Liam woke up to a thundering crash that made his head give a dull throb. It was followed a moment later with a voice, muffled and raspy.

"Motherfucker, you fucking-" Liam squinted against the dark room, the curtains swaying slowly from side to side. He trailed his eyes down as the swearing continued, voice only getting more muffled, his eyes landed on Theo, sprawled on the floor next to the window, an upturned chair beside him as he curled into a ball, slithering slowly like a snake as he made himself smaller.

"Theo?" Liam murmured, grimacing at the cottony tang of his mouth. "What-"

"Shh." Theo said, burrowing his face into his arms as he finally finished pulling himself into the fetal position on the dirty carpet. Liam watched as Theo went quiet, apparently quite comfortable.

"Du-"

"SHHH!" Theo snapped urgently. Liam let his mouth snap shut, far too tired to attempt to fathom out why Theo had decided to stay on the floor when there was a perfectly good bed a few feet from him.

With a soft huff, Liam flipped himself over to face the other wall, burrowing his face into a pillow that smelt an awful lot like Theo. Liam let his eyes flicker to the other bed, the sheets barely ruffled, Theo's jeans still balled up on the floor next to it.

Liam groaned as the memories of the night came rushing back to him, from trying to convince Scott and the others that apples had gotten them drunk to breaking a football table and finally falling asleep curled up next to Theo. His head gave a throb at all the sounds filtering through the room. It felt like when he had first turned again, being completely unable to control the sense. He could hear people talking in another room, the rush of water as someone had a shower, a soft tap tap tap of a pen on a desk, a bell dinged, a car horn honked.

"Oh my god shut up." Liam groaned. Theo made a vague noise of agreement. Liam closed his eyes trying to focus on the thump of his own heart and block out the sounds.

Instead all he could hear was the showering running, forcing him to notice how much he needed the bathroom. Theo's heartbeat paced in his ears and Liam turned his attention to it. It was slow but Liam felt the noises getting fainter, Theo snuffled against his arm and Liam let out a sigh of relief and he managed to focus his hearing on their room only.

His bladder protested still, like it didn't know he'd managed to avert the noise crisis, with a small groan Liam sat up, swallowing down the nausea at the quick movement.

He padded back out of the bathroom after swilling his mouth with water in hopes of getting rid of the dryness, it only somewhat worked. Liam's gaze settled on the matching empty beds.. His eyes moved back to the floor where Theo was still curled up. A small grin found its way onto his face.

"Dude come on." Liam sighed. "Motel floors are gross you shouldn't be-"

"What did I say about shutting up." Theo huffed.

"You're gonna smell even worse than you do already."

"You like how I smell." Theo said, voice barely recognizable as he spoke into the crook of his elbow. Liam chose to ignore that particular comment, instead marched over and laughed at Theo's whine of pain as he hauled him off of the floor.

"Stop being a baby."

"I'm dying." Theo said seriously. Liam threw him back onto the bed. Theo let out a pitiful groan, eyes squeezing shut as his stomach gave a few dangerous sounding rumbles.

"Are you going to throw up?" Liam asked. Theo didn't move, just stayed starfished back where Liam threw him face pinched in pain, skin pale and tacky with sweat. It took him a few moments, bare chest heaving before he finally opened his eyes again with a tentative flutter.

"I hate you." Theo said. "Come here."

"Come what now?" Liam hummed. Theo slapped the bed next to him like it had mortally offended him.

"Here dumbass."

"Uh." Liam floundered. "Are you still drunk?" Theo shot Liam a scathing glare, the effect was only diminished slightly by Theo's clammy skin.

"Just-" Theo huffed, sitting up and grabbing Liam's arm. He gave a sharp tug that left Liam collapsing on the bed next to him. Liam felt his stomach roll at the abrupt movement, bile rising in his throat for a moment. "Not nice is it?" Theo asked, the fact he hadn't thrown up when Liam tossed him onto the bed suddenly felt like a lot more of an achievement. Theo didn't wait for Liam to reply, just curled into his side, burrowing his face between Liam's neck and the comforter. "Now shut up and sleep." Theo murmured.

Liam blinked up at the ceiling.

"You sure you're not still-"

"Every smell in this room is making me want to throw up." Theo said stiffly.

