Timeless

The start of the chapter was fine. I liked that Susie ended up going to Castle Town overnight after all (and she now considers it her actual home as indicated by the end). Very good reveal, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

The game opens up with mocking your curiosity. Classy. Right after calling the cage "Your Cage" and the wagon "Your Ride". It then proceeds to mock you for trying to be curious about the world around you when Kris is actively bringing the world closer to its ending.

But yeah, more of the narrative mocking me please. I love having an antagonistic relationship with a piece of media for choosing to care and engage with it.

Suselle.

I think I don't like how this ship played out.

Susie and Noelle generally, so far, have only really interacted for a bit officially. Remember that ch2's Dark World is only seen as "real" to Susie since Noelle believes it to all be a dream. The two of them start to get a bit closer at the Holiday Household, and Susie says she's gonna take Noelle to the festival. However, this is after so much time of Susie being dense romantically. But regardless, they both seem like their own characters still at this point.

Now let's throw all of that out of the window!

This has always been a gripe of mine with romance in media. It seems like, instead of these two characters being romantic, the two characters ALWAYS get replaced by TROPES. And Suselle in this chapter was ALL OF THAT. Susie goes from bullying Kris on day 1 and being dense with Noelle the entire god damn time they've known each other to "I can hear your heartbeat" in 4 days. It was tropey. It was something that I feel like I could have read from any other typical romance.

Maybe I'm aromantic, which could mean nothing, but I kept asking myself during the scenes if the voice for Susie was actually Susie or just lovey lines being forced out because... well... it's supposed to be a romance!

Susie, someone notorious for thinking constantly about Kris and Ralsei even in conversation with Noelle, suddenly pivots this way for the rest of the chapter to ONLY thinking about Noelle.

And then the Dark World begins.

Oh LORD the Dark World.

Susie just starts completely ignoring Ralsei entirely despite the fact that he's very explicitly being bullied by Flowery. He does the whole forcing the hat back on Ralsei bit, and Susie's just all buddy buddy with him for a while. There's not even an option to unbury Ralsei when he gets stomped into the fucking ground. You cannot do anything to help.

Then, a glimmer of hope. Ralsei starts being honest. He starts talking about the UI and-

Oh? Oh? The scene just lost all impact because Susie was already told that by Flowery? With no reaction? Nothing? What?

This continues so many times with Ralsei. He NEARLY says what he wants to say and then trails off. Or, he's interrupted. Or, Flowery starts saying vague shit instead of getting into the root of the problem.

This entire chapter dances around Kris.

Susie questions why they were behind the shop with the Dark Fountain. Glosses it over. Flowery keeps mentioning that Kris made the fountain. Ralsei doesn't tell Susie. Flowery could tell Susie at any time. He doesn't. Characters just do not tell each other information unless they can do so without even so much as grazing key reveals, so much so that we get told nothing.

We were told nothing by this chapter.

Got a wee bit more context as to what happened during the divorce. Asgore uh... didn't really have much of a presence in his own Dark World except for a few specific scenes. His development basically occurs as "Kris got wounded, okay now I realize I was wrong about pursuing this goal."

But what else were we told?

The Knight's... uh... still taking people?

Suselle is happening?

Ralsei... is still doing the thing he always was doing by trying to resist fate?

Kris is just actively worse and the plot doesn't seem to care.

Like, geez man, there wasn't a garden charred in an inferno of jealousy. Ralsei used fireshock on a damn shuriken. The asylum that the flower king was supposedly trapped in wasn't exactly an asylum.

We got crumbs of meta actually being real.

The secret boss was another "your body is a person". Thanks game. Didn't clock that one. I'll be sure to remember that the next time they're shoving me in a trash can to bring the world closer to its destruction.

It doesn't feel like anything actually changed or happened.

Now, we have all of these lingering plotthreads. I was already skeptical about how Toby was going to bring all of this to a satisfying conclusion in three chapters. Now, we're down to two

Ralsei's personhood and becoming more than just an object meant to be discarded. This chapter tries to talk about Ralsei but utterly fails to say anything meaningful other than "Our dream is better than yours"

Susie finding out about all of the betrayals and reacting accordingly to them

Kris constantly fucking shit up by creating Dark Fountains and working towards a goal with the Knight and Carol that we can only guess about, all the while trying to figure out if they should choose between their promise and the friends that they made.

Your disposition towards all of this as a soul in a cage. You have wanted to express yourself. You have tried to be friends. You have encouraged and lifted everyone else up. It would be nice to actually get to meet them some day. Your vessel was taken. Your means of expression was discarded. Now, they never see you, and they will never love you.

The final prophecy. Everything about the final prophecy and how to divert it

The Pure Crystal's entire existence, which was always expected to be in ch6, but oh god

I never mention them because I hate their existence, but FRIEND and ERAM are still a presence in the narrative, and if Toby plans to use them, he has two chapters to establish two characters and then use them for anything good.

WHATEVER IS GOING ON WITH THE KNIGHT. WE GOT CRUMBS FOR THAT.

I am unconvinced that all of this can be done without cutting out a majority of it. The meta feels like it'll go first, which is great because that means Toby is just redoing UT again. You exist to help everyone else out before the game discards you at the end, because you're above and different than everything else.

