yard. Some of the cars in the yard had clearly been there for a while. Rust poking through their paint coats and windows both missing and shattered onto the grass and gravel below. A pool of light highlighted the busted up green hatchback which was sitting in a corner of the lot away from all the others. It had been cordoned off with crime scene tape. “Are we allowed to touch the car?” Liam spoke up, squinting around at the tape. In front of him Stilinski drew to a halt before turning to stare at Liam for a moment. His mouth had morphed into a thin line and Liam couldn’t figure out what he wanted.“Are we?”“Liam. I’m the Sheriff.”“Well yeah I know that!” he nearly snapped back, face flushing with embarrassment, “I just meant that it’s marked as a crime scene and all.”Sheriff didn’t dignify that with a response and continued over to the car. Liam rolled his eyes just slightly before making his way over to the car as well. The closer he got the more he could see. The front headlight was completely busted out. Glass and metal bent and shattered beyond recognition. A substance, dark in the poor lighting of the lot, shone out and Liam could catch the faint scent of antifreeze on the breeze. The front windshield was fully shattered outwards, a few stray pieces of glass littered the dashboard.The wind shifted again and Liam caught the bright tang of blood hanging heavy in the air. It coated the steering wheel entirely, sticky red lines running down the leather hand holds and distorting the silvery plastic of the cars logo in the center of the horn. “Ugh. I can smell the blood from here.” he muttered. Stilinski lifted up the crime scene tape and motioned Liam forwards. “The force of the impact sent the driver side door buckling off its hinges and it ended up getting stuck in the guard rail that the car smashed into. The whole door was coated in blood and it's currently in evidence lock up.”Liam nodded and ducked under the tape, Sheriff had automatically gone around to the ripped off driver side door but Liam went around the other way. “Are you sure we can touch the car?”“Yes! God, why is it now that you are so worried about upholding the law?” Stilinski muttered the last part under his breath so Liam ignored it and grabbed the passenger side door and pulled it open. Despite the damages to the car the door still opened easily. The scent of blood was stronger now, allowing the stale air from within the car to leak out of another point. Liam slipped into the passenger seat, the fabric covered seats creaked a little under his weight and he had to shift a few times to get comfortable. “Anything?”Sheriff’s voice beside the car broke through his concentration and Liam jumped a little. “I’m getting there, I have to focus on this part.” Stilinski got this weird look on his face at that part as if he didn’t quite know how to respond. However, thankfully he said nothing further and backed off a little bit. The scent of burgers and fries that had been emitting off of him faded backwards as he shifted. Liam took in a deep breath trying to remember to pick out chemosignals. In theory this should be easier because they weren't constantly changing by the second like with a living person. But at the same time with how long it had been the scent had begun to fade out. The blood was the strongest scent in the car, it rolled off the wheel in waves. Dried or not, it was a prominent scent. Liam took another breath, inhaling deeply and pausing before he exhaled again. There! He caught a second scent, floating just under the metallic tang of the blood. Under was the wrong word for it though. It was almost floating through the blood. Twisted around with the scent, wrapped up together like a pair of secret lovers hiding out under the sheets of a hotel bed. Liam sat up and leaned closer to the steering wheel sniffing around it trying to catch the scent again. “You got something?” “I think so. Not a chemosignal though, something different?” Stilinski made his way back closer to the car, crouching down in the open driver side door to peer at Liam as he sniffed around the wheel. “Alright then, what is it?” “I don’t know,” Liam looked around, searching for another patch of blood that he could try and re-find the scent on, “It’s like there’s something in the blood. Not mixed with it though, just like another thing in the blood. Like when you dump oil and water into a jar and prick holes in it. They both come out of the jar, but they come out separated and as two different things. It's like that.”The furrow in Stilinski’s brow deepened considerably and Liam returned to sniffing trying to find something more helpful.“What does it smell like?”Liam took another breath in, forcing himself to focus on the second scent. Whatever it was, his wolf didn’t like it, it kept twisting around and snarling in his chest whenever the scent returned. It was laying flat on his back in the doctor's office trying to keep the shift under control as the nurse tried and failed to find a vein to draw blood from. It was forcing the shift down as he stood outside of the police precinct facing down the hunters as they were given twenty-four hours to leave town. It was holding the shift at bay as the fists of his classmates slammed into his face over and over again “I don’t know. Whatever it is, my wolf doesn’t like it and it’s definitely not supposed to be in the blood like this. She might have taken something but that’s my only guess. It almost smells like acetone but it's more subtle than that.”Stilinski nodded slowly, eyes running back and forth over the car as he considered something. “So there’s a good chance that she might be something as well. Maybe not a werewolf, but some other sort of creature?” “What do you mean?”“Well if your wolf doesn’t like it, it would make more sense if it was something supernatural related. Does your wolf ever react like that to things that are exclusively human, or human related?”Liam considered this, “yeah I guess you’re right.” It was an odd thought to consider. He looked over the driver seat one last time, peering around, searching for any sort of other clues that he could give Stilinski. Sheriff’s radio suddenly went off, bubbling out noise and Stilinski stepped away to respond. As his scent moved out of the way Liam took one final deep breath, trying to remember how he had been taught to search out chemosignals. Scott had that it relied on trusting your gut feeling and seeing what your inner wolf thought about things when unimpeded by thoughts and your own swirling emotions. He closed his eyes and sat back in the passenger seat, closing his eyes and allowing it to all wash over himself. Liam could almost see it. The green hatchback speeding down the highway, cars disappearing behind them as the blonde haired driver tightened her knuckles on the steering wheel. Focused. The sign for Beacon Hills exit sped past and she swerved over for the exit, nearly taking out a Camry going twenty under the speed limit. Focused. The speed limit slowed down as she approached the off ramp. Focused. The turn approached. Fear. The car went out of control, for half a second the breaklines screamed against the tarmac. Fear. Fear. Silver flashed and the guardrail appeared, catching the front of the hatchback sending the car flying around the corner of the off ramp. Fear. Fear. Fear. The guard rail dropped off and the car went skidding again, slipping off the road entirely and smashing, fender first, into the massive tree just off the exit. Fear. Fear. Fear. Fear. Fear. Fear. Liam jerked, his eyes flying wide open with a gasp. She had been afraid. Above and before all else, she had been afraid. Of what though? And how had she gotten this far on her own? There weren’t any other scents in the car indicating another driver or passenger at all. “Hey Liam!” He startled at the sudden shout. Stilinski had returned to the car, “just got a call about a disturbance downtown that I have to go deal with. Do you need a ride back home?”Liam shook his head trying to re-center his thoughts. “No it’s fine, I borrowed my mom’s car.”Sheriff nodded as he pushed the passenger side door open and stepped out of the car. “I think I was able to find something else though,” he started as Sheriff led them back towards the building. “What?”“Fear. She was afraid right before the crash happened. Something went wrong in the car right before she crashed. That’s why it’s so hard to identify any other chemosignals in the car. Literally up until the second she went around the corner for the off ramp she was focused and in control but as soon as she went around that corner something went wrong.”“Fear? Like—”Stilinski didn’t even have to finish the thought before Liam was tracking his assumption. “No, no different than the Anuk-ite. That fear was so strong you could smell it like it was a physical thing, and that caused a reaction of fear in the things around it too. This was different, it’s just normal fear. Strong fear, but perfectly ordinary.”Stilinski sighed, rubbing at his eyes as he opened the back door to let Liam back into the precinct. “That still doesn’t explain how she was able to make it that far in a car while being completely blind.”“I mean, wasn’t Deucalion completely blind and able to fight and everything?”“Sure but he wasn’t driving all over town to do that fighting. He had the rest of his Alpha Pack surrounding him to deal with that sort of stuff.” Sheriff pointed out, “Look you should head back home Liam, it’s a school day tomorrow and I really don’t want to keep you out this late. I’ll give Deaton a call and see if he might know anything further about this.”“Alright, give me a call if you need me for anything else.”Stilinski nodded and split off from Liam following Parrish towards the police cars so they could deal with whatever new situation had popped up downtown. His mom’s car was still sitting outside in front of the precinct where Liam had parked it. The doors beeped as he unlocked the door and climbed in. The small clock over his dash read 11:32 and Liam knew he should be getting back home so he wasn’t breaking curfew. But at the same time he couldn’t bring himself to turn the key over and start up the car. To pull out of the parking spot and drive back home right now. His nose burned again with the phantom break from that morning and Liam found himself wishing, not for the first time, that his healing wasn’t so thorough and quick. Headlights swung across the parking lot as Stilinski and a few other officers pulled out of the side parking lot. Lights and sirens fully up. His mind kept replaying images of that woman. Sitting in the driver's side seat of a green hatchback, skull cracked open over her steering wheel. Eyes blinded out and staring into the depths of his soul.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Trevor had fallen asleep again. Liam could see where he was slumped over, hidden behind a math textbook which was propped up to conceal him from Principal Martin’s prying eyes. Although, Liam chanced a glance up at her, Principal Martin was sitting at the desk in the front of the room, eyes drilling into her laptop. Her fingers flew across the keyboard, no doubt writing emails of some sort. Trevor let out a soft snuffle and shifted around on the desk a little, but remained asleep. There was one other girl on the opposite side of the empty classroom who was a freshman. Liam had no idea what she was in detention for but he also didn’t really feel like asking. The chemistry packet sitting on the desk in front of him was still half empty. He had been planning to try and study with Mason before this whole detention thing had gone down. But now he was here in detention, on his own, while Mason studied from the comfort of his own house, probably with Corey. He had done his best to get through the pieces that he understood, but something about the whole concept of chemistry just went right over his head. Liam sighed and flipped the packet back to the front page which only had his name written across the cover in a messy scrawl. Like he said, he had tried his best. “You still have another thirty minutes of detention Mr. Dunbar. That better not be the sounds of you trying to leave early?” Principal Martin’s voice broke through his semi-concentration. Liam looked up to her and spotted Principal Martin’s eyes drilling into him over the edge of her glasses. She arched an eyebrow at him as soon as they made eye contact. He gave her a half forced smile and reopened the chemistry packet. Trevor gave another muffled snore in front of him and Liam glanced over to him, hoping that he could draw Principal Martin’s attention over to his sleeping form. But by the time he looked back over Principal Martin had returned to her emails. Liam groaned and slumped over his desk. He didn’t even have his phone to try and message Mason or Corey or Gwen or really anybody. Principal Martin had gathered up phones at the start of detention and was keeping them up together in a plastic bucket on the desk. The PTA had been having a meeting in the main office so the three of them had been led into the nearest open calculus classroom to conduct the detention. He had been right about the video too. At least five different people had caught the fight between Liam and Trevor on their phones and the video’s were spreading like wildfire across various social media. Somehow the worst of them had been the ‘wide angle video’. One of the students who had been in the front of the circle that formed around their fight had decided to record the entire video horizontally so that everything was captured. Everything from Liam hitting the ground and his nose shattering open, only to rise up seconds later with nothing but the pooling blood as evidence that anything had happened. They had also captured Liam kicking Trevor in the face with the bottom of his boot. The bruise across Trevor’s face from that had yet to heal and the branding from the bottom of his sole was evident now. Trevor had begun to wear it as a thing of pride now however. Some sort of inverted power dynamic to the usual high school fights. He had walked away from the fight with injuries and that proved that he was normal. It felt like the testing when the hunters had gone around stabbing people to see just who healed and who wouldn’t Somehow, through pure miracle, none of the five videos captured any part of Liam’s shift. He could only guess that he had Mason and Corey to thank for that. They had told him after the fact that Corey had heard the beginnings of the fight go down from the opposite side of the gym and had been trying to figure out where Liam was sitting when Trevor had tackled him. By the time they had gotten all the way across the gym and broken through the circle around them the fight was already well under way and Gwen was struggling to hold either of them back on her own. Most students were aware to some degree about the whole idea of werewolves at this point. Definitely more so than the teachers. The lacrosse kids knew for sure. The jokes had started rolling in at the beginning of the year and had never really stopped. Faintly, something splattered against the window and Liam looked up just in time to watch as the cloud darkened skies opened up above the school and began to pour down over everything. Within seconds the pavement outside was nearly black with rain water and the remaining cars outside began to gleam with the gushing rain. The sound of the rain pounding down against the windows finally jerked Trevor against his midday nap and he sat upright, eyes zooming around the room before finally spotting the rain and settling back into his slump. Liam groaned internally at the sight of the rain. Being some of the last students left in the building there wasn’t anyone he could really ask for a ride home at this point. His mom had mentioned that she wouldn’t be able to pick him up for the rest of his detention time that week as she would be working late. His original plan had been to walk back to his house seeing as it was springtime and the weather wasn’t supposed to be that bad. However the sheets of rain coming down like hellfire from heaven was very quickly disproving that. The school buses had all already left for the day and none of the buses stayed long enough for the kids in after school detention. Something which Liam privately thought was highly unfair. Principal Martin seemed to have noticed the rain as well and checked her watch. Liam had a sliver of hope for just a moment that she would call the detention short due to the rain and let them all go home but instead she just returned to her emails. He groaned audibly and slumped over the plastic desk top, shoulders pinging with discomfort for a moment but Liam ignored it, preferring the discomfort to boredom. The remaining time in detention passed slowly and after Liam watched the third sand beetle get washed off the window from the rain Principal Martin finally called the detention to its end. Despite the three of them not wanting to be in detention any longer, they all packed up slowly as if to delay the inevitable of the rain outside. The freshman had been the most well prepared out of all of them and had an umbrella stored in her backpack. An umbrella which Trevor had stared at the entire way out of the math classroom and to the front doors of the school. Liam tugged his backpack a little closer to his back, regretting not bringing some sort of jacket to school that morning. “Do you three all have a way to get home?” Principal Martin asked as she pushed the front exit door open. Almost immediately the sound of the rain increased, pounding down against the sidewalk with incessant power. Even with his overly sensitive hearing, it was actually kind of nice to listen to Liam mused as they all slipped out into the lone covered section under the door. “My mom is picking me up.” the freshman said motioning to a car waiting in the pick up lane before raising her umbrella and making the dash. Trevor motioned to a car parked not too far away in the student lot, “I’ve got my car,” and then he was gone too. Pushing out into the downpour, hair and clothes almost immediately soaking through. “And you Mr. Dunbar?” Liam glanced back at Principal Martin with an unamused glare, “there’s a metro bus stop not too far down the street. I should be able to get a ride from there.”Principal Martin gave a cautious look out at the rain before nodding herself and ducking out into the rain, pulling the hood of her rain jacket up over her head as she went. Liam had never actually taken the metro bus before. During his time at Devenford Prep he had lived close enough to the school that he could both easily walk the distance and the school bus had a stop nearly right outside his house. However, after his transfer to Beacon Hills High School, since he and Mason went to the same school, Mason had taken to giving him a ride to and from school every day. Liam pulled his phone back out of his pocket to double check which bus would be getting closest to his house. Since he lived on the far side of town most of the buses would only go halfway. But one of them, bus 278, got within a half mile of his neighborhood so he could take that one and then just walk the rest of the way. Through pouring rain. Liam winced a little, trying to peer out from under the cover and see if there was any sign of a break in the clouds. The only thing instead he got was a dump of water directly into his eye socket. He pulled back sputtering and tried to wipe the water out of his eye. His phone vibrated with the notification that bus 278 would be arriving at the bus stop in five minutes. Tucking his phone back into his pocket and buttoning it to prevent any excess water from getting in and ruining the device, Liam set off. The moment his foot landed on the pavement outside of the small shelter that the door cover provided, the rain soaked through the tops of his tennis shoes. He ducked his head trying to avoid getting more water in his face but with how much the rain water was falling from the sky and bouncing off of everything, it was of little help. Dark trees covered in deep green pine needles lined the pathway up to the school for at least a mile. Blocking out the limited sunlight and leaving the sky a dull gray with only the reflective gleam of wet pavement to tell Liam that he was still on the actual road. Since school had long since ended the road was empty and he took the opportunity to walk straight down the middle to avoid accidently stepping off the road into a dirt puddle. That would be the last thing he needed right now. From the depths of his pocket Liam felt his phone buzz against his stomach but ignored it in favor of pushing forwards towards the bus stop. He was pretty sure head seen the bus stop before whenever he and Mason drove past entering and leaving the high school. However the longer and longer that his walk became the more Liam began to worry that he might have passed it already. Rainwater sloshed around in his shoes with each step that he took and Liam shoved his wet hair out of his face for what felt like the hundredth time. Ahead there were only more trees and a rain shadowed road, stretching out into nothingness. Suddenly something in the distance shifted. A large square shadow off to the side of the road. Liam squinted at it and picked up the pace moving closer and closer. Through the rain he could see the faint reddish gleam of brake lights.
The bus!
He picked up the pace, sprinting down the road. Feet pounding and backpack slamming into his spine. The remaining dry patch between his bag and backpack soaked through as the rain was suddenly given access with the flopping of his backpack. The bus stop sign came flying out of the rain at him and Liam jerked backwards, to avoid smashing into the sign. The body of the bus was just pulling back onto the road and Liam was about to start waving his arms around like a mad man when he spotted the numbers glowing on the back of the bus. 287Thank god. Not his bus. Liam relaxed a little, his breath heaving in his chest as he tried to get his breathing back under control. The bus stop didn’t have a covered area so Liam was left to wait in more of the pouring down rain. It had begun to leak down the back of his shirt as well, aided by the strands of hair at the back of his neck, guiding the water straight under his shirt. He shivered as a few stray drops made it all the way down his back and ran, caught, along the edge of his belt. It had certainly been more than the five minutes that it was supposed to be for the bus to show up but with the rain still going he wasn’t going to risk pulling his phone out. The metal pole holding up the bus number side was cold against his sleeve as he leaned up against it. Rocking slightly in the wet dirt as it took his body weight. It was almost another fifteen minutes, standing underneath the downpour before the bus arrived. Liam heard the soft rumble coming down the street and didn’t even bother to check the whole bus number, spotting the 2 at the beginning of it. Simply jumping forwards and waving like a madman so that the bus would stop for him. Thankfully the driver spotted him through the haze of rain and pulled off to the side with a loud screech of brakes. The doors cracked open and Liam rushed over dashing inside. A blast of stale air and warmth washed over him and Liam slumped into the stair railing for a moment, just trying to convince his body to start warming back up. Above him the driver made an impressed noise. “How long have you been out here kid? You’re soaked.”“Like fifteen minutes,” Liam heaved out, “got stuck in after school detention.”The driver made a noise of understanding and tossed Liam a roll of paper towels.“Try not to get water over all the seats.” “Sure thing.” Liam muttered pulling out his soggy wallet to scan his metrocard and find a seat as they took off down the road again. The remainder of the bus was completely empty so Liam found a seat near the front. Ripping off a few sheets of paper towel to put down on the seat in an attempt to not soak through the fabric and ruin it as well. His once navy blue jeans were fully black at this point and running like a leaky faucet, sending water trails behind him with every step. The metal post connecting the seats creaked a little as Liam swung himself into the seat. Everything made a god awful squelching noise at his landing. He swung off his backpack as well dumping it onto the seat beside him and tried to take a breath. With how wet his shirt was though it kept getting stuck to his chest and would prevent him from properly inhaling. Leaving Liam heaving for breath, soaked to the bone, sitting in the middle of an empty metro bus. Liam tipped his head backwards to rest against the back of his seat. He could still hear the rain pounding against the roof of the bus as they began to trundle downtown. In the corner of his eye Liam could see the raindrops splattering in slippery patterns against the windows. The sun was still up, but with the dark clouds above them the street lights were beginning to turn on. Manipulated into action by the darkness of the world around them. It was just as they were beginning to pass the Beacon Hills Fire Station that Liam realized something was wrong. The bus was going the wrong direction. The school was almost dead center of town. Further to the north of the town was Devenford Prep and Liam’s house. The bus was instead heading south, towards Beacon Hills Preserve. “Hey where are you going?” Liam called up to the driver, his hands tightening around the straps of his backpack. Despite the heater being on in the bus, it had done little to ease the chill that was making his fingers shake. “Towards my last stop? Over on 168th street and Barron?”“No, this bus is supposed to go towards Devenford Prep.” Liam shot back, pushing himself unsteadily to his feet, the bus rumbling on.“That's bus 278!” the driver called back, “this is 287. We go the opposite direction.”
Shit. That first bus that Liam had seen leaving the bus station must have been the correct one after all!
His face burned despite the cold and Liam threw himself back into his seat without another word. There was no way he could convince someone to pick him up now, being on the complete wrong side of town and all. His mom still wouldn’t be off work for another hour but at this point she was his only option. He would just have to text her and find some place to wait out the hour and the rain. From inside the recently discovered to be incorrect bus, Liam watched as the sights went by. He recognized a few of them but given how far they were from his usual neighborhood he didn’t recognize much. Finally the bus pulled up to a halt on the side of the road. Off to the right side of the road, just over the cement barrier Liam could see the cars on the highway rushing by. And off to the left hand side of the road he could see a small gas station with a few cars in the parking lot. Liam gathered up his backpack, swinging it over his shoulder and wincing at the cold feeling that wrapped itself over his back as the bag landed square on his spine. “Thanks for the paper towels.” he muttered to the driver, passing them back as the doors shuttered open and Liam was back out in the rain. His hair hadn’t dried at all during the trip so the fresh rain merely melted it right back over his forehead, plastering the hairs down across his vision. Puddles splashed as he made his way over to the crosswalk and waited for the bus driver to pass him before pushing the button and beginning to cross. The gas station was small. Only two pairs of pumps set up under an awning with the prices flashing in bright lights above it all. The attached mini store was small as well but the blinking open sign promised warmth and dry so Liam would take it. There was a truck sitting at one of the pumps, it wasn’t pumping any gas but the meter for it read $20 to fill up four gallons of the tank. Whoever was driving it must not have needed that much gas to fill their tank. Liam frowned at the truck as he got closer, finally ducking under the pump covers and getting out of the rain. He shook out his hair before taking a closer look. From a distance the truck appeared black but under the bright gas station lights it was actually blue, dark blue. It looked almost like— no. That wasn’t possible. Liam hadn’t seen Theo in months. He had gone off with Melissa in the hospital so she could check out his injuries and by the time Liam had realized that Theo hadn’t followed them, it was too late and Liam couldn’t find him anywhere. Simply a dark stain of blood against the linoleum flooring where the hunters bullets had torn through him as he protected Liam. Liam hadn’t even gotten a chance to thank him for coming back. So no — there was no way it was Theo still in town. Liam would have seen him by now. Somebody would have seen him by now. Anyone would have. Right? Liam pushed past the truck trying to avoid checking the license plate and forcing his tired mind to remember if Theo’s plate had been the same. The gas station door jingled as he pushed it open and the brightly haired teenager winced a little at the sight of wet Liam entering their store. He nodded back, shooting them an awkward smile and trying to look as little like a shoplifter as possible. They did not seem to care and instead went back to flicking through their phone. The signs for the coffee maker pointed Liam towards the back of the store and while Liam had never been a big fan of coffee, he was certainly willing to try it in the hopes that it warmed him up. The coffee station was a little self-serve station setup similar to a soda dispenser. Liam hit the glowing button in the middle of the screen to disrupt the ads and bring him to the selection page. His bangs slipped into his face, stabbing him in the eye with a wet curl of hair and Liam growled under his breath, raking his hands through his hair in an attempt to get it out of his face for once and all. His shoes squelched underfoot as he shifted around and Liam glanced down, spotting the small puddle of rainwater forming underneath him. “You certainly look comfy.” A voice suddenly spoke up from behind him. Liam tensed up as familiarity prickled at the back of his neck. From deep within his chest his wolf’s ears perked up, searching through all his senses with rabid attention. His shoes slipped a little on the floors as Liam turned around to face the source of the voice that had wormed its way into so many of his dreams and nightmares alike.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
“Theo.”Liam’s breath caught somewhere in his chest and would not release. Theo somehow looked exactly the same and completely different. In the poor lighting of the gas station his hair looked even darker. Flopping over his forehead and falling into his eyes, the ends slightly curled around the sides of his face. It looked like it had been gelled back at some point that morning but had since been knocked down, either by the rain or by Theo running his hands through it. His lips quirked up in a half smile that Liam had seen both a thousand times and only once before. The gleam in his eyes caught the reflection off of the nearby slushy machine throwing a red and blue glow across his face. There’s a shadow smeared on the left side of his cheekbone too. Dark and chalky as if something had splattered there and Theo had wiped it away with the back of his hand. Liam’s eyes dropped down to Theo’s hands. One of which is tucked into his pocket, the other of which wrapped around a metallic red bull can. True to his theory, there was a similar smear across the back of his hand too. Theo pushed off the rack of sour gummy worms that he had been leaned up against and walked over to Liam’s side. He set down the red bull on the counter and poked his head over the rows to glance up at the cashier. Liam, who had yet to say a word outside of Theo’s name, turned too, looking up to the cashier to see what was so interesting. They were still on their phone, oblivious to the world around them. By the time he’d turned back around to look at Theo the other boy had three bottles of five-hour-energy lined up. He cracked the tab open and set the red bull can down on the counter as well. The plastic cracked under his grip as Theo twisted the caps off and deposited the contents of all three bottles into his red bull. With each emptied container he dumped the empty bottle and its lid into the countertop trash can. It’s only then that Liam finally found his voice again. “Did you already pay for those?”“Pay for what?” Theo asked, swirling his red bull slightly, to mix the contents together, before grabbing a napkin to wipe up the slight overspill in the lip of the can. It hit Liam all at once. He hadn’t seen Theo in months and he just showed up out of nowhere, in some shady ass gas station, mocking Liam for getting caught in the rain and stealing five hour energies. But really, what had Liam been expecting? To hear on the news that Theo’s dead body had been found four states over. Truck crashed somewhere off a ravine with nobody left to claim and bury his body. He had been waiting around for that news report. Keeping an ear out on all the radio stations for unidentified bodies to see if he needed to make a road trip. One final thank you to the boy who had saved him too many times for Liam to be able to repay in a simple afternoon. He figured a proper burial would be the least that he could do in repayment. But here he was. Here was Theo, standing before him. Perfectly alive. Truck outside in one piece. Really, what had Liam been expecting? Whatever he did expect, Theo always seemed to manage to do the exact opposite. Theo turned to toss the damp napkin and Liam punched him square in the jaw. His fist flying before anything else registered but the snap of bone was loud in his ears as the connection radiated back down his fist. Knuckles burning and head spinning as Theo staggered sideways, eyes wide in surprise and hand pressed up against his jaw. “Where the FUCK have you been!” There’s blood staining his teeth when Theo comes back up and Liam can’t help but wish he had punched him a little harder. Hard enough to make the blood gush out instead, rather than just vanish away as Theo licks across his lips and teeth. Liam can just barely make out the sharpness of his canines as he does. Even human, Theo’s teeth are still sharp. “Trying to avoid getting punched in the face for no reason.” Theo shot back, holding his jaw as the bruise bloomed. Dark and angry against his pale skin. Had he gotten paler? Liam growled and the urge to punch him again swelled in his chest, wolf snarling in time with him. Theo seemed to catch awareness of the urge and took another step backwards, grabbing his red bull and pulling it closer to himself. “Fuck you. Where have you been?” The question was quieter this time but no less angry. Theo sighed, the bruise slipped into green and the odd bump in his jaw caused by Liam’s fist smoothed itself out. He wanted to punch him again. He wanted Theo to punch him back. He wanted to fight.
He wanted the hunters to come back and keep killing teenagers so Theo would be forced to stay by his side once more.
“I’ve been around Liam. I know this might be a shock to you, but I do have a life outside of the small world of Liam Dunbar.”“Yeah right. Doing what? Plotting on how to bring back some more dead chimeras so you can steal their powers too?” Theo cocked his head at that and Liam thinks he’s almost hit a nerve but Theo’s face remains blank so Liam has no idea what nerve he’d struck. “Actually I was trying to see if I could create some new ones. More fun that way, creative control and all.” Theo took a sip of his red bull, keeping a careful eye on Liam in case he decided to punch him again. Liam still might, he hadn’t decided yet. Even as he did though, his veins flooded with ice at Theo’s words. The idea of more chimera’s running loose around Beacon Hills killing people didn’t settle well in his chest. It also didn’t click together well with the image of Theo that Liam had remembered. Maybe things were different now. Maybe his time, wherever he had been, had changed him. No longer the boy who threw him into elevators and threatened hunters so that Liam wouldn’t get his hands dirty. No longer the boy willing to haul Liam back from the edge of madness with claws and fangs and sheer strength. Theo’s eyes drifted over the side of his neck and Liam was suddenly subconscious. Could Theo tell what he’s thinking just from his chemosignals? “You’d probably just kill them if you tried to do that.” Surprisingly a smirk wormed its way across Theo’s face at that remark and Liam had to bite down on his inner cheek to keep from returning the smirk. “You never know.” Theo muttered back, leaning up against the counter beside Liam. Liam glanced back and forth between Theo and the coffee machine. He really wanted his coffee, but at the same time he didn’t really want to take his eyes off Theo. What if he looked back and Theo was gone again? Leaving behind only a smear of blood to indicate that he had ever been there in the first place. Theo seemed perfectly fine to just sit there and drink his five hour energy infused red bull so Liam returned to the machine. Seeing as his tolerance for coffee flavoring was not very strong Liam clicked on the most milk filled option that he could find and waited for the machine to process his order. $4.59 the machine blinked at him, his total highlighted in blue light. Liam reached into his back pocket, struggling for a moment against his wet jeans before he was finally able to get his wallet out. He flipped the leather open and pulled out his card reaching for the car reader underneath him when he suddenly spotted the paper taped over top of it.
Cash Only - Reader Down :(
“Shit.” Liam muttered to himself, stuffing his card back into his wallet and pulling open the cash section praying that he had some cash left over. Last week he had twenty-five dollars but then he had to pay Mason back for lunch. A singular dollar bill mocked him from the depths of his wallet and Liam wiggled it back and forth, still holding onto the hope that there were four more somewhere around. Nothing. The singular dollar bill remained singular. Liam exhaled out his nose, dropping his head and shoving his wallet back into his pocket as he went to cancel the order. However, before he could get all the way there, Theo’s hand knocked into his shoulder. He looked up in surprise at Theo who held up a folded five dollar bill out to Liam, pinched between his pointer and middle finger. For a moment Liam just stared at it unsure of what Theo wanted, but then Theo wiggled the bill at him persistently stretching out to hold it up closer to Liam’s face. “You look like you need coffee if I’m being one hundred percent honest.” Liam huffed out a startled laugh as his fingers landed on the bill, “oh wow, I didn’t know you even knew how to be one hundred percent honest.”Theo’s smirk curled upwards again at that, unveiling his sharp teeth once again. Liam lost the battle with his face and returned the grin with a smile, unfolding the offered five dollars and inserting it into the machine. There was another dark smear on the bill where Theo’s finger prints had been and Liam could only wonder what it was that Theo had been doing before showing up at this gas station. “Five minutes until your coffee will be ready. Thank you for shopping with us!” The machine chimed loudly and Liam watched as a paper cup dropped into the machine, right underneath the coffee spout. He glanced back at Theo who was still leaning up against the counter, drinking his red bull. Liam swallowed and turned around to join Theo in leaning up against the counter while he waited. From this angle he could see that the rain had finally calmed down outside. Now only pattering lightly against the pavement and trees around the gas station. Theo’s truck was still sitting solitary at the pumps and Liam wondered how he could have possibly missed the fact that it was Theo’s truck. He’d seen that truck in his dreams. He’d seen the boy standing beside him in his dreams. And yet, here’s Liam, awake and alert as he can be. Staring at the blue truck with Theo at his side. “So, seriously, how did you end up getting that soaked?” Theo’s voice broke him out of his focus and Liam looked to the side to catch his gaze. Sharp green eyes peered at him over the metallic rim of the red bull can. Theo arched an eyebrow at him and Liam sighed, flapping his arms around to try and get any water that he possibly could out of his sleeves. A few stray drops splattered against the tile flooring below him but his clothes still remained wet and cold. The heater inside the gas station was up full blast but did little to nothing for Liam. “I got after school detention and had to catch the bus home. The bus stop is a five minute walk from the school so I got pretty wet on my way over.”Theo hummed in the back of his throat as if agreeing with Liam. “So how did you end up here and not at your house?”
That was the real question wasn’t it.
