The Waiting Halls

The sun was shining into his face, making its way beneath his closed eyelids. Elliot smiled in his half-sleep and rubbed his cheek against the pillow. The light wasn’t irritating, but wrapped itself around his body like a soft blanket, lulling him into lazy bliss. There was a pleasant emptiness hanging in his head. The only thought that entered his consciousness was that today was Saturday. How wonderful. He could lie around for as long as he wanted. And then find something in the fridge and eat it without hurrying. But that was later... For now, his world consisted of a soft pillow and a blanket.

His consciousness was gradually sinking into the depths of sleep, slowly and smoothly, rocking on the waves as though he were floating in salt water. Sleep was pulling him back in again, provoking neither resistance nor even the desire to put up any.

“Elliot! Elliot, sweetheart, are you awake?”

A quiet but insistent knock at the door and his mother’s voice burst into his sleep like completely unwelcome guests. Elliot groaned in disappointment and rolled from his side onto his back. Silence settled, and into his still-sleepy consciousness crept the hope that they had decided to leave him alone. But scarcely had his mind once again become veiled in the haze of warm oblivion when the execution resumed.

“Elliot, sunshine, wake up. And come downstairs to us, please.”

To be fair, his mother’s voice sounded very gentle, even strangely gentle. What was that about? It wasn’t even his birthday yet. And why were they talking to him again as though he were five?

“Uh... okay,” Elliot rasped, realizing that fighting this was pointless.

“Your dad and I are waiting,” came the quiet addition from behind the door.

Listening to the footsteps receding, muffled by soft house slippers, Elliot lay there with his eyes closed, trying with all his might to understand - what for?

Seriously, why the hell?

It was Saturday. Morning. Had someone died?

A stray thought scraped across his skin like sandpaper, drawing a bad premonition from the depths of his soul. His mother had been talking to him strangely. She hadn’t woken him this gently, yet so insistently, since first grade. So why now?

And just like that, sleep was gone. Opening his eyes wide, Elliot stared at the ceiling and swallowed hard.

No. That was ridiculous.

She would have said if something had happened to someone. She would have come in and told him, not kept him in suspense. If he had done something wrong, then the door to his room could very well have flown open with a kick and without questions. His mother in a rage was scarier than a Fury. And she didn’t give a damn that he had been an adult for quite some time now and barging into his room like that could come back to bite her.

This was something else. They talked to him like that when he was sick, when he wasn’t feeling well, when there was grief in the family... As if he were made of glass and any harsh word or voice raised too loudly could cause him irreparable harm and inflict some deep psychological trauma. But he wasn’t sick, and he felt fine.

The fact that his mom and dad were waiting for him didn’t surprise him at all. They usually had breakfast together, after all. Lunches and dinners were more often separate, depending on how things were with father’s work... But on weekends, dad had been home more often lately, too.

Damn.

Sighing, Elliot swung his legs off the bed and unsuccessfully searched for his house slippers with his feet. Naturally, during the night they had somehow magically crawled under the bed, and he had to get up barefoot to retrieve them. He had slept in old white shorts and a matching long T-shirt with a cracked print of a stern samurai cat. So, deciding that he looked decent enough, Elliot chose not to change. He smoothed down his hair, tousled from the night, with one hand already on his way downstairs.

Around the middle of the staircase, a thought caught up with him - what if they had guests? But he immediately dismissed it, because Mom always warned him about that too, so that her already not-too-quick-witted son would have a chance not to embarrass himself yet again. A strange anxiety, seemingly coming from nowhere, was hurrying him along.

“Good morning,” Elliot said.

The kitchen was glowing with sunlight streaming through the large windows. The atmosphere seemed perfectly ordinary - his father, in a T-shirt and white sweatpants, was sitting at the table and scrolling through something on his tablet. In front of him, a cup of coffee he had already taken a few sips from was sending up wisps of steam. The obligatory components of a good breakfast were waiting - a plate of berries and fruit, some kind of cereal, and juice. And Mom, wearing an apron and holding a frying pan, was dishing omelet onto the plates. Dad usually made breakfast. But judging by the tablet, work wasn’t letting him go today.

“Good morning,” his father said thoughtfully, without looking away from the screen.

“Neil. Gadgets at the table!” Mom reminded, setting a slightly offended-clinking plate in front of him a little harder than necessary.

With a sigh, the tablet was locked and sent to the penalty box - under the table, onto one of the empty chairs. Elliot smiled as he lowered himself into his usual seat opposite his father, where a large green mug of tea was already waiting for him. The sun was glaring into his eyes, and he had to shift a little, dragging his plate and mug along with him.

There. Everything was fine after all. Everything was normal. And what had he gotten himself so worked up about? His stupid skittish omega gut had come crawling out again. And he kicks it right back in.