"I'm pretty sure I don't smell good." Liam said, voice catching as Theo's nose traced a line up his throat.

"You smell like a sweaty brewery but at least it's a familiar one." Theo grumbled.

"Do you want me to go get the car?" Liam asked, trying to wiggle out from under Theo's arm. He paused when Theo's chest vibrated in a low growl, arm tightening as he pinned him in place.

"What I want is for you to shut up." Theo said.

"Dude it's-"

"Liam I swear..." Theo breathed, voice low and dangerous. "Just shut the fuck up and go back to sleep." Liam reasoned that he really could use some more sleep and that was why he relaxed back against the arm pinning him to the bed and burrowed his face into Theo's smokey hair.

*

The second time Liam woke up it wasn't to Theo tripping over but to the honk of a car horn outside. Theo didn't even shift next to him, face still burrowed into the crook of Liam's neck, warm breath fanning out against his skin.

His eyes strayed to the clock on the bedside table eyeing the small neon numbers flashing at him. 1:39pm. Liam let out a quiet groan as he realized it was probably too late to consider going back to sleep in a room he'd gotten for free with a clear conscience.

Theo wouldn't have any problems with outstaying their welcome. He didn't doubt if he woke Theo up he'd be just as petulant he had been the last time they woke up. Which meant it was up to him to get the truck and Sheppard Theo into it, which would be a lot easier if he just had to push Theo out the door rather than across town.

Liam wriggled under Theo's arm, fingertips nudging at the skin as he tried so slip out from underneath it without waking him. In theory, it seemed quite easy, he remembered trying to sneak out of bed when sharing with Hayden, how he'd just have to nudged her arm and she'd shuffle back. Theo was nothing like that, the second Liam tried to move he clung on.

Liam bit back a curse as he felt Theo's claws digging into his hip when Liam tried to lift his hand off like a cat trying to cling to the carpet rather than be picked up. The scent of blood hit the air as Liam gave another suddenly shove of Theo's hand, ignoring the pull of claws dragging through the skin and rolling off of the bed.

He hobbled to the bathroom quickly, hand pressed firmly against the four gouges whispering out breathy swear words.

"Clingy bastard." Liam huffed, closing the door with a soft click. He could feel the skin knitting back together beneath his palm and slowly peeled his hand away to look at the healing flesh. He waited a few moments, listening to Theo's heartbeat for any tell he was waking up. By the time he was sure Theo was staying asleep the wounds had healed. Liam made quick work of washing away the blood in the sink before he returned to his clothes.

Liam pinched the edge of his still soaking clothes and frowned. He knew the walk back to the car couldn't be that much further but still, doing it in clothes that felt wet enough to ring out didn't seem very appealing. He dropped the top back to the floor and moved back out into the main room. Theo had moved, arm stretched out over the empty patch next to him. Liam grabbed Theo's shirt and yanked it over his head wincing at the lingering scents from the night before, spilled drink and sweat most prevalent. He yanked the jeans from the bottom of the bed and hopped into them waiting for Theo to wake up and ask him why he was stealing his clothes and car keys.

He didn't. By the time Liam was shoving his feet into his still damp shoes Theo still hadn't done anything, unless you counted his stomach rumbling once. Liam muttered a quick 'back soon' that Theo wouldn't even hear and ducked out of the room, shutting the door with a soft click behind him.

The sun, despite not being too bright, still felt like it was trying to blind him. Liam raised a hand blocking it as he looked up and down the road trying to figure out which way he was meant to go.

"How you feeling?" Liam jumped as the police officer from the night before flounced towards him. uniform gone replaced with a sundress, skirt billowing in the soft breeze.

"Good." Liam said quickly. "And thank you for-" She waved a hand in a little 'don't worry about it' gesture.

"Don't worry about it. I wasn't going to risk you two driving."

"I really wouldn't ha-"

"Where'd you say your car was?" She asked, moving along, Liam noticed the keys dangling in her hand. "Want a lift?"

*

The car ride out of town to the truck was surprisingly not awkward, the officer, Joey. Had waved him off as he tried to give her money from the glove box as payment for the room and just told him to give them a good review online which Liam was more than happy to do.