Behind him the coffee maker dinged and Liam sighed again, closing his eyes. “Got on the wrong bus,” He muttered, turning back around to grab the now steaming cup of coffee from the machine. Even turned away from him Liam could hear Theo snickering into his red bull. Liam grabbed a plastic lid and secured it down over the top before turning back around to face Theo. The chimera wasn’t even making an attempt to hide his laughter and Liam wanted to punch him again. But he was holding his coffee now, and his palms were so warm, so Liam settled back into the counter at Theo’s side. Surprisingly his wolf had been fairly quiet throughout the interaction. It wasn’t like before when the appearance of Theo would send his wolf into full alert. Now it was more so, a calm awareness of the other boy lingering at his shoulder. The latte that he had gotten wasn’t that good. A little watery, a lot of acidic coffee flavor, and oddly enough the faint taste of salt worming its way through the drink. But even still it was warm. Spreading from the tips of his fingers down into his palms and wrapping itself around his chest like a warm blanket. Neither spoke for a long while, merely watching out the windows as the rain faded away into a soft gray that filled the sky. The golden light of the sun shone out from behind it causing beams of light to fall from the sky in the few places it broke through. There was a crunch from beside him and Liam looked over watching as Theo crumpled up the now empty red bull can. Tossing it into the countertop trash can before he pushed himself off of the counter. The rain had stopped outside. Liam also pushed off the counter, shifting uncomfortably, coffee still in hand. Was this it? Was Theo planning to leave again? To disappear for another nine months leaving Liam with nothing but memories. He wanted to catch Theo’s sleeve and pull him back to his side. His mouth opened— “you aren’t going to pay for your red bull?” —came out instead. Theo gave him a once over before reaching into his pocket and pulling out his keys with a jangle of metal. “What red bull?” The snarl built in his chest without warning and before he knew it Liam was stepping into Theo’s space. Theo only rolled his eyes, smirking in return. “Come on little wolf, the rain’s done.” He didn’t even bother waiting for Liam’s response, merely reaching out and catching one of Liam’s wrists which was still wrapped around his coffee. Theo gave a gentle tug and his feet were moving before anything else. Following Theo around the limited aisles towards the store doors which led back out to the parking lot. The cashier barely even spared them a look as the door jingled behind them. “Whoa wait—! Theo, where are you taking me!” Liam protested, pausing his steps and pulling Theo to a halt as well. His hand was still wrapped around Liam’s wrist. His jacket sleeve covered most of his wrist but Theo’s pointer finger was wrapped around the top of his wrist, pressing incessantly into the available skin there. His hands were cold against Liam’s skin. And while it should have made him colder with the water logged clothing, it didn’t. Theo’s fingerprint pressed into his skin. Their arms stretched out between them and for a moment Liam wasn’t standing in the middle of a gas station anymore. He was back in that hospital hallway, hand stretched out to fist bump Theo, pausing at the arrival of more Ghost Riders, their firsts hovering inches away from each other. He swallowed, staring down at Theo’s hand now, wrapped around his wrist.“Where are you taking me?” Liam asked again, voice softer. “I’m taking you back home. Can’t risk getting a cold out in this weather, little wolf.” His face flushed at the nickname and Liam ripped his hand away from Theo, but didn’t move to turn away from him. It had been nine months since he had last seen Theo and now he just showed up again offering exactly what Liam needed. He had heard this story before. He had done this dance. Last time it ended with blood on his hands. But the Theo standing before him is grinning at him and his finger print is still a cooling brand on the inside of his wrist. Right over his heart beat. And really it can’t turn out that badly if he lets Theo drive him home. “I’m a werewolf, I can’t get sick.” Theo snorted. “Sure thing. Come on Mr. Flu-Fighter.” He turned away and headed towards his truck. Liam glanced down at his coffee cup once before chucking it into the nearest trash can and hurrying after Theo. He heard the click of the lock as Theo unlocked his truck and pulled a towel out of the back seats, tossing it at Liam. It caught him around the face sending Liam stumbling a little over a crack in the pavement.“Don’t get my seats all water logged!” Theo called, swinging himself into the driver's seat. Liam rolled his eyes, mocking Theo through the door before opening the passenger side door and throwing the towel into the seat. However before he could haul himself up into the passenger side a breeze caught the air. It smelled like soil and sap mixed together floating through the air. Liam frowned, turning to scent the air and attempt to figure out where the smell was coming from. The bright green tree just opposite the truck waved a little more in the breeze and Liam took a step closer, trying to see if that was causing the scent. “Liam! Come on!” He inhaled once more, trying to find the scent and as he did the corner of his eyes began to burn. Liam scrubbed at his eyes, trying to clear his vision. His chest burned like it did when he was a little kid and swallowed too much chlorine while swimming. “Liam!”“Don’t you smell that?”He turned around to peer at Theo who frowned at him, shaking his head. “Smell what Liam? There’s nothing here except gasoline and a wet dog.” Liam growled at the last part which had clearly been a dig at him. He shook off the strange scent and instead jumped into the passenger seat of Theo’s truck, making sure to slam the door extra loudly behind him.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
“Are you one hundred percent sure that he didn’t secretly try to drug you or anything like that?” Mason hissed leaning across the desk aisle to join the conversation that Liam had started with Corey and Gwen. Technically they probably should have been paying attention to Mrs. Price at the front of the classroom going over the group project but this seemed to take president. Liam and Gwen shared the desk at the back wall of the room, closest to the wall of windows which had been propped open in the summer heat, allowing for the breeze to come whistling into the classroom. “I’m positive. He just drove me back to my house, dropped me off and that was that,” Liam whispered back, scrubbing at the corner of his eye. Corey had this weird look on his face as if he can’t seem to work out how to feel about the whole situation. “He’s the one who offered to give me the ride too.”“Yeah that’s what I’m worried about Liam,” Mason’s chair creaked a little as he leaned even further towards the three of them. “This is Theo we are talking about, he must have done it for a reason. We just need to figure out what he wants before he gets away with what he wants.”From the table in front of him where Corey is turned around he nodded. Obviously Liam knew that Mason was right. Theo had never done anything without looking to gain something for his own interests. But thinking back to the night before Liam couldn’t think of a single thing that Theo would have gained from their short interaction. Hell, the entire ride back to Liam’s house had been quiet. The radio had been left on low volume playing softly as Liam directed Theo back to his house. It had only been once Theo pulled into the empty driveway next to where Liam’s mom normally parked that they finally spoke. Liam had thanked him for the ride and awkwardly untangled himself from the towel on the seat. He only stumbled a little bit, hopping down from the truck before holding up the towel to ask where Theo wanted him to leave it. Theo had said nothing. Merely reaching across the seats and grabbing the towel before tossing it into his backseat. His headlights were still blaring against Liam’s garage door and Liam found himself unwilling to move. The passenger side door was open and Theo’s eyebrow was beginning to creep higher and higher the longer Liam stood there. “Are you just going to leave my door open like that?” Theo had finally asked. Liam blinked realizing just how awkward he looked and moved to close the door a little further, but once again something stopped him. “Where have you been?”Theo seemed more annoyed with the question this time, “I’ve been around Liam, why does it matter?”“It’s been nine months. The last time I saw you you had bullets in your body.”He gave an exaggerated sweep of his torso, “well I have clearly de-bulleted myself within those nine months, as you can see.” The overwhelming urge to punch him again swept over Liam and he snarled a little, finally slamming the passenger side door shut. The sound reverberated loudly in his ears and Liam considered for a moment, punching his claws into the side of Theo’s truck. But then he heard Theo sigh loudly and looked up, only to remember that Theo had rolled down the windows for the drive. Claiming that he didn’t want his truck to stink like a wet dog. Theo turned his keys in the ignition and his truck rumbled back to life, headlights flickering only once. The realization that he was leaving struck Liam like a pound of bricks and he reached out, hand latching around the open window as if he could stop Theo’s truck from pulling away on strength alone. “It’s not a big town Theo, someone would have seen you if you were here—did you leave town?”The question rattled off his tongue before any other thoughts could cross his mind. Even once it was out there, Liam wanted to know the answer. Nine months. It’s not like Theo had stores of money like Peter did to hide out behind penthouse apartments and fancy cars. He would have needed some sort of job to get by. An image of crumpled stolen red bull cans passed by unbidden in his mind and Liam reconsidered. There was no way Theo could have survived on just stealing for nine months straight. Beacon Hills Police aren’t always on the top of their game, but they certainly aren’t that bad. Theo already had a record with them after all. Sheriff Stilinski had shown it to Liam once. Several legal violations in the act alone but the record hadn’t been official. Stilinski had taken the time after Theo dropped out of the picture nine months ago to begin counting up all of Theo’s known crimes and putting them on record. That way, he had claimed, if Theo decided to fuck around and find out, he would be met with the full force of finding out. Stilinski had brought in Liam to see what he wanted to charge Theo with in regards to the whole ‘manipulating him into killing Scott’ situation. Legally there wasn’t a law specific to that situation so it had been up to Liam on how he wanted to arrange the charges. The options had ranged from two to fifteen years. After looking over all the other charges and seeing what the total potential range of imprisonment time that Theo could be facing Liam had gone with three years. He had known Scott for a total of three years before Theo walked into the picture and fucked everything up between them. Standing then in his own driveway, staring up at Theo waiting for a response, a jolt of pain vibrated through his ribcage and Liam wished he had never seen the unofficial criminal record. The longer and longer Liam sat there staring at Theo the more and more his chest began to sting and just as Theo was opening his mouth to respond Liam was ripping his hand off the truck door, swinging his half damp backpack over his shoulder and marching away from the truck and up to his front door. His fingers had fumbled again and again to get his keys out of his pocket and by the time Liam got the door open and chanced a look back over his shoulder, Theo was pulling back out of the driveway. The door slammed shut behind him and Liam couldn’t catch his breath until he put his fist through the small mirror on the entryway table.“You’re absolutely positive that he didn’t drug your coffee or something Liam?” Mason’s voice broke through his thoughts and Liam looked up, letting everything filter back in. “He wasn’t the one who made it. He just paid for it.”Gwen shook her head in the corner of his vision, “even still that’s so weird. Why on earth would he pay for your coffee and yet be stealing a red bull?”Liam shrugged helplessly at that. He had told them all about the situation the night before in hopes that they could help him answer some of those very questions. “Maybe we could call Sheriff Stilinski and tell him about it. I’m sure with Theo being back in town and the gas station probably having cameras, we could get him arrested and get some answers out of him that way,” Corey suggested, looking back and forth between them all. Liam flinched at that, an image of the unofficial file that Stilinski had popped into his head and he quickly shook his head. “No. It’s fine. We’ll just ignore him and if he shows back up again I’ll tell him he needs to leave town.” Corey’s expression warped a little at that but he nodded and seemed to accept this. The corner of his eye burned momentarily and Liam reached up, scrubbing at it. Gwen shot him a look out of the corner of his other eye and Liam frowned at her in question. “How do we know he’s going to listen to that though. I’ll admit I don’t know this guy at all but—from what I know from you all—he doesn’t seem the type to just follow the rules.” she pointed out. Across from her Mason began to nod as well, “that is exactly my point, Liam. Maybe he thinks that with Scott and the rest of the pack being out of the city it will be easier to try his plan again.”“What plan?”“You know—!” Mason’s hands flailed about as he tried to get Liam to comprehend, “—his plan! ”Liam shook his head slowly. A tickle of discomfort began to twitch in the back of his throat and he cleared his mouth before speaking again. “I really don’t. What are you talking about Mase?”“He means the plan where you kill Scott and steal his power so that Theo can kill you and steal the power away from you.” Corey’s face was sharp as he cut in, glancing once at Mason as he finished. Mason finally nodded as well, “yeah, that.”The discomfort built to a burn and Liam huffed out, trying to dislodge the feeling of sand running down his throat like an hourglass. “But Scott’s not in town,” he choked out, breath wheezing through half of Scott’s name. “Maybe not right now—but he’s going to be back in two weeks isn’t he.”“There’s no way Theo could have known that though.”“I wouldn’t guarantee a single thing that Theo does or doesn’t know.” Corey interrupted them and Liam was forced to pause. Corey probably knew Theo best out of all four of them. Despite the half-way friendship he had with the version of Theo who lived in his mind, Liam had to remind himself that Corey had spent three weeks being at Theo’s side. Liam on the other hand, could hardly even manage to find Theo twice within three weeks before that final fight at the hospital. He opened his mouth to protest further but the words stuck in his throat and Liam wheezed out weakly. The burning discomfort was in his nose now and Liam scrubbed viciously at the side of his nose, trying to dislodge the feeling. “Dude, are you ok?” Mason’s chair scraped as he shifted closer, hand landing on Liam’s shoulder. “Yeah,” he wheezed out, “totally fine. Why?” “Your eyes.” Gwen whispered, leaning closer as well. Liam ducked his head instinctually, fearing the worst that his eyes had flared up on full view of an entire classroom. Mason grabbed the top of his head, hauling him back up, “Not like that. Your eyes look all red and irritated.” He pulled Liam’s face almost all the way across the desk gap, nearly dislodging Liam from his chair. He leaned in closer and Liam was staring somewhere into the white’s of Mason’s eyes, watching as the veins of his eyes shifted back and forth. Liam heard as Corey muttered under his breath, “I fucking knew he did something.” He pulled back, trying to get his bearings back together. “No guys it’s fine, I think I just got something stuck in my eye, it’s fine—” However before he could fully appease their concern Gwen had her phone pulled out and flipped around to the camera. She shoved it in front of his face motioning for Liam to take it. He took it. The three of them motioned for him to look, so he did. Liam squinted down at the camera below him, focusing on the reflected image there. He could see himself reflected, the image getting blurrier the closer that he got. Regardless, he could see the discoloration leaching into the sclera of his eyes. A burning, irritated red, surrounding the corners of his eyes and causing the veins to look even more prominent. His waterline was the same shade of red as well and was watering slightly.“What the fuck?” he muttered to himself, pulling at the skin around his eyes and trying to squint closer. However, as he did, the discomfort returned to his nose and throat with a vengeful force. The sensation caught in his throat and he wheezed out a breath, once, twice—and then he was overwhelmed with a violent fit of sneezes. Both Mason and Corey’s eyes were blown wide when the sneezing fit finally stopped. Staring at him with a mixture of shock and concern. “Are you sick or something?” Gwen asked, peering around to stare at him. “He can’t get sick, werewolf immune systems prevent them from getting any kind of sickness.” Mason explained. “Alright so what was that then?”Before Liam could even attempt to right himself from the sneeze or begin responding to Gwen a fifth voice broke through their conversation. “Mr. Dunbar, you are aware of the school's cell phone policy, yes?” They all looked up as the looming figure of Mrs. Price fell across their tables. “Huh?”She frowned a little and indicated towards Gwen’s phone which was still unlocked and clenched in Liam’s hand. Liam looked down at it, suddenly coming to the realization that she thought they weren’t paying attention because they were on their phones. “Oh! Uh—no! This isn’t mine!” He twisted around to pass it back to Gwen who took it and slipped it into her pocket. Her eyes never once leaving Mrs. Price as she did. “Right, well in that case,” Mrs. Price turned to face Gwen, “Mrs. Naomi, are you aware of the school's cell phone policy?”“Yep. Sorry about that Mrs. Price, Liam just thought he had something in his eye and we were trying to use my camera to get it out.”Her expression softened a little more at that, “Did you get it out?”They all turned to look at Liam who swallowed and tried to recollect his bearings, “Uh, I don’t think so.”Mrs. Price leaned down squinting closer at his eye, Liam shrunk back a little, feeling like a bug under a microscope. Her hand landed softly on his face, tilting his head back and forth as she tried to see. “I don’t see anything but you should mention that to the nurse,” She said, straightening back up and motioning for them all to get up. For a moment none of them moved.“Like right now?” Liam finally asked, looking back and forth between his friends. Mrs. Price nodded, motioning again.“Yes, right now, all of you.”“Uhh, Mrs. Price, we don’t all need to go to the nurse though?” Mason pointed out.“Did you four not listen to a word I just said?” A sharp eyebrow kicked up on her face and her lips pulled in the opposite direction, creating an odd tension across the surface of her skin. Their silence clearly answered her question and Mrs. Price sighed, motioning for them to all get up. It was only now that Liam took notice of the empty classroom around them.“Do we—”“No, no, leave your things, you’ll be back to pick them up.” Liam’s chair screeched against the floor as he pushed it in, a gust of wind whistled in from just outside the classroom and he caught a familiar scent riding on it. Soil and sap. A violent sneeze overtook his whole body, nearly sending his whole body careening sideways with the force of it. “Goodness, Mr. Dunbar, don’t throw your back out, bless you.”“Thanks.” He muttered under his breath, subtly scrubbing at his eyes and trying to avoid the looks that Mason, Corey and Gwen were undoubtedly sharing over his head. Mrs. Price led them out of the classroom and they could see the tail end of the rest of their class rounding the corner just ahead. A few other classes were exiting their classrooms as well, following their teachers in the same directions.“You will be joining up with your classmates down in the nurse's office. We have been asked by some of the local doctors to just run a few tests on students, won’t be any longer than ten minutes each.” She explained.“You mean like those hearing tests we used to take?” Mason asked, looking back at her from the front of their mini line up. “Yes! Just like that!”“Tests for what though?” Liam asked. The last time he had gotten a medical test at school it had been a beating. An experience he wasn’t too eager to repeat, and from the looks on Corey’s face, he wasn’t either. “I’m not entirely sure they didn’t give teachers that much information. You can ask the nurses though.”“Nurses?” Gwen spoke up, “I thought we only had one school nurse?”“We had some other nurses come in to make this process go even smoother. Now,” Mrs. Price motioned towards the doors labeled nurses office as they rounded the corner, “please find a place in line and wait patiently.” There were five different doors open on the inside of the nurses office lobby, each had a different colored paper taped onto them. Several other students were lined up in front of various doors and even more were waiting in the limited chairs across the room. Liam spotted Trevor waiting on one side of the room and winced internally. He did not want to risk starting another fight here and now. Gwen grabbed his arm, clearly having spotted Trevor as well, and led him over to a line on the opposite side of the waiting area. With the doors being opened at the angle they where it was impossible to see what was going on inside. “What do you think this is for?” Mason asked, slipping up behind them. Liam shrugged, distracted by trying to angle himself in such a manner to see inside the rooms. “Smells like blood.” They all whipped around at Corey suddenly speaking up. “What do you mean?” Liam demanded, sniffing at the air for himself. Corey opened his mouth to explain but as he did, Liam caught the same scent. It was blood. Not heavy and cloying like when someone had been cut open. Softer instead, more like a multitude of blood drops that had been wiped away by antiseptic over and over again. “Yeah it does.” Corey bit his lip looking over all the students and few teachers surrounding them. Liam spotted Mrs. Price leaned up against the back wall and raised a hand, waving a little to catch her attention. She looked up, brow furrowed and extracted herself from the conversation she had been in. The other teacher nodded as Mrs. Price made her way over to their small group, however before she could get all the way over a door slammed suddenly. Heads flew up around the room spotting a red-haired girl that Liam remembered from the English class he had taken the year prior. “Mia?” Clearly Gwen knew her as well. Mia’s head jerked up, her eyes were red and shimmering with tears, mascara smeared down her face in diluted rivers. The ends of her braids were frazzled and sticking out in every direction. Gwen waved her over quickly wrapping her into a tight hug. Liam grabbed a few of the tissues from the stray tissue box behind them and passed them over to Mia’s shaking hands. One of her sleeves was rolled all the way past her elbow, the other remained loose however.“Mia, what happened?”“I can’t do it! I can’t do it!” She sobbed out, shoulders shaking in Gwen’s arms as Gwen did her best to clear up the smeared mascara.“Do what Mia? What are you talking about?” Gwen asked again. Behind them crowds where splitting apart as Mrs. Price made her way towards them, even faster now. “They want me to give blood—!” She choked out, and then Mrs. Price was there, looming over them all. “Mrs. Graham! Are you alright?!” Mia shook her head quickly, pulling away from Gwen and grabbing the used tissue to wipe away her new wave of tears. “I won’t do it! They want me to give blood! I won’t do it!” her voice was quieter now, but still shaking, nevertheless. Mrs. Price spluttered a little bit, “well—I—it’s—it’s just a little blood, your body will replenish it in no time.”“Woah, woah, slow down. Is that what this is Mrs. Price? We have to give blood?” Mason cut in, “In California, schools are required to get written permission from parents before we can give blood. I don’t know about anyone else here, but my parents haven’t given any sort of permission for that recently.”Mrs. Price began to splutter again, her face paling, “Now Mr. Hewitt, I do hope you aren’t insinuating that Beacon Hills High School is doing something illegal. This is a medical necessity, I’m sure all of your parents would rather have healthy children rather than something happening to you.”“If it was such a medical necessity why aren’t we being told what it is for?” Liam asked, crossing his arms over his chest, the tips of his fingers were beginning to burn and he pressed them into the meat of his bicep in case his claws decided to make an appearance. “You will be told what it is for! You just have to ask the nurses! Teachers aren’t medical professionals so it would be inequitable for us to try and explain medical procedures to you all. Now come with me Mrs. Graham, I’ll sit with you.”Without a second word back to them Mrs. Price whipped around and led Mia away back into the room that she had come out of. Liam watched as a man in a white lab coat with a name tag stepped out of the room and motioned the two of them back in. There was something about the man that rubbed Liam the wrong way. For being a supposed nurse, he didn’t seem like it at all. A tall man with a heavy beard and long stringy hair falling all over his shoulders. The lab coat didn’t seem to fit him properly either, it was tight around his forearms and bulked out around his shoulders creating the illusion that he was hunching his neck in on himself. As he turned he caught Liam’s eye, glazing at him with dark eyes that were void of any light, shadowed over by bushy eyebrows. His coat slipped a little as he entered the room behind Mrs. Price and Mia revealing the stiff fabric of a dark blue vest underneath. The door slammed behind him and suddenly the silence of the room around them was painfully evident.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
His mom’s car was already parked in the driveway when Liam arrived home that evening from after school detention. He had attempted to pry answers about the strange nurses out of Principal Martin all afternoon while sitting in her office. However, she had quickly tired of the senseless questions and instead sent him up to the chemistry lab to help disinfect lab equipment. The disinfectant had left his eyes watering even more and by the time they had finally finished Liam was more sneezing than talking. Thankfully he managed to catch the right bus home that time and didn’t get soaking wet during the remaining trek home. The lock clicked in the door as Liam turned his house key and pushed the door open. He could hear the faint sounds of the radio playing through his moms phone in the kitchen. Liam shut the door behind him and began tugging off his shoes in the entrance way. His mom must have heard the door shut as her head popped around the corner only seconds later. Her blonde highlighted hair was tied up in a loose ponytail and her eyes were watering as if she was cooking with onions.“Oh there you are honey! Your stepdad is getting off work in just a few minutes here so I was thinking we could have a late dinner. Is that alright with you?” Liam nodded, depositing his shoes into the shoe rack beside him and pulling off his jacket. She turned away, a sudden sneeze over taking her body. The fabric caught at the bandage taped on the inside of his arm, tugging uncomfortably and a sudden thought occurred to him.“Hey mom?” Her head popped back up with an inquisitive stare. “Did the school send you any paperwork for you to sign in the past week?” “Not that I can think of. Why?” Another sneeze, sending her hair flying in every direction. “You’re sure? Nothing about a medical procedure or maybe something from the nurses office?” She stepped fully around the corner and Liam could see the apron that had been tied around her waist was lightly splattered with oil. “The last email I got from the school was back on Monday about the upcoming dates for graduation and all that. Speaking of which—” Her voice perked up as if she had just remembered something, “—graduation caps and gowns are going to be available for pick up starting next week. Make sure you grab that soon, alright?” Liam nodded, his teeth digging into his lower lip at the thought. Graduation. He really hadn’t given it much thought and now it was right around the corner. Appearing out of nothingness after being off radar for nine months. Just like somebody else Liam knew. “Liam?”“Yeah, I got it.”His mom nodded, moving to return to the kitchen, “Your grandmother is flying in the weekend before your graduation as well so she’ll be staying with us for a little while.”Her own parents had passed away when Liam was very little as a result of medical complications so his only grandmother was on his step dad's side. She lived up in Vermont so Liam didn’t see her very often but when he did, it was always a fun occasion. But now—Liam hadn’t seen her for at least two years before he had been turned. Hell, the last time she saw him, outside of the Facebook pictures from his moms postings, was back in middle school. So much had happened since then, Liam had changed so much. Would his mom expect him to tell her too? Would she expect him to keep it quiet? The full moon was the week of graduation, right when Scott would be here too, there wasn’t much Liam could do to keep that quiet. Especially with his control as it was. His gums burned and Liam quickly locked his jaw up, suppressing the further questions that he wanted to ask. Watching instead as his mom disappeared back into the kitchen. The entryway mirror was still smashed. Liam had told his mom he tripped over some shoes and fell into it. Thankfully she had believed him and never got close enough to notice the small specks of blood from his knuckles. Something shifted in his mind. A carefully stacked pile of boxes, tumbling down, and his claws dropped before he could even consider it. The cracked mirror caught sight of his burning yellow eyes and the thickening of hair around his brow. How was he supposed to hide this from his grandmother’s watchful eyes? She caught everything. His jaw tensed up and Liam’s face began to burn as the bone there began to stretch and grow to accommodate the shift. A growl built up in the back of his throat as Liam curled his claws into the meat of his palm before he broke something else fragile. “The sun.” He muttered trying to haul back his control. “The moon.”“What was that honey?” Liam’s mom shouted suddenly from the kitchen and Liam flinched. His eyes flew wide open and he caught sight of himself in the mirror. Eyes flared golden and ears pointed up towards heavens that were empty, all of the angels having thrown themselves out upon seeing the state of the world.“Nothing mom!” Liam called back, fighting to keep his voice sounding normal, and dashed upstairs before she heard more of his rambling and decided to investigate. His bed was still a mess of blankets and pillows from that morning but Liam ignored it in favor of locking his bedroom door behind him and throwing himself face down into the mess. Almost immediately his wolf caught the scent of comfort and familiarity and began to calm down, getting progressively less growl-ly with each inhale. The burn in his fingers had yet to fade however and Liam knew, even without pulling his hands out to look at them, that his claws were still extended. He tried to bring his mind off his claws, to focus on something else and allow them to become background noise that would fade away into nothingness. His eyes were still burning and watering with whatever irritant had gotten into them that morning. However unhelpful, his mind returned to that morning. To the bandage wrapped around his inner elbow to stem the presumed bleeding from the needle exiting his body. The nurse that had drawn his blood had been a blonde haired woman with small features, all scrunched up together in the center of her face like a mouse. The whole procedure hadn’t taken longer than eight minutes. It took her three of those minutes to explain to Liam why this was happening. Although her explanation hadn’t made any sense once he started to think about it. She had claimed that they were testing for something in students' blood. But what? She had never specified. His blood had been gathered up into a singular tube and a piece of tape with his name on it had been sealed around the outside. She had placed the blood in a medical fridge and told Liam to return to his friends. He had looked it up with Mason after the fact. California law stated that schools needed written parental permission in order for those under eighteen or still in high school to have blood drawn. And if his mom had never signed anything. Then the school had just violated the law on thousands of different counts. An image of Mia’s tear stained face popped into his mind again and Liam cursed under his breath, fumbling around in his pocket for his phone. By the time he had it pulled out, his claws had vanished. Sheriff Stilinski’s contact hovered directly under the conversation he had had with Mason, Corey and Gwen on the bus ride home. Liam clicked on it and pushed himself up a little further onto his elbows so he could text properly
Liam waited a moment to see if Stilinski would say anything in response right away. He wasn’t expecting him to. The Sheriff was a busy man after all, but still, a part of him hoped he would be available. After two minutes of no response Liam pushed on with his messaging. Even if Stilinski didn’t respond right then, he could still read it and get back to him later about what might have been going on. However, even as he typed out his next message Liam couldn’t help the burning sensation rattling around in his chest. He always picked up when Stilinski called, couldn’t he be afforded the same decency?
Distantly Liam heard the sound of the garage door creaking open. He looked up from the messages and out towards his bedroom window which overlooked the driveway. The faint gleam of headlights reflected up the house walls and Liam knew his step dad had returned home from the hospital. He turned back to his phone and typed faster, wanting to get everything out before he had to go downstairs for dinner.
Just as he was pressing send on the final message his mom called up the stairs for Liam to come down to dinner. “Be there in a second!” He called back down to her. “Don’t forget to wash your hands before you come to eat!”Liam glanced down at his hands, four pinpricks of blood lined each palm where his claws had begun to dig into the flesh there not even an hour earlier. He tightened his now harmless hands into a fist and tossed his phone aside. Slipping out of his bedroom and going to wash the blood from his hands. It wasn’t until four days later, early Saturday morning when Liam awoke to the sound of his phone ringing that Stilinski finally got back to him. His phone vibrated again, loudly against the wooden bedside table, and Liam flailed around, trying to grab it before the call dropped. His knee was twisted at an awkward angle which made turning over very difficult but he finally grabbed hold of the small device right before it went to voicemail. “Hello?” Liam croaked out, voice heavy with sleep and nose slightly clogged up causing his voice to come out all nasally. “Hey Liam, did I catch you at a bad time?” Stilinski’s voice echoed down the receiver and Liam was suddenly more awake. Using his other hand to push himself upright like a seal. “No, not at all, what’s up?”Stilinski sighed, “another body showed up. Exact same thing as last time, seemingly dropped dead in the middle of doing something. Eyes are totally blinded and there is no visible cause of death on this one.” Liam groaned in the back of his throat, dropping his head down into his pillow. Great just what he needed for weekend plans, investigation of another dead body. “Do you want me to come by and check it out again?” He asked, slinging the blanket off of his body and beginning to hunt around for some acceptable clothes. “Yeah, Parrish is out on a breaking and entering call right now and I can’t pull him out of that.”“No worries, I can get there, where should I meet you?” That shirt smelled relatively clean. Liam blinked as the sudden urge to scratch at his eye overtook him.“North end of the preserve hiking trails. It looks like this person might have been on a hike of some sort when this happened. We can’t find their car anywhere though, so maybe you can find it by scent.” Stilinski’s voice faded out a little and Liam could hear as another officer began talking in the background. He grabbed a pair of shorts off the ground and tugged those on as well before slipping out of his bedroom. It wasn’t overly unusual for him to be awake by nine or ten in the mornings on weekends but even still Liam tried to be quiet as he made his way downstairs. “Liam?” A second voice caught his attention and Liam twisted around on the stairs, pinching his phone between his shoulder and ear. His step dad stood on the landing behind him, looking like he had just come out of the master bedroom and was heading for the bathroom. “Hey.” He whispered back, trying not to talk loud enough to distract Stilinski. “What are you doing up? It’s eight in the morning?”He nodded quickly pointing to the phone under his ear, “Stilinski called, there’s something I gotta deal with. I’ll be back.”His step dad’s eyebrows raised in confused understanding. He had taken to the news of werewolves and supernatural creatures with far more grace than Liam had been expecting. Perhaps it helped that he worked at the hospital and had probably seen all sorts of weird things come through there. Or perhaps it was because he worked with Melissa McCall on a near daily basis and got looped in on all the weirdness that surrounded her life. All Liam knew was that he would never be able to properly express his gratitude towards his mom and step dad for all of their understanding in this. “Do you want me to let your mom know?”“Uhh—no, no, it should be fine. Just let her know I’m borrowing her car. I’ll be back in a few hours or so anyways.”His step dad nodded, turning to head into the bathroom, “be safe!” He called softly as Liam hurried down the rest of the stairs. The keys were sitting right in the key dish which Liam quickly snagged and hurried out the door. “Liam?” Stilinski’s voice crackled over the phone, “you still there?”“Yeah, I’m here. I’m on my way over now.”“Alright sounds good, there’s one last thing you should know before you come over.”“Ok,” Liam said, starting up the car and lodging his phone in the hands free holder, “what's that?”“Remember how with the last body, we weren’t able to get an ID of the body because they were from out of town and nobody could find a file on her?”“Yeah.”“We got an ID on this one. They're from Beacon Hills. Which means whatever caused that girl in the car to die like she did, it’s in Beacon Hills now.” Ice flooded through his veins at that one. The green hatchback, smashed into the tree, flashed up in his mind and Liam exhaled slowly. Something had come to Beacon Hills and in the absence of Scott, Liam would be the one that everyone turned to to handle it. There was a beep as Stilinski ended the call. Liam remained frozen in the driver's seat of the car, hand hovering over the gear shifter. He watched as ‘Call Ended’ flashed on the screen a few times before it returned to his messages. A contact name caught his eye ‘camo boy’. Corey . Liam threw the car back into park and surged forwards pressing on the call icon next to Corey’s name. The line rang only once before Corey picked up. Always the morning bird of them all. “Liam? What’s wrong?” The fact that he knew something was wrong purely by Liam calling him set off an odd feeling in his stomach but Liam pushed it down and out of the way. “Stilinski just called. We’ve got kind of a situation going on in the preserve.”“Ok?”“They found a body down there, and it matches the exact same cause of death as a body they found a few days ago.” He cut himself off with a sneeze that echoed through the whole car, “Stilinski had me check out the other body and there was definitely something wrong with it, but neither of us could figure out what.”“Why didn’t you say anything about the other body?” Corey’s voice crackled a little and Liam didn’t have a good response to that. “I didn’t think it was going to be our kind of problem at first.” He finally came up with. Corey sighed over the line.“So I’m guessing you want me to go with you and see if we can find anything supernatural with this second body?”Liam winced at the threat of accusation that had woven its way into Corey’s words, “Yeah, something like that.”“Alright, fine. I’ll be ready in five, are you driving or should I get a ride and meet you there?” “I can come get you.” Liam hesitated a moment, his next words caught in his throat, “And Corey?”“Yeah?”“Thanks for this.”He could hear the faint laugh that Corey huffed out just seconds before the line went dead and Liam put the car into reverse, pulling out onto the open street.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Corey was sitting on the curb just outside of Mason’s house when Liam pulled up. After the whole situation with the hunters had gone down the Bryant’s had skipped town. Running off to some summer holiday cabin down in the Bermudas. Mason had explained the situation to his parents, and given that the two of them would be living in an apartment together after college anyways, they had allowed Corey to move in with them. The Hewitt’s had a big enough house that they split it into two levels. The main house was the first and second floor where Mason’s parents and younger sister lived. Mason and Corey had been given the entire daylight basement as their own space. Liam rolled down his window as Corey clambered off the curb. “Where’s Mason? I figured he would want to come with us.”“He’s still asleep,” Corey explained, pulling the passenger side door open and climbing in, “Just me for now. He said to call if we need him for anything though.”Liam nodded, he couldn’t blame Mason for wanting to sleep in, he just wished it was something he could have done himself. They pulled away from the curb and Liam clicked on the address that Stilinski had sent him. Corey stayed silent as they drove and a part of Liam wanted to turn on the radio and break the silence. But something just felt disruptive about doing that.“So they found this body all the way out in the preserve?” Corey asked, finally breaking the silence. Liam nodded, glancing over at him as they pulled to a stop at a red light.“Yeah, the first one they found was a car crash victim from last week. It was a girl from out of town who crashed her car coming off the exit ramp into Beacon Hills.”Corey hummed a little and the light turned green, “what was the official cause of death?”“That’s just it, with the car crash the girl's head was bashed through her steering wheel. But the thing that made it really weird was that when she was found, she was totally blind. Sheriff Stilinski was able to get highway cameras that caught her driving for at least sixty miles before the crash happened.”“So either she wasn’t the one driving—” Corey began, following Liam’s exact line of thinking. “—Or she wasn’t blind when she started driving and something happened during the drive.” Liam concluded with a nod. He made another turn and the car began to bump along the forest trail into the preserve. “Stilinski called me in to come check out the car that she had been driving to see if I could find anything last week.”“Did you?”“Not quite. There was blood splattered all over the steering wheel from her head but there was something mixed in with it. It smelled a little bit like acetone but it wasn’t quite as potent.” Corey nodded, humming again before they made the final turn to the north side of the preserve. The area was taped off with yellow crime scene tape flapping in the wind and a lone police car was parked just on the other side of it. Probably to deter anyone from trying to investigate. Liam could see a few officers look up as their car approached, one of them moved to walk over to the car, but the distant figure of Sheriff Stilinski waved them back and began to walk over himself. Liam turned off the car and they climbed out. The shade of the trees in the early morning meant that the breeze was still nicely cool as it danced around them. Almost immediately his eyes were watering in the open air however. Liam scrubbed at his eyes, blinking a few times to try to banish the irritation away. “Dude, are you ok?” “Yeah, yeah, fine.” Liam whispered as Stilinski approached. “Thanks for coming Liam. I assume Corey is here to help as well?” Stilinski asked, hooking his fingers through his belt loops as he spoke. Liam nodded, his eyes burned and he sniffed a little trying to clear the blockage that had suddenly lodged itself in his throat. “Alright come this way. The ME is going to be here in about twenty minutes to pick up the body, so we will need to be quick about this.” He held up the tape for the two of them to duck under and led them around the police car. Turned out it had been parked there for more than just keeping people away. As they rounded it Liam caught sight of three officers hovering around the body of a young boy. He couldn’t have been older than thirteen or fourteen with dark hair thrown back from his face by gravity. Same as the last body his eyes were blown wide open, staring up into the heavens, glazed over and whited out. His hair and clothes were covered in dirt smears and broken off leaves and twigs were sticking out in every direction.“We were able to ID him as Everett Cole. One of the other deputies recognized him as a classmate of his kid. We are working on getting in contact with his parents right now.” Liam nodded, violently clearing his throat and trying to ignore the burn that was steadily making its way through his eyes. The three other officers looked up as they approached, however, Stilinski very quickly waved them off and soon it was just the three of them standing over the body. Corey crouched down over top of the kid, closing his eyes and taking deep inhaling breaths. Liam tried to do the same, moving around to Corey’s opposite side. However with each breath that he took in, his nose seemed to get more and more stuffed up. It reminded him of when he had gotten the flu in elementary school and been homesick with his mom for an entire week. Cooped up under the blankets of his bed, running through tissues like little kids with Pixy Stix. He swallowed and tried to tamp down on the ribbon of panic which was slowly making its presence known in his chest. Scott had been very clear that werewolves weren’t able to get sick, but now, Liam was beginning to doubt him. Perhaps some sort of wolf-flu? “Is the scent the same as last time?” Stilinski’s voice broke though his musings and Liam looked up at him. The edges of his vision had gone all crystalline like he was looking through a sun catcher. “Sorry?” he croaked out. Corey looked up rather suddenly as he spoke and the wrinkles between Stilinski’s eyebrows only increased. “I asked if the scent was the same as last time? Are you alright Liam?”“Yes! I’m fine, it’s nothing.” He muttered getting back to his feet. The blockage in his nose was making it difficult to smell much of anything at this point. When they had gotten out of the car he could smell the wet bark around them, but that scent had faded off into background noise. “You said the scent from last time was similar to acetone?” Corey asked, tentatively looking away from Liam. Stilinski nodded, “Liam was the one who found it. Whatever it was, it wasn’t something that a human nose could catch.”“I’m not getting anything like that now. I can smell the dirt and I can smell that they’re definitely dead, but nothing like acetone.”“It wasn’t just the acetone scent though,” Liam protested, wiping at his nose, “it smelled like it was something in the blood. If this kid didn’t have any sort of cuts or injuries on him I doubt you’d be able to smell it.”Corey frowned to himself scratching at the back of his head and peering closer at the body. For a moment Liam’s throat tightened and he had only seconds to twist away from the body before he was sneezing violently. Once Liam got himself turned back around, both Corey and Sheriff Stilinski were staring at him, concern evident in their eyes. “I’m fine.” Liam snapped before either one of them could say something. Corey huffed out a little sarcastic laugh and turned back to the body. “Wait, there!” He said, suddenly stooping over the body. Liam and Stilinski followed his gaze. Corey crouched down and pulled his hand into his sleeve to nudge at the kid’s left hand which was sprawled out over the dirt. A bandage was wrapped around his thumb, a few crumbs of dirt covering it. “If the cut is still open we could see if the scent is there or not.” Corey offered. Stilinski’s eyebrows shot way up and Liam winced a little to himself. “There is no way in hell I am allowing you to take a bandage off a dead body to test for a scent. I’ll see if I can get a post-mortem blood sample for you both to test.”Liam opened his mouth to protest that they should at least try and sniff around the bandage, however as soon as he opened his mouth another sneeze was tearing out of his body. “Liam? Are you sure you’re alright, because you don’t look alright.”“I’m fine!” Corey’s hand which had been floating just above his shoulder jerked away at Liam’s sudden shout. A thread of guilt burned through his stomach but Liam looked away instead. Focusing on the clustering of trees behind him. The typical redwoods that made up most of the preserve trickled off into more of the residential trees that made up the trail parking lot. Thick with foliage, the trees were bright neon green in color with pointy leaves that created triangular sunbeams smattering down against the dirt trail. Spiny trails of bark wormed their way down the tree trunk leading into the root system. A sharper breeze caught the branches and they shifted around, swaying back and forth. As they did, Liam caught sight of a small black box lodged a little way’s up on the trunk. “What's that?” He asked. Not bothering to turn around, merely shifting closer to the tree. Footsteps thudded against the dirt behind him and then Stilinski appeared, shifting around Liam to walk over to the tree. He frowned a little and squinted up at it. “Looks like a trail camera.” “Like one that was intentionally put there?” Corey asked, appearing at Liam’s side. His previous reaction seemingly forgotten. “Yeah, they’re put out and set up by the Sheriff's Station and the local wildlife facility—” As the words left his mouth however, Stilinski seemed to come to the same realization that Corey had. “—and they would have captured video of anyone coming in or out of the parking lot. So we can see where this kid might have come from or what got him here.” And without a second word Stilinski was whirling around and marching back over to them. “The ME is going to be here any second. Give me five minutes to get them briefed and then I’ll meet you both back at the station. I have access to the cameras there and we can look over them, alright?” Liam’s head was beginning to swirl with everything going on, his nose was still stuffed up and the itchiness of his eyes had spread into the back of his eye sockets as well. Somewhere far out of reach that left Liam scrubbing at his eyes for some sort of relief. He barely even heard Corey’s agreement before his hands landed on Liam’s bicep and Corey was tugging him back in the direction of the car. The moment they were out of human earshot however Corey shoved Liam away and rounded on him. “What the hell is going on with you? Did you get injured and not tell anybody? What is it?!” He hissed, stepping backwards to eye Liam up and down. “No!” Liam protested, staggering a little bit, now walking on his own. He could see the silvery outline of his mom’s car, left where he parked it and tried to stagger his way over. “Nothing’s wrong with me. I’m fine.” The words were unbelievable, even to himself. Something was wrong with him, there was no question about it. However all the usual reasoning made no sense in this scenario. He wasn’t injured as Corey had so helpfully offered. It wasn’t a panic attack or anything like that. And his body wasn’t reacting as violently as it normally would with airborne wolfsbane or poisons like that. He shouldn’t be able to get sick. But that was the only one that made even the slightest bit of sense. Scott had said that werewolves would never get sick, but at the same time he had really only been a werewolf himself for a few years, he didn’t know everything. Maybe this was something that Deaton knew better about. He had way more knowledge of werewolves and the like anyways. But at the same time, Liam felt odd about going to Deaton for things. Deaton and Scott had been friends long before Liam even came into the picture. And after everything with Scott had gone down it felt wrong to go to Deaton for things without Scott around as a mediator. He really couldn’t blame him. He had nearly killed Scott and then left him for Theo to actually kill. That kind of thing left a stain on relationships. He hadn’t spoken with Melissa since she cleaned up his injuries in the hospital after Monroe’s defeat. His last interaction with Deaton even further back than that. In front of him Corey sighed and reached back out to pull Liam in the direction of the car, pulling the keys out of his hand as he did. “Fine. But I’m not letting you drive. Come on.” Corey’s hand was cold against the bare skin of his arm where his sleeves were rolled up. The pressure there made his wolf’s teeth snap in his chest. He wanted to lock his jaws around Corey’s wrist and throw him into the nearest tree trunk. They made it to the car and Corey unlocked the car. Ushering Liam into the passenger seat. The door slammed behind him and the world went silent. The wolf howled in his chest, throwing its head back and attempting to expel all of its problems out in a single scream. His fingers tightened up, curling into his palm and sharpening into claws. The driver side door opened up and Corey was in the car with him. Spearmint and rage. Liam shifted around, placing his hands flat under his thighs to keep from doing something that he would regret. The place where Corey’s hands had pressed into his arm tingled like spider bites running all up and down his arm. small, stinging, pinpricks of pain that refused to subside. It didn’t feel like it did when Liam lost control of the shift. But all the same, it didn’t feel good. Corey started the car and released the parking brake, making a u-turn as they left the parking lot. They passed the ME making the turn up into the preserve as they went. Liam shut his eyes and tried to find something else to focus on other than the tingling sensation running through his arm. His stuffy nose had yet to release or clear up so Liam focused his hearing, searching out Corey’s heartbeat to try and match his breathing to. However as he found it thumping away in Corey’s chest, the panicked speed of the beats had Liam struggling even further to breathe. A sharp sensation radiated down his arm and Liam flinched, distracted from the sound of Corey’s heart beat. He wanted to rip the skin off of his arm where Corey had touched him. It wasn’t even anything against Corey either. It was just simply the fact that this feeling would not go away. He tipped his head back once more and pinched his eyes even tighter closed. Sparks exploded behind his eyelids as a wave of darkness overwhelmed him. For a moment he was lost to the darkness. Stumbling around on the stairs of his childhood basement looking for the light switch before the monster in the darkness caught up to him. But then there was a band of pressure around his wrist. The cooling imprint of a fingerprint pressing over his pulse, hammering away in his wrist. Liam focused on the sensation. He had no idea where it had come from but it helped. The sensations in his arm began to fade into background noise, becoming nothing but static. The pressure increased momentarily and from the darkness of his own eyelids Liam caught sight of a familiar green eyed stare.
Theo.
Theo standing with him outside the gas station.
Hand wrapped around his wrist.
Theo standing with him in the hospital.
Strong at his side, arm wrapped around Liam to keep him away from Gabe’s bullets.
Theo standing behind him in the mirror.
Calm as ever and a cooling brand over Liam’s red hot rage.
Theo.
The sun. The moon. And the truth.
Theo.
The sun. The moon. And the truth.
Theo. Theo. Theo.
Slowly his senses began to filter back in. Corey’s heart rate was calmer now. Trees rushed past outside the car as they drove. The sun was a faint thing in the sky, creating sharp shadows as they went by. Liam took a slow breath in and was relieved to find that the pressure clogging up his nose had been released. It wasn’t fully gone, some lingering remnants causing his inhales to catch and scratch a little. Liam cracked his eyes open a little. Peering out at the world through little slits. They were just passing the final traffic light before the Sheriff’s station. The car rumbled over the curb entrance to the station and Liam fully opened his eyes. Corey pulled them into the closest open parking spot and turned the car off. He seemed to be aware that Liam was closer to ‘actually fine’ now, but even still he didn’t turn to Liam. Liam pushed his head off of the headrest and began to try and right himself in the passenger seat. It was only then that Liam noticed what he had done with his hands. Typically whenever he lost control of the shift, it ended with claw marks digging into his palms. However this time—he had somehow managed to wrap his right hand around his left wrist. Pointer finger pressing into his pulse point. Now that he was more aware he could feel the heat radiating off his hand and slowly detached from his wrist. His hand was sticky with sweat and Liam scrubbed it off on his jeans to get rid of the sensation. For a long moment neither of them moved. Liam peered at Corey out of the corner of his eye and found the other boy already looking at him.“Liam,” He began, voice ringing with exhaustion, “I’m going to ask one last time and then I’m going to leave this alone for you to deal with, what the fuck is going on with you?”The worst part about it was that Liam himself had no idea what was going on. His proposed hypotheses were few and far between. Even harder to pick out which of them were true or not. Corey’s gaze remained focused on him and the spider bite tingling returned to his arm for just a second. Liam scratched at his arm and looked away finally. Distantly, on the other side of the parking lot, he could see a Sheriff’s vehicle pull into the back parking lot. Liam unlocked the car door and climbed unsteadily out of the car. “Sheriff Stilinski is here.”He slammed the door shut, but could still see through the windows as Corey muttered something to himself before climbing out as well. He passed him back his keys which Liam pocketed with a grateful smile.Stilinski met them halfway across the parking lot and led them directly into the station and back towards his office. “I called the wildlife facility on the way over and they were able to send over the tapes from last night and yesterday which should cut down on our searching time.” Stilinski explained. He held the door open for them as Liam and Corey slipped inside. The rest of the station was nearly empty with only one or two other officers working at their computers. A different woman sat at the desk which had once belonged to Deputy Valarie Clark. A pang of something radiated through Liam at the thought. He hadn’t spoken to Hayden since the day she told him she was leaving. Near a dozen half typed messages to her lingered in his draft inbox however. It had always seemed like it was too soon to message her, but then time passed and it felt too late to message her. So he just never had. Stilinski threw himself into his chair behind the desk and began pulling up his professional email. Liam and Corey both sat themselves in the chairs opposite of Stilinski’s desk and waited. It didn’t take long before he was spinning the desktop computer around to face them and clicking on a video file. The date and time in the corner marked the tape having been from the previous morning. The sunlight was bright in some spots blowing out the video and dark in other spots, shielding everything in darkness. A few lone cars were parked around the lot but no sign of the boy.With a few clicks of buttons the video sped up to 5x and the three of them watched cars pull in and out of the lot. People walk in and out of the trails. And slowly the bright morning turned to brighter midday to dull evening to the dark of night time. Still no sight of Everett or anyone who even looked similar to him. It was only when the soft light of dawn was beginning to illuminate the parking lot and the street lights were flickering off that Liam spotted something. There were two cars in the parking lot. A silver car of an overnight hiker which they had seen enter the preserve hours earlier. And the very corner of a truck that had been parked on the edges of the camera’s sight. The driver hadn’t been a hiker as they had never gone over to the trail entrance. Instead the corner of the driver side door that had been visible had opened, shut, and then the person disappeared off camera. At exactly 2:15 on the CCTV clock Liam spotted something. The bushes and trees off to the side of the lot were beginning to wiggle around and bounce in a way that looked to be more than just the wind. “There! Look at that!” Stilinski returned the video to normal speed and they all watched as the bushes gave one final violent shake before the body of Everett Cole came staggering out of them. The camera wasn’t a great quality camera but even still the leaves and twigs stuck all over his hair and clothes were visible. Everett staggered around for a moment, hands thrown out in every direction to keep himself upright.“Look at his eyes!” Corey exclaimed, finger jabbing into the screen. Both Liam and Sheriff Stilinski leaned closer to see better. Everett’s eyes were dark but clear all the same. No sign of the whitened eyes that they had found on his dead body. “They weren't blind to start out,” Stilinski muttered to himself, pulling a notepad closer to himself to scribble the note down. Another source of movement caught his eye and Liam looked over in time to watch someone pull down the tailgate of the parked truck. He couldn’t see their face but watched as they carefully placed a massive cardboard box down onto the bed of the truck. The box was clearly heavy as the truck shifted a little lower with the added weight. They shifted around to the side of the truck to finish shoving the box the rest of the way up so it was pressed up against the cab. They must have known the camera was there and was trying to stay out of view. From what he remembered of the lot the spot they were parked in was the very last spot before the end of the lot. “Wait who’s that?” Corey’s voice broke him out of his concentration and Liam looked up. Corey’s eyes were now locked on the screen as well staring at the person standing behind the truck. Across the parking lot Everett finally collapsed to his knees, now dragging himself through the dirt. The camera had no audio but the person by the truck must have heard them fall as they walked around the edge of the bed to get a closer look. Still keeping their face out of view of the cameras. “I have no idea. We didn’t get any nine-one-one calls until a runner found Everett’s body around nine in the morning.”“Well clearly someone else saw something.” Liam pointed out, trying not to cringe at the obviousness of what he was saying. The person only remained there for a moment longer watching Everett before turning their back and slamming their tailgate shut and walking back around to climb into the driver’s seat. Tail lights flicked on as they started up the truck and began to back out of the spot. As they reversed out of the spot Liam’s hand shot out and slammed the pause button. “Liam what—” Stilinski didn’t get a chance to finish his thought before Liam pressed his finger into the screen. “License plate.” He said by way of explanation. Stilinski’s eyes widened and he grabbed the notepad again, scribbling down the plate number.