“All right, eat while it’s hot!” Mom smiled.

Only the smile came out somewhat strained, and Mom sat down not as usual - off to the side between them - but opposite him as well, beside Dad. Like when they came back from parent-teacher meetings, and Elliot remembered that he had spent the whole month slacking off, smashed a boy from the parallel class’s nose against a desk last week, and skipped P.E. His stomach dropped somewhere into another galaxy from this flashback, and he folded his hands on the table.

“What did I do?”

Two pairs of surprised eyes immediately turned toward him.

“Well, shit, if it’s not me, then that’s even worse,” he breathed. “Did something happen? To Aunt Naoko? Uncle Tatsuo?”

“Good thing we didn’t go into theater, huh?” Dad sighed, shifting his gaze to Mom.

She only answered him with a nervous smile and said:

“Please eat. We’ll talk afterward.”

Elliot was already about to protest when Dad decided to drive the point home.

“Elli. You didn’t do anything wrong. Everyone’s fine. Nobody died or got hurt. Now let’s just have breakfast and talk. Okay?”

His teeth clenched on their own the moment the changes in the alpha’s pheromones reached his nostrils. When Elliot had walked into the kitchen, it had smelled almost normal, a little irritated, but at a level of - an omelet had burned, or, well, gadgets at the table. From Mom came the usual sweetish, dusty scent of an emotional, slightly twitchy omega, from Dad - the thoughtful, heavy calm of a grown, steady alpha. Such an ordinary domestic background that, after living in it all your life, you simply stopped noticing it, like a default setting. But now the moods had changed. As though ripples had passed over the water, stirring everything at once. And into the air crept viscous unease, vibrating anxiety, and... sticky fear. Damn it. A muffled, prickly scent of fear. His? Fear for him? What the hell?

Not wanting to make things worse, Elliot began to chew, tasting nothing, and tried to keep his emotions in check and not give in to them. He could, of course, start freaking out now and let everyone around him choke on his hurt feelings over all these secrets, but what was the point? If everything was fine, they would tell him themselves later. And a hysterical omega was disgusting. Elliot sincerely wanted to believe that he wasn’t hysterical. He had never really felt like an omega in the full sense of the word, either. Just a word.

So he carefully divided the omelet with his chopsticks, washed it down with tea, and thought only about which jam to have for dessert - orange or strawberry. Switching his focus helped a lot with getting rid of unnecessary emotions. At least in the air. Inside, somewhere at the edge of his consciousness, the feelings of anxiety and hurt still lingered, but they were unlikely to break through into his pheromones. Only the emotions and intentions dominant at the moment could be sensed in a scent. If all of Elliot’s feelings could always be sensed, people around him would be dying of suffocation by the dozen, he was sure of it. Which was why he was also sure he was holding himself together as usual right now.

They ate breakfast in silence, with only the occasional request to pass something. Plates and utensils clinked. The sun shone through the windows, spilling a golden glow across the table and reflecting in the cups. The warmth made his body relax again, and Elliot even calmed down a little, deciding that the fear had been caused by an argument brewing out of nowhere and that, quite possibly, he himself had been the cause of it. His father was an alpha, after all, obviously, being relatives meant they didn’t sense each other’s pheromones the way strangers did, but son's emotions were still sharp to him in their own way. Just as his father’s reactions had always felt more intense and more painful to Elliot than his mother’s.

Breakfast ended unexpectedly while Elliot was examining the empty plastic jar of strawberry jam.

“We need to tell you something,” his father began seriously.

His voice was frighteningly quiet, which for some reason made Elliot flinch and drop the jar.

“I noticed. So just say it already!”

“This... isn’t the easiest conversation, Elliot,” Mom said, her brows drawing together at the bridge of her nose and creating a fine expression line that suddenly made her look years older. “Please, listen to us until the end. Even if you don’t like what you hear.”

“Damn,” Elliot sighed. “I already don’t like it. Just tell me!”

Such a long preamble could only mean one thing - he definitely wasn’t going to like the subject. So much so that his parents looked ready to pin him to the spot if necessary. You could see it in their eyes. For now, everything looked sweet and sad. But what would happen a moment from now was anyone’s guess.

They exchanged glances, having some silent conversation of their own, and Dad nodded. Apparently, he needed to be the one to start.

“I’m not going to beat around the bush. Neither of us likes that, right?” He smiled, warmly, though uncertainly. “Elliot, our decision may surprise and upset you, but... we’re going to have to marry you off.”

Elliot felt as though something had struck him over the head. His vision darkened, and he grabbed the table, scraping his fingers against it as he tried to process it. To understand.

This wasn’t real. It was just some stupid joke.

“W... what do you mean?!” he gasped. “You... you’re not serious, are you? I... I’m studying. I’m going to work. I’m doing well! We had an agreement!”