She dropped him off at the road Liam had met Marty the night before. Liam watched the car disappear down the road, kicking up a trail of dirt in its wake before he turned back towards the trees and tried to retrace their drunken route from the night before. He found fairly quickly he didn't need to do much retracing, despite it taking a good five minutes to walk to the car the night before Liam spotted the clearing of trees within a minute.

The truck was exactly where and how, they'd left it, Theo's blanket draped half out of the bed from where Liam had tossed it while trying to scramble after Theo and Emmie. He gave the door an experimental tug and was happy to find it was actually locked. At least it seemed they had some sense last night, or at least Theo did.

Liam's thigh buzzed as a phone vibrated, he scrambled into the pockets of the borrowed jeans, slapping them until his hand clasped around Theo's phone. His brow furrowed as he pulled it out to reveal an empty screen. The phone buzzed again, Liam's thigh vibrated again. He quickly narrowed down the source of it to his back pocket. He pulled the second phone out recognised it instantly. Mason's face flashed on screen, Liam yanked the door open tossing Theo's phone into the passenger seat and swiping answer on his phone.

"Hey man." Liam said, shutting the door and climbing into the bed, the bottle rolled ominously across the ground.

"Hey! Finally, you know I was beginning to think Theo killed you." Mason said. "How's your nose?"

"My nose?"

"Yeah, is it healed?" Mason said, Liam heard the familiar sound of his computer chair squeaking as he laid back in it.

"Why would it have to heal?"

"Because you got into a bar fight?"

"How the hell do you know about that?" Liam gasped, eyes flickering around the clearing as if the pack were about to dance out from behind a tree.

"You texted me?" Mason said slowly. "Like... a lot."

"Wha-"

"Dude. Check your messages." He added, voice light with repressed laughter.

"Oh god." Liam groaned. "What did I say?" Liam made quick work of swiping through his phone. He was relieved to see he had only texted Mason. The content of said texts were far more disturbing.

It started fairly normal. That stopped at around 9 pm when Liam had simply textrd 'I'm a thug' with no context. The next ones came in almost an hour later with 'Theo has never makers and le' and seemed to keep spiraling. A mix of blurry photos and incoherent drunken texts. Until suddenly it wasn't, there was a clear selfie of Theo in the clubs bathroom taken in the mirror with the caption with a texts right after it saying 'delete the photos of me or I'll kill you' the next was another photo, again of Theo in the mirror but this time with his fangs out captioned 'I'm no tmfknf.' And one immediately after saying '*not.' As if that was the major misspelling in the sentence.

Liam brought the phone back to his ear.

"Dude I-"

"He called me."

"He called you?" Liam squeaked, when had Theo even stolen his phone? Liam remembered Theo's hands on his waist as they went to dance and scowled. Of course, Theo had pickpocketed him.

"Yeah. Like... a minute after threatening to kill me in that text. He couldn't find you, said he was going to howl. I'm guessing he didn't?"

"No... No he didn't howl. I'm sorry, we must have kept you up and-"

"Dude. You got Theo Raeken drunk enough to drunk dial me ranting about not being able to find you and how the welsh had probably stolen you. You don't need to apologize, you deserve a medal. Is he a crying drunk? Does he sing?"

"Dude." Liam sighed.

"Corey was here too so he heard the whole phone call. We couldn't stop laughing for about ten minutes."

"It can't have been that funny."

"Dude I heard him apologize to a door. I didn't even know Theo could apologize." Mason said. Liam let out a small snort of laughter "So come on, how hungover are you two?" Liam thought of Theo cuddling him to block the smells.

"Could be better." He hummed lightly. "I'm alright now but Theo's a bit...He's still out of it." Liam decided on unsure of how to say 'dead enough to actively initiate cuddling'.

"Alright, I came up with this last night when I got the photo of you giving Theo a piggy back-"

"I did that?" Liam asked.

"The ultimate wolfy hangover cure."

*

Mason's ultimate hangover cure was a shower, food, sunglasses and ear plugs. They stayed on the phone for another ten minutes, Liam relaying what he remembered of the night to a cackling Mason. Leaving certain parts out, like walking between pubs holding hands and the way his throat had run dry when Theo first asked him to dance. Then Liam made his way back to town, driving slowly partly because of nerves of driving without Theo in the car and partly because though he was feeling better than the first time he woke up, he was worried if he drove over ten miles per hour he'd end up getting motion sickness and throwing up all over the interior of the truck.