5HPQ349.
He turned back to his computer and pulled up a separate application and typed in the license plate. Liam and Corey watched on anxiously. The cursor spun in the middle of the screen, seeming to take ages.“If you can get a match on the owner are you able to bring them in to interview for this?” Corey asked, voice soft. Stilinski scoffed a little at that, “Everett is a minor and since this ended in his death it’s considered a misdemeanor. Even if they know nothing about what happened, they would still be charged for not reporting this.”Liam shifted as a sudden discomfort took root in his chest at the idea. It was totally reasonable to have a criminal charge for not reporting potential crimes against children. But something now felt wrong about this situation. It felt like he had just tattled to the teacher. The cursor stopped spinning and a familiar face popped up on the screen. Liam’s heart dropped out of his chest.
License plate 5PHQ349 traced back to owner Theodore K. Raeken.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
It took mere minutes before an APB was sent out across the entirety of Beacon Hills detailing a physical description of Theo’s truck and Theo himself. Liam could feel his heart jackrabbiting in his chest as he watched Stilinski make the announcement just outside his office doors. Corey remained in the chair next to him, twisted around to watch as well. “Are you worried?” “What?” Liam looked over at Corey’s question, straining to hear him over the sound of his own heart beat. Corey nodded down at Liam’s chest, right where his heart was. “Your heart is beating like crazy, are you worried that Theo’s going to try and hurt anyone who tries to arrest him?”Liam hadn’t even considered that. In all honesty he didn’t know why his heart was beating so fast. Maybe it was memories of their interaction at the gas station a few days prior. Maybe it was the off-record file locked in the bottom drawer of Stilinski’s desk with Theo’s name on it. Maybe it was the conversation he had with Mason, Corey and Gwen earlier that week. He had promised them that if he ran into Theo again he would tell him to leave town again. But had he really promised them that? Was he really going to follow through with that? Did they expect him to?If there was a chance that Theo knew something about what happened to Everett, shouldn’t they let him stick around and try to help. Or maybe he had caused Everett’s death himself. Liam glanced back at the computer. It had gone to sleep but the last image on it was still strong in Liam’s mind. By the time Everett had fully collapsed, dead in the dirt, after staggering around for almost five minutes, Theo had long since vanished from the parking lot. The box that he had put in the back of his truck bothered Liam the most. The box had clearly been full of something—but where could Theo have gotten it from? He had pulled into the preserve parking lot with nothing in the bed and was gone from the camera’s view for only a few moments. Barely enough time to pick up the box from wherever he had gotten it and place it down on his truck bed.The office door banged open again as Stilinski re-entered and Liam was grateful that he didn’t have to answer Corey’s question. “I’ve got as many available deputies as I can out searching right now and I'm waiting on a warrant to be approved so I can pull more officers from some of the nearby towns to help search, but until then, are either of you two able to track him down through scent?” Stilinski asked and there was something in his eyes that had Liam shrinking back. It was something dark and vindictive. Something that said if Theo was caught, Stilinski would be following through with the unofficial record. “We don’t really have something to get Theo’s scent off of though,” Liam began hesitantly. “We could try and go back to the preserve and find something with his scent on it.” Corey added quickly. Liam shot him a glare which Corey missed completely, “Yeah maybe, but this was hours ago, any scent’s would have been long gone by now.”“We never know if we don’t check though.” Corey gave a decisive nod and got to his feet, disappearing out of the office before Liam could even attempt to get a word in edgewise. He exhaled, dropping his head down to rest against the back of the chair. “Liam?” Stilinski’s voice had Liam raising his head again to peer at the Sheriff, “Don’t worry. As soon as we get him in here I will take care of everything. After everything with the Anuk-ite and the hunters last year Theo was a last ditch effort but if he’s going to continue to break the law as if he is above it, then I’ll make sure he gets what's coming to him.”The words in Liam’s throat locked up at that and he could only nod. He didn’t know how to explain to Stilinski that his nightmares consisted of what-if scenarios where Gabe’s bullets tore through Theo and he didn’t get up again. He didn’t know how to explain that he had started listening to the radio. Not because he found the news interesting, but because he had become obsessive about every single unidentified body found. Worrying himself to sleep with the idea that it was Theo’s body left unidentified in some unknown morgue. He didn’t want Stilinski to ‘take care’ of anything. It was the first time he had seen Theo in nine months. Liam didn’t want anyone or thing to step in and scare him off again. Before he could even begin to try and put that all into words Stilinski stepped aside and ushered him out the door. Corey was waiting for him by the front door, foot tapping impatiently. “I already called Mason and Gwen,” he said as Liam approached, “Gwen is going to meet us at the preserve and Mason asked if we could pick him up on our way over there.”“Yeah, sure, we can do that, but why’d you call them?” The sun had brightened considerably and left the both of them squinting as they pushed the doors to the parking lot open. “There’s two of us so if we split up and I go with Mason and you go with Gwen we might be able to track Theo down faster.” Liam unlocked the car and swung himself into the driver's seat. The inside of the car had heated up considerably and left the leather seats sticking uncomfortably to his body. “That’s only if we do find a scent though.” “Sure but either way, we know where Theo has hidden out before. We can check out those spots at the very least.”Liam rolled his eyes, “do you really want to spend your Saturday morning trying to track down Theo though?”“If it keeps him from going after some other poor kid,” Corey’s voice had suddenly taken on a serious note, “I would spend my entire weekend looking for him.”Liam swallowed, barely sparing him a half glance as he did. It was difficult to remind himself that the Theo that Liam knew and the Theo that Corey had known, were two very different people. He nodded ignoring Corey’s sharp gaze and kept focus on the road as he drove back into town. In a mirror image of his boyfriend Mason was waiting for them on the curb when they pulled up. His sweatpants were rolled up at his ankles and the hoodie was probably Corey’s. He bounded over to the car and hopped into the backseat. “You seriously weren’t going to tell us about all this stuff any sooner?” Mason demanded playfully the second the door was shut behind him. “What stuff?” He asked, heart sinking at the thought that Corey had told Mason about everything that had gone on with him when they had been in the preserve. “Seriously? A body shows up and you just keep that to yourself?” “Oh! That! I didn’t know it was supernaturally related with just the first body!” Mason scoffed a little, “Well whatever is going on we need to figure this out before more start popping up. I am not missing graduation because someone decided to go on a killing spree again.” The rest of the drive to the preserve was quiet and as promised Gwen met them at the preserve. Leaning up against the trunk of her car as they pulled up and parked behind her. “Morning,” she greeted as they all clambered out of the car, “what's the plan here?” “Corey and I are going to see if we can get some sort of scent from the far side of the parking lot to track.” Liam explained shutting the car doors behind him. The scent of sap and soil radiating off the trees was stronger than it had been that morning. Flowing in overwhelming waves with each breath as they moved further and further into the preserve. The cop cars and officers had since disappeared but the crime scene tape remained. Liam held it up as Mason, Corey and Gwen all ducked underneath.Almost exactly the same as that morning, with increasing pressure, his nose began to block up again. Limiting his sense of smell down to almost nothing. They came to a stop at the center of the parking lot. The space where Everett’s body had been was now empty but extra tape surrounded it to keep people away. Liam turned away slightly trying to subtly scratch at the irritation that had returned to his eyes. “Alright,” He started, determined to get out of there as fast as possible. This was the second time his body had flared up like this in preserve. Maybe someone had planted some sort of werewolf irritant nearby and that’s what was affecting him. Whatever it was, it must have been something that Corey’s chimera anatomy was resistant to. However the longer he thought about it the less it made sense. His eyes had been irritated in the classroom last week and he had been sneezing in his own home. “Everett collapsed over here and Theo’s truck was in that far parking spot on the right. He was only out of sight for a few seconds so it's most likely that he just walked up to the trees there and not much further.” Behind him Corey made a noise of affirmation before striding forwards. “I’ve never met this guy, is there anything in particular that we should be looking for?” Gwen asked. Mason shook his head. “Unfortunately he’s pretty smart so I doubt there will be much here to find physically. We are primarily here as backup for Corey and Liam.” Unfortunately? Liam griped, what was so unfortunate about being smart? Mason continued, “Things like scents and chemosignals? Those are a bit more difficult to cover up which Liam and Corey should be able to track.” Gwen nodded, tucking her phone into her back pocket and joining Mason in searching through the foliage there. Liam made his way over to stand at Corey’s side. There were two tracks of car tires in the parking spot. One layered on after the other. One of them was heavier and sank into the soil a lot further creating sharp indentations. Most likely from Theo’s truck. The other was lighter but still crossed over Theo’s tracks, making it difficult to fully follow his truck. Corey took a deep inhale at his side and Liam tried to mimic doing the same. He had a feeling that if he actually tried it he would end up having another sneezing fit. He could lie to Corey. Corey would accept his lies and push no further. Mason and Gwen? They would push. They would prod. They would demand answers that Liam did not have. “Hey guys!” Gwen called suddenly, causing them all to turn, “There’s an imprint in the leaves over here, looks like something heavy was sitting here.”She was right. The twigs and leaves had been crushed down in a two foot by two foot square which looked like it could match up to the box that Theo had loaded into the back of his truck. Corey knelt down and sniffed around at the dirt. “Whatever was here smells really sweet.”“Sweet? What the hell is he doing? Transporting baked goods?” Mason muttered. The three of them turned, almost automatically towards Liam who flinched a little at the sudden attention. “What?”“Dude—!” Mason gestured a little frantically at the ground and Corey as if Liam would suddenly understand, “—any input on mystery scent number two?!”“Oh! Uh, right,” Liam inhaled as heavily as he could. Almost immediately his throat dried out however, sending him off to the side in a coughing fit. Gwen’s hand landed on his back, patting Liam awkwardly as he tried to get himself back under control. They were all staring at him when he came back up. “What?” He snapped, suddenly defensive. Mason and Corey shared a look before shaking their heads and looking back to the dirt below them. So Corey had told Mason. Gwen’s concern still lined her face however so Liam guessed that she hadn’t been told quite yet. Corey took a few more inhales of the scent, his face furrowed as he tried to parse through everything that it held. Suddenly he paused, face smoothing out in recognition. Corey glanced up and down from the dirt to their small assembled group for a few moments. “It smells like laughing gas.” He finally said. Liam’s eyebrows shot up at that. What the fuck would Theo have been doing with laughing gas? Theo’s joke from the gas station rang out in his mind. The small little joke about creating new chimeras. What if it hadn’t been a joke. The hammering of his heart picked up tenfold and Liam huffed in his chest as breathing suddenly became much more difficult. “Laughing gas? Like nitrous oxide? What the hell would he be doing with that?” Mason muttered. Asking what they were all thinking. “I have no idea. But it’s an easy enough scent to track,” Corey twisted to catch Liam’s gaze, “Can you find the scent?”Liam nodded, lying. He had had dental surgery in freshman year after a solid hit from the opposing lacrosse team cracked a molar. If he tried hard enough he could just barely remember what the laughing gas had smelled like. Sickeningly sweet in a chemical form. Artificial flavoring in frosting. He could use those memories to track after Theo now. Corey clambered back to his feet and Liam nodded again, clearing his throat before speaking. “Mason, you can take my car with Corey and I’ll go with Gwen to track the scent. We’ll take everything north of the high school, you guys take everything south.” Mason and Corey both nodded and Liam tossed Mason the keys. Sure it was technically his mom’s car and he should have probably checked with her before loaning out the car, but Mason was a safe driver it would be fine. “We’ll meet at my house in half an hour and update if we find anything there. Obviously if you find him first—Stilinski is in the middle of getting an arrest warrant so—call him first.” “Good luck.” Mason nodded, grabbing Corey by the arm and pulling him towards where they had parked the cars. Gwen pulled her own keys out of her pocket and led Liam over to her car. He blinked furiously as she stepped in front of him and was no longer staring at Liam. The blinking eased up the irritation of his eyes just a little but still sent tears rolling down his face. Liam hurriedly wiped them away and coughed again to clear his throat. Gwen unlocked the car and they climbed in together. She started it up and quickly turned off her music which must have been playing on the way over to the preserve. Behind them Mason and Corey turned Liam’s car around and began heading out of the preserve. Gwen followed suit and before long they were rumbling off the dirt roadway and back onto the pavement. Liam hovered a finger over the window controls on his side of the car. He had watched Scott track someone via a car only once. He had hung his whole head outside the car like a dog while Stiles drove them around. Now in front of them Mason turned off to the right and Gwen came to a rolling stop at the stop sign. Liam rolled down the window and shifted over to get closer to the opening to try and track the scent. He summoned up his memories of the surgery and took a deep inhaling breath. However, rather than catching the free flowing scent of rushing air and gasoline from the car, there was nothing. He couldn’t catch a single scent. Liam pulled away from the window, rolling it up a little ways to try and find a scent inside the car. Gwen had a pomegranate air freshener attached to her vents, which he focused on. But still—nothing. It was like someone had pinched his nose completely closed. Liam reached a hand up and prodded at his nose to see if he had managed to get a leaf stuck in there and somehow just hadn’t felt it. Nothing. A drip of snot ran down the inside of his nose and Liam sniffed furiously to banish it away. He scrubbed at the underside of his nose a few times and tried to take a deep breath to calm himself down. But as he did the air caught inside his nose and it felt like he was suffocating. Liam forced the breath out through his mouth instead.“Anything?” Gwen’s voice broke through his concentration. Liam looked up, startled. “No, nothing.” He wheezed out. She nodded and turned onto the main street running through the center of Beacon Hills. Liam shifted more in his seat so he was fully facing away from Gwen. Whatever was happening, he didn’t want to involve her in it. They drove all over town for another twenty minutes before Liam finally called it quits. His nose had yet to release whatever blockage was preventing him from being able to smell. And there was a dripping sensation beginning to form in the back of his throat. Causing all of his words to come out bubbled and warped. Mason and Corey met them back at Liam’s house. Both his mom and step dad were sitting in the kitchen together when the four of them trudged into the house. His mom had known Mason almost as long as Liam had known him. Their mom’s had both worked together growing up so commonly they would trade off playdates when one or the other had to stay late at work. Corey had been a welcome acceptance as well after Mason began to bring him around. First as friends, then as boyfriends. And despite not knowing her for as long or much outside of school, Gwen and his mom had quickly become fast friends. “You four are up early!” His mom commented as Liam locked the door behind them. He nodded and a few other noises of agreement arose from the group. “Did you get your situation sorted out with the Sheriff?” his step dad asked, setting down his coffee cup. The joking grin faded quickly off his mom’s face and she twisted a little more in the seat to stare at them all. Liam shook his head a little, “Not quite, we’re still dealing with it. But we did what we could so Stilinski is seeing what he can do officially.” They both nodded and seemed to accept the answer but didn’t look exactly pleased about it. Liam shuffled his friends up to the second floor where his bedroom was. He pulled his phone out as they entered, clicking on the chat he had open with Sheriff Stilinski.
To his slight surprise Sheriff Stilinski responded almost immediately. Liam shut his bedroom door behind them and plopped down on the corner of his bed. Mason had taken up his usual spot on the floor at the foot of his bed facing the TV. The two of them had spent hours in that exact spot playing video games well into early hours of the morning before. Corey had taken the spot beside Mason leaning half into him and half into the bed. Gwen grabbed his desk chair and dragged it over to join the group as well.
Liam shifted to throw his phone off to the side when a sudden thought occurred to him.
Liam sighed and itched at his inner arm, the phantom pain of the nurse's needle going in still bothered him some nights. It wasn’t so much because it had hurt, but more because the circumstances surrounding it were so strange. Mia’s tear stained face appeared in his mind as she was led back into the nurses office by Mrs. Price. His phone buzzed again and Liam looked down.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Liam woke to the sound of his phone vibrating off of his bedside desk. There was a dull thud as it landed heavily on the carpet below his bed and Liam twisted around, trying to figure out what was going on. A blanket was tangled around his lower legs and sweat coated his skin in a thin sheen. His phone was still ringing. Liam finally blinked his eyes open to be met with the familiar darkness of his bedroom. Even with the curtains covering his bedroom window he could see that the sky outside was still dark. His phone gave one last vailant ring and Liam hauled himself off the bed with a heave, grabbing it and pressing accept. “Hello?” He croaked out. His voice was shot to hell. Throat dried out like he hadn’t spoken in years and Liam tried to clear out his throat by coughing but it just sent him into a coughing fit. “Liam?” A second voice echoed out of the phone and Liam had to pull his phone away from his ear to check who had called him. Sheriff Stilinski; the contact name read. “Yeah, it’s me.” Liam pushed himself up a little further on the bed, managing to untangle his legs from the blankets. His nose had never released its stuffiness from the second trip into the preserve the day prior and so Liam had resorted to stealing an entire tissue box out of the bathroom. Even now, with each exhale the breath got caught in his nose and Liam was forced to breathe out through his mouth instead. “We got him.”And without a word further Liam knew exactly what Stilinski was talking about. His heart dropped out of his body and claws pierced through the seam of his blanket that he had been holding onto. He waited to see if Stilinski would prove him wrong and continue the conversation in a different direction. “One of my deputies found Theo in his truck on the edge of the preserve about ten minutes ago. They are bringing him in now—”“I’ll be there.” Liam didn’t even let him finish, cutting Stilinski off. There was a beat of surprised silence from the other end of the phone.“Liam, it’s three in the morning, you need your sleep. I was just calling you to update on the situation, go back to sleep. I doubt Theo is going to be in any rush to start talking to people anyways.”Liam pulled his phone away from his ear for a moment, glancing at the clock there. It was 3 in the morning. He had barely gone to bed four hours ago, which explained the unhappy pounding in his head. “I can tell when he’s lying about things!”
He couldn’t.
But Stilinski didn’t know that, and Liam wasn’t about to tell him. “That way, when you question him you won’t have to waste time figuring out if he’s lying or not.” Stilinski’s sigh echoed over the open line and Liam bit his lip hoping and praying that Stilinski wouldn’t deny him now. “Look I’m not your parents so I can’t really tell you what you should or shouldn’t do at this point Liam but if you really want to come by the station, I won't stop you.” Liam could barely hold back the grin that spread across his face as he nodded to himself. “I’ll be there in ten minutes.” The line beeped as he hung up and Liam quietly clambered out of bed. Despite his parents' overall acceptance of the supernatural comings and goings of the world, he had a feeling that they wouldn’t react too well to catching him sneaking out of the house at three in the morning. Given that he had a second floor bedroom it was almost always hot no matter the season. Summers made it worse of course. But for some reason Liam was cold outside the soft cocoon of his blankets. He pulled a hoodie over his t-shirt before creaking his bedroom door open and slipping out into the darkened hall. In typical Liam-Dunbar-fashion, the moment the door was shut behind him he was struck with the overwhelming need to sneeze. The pressure built in his chest and Liam quickly pinched his mouth and nose shut. He urged his feet to go faster and just about leapt over the last step on the stairs which he knew from experience was the squeakiest. The keys jangled loudly as Liam grabbed them off the table. He winced, rushing for the door as the pressure built up in his chest even more so. The door just barely shut in time behind him before the sneeze was ripping itself out of Liam’s chest. The sound reverberated down the street in the quiet of the night and for half a beat Liam feared it was going to be a cartoon moment where the car alarms started going off around him as well. But the street remained quiet and no lights turned on in the upstairs bedrooms. He relaxed a little, wiping his nose and crept over to the car, using the key to unlock it and climb stealthily into the driver's seat. The car rumbled to life as Liam turned the key in the ignition and within seconds he was creeping out of the driveway. Keeping his eyes locked on his parents bedroom window for any sign of movement. Thankfully the room remained dark. With the streets as empty as they were at three in the morning it took less than ten minutes to get to the sheriff’s station. His parking job was awful and definitely would have gotten him a parking ticket had it been any other time of day. But Liam couldn’t care less as he pulled open the station doors and dashed inside. Unsurprisingly the station was mostly empty. A single deputy sat hunched over their desk with the light on, squinting at the papers below them. The AC appeared to be on full blast in the station as the cold air had Liam shivering despite his hoodie. A quick look around the desks showed no sign of Stilinski so Liam rapped his knuckles quietly against a nearby desktop to draw the deputies attention.The bags under their eyes were evident as they looked up but they recognized Liam and nodded to a doorway off to the left. The holding cells. Heart hammering in his chest Liam made his way over to the doorway. Sheriff Stilinski stood inside, arms crossed facing down one of the holding cells, a lone deputy at his side. They both looked over as Liam approached and visible relief spread across their features. He was suddenly painfully relieved that Stilinski had allowed him to come. Despite not being able to smell it the distress was evident on both. “Liam, thanks for coming.” Stilinski breathed out, uncrossing his arms and relaxing a little. From inside one of the holding cells came the rattle of handcuffs and Liam edged forwards. He couldn’t see fully inside the cell as part of the wall was blocking it. “Yeah, of course.” He shifted around the wall and stepped fully into the room. And there was Theo. Somehow exactly the same and completely different from when Liam had seen him last. His hair was looser, missing the usual gelled back look and instead flopping over his forehead and into his eyes. His mouth was quirked up in a familiar smirk but his eyes were missing the usual sparking challenge that went with said smirk. “Here comes the cavalry.” Theo muttered, loud enough and intentional enough that just about the entire room was shooting him a pointed glare. He shifted to lean back on the bench in the back of the holding cell and Liam finally spotted the cuffs. One pair tightened around his wrists, digging into the skin there, creating sharp red lines under the metal. The other pair cuffed around the chain links of the first pair and hooked around a bar running underneath the bench seat. “Why’s he handcuffed?” Liam whispered, moving to stand beside Stilinski and shifting so he didn’t have to keep Theo’s intense stare. Clearly he didn’t ask the question quiet enough though because Theo spoke up before Stilinski could say anything. “Security precautions, little wolf, you know how it is.” His voice was louder now and Liam could hear just how gravelly it truly was. Stilinski turned slightly, keeping one eye on Theo as he spoke, “I didn’t want a repeat of him trying to snag a key, and being successful this time.” Sound enough reasoning, Liam couldn’t deny. But still the sight of the cuffs on Theo’s wrists had something sharp and painful twisting in his stomach. He scrubbed at his nose as it began to run again and Liam wished he had brought a pack of tissues. “I hadn’t started an official questioning yet until you got here, are you good to go?” Stilinski asked and Liam wiped at his runny nose nodding slowly. Stilinski shifted to stand right in front of the bars of the holding cell, arms crossed over his chest. “What were you doing Saturday morning?” The question caught Liam a little off guard. He had always assumed there had been some sort of official process for questionings like this, but it seemed Stilinski was jumping right into it. Theo’s eyes flicked back and forth between Liam and Stilinski before he gave a careful smirk and leaned back on the bench. “Running some errands.” He said finally, voice smoothing out into something more controlled. His heart rate remained steady and Liam began to regret saying that he could tell when Theo was lying. Even when he was able to scent out chemosignals he had been nowhere good enough to parse through Theo’s. But now with his nose being blocked, he was left with just a heartbeat and body language which Theo seemed to have full control over. Stilinski glanced back at Liam and he nodded, wincing internally. How long could he keep this up before Stilinski caught on to his bs. And more importantly how long until Theo caught on. “Security cameras placed you at the Beacon Hills Preserve’s North Parking Lot at 5:30 AM yesterday morning.” Theo nodded along as if he wasn’t surprised that they knew that. Had he seen the cameras then? Had all of the footage been carefully controlled and manipulated by him? Had it been intentional that he was seen moments before Everett’s death? “What were you doing down there?” Theo shifted as if to run his hands through his hair but the handcuffs quickly stopped that motion. He paused and glanced down at them as if he had forgotten that they were there. A dark curl of hair had fallen into his eyes so Theo instead flicked his head backwards, sending the curl out of his face. A move that Liam had attempted to do only once with his own bangs. It had ended with him cocking his head straight back into a metal pole and getting a concussion which faded away within minutes. The teasing from Mason and Corey however had still yet to stop. Even four months later it had yet to show any signs of slowing. Stilinski took his pause as a refusal to answer and pushed onto the next question.“You were seen loading a box into your truck on camera as well, where did you get that? It wasn’t in your truck when it was impounded.”“You impounded his truck?” The question was out of his mouth before Liam could even fully think about it. Three sets of eyes spun to look at him and he curled his lips into his mouth wishing he had had the common sense to think before blurting that out. Stilinski nodded, “He was in his truck when my deputies arrested him. We can’t just leave vehicles sitting around, especially in open parking lots like that. So yeah, we impounded it?”Liam spun to face Theo now, “What were you doing in a parking lot at three in the morning?” Theo huffed a little, “I thought he was the one asking questions. What is this, intern police day?”A snarl built in his chest but before Liam went further, Stilinski caught him by the arm, hauling him back. “Let me handle this Liam.” Stilinski hissed into his ear, pushing him backwards not unkindly. Liam allowed himself to be pushed and settled back down crossing his arms over his chest as he did. He refocused his glare onto Theo who caught his eye and arched a mocking eyebrow at him. “Where did you get the box Theo?”He shrugged a little before answering, “I had left it there earlier that morning, I was just picking it up.”
So it had been intentional?
Liam couldn’t stop the furrow of his brow as it formed across his face and something flickered across Stilinski’s expression from beside him. He glanced back to Liam who nodded quickly, wanting Theo to continue on talking.“So you’re saying the box belonged to you?”The muscle of Theo’s jaw tightened just slightly before he grinned. But it wasn’t as smooth of a motion as it would normally look. “Not really. I was just moving it.”“We know the box was either carrying or surrounded by nitrous oxide which is illegal in the state of California. What did you do with the box?”“I took it to Beacon Hills Recycling Center.”His heartbeat remained steady as ever and he glanced between Liam and Stilinski. “What is this really about? You can’t care enough about my recycling habits to arrest me over it.”Stilinski nodded, ceasing his original line of questioning but Liam had a feeling it wasn’t over quite yet. He took a miniscule step closer to the holding cells, nose nearly pressing in between the bars. The movement blocked part of Liam’s view of Theo and his wolf began to whine in his chest as he could no longer see all of the chimera. Liam took a few steps forwards himself until he could see all of Theo again. As he shifted back into view he realized that Theo’s sharp gaze had followed him the whole time. Green eyes dropped down to his shoes and slipped back up to his face but did not look away from him. “At 5:40 AM Saturday morning a child by the name of Everett Cole collapsed and died in the North Parking Lot of the preserve. We have you on camera, moments before his death, watching him struggle and collapse. What do you know about that?”
A jump.
Liam perked up as his ears finally caught an irregularity in Theo’s heartbeat. Externally there was no change in his body language but as his eyes drifted to Liam he seemed to know that Liam had caught on. “I was only there for five minutes before I left. I didn’t see or do anything to him.” His voice was terser now. A river smooth stone bouncing down a dry stream. “Why didn’t you call 911? Everett was a minor, you’ll be charged with accomplice in the death of a minor for walking away like that.”Theo’s lip twitched in a near snarl and he leaned forwards, “You wouldn’t have believed me. The last time the cops were called for a suspected murder you arrested me for hours for something I had nothing to do with. Forgive me for being a little unwilling to drag the cops into this again. I knew the body would be found eventually.”“And look where we are now. You made things worse for yourself by not calling.” Stilinski shrugged, a humorless smile crossing his face, “See if you had just called us, we would have sorted things out eventually. But now, you’re looking at criminal misdemeanor charges for failure to report a crime.”Theo must have heard it as Liam’s heart picked up in his own chest. He looked over, brow furrowing slightly as he glanced back and forth between Liam’s face and his chest. Liam chewed his lower lip into his mouth and prayed that Stilinski wasn’t about to try and go through with the unofficial record now. If he did, it would no doubt scare Theo out of Beacon Hills permanently.“He was already dead when I saw him!” Theo spat. Suddenly looking back at Stilinski, an icy look crossed his face. The comment must have shocked Stilinski as he fell silent, just staring at Theo. Liam took over. Theo’s heart rate hadn’t jumped when he said that, but now it was beating just the slightest bit faster. “What do you mean he was already dead? We have cctv footage of him moving around for a good five minutes after you left.” Liam spoke up. Theo shook his head, chains rattling as he sat back on the bench, “He smelled like death, little wolf. There was nothing that could have saved him at that point. Whatever he took killed his spirit long before it killed his body.”A rush of ice overtook Liam’s body, “What do you mean ‘whatever he took’?” “I don’t know what it was! He took something though, there was this scent coming off his body that wasn’t meant to be there.”Liam took in a slow breath, his mind flashing back to the inside of that green hatchback. The blonde haired girl and the scent of acetone floating out of her blood. Had Theo found the same thing? If so, why hadn’t Corey been able to catch the scent in the preserve? It had been a longer span of time between the blonde girl crashing and Liam catching the scent coming off of her. Then it had with Everett’s death and Corey trying to catch the scent on him. Maybe it really was something in the blood that made it more potent? But Everett hadn’t had any open wounds at the time of his death for the scent to leak out of. “What scent?” He asked, voice slightly shaky as he stared Theo down. The other boy’s eyes had yet to leave his own and Liam saw the slight squint of contemplation that he gave. He had zero practice with his own chemosignals, but even still, he did his best to try and exude an air of trusting towards Theo. “Lilies.” Theo finally said, “It smelled like lilies.”The disappointment must have been palpable on his face because Theo cocked his head at him. Fingers drumming lightly against the metal bench. Liam glanced over towards Stilinski who had fallen silent, following Liam’s line of questioning. He did not look disappointed that the scent that Theo had found didn’t match up with the one Liam found. Stilinski opened his mouth and Liam was struck with a sudden need to prevent that unofficial record from becoming official.“That’s it? Just lilies? Nothing else?” Theo frowned, confused with Liam’s sudden change in energy. “Was there anything weird about the scent? Like did it smell like it was mixed with something?” Theo started to shake his head but paused, considering, “not mixed with something, but it did change at one point.”“To what?”He paused for a moment, eyes flicking back and forth between Liam and Stilinski as if contemplating how to answer. “It started to smell like acetone.” A grin shot across Liam’s face before he could stop it. Whipping around to stare at Stilinski who didn’t look convinced. They made eye contact and Stilinski gave the faintest shake of his head. Liam opened his mouth to fight back when Stilinski grabbed him by the arm and pulled him out of the room. They ducked around a corner out of view of the holding cells. Liam had a feeling that they hadn’t gone far enough to be out of Theo’s range of hearing but he didn’t mention that. “What are you doing Liam?” Stilinski demanded, hands settling on his hips.Liam shrugged, “Theo was there in person when Everett died, he might have seen something that could help us figure out what is going on here.”“And he could also be the cause of what is going on here.”His wolf snapped his teeth in his chest and Liam lifted his chin higher. Stilinski was still taller than him but the defensive move had them looking eye to eye. “I don’t think he is. If he wanted to do something why wait nine months to do it? Why start with random people that we don’t even know if they are supernatural? None of this lines up to Theo. I think he just showed back up at the wrong time.”Stilinski huffed, eyes nearly rolling, “You think this is all a coincidence? What about the box?”The box, he had no idea what that could have been. But if they keep pushing at Theo like this he would be on the constant defensive. They would get nothing out of him. “He’s not going to tell us what it is if we keep trying to interrogate him like this. I think we should let him go over what we know so far and see if there is anything that he can pick up that we’re missing here. He knows about the medical side of supernatural things, hell he probably knows some stuff that Deaton doesn’t know.”“Liam! I am not giving a wanted criminal access to private police records!” Stilinski’s voice picked up in volume and Liam winced, knowing there was no way that Theo hadn’t heard that part. “You need time in order to get that record officialized anyways.” Liam snapped right back. A slight growl had filled his voice and he made no effort to conceal it. Stilinski shrunk back slightly as Liam pressed onwards. “How about this, we let him look over what we have so far and see if there’s anything that we missed. You let me keep an eye on him and if anything happens or things seem suspicious, I will let you know and you can get that record finalized.”Liam was heaving by the time he finished and Stilinski’s annoyance had transformed into a twitchy eyebrow which kept trying to raise itself over his forehead. “Fine. But I’m not waiting for him to do something else. I’m getting that record officialized now, the next toe he steps out of line is going to be the last.” Without waiting for a response Stilinski swerved around Liam and re-entered the holding cells, leaving Liam waiting behind the wall. He slumped back into the wall a little further, trying to exhale a little easier. Liam sniffed, wiping at his nose again before pushing off the wall and re-entering the cells. Theo’s eyes landed on him the moment Liam entered. Instinctually his lips twitched upwards as if he wanted to smile at him. Stilinski heard his entrance and pulled a small white card out of his pocket, wiggling it back and forth between his fingers. Both Liam and Theo’s eyes landed on the card and Liam was struck with a sense of dé-jàvu. The last time Theo had been locked in the holding cell as they waited for the Ghost Riders to descend upon the station. “Let me make something clear to you once again. Just because we are letting you out, doesn’t mean that we trust you.” Stilinski began, Theo’s eyes flicked over to Liam and he had to look away to avoid the intense stare. “Deaton is going to be meeting us at the city morgue so he can look at the body. You will be coming with us as a condition of you being allowed out of custody. Make no mistake here you are still under arrest, we just need you to look over the body and then you’ll be going right back into this cell as soon as you aren’t helpful to us, understand?” Theo exhaled sharply through his nose but nodded all the same. The card reader beeped as Stilinski swiped the card and the red light turned green. With a rattle the bars slid open and Stilinski stepped into the holding cell. Theo sat forwards on the bench, eyes locked on the keys that he pulled out. The handcuffs pressed into his skin further as he stretched his hands as far out towards Stilinski as he could.Liam could feel his heart thudding in his chest as the cuffs finally dropped away and Theo got to his feet. He pulled the sleeves of his hoodie down over the marks on his wrist and followed Sheriff Stilinski out of the holding cell. He caught Liam’s eye as they passed by and Liam caught sight of the slightest gleam beginning to return to his eyes, matching up with his sardonic smirk.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Despite almost five minutes of protests from Liam, Stilinski refused to allow Theo his truck back from the impound lot. So the three of them had ridden over to the hospital morgue in the official sheriff’s vehicle. Stilinski in the front seat with Liam and Theo together in the back. Liam had been offered the front seat but he had declined and sat in the back with Theo. He had never ridden in the back of a police car before and it was an odd experience. The bars over the windows created a dissonance between them. So much so that Liam almost missed Stilinski suggesting that he call Corey as well.
That way if Deaton was able to find something, they wouldn’t need to be playing telephone with the known supernatural creatures in Beacon Hills. Liam could feel Theo’s eyes drilling into the side of his head as he clicked on Corey’s contact. It was almost five in the morning now and while Corey wouldn’t willingly be awake for another few hours, he would wake up at the phone call.
It had become some sort of instinct for the pack over the years. Phone calls after dark where something to be answered without question. The line rang twice before Corey picked up, his voice muddled with sleep on the other end.
“Liam? Everything alright?” He asked.
“Yeah it’s fine
—uhh—” Liam hesitated, unsure of how to fully put the situation into words without freaking out Corey or pissing off Theo.
“—just can you meet me and Sheriff Stilinski over at the hospital’s morgue?”
There was the sound of blankets moving around in the background of the call as Corey sat up.
“Sure, but why now? It’s five in the morning Liam, does this need to be a right now thing?” Liam shot a quick glance at his backseat-passenger-partner and managed to catch Theo’s gaze in the dark of the car. He whipped back around quickly so as to not stare at the chimera.
“Yeah it kinda does. I’ll explain when you get here!” He said quickly before hanging up the call and tucking his phone back into his hoodie pocket. A sudden dryness in this throat had Liam coughing into his elbow for a moment before coming back up. His eyes were beginning to become irritated again and it seemed like no matter what he did, the sensation wouldn’t ease up.
“What’s the matter with your eyes?” Theo spoke up quite suddenly from beside him. Keeping his voice quiet in the back of the car. Liam glanced at him quickly before looking away again.
“Nothing. Don’t worry about it.” Theo’s expression was one of clear disbelief.
“You look like you’ve been crying. Where you crying?”
He couldn’t stop himself from turning back around to stare at Theo incredulously at that.
“No, I wasn’t crying, Theo, thank you very much.” The chimera shrugged a little and turned to look back out the window. For half a second Liam wondered if he should damn it all and tell Theo what was going on with him. He hadn’t lied when he said that Theo knew all about the medical side of the supernatural. If he told Theo, the information wouldn’t find its way back to Scott through one channel or another. Liam’s previous attempts at managing the supernatural's of Beacon Hill’s hadn’t exactly gone stellar. He needed to prove to Scott that he had made the right choice leaving the town in Liam’s hands. And he wouldn’t do that by Scott finding out that Liam had managed to get himself a werewolf-flu.
He glanced at Theo out of the corner of his eye. Theo was staring out the window and with the added darkness around them he could just barely see his reflection in the glass. In the reflected image the exhaustion written across his face was even more painfully evident. The dark shadows under his eyes and cheekbones looked almost like bruises in the backseat of the police cruiser. Liam opened his mouth to draw Theo’s attention but before he could do anything his phone was vibrating in his pocket.
Liam pulled it out, wiping at his runny nose, a message from Corey popped up and Liam clicked on it.
Liam frowned, typing out his response quickly.
He winced a little, tilting the phone further away from Theo in case he decided to try and snoop through the messages. Liam’s fingers hovered over the screen, unsure of how exactly to respond to Corey and explain what happened. But it turned out he didn’t need to. His phone vibrated again as another message came in.
Corey hit the nail directly on the head and the sleep deprivation headache began to pound in his skull again.
“Is that Corey?”
Liam jumped as Theo’s voice came suddenly again from right over his shoulder. He whipped around to stare at the older boy who had leaned over slightly to peer at his messages from the other seat.
“No.”
Theo’s eyebrow raised and the beginnings of a smirk pulled at the corner of his lips.
“Oh really? So you know some other people who are chameleon chimeras and can turn invisible?” He shot back.
“Who said anything about chimeras and turning invisible?” Liam went to set his phone back down when Theo’s hand shot out and grabbed him around the wrist. His palm was cold against the thin skin of Liam’s wrist there.
“Even if I couldn’t smell your chemosignals, I would still be able to tell that you’re lying, little wolf. You suck at lying.” The taunted nickname was softer this time. As if the two of them had been tossing a carefully packed snowball back and forth. Knowing that if they dropped it, the illusion of trust between them would shatter quickly. But now—Theo had walked straight up to him and deposited the snowball directly into his hands. Given to him for safe keeping.
Theo shifted his grip on Liam’s wrist. Moving his hand so it was covering the back of Liam’s hand and turned the phone over revealing Corey’s messages. They both looked down at the last message and Theo gave him a pointed stare.
“No, no, you’ve got this all wrong, see “camo boy” is actually this kid from my math class who I had to do a group project with. He never showed up to class so the running joke was that he was camouflaged in the classroom the whole time.” The twitch in Theo’s mouth grew into a full out grin causing his eyes to glimmer in the passing street lights.
“Well it looks like you’ve figured out how to get him to show up to things now.” Liam couldn’t stop himself from grinning back in return and for a moment neither moved away. But then his phone vibrated again, reminding Liam that he had yet to open Corey’s message. Theo must have caught sight of his expression because he released Liam’s hand like he had burned him. The spot on his wrist just over his pulse where Theo’s finger had pressed into him, the print of his finger pulsating as a steady pressure even once his hand was gone.
Liam retracted his own hand slowly, still holding his phone and clicked on the message again.