He barely realized that by the end he had raised his voice - he didn’t so much hear it as see it in the painful grimace on mother’s face and the way father’s lips tightened. And then pheromones flooded his nose - calming, comforting, enveloping. And Elliot felt as though he had been struck a second time.

“Don’t! Don’t you dare do that!” he breathed in disbelief, staring at his father. “Stop! I’m not an animal!”

Never. Never had Dad influenced him. Not since Elliot had grown up and realized how disgusting it was. How shameful and vile. A cruel tool placed in alphas' hands by nature. Like a wrench that let you reach into someone else’s soul and tighten the screws on their emotions and sensations. Except that in the end, it all came down to being beaten over the head with that wrench until you bled. Until you became convenient. Until you became obedient.

It was despicable.

“Okay, okay, I’m sorry!” Dad threw up his hands, and the pheromones immediately settled, no longer trying to relax him. “I just wanted to help you a little.”

“Help me with what?! Marry me off? That’s how you decided to help me?”

Everything inside him was screaming, and he was screaming. Because this was impossible. They had an agreement. When he was about twelve, before he had even gone through his first heat. He had begged them - no. No husbands. He didn’t want them to find anyone for him. He would grow up and find someone himself. Or not find anyone - which would be even better. And they had told him - okay, whatever you want, we love you. You’re our sunshine. We won’t give you away to anyone.

“This isn’t normal! It’s wrong,” Elliot declared, slamming his fist against the table. “We live in a modern world! I’m legally of age. I can be on my own. This depends entirely on you. But you’re not like that! We’re not like that!”

He believed he could get through to them. Whatever had gotten into their heads. They were his own mother and father, after all. He loved them. And they loved him. They had always understood him. Never forced him into anything. Quite the opposite - they had told him to stay away from alphas. He didn’t need those relationships. And pregnancy? And influence? Alphas were cunning. One would mark you and that was it - say goodbye to your old life. Then marriage would definitely be the only option left.

He had avoided alphas like fire. And not only because his parents had told him to, but because he simply didn’t fucking need one. He had seen what relationships did to normal people. A person seemed like a person, but the moment they got involved with an alpha - that was it, a typical omega. Studies, work, friendships, responsibilities, hobbies - all of it lost its meaning. Except for whatever the alpha allowed and approved of. But they weren’t like that. Their family wasn’t like that. And he wasn’t like that. He would become a professional, a damn good and famous one, and he would work, not do all this shit.

“I’m so sorry, sweetheart. We don’t have a choice.”

His mother’s hand closed around his, and looking into her tear-filled eyes, Elliot felt everything inside him give way.

“Who?” he whispered. “Who’s forcing you? We’ll sue him! We’ll sort everything out, Mom, we really will!”

Elliot stroked her fingers with a trembling hand and tried to smile, but the muscles in his face wouldn’t obey.

“It’s your true partner,” father said, his expression grim. “We tried to convince his family. You can’t even imagine how long. We did everything we could. But they want a marriage. And there’s nothing more we can do.”

His throat tightened, and his head began to spin as his father’s bitterness and anger suddenly flooded the kitchen air, saturated with sunlight and warmth. His thoughts swarmed like a mad hive of startled bees.

“But... I don’t have a true partner! I’ve never met anyone.”

This was some terrible mistake. They would clear everything up now, and everything would be fine.

“You do,” Dad nodded. “You just don’t remember him.”

“Listen, I’m asleep and this is a nightmare, right?” Elliot said, letting go of his mother’s hand. “Or did you decide to play some kind of prank on me? I don’t have a true partner! How can you even forget something like that?”

How could you forget the almost mythical bond they drilled into omegas’ heads - regardless of primary sex? That somewhere out there was your perfect partner, an alpha who was one hundred percent compatible with you, just as you were with him. And then you would meet, fall in love until death do you part, have ten children, and live in bliss.

Except there was no truth in that. No one told you that it was all physiology making the decisions for you. That you could hate each other until the end of your lives and still be chained together - by pheromones, emotions, the law. That meeting your true partner was actually dangerous and painful. And if you didn’t start fucking like animals right there in the middle of the street, you would definitely do it within the next couple of days. Because millions of years of evolution had shaped you for exactly this, and true partnership wasn’t about sweet love or soulmates. You were genetically perfect complements to each other. Your children would be perfect. But nature didn’t give a damn about your feelings.

It was rare. True partners were vanishingly rare. Thankfully. Because such a bond had no right to exist. It was simply unnatural - to belong completely to another person, to be a part of it, and to die without it, because the stronger the bond between partners, the stronger the dependency.