Liam grabbed some money from the duffle beneath the seats and went to buy some sunglasses. He didn't bother searching just grabbed the first fairly decent pair he saw and went on the search for some earplugs for Theo.

He quickly ditched the earplug idea when he spotted a set of fuzzy ear muffs that would definitely do less to muffle the noise but would look funnier. Before long he was back at the motel room Theo was sprawled in the exact same position he left him in but his eyes were open as he stared blankly at the closed curtains.

"I got the truck."

"I'm not moving." Theo grumbled. Liam snorted, moving into the room and coming to a rest by the side of the bed, Theo turned his head to look up at him with what looked like great effort.

"Come on, you need a shower."

"No." Theo said stiffly, eyeing Liam like he was considering yanking him onto the bed to act as a personal air freshener again. Liam shifted backwards. Theo sighed, turning away from Liam.

"Dude, it'll make you feel better."

"I'm not moving."

"They let us stay for free. We can't abuse that."

"Speak for yourself." Theo said.

"Look just go shower, the car is right outside so we can go find food and-"

"Not happening."

"Theo."

"I said no."

"You stink." Liam snapped. "You smell of strangers sweat, your breath is like an ashtray and it's like your blood is vodka. Get up, get in the shower. Mason said-"

"I don't care." Theo said. "Just let me-"

"Okay fine, you wanna be a baby, I'll treat you like one." Liam growled, something Theo seemed to find hilarious. Liam ignored his smirk and ducked down, hands tugging Theo towards the edge of the bed.

"Liam no-" Theo whined.

"Yes." Liam said, hauling Theo off the bed. The moment Theo was standing he went limp, flopping back against Liam's arms. Liam was sure were he not a werewolf the sudden weight would have sent both of them crumpling to the ground. "Really?" Liam huffed. Theo covered a laugh with a cough.

"I'm not moving." Theo said seriously. "So either drag me to the shower or put me down."

"You think I won't drag you to the shower?" Liam scoffed, wrapping an arm tighter around him and taking a few swift steps back, Theo stayed limp in his arms, letting his feet drag across the floor uselessly, his body slowly slid down Liam's. Liam jostled him as much as possible.

Getting Theo into the tub was more effort than Liam had hoped it would be, mainly because Theo still refused to give any help. As such Liam was none too gentle when he pinned Theo back against the shower wall, laughing as he let out a squeak at the sudden cold press of tile on his skin. He used his other hand to turn on the shower.

Theo didn't move, or even flinch when the water spurted to life and poured over him. Just stood glowering through the stream.

"This is revenge for the pool isn't it?" Theo asked. Liam snorted.

"No, this is about you smelling like crap." Liam said. loosening his hold on Theo. Theo's lips twitched in a half-formed smile, water washing his hair in front of his eyes. He finally relented, eyes fluttering shut as he tipped his head up towards the spray. Liam's eyes followed a trail of water as it ran down his exposed throat, cutting like a river against his skin. It spilled down, forking off at his sternum and spilling onto his chest in a thin trail. Liam's eyes snapped back up as Theo let out a soft sigh, lips parted, face shadowed by his hair. Liam wondered how Theo made something like a forced shower look like a photo shoot. "I'm gonna get the shower gel and stuff." Liam said, voice coming out in a curious little croak. He let go slowly, fingers inching back from Theo's skin, brushing across it softly as he made sure Theo was actually holding enough of his own weight that he wouldn't fall over immediately.

Liam rushed out of the bathroom and ripped through the bag to find the small wash bag. He made it back into the bathroom only to pause as he looked back at the bathtub. Theo had apparently seen fit to slide down the shower wall and sit in a sorrowful heap on the floor, water lashing against his back as he let his head fall between the gap in his knee's.

"If you use all the hot water moping and I have to have a cold shower I'm going to steal your car and leave you here." Liam promised, scooping out the bottles and lining them up on the edge of the bath. Theo reached out blinding, knocking two of the bottles over before he settled on the shampoo.

"That's fine." Theo hummed. "You drive slow enough I could have a nap and dinner before catching up with you on foot." Liam closed the shower curtain with a sharp tug that had Theo chuckling.