Even though Theo was no longer directly staring at him Liam could still feel his watchful eyes scanning over Liam’s fingers as he texted. Corey’s response came in before he could even re-lock his phone.
The car jolted as they rumbled over the entrance to the back of the hospital where the morgue entrance was and Liam could see the lone figure of Deaton waiting for them by the doors. Stilinski pulled into the first open parking spot. Which, with how empty the lot was, turned out to be right next to Deaton’s car.
He pressed send without even checking over the message. Stilinski shut the car off and Liam unlocked his seatbelt, hopping out of the car. Theo’s door slammed shut on the other side and Liam waited for him to come around the car while Stilinski went to Deaton. If he wasn’t lying to himself Liam would also say that he was waiting because he didn’t exactly know how to approach Deaton. The last conversation between them had been regarding Scott’s leaving of Beacon Hills.
His phone vibrated again and Liam glanced down quickly at Corey’s latest message before shoving his phone back into his pocket.
Theo stepped up to his side and Liam felt a rush of calm wash through his body. The air was still cold and Liam pulled his sleeves down over his hands. The breeze was even more of an irritant to his eyes however so Liam took in a wheezing breath and walked quickly over towards Deaton and Stilinski. Perhaps it wouldn’t be that bad.
Deaton looked up as they approached and a kindly smile crossed over his face at the sight of Liam.
“Hello Liam. It’s been a while.” He said, voice soft. It washed over Liam like the sunrise through an open window and he couldn't stop the relieved grin from crossing over his face as well.
It would be alright
. Deaton’s eyes shifted off of Liam and focused on Theo who was hovering right behind his shoulder. For a moment there was a long pause and Liam glanced back at Theo. His expression had smoothed over, leaving his face carefully blank and his heartbeat remaining steady.
“Theo.” Deaton finally said, inclining his head in greeting. The tension broke and Theo nodded back at him, accepting the greeting.
“Liam suggested that Theo should look over the bodies as well, that’s why he’s here.” Stilinski explained with a wave of his hand.
Deaton gave a nod, “I think that’s a fine idea. Are we waiting on anybody else?” Stilinski looked back towards Liam and he nodded.
“Corey is on his way over now.”
It didn’t take long for Corey to arrive either. However rather than just one car pulling into the parking lot, there were two. Liam could see Corey in the driver seat of the first car that he shared with Mason. Mason, who was sitting in the passenger seat, waved at Liam as they pulled into the parking spots opposite of the small assembled group.
“I thought you only called Corey, Liam?” Stilinski asked, confused.
“I did.”
Doors slammed as Corey and Mason climbed out of their car. The second car’s headlights flicked off and Gwen climbed out of the driver’s seat as well.
“What are all three of you doing here? I just called Corey, not the whole cavalry.” Beside him Theo snorted and Liam realized he had just about quoted Theo’s words earlier that morning.
Corey shrugged as they all walked over, “Well Mason didn’t want to miss out on anything. And I didn’t want Gwen to feel left out, so here we all are.”
“More the merrier, right?” Gwen offered as well, stepping up onto the curb to stand beside Liam. Her eyes drifted behind him where Theo was and her face did something complicated that Liam had no such desires to try and figure out. Liam shot a slightly apologetic look back at Stilinski who shook his head before pulling open the doors and motioned everyone inside. Liam glanced over his shoulder at Theo who was hovering behind the group.
They made eye contact and Liam’s hand twitched at his side, desperately wanting to reach out and pull Theo towards him. But before he could raise his hand up Theo was moving on his own. Stepping forwards to follow after Liam into the hospital’s morgue. There was a single mortician sitting at the front desk who led them down into the basement. The air got colder and colder with each step further downwards that they took. Liam could hear someone’s heartbeat pounding faster than normal but with so many people in the enclosed space it was difficult to tell who’s heart it was.
The mortician held the door open for the small group to slip into the heart of the morgue where rows upon rows of silver refrigerated drawers lined the walls. The tile flooring meant that each footstep taken echoed loudly against the walls. Stilinski thanked the mortician and then the door slammed shut behind the group, locking them in the silence of the morgue. In the quiet the pounding of the heart beat was even louder. Echoing off the walls and reverberating down Liam’s ear drums. He turned, looking over his friends for who it could possibly be. However, they all remained calm.
Duel clunks echoed as Stilinski walked up to two drawers and unlocked the doors before pulling them open. The wheels of the drawers banged against the end of their track and Liam finally realized that the heartbeat was coming from right behind him. Loud and frantic. He turned to see Theo hovering against the door of the morgue, his eyes glazed over and locked on the opened drawers. Liam glanced back and forth between the drawers and Theo, confused. Theo had been around plenty of dead bodies before, they all had. It seemed strange that he would freak out about it now.
But even as he listened to the pounding heart of the chimera, Liam knew that his guess was wrong. Memories of the hospital and the Ghost Riders popped into his head.
“Just a bad dream.”
What sort of bad dreams haunted a boy known once as the Chimera of Death?
“Liam?”
He jerked around to face Stilinski who had called his name.
“Yeah?”
Stilinski shook his head, “Just making sure you’re with us,” he motioned Deaton over and motioned to the first body, “this one here we haven’t been able to get an ID on yet but her body showed up first. She had been involved in a car crash about a week and a half ago. And this one here is Everett Cole who we found yesterday morning and were able to ID on scene.”
Deaton nodded and stepped up beside Everett’s body first. He had pulled on a pair of gloves and began to look over the bodies.
“They were both found completely blind at the time of death and when we found their bodies. Which shouldn’t be possible, because she,” Stilinski motioned to the blonde woman, “was driving a car at the time of her death.”
Reaching into his bag, Deaton pulled out a pair of medical forceps and carefully pulled the eyelid of Everett back. Revealing the whited out eye underneath. Both Mason and Gwen made similar visceral noises at the sight, neither having seen Everett’s body that morning before the ME took it.
Liam looked back at Theo and found that his eyes were still fixed on the morgue drawer doors. With everyone else focusing on the bodies Liam slipped away from them to stand at Theo’s side. The closer that he got the louder the heartbeat got.
“What is it?” He hissed quietly to the other boy. Had it not been Theo Raeken, Liam guessed he probably would have startled at him popping up like that. However, given that he
was
Theo Raeken, his heartbeat instead violently settled back into a normal rhythm as if by force. Liam narrowed his eyes at him with a pointed glare and Theo finally looked over to him.
“Nothing.”
“Yeah? Why was your heart going so fast?”
Theo’s lips twitched and Liam could see as he licked the front of his teeth inside his mouth.
“It’s not.”
“Yeah not
now.
But a minute ago it was. So what’s up? What's going on?”
Theo opened his mouth to say something and Liam could almost see the beginnings of the mental blow that he was planning to deliver. But it never came. Theo shut his mouth again and shook his head.
“Don’t worry about it, little wolf.”
His tone made it clear that their conversation was finished but Liam wasn’t quite ready to drop it yet. He reached out, grabbed Theo’s wrist and tugged at him until he began to slowly follow Liam over to the rest of the group. Theo’s skin was cold under his fingers and Liam could see the beginnings of the red marks from the handcuffs poking out at the bottom of his sleeves.
Chimera healing.
Corey had tried to explain it to him once. About how his body would heal differently than the likes of Liam or Scott. But given that Corey didn’t understand much of it himself, he was unsuccessful in getting Liam to understand. For a moment Liam wondered if Theo would be able to explain it better to him.
“You’re right.”
They rejoined the conversation just as Deaton finished his examination of Everett’s body.
“The most common form of blindness is cataracts which involves clouding of the sclera and this is showing no sign of damage to the sclera. It’s more like the eyes just suddenly lost the ability to take in light which is what caused the blindness. I’ve never seen anything like it before, whatever caused it, it was something that happened after the body shut down.”
“Could it be something related to the supernatural?” Liam spoke up, “on the first body I looked at there was this scent mixed into the blood. It smelled a little like acetone and my wolf didn’t like smelling it at all. Theo mentioned catching a similar scent on Everett before he died so there has to be some sort of connection there right?”
Deaton raised his eyebrows at Theo.
“You saw Everett before he died?”
There was a pause before Theo finally nodded, “It wasn’t just the scent of acetone though. That showed up right before I left, the main scent that I was able to catch was lilies.”
“Lilies are known to be poisonous to dogs in some cases so it would be reasonable to assume that they could be poisonous to wolves as well. But as far as we know Everett here isn’t a supernatural creature.” Deaton set the forceps back down and recovered Everett’s face, making his way around the drawers to get to the first body. He pulled the cover back and inhaled sharply, heart immediately ticking up.
“What is it? What's the matter?” Mason demanded stepping forwards to look at the body as well. The woman’s face looked exactly like the pictures that Liam had seen of her at the crash. The blood had been cleaned off of her face but the indentation where the steering wheel had gone through her skull was clear as ever.
“I know this woman.” Deaton whispered, his facing sorrowing out as he replaced the covering of her face.
“You know her? Like you’ve met her before?” Stilinski asked, the wrinkles on his face seeming to deepen miles.
Deaton nodded, turning back to the group.
“Her name was Kara Decker. The last I heard of her she was living up in Half Moon Bay. She was a werewolf, an omega. Her pack had abandoned her after she killed her sister for betraying their pack to hunters. I ran into her up in Washington many years ago on the run from the same group of hunters. She was poisoned and severely injured but I was able to help nurse her back to health and get her out of Washington. We split ways after that but I gave her the address of the clinic and told her to come there if she ever needed anything.” He explained.
Liam looked down at the dead woman on the table and felt something burn in his chest. He couldn’t imagine just abandoning one of his packmates like that. Extenuating circumstances or not, his pack had come to be more than just friends to him, they were family, they were a part of him, an extension of his own limbs and body. To violently and willingly sever one left an odd taste in his mouth.
“The speed cameras don’t show her making any other stops in her drive here and she didn’t lose control of the car until she was already on the off ramp. She wanted to come here. She must have been looking for you then?” Stilinski said, partially aloud, partially to himself. Deaton nodded along, seeming to follow Stilinski’s line of thinking.
“Alright. So if she’s
definitely
a supernatural creature,” Corey began, “what are the chances that Everett is too?”
Stilinski shook his head, “it’s a good guess, but we still only have two bodies, two can be coincidence.”
“So what? You just want to wait around for a third to pop up?” Gwen demanded crossing her arms over her chest.
“No! Of course not! But we can’t just assume something is a pattern based on two separate instances.”
“And how many murders in this town are human related compared to supernatural related?” Mason pointed out and Stilinski threw up his arms.
“What else can you tell us about the bodies?” He said to Deaton instead, changing topic. Deaton took a breath and pulled the cover off of Kara’s face once again. He began the same process as he had with Everett. Liam sniffed a little to clear his runny nose and was struck with the sudden realization that he could once again breathe through his nose. He paused, taking a hesitant sniff in case whatever it was decided to return with a vengeance and leave him as a pile of sneezes on the floor.
Still it remained clear. In the enclosed space of the morgue Liam could catch all of the scents bouncing off of each other once again. He could smell the exhaustion radiating off of Stilinski coupled with the artificial scent of his hair gel. Mason and Corey’s scents were all wrapped up in each other, most likely from having been both in the same bed together, and then the same car. And probably because they were wearing each other’s clothes Liam mused, recognizing Mason’s sweater on Corey.
Gwen smelled like mango face masks and aloe vera hand lotion. She had always been one for the fruity and floral scents, Liam had quickly realized when she began to hang around their group. Honestly she was sometimes the easiest one to find by scent out of them all. Deaton smelled like the antiseptic and latex from the blue gloves still on his hands as he prodded at Kara and Everett’s bodies.
Liam stretched his sense of smell out towards the two bodies, trying to see if he could catch the scent of acetone again. However before he could get further Theo shifted next to him.
“What’s the marking on her neck?”
The whole room spun to face him. Liam included.
“What marking?”
Theo lifted a hand, pointing towards the right side of Kara’s neck, just on the opposite side of her trachea. There was a shuffling as several bodies suddenly got much closer to inspect what Theo had found.
It was a small black marking. Two circular bruising indentations. The first was a dot barely half a centimeter wide, dark black with edges that faded out into a purplish color. The second circle was a ring around the outside of the dot, another purple bruise which was fainter over all. It was as if someone had nailed her with a mini paintball.
“What the hell is that?” Stilinski muttered. Deaton didn’t answer, instead turning back to Everett and pulling back the cloth to check his neck as well. Sure enough; the same marking.
“It might not be a third body—but two sets of matching patterns
has
to mean something.” Gwen pointed out. Stilinski didn’t answer but he did begin to chew on his lower lip.
“What could it be from?” Liam spoke up.
Deaton shook his head, “If it was smaller it could be an injection marking from a needle, but this is way too big for any sort of injection into the jugular.”
“Could it be a symptom of some sort of drug that they both took?”
Deaton shook his head again, “the jugular vein is very fragile in some regards. There aren’t any drugs, human or supernatural, that would ever be injected into the neck if someone was hoping to get high.”
“Alright well, if we know for a fact that Kara was supernatural, and both her and Everett have identical markings and types of death. Wouldn’t it be reasonable to assume he was supernatural too?” Corey reiterated, moving around Mason to get a better look at the marking on Kara.
Stilinski threw up his arms and seemed to lose all concept of what he was about to say.
“What if we got proof?” Everyone turned to look at him as Liam spoke up, “we have an ID for Everett and he goes to Beacon Hills High right? So we could go to his family and see if they knew anything about him being supernatural or maybe he left evidence in his house?”
“You want to go disturb a grieving family and ask them if their son turned into a slightly murderous werewolf once a month?!” Stilinski demanded incredulously and Liam could suddenly see exactly where Stiles got it from.
He gave a half shrug before nodding. It was then that Liam finally noticed that he had never released Theo’s wrist from his grip. He looked down and spotted his hand still wrapped around the chimera’s wrist. Theo looked down as well and his face flattened out before he tugged his wrist out of Liam’s grasp. Almost immediately cold air rushed over his now empty hand and Liam wished he could grab Theo’s hand once more to chase away the uncomfortable feeling now tingling through his palm.
“Everett went to the same school as us, right? We can just go as classmates of his. It’s not like we are going to do anything, just ask them a few questions and see what they know or don’t know.”
Everyone’s eyes swung back to Stilinski and Deaton began to pull off his gloves.
“I have to say Sheriff, it’s not a bad idea. If Liam goes and checks this out it could confirm how related this all is to the supernatural.” he offered, tossing the gloves into a nearby trash can.
Stilinski sighed, scrubbing at his eyes with the palms of his hands, “Fine. But I don’t want you going alone. Take Theo with you.” The sharp look Stilinski gave Liam made the second order there clear as well.
Keep an eye on him.
Liam nodded and glanced back at Theo who held his gaze. Behind him, Mason, Corey and Gwen were all sharing a concerned look but it slowly faded as Liam gave them a nod as well.
“It’s much too early for you to go ask them now, and I need to find his family's address first. Give it a few hours and then I’ll send you the address, alright?”
“Sounds good. I’ll update you all with what we find.” Liam said, the last part more directed to his friends who nodded.
“Any chance I can get my truck back now?” Theo spoke up, hand half raised.
Stilinski opened his mouth, presumably to say no, when Liam jumped in.
“I don’t have a car either, so we probably
will
need his truck.”
“I thought you had your mom’s car? You were driving around all yesterday with Corey and Mason.” Liam winced at his flimsy lie.
“I got—grounded?”
Stilinski’s sigh was the loudest echo in the morgue as he turned around and motioned for them to follow him out the door.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
The lock popped under Liam’s hand as Theo unlocked the doors to his truck. Liam pulled open the passenger side door and swung himself into the seat. A backpack wrapped with a blanket had been shoved down on the driver side door, left from when the deputies had arrested Theo earlier that morning. It nearly fell out as Theo pulled the door open. He caught it and quickly tossed it into the backseat before climbing into the driver's seat. He started up his truck and the blare of headlights cut quickly across the impound lot. Stilinski, who was standing off to the side of the gate with his arms crossed over his chest, raised a hand to block out the bright lights. The frown on his face was clear even without the headlights illuminating it. Theo threw the truck into reverse and began carefully backing out of the spot that the tow truck had dropped his truck off in. Stilinski had made it very loudly clear that if Theo scratched up any of the other cars in the impound lot, that he would be paying for it out of pocket. Liam watched with moderately concealed impress as Theo expertly navigated his truck out of the spot and towards the gate. Stilinski hit a button on the control panel and the gate rumbled itself open. They made eye contact as Theo drove past Stilinski. Liam shot him an awkward smile from the passenger seat and Stilinski gave him a pointed nod towards Theo. He ignored it in favor of glancing over towards Theo who was focused on driving. The gate rumbled shut behind them and the truck fell silent. They made it barely a minute down the road before Theo noticed Liam’s eyes on him. “What?” He snapped. “Huh? What?” Liam jolted out of his thoughts, trying to figure out if Theo had been asking him something important. The chimera threw his hands up, releasing the steering wheel for a moment. “I don’t know Liam! What are you staring at me for?” Honestly a fair question. Liam didn't even realize he was still doing it. He had been watching the older boy for some sign of a change. Some neon red flashing sign above Theo’s head that explained whether he was the same person as before those past nine months or not.
‘WARNING; Chimera missing a heart!’
‘WARNING; Chimera doesn’t care about you!’
‘WARNING; Chimera isn’t human!’
Warning, Cupid’s gone into retirement and Eris holds the bow. All those beware.
“Liam.” The growl cut though his focus and the sensations inside the cab faded back in. Theo’s hands were tight around the steering wheel and Liam realized that he was still staring at Theo. “Ahh, sorry.” He turned forwards, facing out the window and watching as the street lights began to turn off with the rising sun. A question lingering in the front of his mind began to press a little more incessantly on his tongue. Liam bit down on the muscle, trying to trap the rabid thought before it went flying out of his mouth.“Where’d you learn to drive?”
Too late.
“What?” Liam risked it and glanced over to Theo once again. The shadows under his eyes looked worse in the poor lighting of his truck. “Like did you go to a drivers ed class? Or did someone teach you? Or like—” Liam trailed off as he realized he couldn’t think of any other examples, “I learned in drivers ed. Or at least I tried to; the first instructor I had wasn’t very patient and he ended up yelling at me in the middle of an intersection.”Theo snorted and the corners of his lips twitched upwards, “What did you do to him?”“Nothing! He just started yelling at me for not following directions properly!”“No, I meant after the fact, like what did you do back to him?”“Oh!” Liam flushed a little at the memory, “I didn’t get a chance to do much. My mom called the head office and got him fired. I was too embarrassed to go back to that place so we ended up having to drive a few towns over so I could get my official license.”That got a laugh out of Theo. Like an actual honest to god laugh. It was soft and barely more than a breath or two but it was a laugh nevertheless. Liam looked over a grin stretching across his face to match Theo’s. “Your turn! Where’d you learn to drive?”Theo huffed and turned down onto the street for Liam’s neighborhood. “I taught myself.”“Aww come on, that’s no fun!” Liam protested almost immediately, “How’d you actually learn to drive?”“That is how I actually learned to drive,” Theo said, lifting a hand to make mocking air quotes around the word ‘actually’. He executed a perfect one handed turn into Liam’s driveway and shut the headlights off as they came to a stop. “See! Like that! I know maybe one other person who can do one handed turns like that. You’ve got a truck, and yet you can drive it like a smart car! That's not something you just figure out, ” Liam did the mocking air quotes right back and Theo rolled his eyes. “It was just practice. Sometimes when the doctors would take people they would be driving and they would need someone to dispose of the car. It’s easier to wipe down a car for prints if you’re only using one hand to drive in the first place.”It took a moment for Liam to realize just where the conversation had taken a dive off to. “Oh.” He hesitated, unsure of how to respond to that sort of thing. Theo seemed to think he had said too much and shut his mouth, quickly looking away. Liam wanted him to keep going but he also didn’t want to scare Theo off by pushing too far too fast. They both sat in silence for a moment and Liam could faintly hear Theo’s heartbeat. It was going steady but the tension simmering in the air was palpable and Liam had a feeling Theo was forcing his heartbeat to remain as it was. He sniffed and wiped at his nose again. Ever since they came out of the filtered air of the morgue the stuffiness had returned to his nose and Liam could feel the irritation beginning to bubble in the corners of his eyes. His phone vibrated in his back pocket causing Liam to startle violently and nearly clock his head on the cab roof. Theo looked over as well, eyeing Liam’s phone like it might try to bite him as Liam pulled it out. “Stilinski?” He guessed, voice soft in the silence. Liam shook his head clicking on the notification. It was the school's instagram posting about the upcoming school spirit week which would be starting tomorrow on Monday.“It’s the school. Graduation is coming up so they’re doing a whole spirit week for the end of the school year.” He turned the screen towards Theo so he could see the post as well. “Animal day?” Theo mocked, reading over the list, “What genius came up with that idea?” “I know right! I said the exact same thing! Somehow Mrs. Martin thinks that by declaring the school a ‘safe space’ that it means that everyone will just forget about the supernatural between the hours of 7:30 and 2:30.”Theo hummed and Liam slipped his phone back into his pocket. The tension seemed to have loosened up a little bit, which Liam was grateful for. However one look at the front door of his house had him blurting out another question. “Do you want to come in?” Theo’s eyebrows both shot up at that. “In?”“Yeah, like in the house? No point in you going home and wasting gas to come back and pick me up in an hour or two.” He offered pointing with his chin at the gas indicator on the truck which was near empty. Theo’s jaw tensed up again and Liam could see the vein along his cheek tighten slightly. “Liam I just spent my night getting arrested, why wouldn’t I want to go back to my own house?” His voice twisted weirdly on the word house and Liam just about slapped himself. Theo’s fake parents had probably ditched town the moment they could, leaving Theo with a house all to himself. Lucky him. Liam loved his parents but he couldn’t deny he wished he could have his own space some days, especially now as a near adult. No doubt Theo would prefer his own house all to himself than being bothered by Liam for two hours. “I didn’t say you had to come in.” He muttered, unlatching the door and pushing it open. His feet landed solidly against the pavement and he twisted to glare faintly at Theo in the driver's seat. “So is that a no then?” Liam asked, hands tight around the door, the wires of the locking mechanism digging into his hand. Theo’s hand hovered over his gear shift for a second before he looked away blinking suddenly. He squinted at the gas indicator and threw the truck into park. “Fine. I’ll come in. But I’m not about to sit and have a little conversation with your parents, alright? I’m just trying to not waste gas driving you around all day. ”“Why would you even think that would happen?” Liam laughed, slamming the door shut. Theo flipped him off through the window, stuffing something into the backseat before turning off the truck and jumping out. Liam returned the gesture and waited up by the hood for Theo to join him. “It’s five in the morning on a Sunday. Both of my parents are fast asleep. I guarantee it.” Liam dug his keys out of his back pocket and shoved them quietly into the door. He could feel Theo hovering right behind him as he unlocked the latch and pushed the door open. “Liam? Is that you?”
Fuck.
His heart dropped straight into his shoes as the door swung all the way open to reveal his mother sitting at the kitchen table. The lights around her were all off which was why the house was dark but the light from her phone illuminated her face. She reached behind her and flicked on the overhead light sending Liam wincing as the whole foyer lit up in yellow light. The door was still open behind him but Liam could feel Theo still hovering at his back. He hadn’t ditched yet. “Guarantee no parents huh?” Theo whispered behind him, his words ghosting over the back of Liam’s neck. He snapped his teeth quietly at Theo and forced himself to take another step into the house. “Hey mom,” he started off, “what are you doing up?” She sighed, voice rattling in her lungs and gestured at the table before her where a half used box of tissues sat and a trash can on the floor below her, filled with the used tissues of the other half of the box. The waterline of her eyes was red and irritated and Liam felt his own eyes burn in sympathy. An image of the box of stolen tissues hidden on his nightstand upstairs flashed in his mind and Liam shoved down the tendril of fear that wove its way through him. She had been sneezing and coughing just the same as Liam had over the past few days. She couldn’t be sick though. If she was sick and their symptoms were identical, that meant Liam was sick too. And werewolves weren't meant to be able to get sick.“Couldn’t sleep.” She said finally, setting her phone face down on the table, “What are you doing up at five in the morning? And who’s your friend?” Her bouncing inquisitive eyebrow made it clear exactly what she thought Liam was doing up at five in the morning. “Ah! No, no, uh, werewolf stuff!” He choked out. Trying to forget the fact that his mother had just assumed he and Theo were sleeping together. “Oh.” Her expression sank a little, her eyes shifted to Theo behind him, “I take it you’re a werewolf as well then?”Liam just about face palmed, whipping around in case he needed to damage control Theo’s reaction. However the chimera’s expression rippled only once and shifted into a bright smile that Liam had only ever seen on pre-hell Theo. “Give or take a few missing pieces, yeah pretty much.” Theo said in response to Liam’s mom who nodded with an infectious smile. “Uh mom, this is Theo.” He introduced cautiously as he began to toe off his shoes in the entryway rack and Theo shut the door behind him. “Nice to meet you Theo, I’m Jenna.” She said, grabbing another tissue and wiping at her nose again, “I would come over to greet you properly but well—” she motioned to the tissues and Theo nodded, the picture of perfect understanding. He followed Liam’s suit and slipped off his own shoes before maneuvering to be in front of him. Liam watched as he placed them next to Liam’s pair on the rack. The once white converse had become a dull brown with streaks of dirt and a red substance that could have been blood? Being right next to Liam’s they somehow made his own shoes look clean. Shoes which had been dragged through the lacrosse pit far too many times to count. “Oh it’s no trouble Mrs. Jenna, it’s lovely to meet you either way.” Hidden behind Theo’s shoulders Liam began to make faces at the wall, trying to parse through the weirdness of the interaction happening in his own living room. “Aww you’re too sweet.” She cooed and Liam had had enough. He grabbed Theo by the sleeve and began shoving him up the stairs towards his bedroom. Liam had barely gotten one foot on the step when his mother called his name back down.“Yeah mom?” She shot him a ludic grin and nodded, “I like this one.” Her whisper was a poor attempt at being quiet. And based on Theo’s startled chuckle from two steps above Liam had a feeling she wasn’t trying to be quiet in the first place. “Thanks mom.” He muttered flatly. She winked at him and Liam vanished up the stairs, face burning as he hauled Theo up after himself. He made a solid attempt at opening and closing his door quietly as his step dad was undoubtedly still sleeping. The lock popped quietly into place behind them and Liam sighed, his head thunking against the doorframe “Is she sick?” Theo spoke up causing Liam to raise his head off the doorframe. “Is who sick?”“Your mom? She smells sick.” He was across the room before he even knew what happened, hands fisted in the collar of Theo’s hoodie, face inches away from the chimera’s. “No.” He hissed, “she is not sick.”Theo arched an eyebrow, clearly unimpressed by Liam’s inability to keep his hands to himself. “Right. So she’s just like that twenty-four-seven?” Liam shoved Theo lightly backwards, releasing him as he did. Theo didn’t even stumble, just shifted to lean up against the wall as Liam plopped himself onto the bed. “No but—she’s fine. She’s not sick.” He thought for a moment Theo was going to continue to push it but he just shrugged and scrubbed his eyes. “Do you want to sit down?” Liam offered, jerking his head towards the open space on the bed beside him. Theo narrowed his eyes, glancing back and forth between Liam and the bed space. Then he pushed off the wall and slowly made his way over, keeping his eyes locked on Liam; as if he was about to leap out at him and yell psych, claws extended. The mattress shifted with the added weight of Theo settling down on top of his comforter and Liam gave a small grin. It didn’t look like Theo had yet to fully relax but Liam wasn’t surprised. Theo never seemed to relax. A constant coil running through his shoulders, prepared to move or run at any sight of danger. Liam pulled out his phone and tossed it onto the bed spread between them. Stilinski had promised to send over the address as soon as he was able to find it and it was a more reasonable hour. Now it was only a waiting game. Theo’s eyes slid around the room, visually investigating all of Liam’s belongings. The posters on his walls. The books on his desk. The dirty clothes, just barely fitting into his laundry bin. The lacrosse gear in the corner. The glow in the dark stars above his bed. For some reason those made Theo smile. Something small and secretive that lingered in the corners of his face. “My step dad gave them to me when I was eight.” Liam spoke up, somehow compelled to tell the story, “My mom and I had just moved out of my bio dad’s house and we had to leave all of our stuff behind. I had only met my step dad once or twice before at this point and I had no idea what to expect. All I knew was that we were going to stay with him for a little while. And we show up to his house and he greets me with glow in the dark stars and a little stuffed dog toy. I ended up naming him Cerberus.” Liam reached over to the top of his head board and snagged the small worn stuffed dog from his resting place. The fur on its body had once been pure white and fluffy, but with time and Liam constantly playing with him it had come out in patches and turned slightly gray. He fiddled with the arms of the small toy, eyes lingering on the loose pieces of fuzz. Beside him Theo said nothing and Liam looked up to see that Theo’s eyes were still focused on the small stars on the ceiling. He must have felt Liam’s eyes on him because he cleared his throat but didn’t take his eyes off the ceiling. “I had some too.” Theo looked back down finally and met Liam’s gaze, “Stars.” He clarified in case Liam had somehow missed what he was talking about. “What happened to them?” Stuipd. Stupid. Liam. The Dread Doctors happened. Liam cursed himself out internally, waiting for Theo’s expression to close off and for him to shut down again. But he didn’t. Theo merely turned his eyes back to the small stars on the ceiling and shrugged. “I don’t know. We sold the house before we left Beacon Hills and some developers tore it down two years later.”Liam frowned looking back down at Cerberus in his hands. He couldn’t imagine it. Being stolen away in the night by mad pseudo-scientists to become a living breathing test tube of human experimentation. Only to return to your home a decade later and find out it was decimated for new growth. He set Cerberus back down on the headboard and climbed carefully to his feet atop the bedspread. Theo quickly caught the movement and shifted away, his expression clearing up and focus shifting to Liam. His feet wiggled in the unsturdy mattress and Theo’s hand wrapped itself around Liam’s ankle, steadying him. “Thanks.” He muttered, stretching up onto his tippy toes and pulling down one of the small stars from above the bed. The plasti-tac on the back came down with it and Liam smoothed it down over the back of the star. He dropped into the mattress beside Theo and held the small star out towards him. Theo’s brow furrowed in confusion as he looked back and forth between Liam’s face and the small star. Liam rolled his eyes a little and reached out, grabbing Theo’s hand and placing the small star into his open palm. “For you, to put on your ceiling now.” Theo blinked once and closed his hand tightly around the small star, his heart beat jumping only once in his chest before he tucked it into the pocket of his hoodie. “Thanks.” The word was barely more than a whisper but it echoed loud in Liam’s ears as if Theo had whispered it directly to him. Liam nodded, smiling slightly leaning back on the pillows behind him. Theo flexed his hand and Liam could see the imprint of the five points of the star in his palm. In the end it took barely a single comment to convince Theo to play a video game with him while they waited. He had seen Theo play only once before when he and Stiles had stalked him and wanted to see if Theo was really that good, or just beginner's luck. However, after losing five rounds to the chimera Liam was incredibly grateful to receive a text from Stilinski with an address included.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
The Cole house was a tiny thing. A single floored brick house rising out of an overgrown lawn. Theo parked across the street as they pulled up to the house. Liam squinted at the building numbers, making sure it was the right house before he locked his phone again. The porch light was on but the house was still dark. Soft morning sunlight gleamed off the car in the driveway and the weeds in the front lawn sagged heavy, bobbing in the air.
“Alright, this is it.” Liam said slowly, hands hovering over his seatbelt. Theo nodded and turned off his truck. The engine cut out and silence hovered around them. He glanced back at Liam and eyed up and down him for a beat.
“What?”
Theo shook his head, “Nothing. Come on,” he popped the door open and hopped out onto the pavement. Liam rolled his eyes and jumped down on the other side of the truck. The lights flashed once as Theo locked the doors and Liam made his way to stand at Theo’s side.
“You got a plan for this?” He asked, glancing at Liam with a raised eyebrow.
He did not have a plan for this.
“I’ll figure it out as I go.” He mumbled, moving towards the house so he didn’t have to watch Theo’s expression. The chimera muttered something too soft for Liam to hear but he didn’t bother to stop him. The weeds brushed over his clothes as Liam passed by the car in the driveway and made his way up cracked stone steps to the front porch of the house.
A large tree grew out of the far side of the yard. Bright green leaves jabbing out and creating triangular patterns.
A layer of ivy coated the trunk of the tree despite thick layers of spiny bark covering it. Its leaves wiggled at Liam as if saying hello and he was caught off guard by a sudden sneeze ripping itself out of his chest.
“Oh yeah, just be as loud as you want.” Theo muttered from behind him, snark layering over his words. Liam rolled his eyes and wiped at his nose, stepping onto the porch.
The doorbell was cracked and looked smashed in so Liam knocked on the red door. It echoed loudly as if the house was hollow. Behind him Theo shifted into place just over his shoulder, eyes running up and down the street, over the house windows, and the tall grasses behind them.
The door opened.
Liam turned, a greeting on his lips but paused at the sight of a small blonde haired girl looking up at them. She must have been Missy Cole. The younger sister. She couldn’t have been any older than eight or nine. His eyes began to burn with irritation again and he scrubbed at them impatiently, not wanting to have to deal with this again.
“Uhh
—hi?” He stuttered out. The small semblance of a plan that he had made, disappearing almost instantly at the lack of an adult figure to interact with.
“Hello,” Missy said, her voice loud and squeaky with youth.
“Do you live here?”
Theo snorted behind him and Liam flailed a hand backwards, aiming to hit the traitorous chimera. He missed as Theo expertly swerved out of his range of hitting. This was his first time doing something like this, sue him. His vision was beginning to blur over, making it look instead like there were three girls standing in open doorways.
Missy chewed at the edges of her hair, face furrowing at him in concentration as if she was trying to piece together the pieces of an impossible puzzle. His smile grew awkward as he tried to look more approachable. There was a sudden creak of wood behind Missy and she twisted around as a shadow appeared, coming down the stairs towards them.
Another blonde woman who looked to be an older version of the small girl before them appeared. She quickly scooped Missy up, glaring down the strangers on her doorstep. Her bright eyes were rimmed with red and the veins in her face were prominent against pale skin.
“Who are you? What do you want?” She demanded, hand curling into her daughter's hair.
“Hi—uhh—Mrs. Cole. My name’s Liam,” Selina Cole nodded with an exaggerated question dancing across her face.
Liam swallowed, his throat suddenly dry, and tried to clear it out with a cough, “We heard about what happened to Everett.”
The shimmering waterline under her eyes suddenly worsened and Selina turned her face into her daughter's hair, subtly wiping at her eyes.
With each inhale that he took it became more and more difficult to breathe and Liam wiped at his nose again, sniffing to try and hold back his runny nose.
“What do you want then?” She demanded.
Liam opened his mouth to respond when another round of sneezes cut him off. He turned away ducking into his elbow as the sudden sneeze attack rendered him unable to speak. He barely heard it as Theo stepped up behind him.
“We went to school with Everett, at Beacon Hills High.” Theo explained, voice drifting softly in and out of Liam’s ears as the wheezing and pressure in his chest began to build up again.
He missed Selina’s response as another wave of sneezes overtook him. A hand landed on his shoulder.
Theo.
Part of his collar had slipped to the side when he began sneezing so Theo’s hand landed half on Liam’s shirt and half on the skin of his neck. His hand was cold. Liam had noticed it before a few times. When Theo grabbed him at the gas station. When he had clung to Theo’s wrist in the morgue. But now, with the weight of his hand pressing down on part of his neck the chill of his skin was impossible to ignore.
There was a familiar tug that echoed through his veins similar to whenever Scott would take his pain. It was enough of a full body sensation that Liam snapped out of the sneezing fit. Her remained bent over for a moment, catching his breath and waiting for his vision to clear up before he slowly straightened back up. Theo’s hand didn’t leave his shoulder until Liam glanced back at it. Despite Theo’s sleeves covering most of his arms Liam still couldn’t see any evidence of black lines trailing up his arm.
Perhaps he had imagined it? But it had felt just like Theo had tried to take his pain and discomfort. He could still remember watching those black lines trail up Theo’s arm in the hospital as he took away Gabe’s pain nine months ago. Had that been a one time thing? Theo seemed to notice Liam’s heavy stare sitting on his hand and retracted it back into his own space. Liam missed the sensation almost immediately. The spot where his hand had rested was immediately colder in the exposed air and Liam tugged his shirt to cover the spot and warm it back up.
“You both knew Everett?” Selina asked, looking back and forth between Theo and Liam. He could still feel the stuffiness closing off his nose but nodded regardless.
Selina chewed at her inner lip for a moment before sighing quietly and pushing the door further open. She crouched down to set Missy on her feet as the two of them entered the house. Selina reached over and flicked on a hallway light, lighting up the entryway as she did.
A short hallway led into a living room on one side and a home office on the other. Two other people sat in the living room, both having been concealed by the darkness of the house originally. Liam blinked at them, trying to conceal his surprise. One of them was a man about Selina’s age with dark hair and another boy, younger than Missy with matching blonde hair. Andrew and Solomon Cole.
Freed from the arms of her mother Missy ran immediately towards her dad and brother, leaping up to sit beside them on the couch. Theo toed off his shoes in the entryway and Liam followed suit. Their shoes joined the large pile just to the right of the front door. There was a pair of black boots in the middle of the pile. Too big for Missy or Soloman and too small for Selina or Andrew. They must have been Everett’s.
It was then that Liam began to regret not going into this with a better plan. He knew literally nothing about Everett Cole. Hell, he hadn’t even known the boy went to the same school as him until he had been standing over his dead body. Selina ghosted past them towards her family and Theo nudged Liam in the arm before he could follow after.
Liam twisted to look at him and Theo nodded towards the back of the front door. The usual lock that came with the door was locked in place, but right above it, there were two different deadbolts which looked to have been added after the fact. Both dead bolts had also been locked into place. They shared a look and, Liam’s heart sinking into his stomach, followed Selina into the living room.
The Cole family had assembled themselves on the couch facing the window leaving a singular two person couch for Liam and Theo to sit with their backs to the window. Missy and Solomon were sitting in between their parents playing back and forth with a plastic wolf toy.
Andrew’s face was just about gray with blankness. His eyes were dull and the hollow of his cheekbones was coated with unshaved peachfuzz. Liam swallowed and took a seat next to Theo on the couch. It was odd, even with the siblings playing with their toy, the house was silent. He wheezed out a soft cough and it echoed about the room seeming to soften with each bounce against the walls. Theo’s eyes followed the sound before he leaned back on the couch, his arm coming to rest behind Liam’s head.
“So, why did you come here?” Andrew spoke up in the silence. The gray of his face left the inside of his mouth looking unnaturally shiny and red
“Well we went to school with Everett—” Liam began.
“You said that already.” Selina cut him off, eyes locked onto the carpet between them. He nodded, mouth hovering between open and closed. Theo had already covered the basis of their information while Liam had his sneezing fit outside. That meant he was left to his own devices to direct the conversation where he needed it to go.
“Yes. I was just saying we went to school with Everett so we knew of him pretty well. But we wanted to extend our condolences for your loss.” He explained, the words spilled out of his mouth faster and faster as his confidence grew.
Neither Andrew or Selina made any move that they had heard or understood. Liam opened his mouth to keep going when Selina cut him off.
“You’re on the lacrosse team aren’t you? Dunbar right? Liam Dunbar?”
His eyebrows shot up in surprise, “yeah, that’s me. I’m the co-captain of the team.”
She nodded slowly, “Everett was bullied by some of the lacrosse team for being involved in the musical production. They thought it wasn’t good enough to warrant leaving him in peace.”
Liam couldn’t stop the wince from passing over his face at the new information.
God, he really wished he would have made an actual plan for this rather than just charging in.
While he wasn’t best friends with the entire team he did know that some of them could be real jackasses. Looking back on it, it should have been something he dealt more directly with as captain. He looked briefly towards Theo who’s expression had morphed into one of manufactured half concealed pity.
“We didn’t know about that—” Liam started.
“Yes. You clearly didn’t know much of anything about our son. Did you even know he existed in that school?” Selina snapped.
“Yeah of course we did!” Liam protested with a lie. His nose was beginning to run again and he wiped at it quickly, trying to distract himself from the burning humiliation across his face.
“No I don’t think you did—!”
“Can I use your bathroom?”
Both Liam and Selina started a little as Theo spoke up suddenly, leaning forwards, a smile lacing his face. Selina blinked to herself a moment before nodding and motioning back to the entryway door.
“Yes, go ahead, it’s down the hall. First door after the office.” Theo nodded his thanks and got to his feet, rotating to face Liam as he did, turning his back to the Cole’s. For a moment they made eye contact, and the ‘nice student’ persona that he had been wearing disappeared. His eyes gleamed as he mouthed the words
‘be more honest with them’
at Liam. Then he turned and vanished out of the room, disappearing around a massive potted plant at the edge of the hall.
Liam turned back to the Cole’s, an uncomfortable smile tugging at the corners of his willpower.
“I—uhh—I’m sorry about this,” He struggled out, trying to figure out what Theo meant by his comment, “I’ve never really done this before.”
“We can tell.” Andrew snapped, his hand tightening around his wife’s shoulders. She laid a hand atop his as some form of comfort.
“Look—I didn’t know Everett. I certainly didn’t know about the team bullying him, that’s unacceptable for them to do and I will be handling that. But I guess his death just struck a chord in me and I felt like I should offer my condolences for your loss.”