It was rare. Unfortunately. Because that was precisely why it was protected by law. The days when adult omegas were required to marry candidates chosen by their parents were long gone. And even candidates they found themselves. It had long been possible to never marry at all. If your parents didn’t object. If you weren’t afraid of being a nobody’s omega, vulnerable to any stupid alpha who decided to take a bite - go ahead.

Elliot wasn’t afraid of anything. And as it turned out - he was wrong.

Because none of these new concessions applied to true partners, whose marriage was highly desirable. And it could only fail to take place if absolutely everyone involved was against it - both partners and the leading alphas of the clans. It was an old law. An old order. The decision of the dominant - the strongest alpha in the family - played an important role here. If even one person in this arrangement suffered, the law was on its side. And everyone else was obliged to obey. Because being true partners was no joke. An abandoned partner could suffer once the bond had been established, and a marked one could even die.

But Elliot hadn’t had any memory gaps so far. And no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t remember ever suddenly having an overwhelming desire to get under someone in this life.

“No,” he repeated, shaking his head in disbelief. “There’s been a mistake. His parents got it wrong. I’m not his true partner. Whoever that might be!”

“Elli,” his father said quietly, crossing his arms over his chest and making him listen. “Do you remember how your first heat started?”

“Of course,” Elliot muttered, not understanding what that had to do with anything.

He had gotten into a fight. The first time, apparently, that he had ever fought like that. Or maybe he had never done anything like it again afterward. He had been thirteen, the reason had flown out of his head. What remained was a memory in the form of a scar on his temple. There had been a boy in his class. Annoying beyond belief, really. He had always gotten on Elliot’s nerves. And it had been mutual, he had to admit. But until they were thirteen, everything had been limited to taunts, shoves, and trips. That day, however, the verbal abuse turned into something quite physical.

Elliot didn’t even remember who had started it first. He only remembered rage, and fear, and disgust. He had fought as though his life depended on it. Fighting an alpha was a pointless endeavor for an omega or beta at any age. But that had never stopped Elliot. So they had rolled around in the dirt on equal footing, trying to get at each other with fists, teeth, and feet. But their strength had been unequal. And Elliot had been pinned to the ground anyway. At that age, the difference between alphas and omegas wasn’t yet so pronounced, but it was already beginning to show. Forever burned into his memory were furious black eyes, the insane, disorienting mixture of pheromones from a very young alpha, and the way he had grabbed Elliot’s face with both hands, trying either to push him away or hold him in place. And how his body had jerked wildly in panic, while the other boy’s short nails scraped across his temple, leaving a scratch. Which, for some reason, never healed completely, turning into a long, thin scar. What a souvenir. One hell of a thing to forget.

That same day, Elliot was doubled over in pain by the end of his classes. He didn’t understand what was happening to him, why he felt so awful, why his stomach hurt and his body had become weak and limp. And only after asking to go home and seeing streaks of clear slick on himself did he realize - it was over. There went the end of his peaceful, neutral life. He immediately thought it was connected to the fight. They had fought brutally, who knew, maybe he had been hit somewhere hard enough to trigger it. Which was what he honestly told his parents. And then Elliot was bedridden with his heat for a week, and when he returned to school with a doctor’s note - the boy was already gone. Either he had been transferred to another school, or his parents had moved away - the details had been erased from his memory.

“It was Rei.”

His father’s voice sounded like a gunshot in the silence.

Yes, his name was Rei. Nakamura Rei. An obnoxious, vicious, cold, cruel alpha. Their childhood conflicts, of course, no longer meant anything. But memory had preserved him exactly like that, forever freezing the dislike in Elliot’s soul.

“So what?” Elliot still didn’t understand. “What does that have to do with...”

Understanding stitched reality to his thoughts, brutally and smoothly, with the soulless precision of a sewing machine. Every seam came together along the lines drawn in chalk. And everything inside him froze with horror.

“Rei is your true partner,” Mom said softly and confidentially, nothing like her usual self, that only made everything worse.

“How can that be?! It’s impossible! All these years... I would have remembered...”

His brain was still resisting, even though it was already beginning to understand. But he desperately didn’t want to believe it.

“That day when you fought, your first heat triggered Rei’s rut,” his father explained, cutting apart the last remnants of hope that this was all some stupid mistake. “That was probably what caused the fight. You were still teenagers. Puberty was only beginning, you couldn’t cope with the emotional and pheromonal overload, and apparently you dealt with it in the most natural and comprehensible way available to you at that age and within the nature of your relationship.”

“And it’s a good thing that’s how it happened,” Mom remarked darkly.

“Rut?” Elliot couldn’t believe what he had heard. “What rut? That reaction is rare even in adult alphas. Rei is just an angry, conniving asshole! Maybe he was afraid he’d get punished back then? And he lied to his parents. That’s the whole story! And now they’ve made up this nonsense about true partners.”

“Unfortunately, it’s true,” Dad sighed. “The Nakamura family contacted us back then. While you were suffering through your heat, Rei was going out of his mind at home. He lost his appetite, couldn’t sleep, became almost completely irrational - angry, responding to everything with aggression. They forbade him from leaving his room and...”

His father paused and glanced at Mom somewhat guiltily. She shrugged as if to say she didn’t care - it was too late now, so he might as well tell him everything.

“Rei’s parents suspected something was wrong and called us after they found out about the fight,” his father continued, looking Elliot straight in the eyes and holding his gaze. “I went to their house. I brought the T-shirt you had been wearing that day so they could check. And I saw Rei calm down when he grabbed it. They told him it was simply an omega’s item, which was why it affected him that way, but... that was an excuse for a teenager who didn’t know what rut was. Any omega’s belongings would have triggered even more agitation and aggression. Only the scent of his own omega could calm him and ease his condition. And you and Rei, of course, had never had a sexual relationship. You weren’t his. And yet... it was as though you were.”

It was clearly difficult for Dad to talk about this. He pulled every word, every sentence out as though with pliers. And Elliot didn’t interrupt. Besides, he was still looking for errors in this code. Looking for salvation.

Rut happens rarely these days. Except perhaps in alphas with a truly chronic lack of sex, or in overly impressionable individuals who have developed a passion for someone specific. But certainly not in thirteen-year-old teenagers. And, yes, it is a sign of true partnership. Only true partners can trigger a heat or rut in each other. It is a very obvious sign, but not the only one.

“Maybe he just had some hormonal problems,” Elliot muttered, feeling his hands tremble as he quickly laced his fingers together on the table.

“He didn’t. You did,” Mom snorted, obviously displeased. “Because of this whole mess... Remember how long we couldn’t get your cycle under control?”

Talking about it was unpleasant, and Elliot stared down at the table. He had had problems with his heats before - they stubbornly refused to start, came too often, lasted too long, hit too hard. He suffered for a whole week, even though the omegas he knew disappeared for only three or four days. But then he simply went on suppressants and everything settled down. Except, of course, for the unpleasant sensations. But there wasn’t much that could help him with those besides an alpha, and he didn’t want an alpha himself.

And now, apparently, his body had wanted an alpha all along. One specific alpha, whose existence it knew about and had been waiting for. Rei had thrown everything in his life out of balance. Simply by existing.

“I don’t understand,” Elliot said in a broken voice, trying to piece together the fragments of information that kept cutting his hands. “If you knew - why did you keep quiet? And if everything was fine with us being apart for seven years, then why now... marriage?”

“Elli, you were children!” Dad smiled sadly, as though that went without saying. “We decided not to ruin your lives. To give you the chance to study and grow up normally. Besides... Both Rei’s parents and we were afraid that nature would take its course too early. We were afraid of a teenage pregnancy, that you would hurt each other. So we agreed to keep quiet for the time being. Rei was transferred to another city, to a boarding school, so you definitely wouldn’t run into each other somewhere on the street. But now... Now you’ve grown up.”

He fell silent again, and Elliot could have sworn he heard his father grind his teeth.

“You have no idea how much I hate this myself!” he breathed, and a helpless anger pulled at him, cold, metallic pain. “But Rei’s family is very traditional. They think voluntarily giving up a true partnership is foolish. All these years, your mother and I have stayed in touch with them from time to time and tried to talk them out of it, convince them. To let you decide for yourselves! But they won’t listen to a word of it. And you know the law, right?”

Of course. Neither side had to be “for” it. Only then. Only.

“What about Rei?” Elliot gave a crooked smile, remembering the kicks they used to trade at school. “That asshole isn’t against it either?”

“I honestly have no idea,” Dad shrugged and leaned back in his chair. “We haven’t been in contact with him. But, you know, I don’t think anyone asked him. So maybe you’ll be able to work something out? Maybe he can convince his father to give up on the marriage. Or you could sign the papers, but not restrict each other’s freedom. There are plenty of options! It’s not the end of the world.”

Mom looked at him with poorly concealed disapproval, and Elliot understood perfectly why. Nature would decide everything for them. Even if neither of them wanted it... Because that was precisely the point of being true partners. Resisting the physical attraction would be very difficult.

But it was possible, wasn’t it? Really?

Either that, or... No. He didn’t want to think about the second option. Everything inside him burned with outrage and hurt. And, of course, everyone around him knew it. But he couldn’t suppress feelings like these. It was like trying to catch the ocean with a fishing net.

“Then why did you promise you wouldn’t marry me off?” he blurted out what hurt the most now.

“Because we really weren’t going to,” Mom looked him seriously in the eyes. “We made that promise before we knew about Rei. And afterward, we did everything we could to protect you from such a fate. We truly wanted you to live the way you wanted, but here... Not everything is up to us.”