He was repeating himself, he knew, but he didn’t know what else to do. With Theo gone, it left him alone in the room with a grieving family. Selina looked away, eyes shimmering brighter, her arm’s beginning to move to wrap around her stomach. It was then that Liam was struck with a sudden memory. A memory of holding Hayden’s cold body in his own hands. Her dark eyes closed and skin lifeless and dull. Silvery trails of liquid spilling out of her lips and eyes.
‘Be more honest with them.’
“My girlfriend died last year.” Liam said suddenly before he could stop himself. Theo had told him to be honest, and this was the closest Liam was willing to get with this family.
“Medical complications after a failed kidney transplant. It was an attempted cure for glomerulonephritis and it worked for a little while. But eventually the medication failed and nobody was able to save her.” Liam looked down at his hands. Sometimes on the bad days he could still see Scott’s blood coating his hands. His own failure to save Hayden or be there for her in the end, layering onto his list of failures.
He exhaled slowly though his mouth and clenched his hands into fists, returning his attention to the Cole family. Selina’s eyes had returned to him and duel shiny trails ran down her face.
“I guess I just knew what it felt like to lose someone and wanted to say something so you knew that at least one other person understood.”
There was a longer pause and Liam broke eye contact with the Cole’s glancing over to the entryway where Theo had vanished into. However, rather than seeing an empty hallway or seeing Theo walking out of the bathroom doors, he instead spotted Theo leaning up against the far wall of the hallway. Arms crossed over his chest and leaned against the wallpapered wall. Liam’s expression started to slip into one of visible confusion when Theo shook his head at Liam suddenly.
“I understand that you wanted to do something nice here,” Andrew began, “but just because you had a situation where you lost someone, doesn’t mean you get to come into our den and talk to us about condolences for someone you don’t even know.”
Liam’s ears just about perked up out of his head as the word ‘den’ slipped out of Andrew’s mouth. Could that be the proof they were looking for? He had never once known a human to refer to their home as their ‘den’. Liam glanced quickly to Theo who shook his head again and motioned Liam to keep going.
“Why don’t you tell me about Everett then?” He suggested, “you’re right, I knew nothing about Everett, but maybe you could change that?” Selina and Andrew shared a look back and forth before Selina broke.
“He was brilliant.” She whispered, “We lived in Boston until about three years ago and Everett loved going to all the different theaters there. He loved the theater so much and got involved with our local theater from the moment he could walk and talk well enough to perform. When we moved here he was pretty crushed at how small the theater program was. Hell, we just about moved back to Boston so he could keep at the theater, but something kept us here.”
Liam felt a pang in his chest at that, the Nemeton. It had dragged so many unwilling supernatural creatures into Beacon Hills only for them to be slaughtered and killed in various gruesome ways. Everett now being as well claimed as one of those victims. Liam had never been to one of the school musicals. Usually being too busy with lacrosse or supernatural threats to find time. But now he regretted that slightly. Perhaps if he had he could have actually met Everett before his death.
“Keep them talking,” Theo’s voice whispered across the room to him, catching Liam slightly off guard. He flinched a little before sorting himself out and pushing onwards.
“Was there anything unique about Everett?”
“Unique?”
Selina had slipped out of the happy trance that she had fallen into while talking about her son. Her brow wrinkled and her hands tightened around her body. Liam cursed himself internally for the odd phrasing.
“Or special maybe?” He tried uncertaintly but Selina’s face only furrowed further.
“Special?”
“Yeah, like an ability that he had that not very many people knew about?”
“What are you trying to insinuate?”
Liam could hear Theo’s sigh of disappointment all the way across the room and tried to drag the conversation back into the direction he wanted it to be.
“Nothing! I just was curious about who Everett was. You know as a person, or maybe something more?”
The ringing silence leached out though the room as Liam finally stopped talking. Selina’s expression had closed off completely and Andrew was sitting up fully, his wife tucked into his side and one hand pulling his children closer. There was a clank as the plastic wolf door tumbled out of Missy’s hands and knocked against the coffee table between them. Through the exhaustion in Andrew’s eyes Liam could see a specific brand of red hot rage flashing there.
On the other side of the room, Liam heard the faint growl as Theo pushed off the wall and stepped into the room. His arms carefully tucked in at his sides and his eyes locked on the Cole family. It felt like standing in the middle of two predators about to fight. Two wild animals, snarling and baring their teeth at each other in a show of aggression. He got to his feet unsteadily, shifting towards Theo in case something went wrong and they needed to run.
“Have you ever been hunting Liam?” Andrew asked and his heart dropped straight through the floor. He hadn’t even considered the possibility that the Cole’s weren’t supernatural but were in fact a family of hunters.
But that didn’t make any sense. What hunters referred to their home as a den? And what hunters responded to the call of the Nemeton? But at the same time, what supernatural creatures had three locks on their front door? And talked about hunting?
His mind flashed to the large tree outside in their yard. It matched nearly identically to the tree that he had spotted in the preserve with the camera drilled into it. The same tree that had sent Liam coughing and sneezing all over. Maybe it was a form of warding against supernatural creatures. That would make sense why it hadn’t been affecting Corey or Theo at all. Both of them being chimeras meant that the things that harmed normal werewolves would have zero effect on them.
What supernatural creatures willingly lived by a tree that
harmed
supernatural creatures? Unless they weren’t actually supernatural creatures but in fact hunters. Liam took a further step back away from the Cole’s, shifting his hands to his side in case things went badly and he needed to pull out the claws.
“What about you Theo? Have you ever been hunting?” Andrew shifted his attention to Theo as he got to his feet. Both Solomon and Missy seemed to understand that something was wrong and they rushed to hide under their mother’s arms.
“Depends what kind of hunting you’re talking about.” The chimera responded with a smooth shrug. Andrew nodded slowly as if he had been expecting that answer. His hands dropped to his side as well and Liam began trying to eye out if he had hidden a gun somewhere on his person. Theo caught Liam around the wrist and gave a gentle tug, pulling him slightly behind the chimera’s body.
“I think it’s time that the two of you leave.” Selina spoke up from the couch, her arms clenched around her children, voice sharp and ringing.
Liam nodded quickly, “yeah, we’ve clearly overstayed our welcome.” Even if Selina’s words were nothing more than a ploy to get them out of the hunters house Liam was willing to take them. He took a careful step backwards, not taking his eyes off of Andrew as he did. They slowly walked backwards into the hallway. Liam nearly fell over as he tugged on his shoes quickly.
Theo remained standing and just grabbed his shoes to carry out of the house. Andrew threw the locks back on the dead bolts and pulled the door open, using his body to block their view of the rest of his family. Liam scurried out the door, Theo right behind him and before he could even try to apologize for bothering them, the door was slamming shut, deadbolts slamming back into place on the opposite side.
“Well,” Theo began, “I think that went really well.” He dropped his shoes down on the stone porch and began tugging them onto his feet. Brushing off pine needles from his socks as he did. Liam dropped his head into his hands, trying not to scream in frustration. He had been so convinced that Everett had been supernatural. If these new deaths concerned both human and supernatural bodies, it meant one of two things.
One; someone was going after
both
human and supernatural creatures in Beacon Hills with intention. Which was a scary thought on its own. Or two; someone had managed to kill both humans and supernatural's by coincidence, which meant they could be working with flat out ignorance coupled with the power to kill.
“I was so sure they were supernatural.” He muttered to himself, slightly muffled by his own hands.
“They are.” Theo said as he passed behind Liam, shoes tied tightly, and hurried down the stone steps, “Come on, Andrew’s still listening on the other side of the door.”
His head jerked up at the casual tone.
What?
Theo reached the driveway and motioned quickly for Liam to follow him. Sparing not a single glance back at the red front door Liam dashed after the chimera.
“What are you talking about? You heard what he asked about hunting, they’re a family of hunters!”
“No, he thought that
you
were a hunter because of how weird you were being.” Theo unlocked his truck from across the street and crossed over to it in a few strides, pulling the door open and slamming it quickly behind him before Liam could ask another question. Liam growled in the back of his throat and dashed around the truck, throwing himself into the passenger seat.
“What are you talking about?” He demanded. Theo sighed and pulled his phone out of his pocket, opening the camera app and clicking on the last picture. It was taken inside the Cole house. Angled off from the right hand side where the entryway was, right where Theo had been leaning up against the wall, before revealing himself.
The picture had been taken of the Cole family where they huddled together on the couch and Liam could see the edge of the couch that he had been sitting on in the opposite side of the picture. But that wasn’t what drew his focus. What drew his focus was the four identical lens flares emanating off of each of the Cole family members eyes.
“They’re supernatural alright. You just freaked them out by asking about Everett’s ‘abilities’.” Theo explained as Liam grabbed his phone to zoom in on the image even more.
“How else was I supposed to ask that?!” He demanded off-handedly, “It wasn’t like I could just walk in and go ‘hey there, I know your son just got possibly murdered, but would you mind telling me, a complete stranger, if he was a werewolf or not?’”
Theo huffed out a laugh, “that’s basically what you did. Only with the added side effect of you making them think that we were hunters.”
“Ok Mr. Genius, if you knew how to do this so well, why did you just leave me there on my own?” Theo frowned at him a little condescendingly as he started up his truck. Liam quickly pulled on his seatbelt, careful not to drop Theo’s phone as he did.
“Liam, you could tell they were werewolves from the moment you went into the house. They were making no effort to hide their scent. Especially the kids, hell the kids probably didn’t even know how to do it yet.”
Liam flushed as a stone settled in his stomach. He hadn’t been able to smell a single thing inside the Cole house. Even now, he couldn’t smell anything. His fit of sneezes had sealed off his ability to catch scents once again.
“Alright then, why didn’t you just say that? Why bother going through all the trouble of getting proof?”
That got a full laugh out of Theo, “Come on Liam, nobody would believe me without proof of what I was saying.”
“I would.”
Theo looked over, his expression cracked open and for a beat he merely stared at Liam. Maintaining their course down the street without looking at the road. Liam swallowed at the force of Theo’s gaze but held his eyes until Theo looked away.
“You would have?”
“Yeah,” he looked back down at the picture, “I mean, proof is great, but you could have just told me that you could tell based off of scent and I would have believed you.”
“You couldn’t tell from the scent?”
Liam paused as he clicked on the ‘share image’ button on Theo’s phone so that he could send the picture to his own phone. He didn’t quite know how to answer that. The definitely-not-a-werewolf-sickness that had been bothering him for the past week was beginning to take a bigger impact on things. It wasn’t painful but it was uncomfortable, it made him feel tired and his wolf was less and less willing to pull out the full shift. Not to mention the effect it had on his breathing and ability to catch scents.
“I guess Scott never taught me how.” He muttered as a list of Theo’s contacts popped up. He frowned at the list. There were barely ten phone numbers but not a single one had a contact name attached to them. Just the numbers ordered by area code, however as he scrolled he found a single contact with a name attached. His own.
“Am I really the only person who has a contact in your phone?” He asked, a little mockingly, although he had no idea what there really was to mock about that.
Theo shot a look down at his phone in Liam’s hands, “Yeah, that way I know whenever you’re calling so I know to let it go to voicemail.”
Despite the cold words Liam could hear the faint joking underneath it and grinned instead of getting mad over it. He clicked on his name and watched as the blue line slid across the screen sending the image. A beat later his own phone buzzed under his leg and Liam grabbed it out.
He quickly saved the picture to his own phone and pulled up the messages between him, Sheriff Stilinski and Deaton.
Liam relayed the information to Theo and clicked on the pack group chat which had been affectionately named the ‘puppy pack’ so that he could catch them up to date as well
Liam snickered as Corey and Mason began going back and forth, he muted his notifications and stuffed his phone back into his pocket, reminding himself to look at the fallout later on. Theo made a familiar turn and he realized that they were turning back into his neighborhood. Their time was up. Liam sat up in the seat a little higher, not entirely willing to leave the truck quite yet.
He knew Theo wouldn’t try to leave town with Stilinski’s threat of further arrest hanging over his head. But all the same, he wished he knew where Theo’s house was so he could find him whenever he needed the chimera. It was an odd thought, needing Theo. After everything that the two of them had been through together Liam had never expected that they would end up here.
As Theo pulled up alongside his house Liam began to wonder if ‘friend’ was the right word to describe what he and Theo were. Allies felt accurate but too impersonal. Partners felt closer, but partners in what? Crime? Supernatural experiences? Pissing off hunters? He turned to look at Theo and found the other boy distracted by fixing his keys which had caught on a string from his hoodie.
The sharp line of his jaw was even more evident in the shadowed truck and Liam could see the faintest reflection of his chimera’s eyes from the headlights. Just enough to make him look a little
off
from being fully human. Fractured slices of gold glowing through the green of his eyes. There was a pop as Theo gave up and just ripped the thread out of his keys sitting up to face Liam. And he knew his time really was up.
“Where are you going after this?”
Theo arched an eyebrow at him, “I’ll be around. It’s not like I can leave town exactly.”
Liam rolled his eyes, “I know, but like, are you going to be at your house for the rest of the week?”
A vein pulsed in his temple and Theo looked away, “Something like that. Why? Do you miss me already?”
“Oh fuck off, I just don’t want you to disappear for another nine months again.”
“I didn’t disappear.” The tightness in his voice wasn’t entirely gone but it smoothed over a little.
“Oh yeah? Where were you then?”
They had had this fight before. Part of Liam didn’t want to pull it up again. Wanted to sit in the comfortable silence with the older boy. But the larger part of him wanted to drag out answers. Wanted to fight and press until Theo caved and told Liam what had been so important for him to leave town for nine months.
Theo didn’t answer and after a moment Liam got tired of waiting for a response. He opened the door and climbed out of the truck, slamming the door over his shoulder and refusing to look back as he marched up to his front door. If Theo wanted to keep his secrets close to his chest Liam couldn’t stop him but he would find his way to the truth no matter what Theo did to keep it concealed.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
The beginning of the following week Liam woke with a pounding headache. Everything in him was begging to stay wrapped up in the warm cocoon of blankets that he had surrounded himself with. The box of tissues he had stolen was nearly empty and the pile of used tissues had filled the small trash can in the corner of his room. His alarm was blaring loud and bright from his desk and Liam slunk a hand outside of his blanket nest to try and fumble for the snooze button.
After a solid minute of struggle and no success in getting his alarm to cease its violent prattling, Liam finally opened his eyes. Light was streaming in through the curtains leaving strange patterns on the floor. He could distantly hear the sounds of his mom getting ready for work as well. His step dad was most likely long gone off to the early morning shift at the hospital.
With his eyes open Liam finally found the snooze button and smashed at his screen before finally the noise shut off. He closed his eyes tighter and sniffled quietly into his blankets. Even now that he was more awake, his desire to go back to sleep was still pounding loudly in his head. With grimincing force Liam pushed himself upright in the bed. His nose began to run almost immediately and he wiped at it with his sleeve.
The clothes that he had borrowed from his step dad for the first day of spirit week, parent day, sat on his desk chair. He had considered asking to borrow some of his moms old clothes for the day but she had been considerably cooler than him in high school and Liam had a feeling he wouldn’t be able to pull it off.
His step dad had been able to find an old red and yellow striped polo and faded blue jean jacket from his high school years. Both were a little big on Liam considering their height difference but when he tucked in the shirt, it wasn’t that noticeable. He already had a pair of blue jeans in matching color to the jean jacket so he had rush-washed them the night before and found a pair of, surprisingly, all white tennis shoes.
At some point the night before Mason had started texting him pictures of his and Corey’s outfits. However between trying to catch up on last minute homework and debating with himself on texting Theo again he had been busy. There were six different images of outfits that Mason had sent Liam of him and Corey. His head was already starting to pound even more looking at the screen so Liam shut his phone off and promised himself that he would read Mason’s messages later.
Liam could hear the bathroom skin running as he stumbled out of his bedroom and into the hallway. The door was open ajar and Liam could see his mom standing at the sink opening a new bottle of cold and allergy medicine. The dark purple liquid in the bottle sloshed around as she popped the cap open and poured thirty milliliters into the provided plastic cup. She downed it with a slight grimace before replacing the cap and turning to exit the bathroom.
“Oh! Liam!” She startled upon opening the door and spotting him standing there. Liam offered a weak nod and sniff. Her work clothes were already on and the keys were in her opposite hand. He could see a slight reddish tint lingering around the corners of her eyes but she didn’t look as visibly sick as she had the previous morning.
“I’m about to be late so I’ll see you tonight. Have a good day at school, love you honey!” She called, pressing a quick kiss into the crown of his forehead and dashing down the stairs. Liam grunted out a response that sounded vaguely positive. He wasn’t naturally a morning person so most mornings were something to the same effect. But the stifling sinus congestion was making it worse than normal.
Liam pushed the bathroom door open and slipped inside himself. He looked even worse in his reflection. Red ringed eyes and nose, snot dripping and an unusual pallor to his face that had him just about blending in with the shower tiles behind him. Liam groaned and tipped his head forwards to rest against the counter. The polished stone was cooling underneath his forehead and Liam remained there for who knows how long, soaking up the sensation.
His eyes landed on the bottle of Dimetapp still sitting on the counter. In theory he was well aware that taking other people’s medication was
not
the smartest idea. But it was only cold and allergy medicine, so it wasn’t really considered ‘prescribed medication’ in the way that the saying was implying. Liam reached out and grabbed the bottle, pulling it closer to himself to read the label on it.
Thirty milliliters was the recommended dosage. And he could take two doses in twenty-four hours. Liam popped the cap. Werewolf or not he seemed to be affected by the same sort of sickness that his mom had gotten. She also clearly seemed to know how to fix it, so it couldn’t be too terrible if he followed her lead.
The medicine was thick as it went down his throat and burned faintly like he had just licked hand sanitizer. Liam washed out the cup and took a few swigs of plain water to wash away the flavor before he returned the cup and bottle and went to continue getting ready for school.
By the time Mason and Corey showed up to pick him up that morning Liam felt slightly better. The congestion had yet to fade out but the pounding in his head had reduced to a much more manageable level and, after checking in the hallway mirror before leaving, his nose looked more and more like the color of normal human flesh. He watched from the kitchen as Mason pulled into his driveway. Liam shoved the rest of his breakfast into his mouth and grabbed his backpack stumbling out the door.
He could see the outline of Corey sitting in the passenger seat as he locked his front door. Mason waved as he spun around, a move with Liam quickly returned. He hopped into the backseat behind Mason and dumped his backpack into the seat next to him where Mason and Corey were storing their bags as well.
Faint music echoed out of the radio as they pulled out of the driveway and set off on their way towards the high school.
“Any news from Deaton?” Corey asked, twisting around in his seat to stare at Liam. He shook his head, catching Mason’s curious stare from the rearview mirror as well.
“Not yet. He said he was going to do some research on it, so I have a feeling it might take him a little while.” He explained.
Corey sighed and slumped backwards into his seat.
“As much as I don’t want it to be hunters or Monroe back in town, I would so much rather know sooner than later.” He muttered, fingers tapping on the arm rest set into the door. Despite the immediate damper that Monroe’s name put on the small car Liam couldn’t help but agree. Argent, Derek and Braeden had all been traveling around the state to see if they could pick out the last remaining strands of Monroe’s control.
The last report they had gotten from Braeden had been four months ago and said that Monroe had completely disappeared off radar. Even FBI level scavenging from Scott’s dad wasn’t able to bring up anything on her status. After that announcement Derek had gone back down to Mexico to see if she had managed to slip out of the country while Braeden went up to Canada. Argent had stayed in the US due to the majority of the Argent bases being in the US.
He was traveling with someone else too at the time. Liam had never met the other boy except for on one occasion over the monthly pack facetime when Argent couldn’t make it. His name had been Isaiah or Isaac, something along those lines. He hadn’t spoken on the call long enough for Liam to be paying full attention anyways.
“Here’s the real question,” both Liam and Corey turned to look at Mason, “are those weird nurses from last time still going to be at the school?”
He had almost forgotten about them!
Based on the look on Corey’s face, he had too. But now that Mason had brought it back up Liam was wishing he hadn’t forgotten about it. Stilinski had never gotten back to him about looking further into the nurses and Liam had a feeling that until the situation with Kara and Everett got sorted out, he wouldn’t be getting a response.
In the general scheme of things, some doctors taking blood samples of students wasn’t the worst possible thing to happen. Afterall, the school already had their blood drive every spring. It wasn’t much different to that. But even as he thought it Liam knew it was bigger than that. There was no way it couldn’t be.
“I really fucking hope not.” He muttered finally, breaking the silence. Corey nodded but said nothing as they pulled into the school parking lot. Most of the student parking spaces were filled up already but Mason was able to find one without too much struggle and turned the car off. Liam clambered out of his seat grabbing his backpack and slinging it over his back. He waited by the front of the car as Mason and Corey got their bags as well.
Off to one side of the school was a tree. As far as he could remember the tree had always been there, but something about it that distracted his attention. Liam made his way through the parked cars to approach the tree, something about it seemed familiar. The closer he got to the bark the more it came back to him. Rows of bark running vertically up and down the tree in sharp scale-like patterns.
It was the tree growing in the Cole’s front yard. It was the tree with a CCTV camera drilled into it in the preserve. And now it was apparently the tree growing in the school parking lot. Liam hesitated remembering the awful sneezing fit that he had gotten the last time he had been around said tree. But curiosity pushed him forwards and Liam stepped off the pavement onto the bark lain dirt surrounding the tree.
Liam took a cautious sniff of the air emanating off the tree but with his congestion he couldn’t smell much. Even as he got closer, he couldn't smell much of anything, his face just about pressed into the leaves. A familiar tingle built in the top of his nose and Liam backed off quickly before he started sneezing again. He had been doing so well since taking the Dimetapp that morning and he was not about to ruin it with whatever this tree was doing to him.
“Liam, come on! Let's go!” Mason shouted distantly behind him and Liam twisted around. Mason and Corey were waiting by the car, Gwen having found them at some point while Liam was distracted and now standing with the group.
“Come here for a second!” He called back, waving them over. Liam stepped back onto the pavement and pulled Corey towards the tree once he was in arms reach.
“Smell the tree.” He commanded with a gentle push.
Corey’s expression screwed up in confusion. Liam waved his hands impatiently at him until the other boy gave up and approached the tree. Corey awkwardly leaned closer, sniffing tentatively at the tree. Liam bit at his lip waiting to see if Corey would notice any scent.
“Uhh
—guys,” Gwen interrupted, “We might have a problem.”
Corey stepped away from the tree and they all followed Gwen’s pointing finger to a white van parked on the opposite end of the parking lot. The back doors were opened, hiding the people standing by it, from view.
“What do you mean?” Liam asked, walking a little ways in the other direction to try to get a better look at the van.
“I just saw one of those nurses from last week come out of the back entrance of the school and open up the van.” Liam whipped around to stare at her. Mason and Corey’s eyes widening in unison before the four of them unanimously took off sprinting across the parking lot. Several apologies were thrown over shoulders as other students were shoved aside in the rush for them to get across the lot.
Liam ducked behind a bus stop sign and the other three quickly followed suit. Shoving their bodies into the tight space and peering through the blurry plexiglass. Being closer to the van meant they were at a better angle to watch as the back door to the school opened and a woman shoved a wooden door stopper under the door. She was tall, almost taller than Stilinski. Liam didn’t recognize her from the array of nurses that had been at the school previously.
But at the same time, he had only seen two of said nurses, maybe she had been there and he had just missed her. The woman made her way over to the back of the van and helped prop the doors open a little further. Two other nurses carefully lifted something out of the back of the van and lowered it down onto a rolling dolly.
“What the fuck is that?” Gwen whispered, leaning even closer to get a better look. Liam shrugged, it was a square metal container. Two latches across the front keeping it tightly sealed up. They loaded it onto the dolly and began to roll it carefully towards the opened back door. Unlike usual medical equipment there wasn’t any kind of labeling or markings on the box itself. Just a plain steel box with latches on it. If he had seen it in any other context Liam would have assumed it was some sort of portable refrigerator.
“I have no idea.” He muttered.
“Do you want me to try and get a closer look?” Corey asked from over his opposite shoulder. Liam was about to open his mouth and give an affirmative when the tall nurse stopped suddenly and turned around to stare directly at them.
Liam shut his mouth quickly and shook his head, backing up slowly and keeping his friends behind him. The nurse shut the back doors of the van quickly before taking long strides to cross the parking lot towards them. He felt it as Corey’s hand landed on his shoulder, still slightly concealed by the bus stop.
“No.” He hissed, “Not yet, give it a minute.”
“Can I help you four?” Her voice was soft. But it seemed soft in the way that a lack of speaking made people's voices soft rather than actual softness.
“Uhh no, sorry Miss,” Liam laughed awkwardly. Compared to the nurse that he had seen last time working at the school, this woman actually looked like a nurse. Her dark hair was all pinned back out of her face and she wore a pair of blue latex gloves. The white lab coat actually fit her body as well and dark scrubs were visible underneath the lab coat. She had a tag that looked like it was meant to be a name tag, but rather than having a name on it, it just said ‘MedStar Washington Hospital Center’ in thick black text.
“We were just curious about what was going on.” Gwen offered from behind him and the nurse gave a small smile. She tucked her hands into her lab coat pockets and took a step closer. All four of them took a step back in unison.
“That’s perfectly understandable. But I would have to ask that you don’t disturb my nurses, we are working very hard right now, and a distraction is the last thing they need.”
“Your nurses?” Liam asked.
She nodded, “Yes, I am the lead doctor here. Now please, I really must get back to my work here. And I do believe you four are about to be late for class as well.” She arched a pointed eyebrow at them all. Almost as if on cue, the bell rang out from the building behind them and Liam cursed under his breath. As much as he did want to stick around and dig for further answers, he had a feeling Principal Martin wouldn’t take too kindly to them missing class to bother nurses.
He nodded, turning around and following after his friends who were beginning to head for the front doors of the school.
“Did you see her medical tag?” Mason hissed once they were a suitable distance away
“Yeah she’s from the Washington State hospitals.”
“No, she’s not from any west coast hospital at all.” Corey and Gwen slowed down to keep pace as they pushed the school doors open.
“What do you mean?” Corey whispered.
“MedStar Hospital is from Washington DC. Like up where Stiles is right now.”
Liam stopped in the middle of the empty hallway, the three others pausing with him.
“What the hell are DC doctors doing in Beacon Hills?”
Mason shrugged, his expression barely concealing his concern, “I don’t know, but with what happened last week, and the fact that they’re still here, it can’t be for something good.”
Gwen’s sigh hissed out through her teeth as she began chewing at the inside of her mouth.
“Alright then, so what do we do?”
His heart was pounding in his chest. Stilinski had never gotten back to him about his original question about the nurses and now he was wishing he had pushed harder for an answer. Mason was right, whatever was happening with the nurses, couldn’t be good. But was it not good for the humans? Or for the supernatural?
“Here’s the plan,” he began, bidding for time for a genius idea to hit him suddenly, “Don’t do anything for now but keep an eye out for the nurses. If they do anything weird or strange, make a note of it. I tried to ask Stilinski about them last week but he never got back to me. Maybe if we can catch them doing something weird he can intervene legally.”
“Weirder than taking a bunch of high schoolers blood without getting parental permission?” Corey pointed out.
Liam shrugged, feeling a little out of bounds with this whole thing. Normally when supernatural things happened in Beacon Hills, they would be less directly related to the school. Or at least be evidently supernaturally involved. But now, with the death of Kara, Everett and the weird nurses, the line was getting muddled.
Corey seemed to notice his uncertainty and just nodded. The sound of heels echoed down the hallway and Mason and Gwen quickly ducked off in the direction of their classes with a quick goodbye before Principal Martin appeared. Liam and Corey shared a look before they headed towards the stairs.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Perhaps it had been fate or Principal Martin with her version of a genius idea, but Liam and Corey both shared multiple classes during senior year. More than Liam had ever shared with any student in the past. In one regard it was a good idea because if someone went after one of them, the other would be able to step in as protection. However, if someone went after them, they were both there, making them an easier target overall. Liam and Corey both shared their first period science class together which was on the top floor. The teacher was a temporary sub after Mrs. Finch left town and he wasn’t up to the same standards that the class was used to. However he was a stickler for the classroom rules.Liam eased the classroom door open, wincing a little as it creaked. However, rather than being met with a class reading silently and a teacher poorly hiding his phone behind his laptop they were met with loud voices and chairs scraping across the floor. He pushed the door further open so Corey could step in beside him and they paused to watch the scene before them. All of the students and their backpacks were out of their seats, moving towards the side wall while Mr. Rich stood in the middle of the room looking over a piece of paper with a man in a white lab coat at his side. The usual single person desks which typically sat in lines through the classroom had been replaced with larger square desks with four chairs around them. The nurse looked up as Liam and Corey entered. He whispered something to Mr. Rich who’s head snapped right up at the sight of them. “Mr. Dunbar! Mr. Bryant!” Liam winced at the sudden shout and the voices of their classmates quieted almost immediately to listen to the shout. “Where are your late passes?!” He demanded. “Sorry, Mr. Rich, we were talking with a teacher down the hall.” Liam lied. “Last week, you had car trouble, and the week before that you got your backpack strap stuck in your locker, and the week before that—” He clearly would have continued on shouting but the nurse at his side said something too quiet for Liam to hear and the yelling subsided. “Oh whatever, just go line up, we have a new seating chart.” Liam and Corey shared a surprised look before quickly scurrying across the room to slip in at the end of the line.“Does this count as doing something weird?” Corey asked, leaning over to whisper to Liam. “Not yet,” Liam whispered back, “There’s nothing really weird about a new seating chart.”“Yeah but when have you ever seen a nurse facilitate a new seating chart? And what's up with the desks?”Liam couldn’t deny that part was a little odd but before he could respond Mr. Rich began calling out names for the first table at the front of the room. It was only then that Liam realized he had never gotten an answer out of Corey that morning about the tree. He cursed internally and made a mental note to have Corey check out the tree again after school got out. Liam turned his attention to the nurse who remained in the front of the room. He was watching each group of four students leave the line and take their seats in their assigned desks. The process repeated throughout the entire classroom until they reached the final desk which was at the far side of the room. Furthest away from the windows and doors. “Liam Dunbar, Corey Bryant, Riley Carson and Lacy Taylor, you four will be at the last table there.” With a definitive nod Mr. Rich folded up the paper and passed it back to the nurse. The man gave one last survey of the classroom before tucking the paper into one of the pockets in his coat and then disappeared out the classroom door. Liam swung his bag down at his feet and slid into one of the chairs, Corey sat down next to him and Riley and Lacy sat down opposite. It was weird having tables facing each other as Liam had gotten rather used to the single person desks. He gave them both a friendly nod, one which Lacy returned. Riley was on the lacrosse team as the goalie so they had interacted plenty before. However, he didn’t acknowledge Liam at all. Instead curling his arms up under his head and pulling his hood up to lay his head on the desk before him. He had lost a bet with a few other members of the lacrosse team earlier that week and had bleached and buzzed his typically dark hair. But it was covered by an oversized hoodie now so Liam couldn’t see it.Dark circles hung under his eyes and he looked about seconds away from falling asleep. His skin was just about gray and his veins were dark and protruding out of his skin. A thin sheen of sweat covered his face and Liam could see his hands shaking just slightly. Riley had told him once that he worked late night shifts at the local gas station, leading to him getting regular sleep deprivation. Liam let him be, figuring he had a late shift, and pulled out his homework. Up at the front of the Mr. Rich finally began the lesson of the day.Second period of the day was Coach’s class. Usually it was either the best class of the day, or if Coach was in a mood it would leach out into all of them. However, upon opening the classroom Liam was met with a familiar scene. Coach stood in the middle of the room with a disgruntled look on his face and a blonde haired nurse at his side. Four chair-ed square desks surrounded them and the few students who were already in the classroom were lined up in the back of the room. “What’s up with the seat changes, Coach? Did the school pay for new desks or something?”Coach’s expression of displeasure only deepened, “If they can afford to be buying new desks they should be giving us more funding for when you little demons break your lacrosse equipment.” Liam rolled his eyes laughing a little. Somehow despite the whole hunter issue happening not too long ago, Coach seemed to have completely forgotten about anything relating to students turning into half wild animals once a month. A part of him wondered if it was Coach’s way of keeping the peace between lacrosse players. It certainly worked better than Principal Martin’s version of peacekeeping. “Coach, the lacrosse team gets the highest amount of school funding. If anything the theater gets the worst funding, if anyone needs more, it’s them.” A flash of Everett’s body laying in the dirt appeared in his mind and Liam barely stopped himself from wincing. “How’s your singing voice Dunbar?”“Huh?”“Your singing voice? How is it?” The nurse standing at Coaches side seemed to be just as lost as Liam was with the direction that the conversation had taken. He shrugged a little and the bell rang behind him. The rest of his classmates seemed to have understood what was happening and had lined themselves up at the back of the room talking quietly together. “Well, if you ever want to audition, I’ll get the team to help you out with those high notes.” Liam’s eyebrows raised as he attempted to understand what Coach was trying to say. However before he could, the nurse stepped up, motioning Liam to join up with the line. Identical to Mr. Rich, Coach began to read through the list of students' names. Directing them in groups of four to sit at various different tables across the room. Coach’s classes were almost always large classes, he had somehow managed to teach a class that was required for graduation at every grade level. Something which Coach took every possible opportunity to complain about whenever someone asked him for an essay to be graded. Despite him getting a naturally large classroom to match the class size, it felt small with the amount of tables in it. Liam quickly realized why however. Even though there were only four students left, there were two sets of four person tables left over. “Smith and Rodsen are sitting here—” Coach paused as he looked back and forth between the paper and the seating layout before him. He frowned for a moment.“Well that’s stupid,” he muttered, “Dunbar and Christans you two can just sit here with the other two.” He motioned to the table where Ellie Smith and Anya Rodsen had already taken their seats. That left one empty table.Before Liam could even grab his bag however the nurse stepped forwards. “No, I’m sorry, we need you to follow the seating chart exactly how it is. Mr. Dunbar, Mr Christans, you two will be at that other table.” She motioned, taking the paper away from Coach as she did. “This is ridiculous, we have two more open seats, why waste a whole other desk on these two?” Coach complained. Mick Christans looked over to Liam from where he was hovering over one of the open seats at Ellie and Anya’s table. Liam shrugged, unsure of what was happening. Mick slowly pulled the chair out and went to sit down.“No. Mr. Christians, you need to sit at that other desk.” The nurse's voice had become sharper, appearing out of thin air at Mick’s side and pushing the chair he had grabbed back in. “It’s alright, they can sit there.” Anya spoke up in defense, “Mick is my step brother, and we all know Liam, there’s no need to make it weird.”The nurse shook her head again however, “that doesn’t matter, this has nothing to do with who knows who, we just need our seating chart to be followed exactly as it is.”Not wanting to cause a further scene, as the entire class was already staring, Liam went and took a seat at the other desk. “No don’t sit there Dunbar,” Coach whined almost immediately, “it just doesn't work with eight tables in the room! This one is right in the middle of my teaching space,” he gestured frantically at the table where Liam was sitting. The nurse arched an unimpressed eyebrow.“You teach from the back of the classroom right next to the fire safety hose?” A few snickers arose from the classroom at her point. Coach just doubled down though and stepped further under the head of the hose. “Yes. I actually have a very bad fear of spontaneous combustion and it makes me feel safer to conduct my teaching from here.” An amused smile spread across her face and she walked around the desks, shooing Mick to the table with Liam. “Well you are in luck Mr. Finstock, as a formally trained nurse, I’ll stay here for the class to ensure that should you catch fire, there is someone here to administer care.” Liam couldn’t stop the amused smirk from spreading across his face as she settled down against the back wall, preparing to go to war with Coach’s power of will. There was a long pause as Coach stared at her, his head forced at a strange angle from the fire hose. He narrowed his eyes at her lack of movement only once before giving a nod of finality and turned to the front of the room.“Greenberg! Go turn on my laptop and projector!”Liam was almost disappointed in himself to admit that it took until fifth period to realize that something was very wrong with the newly assigned seating charts. Both Mason and Gwen had texted the group chat after second period about the weird change in pace. Normally they would have met at lunchtime to discuss, but at the semester change Liam had been switched to first lunch due to an elective change. So thus they weren’t able to meet until fifth period history class with Mrs. Price. Upon entering the classroom and spotting Mason, Corey and Gwen huddled together in a line at the back of the classroom Liam made a bee-line over. Ignoring Mrs. Price and the nurse standing at her side. “Dude,” Mason greeted as soon as he reached them, “this has to count as weird behavior right?” “Yeah something is definitely wrong here. But I have no idea what, new seating charts aren’t exactly illegal.” He pointed out, keeping a watchful eye thrown over his shoulder in case someone decided to listen in on their conversation. “What about identical seating charts?” Corey spoke up. They all turned towards him.“What do you mean?” Gwen demanded. Corey pulled Liam out of the way so he was standing in a line with the rest of the class. He realized distantly that the bell had just rung and Mrs. Price was beginning to talk. Corey leaned closer so that he could whisper to them all. “Watch who all is sitting together and where. Every single class that I have been in today has had a new seating chart, but one part has stayed the same. Liam and I are sitting together in our first period, our third period, and I’m willing to bet we’ll be sitting together in this one too.”Mason shrugged a little confused, “Ok, maybe they just copied parts of the seating cart across classrooms.”Corey shook his head, “I’ve been watching, it’s not just Liam and I, there are specific students who are constantly sitting at the table with us. First period is me, Liam, Riley and Lacy. and then again in fourth period I’m sitting with Lacy.”Mason bit his lip, eyes narrowing as he thought. “My second period is just me and this other kid Mick at a table by ourselves,” Liam spoke up as the pieces began to fall together in a way that he distinctly did not like, “but the weird thing is, there’s this other table that only has two students sitting at it. Coach tried to move Mick and I to the other table but the nurse in the room wouldn’t let him and sat in the room for the entire period to make sure that he didn’t move us.”“Alright, but why would someone want you two constantly sitting together?” Gwen whispered. But before anyone could answer her question, Mrs. Price called her name.“Mrs. Naomi, you'll be sitting at this table here.” She called out, not even checking if Gwen was following before drifting over to the next table. The classroom was half filled at that point and Gwen shared a look with them all before pushing off the wall and walking over to her seat. Both Liam and Mason fell silent as the rest of the seats were called out. Mason was sitting at the very next table with three other classmates. Liam looked around them. Nobody was left aside for him and Corey. Motioning towards the last table in the classroom Mrs. Price called out three names.“And in the last table here, we have Mr. Dunbar, Mr. Bryant and Mr. Carson.” Liam and Corey shared a look, making their way over to their new seats. “Are you missing a student, Mrs. Price?” The nurse spoke up, eyes locked on the remaining table. Mrs. Price looked back and forth between her list and the room of sitting students. “Huh, it would appear that I am,” she turned to the class, “has anyone seen Riley Carson today?” Liam frowned, Riley had been in first period with him and Corey. Despite his similarities to the jock stereotype, Riley was never one to skip classes or arrive late. But as he thought back on it Liam couldn’t help but remember Riley’s odd behavior that morning. “He was in my first period class, but I don’t think he looked very well, he might have gone home.” Mrs. Price nodded and made a mark on her sheet of paper before passing it over to the nurse. He nodded and took the paper, folding it up and placing it in his pocket. “I’ll double check with the school nurse, thank you for your cooperation Mrs. Price. I’ll be back for your sixth period.” She nodded and the nurse was gone. Liam glanced over the heads of his peers to make eye contact with Mason and Gwen on their respective sides of the classroom. Both of them were watching him and Corey with unconcealed concern, ignoring Mrs. Price as she started up the lesson. Liam twisted around so he was angled more towards Corey. “You and I are the only supernatural creatures who have been singled out like this. But it wouldn’t make sense to be based off of that, otherwise we would be sitting completely on our own, right?”Corey shrugged before whispering back, “I mean, we don’t actually know for sure if those other people are supernatural. The nurses are pretty determined to keep people grouped together based on only their lists, so it would definitely have to be something that we all have in common.”Liam nodded humming to himself, “You, me and Riley are all on the lacrosse team?”Corey scoffed, “yeah somehow I don’t think lacrosse is enough of a reason to start singling people out like this.”Liam huffed and looked away, he let his mind drift off trying to think through all the possible options when the sound of distant sirens began to hum in his ears. “Do you hear that?”“Hear what?”Liam pointed towards the window as the sirens got louder, it sounded like they were right outside the window.“That.” Corey glanced back and forth between Mrs. Price only once before he held a hand out towards Liam, his intent clear. Liam nodded, grabbing his hand and ducking down slightly as Corey pressed a hand against the table top. A wave of shivers went down his body as if someone had dropped a fiber-thin fabric over top of him. A green glare consumed his vision as Corey pulled him to his feet, tugging him over to the window. He had seen and felt Corey’s invisibility before, but still, it was odd to just stand up and have nobody notice your movements despite being able to see them no issues. Corey pulled him over to the window, their hands clasped tightly together. The sirens got louder as they leaned up against the counter. There, pulling into the parking lot were two ambulances, followed quickly behind another two sheriff’s vehicles. One of which Liam recognized as Stilinski’s truck. “What’s Stilinski doing here?” he whispered to Corey who shrugged. They both watched, half captivated as the ambulances swung to a halt, the back doors flying open. Four different EMT’s lept out, two of them carrying a stretcher and began sprinting for the lacrosse field. The classroom window angled too much towards the front of the school to be able to see what was happening on the field. “I have no idea, but there’s nothing stopping us from finding out,” Corey whispered back, shooting an intentional look at the open classroom door. Liam nodded quickly, and they dashed around the desks and out the door. The sound of Mrs. Price talking was enough to cover the noise of their escape but Liam could see Mason’s eyes following their invisible silhouette out of the classroom and made note to text him once they were safely outside the school. They hurried down the flight of stairs to the first floor and were almost to the door when a sudden voice called out. “Excuse me, what are you doing out of class?” They both froze, Corey’s hand tightening around Liam’s as they turned to follow the sound of the voice. The same nurse that they had spoken to outside was standing near a classroom not too far down the hall. Liam glanced at Corey with a pointed look of ‘how the fuck does she know we’re here?’ Corey gave a helpless, freaked out shrug when another voice rang out. “I’m just going to the bathroom.” Corey spun around, pulling Liam with him and he spotted Mason standing at the top of the stairs behind them. A grin broke across Corey’s face and Liam felt himself relax. Mason must have followed them to see what was going on. The nurse strode down the hallway, her eyes now clearly focused on Mason. Liam tugged at Corey’s arm until he finally turned back around. They snuck over to the door leading out of the school when Corey paused suddenly.“What are you doing?” Liam hissed. Corey raised an arm, pointing towards the lacrosse fields, eyes focused on Mason.“Telling Mason where we’re going.” He said by way of response. It was a smart idea no doubt but Liam’s impatience was in no mood for smart ideas. He tried to lean around the window in the door to peer out towards the lacrosse field. But even as he did, it was difficult to see what was happening. A large crowd had formed up on the field and he could see Stilinski fighting to keep the students back. A fight which he was very quickly losing. “Alright, he got it. Let's go,” Liam didn’t even wait for further confirmation. Pulling Corey straight out the door and sprinting for the lacrosse field. Someway across the campus Liam released Corey’s hand and Corey turned back to visible. However before they could even get there, the crowds broke away and two EMT’s came rushing out, a stretcher carried between the two. “Shit!” Corey gasped out as they approached, a hand coming up to cover his nose. “What? What is it?” Liam demanded but Corey only shook his head nodding at the figure on the stretcher. The EMT’s rushed by and Liam looked down at the figure as they passed by. He caught sight of recently buzzed bleach blond hair and froze up. Heart nearly stopped in his chest as he recognized the face of Riley Carson going rushing past him. The only difference between the Riley Carson that he had seen that morning. And the Riley Carson passing by him on a stretcher now, was, this one was missing a heart beat, and his eyes were whited out. Completely blinded.It was only once Riley’s body had passed him that Liam recognized the scent floating on the air though his congested nose. Death.Blood.And acetone.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
The chaos started almost immediately. Several of the classes on the first floor and even more of the classes facing the lacrosse field had seen the stretcher carried out. Doors went flying open and frantic students came pouring out of doorways. Teachers following in their footsteps trying to wrangle them back into place. Mason caught up to them quickly amidst the chaos.