Elliot nodded and stared down at the beige tabletop again. His head was a complete mess, his chest was tightening, and his eyes stung.

“And what happens now?” he asked tonelessly.

“Now,” Dad snorted and added in an unnaturally even voice, “we’re meeting the Nakamura family tomorrow. Rei will be there. Call it a meeting of prospective spouses if you want. Or an assessment. It’s the final step before the marriage. We all need to make sure you really are true partners. A formality with this much evidence, as you can imagine...”

“But it’s still a chance!” Mom slapped her palm against the table and jumped to her feet. “We don’t want to give you false hope, but... Take this.”

A white package of pills landed on the table. Elliot blinked, feeling stupid as he stared at them.

“Suppressants? But I have... almost three months until...”

His previous heat had already passed, and it was too early to take anything before the next one. Were they afraid he would go into heat from an alpha’s mere presence? That would be the absolute fucking bottom.

“Just take it, okay?” Dad said softly but insistently. “If, of course, you want to use every chance you have to avoid this marriage.”

Elliot didn’t need to be asked twice. He yanked out the blister pack, popped out a pill, and quickly swallowed it with water.

“That’s it?” he asked, setting the glass down on the table.

“If you don’t want anything else...”

“No.”

He grabbed the package of pills - he’d take another one tomorrow - and left the kitchen as quickly as he could, leaving his silent parents behind. His bedroom door slammed shut behind him. Elliot angrily tossed the cardboard box onto the nightstand and collapsed onto the bed. He buried his face in the pillow and howled, muffling the sound in the soft fabric.

What a fucking mess.

What the hell. Why the fuck did he need this? And what was he supposed to do about it? He didn’t need any of this shit they wanted from him. Marriage. Look at that. The fucking Nakamura. And his parents, too... Yes, of course, they had done everything they could - Elliot had never doubted that. Never. But couldn’t they have moved to another continent and changed their names? Witness protection? Anything. As long as he could live a normal life.

Everything was supposed to go differently. He was studying. He liked it. He was supposed to graduate, find a job, land a good position at his dream company, and live a completely independent and happy life. With a cat. Or a dog. Actually, he was planning on both. And no fucking alphas.

He was supposed to be invited to work in the States on cool projects. Not have his face shoved into a pillow. And by whom, no less? Rei? That little rotten bastard who had made his life miserable in elementary school? Fine, maybe he wasn’t little anymore. But did that really matter? It didn’t change the point.

He was supposed to prove to everyone that an omega could hold important positions. Maybe even start his own company. Not have children.

The thought brought almost physical pain. What children? No children. No sex. He would fucking die before he did this. That was exactly what everyone expected from him. Of course, because what else were omegas for if not to be used for their intended purpose, as incubators. Damned alphas thought they were the smartest people alive. A facade of tolerance. A screen of equality. Omegas could work. Omegas could choose not to marry. But behind closed doors, alphas smirked condescendingly, because omegas were merely being allowed these things. Like a game. Like a long leash that could be wound around a fist at any moment. How could you entrust serious projects to a creature that spent a week every three months whining in pain and dreaming of being fucked?

Omegas were stupid. Omegas were weak. Omegas were unreliable. Not serious. Irresponsible. Scatterbrained.

He had thought he lived in a different world, in a different family. That here, he was loved and respected as a person. But it had all turned out to be simpler than that. They had lied to him here, too. He had thought he was safe. That they understood him. That they protected him, and that was why they told him to be careful around alphas.

And it was just so he wouldn’t have anyone else’s scent on him and Rei would enjoy fucking him more!

Tears suddenly and viciously burst from his eyes. Elliot hadn’t even meant to cry. But he growled angrily and buried his face in the pillow, which quickly grew damp beneath his hands. Pathetic, teary omega body. Why hadn’t he been born an alpha? He was an alpha on the inside. He didn’t like children and didn’t want a family. He wanted to achieve something, prove himself to everyone, become someone. Be remembered.

But thanks to his dear parents and the Nakamura family, the future was now as uncertain as a mirage. And thanks to Rei, too. He’d met him. He’d grown up. And he hadn’t even gone away, hadn’t married someone else. He’d lived long enough, waited it out. Elliot would kill him with his bare hands. If he could get to him. If he had the strength. He’d strangle him right there in bed. Destroy him. Let alpha just try to touch him. This wasn’t his life. Not his body. Idiot. A person who was destroying everything simply by existing. Why?

What a load of bullshit. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be.

He would think of something. A thousand backup plans. Tomorrow’s meeting could still clear everything up, and it might turn out to have been some kind of mistake. They might not be true partners at all. And even if they were - he would try to negotiate with Rei. And if that didn’t work... He would do everything he could to become free again. If necessary, he would threaten him. Find something to scare him with. Put pressure on him. But that was the last resort. If they couldn’t sort everything out like civilized people.

Still, as a child, Rei had been an arrogant little prick who always thought he was better than everyone else. And something told Elliot that he probably hadn’t changed.

Elliot couldn’t settle down all day. He did all the homework he had been too lazy to do and had been putting off all week. Against the backdrop of the news, it felt like happiness and a gift from fate. How wonderful that he could study and become someone. Maybe work somewhere. Or rather, he could have. Now he had every chance of becoming an alpha’s doormat.

Elliot bit down on the plastic of his pen, crumpling the notebook page between his fingers. Fear and disgust rolled over him like a suffocating wave. What if they forbade him from studying and working? This Rei. Or his parents, if they were all so traditional. And no one would be able to do anything about it. Not him, not Mom, not Dad. He would be taken into another family, transferred to another clan, and there would be an alpha responsible for him there. And the alpha always decided. The elders always decided. None of this required his consent, arguments, or even coercion. One letter to the dean’s office - and he was expelled. One notice to his employer - and he was fired. Because he will have an alpha. And the alpha will have strict traditional parents. They will be responsible for him and make his decisions.

If you didn’t want an alpha making decisions for you, you didn’t get an alpha. That was exactly what he had done. But now he had no choice left.

Elliot refused lunch. He had absolutely no appetite. After finishing his assignments, he lay back down on the bed and scrolled through the news feeds, trying to distract himself somehow. But all his thoughts kept circling around tomorrow. When his phone vibrated with a message, Elliot nearly dropped it on himself. He tapped the notification, opening the chat with the proud name “The Alphas.”

Sota

“Look. Koji brought it.”

The photo showed a rather battered-looking black motorcycle helmet. Another message appeared just below it.

Koji

“It’s yours. Say what shoud it be.”

Tears welled up in Elliot’s eyes again, and he sniffed. All of this already felt like almost a past life. These were his friends. And they were all alphas. He had always found it easier to be friends with alphas, omegas were kind of boring. He lived on suppressants and didn’t provoke anyone, so the alphas had no problem being friends with him either. See? There were normal ones. They existed. But what if he had to cut ties with them now, too?

No. Fuck that. He wouldn’t. He wouldn’t allow it.

After thinking for a moment, he quickly typed a message.

Elli

“Let’s make it a cat. A wild one, mean as hell, and BIG.”

Almost immediately, a thumbs-up sticker dropped into the chat from the contact named Yuzu, and Elliot turned off the screen.

When Sota dragged a beat-up Harley into his father’s garage at the end of summer, nobody believed in him. Or in the Harley. But barely a month had passed and there they were, digging out helmets and arguing over whether they could get enough riding in before the cold weather. Snow wouldn’t settle in Tokyo for quite some time yet, and as always, it wouldn’t last long. But the mud and humidity were another story. And tearing through puddles on a Harley was nowhere near as fun as flying down a clean, dry road.

Sota and Koji had been friends with him since school. He had only met Yuzu when they started university. Or rather, Mao had introduced them - another mutual classmate and Yuzu’s omega. Life had, of course, mixed them all together - he and Sota were in the same group, while Yuzu had been assigned to another. Koji had gone into architecture altogether. Mao had decided not to apply, though she had even come along with her alpha to the admissions office just to keep him company.

That was why Elliot still preferred being friends with alphas. Omegas disappointed him, upset him. Mao had always been so smart, she could have done so much more. She had done much better than him at school, Elliot himself had been a slacker. But she had given up. Stopped. And neither her parents nor Yuzu had forbidden her anything. Quite the opposite - they supported her in everything. And even though she said it was what she wanted, Elliot didn’t believe her. Didn’t want to believe her. He was afraid. It seemed that if he believed, he would become like that himself.

He wanted to write about his misery in the chat. Share it with his friends, hear them say everything would be fine, even if it wasn’t. But for some reason, he felt terribly ashamed. In front of the alphas, in front of himself.

Ashamed to be an omega. Ashamed to be the one who gets fucked.

No matter how smart, strong, and cool you were. No matter how brave and self-sufficient you considered yourself. No matter how much you had done in your life, how much you had achieved, how much you had managed - you still got fucked.

No matter who you were. There was an alpha who was automatically better than you at everything. Who was automatically on top of everything. Just like his word was.

And in that regard, Elliot considered himself a representative of the most oppressed and humiliated layer of society. Even female omegas had it easier. At the top of the food chain, there was always an alpha. Who could only be a man, the most terrifying creature in the world. Second place confidently went to male and female betas. They always kept somewhat apart from the general battles for equality, since they were insensitive to scents - they couldn’t be influenced, they were difficult to control. And alphas were usually not interested in them. And then came the omegas.