“What happened?” He breathed out, watching as Stilinski struggled to keep the invigorated students at bay.
“I think we just got our third body.” Corey responded, just as quietly. Liam focused his hearing trying to listen in on the orders that Stilinski was shouting at his fellow deputies. But it wasn’t until one of the students began throwing punches that he jumped into action. A girl that Liam had seen once or twice before and faintly recognized as Riley’s girlfriend was shrieking. Struggling against the deputies grips, her hands flying in every direction.
Liam threw himself into the fray, grabbing the girl
—
Nancy?
—
Had her name been Nancy?
—
And tugging her away. Her fists pummeled into the skin of his arms and would have no doubt caused bruises had it not been for his healing. His feet slipped against the turf, throwing sprays of black pellets in every direction.
“Nancy! Nancy!” He shouted, trying to get her to break hysterical focus. It wasn’t until another pair of hands grabbed Nancy’s other arm and began hauling her away from the crowds as well that Liam finally got her under control. He looked up, expecting Corey, only to be faced with Nolan.
They made eye contact and Nolan’s face twisted into something too difficult to determine. Liam didn’t dare take his eyes off Nancy to look for Corey in fear that she would overpower them, wolf-strength or not.
“Nancy, stop!” Nolan shouted, grabbing her other shoulder and stepping directly in front of her vision. That seemed to break her concentration and she stopped, head swaying as if dazed, face wet with tears. Her hands had stopped flailing about but now they latched onto Liam’s wrists, nail digging right into the skin there.
She swayed back and forth once, before her eyes rolled back into her head and she collapsed. Nolan caught her, lowering her carefully down to lay in the turf on his knee.
“Is this something to do with you?” Nolan finally spoke up, his voice quiet enough that Liam had to strain to hear it. Liam took the opportunity to search out Mason and Corey within the crowds. They had gotten stuck on the opposite side of the field, helping the deputies keep the fresh wave of students off the field.
He looked back to Nolan, “I think so,” he muttered. Corey’s realization couldn’t have been a coincidence. If Riley’s manner of death had been the same as Everret and Kara's, that meant that he would have been supernatural as well. He found Corey’s eyes in the crowd and the expression of sharp dismay was evident. Unfortunately Liam hadn’t been paying attention well enough to recollect who all he had been sitting with throughout the day.
That would have been their best attempt at a list of possible victims. Obviously Liam knew of himself, Corey, Parrish and Theo as the primary supernatural creatures in Beacon Hills. But he hadn’t known about Riley, and if Riley was a born wolf then there was a chance that he had an even bigger pack surrounding him. A bigger pack which was at risk of harm.
“Are you good with her?” He asked, glancing back down at Nolan who was trying to fan Nancy. Nolan nodded.
“Alright, I’ll let a deputy know to come check her out.” Liam could see Stilinski beginning to tape off the entrance to the lacrosse field, a few newly arrived deputies working to head students off at the school doors.
“Sheriff Stilinski!” The man looked up as Liam jogged over, ducking under panicked students.
“I’m busy right now Liam, what’s wrong?”
“There’s a girl over there, Nancy, she fainted. Nolan’s with her right now, but someone needs to check her out. She’s Riley’s girlfriend I think.” Stilinski’s echoing sigh was weighty and Liam could feel it echo through his body.
“Vargas!” He shouted, a woman nearby looked up, “we’ve got a girl down, can you deal with that?” She nodded quickly, jogging over to where Nolan was sitting on the turf.
Without a second word Stilinski was tying off the tape and moving on before Liam could catch up. He hurried after the other man nearly running into Mason who appeared out of the crowd with a red mark on the side of his face.
“Woah! What happened?” Liam demanded.
Mason shook his head, rubbing at the mark, “spirited discussion with a mathlete trying to get them off a deputy. What the hell is going on?”
“We got another body I think. Corey and I heard the sirens and snuck out to see what was going on. They took Riley Carson’s body off the field right before everyone got out here. I didn’t get a good look but it looked like his eyes were completely white too.”
Mason’s eyebrows shot up as he nodded slowly, “So that means Riley had to be supernatural too right?”
“I mean, maybe? He’s never shown any signs of being supernatural though. I think at least one other person would have caught on. He was on the team when Scott was captain too.”
“Sure, but Brett and Lori were able to hide themselves until the deadpool so it’s not like it’s impossible.” A rush of shame flooded through Liam’s body at the mention of their names and he nodded slowly.
“Let’s just assume for a minute that Riley was supernatural,” Mason began, “Riley was in school today up until fifth period right, so how did he go from alive and fine, a few hours ago, to getting carried out on a stretcher now?”
Liam took a breath, trying to fight through the congestion in his nose. The medicine that he had taken that morning was slowly losing its effect and Liam could feel the irritation and congestion returning. Behind them the deputies were slowly succeeding in taping off the field and Mason pulled Liam away from the crowds. Corey spotted them and jogged over.
“I saw Riley this morning. He was moving around but he didn’t look very good. His skin was practically gray and sweaty as if he was about to throw up.”
Corey nodded, quickly catching up to their conversation, “ I saw it too. He didn’t smell like he should have either.”
Liam had missed that.
“What did he smell like?”
Corey chewed at his lip, eyebrows furrowing in concentration, “at first it was really difficult to notice but it got stronger the longer he was in class. It smelled like when you eat too many sugary foods and it starts to get stuck all over the inside of your mouth. Really sweet and almost floral.”
Liam hummed, trying to think what could have caused the scent. Beside him Mason made a noise as if a thought had just occurred to him.
“You got something?”
Mason’s lips pinched together as if he wasn’t sure what to do with the thought, “possibly.”
After a beat of silence, Liam waved his hand impatiently to get him to spit it out.
“Liam, you were there when Theo was brought into the Sheriff's station right?”
“It wasn’t laughing gas,” Corey interrupted.
Mason shook his head, “no, not that. Liam, you said that you asked Theo about what happened when he saw Everett before he died, right?”
He nodded.
“Didn’t you say that Theo caught the scent of lilies coming off Everett’s body before he left that parking lot?”
The realization slammed into Liam’s stomach like a truck. Corey’s eyes had gone wide.
“Theo was right, that’s exactly what it is. It smells just like lilies,” he muttered
“Riley had to be supernatural then. There’s too many similarities,” Liam said slowly, nodding to himself, “we have to tell Stilinski.” He spun around to sprint across the field when Corey caught his arm, pulling him back.
“Hey! Wha
—”
“Look!” Corey hissed.
Liam followed his pointed finger across the field to where Stilinski was standing in the middle of a cluster of his deputies. Standing before all of them, was a tall woman. Dressed in a white lab coat and dark scrubs, with brown hair that was pulled up and out of her face, speaking to the deputies. Liam tilted his head to the side trying to focus on their conversation. Corey mimicked the movement. He could faintly hear the quiet voice of the nurse as she spoke.
“—it’s very serious, we have been sent from MedStar Washington Hospital Center in Washington D.C. to try and contain it the best we can,” she said, voice soft as rumbling grass weeds.
Stilinski’s echoing sigh was much less quiet, “and you’re telling me there’s no further information that you can give me right now?”
“No. I do apologize, but that is all I have the clearance to share with the general public at this time.”
“We’re the county police department. If you want us to be able to help out and do our jobs correctly, we are going to need more information than just what the general public gets.”
Even from a distance Liam could see the chiding smile that slid onto the nurse's face, “Sheriff Stilinski, I think this is a discussion best held at a different time. Right now our top priority is getting the school closed down before this disease ends up infecting all our children.” And without another word the nurse turned. Spinning on her heel and marching her way across the field.
Disease?
Liam thought. There was no way this was a sickness of some kind. Supernatural creatures weren't supposed to be able to get sick like this. But at the same time there wasn’t any sort of human sickness that caused blindness in the manner that they had seen thus far. Perhaps this was a disease that only affected supernaturals?
Was that even a thing?
Liam exhaled and a horrible feeling caught up in his stomach as the congestion in his nose made itself known again.
Oh god—what if—?
The nurse’s eyes drifted for a moment across the crowds of students who had fallen quiet waiting for the inevitable announcement.
As her eyes swept the field Liam was struck by a full body shiver passing over his veins. The nurse's eyes shifted back to him and they made eye contact for only a second. But a second was all it took for a heavy stone to settle in the bottom of his stomach. The nurse reached Principal Martin who had fought her way onto the field, megaphone in one hand, a clenched fist in the other.
This time both women turned their backs to the students as they whispered together. A sharp nod from Principal Martin and the nurse was disappearing out one of the side exits. Liam could see two other nurses in matching white lab coats standing there waiting for her. They left like ghosts, slipping out on silent feet and whispering waves. A few other students saw them go, eyes following after.
But their attention was quickly drawn away by Principal Martin activating her megaphone. The loud screech it let out was echoing and reverberated straight down Liam’s ear drums.
“All students need to proceed back to their classrooms right now. School has been canceled for the remainder of the day, buses will be called early and transportation will be arranged but all students and faculty must leave campus.”
The uproar caused was nearly deafening. Some students were thrilled with the development, others who had seen the collapse and removal of Riley weren’t as convinced. The deputies began herding students back towards the building doors. Before he could even say a word to Mason or Corey they were swept up in the thrum of students' bodies.
With the chaos of school being shut down, they never got a moment to talk. Mason and Corey had been some of the first students allowed to go home as they had their own car. Mason had offered to take Liam home as well, Liam had declined and taken the bus instead. His nose was beginning to run again, leaving Liam snuffling into his sleeves and spare tissues. Normally he would have taken a ride from them, no questions asked. But now—Liam was shaken—he couldn’t even deny it. The word
disease
kept echoing around his head like a broken record.
It was almost another two hours after the official cancellation of school that the buses were called back to the school. Liam was curled into his phone as the bus bumped along the road, sending text after text, waiting for some kind of response from Stilinski.
He had texted Stilinski once before when they had first been shuffled back into their classrooms. He had never responded so Liam texted him again.
It wasn’t until a good ten minutes down the road that his phone finally buzzed with Stilinski’s response.
But of course, it was only to deliver the most unhelpful information. Liam had already grilled Principal Martin when passing her in the halls and gotten that much out of her. His next four messages were slightly scathing but no less important.
Another five stops before Stilinski responded. Liam felt slightly bad for bothering the man as he was undoubtedly trying to get work done at the high school. But as another sneeze echoed out of his nose, Liam’s guilt faded to background noise.
He
shouldn’t be able to get sick.
Liam could picture the half annoyed furrow between Stilinski’s brows as he typed out his own response. A look which had once been most commonly aimed at Stiles. Now Liam mainly saw it aimed at broken printers and himself.
The ‘Do Not Disturb’ notification appeared at the bottom of Liam’s messages to Stilinski and he groaned. Dropping his phone back into his lap and throwing his head backwards to rest against the cold window. Glancing up once at the stop announcement board on the bus ceiling Liam half heartedly tugged at the yellow wire. His own stop was next. The bus slowed to a halt and Liam clambered off, tossing a ‘thanks’ over his shoulder to the driver.
Thankfully, the weather hadn’t been as bad as the downpour a few days ago so Liam was walking in tolerable weather. As soon as the roar of the bus faded away from his ears, he was left with the quiet of the residential street. The local chihuahua barked at him all the way down its fence. Liam was too tired to even glow his eyes back at it to make it stop as he passed by.
The breeze shifted and Liam was struck by another fit of sneezes. He keyed open his front door miserably snuffling to himself. He tossed his backpack down on the floor by the door and made his way upstairs. It was just as he was passing by the open bathroom door that an idea struck him. The Dimetapp he had taken that morning had said he could take two doses. Supernatural disease or not, it did seem to help for a time.
Liam knocked the door open with his hip and grabbed the small bottle, pouring some out and downing it in one go. The medicine-y flavor burned all the way down but Liam took a few swigs of water to clear it out. As he gazed into red rimmed eyes in the bathroom mirror another idea struck him. Stilinski might have been there at the crime scene, but he wasn’t the only one who might have answers.
The response came much faster than Stilinski’s had and a warming hope filled his chest as Liam walked into his bedroom.
He flopped onto the bed. Watching as the typing animation appeared and disappeared for a long moment.
Liam remembered the deadpool. Even though he hadn’t been there for the incident at the school, he was pretty sure Scott had talked about it before.
Deaton’s simple words sent something painful burning in his chest and Liam scrubbed at his eyes. Riley had been on the lacrosse team. And now he wouldn’t be. Even before he had been a werewolf, lacrosse teams always felt like the human equivalent of a pack. And he had just lost a pack member. Pushing that aside, Liam quickly texted back, determined to not get too side tracked here.
Liam could feel his heartbeat hammering away in his chest as he texted Deaton. He did his best to remain vague enough that Deaton wouldn’t be able to pick out something being wrong. The last thing he needed right now was for Deaton to catch on and the news to get back to the rest of the pack.
Despite the slight joking nature of Deaton’s message, Liam’s stomach still sank into his shoes. If Deaton didn’t know anything about this then there was nothing that could help Liam now. Even with the medication he had just taken Liam couldn’t feel his congestion getting any better. It still lingered in the back of his nose, preventing him from inhaling properly. His vision was beginning to crystalize again as irritated tears formed in the corners of his eyes.
Liam sighed, dropping his phone down and pressing his face into his covers for a moment. The sheets blocking his nose as well only served to make his congestion worse so Liam rolled onto his back instead. He hadn’t turned on the overhead lights of his bedroom and it was only for that reason that he spotted something. There, in the array of glowing stars stuck all over his ceiling, Liam spotted a gap missing a star. For a minute he frowned, wondering if one of the stars had fallen off but then he remembered.
Theo. He had given it to Theo.
Theo who had grown up with the Dread Doctors.
If anyone was going to know more about the medical side of the supernatural, it would be him.
With renewed energy Liam flipped back onto his stomach and grabbed his phone again. Firing one last text off to Deaton before clicking on Theo’s contact in his phone.
Theo’s response arrived before Liam even had the time to set his phone down. The chimera must have been on his phone when Liam texted.
A flare of annoyance wormed through him at the nickname.
He had
not
known that. It made sense in theory. If Theo had been traveling around with the Dread Doctors, he would have been at multiple different schools over the years. He would have graduated at one or the other at some point.
His answer wasn’t an actual answer to Liam’s question, but he was willing to take it if it meant that Theo would actually help out.
Tossing his phone off to the side and forcing himself up from the bed Liam made his way downstairs. Recollecting his thrown backpack from the floor and forcing himself to slowly put things back where he normally stored them. By the time he heard the sound of tires hitting the driveway Liam had just finished shoving his backpack back into his closet. A knock echoed from the front door and Liam went to go get it.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
There were faint, slowly healing cuts on Theo’s hands when Liam opened the door. The leaking red blood, a vibrant smear against his pale skin. The words Liam had been holding in his throat died almost as soon as he got the door open. Distracted first by the blood and secondly by the idea that Theo had shown up. A small part of him had been thinking over his conversation with Theo. Trying to parse out if he had pissed off the other boy enough to warrant being ignored. But evidently he should have just had a little more faith. “Are you going to let me in or is this a standing on your porch in a dead silence kind of situation?” Theo’s voice echoed quietly, snapping Liam out of his daze. He shot a glare at Theo and gave a violent sniff to try and clear his congestion. Theo slipped past him into the front room. Liam recognized his hoodie. He had seen in on Theo recently. Maybe it was a favorite of the chimera’s or something. “What’s the matter with your hands?” He asked as he shut and locked the door. Theo paused from where he had been crouched down, in the middle of untying his shoes. His converse had blood on them too. Full out droplets of blood splattered across the point of his shoes and running over the rubber sole. Theo flexed his hand, the tendons tightened and released like a machine, pulling the blue tinted veins to the surface of the skin. Stiles had called Theo cold blooded once. He had been trying to call him callous and uncaring. Instead he ended up offending Corey who did actually have the cold blood of a reptile running through his veins. The effect of Stiles’ words had lingered for a while in Liam’s mind however. The comment had been said the night before Stiles left back for Virginia. Scott had also left around the same time. The pack had been trying to spend one last week together before everyone went their separate ways for the next year. Liam knew better though. It was just a way for Scott to keep an eye on everyone and make a last ditch effort at finding Monroe before the pack was spread across the states. Obviously, there had been no luck on the Monroe front. Regardless Stiles had taken the opportunity to walk Liam though all of the people in Beacon Hills that he had to watch out for. They talked about the nurses in Eichen house. They talked about suspicious teachers. They talked about Monroe. They talked about Nolan. They talked about Peter. And they talked about Theo.Stiles was still convinced that Theo was up to no good. A view heavily backed by Malia and a few other pack members. Liam was less confident. At the time it had been only a week prior that Liam had last seen Theo. He could still feel the burning grip that Theo had grabbed him with when he shielded Liam from Gabe’s bullets. He had changed his clothes. He had washed the blood from his skin. He had healed his injuries and he could still feel Theo’s hands on his body. Liam hadn’t told Stiles about that part. He just nodded along and tried not to think too hard about Theo. Hell, when it came down to it, he hadn’t even told Scott about it all. Somehow he figured Scott might have known. Liam found out later on that Scott had been the one to call Theo that night at the hospital. He didn’t know if that made it better or worse. Knowing that Scott trusted in Theo enough to call him. Or knowing that Theo hadn’t shown up for Liam entirely of his own volition. Scott was gone now. It was just Liam left with the trust in Theo. Which meant that it wasn’t Scott’s violation making Theo show up for Liam. It must have been of Theo’s own volition. Theo straightened up in front of him. Converse now tucked away on the shoe rack. His green eyes were trained down on the cuts on his hands. As if he could will them to heal faster by force alone. One of the smaller cuts closed up.
Maybe he could.
“Paper cuts.” He said finally, a note of finality hanging in his voice. Liam blinked once. He was about to shoot back that the cuts were far too big to be caused by mere paper, when Theo cut him off. “What's the matter with your eyes?” He asked in a near perfect imitation of his question days prior in the back of the Sheriff’s truck. “I was crying.” Liam lied, remembering the excuse that Theo had offered up the last time. He wiped at his eyes and sniffled a little trying to mimic wiping away tears. Theo’s eyebrow rose up slowly, and he cocked his head like a confused dog, “you don’t smell sad though?”Liam shrugged, brushing past Theo and heading for the stairs, trusting the chimera to follow after. This was already not going the way that he had been hoping for. Compared to his own, Theo’s footsteps were near dead silent as he followed Liam up the stairs. Liam pushed his bedroom door open and waited for Theo to follow after him. But after a beat there was no sign of the other boy. He poked his head back out into the hallway to find Theo standing in front of the open bathroom door, head cocked slightly to the side. Liam glanced in as well and mentally cursed himself, spotting the bottle of Dimetapp on the counter.Theo turned, making eye contact with Liam as he did. Liam opened his mouth to hurry Theo up but before he could get a word in Theo raised a hand pointing towards the bathroom. “Can I wash my hands first?” Liam glanced down at the few blood smears over the skin of his hands and nodded wordlessly. Theo disappeared into the bathroom, shutting the door behind him. Liam returned to his bedroom, plopping down on the messy bedspread to wait. Sitting there in the silence he tried to just breathe. Distantly he heard as Theo flicked on the water in the bathroom. But as he tried to inhale his body refused to allow him. The congestion and stuffiness was back in his nose, clogging up the surrounding scents, as if he was breathing through cotton. His eyes were itching again and Liam scrubbed at them wincing as they came away wet with irritated tears. He tried to inhale but his breath caught and left him violently sneezing again. A pressure built in his chest. A feeling like a pair of hands reaching out and closing around his lungs. Shutting off his ability to breathe, leaving him choking on nothingness. Another breath heaved out and deep in his chest his wolf shuddered, curling its tail around itself and whimpering softly. Suddenly the pressure shifted. The skin around his wrist, enveloped in a cold sensation, pressing down into his heart beat there. Liam opened his eyes and was greeted with a blurry image of his floor. The irritation in his eyes hadn’t gone away yet, but he powered on and looked all the way up. Through the gossamer imaging Liam recognized Theo standing before him. His head was cocked faintly to the side causing the curl of his bangs to fall across his forehead. Liam blinked and tried to swallow down the bile in the back of his throat. He still couldn’t breathe properly, but the wheezing breaths weren’t as difficult to get through now. Theo’s hand had wrapped itself around Liam’s wrist he realized. The chimera’s skin the source of cool pressure over his heart beat. Once Theo spotted Liam’s eyes on his he released his hand. Liam’s hand just about twitched with the sheer desperation to grab Theo’s hand and pull it back. Theo’s eyes shot to his hand and he quickly stepped back. It was then that Liam noticed he had one hand tucked carefully behind his back. “What is going on with you little wolf?” Theo asked, voice quiet as if he was afraid to break the silence hanging in the bedroom. Liam chewed at his lip. He had called Theo for help. But not for help with his own personal problems. He had to stay focused. To deal with the issues that they were facing at present. To deal with Riley, with Kara, with Everett. They came first. Liam shook his head, pushing himself to his feet, scrubbing quickly at his eyes to hold off the irritation for a half second while he spoke. “You remember that body that we went to see a few days ago with Stilinski and Deaton?” Theo’s eyebrow pulled, “you mean the one I got arrested over? Yeah I remember that.”Liam almost winced at that, when a sudden thought occurred to him. Stilinski had never officially told Theo he was free to go after they left the morgue. How had he not been arrested again? “Yeah that—how did you get out of that anyways? I thought Stilinski said you were still technically under arrest?”Theo gave a one shouldered shrug, “when he gave me my keys back he said I was free to go.”For a moment hope flooded through Liam, maybe Stilinski had dropped the charges. But then another thought struck him. The unofficial record. Stilinski had said he wasn’t going to wait on getting it officialized. He hadn’t let Theo go just as a gesture of good will. He had let him go so see if Theo would do anything to add further to the record. Theo obviously didn’t know about the record. But Liam did. Was he supposed to tell him? Warn him? What would he even say?
“Hey Theo I don’t know where you’ve been or what you’ve been doing for the past nine months but try not to commit any more crimes in Beacon Hills. You might get life in prison for it!”
Yeah, somehow Liam couldn’t see that going over too well. “Right,” he began, trying to hide the tremor in his voice as he did, “well, the reason that I had you come over was because another person died. Same thing as those other two, eyes are completely blinded, they just dropped dead randomly. And Corey found something else—”“You can’t smell that?” Theo’s sudden voice pulled Liam out of his word-vomit. He met Theo’s eyes, brow furrowing as he tried to figure out what the other boy was talking about. For a moment neither boy moved, before Theo unfolded his arm from behind his back. He opened his hand to reveal a crumpled tissue in his hand. “I doused it in hydrogen peroxide. You can’t smell it?”“What would you do that for!?”Theo shoved his hand with the tissue closer to Liam, “Liam, take it. Can you smell it?”He hesitated for a half second. But Theo was faster, grabbing his wrist and depositing the tissue into his open hand. It unfurled slightly as it landed and Liam took a hesitant sniff of the air. He couldn’t smell a single thing. No chemicals. Liam took a bigger sniff trying to catch the scent of anything else in the room. His bed. His clothes. His lacrosse gear. Nothing. His heart pounded in his chest and Liam pulled the tissue even closer, desperately trying to find the scent. But before he could Theo snatched it out of his open palm. “Don’t do that. Hydrogen peroxide can be toxic if you inhale too much of it.” He said quietly, tissue vanishing into his pocket. “I—but wait—wait—uhh I—”“Liam,” Theo’s hand wrapped around his wrist again, right over his pulse point. If he focused just hard enough he could almost feel the echoing pulse of Theo’s heart where his thumb was pressed into his skin. Liam met Theo’s eyes. The shadow’s under his eyes were still visible but in the poor lighting of the room, it made them look softer. “The peroxide is just about all that I can smell right now. You should be able to smell that. What is going on with you? You’ve been acting so weird every time I’ve seen you.”Liam chewed at his lip, focusing on Theo’s heart beat tapping away against his skin. He slowed his frazzled breathing down until, slowly, finally, his heartbeat was thumping along to the same rhythm as Theo’s. Liam forced a breath out of his mouth.
It would be ok.
He could trust Theo with this.
“I don’t know,” he finally admitted, voice barely a whisper, “It started a few weeks ago. My nose is all congested, my eyes keep watering. I’m tired all the time and whenever I wake up in the morning’s my head keeps pounding afterwards. These nurses came to the school a week ago and did a blood draw on all of the students. We couldn’t figure out what they were there for at first, but the lead nurse finally told Stilinski today. Those two bodies that showed up, we had another one today at school and the nurses said it was a disease going around that they had been tracking.”Liam lifted his eyes from where they had drifted off to the floor. Theo’s face had been carefully smoothed over and calm as he spoke but now the slightest furrow had appeared on his forehead. “That’s not possible Liam. Supernatural creatures shouldn’t be able to get sick or get diseases like that.”Liam threw up his hands in exasperation, accidentally dislodging Theo’s hand as he did. He dropped his hands back down to his side awkwardly as Theo tucked his own back into his hoodie pockets. His skin pulsed with want where Theo’s hand had once rested. He wanted him to reach back out and take his hand again. He wanted—“I don’t know! I talked to Deaton and he said it might be possible depending on the type of creature and the type of disease!”Theo shook his head however, “No Liam, it shouldn’t be possible. In some cases, yes, maybe, it could be. But not this one.”“What sort of cases?”Theo sighed and scrubbed a hand through his hair, pushing his bangs out of his face before dropping down onto the bed, seemingly uncaring of the mess there. Liam plopped down beside him, never once taking his eyes off the other boy. “With non-supernatural creatures it is possible—”“That’s not a thing though!” Liam quickly protested, “That's just a human.” “I’m talking about chimera’s Liam!” Theo snapped back just as quickly, “With creatures made from something not based in the supernatural. Typically it’s based in pseudo-science or medical-science but either way not created supernaturally. They can get sick and be affected by disease.”“So, like, you could get sick.” Liam whispered, thoughts spinning through his head. “Yes. In theory,” Theo confirmed, “But Liam, you are supernaturally created. You got bitten by Scott who was bitten by Peter who was a born wolf. All three of you were supernaturally created so you can’t get sick from diseases like this.” His voice was firm as he stopped speaking. “That doesn’t make sense though, Deaton said there might be a way—”“Might is the key word there. Disease is constantly changing Liam, it can be different one week to the next. With supernatural creatures you have to evolve to be resistant. So it could be that there is a disease that the current generation of wolves and supernatural creatures aren’t resistant to, but the generation after them would be resistant to.”“Could that be what is happening here?” Liam’s question had Theo shrugging and sighing again, “I don’t know little wolf. I would have to see more of the data taken from the bodies after their deaths to know. But either way, this isn’t spreading like some sort of disease. If it was a disease, we would be looking at way more than just three bodies.”Liam nodded slowly trying to get his brain to absorb Theo’s words. He couldn’t be sick. It just didn’t make any sense. The bite had cured Scott’s asthma and if Liam had gotten the bite from Scott then they should be resistant to the same sort of things. Diseases included. But even as he thought it, Liam couldn’t get himself to believe it. As much as he hated to admit it, he felt sick. An image of Riley’s face that morning popped into his head. His skin, graying and covered in sweat. “What if you could see the data from the bodies? What if you could see the bodies?” Liam offered as a lightbulb idea flashed in his head. Theo turned to look back at him, “Oh? You got the bodies stored in your closet somewhere?”He rolled his eyes, “No, but I do know exactly where they are.”Liam jumped to his feet, Theo following after him as a small smile began to grow on his face. “The hospital.”They didn’t trigger any speed cameras getting over to the hospital but Liam could see the speedometer of Theo’s truck quickly creeping past the speed limit with each green light they passed. It was nearly mid afternoon by the time they pulled into the hospital parking lot but even still the lots were all packed. Theo ended up driving around in circles before finally managing to steal a spot from a car that was just pulling out. Liam hopped out of the truck, shutting the door behind him and went to walk around to Theo’s side when something caught his eye. There in the bed of the truck were three cardboard boxes. All three were taped up with clear packing tape. A stretchy cord had been wrapped around the front of the boxes and tied through two loops on either side of the truck bed to prevent the boxes from sliding around. “Did you get stuck?” Theo’s voice spoke up from the other side of the truck, clearly waiting for him. Liam glanced back and forth between the boxes and the edge of Theo’s shadow that he could see reflected in the navy paint. Liam shot him a glare that Theo probably couldn’t see and pushed the boxes out of his mind. He would ask him on the way back out. But even still memories of the other box and laughing gas lingered in the back of his mind.
What was Theo doing?
An ambulance was dropping off two patients as they reached the front doors. Liam paused to let them pass. Beside him Theo’s eyes were flitting all over the hospital grounds. Almost as if he was looking for someone. “Come on.” Liam muttered, grabbing his hand and pulling Theo after him into the hospital. The front lobby had patients sitting all over the assembled chairs and the desk was void of nurses, all of them trying to help various patients. Liam hesitated, he had planned on asking Melissa to let them back into the morgue so they could see the bodies. But Melissa was nowhere in sight. A nurse rushed past them and Liam pulled Theo further into the hospital, ducking around the mess of the lobby. The further halls weren't as busy but the doctors and nurses were all moving around with purpose. “Do you even know where you’re going?” Theo hissed at him as they passed by another hallway. Liam shot a glare over his shoulder at the other boy, Theo rolled his eyes at the sight of Liam’s glare but there was a tension in his jaw that had Liam glancing back again and again. His shoulders were tight, corded muscles tensed up as if in preparation for something. But for what? Liam blamed his distraction with Theo for not noticing the door right in front of him opening. The solid wood slammed into his face and sent him careening backwards, swearing loudly.“Oh my god! Liam!” The familiar voice of Melissa McCall exclaimed loudly. Liam faintly heard Theo snickering over the sound of blood rushing through his nose. The hit hadn’t been hard enough to break anything but it still hurt nevertheless. “Hi Ms. McCall.” He groaned out, voice slightly muffled by his hand over his nose as he straightened back up. Her face was twisted up in an apologetic grimace as he did, a clipboard clenched in her hands.. “What are you doing here Liam?”“We were going to see if you would let us check out that new body from the high school. We think it’s supernaturally related and Deaton had a few ideas about what might be happening.”“We?”Liam nodded, turning towards where Theo had originally been beside him, only to find the other boy a few steps behind them, waiting. Melissa followed his line of sight and spotted Theo, her expression quickly closing off into something sharper. “What are you doing here?” She demanded. And before Liam could even take a second to register what was happening, her clipboard was flying at Theo. The oddly positioned papers had it hitting the ground at Theo’s feet rather than hitting him. But the chimera still backed off with an annoyed snarl. “Well hello to you Ms. McCall.”Melissa ignored the jab and turned instead back to Liam, her eyes flashing, “Liam what's going on?” She demanded. “You’ve seen the two bodies that came in over the past week right? Well another one came in a few hours ago and they are shutting down the school because these nurses from DC are claiming it’s a disease. But the thing is, at least two of the bodies are for sure supernatural creatures.”“But you guys can’t get sick.” Melissa interjected. Liam nodded, “Exactly. Deaton had a few ideas but said he doesn’t know much about diseases. Theo knows more about the diseases, we figured we could get some more answers if he checked out the bodies at least once. Especially the new one.”Melissa shook her head slowly, “I can’t do that—”“Why not? Come on, please Ms. McCall, we’ll be quick I promise, but we need to figure out what is going on here.” Desperation was bleeding into his words and Liam could feel his heart thudding in his chest. Ricocheting off his ribcage and making his lungs feel tight. He tried to swallow down the bile rising in his throat but just ended up nearly choking on it instead. “Liam!” He paused at her exclamation, “I can’t let you see the bodies, because we don’t have them.”“What?”“You’re talking about Riley Carson’s body, right? That was the one from today?”“Yeah it was.”Melissa nodded and shoved a loose strand of curls out of her face, “we got an announcement during the transportation of the bodies that it was being rerouted to Eichen instead.”Liam twisted a little to glance at Theo, “Why would they go to Eichen? You still have morgue space at the hospital right?”Melissa nodded again, “Not only do we have space, we currently have no bodies in our morgues.”“What about the other two bodies from last week?” Theo asked, speaking up for the first time since they had entered the hospital. Melissa’s expression did something complicated as she glanced at him but she sighed eventually.“I had the day off yesterday, but apparently my supervisors got a call from some higher ups and some nurses came in to take those two bodies to Eichen as well.”“Do you know where the nurses came from?” Liam demanded. “Uhh—” Melissa stooped over and grabbed her clipboard off the floor, flipping back a few pages, “Yeah they were listed as being from MedStar Washington Hospital Center, why?”A rush of cold flooded through Liam’s veins at her words. “Those are the same nurses who came to our school last week and did blood draws on all the students without parental permission.”Melissa’s eyes shot wide at that, “And you just didn’t tell anyone about this?! That’s such an illegal move!”“I told Stilinski! He was busy dealing with the bodies though and I figured if the school had done their checks on the nurses it couldn’t be that bad.”Melissa opened her mouth to respond, however before she could say a word, blue lights started flashing in the hallway and the hospital speakers crackled.“Code blue, code blue, all available nurses to the third floor, again this is a code blue!”“Oh shit!” Melissa muttered, “Look I need to go, you two should go as well before you run into any other nurses!” she shouted over her shoulder as she took off down the hallway. Liam turned around to face Theo who was watching her go, before his eyes slid to Liam’s.“We gotta get into Eichen now.” Liam said with a note of finality.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Two text messages and three hours later, five people stood hovered outside the front gate of Eichen House. Only two of the five were visible. Liam and Theo being concealed by Corey behind Deaton and Mason. Deaton’s hands wrapped loosely around a brown leather bag, a nearly identical, slightly older one, clenched in Mason’s hands. A part of Liam wanted to reach out and lay a comforting hand on his friend's shoulder but before he could, there was a loud screech and the gate clicked open. Deaton lifted his gaze and stepped quickly through the gate. Mason hesitated for a second, as was planned, allowing for Corey, Liam and Theo to slip past the gate undetected.
The rattle of the lock clicking into place behind them had a slight shudder running through Liam’s body but he did his best to ignore it. Beside him Corey’s eyes were locked on the imposing building before them as they approached. On the other side of him was Theo who had been nearly silent during the entire three hour making of this plan. Only interjecting once or twice to add some minute detail about Eichen’s building.
Honestly Liam probably should have been a little more concerned about how Theo knew so much about Eichen. But given that they needed to break in anyways, he was inclined to ignore it. That little voice in his head was just beginning to sound even more and more like Stiles anyways.
Dr. Howe, the replacement of Dr. Fenris, was standing at the top of the building's staircase waiting for them. His arms crossed over his chest and a sharp glare on his wrinkled face.
“Hello Mathew,” Deaton greeted as they reached the top of the staircase. Dr. Howe’s glare only deepened at the greeting. Deaton had recommended an old friend of his as the replacement Chief Medical Personnel for Eichen. However the decision had ultimately fallen with the hospital higher-ups who had hired Dr. Howe instead.
“Alan,” Dr. Howe returned the greeting before his eyes drifted over to Mason, “Did you miss the part of my phone call saying not to make this a social call?”
Mason clearly gulped, but said nothing, “This is Mason, he’s training with me and I figured this would be good field training for him.”
Dr. Howe gave Mason another look up and down before giving a nasally snort and turning around, leading the way into the building.
“Just get this mess fixed,” He muttered, “I don’t want this sort of thing to become a routine. Every single supernatural creature kept here, just passed out without notice.”
Liam couldn’t help but grin at Corey at that. Gwen had played her part perfectly. Having slipped in with a visitation group an hour earlier and placing a supernatural sedative into the water pipes. Mason held the door open behind himself just long enough for the three of them to slip inside as well. Since the last time he had been inside Eichen, things had changed around. The chairs that had once sat in the lobby were now gone, replaced with mean looking guards holding taser guns.
“You will have to check in at the front lobby and go through a metal detector before being allowed any further.” Dr. Howe explained, stepping aside and gesturing to the front desk where a nurse, flanked by two guards, stood.
“Any reason for the increase of security, Mathew?” Deaton asked, setting down his bag and stepping up to the desk. A clear box was placed in front of him and Deaton quickly began unloading his pockets. Liam glanced over towards Corey as the other boy quickly shook his arm to get his attention. Corey shot him a look which Liam couldn’t distinguish, before Theo leaned around him to hold up and wiggle his phone at Liam.
It was then that Corey’s message hit him. Their phones would all go off in the metal detector. With the new layout of Eichen, the only way to get into the actual patient center and morgue, where they needed to be, was through the detector. Theo waved a hand in front of Liam’s face to catch his attention and then pointed towards Deaton’s bag which was sitting on the floor.
Liam had watched him pack the bag, it had to have metal in it already. If they could shove all three of their phones into the bag, Dr. Howe would have to let it pass. Using his free hand Liam quickly dug his phone out of his pocket and passed it over to Theo. He could see Corey’s phone poking out of his pocket and quickly grabbed it, passing it over to Theo as well. Corey shot him a thankful smile and nod, as both of his hands were busy keeping Liam and Theo invisible.
With a gentle tug Theo moved them closer to the bag, crouching down, resting the phones on top of his knee. In front of them Deaton finished writing his information on the sign in sheet and stepped back so Mason could also write his own. Liam saw only out of the corner of his eye as Deaton began to move towards his bag on the floor.
Without thinking Liam lunged for him. Catching Deaton by the arm and stopping him from moving. Not expecting the grab, Deaton startled a little, but thankfully kept his face blank enough to not alert Dr. Howe. One of the guards caught the jolt however and stepped forwards, Liam could feel Corey’s hand stretching to keep his hold on him and Theo at the same time.
“Phones!” He quietly hissed to Deaton before releasing his arm and shifting back closer to Corey and Theo. Deaton gave the smallest possible nod before he turned back around to watch Mason, leaving his bag open on the ground. Dr. Howe caught sight of one of the guards moving forwards and whipped back around to Deaton. With both the guard and Dr. Howe, staring at Deaton who was right in front of them, Theo tugged the three of them around to the other side of the bag.
Even with Corey’s invisibility it was better to be out of potential sight if something went wrong. Slowly, carefully, Theo unclasped the small magnetic clip on the front and began to open the bag slightly.
“What’s in your bag?” Dr. Howe demanded quite suddenly. Liam swore internally and Theo backed off, letting the clasp fall back into place. In seconds, two more guards had filled in on either side of him, appearing out of nowhere.
Deaton looked down slowly as if surprised by the question, “My bag? It’s my equipment.”
Dr. Howe motioned a guard forwards and they grabbed the bag away, opening the latch and upturning the contents onto the lobby desk. Mason backed up quickly as well but the guard grabbed his bag too before he could get far. With a loud clatter of supplies, everything fell out onto the table. Bottles and half filled containers landed all over the counter. Dr. Howe stepped forwards and shuffled through the various supplies, reading a few of the labels as he did.
“These will have to be run through the detector separately, due to the metal,” He finally grumbled, shoving everything incorrectly back into the bag. Liam leaned forwards to glance at Theo who shook his head and held up the three phones he still had.
“Why was it opening on its own just now?” One of the guards suddenly demanded. Mason’s eyes shot wide and his hand faltered where it had been about to grab one of the bags back.
Dr. Howe turned back to Deaton with an unimpressed eyebrow.
“What ever do you mean?” Deaton asked.
The guard gestured with his taser gun towards the clasp in Deaton’s hands.
“Oh this part?” Deaton held up the metal piece and Liam could feel his heart beginning to pound in his chest. This had become so much more of a hassle to get in than it had the last few times. The guard nodded.
“Well it’s a newer bag, so the magnet is pretty powerful. Sometimes if it isn’t properly closed it can look like
someone else
is opening it.” The last words were intentional as he said them and Liam quickly caught on. Pulling Corey and Theo over towards Deaton so that he could grab onto the small clasp as well. Deaton released the clasp and, unseen by all but two of the room's occupants, Liam flipped the flap all the way open.
The guard made a startled noise and Dr. Howe stepped closer, his eyes narrowing as he glared at the bag. On the other side of him Theo quickly stepped up and around, spotting his chance, and dropped one of the phones down into the side pouch of the bag. It slipped in silently, but before he could get another Deaton flipped the bag back closed. Despite being invisible, the glare that Theo shot at Deaton was impressive. Liam bit down on the inside of his lip so he didn’t start laughing and flipped the bag open again.
Another phone slipped inside, and this time Theo got the last two phones inside the bag before Deaton flipped it back closed.
“You see, it's just the magnet.” He said slowly, putting the latch back into place. Liam glanced up as well, watching the faces of everyone in the room. The guards looked bewildered along with the nurse, Dr. Howe however, did not look as convinced. He glared back and forth between Deaton’s face and the bag for a moment before shaking his head and nodding towards the metal detector with a dispirited glare.
Deaton motioned for Mason to go first and Liam allowed Corey to tug him a little further out of the way. They would be going through the detector last. This hadn’t been a part of the plan, but even still, they could improvise pretty well together.
Mason went through first. A loud hum built up from the machine growing in power until a loud beep emitted from the computer on the other side and the light flashed green. Mason was clear. Deaton went next, stepping through to similar results, leaving only Dr. Howe on the other side with their bags. He passed through Mason’s bag first to a guard. The same hum built up inside the machine, but rather than fading into the beep a loud ringing burst out of the computer instead.
Liam flinched, trying not to make any noise despite his ear drums feeling like they were about to burst. The light began to flash red and the beeping continued to rise in volume. On the other side the guard grabbed the bag and clicked a button on the computer. The noise abruptly shut off and the guard nodded. Dr. Howe passed the second bag through with the same result. The noise went off again, vibrating down Liam’s ear drums and making it feel like his brain was vibrating in time with it.
The noise shut off and Dr. Howe himself stepped through the metal detector, the light flashed green and then the three of them set off down the hallway. Liam tugged on Corey’s hand, quickly pulling the three of them through the detector and down the hall. The guards, having returned to their posts, didn’t see as the light on the detector flashed green one extra time.
Dr. Howe led them all down the hallways towards the central staircase. Their footsteps echoed loudly with each stair down and Liam winced to himself, trying to focus on Corey and Theo’s footsteps to match to. As expected he could barely hear Theo’s footsteps but Corey’s were louder so he focused on those. Looking down in order to properly time their steps without falling flat on his face and exposing the whole plan.
They reached the basement and Dr. Howe turned to the left, down a long hallway with identical rooms on each side of it. Corey began to walk slower, forcing Liam and Theo to also slow down to match his pace. They passed by the first set of double metal doors. And then the second. And then the third. But by the fourth set they had reached their target.
Liam could see the large words ‘Morgue’ posted beside the double doors and they slowed down to a halt. Waiting for Deaton and Mason to vanish around the corner with Dr. Howe. The moment they were gone from sight Corey released both of their hands and shoved them through the swinging doors into the morgue.
They both hesitated inside, listening to Corey’s footsteps disappear down the hallway again. His job was to wait at the end of the hallway and then text them whenever Deaton was coming back so they could all sneak back out behind him and Mason. The hallway outside fell silent until Theo spoke up, his voice echoing strangely against the metal walls.
“Deaton has all of our phones,” He pointed out quietly, “How’s Corey going to be able to tell us when they are coming back.”
Fuck. That complicated things.
“I’m sure he’ll figure it out, we need to check out that body before Deaton and Mason get the rest of the supernatural's in here woken back up.”
Theo sighed but nodded, checking his watch which was borrowed from Deaton. The small timer inside beeped as he set it for twenty-five minutes. One minute for each creature that needed to get the antidote.
The last time Liam had been inside the Eichen morgue it had been inside of a body bag. Thankfully, unlike upstairs, not much had changed. Aside from a few tables having been moved around a large hole had been punched in the ceiling. Metal bars were bent down towards the ground and the ceiling paneling around it was cracked. It almost looked like something had fallen through the ceiling.
Pushing it out of his mind Liam walked over to the wall on the right side and Theo took the left. The small tags on each metal drawer were faded and wrinkled but the names on them appeared to be fresh. The first row didn’t have Riley’s body, and neither did the second but as he reached the third row, Liam found it.
Riley Carson - 18/M
“I found it!” He cheered quietly, voice still managing to echo as if he had yelled it. Theo appeared quickly. His eyes scanning over all of the tags on Liam’s side as well before reaching down and unlatching the drawer. It came open with a single tug and despite the curtain covering Riley’s face, Liam’s heart still sank into his stomach.
“You don’t have to watch.” Theo said, his voice soft as he flipped the curtain back. Liam shook his head. Theo seemed more assured of himself in Eichen’s morgue than he had back at the hospital morgue. Perhaps he had some sort of personal grudge against that morgue because of the whole Ghost Rider thing.
Whoever had brought Riley in hadn’t even bothered to close his eyes properly, the blinded white irises still staring lifelessly up at the ceiling. Theo tugged at the skin underneath his eye, pulling it back to peer at the underside of the eye. Strangely enough, where there would have been veins on a normal eye, there were none.
“Did you ever find out if this kid was supernatural?” Theo asked, releasing the skin and lifting one of Riley’s hands to peer at his nail beds.
“No, but it would make sense wouldn’t it? Kara and Everett both were. Three makes a pattern right?”
Theo shrugged, “Depends. This is less of looking for a pattern and more of trying to solve an equation. This,” Theo gestured to the body, “is the answer to the equation, but we don’t know the factors going into this. If we assume that because of the manner of death, that one of the factors is being supernatural, then we could end up jumping to conclusions about things.”
Liam resisted rolling his eyes. He knew Theo was right but that logic meant they were still missing something. He wiped at his nose, trying to ignore the congestion still hovering there.
“Is there any way to tell if someone is supernatural once they are dead?”
“If he’s a were-creature, yeah there is.” Theo muttered, dropping his hand and pulling Riley up by the back of his neck so he was hovering a few inches off the table.
“Whoa! What are you
—!”
Before he could demand further, Theo pressed into something at the back of Riley’s neck. There was a loud popping noise and Liam jerked backwards as the tips of Riley’s fingers exploded open. Blood gushing out of his nail beds, and running out the sides of his closed mouth.
“What the fuck was that for!? What did you do!?” Liam nearly shrieked, leaping away to avoid the rivers of blood.
“That’s not supposed to happen!” Theo hissed right back, his eyes locked on the blood. He carefully pulled Riley’s upper lip back and a pool of built up blood went slithering out down the side of his face. Theo frowned at whatever he was looking at and Liam edged a little closer.
“That’s weird.”
“What is?”
Theo released Riley’s lip, “werewolf’s and most other were-creatures with claws and fangs have a pressure point at the very back of their neck. When you get bitten the muscle grows there, it helps with the extra weight on the jaw from your fangs. It’s why the back of your neck gets really sore after you’ve been shifted for a long time. Born wolves have the same thing, but they get used to it because it grows with their bodies.”
Liam reached up, pressing into the skin there at the back of his neck. He had always assumed the soreness there had come from overextending his jaw too much.
“If pressure is applied to that muscle after death it should cause the claws and fangs of any creature to drop. Press it again and they go back in.”
“Why didn’t Deaton try that when we had to try and hide all those bodies of chimera’s that the Dread Doctors killed?” Liam couldn’t resist interrupting. Theo shot him a pointed glare and Liam mentally bit his tongue at that
“He probably knew it wouldn’t work. Chimera’s don’t have that same muscle.”
“Oh. So does this mean that Riley was supernatural?” Liam asked, gesturing towards the mess which was now beginning to bleed onto the floor.
Theo shook his head, “I don’t know. It’s not supposed to do
this.
Putting pressure on the muscle should just make them drop. This here just made the skin burst open, but nothing actually dropped. The socket where the fangs should be is empty.”
“What does that mean?”
Theo pulled the cloth back up to cover Riley’s face, but paused as he did, staring at something on the side of his neck.
“It looks almost like the supernatural part of him was removed.” Liam could feel his heart rate beginning to pick up in his chest at that.
Removed? Or killed off by a disease?
“Liam,” He looked up at Theo’s call. The chimera was staring him directly in the eye now, almost reading his thoughts, “whatever this is, it’s not a disease. I’m confident of it.”
Liam opened his mouth to fight back that it
could be
when a sudden slam of metal outside had them both jolting upright.
“What was that?” Liam demanded moving to peer out the morgue door windows. Behind him Theo slammed the drawer shut. Liam peered down the hallway, three nurses in white lab coats stood hovered around a covered rolling bed in the middle of the hall, barely a few feet away. Corey must have seen them coming and was trying to give Liam and Theo time to hide.
“Fuck,” he hissed, “nurses.”
Theo’s eyes flitted all over the morgue before landing on a table positioned directly under the cracked open portion of the ceiling. He grabbed Liam by the hand, pulling him away from the door and towards the table.
“Theo! What—!”
“Go! Up! Now!”
Without giving a second to consider exactly what he was doing Liam hopped up on the table and grabbed one of the metal bars, using it to help pull himself upwards and into the ceiling. It was much taller than he had expected up there but the paneling looked nowhere near safe to stand on. He stuck to the metal beams, running in a grid like pattern, shuffling backwards a few feet so Theo had room to hop up beside him. Just as the chimera got himself fully up and out of sight, the door swung open.
Liam held his breath, his feet wobbling on the beam as he did. It was barely a few inches wide, nowhere near enough support for him to stand on. Below them wheels rattled as the three nurses entered, with a rolling bed between them. One nurse unlatched one of the drawers and the other two began to lift the body off the bed. Liam leaned forwards trying to see better when another wobble sent him falling off balance.
Theo caught him around the waist, just in the nick of time before he went back through the opening in the ceiling.
“Stop moving around,” Theo hissed in his ear. From where he was pressed into Theo’s chest he could feel the vibrations of his words as they echoed into his ear. Liam swallowed trying to clear his suddenly dry throat. They had shifted on the beam, no longer standing next to each other, now basically on top of one another. Liam’s right foot bracketed by Theo’s legs.
With Theo’s arm wrapped around his waist pinning him in place and preventing him from falling Liam had no idea what to do with his own hands. Hovering awkwardly just above Theo’s shoulders. He just about missed the nurses beginning to speak, too much in his own head over the whole situation.
“We’re running out of space here,” One of the nurses muttered, clearly a gripe as he worked.
“I’ll let the Doctor know and see if we can do a dump run after this. Ready?” the other nurse nodded, together they lifted the body up and onto the metal drawer. As they set it down the white sheet slipped off to the side revealing a young woman that Liam had never seen before. But there was one thing he had seen before. Her eyes. Completely white and unseeing. A nurse fixed the sheet and gave the door a shove
“Do you see what’s wrong here?” Theo whispered to Liam, his voice completely calm.
“Yeah the dead fucking body? I see it!”
“No not that. Look at all the drawers, every single drawer in here is filled with a dead body. The last time that happened was when
le Bête was running rampant.” Liam’s heart sank as he realized the truth of Theo’s statement. Every single drawer that he had checked looking for Riley’s body had a different name written on them. Eichen had a total of fourteen morgue drawers, thirteen of them were now filled. Thirteen dead bodies in Beacon Hills, only three of which Sheriff Stilinski knew about.
“Morgue’s can only keep bodies for a week, these are all recent too.”
Liam twisted slightly to look at Theo. Without realizing it his arms had come down and settled around Theo’s shoulders. Pressed together like his Liam could feel Theo’s heartbeat echoing against his body. The slower, calmer beat a direct opposite to Liam’s racing heart. He huffed out a breath trying to regulate himself to breathe easier.
Theo’s eyes scanned over his face and even in the poor lighting of the morgue ceiling Liam could tell the exact shade of green that his eyes were. It was then that Liam began to remember the feeling. The feeling of being at Theo’s side when fighting the Ghost Riders. The feeling of being at Theo’s side when fighting the hunters.
The feeling of waking up in Theo’s truck after the zoo and feeling nothing but warmth and safety. Theo’s arm tightened around his waist and Liam’s gaze slipped down to Theo’s face. To the sharp cut of his jaw. The soft curve of his cheekbones and slight part of his lips. A faint smattering of freckles falling over the bridge of his nose. Looking like the first snowflakes falling in the middle of winter when you just knew it was about to consume the entire world in soft blankets of snow.
Theo glanced back down at the nurses who were doing something that Liam had no such desire to focus on. A curl of hair had fallen out of its usual gelled spot and Liam realized he hadn’t seen Theo gel his hair back once since he reappeared. Always leaving it soft and long, falling around his face. The fabric of his hoodie was soft under his hands and Liam could feel a few fabric pills along his back.
Now watching Theo’s profile as he gazed down at the nurses, expression blank but a focused look in his eyes, Liam was struck with a realization. Theo was pretty. Like really pretty. He was pretty in the way that winter was pretty. Cold and sharp for those unprepared, but if you caught it at the right moment, when the sun caught the crystalline flakes of snow, lighting everything up in a silvery glow it looked like heaven.
He was pretty in the way that blood and broken noses and bruises were pretty. Dark and slightly damning but also addicting as all hell. Liam had always been a chronic bruise presser growing up. A habit which had clearly extended into his teen years. He had been digging into the Theo shaped bruise in his consciousness throughout the past nine months. Distantly Liam figured he had always been aware of this. But now with all the evidence staring him in the face the realization hit even harder.
Maybe this was the worst possible time for Liam to have realized this.
They were stuck in a ceiling, with thirteen dead bodies under them.
Thirteen
supernatural
dead bodies.
Maybe caused by a disease.
Maybe something else.
Maybe Liam was dying too.
But damn it all, Theo was fucking pretty and Liam was mentally kicking himself.
Where the
hell
was he supposed to go from here?
“You ready?”
Liam’s eyes shot to Theo who was looking at him again suddenly. The nurses were gone below them.
“Where are we going?”
“Down.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Corey managed to get them out almost as soon as the nurses left, and nearly thirty minutes later they met up with Mason, Deaton and Gwen inside the animal clinic. Liam could tell almost immediately upon entering the clinic that something else had gone wrong within their plan. Matching tense expressions lingering on everyone’s faces as they entered the room. “You three get out alright?” Deaton asked, grabbing his leather bag and pulling out each of their phones to return. Liam nodded, grabbing his own phone and passing Theo his phone where the other boy was lingering behind him. Theo took it with a nod, slipping his phone into his back pocket.“Yeah, we had some nurses come into the morgue unexpectedly, but it was fine.” Deaton nodded and Mason and Gwen let out near identical sighs of relief. Deaton motioned for them all to gather up around the table. “So? What did you guys find?” Gwen quickly demanded. “It’s not a disease,” Liam began, hoping the words would give him strength to keep going. “What is it then?” Mason leaned forwards on the table. Liam turned to look at Theo, the movement causing their shoulders to brush together. Turns out Theo was already looking at him causing the words to dry instantly in his throat. Liam opened and closed his mouth uselessly a few times before giving up and just nodding at the other boy to get him to explain. With the nurses coming in when they did hadn’t allowed for Theo to fully explain what he had found with Riley’s body. Despite his lack of words Theo seemed to understand what Liam was asking and shifted closer to the table.
Closer to Liam as well.
“Were-creatures have a pressure point at the back of their neck that if pressed forces their claws and fangs to drop. I did that with this body and rather than his claws and fangs dropping it just caused the skin there to explode. The sockets where his teeth and claws were supposed to be were completely empty. Disregarding the fact that supernatural creatures can’t get diseases, there isn’t a disease that could infect a supernatural creature like that.” He explained. Liam looked over to Deaton waiting to see what he had to say. A look of contemplation had taken over his face and a furrow had formed between his brows. “So that has to mean that those nurses are here for something else then right?” Corey spoke up, “like something supernatural?”“But why would they go after the entire high school then? If they were hunters for example, wouldn’t they already have what they needed from the war last year?” Gwen offered. Deaton shook his head, “I don’t think it is wise to completely rule out a medical explanation here. A disease might not be the cause of this, but an infection could.”Looking between them all, Deaton nodded and spun around, pulling open a drawer and rooting through some of the files there. After a moment of searching he pulled out a blue file and flipped it open on the table.“Septic shock can cause similar symptoms if the body reacts poorly to an infection. It can cause death within twelve hours in shock cases. Other cases without shock involved can survive for longer but it is a fatal condition. Some of the symptoms include organ failure and damage to parts of the body. It can also show up as a fever with difficulty breathing.” Almost as soon as he said the words Liam’s lungs seized again, leaving him choking silently on nothing but air. Theo caught sight of him as Liam twisted away from the table to conceal himself. His hand landed on Liam’s wrist, holding him tight. Liam tried to pull away but Theo refused to let go, strengthening his grip and stepping with Liam away from the table. “Is there a way to determine death from septic shock after the fact?” Gwen asked from behind them. “Not really,” Deaton said, “I would need an active case in order to determine if it is or not. And we don’t have any patients who are currently sick.”
But maybe they did.
His heartbeat was going even faster now and Liam could barely breathe through the congestion in his nose. This was it wasn’t it? Theo had been wrong. Liam had to be sick. This was the answer they had been looking for. “Septic shock is something that happens in humans and non-supernatural creatures though,” Theo spoke up, biting back for the first time in a long time, “we know for sure that two of the bodies are from supernatural creatures. More than likely that third body was too.”Deaton gave a little half shrug and flipped the file closed, “supernatural creatures can still get infections, their healing doesn't protect them against that. It can make them more resistant, but not invulnerable.”“Melissa said all the bodies had been moved to Eichen right?” Mason spoke up, “Did you guys check if the same thing happened with Kara and Everett’s bodies, that would be proof of a pattern right?”Liam could see the muscle in the side of Theo’s face twitch slightly at that, “No,” he said, trying to rejoin the conversation without making his miniature freakout too obvious, “these three nurses rolled in another body. It was the same as Riley, Kara and Everett. Eyes were completely blinded out.”“Wait what?” Mason’s face had gone a startling shade of white and he looked quickly towards Deaton who cocked his head in concerned interest. “They said something else too. Apparently, the Eichen morgue is completely filled with bodies. There are fourteen drawers in there and thirteen of them are filled.”“Did you see Kara and Everett’s name tags in there as well?” Mason demanded. Liam looked to Theo who nodded, “yeah, I saw them, why?”“So without the three of them that means ten bodies that are in the morgue that we didn’t know about.”Deaton spun around and went digging through another filing cabinet before he pulled out a thick, worn file with green text scribbled on the front. He plopped it down with a cloud of dust billowing off the top as he did. “Dr. Howe didn’t specify anything about the supernatural creatures who had been affected by the sedative when he called me. The last time I was in Eichen for something supernaturally related, I made a head count. At the time there were thirty-four supernatural creatures, when Mason and I were in there today, there were sixteen.”Something dropped into the pit of Liam’s stomach, maybe his heart, maybe his nerve. “What does that mean?” Gwen demanded. Deaton didn’t respond, merely flicking the file open and pulling out smaller individual files from within. He shifted the file to the side, laying out a total of ten smaller files on the table before them. “It means that we are missing eighteen supernatural creatures from what should be the most secure pseudo-prison in Beacon Hills.”Gwen’s eyes shot wide and Corey made a noise in the back of his throat, Liam glanced over towards Theo. His eyes were locked on the table before them, bright shimmering green in the vibrant lights of the clinic. Theo must have felt Liam’s eyes on him because he glanced over, meeting Liam’s gaze. The sharp eyed stare roamed over his face for a moment before Theo nodded towards the table and Liam realized he was trying to tell him something. The files each had a picture on the very top. A small polaroid, stapled into the uppermost corner with the person’s name in matching green ink below it. The file on the closest corner to them was of a young woman with dark hair. She had an all too familiar lens flare surrounding her eyes and most of her face, but even still Liam recognized her. “That’s her.” He whispered, realizing what Theo had been trying to point out to him. “What?” Liam looked up to Deaton who had asked the question. He pointed down to the polaroid of the woman. “Her. She was in the rolling bed that those nurses brought into the morgue when Theo and I were in there.”“Are you sure?”“Positive. We were hiding out in the ceiling tiles right above her body.”A pensive furrow formed between Deaton’s brows and his lips flattened out into a wrinkled line. After a pause he turned around and grabbed the large file pulling out a handful of other files. He passed them over to Mason, collecting up the rest of the files save for the one Liam pointed out. “Can you identify the sixteen people who we administered care to today in Eichen?” Mason nodded and began quickly flipping through the files and pulling out a file every so often, placing them in a small pile on the table. After barely five minutes they had two piles before them. One was a pile of sixteen people who were current confirmed supernatural creatures in Eichen. The other was a pile of seventeen possible missing cases. The girl that Liam and Theo had watched be brought in was a werecoyote who had been admitted into Eichen four years prior after a series of hallucination based break-in’s on her record. But now she was just dead. The place that was supposed to care for her and protect her, having an possible invisible hand in her death. Looking over the pile of seventeen other missing supernatural creatures Liam couldn’t help but wish that Scott had dropped him instead that night at the hospital. The dead weren't required to get this involved in things. They weren’t required to care. They weren’t required to stick around and see things like this through. The solid weight of Theo’s shoulder pressing into his own had Liam tipping himself sideways with a little more force. He wondered sometimes what it would be like to follow in Theo’s footsteps. Buy a shitty old car, jump on the road with all the money in his bank account and drive until he found the edge of the world or a world better than this one. Honestly he couldn’t even be mad at Theo for leaving Beacon Hills anymore. There was no point. Liam understood. Hell he was jealous of it. Maybe if he asked nicely and promised to pay for gas Theo would take him away from this place now. They could go looking for the edge of the world together.“You five should head home.” Deaton’s voice broke Liam out of his daydream of pretty views and prettier boys, “I’ll get in contact with Sheriff Stilinski about this.”“I don’t know if he’s going to be able to deal with that right now,” Liam spoke up, trying to make it seem like he was totally paying attention and not off in la la land.Mason’s face was incredulous as he turned to stare at him, “this is seventeen missing people and one dead girl with no official death certificate that we know of Liam. What the hell else would he be doing?”“The school is still shut down right now, he’s busy with that, I guarantee it.” Understanding dawned on Mason’s face and he bit at his lip. Deaton nodded, “It’s almost evening time, you five go home, get some sleep, eat some dinner. I will take care of Sheriff Stilinski.” He gathered up the files and pulled out a stray rubber band to wrap around the files. Gwen was the first to leave. Ducking out the front doors as her mom began to call asking where on earth she was. Deaton led the rest of them to the door behind her. Outside the sky was already beginning to darken and the street lights were flickering on, illuminating the way back out of the clinic. Liam could see the sign in the window hanging on closed, Deaton had been keeping it closed all day after they arrived from the hospital that afternoon.Staring at the sign, silhouetted from behind by stray street lights, the world began to spin around him. Voices fading in and out of focus. Gwen’s tail lights formed twin trails of red light pulling out of the parking lot and disappearing around the corner. The trails lingered long after her car vanished down the road. Liam sniffled, a little halfheartedly. His nose resisted, still blocked by congestion and the throbbing pressure that had been hanging there all morning began to slither its way up his nasal bone. Pressing and pressing like a desperate grave digger who had been locked into the coffin. Digging further and further down to try and get out, but knowing even still that down meant death. Liam had no idea how to start climbing out of the grave that he had dug for himself. He was much too far from the top to jump back up, and his shovel was far too broken to do anything but dig. Icy pressure closed around his wrist, pressing into his heartbeat there and Liam just about wept. Water flooded into the grave surrounding him. But rather than drowning out his screaming, it wrapped itself around his tired body and urged him to the surface. He could distantly feel a second heartbeat pressing up against his own. The echoing heartbeat of someone’s thumb resting against his skin there.
Theo’s heart.
He knew it without question and without regard. He could recognize its calming beat from worlds away. But they weren’t world’s away; Theo was right next to him. Liam refocused his eyes on the situation before him. The trails from Gwen’s lights faded away into darkness and they were standing outside the clinic. Liam facing out into the parking lot, staring at Theo’s truck, parked next to Mason’s car. Corey and Deaton talking quietly from opposite sides of the door frame. Liam blinked once, then twice, then turned around. Theo was much closer than he had expected. The other boy nearly chest to chest with him, staring at the side of his face with a blank expression. Although, it wasn’t really blank. He looked, calm almost, at peace. Without even thinking about it Liam turned the rest of the way, pressing his forehead into Theo’s shoulder. For a moment nothing happened and Liam realized just how tense Theo had suddenly gone. Awareness flooded back into him and Liam went to straighten back up, but before he could, the hand that wasn’t wrapped around his wrist, lifted up and wrapped around his waist. It was like the final plunge into a pool that your body hadn’t quite adjusted to yet. The hot air around them of the late June evening had nothing on the soft chill of Theo’s arms around it.The sensation washed over him and Liam relaxed back into the hold. Theo’s heartbeat pumping along steadily beside his. The fabric of his hoodie sealing Liam’s eyes away from the excess stimuli surrounding them. And the solid weight of his arm, wrapped soothingly around his waist, grounding him. A sudden tap against the inside of his wrist had Liam snapping to awareness. He lifted his head up slightly only to be met with the sound of Mason’s voice calling his name. “Liam!”He looked up, blinking back the blurry pools of light running across his vision. Liam twisted a little, searching for the familiar form of his best friend while trying not to dislodge Theo’s arm. “Mmmhh?” He forced out upon finding Mason standing a few feet away staring at the two of them. Corey and Deaton were staring as well but they had clearly been mid conversation as they turned back to what they were doing. “I’m going to give you a ride home, if you’re tired you can wait in the car,” Mason said, his voice back to normal volume levels. Liam frowned. Heading towards the school Liam’s house was in between Masons’ and the school making for easy pick-up and drop off. But from the animal clinic to Liam’s house, it was further away than Mason’s house. He would be going out of both his and Corey’s way to drop Liam off. “Oh that’s ok Mase, Theo can—”“I want to though.”And that was that. The protests died in Liam’s throat and his words closed up. Around his waist Theo’s grip tightened almost to the point that Liam could feel his fingerprints through his shirt. Behind them all Deaton bid Corey goodnight and shut the door behind himself. Mason twisted half towards Corey and dug into his pockets for his keys. As he did, Corey's eyes slid from Mason over to Liam and Theo. Without even meaning to, Liam had returned to pressing his head into Theo’s shoulder. Behind them Mason’s car beeped loudly and Corey hurried down the stairs. Mason paused however, clearly waiting for Liam. Liam gave him an awkward smile before twisting to fully face Theo who had yet to release him. The chimera locked eyes with Liam and for a moment he did nothing, but then his lips twisted into a halfway smirk. “Don’t get yourself into trouble on the way home little wolf.” He murmured, voice as soft as falling trees. Despite the exhaustion beginning to flood into Liam’s body he mustered up the energy to shove at Theo in pseudo-annoyance. The shove was gentle but Theo took it in stride, stepping fully away from Liam. It was like getting hit by a lamp post. Everything came rushing back in all at once and Liam could almost hear the reverberating metal from the hypothetical lamp post vibrating through his skin. Suddenly the world around them had gotten much darker and the street lights much brighter. The air around them was stiflingly hot and Liam found himself regretting changing into a long sleeve shirt that afternoon. Stumbling down the gravel Liam followed Mason towards his car, and even with the usual silence of Theo’s footsteps, Liam knew without question the chimera had not followed them. A fact which was only proven right when Liam climbed into the backseat of Mason’s car and he spotted Theo watching him from under the golden pool of a street light. Neither Mason or Corey said much as Liam shut the door behind him and they set off down the road. The radio was off but the headlights were bright against the pavement and Liam tipped his head back against the headrest. It was only then that he began to remember how long it had been since he had eaten any sort of food. Lunch at school had been hours ago and with the adrenaline rushes of that morning his hunger was beginning to make itself known. The drive back to their neighborhoods was short, or maybe Liam was just way too out of it to really notice how long it had taken. But before long they were pulling up in front of his house. Carefully, Liam picked his head up off the headrest and reached for the door handle. “Liam?”“Mmm?”“Come sit up front with me for a second.”Liam frowned. “Isn’t Corey sitting there?”The seat creaked in front of him as Mason twisted around to catch Liam’s eye, he glanced over to the passenger seat which was empty. Corey nowhere in sight. “I dropped him off almost ten minutes ago Liam. I wanted to talk with you.” Mason’s voice was soft and Liam knew after all their years of friendship that this wasn’t about to be a quick little chat. Mason had something on his mind, something that Liam had been too far in his own head to notice. He released the door handle and clambered awkwardly over the center console as he had done several times before. The drop into the passenger seat hurt a little bit but Liam ignored it in favor of stretching his legs back out in the open space. The car was off but even still Liam could hear the rumbling of the headlight fans as they powered down. “Liam, what is going on with you?”“What are you talking about?”Mason’s sigh echoed through the whole car. “I think you know what I mean. Ever since Theo popped back up, you’ve been acting so weird. You didn’t tell us when all the bodies started appearing two weeks ago. And now it seems like you’re trying to hide something from Corey and Gwen and I—”“—I’m not!”“—Something that Theo knows about but we don’t.” The fight in him just about died at that. Mason wasn’t entirely wrong. Liam had been avoiding telling them about the whole potential-mystery-disease-killing-him-slowly thing. It wasn’t his fault that Theo was the only one who knew about it! That was just how it happened!“Mason, I’m not trying to hide anything.”“Are you sure about that Liam, because the last time that you got weird and cagey about things like this,” Mason bit his lip, “well you remember what happened.”Even that small reminder was enough to send shame bubbling up in Liam’s chest. He understood what Mason was getting at, he really did. But picking at Liam’s already frayed nerves like this, unintentional or not, was only causing more of them to fray away. “Look, I wasn’t hiding anything about the bodies, I just didn’t know it was a whole supernatural thing yet and I didn’t want to involve you all over nothing. That’s all it was!’“Alright, but why were you even so involved in that situation in the first place? It’s not like you’re training to be an officer or something?”Liam threw up his hands in frustration, “Sheriff Stilinski has my number, sometimes when stuff would happen, he would call me in and I would check it out to see if it was something that we needed to deal with.”“Liam, you aren’t our supernatural vetting process. This stuff is meant to be handled as a group, all four of us working together.”
Four.
Theo made five.
But to Mason it was four.
Only four.
He sighed shakily looking away, the space where Theo’s finger prints pressed into his waist and his wrist burned with an icy fervor. “I know that.” He said finally, voice soft and echoing oddly inside the car. Mason sighed again and Liam sat up in the passenger seat twisting to look at his friend. “School is still canceled tomorrow, I don’t know about you but I don’t think this is going to be Sheriff Stilinski’s first priority. So how about we all meet up tomorrow at my house and try to get some answers from these nurses ourselves?”A faint grin appeared on the edges of Mason’s lips and he nodded slowly, “are you going to invite Theo too?”Liam shrugged trying to make it seem like it wasn’t a big deal, “sure, why not?”The grin on Mason’s face only expanded, “your house, your choice.” He narrowed his eyes at Mason trying to figure out if there had been another meaning behind the causal words. “Yeah, it is.” Liam said slowly, smiling back and nodding along. He reached out and carefully popped the latch for the door open. The streetlight spilled into the car and Liam swung his legs onto the dry grass next to the curb. Mason rolled down his window as Liam shut the door behind him. He stepped back from the car and Mason turned it back on, but before he pulled away from the curb he turned back to Liam one last time. “Hey Liam?”“Yeah?”“Just one thing.”“Ok?”“You have really shitty taste in men.”And then he was gone. Speeding away from the curb with a vindictive honk goodbye, leaving Liam standing on the curb, beet red and just about wearing his vulnerability as a shirt.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Corey was staring at him. Liam could feel his eyes burning into the side of his face. Gwen was too far behind him to tell if she was staring at him as well or not. And while Mason wasn’t full out staring, the returning smirk that he had worn all morning was more than enough. That meant that Mason had probably told Corey already. He probably hadn’t had the time to tell Gwen yet, but he had told Corey. No more secrets for Liam.
He swallowed and swung the front door open further. Outside Theo’s truck beeped once as he locked the doors and hurried up the porch. His eyes drifted faintly over the small assembled group there before slipping inside the house. Liam shut the door behind him and tried to remember how to breathe correctly.
“You want anything to drink?” He muttered to Theo as he slipped off his shoes in the shoe rack.
“No thanks.” He straightened up and Liam watched from the corner of his eye as Corey straightened himself up as well, lifting his head to stare down Theo. Visibly nothing changed on the chimera’s face but Liam could somehow tell the slightest quirk of a challenge in his eyebrow.
“Ok lets go!” Liam moved on quickly. His parents were both out working for the day so they had the house to themselves, but he would really rather not have to be cleaning blood out of the floor whenever they returned should something go wrong.
The living room area had already been set up by Liam and Gwen when she had been the first to arrive that morning. Liam threw himself into one side of the couch where his laptop sat, screen dark, having just gone to sleep. Mason and Corey took the two chairs perpendicular to the couch and for a moment Liam figured Gwen was going to reclaim her seat next to him on the couch.
But she instead stole a pillow off the couch and plopped down on the floor. Leaving the seat next to Liam wide open. Wide open for Theo to sit beside him. A move which the older boy quickly took. The movement caused the cushions to shift and sent Liam sliding almost into Theo’s side. From the floor Gwen’s grin was quick and vindictive and Liam could only curse out Mason internally for having told her as well.
Or maybe he hadn’t told her. Maybe Gwen had just figured it out because she was smart like that. God if it was so easy for her to figure out maybe Theo had noticed it too. Maybe that was why it had taken him so long to respond to Liam’s message that morning. Maybe he had noticed too.
Liam quickly pushed himself in the opposite direction on the couch and grabbed his laptop. The screen lit up with the small section of notes that they had managed to get written up about the whole situation. After a moment of half settled silence Theo spoke up.
“So what's the plan here?”
Mason, Corey and Gwen all turned to look at Liam and he was hit with a wave of distaste and fear. The plan fell to him again. He had no idea how Stiles and Scott had done this for so long. Continuously coming up with the plans and the ideas for how to deal with this world.
“I uhh
—” he staggered out, “well I was thinking we should try and get some more information and figure out what the general public knows about this.”
Mason nodded, “With Deaton dealing with Stilinski we’ll have to find someone else with information.”
“I think the school nurse has a phone number posted on the school website for parents to contact if they need something,” Gwen offered, pulling out her phone.
“Yes! She would have to know something,” Liam said quickly typing in the school’s web page link. Helpfully, the phone number for the school nurse was one of the first numbers on the page. Gwen quickly punched in the numbers and they all leaned forwards as the line began to ring. Theo leaned forwards as well resting his elbows on his knees and pressing his chin into the tops of his folded hands. The move had his thigh pressing into the side of Liam’s leg and almost immediately the sound of the ringing line was the last thing on his mind.
The denim of Theo’s jeans was worn just about white at the knees. The fabric barely hanging onto itself by threads. Liam couldn’t help but wonder if it was some sort of self punishment thing. Before, Theo had always been decorated in nice clothes and semi recognizable brand names. But ever since he had come back he seemed determined to wear his clothes to and past their prime.
Maybe some sort of guilty indicator? Did Theo even feel guilty? What would he even feel guilty about? Liam could think of quite a few things that probably required some level of guilt to them. But through and through he was only on his own side of the situation. He had no idea how Theo felt about all this. He had no idea if guilt was even something on the chimera’s emotional palette.
“You have reached the Beacon Hills High School Nurse Eleanor Tremblot. Unfortunately I am not in the office right now and cannot get to your call. Please leave your name, number and a short message and I will return your call whenever possible. If you are calling about picking up your student to take them home sick, please press 1 to be connected to the attendance office. If you or your student is experiencing a medical emergency and needs help please contact 911 directly instead. Have a wonderful day.”
There was another beep as the line cut out and Gwen quickly hung up before the voicemail could begin recording. She tossed her phone down on the table with a distasteful sigh and Liam shook himself out of his trance. He sniffled and quickly added the note into the list of notes on his computer. He had taken more of the Dimetapp that morning given its success with the previous day. It seemed to help but the reddened tint to his eyes had yet to fade and they kept watering to no end.
“Well for being a school nurse, she isn’t very helpful.” Corey muttered and Liam couldn’t help but snicker in return.
“What about Natalie?” Theo spoke up from right over Liam’s shoulder. He twisted slightly to catch his stare. Theo hesitated the moment they made eye contact and blinked once before nodding towards Liam’s computer screen. Liam followed his line of sight and spotted the phone number for one Natalie Martin listed underneath the school nurse’s phone number.
“You mean Principal Martin?” Gwen asked. Picking her phone back up looking a little unsure.
“She’s the principal now?” Theo scoffed an incredulous look taking over his face.
Gwen nodded, motioning for Liam to turn the computer towards her so she could enter the phone number. On the other side both Corey and Mason shared a look.
Finally Corey spoke up, “If we are going to try and get in contact with her, shouldn’t we try and call her personal phone instead? She knows us so she’d be more understanding if we got into direct contact with her right?”
“No. She’ll just ignore the call or tell you off for calling her if you try her personal phone.” Theo explained.
“You don’t know that.”
There was a long pause as Theo’s eyes swung towards Corey who held his gaze. Liam was struck with the sudden realization that this might have been a bad idea. Sure he and Theo had slowly reconnected over the past few days since Theo returned to Beacon Hills, but Corey had not. Mason had not. And Gwen certainly had not. None of them had been particularly close with Theo before he left anyways. Liam glanced towards Mason, almost pleading with him to intervene. But before either could do anything Theo cut back at Corey.
“She’s not good with the supernatural stuff is she?”
“What?”
“Natalie. She’s bad at handling it and knowing how to keep the peace between everyone. She probably acts like this is a top clearance FBI level secret and ends up making it worse for everyone in an attempt to make the human kids feel safer. Right?”
The fact that he
was
right probably should have been more disconcerting than it was. But at the same time it was a little impressive.
“She’s still learning.”
“She’s learning
badly
.”
There was that tense silence again. Mason shot him a look and Liam understood he wouldn’t be getting backup on this one. It was like trying to invite a hawk to sit nicely in a chicken cage. Liam was the poultryman and he had opened the cage for the hawk to hop inside. His choices required his management. If he wanted this to be able to work out, he needed to play an active role in the assimilation. He had promised the hawk some safety from the fox and he had promised the chickens safety from the hawk. It was only a matter of holding to that promise
“It can’t hurt to try and call her on the school number. I mean she would have to know the most about this whole situation seeing as she’s the one who shut down the whole school.” His voice was quiet but the words were no less firm. Corey’s eyes immediately shot to Liam and for a half second his eyebrows furrowed as if he was about to complain but Mason nudged him in the arm. Something in the look that he gave him must have been enough for Corey to calm down because he sighed and leaned back.
On the other side of him Liam could feel Theo’s eyes drilling into the side of his head but he kept his eyes locked onto his computer. The worst thing in this situation would be for one of them to think he was picking sides. Liam nodded to Gwen who hit the dial button and the line began to ring. It rang once, twice, and then—
“Hello, this is Principal Natalie Martin, how can I help you today?”
Gwen’s eyebrows immediately shot up on her forehead as she pulled the phone slightly closer to herself to speak clearly into the microphone.
“Principal Martin?”
“Yes? How may I help you?”
“It’s uhh—it’s Gwen.” They hadn’t planned far enough into this to determine what exactly they were going to ask.
“Miss Naomi, this line is meant to be for parents and guardians, what are you calling for?”
“Ask her why the school is closed,” Mason hissed, keeping his voice low.
Gwen nodded quickly, “Yeah I know,” she started off, picking up the phone to hold it closer to herself, “I’m just trying to figure out what is going on. My parents were supposed to be out of town for this week so I’m taking care of my sister. We just wanted to know what was going on with school.”
Gwen was also a good liar when it came to white lies like that. Liam had seen her parents at her house just a few days prior so he knew they were still in town.
“Well school is back on for tomorrow so make sure you are both on campus for that.” Principal Martin’s voice crackled over the line.
“Alright but what’s going on, why did school get shut down by those nurses yesterday and why is it shut down today?”