And Elliot had always been certain that men came only after women. Because a woman was, from the outset, a creature of another kind and primary sex. But a male omega was simply an alpha that hadn’t worked out. Defective. You were always just a little bit less. Less of a man, less of an alpha, less of a human being. You could have been born an alpha. Or a beta. You had been halfway there. You could have entered an entirely different league. But something had gone wrong. And now you were fair game for alphas.

Elliot had sincerely believed that nothing like that would ever happen to him. That it absolutely wasn’t about him. After all, he had such wonderful, understanding, reasonable parents.

He had sincerely been an idiot.

Closing his eyes, he lay there for a while, watching colored circles. A knock at the door made him jump in surprise.

“Elli. Can I come in?”

“Yeah, sure. Come in,” he said, desperately not wanting to see his mother, but there was no strength left in this awful body for a fight.

He sat up on the bed, pulling himself against the headboard, and wrapped his arms around a large green cat-shaped pillow, putting a buffer between himself and his mother.

“You haven’t eaten. I left something from lunch for you in the fridge,” she said carefully, smiling.

“Thanks. But I’m not hungry.”

His mother suddenly snorted irritably and slammed the bedroom door shut.

“Okay, that’s it!” she declared, instantly appearing beside him and sitting down on the edge of the bed. “So? What are we going to do? Come on, should we dress you up as a punk tomorrow? Although, no, what if he likes that sort? Then we’ll order a hitman. Or I can just bring a heavier frying pan with me. We’ll save money.”

Elliot snorted, but felt his lips stretch into a smile against his will.

“What can I do to make you feel better?” she asked, more seriously now.

His mother’s warm palm covered his hand resting on the plush cat’s head, and the familiar scent tickled his nose, a little melancholy and very tense right now. Omegas smelled soft and couldn’t influence other omegas. But he didn’t need any influence to feel a little better.

“Tell me this isn’t really happening. That I don’t have to marry some stranger.”

Mom sighed, stroking the back of his hand, sadness reflected in her large, clear eyes.

“I really wish I could. But I can’t.”

Elliot nodded, staring at the round matcha-colored cat in his arms.

“Listen, did they say anything about me studying? Do you think they’ll forbid me?”

That worried him more than anything. It mattered more than anything else. Because this was the one thing that absolutely nothing could replace or fix.

“I don’t know,” Mom shook her head and seemed to lose heart for a moment, but then immediately brightened. “You know, they have an older son. He’s an omega and married. But he works and, apparently, even holds some kind of managerial position. So, for the Nakamuras, an omega who works isn’t something extraordinary. I think if you can come to an agreement with Rei, you’ll be able to do it, too.”

She smiled encouragingly, but her words brought Elliot little comfort. Or rather, the fact itself certainly gave him hope. But once again, everything came down to Rei. A person with whom they had absolutely hated each other as children. They were completely different. They had never been friends. It was difficult enough to imagine them finding any common language at all, let alone one in which they could negotiate anything.

“Maybe he’ll get tired of it and we can get divorced after a while,” Elliot suggested wearily.

Why not? It wasn’t a bad idea. He could even ease Rei into it. If there was one thing Elliot knew how to do, it was get under Rei’s skin with exquisite precision, and he had been doing it since childhood. But his mother clearly didn’t approve of the idea.

“Elli,” she said softly, “you do understand this isn’t an ordinary marriage, right? You’re true partners. You recognized each other already. Back then, when you were teenagers. If you don’t stay with Rei, there could be a lot of problems. In the long run, depression, infertility, all kinds of disorders... No one else will be right for you except him. But being without an alpha altogether will be difficult for you, too.”

Difficult. As if he didn’t know. As if he hadn’t been doing exactly that all these years. When his classmates omegas would bring in their proud little notes saying they had gone into heat and missed a week of school, everyone would look at them with envy - an extra vacation. Because almost all of them had some kind of partner by then. Only Elliot knew that he wasn’t going to get anything like that. First, because he was too proud to get under an alpha. Second, because a partnership with an alpha was too dangerous. The price of spending a week every season in a sex marathon instead of enduring exhausting pain and agonizing arousal could be far too high.

He was ready for the risks. He was ready to sacrifice something. To bite off his own paw to escape the trap. Especially since he had never wanted children. But he didn’t tell his mother any of that. He only said:

“I know.”

And he had to endure her unbearably sympathetic gaze and the trembling sadness in her scent.

“Everything will work itself out somehow, you’ll see. Maybe you’ll even like Rei. Who knows? Give true partnership a chance. Nature isn’t as stupid as we sometimes think.”

Her soft palm gently stroked his hair. Elliot didn’t look as his mother left, seeing nothing but the green plush fabric of the pillow in front of him.