There was a long pause over the line and for a moment Liam checked the phone to make sure the call was still open.
“I don’t know that information Miss Naomi. It is outside of my jurisdiction and I am just following the information provided to me by Sheriff Stilinski to the best of my ability.”
“So you have no idea why the school was closed down?” Gwen glanced up making tentative eye contact with Liam. It was only then that he realized he had been bouncing his leg up and down against the carpeting. Shifting on the couch, Liam tucked his legs back underneath himself and tried to focus on the conversation happening before him.
“Look, the best I can do is give you the phone number of one of the lead doctors and they might be able to provide you with some more information.”
“Isn’t that the lady we met on Monday?” Corey whispered over to Liam. An image of a tall brunette woman popped into Liam’s head and he nodded.
“Yeah I think so. That’s what she said anyways.”
“That would be great, thank you Principal Martin,” Gwen cut in before they could keep going. She motioned quickly for Liam to pass over his laptop so she could write down the phone number as Principal Martin read it out. After a few more farewell pleasantries there was a beep and Gwen ended the phone call.
“So you have all met this lead doctor then I take it?” Theo asked as Gwen pushed the laptop back over to Liam.
He nodded, “She was on campus Monday morning before everything went down.”
“What’s her name?”
Liam hesitated trying to remember if it had come up in conversation.
“I don’t think she ever gave one.” Mason said, shaking his head, “she had a name tag but it only said the hospital that she worked at.”
“Did you try and look her up in the hospital system?” Theo asked.
“She’s from Washington DC, I doubt we can just casually go through their entire nursing and doctor staff to find one person.”
Theo shrugged, “You’d be surprised. What did she look like?”
Liam gave an even more exaggerated shrug back, “I don’t know she was white and had brown hair and she was really tall.”
“She probably wasn’t much older than her mid twenties,” Gwen added in.
Before anyone could say anything further she pressed call and placed her phone in the center of the table. Liam slid off the couch to sit with his arms resting on the coffee table. On the other side of him Corey and Mason followed suit. Theo however remained on the couch and simply leaned forwards. Leaving him hovering just slightly over Liam’s right shoulder.
Just as before the line rang only twice before it was picked up and a woman’s voice crackled out of the phone.
“Hello, this is the Lead Doctor from MedStar Washington Hospital Center, operating out of Beacon Hills. How may I be of assistance today?”
“Hi there!” Gwen spoke up, “My name is Gwen, I’m a student at Beacon Hills High School and I wanted to know more about what is happening at the school right now. I tried getting in contact with Principal Natalie Martin but she didn’t know much and directed me to get in contact with you.”
“It’s very nice to speak with you again Gwen.”
The color drained out of Gwen’s face faster than Liam had ever seen it.
“Again?” She demanded, “What do you mean again?”
There was a pause down the line and Liam glanced back up to Theo who’s face had cleared of any determinable emotion.
“Gwen Naomi, correct? I believe we spoke on Monday morning? I met you and your friends, Corey Bryant, Mason Hewitt and Liam Dunabr.” The pounding of Liam’s heart picked up in unison with three other hearts in the room at the sound of their names being read off.
“Um—yes that’s me—can I ask your name?”
“I am the Lead Doctor operating by extension of MedStar Hospital on the ongoing case here in Beacon Hills. I do apologize but I am in a bit of a time crunch here, you said you had a question for me?”
“Oh—alright, yeah I was wondering what exactly is happening at the school right now. My parents are out of town so I am caring for my sister and I just want to know how to best keep her safe.”
Behind him Theo tapped against Liam’s shoulder. Liam twisted around as Theo leaned forwards, holding his phone out to Liam. Pulled up was the MedStar Washington Hospital Center page staff list. An unfamiliar woman with cropped brown hair and a freckled face was on the center of the screen. Theo arched an inquisitive eyebrow between Liam and the screen and he understood what the other boy was trying to ask.
He shook his head and whispered back, “She didn’t have any freckles.” Theo nodded and returned to scrolling through the staff list while Liam returned to the phone call.
“Oh of course!” the Doctor was saying, “we have been monitoring a disease that we believe may have originated out of Half Moon Bay.”
Half Moon Bay—
that had been where Deaton said Kara had been living before all this went down. As far as Liam and Beacon Hills was concerned she had to have been patient zero.
“A few cases were beginning to pop up here in Beacon Hills which we have been keeping a close eye on. However, unfortunately as I’m sure you heard yesterday we had a student pass away from the disease on campus.”
There was an odd crackle over the line which seemed to echo all through Liam’s stomach at the thought of Riley getting carried out past him on a stretcher. There was another tap on his shoulder and Liam turned, half distracted to see another picture of a brunette woman, this one with blonde highlights in her hair and thick black glasses. He shook his head and turned back to the phone.
“Yeah I did hear about that. What sort of disease is it?” Gwen asked.
“Unfortunately that is not something I have the jurisdiction to release information about at this time.”
“So you can’t tell me anything either?” The anger beginning to creep into Gwen’s voice was beginning to sound more and more realistic.
“Gwen please know, I can promise you with 100% certainty that you and your sister will be perfectly safe.” Liam’s head popped up to stare at the phone, his forehead wrinkling up in confusion. The confidence in the Doctors’ voice was almost concerning.
“What do you mean?”
“I do apologize, something has come up that I must attend to. But please know after tomorrow things will start to get all sorted out. We have a test that we are setting up to see if any other students might be sick at this time. You will get more information about it tomorrow, but just make sure that you and your sister are at school tomorrow and everything will be alright for you two.”
“Oh—I—are you—”
“Have a good afternoon Gwen.” And before she could even get another word in there was a beep and the line went silent.
For a long moment nobody spoke.
“I hate to be the pessimist here,” Mason finally started, “but the last time there was a school wide test going on like this, it was Gabe and Nolan walking around and stabbing people with pencils to see who did or didn’t heal.”
Liam couldn’t deny that.
“This is such a massive operation though. We’ve got the police and all of the teachers involved with this, if they were trying to do something illegal to hurt students someone would have noticed,” Gwen pointed out.
“They’ve already done a forced blood draw. That’s pretty illegal.” Corey shrugged, pushing himself back up off the floor.
“Last time this happened the police and teachers were all involved too.” Theo added, leaning over to show Liam another picture of a potential doctor. Liam shook his head at the sight of another yet still unfamiliar face.
Theo shrugged and finally locked his phone, “that’s all the doctors that match your description.”
“So what does that mean?” Liam asked.
“Well,” Theo shrugged again, “unless there’s another staff list, or she’s in a different branch of the hospital, she’s not a doctor at MedStar Hospital.”
Gwen sighed, slumping forwards to rest her head on the coffee table, “so we got basically nothing out of this. We still have no idea who this Doctor lady is, we have no idea what disease this is, and now we don’t even know if she’s from the hospital that she’s claiming to be from.”
“Yeah it’s super weird that she wouldn’t give us her name.” Mason muttered as well.
Chewing at his lower lip, Liam woke his laptop back up and added a few more question marks next to the notes that they had made earlier that morning.
“I mean the best we can do is just go into school tomorrow and take this test right? None of us are sick anyways so it should be fine.” Mason offered. Liam felt it as Theo’s eyes swung to him, once again drilling into the side of his head with fervor.
He had yet to tell them.
He probably should tell them right? If not it would all end up exposed tomorrow that he was sick. Liam had no idea what to believe.
If he believed that the nurses were just nurses following a disease then they might be looking at a disease infecting supernatural creatures as well as humans. If he believed Deaton it could be an infection and he was in the beginning of septic shock. If he believed Theo it could be something else entirely. The compass needle was spinning and Liam had no idea how to find his true North. No idea how to find his plan. His next action.
“Until we know more, there’s really no way to plan for what might happen.” Gwen said, nodding along with Corey.
“Our best bet might just be to keep observing and stay out of the focus until the scales tip towards one way or the other.” He added.
Liam took a breath and mentally reclosed the door on the idea of telling the group about his potential disease. They were right. They didn’t have nearly enough facts in the situation to warrant him bringing this up and causing a commotion. Theo knew and Liam could trust him to keep his secret until the time came.
He nodded, “Alright then, that's the plan. We’ll go to school tomorrow and see what’s going on with this test. But be on the lookout for anything that might indicate what’s happening here.”
Behind him on the couch Theo got to his feet, Liam twisted around to stare up at him.
“Where are you going?”
“Out?” Theo responded, rounding the couch and moving towards the front door. Liam quickly scrambled to his feet to follow after the chimera.
“I’ve got stuff to do little wolf, I can’t just sit around all day with you guys and play video games or do whatever it is you do.” There was a sharp smirk tugging at the corners of Theo’s mouth and Liam couldn’t help the bubble of frustration that rose in the middle of his throat.
“What stuff?” He demanded.
Theo tugged his shoes on and tightened the laces quickly, “
important
stuff, little wolf.” And without a second word Theo was unlocking the front door and disappearing out into the midday sun. Liam considered ripping the door back open and dragging the chimera back into the house. More time for the hawk to get accustomed to the safety of the chicken coop. But before he even could Mason was brushing past him right out the door behind Theo.
“Forgot my phone in my car. Be right back!”
The door slammed shut again and Liam was left standing in the silence. Now even more so he wanted to reopen the door and see what was going on. He took a step closer, trying to stretch out his hearing to reach Mason and Theo outside.
“Theo! Wait up!” Came the faint shout from Mason.
“Hey, Liam.” Liam just about jumped out of his skin as Corey’s voice echoed from the doorway behind him. He turned to find the other boy staring at him with an all too knowing look.
“Come look at what Gwen and I found.” The offer clearly wasn’t much of an offer. More a planned coordination between Mason and Corey to get himself and Theo split up. Liam exhaled sharply before nodding and following after Corey back into the living room.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
“Dunbar, Liam.” Liam could feel Corey’s eyes hovering on him as he pushed himself out of his seat and slowly made his way to the front of the classroom to join up with the alphabetized line of students already there. “Dolan, Missy.”From the front of the room Liam could see the faces of his classmates better. He could only watch as Missy clambered out of her seat, stretching out long legs and tugging at the sleeves of her hoodie as she joined his side in line. Mr. Rich passed by the lineup of students once again, half muttering to himself and directing students to line up at the front of the classroom. There were too many students in between himself and Corey for Liam to comfortably start a conversation without worrying about others hearing them. Despite that, a quick look over at Corey confirmed that the other boy was already staring at him. Gwen had been the first to head home the day prior around noon, but both Mason and Corey had stuck around long after the fact, playing video games and trying to distract themselves from whatever might come the next day. But now the next day had arrived and Liam had no idea what to do. Sleep had evaded him that night, leaving him tossing and turning, ranging back and forth between too hot and too cold underneath his sheets. It was almost like his wolf was unable to get comfortable under his skin. Always hovering, slightly awake and slightly too on edge to fully relax. Ever since Theo had left early there had been a bad taste lingering in the back of his throat. Liam had no idea what Mason had said to Theo as he hadn’t gotten an explanation when Mason came back in. He hadn’t heard anything from the chimera since then either, but he also hadn’t texted him himself either. Liam supposed it was a little irrational to assume Theo would do all of the work in cultivating their interactions. “Vargas, Elliott.” Mr. Rich called out the last name, shooing the final student into the line up. He hesitated once Elliott had gotten into the line up, pausing glancing back and forth between the paper in his hands and the lineup of twenty students before him. It was irrational but Liam couldn’t help but feel like he was in a police lineup. Someone in the line had done something. Something wrong. But what? Liam had no idea. The phone calls he had made yesterday didn’t help in the slightest and something about the manner in which the Lead Doctor spoke to Gwen made his skin ripple with distaste. “Mr. Rich?” Missy spoke up from beside Liam, “what’s going on? Where are we going?” Mr. Rich swallowed and Liam watched the bulge of his throat as he did. The pounding of his heart echoed loudly and if he could still smell things Liam had a feeling he would be able to scent out the exact moment that sweat began to run down Mr. Rich’s face. “Just be patient everyone, we’re just waiting for our turn to go.”“Go do what?”“Not now Missy. Just wait in line, you all can go on your phones if you want, just stay quiet and wait.” That was clearly the end of that as Mr. Rich folded up his paper and plopped himself down atop one of the nearby chairs. Liam and Corey shared another look of confusion over top of Missy’s head. Mr. Rich was usually pretty strict about phones. If you had a phone call you needed to take you had to sign your phone out of the phone cubby and would only have a minute of conversation time before he would start docking participation points. Something was wrong. The teachers clearly knew more than they were letting on as well. Behind them there was the ding of an email arriving in an inbox. Mr. Rich hopped off the chair and hustled around the desk to click on the email. “Alright everyone, it’s our turn. Head out into the hall and towards the gym, if I hear any talking I’m docking four participation points.” Liam rolled his eyes. Despite how weird Mr. Rich was being, some things would still stay consistent. The classroom lights clicked off behind them and the door pushed open. Outside the classroom the hallways were unnaturally silent. The few classes who had their window’s unblocked allowed Liam to see similar lines of students lined up at the front of the classrooms.However the strangest thing of all was the nurses. One standing at the top of the stairs. Two standing at the exit doors. Another passing by them in the hallways. Liam had no idea how it had happened but it seemed like every time he came to school the amount of nurses had increased tenfold. For as much as they had felt like an odd presence in the beginning it was only worse now. It felt like being a rat in a cage while the scientists stuck their hands in every so often to lift out a rat or two for testing. Once they reached the gym Liam felt as his heart dropped lower in his chest. The entryway to the gym had three sets of double doors, so six doors in total. All six of which had a nurse in a white lab coat posted in front of them. Some of the nurses actually looked like nurses with their hair pinned back and proper masks covering the lower half of their faces. However, others in the mix looked like the last time they had seen the inside of a hospital had been on the day of their birth. Hell, Liam could even see the still hovering cloud of what looked like cigarette smoke lingering around one of the nurses. The man made eye contact with Liam as he passed by, his head tilted and his eyes began to just about glow. Liam had seen and faced down the glowing eyes of werewolves, werecoyotes and murderous nazi löwenmensch’s but there was something about the glowing eyes of a smoke addled middle aged human man eyes reflecting off of the dim fluorescent lights that made Liam wonder who was truly the worst of them all. A different nurse pulled one of the gym doors open and the line of students slowly made their way into the dead silent gym. To no one's surprise the inside of the gym had been completely changed around as well. Rows of rolling curtains had been rolled into the gym and divided the area up into eight mini rooms. A folding table with two nurses sitting at it stood at the front of the room. A few students stood in line on the right side of the table and Mr. Rich led their line up the opposite side of the table and motioned for them to wait. Liam was too far away to hear what the nurses were saying to the students at the beginning of the line. However, before he could focus in his hearing the nurse crossed something off the paper and motioned the student at the beginning of the line to go past her. On the opposite side of the table Liam watched as something similar happened and the two students walked up to a section of curtain. The curtain was pulled aside from the inside and the students were motioned inside. The same thing happened six more times until all eight of the curtained rooms had a student inside them and Liam was standing next in line. He had been planning to try and talk with Corey while they waited but the other boy had already been pulled off into a pseudo-room.The nurse on his side of the desk was an older man with graying blond hair and a wrinkle running down his chin that seemed to be made of more scar tissue than skin. “Name?” The man demanded his voice crackling over a whisper. “Liam Dunbar.” The nurse nodded and flipped over a page before crossing off Liam’s name from the list. “Wait here until someone leaves.” Liam nodded back, not fully trusting his voice to speak. He twisted around to try and get a better look at his surroundings in the altered gym. Behind them the doors were opening and another line up of students with their first period teachers were slipping silently into the room. Their teacher motioned for them to join up with the end of the other line which was much shorter at this point. It was only then that Liam noticed a familiar face trying to catch his attention.
Mason.
A relieved look passed over his face as soon as Liam made eye contact with him. He gave a questioning shrug, gesturing to the situation surrounding them and Liam could only return the gesture. He had a feeling this all had something to do with the testing that the Lead Doctor had mentioned the day prior but he had no idea outside of that. Suddenly there was a soft commotion behind them and Mason’s eyes went shooting past Liam. Liam whipped around to see what he was staring at and could only watch in confusion and horror as the curtain at the very end of the row billowed open and Corey appeared. Surrounded by four nurses in white coats, masks and full suited PPE gear. “Corey?” Mason called out as they approached. Corey’s eyes shot up from the floor and Liam could see the faint tinge of white that had taken over his skin. Frantic eyes shot between the two of them and the nurses surrounding him. “Mason—I—!” “Keep walking.” One of the nurses at his side cut in before Corey could say much more, grabbing him by the elbow and tugging him out the side doors of the gym. “Corey!” The panic in Mason’s voice was evident now and he broke out of the line making a dash for the door. However, before he could get very far, a teacher, probably Mason’s, appeared out of nowhere and caught him. “I’m sorry Mr. Hewitt but you cannot leave the gymnasium until this is complete.”“Where are they taking him?!”“Mr. Bryant will be sent home for the day, now please get back in line before you cause more of a scene.” Then, with a shove that was decidedly not very gentle, the teacher pushed Mason back into the line. Liam opened his mouth to continue the protests, but before he could get a word out a sudden call of his name distracted him. “Mr. Dunbar,” Liam spun back around to spot the Lead Doctor who he had met on Monday standing in the middle of the gym. The curtain that Corey had left from still standing open behind her.“Come this way please,” then without waiting for a response she spun around and made her way back towards the section at the end of the gym. Liam glanced back at Mason, spotting the visible panic hanging in the back of his eyes before he turned and followed the Lead Doctor. Suddenly, halfway down the manufactured hallway his phone vibrated in his pocket. Without even thinking about it Liam pulled it out of his pocket and clicked on the message. It was from Corey to their group chat.
Liam barely felt it as his feet stumbled on the linoleum flooring tripping over themselves and sending him teetering forwards before clumsily catching himself. That couldn’t be right. Corey couldn’t be sick. Liam was the one who was sick. Corey was totally fine. Or was he? A tiny voice whispered in the back of his mind, taunting Liam with an idea he didn’t want to consider. What if Corey had gotten sick off of Liam. What if he had been contagious this whole time and had been putting them all at risk by constantly demanding them to be around him? Theo too. Theo had been around him too, what if he was sick too? What if that was why he left so quickly yesterday? Theo wasn’t exactly the type to tell people when something was wrong so it’s not like he would have been upfront with Liam if something had happened. Almost immediately messages from Mason started flooding in.
Even over text the desperation in Corey’s voice still shone through like the morning sunlight through broken curtains.
Liam typed out his response quickly, trying to maintain some sort of control and calm over the situation before things flew completely off the chain.
But Liam knew something. Oh Liam knew something. He knew something terrible. “Mr. Dunbar!” The voice of the Lead Doctor echoed across the gym. Liam’s heart dropped even further as he looked up to see the Lead Doctor standing by the far wall, holding open the curtain and motioning for him to hurry up. Liam twisted around and spotted Mason already staring at him. Even from a distance Liam could see the shimmering of his best friend’s eyes that indicated he was close to tears. He locked his phone and stuffed it into his pocket, but not before spotting Gwen’s final message as it vibrated through.
Liam had no idea what he was supposed to do here. The test would expose him for all his lies. He couldn’t hide this any longer. Theo was wrong, he had to be. Liam was sick, and now he had gotten Corey sick as well. Corey, who was a chimera. Corey, who’s healing wasn’t as powerful as Liam and Scott’s. Corey, who might be the next dead supernatural that they were burying.It was quieter inside the curtained off rooms. The links rattled as the Lead Doctor drew the curtains closed behind Liam and motioned for him to take a seat on the rolling bed before them both. A rolling tray had been set up opposite the bed and a refrigerated container was pushed off into the corner where various tubes were lined up inside. “Thank you for not making a big scene out there Mr. Dunbar.” She began as Liam hopped up onto the bed. “What?”She twisted for a moment to arch a pointed eyebrow at Liam, “with your friend, or at least I assumed he was your friend, Mr. Bryant out there?”“Oh right.”Liam’s heart was beating much too fast for him to be able to think properly “What’s happening to him?”She nodded with a hum, picking up a sterile wrapped package from a lower tray on the table. “We want the school to be a safe space for students to continue their education during this time. No sense in canceling all of school for just a few people. But all the same, that means we have to find those that are sick and remove them from the population before they can spread their sickness around to others.” She spun around suddenly to face Liam, “you understand? Don't you Mr. Dunbar?” She asked, holding out a dixie cup of clear liquid towards him. Liam took it but didn’t move any further. After a long pause the Lead Doctor let out a cheerful hum and picked up a small strip of paper from the tray and laid it over top of a larger clear strip. “Alright Mr. Dunbar, let's get to it. This is a solution that is looking for any evidence of bacteria from this disease in your body. Please take all of the liquid into your mouth and squish it around for thirty seconds, then spit it back into the cup and give it back to me.” Liam glanced down at the liquid nervously. It looked harmless enough, but then again, so did wolfsbane, and that shit sucked. Liam sucked in a breath and held it before bringing the small cup up to his lips and dumping the clear liquid into his mouth. As much as he was prepared for a chemical sort of taste Liam was surprised when it tasted like nothing. If not for the physical sensation of liquid in his mouth he would have assumed there was nothing there. Carefully he swished it back and forth, time and time again, trying to remember how to count to thirty before he spit it back into the cup. Almost the second the liquid left his lips again the cup was snatched from his hands. The Lead Doctor grabbed a small syringe and pulled some of the liquid out of the cup and dropped three droplets onto the strip of paper that she had laid on earlier. “What’s that?”“This is how we know if an indication of the bacteria has been found. You’ll see the test strip under the solution there. If it turns green that means that you are fine and no bacteria has been found, but if it turns purple that indicates the presence of a bacteria.” Liam hesitated, unable to tear his eyes away from the small slip of paper. “And if there is an indication of bacteria? What does that mean?”“That means you’re sick Mr. Dunbar.” Her words were so final that Liam found himself bound into silence by them. He had nothing further to say to that. He already knew what the little test would display. There was no denying it now. Slowly, as the seconds ticked by, Liam watched as the slip under the solution slowly became darker and darker until the violet color bleeding into the paper was unmistakable. The small minute long timer that the Lead Doctor had set up on the counter beeped and she looked up from her paperwork, staring down at the slip with a blank expression. “Oh that is a shame. I’m sorry to say Mr. Dunbar, it would appear that you are sick as well.” Almost on cue, the curtains were ripped apart and the four nurses who had escorted Corey out stood there before them. “Wait! What happens now?!”“You’ll have to head home for a while Mr. Dunbar, your primary care doctor will be in touch in a few days with further instructions for you. Until then it is best to avoid all contact with those that are healthy. No sense in getting them sick and making this worse for everyone else.” The air huffed out of his chest in a rush of exhaustion as Liam hopped down from the rolling bed. In an instant the four nurses were surrounding him and the march of shame out of the school began.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
It was the keys turning in the door that finally jolted Liam out of his hour-long mental slump. The lock dropped and Liam quickly set down the glass of lukewarm water that he had been attempting to sip at for the past hour. The door swung wide open and there his mom stood in the doorway, her work bag slung over her arm and her blonde hair falling out of its ponytail holder. “Hey honey! I thought you were supposed to have lacrosse practice after school?” The door rattled shut behind her and Liam watched as she not so carefully dumped her things to the floor. Hands flying up to loosen and remove the black ponytail holder entirely, slipping it loosely back onto her wrist. Liam nodded limply, unsure exactly of how to explain the situation going on at present. His body gave an unhelpful sniffle as his mom began opening up her bags and pulling out her work things. She seemed to have more things than she would usually bring home from work, depositing a few items on the table and a few others into the kitchen sink. The warmth of her steps brushed back and forth against Liam’s body as she went, but no matter how hard he sniffed or how close he got, nothing came. He couldn’t catch a single scent radiating off of her body. Not a single emotion, not even the sweat gleaming at her hairline or the overly floral perfume that she typically wore with pride. Before even realizing it Liam’s head made contact with something soft and he blinked a few times before realizing he had slumped fully into his mom’s shoulder. Her sweater a warm press against the center of his forehead, still doing nothing to ease the beginnings of a pounding headache humming behind his skull. She made a noise in the back of her throat, twisting even further around to fully envelop Liam’s body in a hug. Liam would never complain and would never say it out loud but a hug was the last thing he needed right now. But that was something he would never tell her, given the company he kept and the monthly engagement that he would hold for the rest of his life, he would never stop her from hugging him. But here, now, standing in the middle of his kitchen with her arms wrapped tight around his chest, the warmth was unbearable. Liam shut his eyes tightly as a near wave of nausea swept through his chest. Stars lit up the inside of his eyes at the pressure there and another groan escaped him. She mistakenly took that as a groan of thankfulness and pressed the hug tighter. Liam sealed his lips together and tried his best to just wait it out. He would do just about anything to go and grab an ice pack out of the freezer in order to wrap his whole body up before crawling into bed and falling asleep until this whole nightmare was over. “Not feeling good?” She finally asked pulling back to hold him by the shoulders and catch his eye. Liam opened his mouth to begin to try and explain, but try as he might, nothing was coming out. It was like someone had muted his ability to speak. He didn’t even know how to begin explaining it all to her. So he simply nodded. His mom huffed out an empathetic sigh and ruffled his hair, tossing his bangs all into his face before she turned back to her bags and resumed unpacking. “I get it honey, it’s probably going around right now, I’m not feeling great myself right now either.”A jolt of ice shot through him and Liam quickly looked up. “What do you mean?” She looked up with a slight frown at Liam’s quick tone, “it’s just that time of year for this sort of thing, nothing unusual,” Nothing unusual? Nothing unusual? This whole situation was unusual. There was no explaining the nurses, or the bodies, or the sickness. Hell Liam had nothing to explain why he wouldn’t be going to school the next day. “No I mean like what do you mean you aren’t feeling great right now either?” She shrugged, “just a little under the weather kiddo, like I said, it's common this time of year. Besides I’m not fully sick, I know that for a fact.”“How? Did you go to a doctor or something?”Plates clinked as she began pulling them out of the cabinet and setting them down on the counter, “oh no, we actually had some very nice nurses come into the office today and everyone got tested on if they were sick or not.”The pit in the bottom of his stomach opened up even further and Liam’s heart just about dropped down to his shoes. “What nurses?”“I don’t know-”“No, mom, what nurses?”She paused, hand hovering over the fridge door and turned to stare at him, almost a little bewildered. “I don’t know. They had tags that were from MedStar Washington Hospital Center. I just assumed they were from further up the coast and where assisting Beacon Hills Memorial-”“That test you took, was it a liquid that you had to swish around in your mouth and then spit it out onto a little test strip?” Liam demanded, pushing himself off the counter, heart pounding in his chest. “I—yes—how did you know that?” The fridge door slipped out of her hand, and clicked shut, light flickering off. “They came to the school too. They’ve been by the school a couple different times but they came by today and did the exact same thing to all the students there.”“That’s a little weird,” she muttered, “I never got an email about it.”“Nobody did. They had a blood draw last week and blood was taken from all the students and then they were back today to do the test.”“What?! They can’t do that without permission from parents!” A fire had lit up in her eyes leaving the pale blue color glittering with unshed embers. Liam opened and closed his mouth a few times, the fire that had pushed him off the counter very quickly flickering back out and leaving him exhausted. “Yeah I know,” he sighed slumping back into the counter. For a moment there was silence before the shifting of shoes and the tips of his moms boat shoes appeared at the edges of his vision. She was standing directly in front of him, but Liam couldn’t convince himself to look up at her. There was another warm press as her hands came to rest against his shoulders, pressing insistently for a moment before rising higher and pressing against his jaw, encouraging him to lift his face to hers. “Sweetie,” she began, voice soft, “is this something to do with you and your friends?”
Damn, he couldn’t even answer that question.
“I don’t know,” He began helplessly, “I really don’t know.” Finally Liam lifted his eyes to meet his moms face. When he had been younger and his hair had been a brighter blonde like hers, people often said that they looked like each other. As he got older Liam couldn’t really see the similarities, but here in the middle of the kitchen he could. The blue eyes, tinged almost red from the irritated iris surrounding them. The dried and rubbed raw pointed nose, from too many tissues. It settled with a heavy weight in his chest. She was sick. She was sick too. What had Deaton called it? Septic shock. The body failing to react to an infection. Death within 12 hours in shock cases and within days in non-shock cases. Either way, fatal. That must have been why she had more stuff with her. The nurses had declared her sick and she would have to be working from home for the foreseeable future. However long that future may end up actually being. Things were making sense now. She had gotten sick weeks ago. The night that he had stopped by the house with Theo popped into his head. They had both been surprised to see her up and sitting at the kitchen table. But even as he thought back on it, Liam could remember the tissues piled up around her and the puffy way in which her eyes and nose had gleamed. Hell, even Theo had called him out on it. Theo had seen all of the signs before anyone else. God why hadn’t Liam listened to him sooner and told Deaton, or, god, anybody what was going on? Maybe he could have done something to catch this sooner. Maybe they could have found a cure.Her arms twitched like she was about to try and wrap him in another hug, so Liam quickly twisted around and stared sideways out the kitchen window behind them. A soft radiating sigh echoed from behind him and the pressure in his chest only increased. Liam sniffled again and wiped at the snot slowly dripping down the inside of his nose. There was another click of plates as the two plates sitting on the counter were replaced into the counter. “Your stepdad has a late shift at the hospital tonight so how about you and I skip the pasta salad and grab some pizza from Leo’s down the street and you can tell me about everything going on?” Pizza and movie nights was something that they hadn’t had a chance to do since Dr. Geyer had moved into the house. Not because he had interrupted their tradition or anything but more because it had been a sacred thing between Liam and his mom in the few years right after his biological father had finally left. “Sure,” he sniffled out, “can we do a movie marathon like we usually would?” There was a hum of deliberation behind him, “as long as it doesn’t get super late, I still have to go in to work tomorrow.”
What?
“Wait, what do you mean?”She chuckled slightly, grabbing her phone from her purse, “it’s still a work day tomorrow sweetie. I gotta go to work and you gotta go to school. Do you want garlic knots as well?”“They’re letting you still go to work?” he demanded, pushing off the counter. The expression that she leveled at him was beyond incredulous. “Yes Liam. They hired me for a reason and as far as I know I haven't been fired yet so yes, I still have to go into work tomorrow.”Liam flapped a hand exasperatedly, “no I know that. I just mean like the nurses, they’re letting you come to work even though you’re sick?”Her eyebrows crushed together and she lowered the phone, once again giving Liam her full attention, “Sweetheart, I’m not sick. Are you feeling ok? You’re acting very strange right now, stranger than normal I mean.”“But—you said—”“I said that some nurses came in to work to take some tests to see if anyone was sick or not. But no, I am not sick, I passed their test just fine.” around him the world began to spin as Liam struggled to fit together the pieces. For a moment it had all made sense, but if she wasn’t sick—that made no sense! He wanted desperately to stamp his foot like a child and fall to the floor, waiting for someone else to swoop in and hand him the remaining pieces that he was still missing. But this was the real world. Things didn’t work like that. “Did they let you watch the test process?”“Yes? Why?”“What color did the paper strip turn for you?”“Green? Liam, what is going on with you?”
She wasn’t sick.
He was wrong.
She wasn’t sick.
But he was.
What was going on?“Liam, what happened with your test?” She caught on faster than he would have liked, advancing quickly across the kitchen to stand in front of him once more. “I—I—” the words wouldn’t come out, they were stuck in his chest like a hamster stuck in a hole. Her hands landed on his shoulders and his voice broke free. Echoing out in the small kitchen, explaining everything. The bodies, the nurses, the sickness— the bodies—oh god the bodies. Liam didn’t know when it happened but at some point tears had started pouring down his face and they had both ended up on the cold tile of the flooring. Liam curled up as tightly as he possibly could with his mom’s arms wrapped even tighter around his body. As if she was wishing that she could shut it all out for him. By the time that the words had all finished spilling out of his chest it was pressing on nine o’clock and they were both hungry and exhausted. “How about this,” his mom began, finally breaking the silence that had settled as Liam’s tears began to dry up finally, “you head upstairs to my room and I’ll go run out and get us some pizza. We can watch some movies on my laptop and then get to bed early tonight. I’ll take tomorrow off of work to stay here with you and make some calls to figure out what is going on, ok?” “No mom—” Liam started weakly, but she was already shaking her head before the words were even out of his mouth. “Nope I won’t hear it. I’ve got plenty of sick days and I’d rather spend them figuring this out with you than spend them planning your funeral.” The definitive end to her words killed everything else that Liam had been trying to put into words and he instead nodded. Her arms wrapped tighter around his body for a long second, squeezing as tight as she possibly could before releasing and clambering to her feet, Liam not far behind. The setting sun made the kitchen look funny in the low light. Haunted almost. As if these would be the memories that flash up on the TV screen as his death played out slowly. Gasping for breath on cold concrete and eyes slowly fading to white as he was surrounded by friends, cradled in the arms of a lover. He could distantly hear the sounds of his mom picking up the phone and beginning to dial for pizza as he made his way up the stairs towards the master bedroom. The room was dark at the end of the hall, but as he passed by his own bedroom door Liam could hear ringing from inside. His phone. Even in the dark Liam could see the flashing light of his phone lighting up with a phone call. Probably Mason, or Corey, or Gwen. He hadn’t said anything to them outside of a brief text following in Corey’s steps mentioning that he had also tested as sick. However, as he picked it up he was surprised to see that it was not one of the three calling him. Despite their numerous texts left unread Scott’s name flashed over and over on the phone screen. Liam could see three other new messages from Scott sitting in their private chat as well as he swiped to accept the call.
The line crackled once as Liam connected the call and almost instantly Liam could hear the sound of the fan in Scotts apartment running as Scott scurried around in the background. “Hey,” he wheezed out, voice crackly and unsteady as he spoke. “Oh shit my bad, were you asleep?” Scotts voice was distant as if he had set the phone down on the edge of the bed and was making himself busy running back and forth across his bedroom. Liam cleared his throat trying to make himself focus and shook his head even though Scott couldn't see him. “No sorry, I’ve just been doing some homework, nobody's home so I haven’t really been talking to anyone.” Scott made a noise distantly that sounded like understanding, which was quickly accompanied by the sound of something heavy falling. “Ahgk—motherfucker, I keep telling him not to leave that there,” Scott muttered, most likely complaining about the newest thing that his roommate had left out on the floor. Scott may not have been the most organized person in the world but his roommate made Scott look like an in-house maid. “It’s Thursday, don’t you have lacrosse practice?” His voice was suddenly much closer now and remained strong as if he was now carrying his phone. Liam hesitated, unsure of exactly what he could say. He had neglected to tell Scott anything, hell he had neglected to tell anyone outside of Beacon Hills what was going on. But you told Theo, a little voice chirped chidingly in the back of his head. Liam quickly shook the voice off and tried to come up with a good response. “Liam?”
Too late.
“Uhh yeah, I—look Scott—something happened.”The background noises all stopped at once, “are you ok? Is everyone there ok? My mom—” the rest of the question hung in the air unanswered.“She’s fine,” Liam quickly reassured, “It’s nothing bad, I just don’t know what to do.” “Tell me. Tell me what’s happening.” Scotts voice left no room for disagreement and so, once again, for the second time within the hour Liam felt himself breaking down and spilling his guts. It was a feeling he was starting to dislike. He was supposed to be the stand in alpha, the leader, the decision maker, and yet all he had done was fumble around and panic before dumping everything on another person. Scott left to get away from all this, and here was Liam dumping it right back onto him. Scott was quiet as Liam spoke, never once interrupting him or pushing him for further information and as Liam finally fell silent he heaved a great sigh. “Alright,” Scott began, “well you are all safe right? You don’t feel weird or anything after taking that test?”“Outside of generally feeling sick? No, nothing weird.”“And what about Corey? How’s he doing?” “I haven’t seen him since this morning, but he’s been totally fine all the other times I’ve seen him. But Scott, my mom—”“—is just fine. Liam you are a werewolf, you are physically incapable of getting sick, Deaton had to have told you that about a thousand times.”Liam nodded numbly. He had told Scott just about everything, only really leaving out one key detail. He had neglected to mention about Theo. Obviously he had told Scott that Theo was back in town, but he had neglected to mention exactly how involved Theo was in all of this. Theo had been the one to reiterate to him about a thousand times that he was a werewolf and couldn’t get sick like that.Though, with flashes of a bloody and broken Scott flying through his mind, maybe Theo was just jealous of his werewolf healing and was trying to cause chaos by disagreeing with Deaton. But as soon as the thought took root in his mind, Liam was ripping it back up. That was stupid. He didn’t know where the sudden burst of confidence in Theo had come from, but he was willing to bet anything that Theo wasn’t still trying to cause chaos. “Have you gone to Deaton about this?”“Hmm?” Liam had gotten distracted, missing Scott’s words as they echoed down the phone once more. “Deaton, have you talked to him about what's going on with you?”“Yeah a little.”“What did he say?”“He thinks it might be an infection of some sort infecting the bodies.”“Septic shock?”“Yeah! How’d you know?”Scott chuckled a little, “it makes the most sense. But Liam, listen to me, Septic shock takes 12 hours to kill a person, at maximum it would take 2 days. You have been feeling like this for two weeks, that's how I know you don’t have it.”Liam chewed at his lower lip, mulling over Scott’s words. He hated to admit it, but it made sense. “But—”“No, no buts. Liam I think it’s just stress. I left town pretty quick after the Annuk-ite and even though all of our parents are still in town, they aren’t a very good support system for teenagers, especially our type of teenagers. So here’s what we are gonna do, you still with me Liam?”“Mmhhmm,”“You stay home tomorrow with your mom. Let her make her phone calls and figure out what is going on through the human explanation of things. My flight gets in at 4, and then after you pick me up, we can all meet up and go over everything, alright?” Scott’s voice faded out into a pause and Liam’s brain finally caught up with what he was saying. “Wait what flight?”“My flight back to Beacon Hills?” Shit. Liam had completely forgotten. Scott had been planning to fly back into Beacon Hill’s for weeks. He would be getting there for the end of the school year and Malia would be arriving shortly after. As much as his brain wanted to panic over the idea of them all coming back in, something in that thought soothed him. Two more senior pack members would be coming back into town. They would be able to be a better judge of the situation and maybe point Liam in the right direction. “Oh right, sorry it’s been a busy few weeks. I forgot that it was tomorrow. I can definitely do that though, just text me when you land and then my mom and I can come pick you up.”“You’re all good Liam—” in the background of Scott’s end a sudden high pitched beeping started up “—oh FUCK ME! Charlie! Did you set off the fire alarm again!?” Another loud shout that Liam couldn’t decipher came through accompanied by more of Scott’s swearing. “Look Liam I gotta go, I’ll text you tomorrow, but don’t worry about this. It sounds like Deaton’s got some idea of a direction and when I get back into town we can all meet and figure out what we know. Try and get some sleep tonight, ok?”“Ok. Bye Scott,” The line clicked shut without a word further and Liam was left standing in his darkened bedroom, feeling somehow lighter and heavier than he had hours ago. Far below, as if by fate he heard the sound of his mom’s car pulling into the driveway with pizza. Liam tossed his phone back down onto his bed and went to help her. Hours later, well into the early hours of midnight, Liam slipped out of his mom’s bedroom. She had fallen asleep halfway through their third movie and Liam was getting pretty tired himself. So he had snuck back out, empty pizza boxes in hand, he snuck downstairs and quickly tossed them in the trash can. Flaring his eyes against the darkness Liam made his way back to the staircase and slipped into the bathroom. Again the flare of his eyes reflected in the mirror, the bathroom seemed to almost glow with an unholy yellow light. Liam quickly averted his eyes, unwilling to stare into his reflection for longer than necessary. The tap was quiet as Liam wet his toothbrush and hastily shoved some toothpaste over top. Distantly his ears pricked up as they caught another sound. In the room behind him he could hear the sound of his mom’s heart beat, slow and steady in time with her breathing. But if he focused hard enough he could hear another. Liam paused, toothbrush hanging out of his mouth, he opened the bathroom door quietly, peering out into the darkened hall. With the door no longer in his way, the heart beat was louder, but it still was very quiet for the sound of a normal heart. Quieter, softer, controlled. Liam stepped out of the bathroom, his foot creaking against the flooring, and almost immediately the heartbeat vanished. Too quiet for Liam’s ears to catch. It was almost like a beacon, something was calling for him. Someone wanted his attention, and now they certainly had it. Liam slipped out of the bathroom completely entering the hall. The heartbeat had come further down the hall where there were only two rooms. One being his mom’s room which he had just left and the other being his own bedroom. Liam took a calming breath and tightened his hands into fists. He clenched his jaw around his toothbrush, regretting silently that he had not had the foresight to take it out of his mouth before leaving the bathroom, but it was too late now. Liam approached his bedroom door, straining his ears for another beat of the heart. If he focused just hard enough he could hear something faintly, but that could have been the heart beating in his own chest. The gap under his door was dark so Liam took the risk and grabbed his door knob, turning it slowly and pushing the door open to reveal his darkened room inside. For a second he saw nothing and Liam wondered if he had imagined it all. Feeling a little silly Liam went to close the bedroom door when he caught sight of the figure sitting at his desk, facing the door. Almost immediately his own heart picked up in his chest and Liam wondered how he could have missed the third heart beat, now beating strong in the house. He swung around, slamming blindly for the light switch when a soft voice echoed out. “Careful little wolf, don’t wake your mother.”