Nevermind the fact that this spits in the face of Ralsei's plotline, which is that his difference do not make him any less deserving of love and friends.

But I digress.

I liked the other six flowers. Yellow's entire uh. Sequence. Was funny. Green is my goat. Aqua reminded me that just because I played UT does not mean I'm good at omega attacks (I used to face tank them because you can't die in soul attacks instead of getting good).

Mad Mew Mew was. Not good. I already explained my distaste over the surface-level themes. However, the fight itself felt like you couldn't visually read any of it. The bombs were difficult to sight read. There were at times three different patterns happening. The attack where you were on three strings but the bullets came from opposing directions felt like a clusterfuck.

And it was. Y'know. Mad Mew Mew.

After how relevant the past few secret bosses have been, I guess I just expected more? Ralsei solo boss never happening I suppose. We'll just. Do Spamton NEO but slightly to the left I suppose.

I need to think on it all more. It just feels like we're entering a phase of discussion that will be a LOT more of the same. Kinda just. Gonna gonna float around and ruminate on it more.

2 more years of player bad discussions

2 more years of Ralsei is a piece of shit discussions

2 more years of trying to claw any semblance out of this narrative that Kris maybe isn't good or a hapless puppet.

Oh well.

It wasn't bad. I had a lot of laughs. It even got me to cry a few times. I just don't think the chapter really had anything to say other than "Suselle real" and "THE DREAMS OF THE FLOWERS ARE GREATER THAN YOURS!".

When Zanka first met you, he knew instantly what your presentation was.

Now, you didn't look like the classical image of an omega (fragile, elegant, something meant to be kept in the privacy of a luxurious house or on the arm of a nobleman), but you did have the scent of one. Zanka, himself, couldn't smell you—betas are all noseblind, unable to detect pheromones—but every single alpha in HQ could. To this day, their heads always turn as soon as you enter the room, enticed by whatever honeyed scent trails after you. Some of them openly trail after you, offering little gifts in the hopes of starting a courtship. Even Enjin, who's met far more omegas than most people will ever encounter in their lifetime, sometimes gets distracted by your presence.

“She smells like fresh flowers,” Delmon once told him. “Tuberoses, I think. They're tough to grow—tougher than any other species.”

Zanka understood the attention after that. Flowers are incredibly rare on the Ground, and most species smell foul thanks to the toxicity of the soil and their frequently carnivorous nature. Even the full garden and all the resources of the Nijiku Estate could hardly support more than a handful of lilies. Zanka couldn't tell you what a tuberose would smell like, and couldn't even really tell you what one would look like—but it must be something addictive, with the way you're always turning heads. He can't be sure, though. Zanka won't ever know your scent.

He has no biological reason to look at you as much as he does. No biological reason to be mesmerised by you as much as he is. No biological reason to want you the way an alpha would.

But it's really hard not to want you. Really, really hard. Which is unfortunate, since he has no business looking at an omega.

“You're so old-fashioned about this stuff," you whine at him one day, looping your arm around his and pressing yourself to his shoulder. Zanka’s heart rate ticks up, but he keeps a straight face. Somehow. He distracts himself with your musings. You love to interrogate people about their thoughts on mismatched relationships—alphas with betas, and omegas with betas, and omegas with omegas—and right now he's the focus of your scrutiny.

“What do you mean you’d never date an omega?” you demand. “What don't you like about us?”

Zanka studies your face carefully. You don't look hurt, exactly, but you do look disappointed. He gets it. Exceptionally rare and desirable, omegas have a tough deal in most parts of the Ground. In places like Kamuatari District, you'd have been courted by multiple suitors, then engaged to an alpha soon after coming of age and safely married off long ago; elsewhere, you might have ended up exploited, or trafficked, or worse. It was his old man’s opinion that alphas couldn't be trusted around unmated omegas, and that omegas should be considered a kind of protected class. The rest of Kamuatari district felt similarly; it was unusual for omegas to marry anyone other than alpha suitors who could take proper care of them—except for maybe the occasional beta with enough wealth and rank among the Hell Guard, but those marriages were usually considered a farce. It was also unheard of for omegas to freely talk to anyone without the company of their alpha mate. Zanka’s mother, herself, never left the Nijiku Estate unless it was on the arm of his father, and said that doing otherwise would be “foolish”.

When Zanka first told you about this, you'd balked at him—probably because you seem deeply uninterested in finding an alpha to chaperone you for all your exploits—though you also kind of understood it.

It does make me nervous sometimes that this place is full of alphas, you'd said, seating yourself on Zanka’s lap. He’d tried not to look at your doe eyes or pouty lips, nor the dangerously low cut of your top. That's why I like it when you hold me, you know. You make me feel so safe.

Zanka said he was glad to hear that, and then he prayed to every god in existence that you wouldn't notice his flustered expression or very obvious boner. Just as he is right now, trying to ignore the press of your chest against his arm.

“It ain't that I don't like omegas,” he replies carefully. “But I’d never be able to take care of one as their mate, y'know? Not as a beta.”

“That's stupid,” you say plainly. “What could an alpha do that a beta can't?”

He tries not to splutter. “Ain’t it obvious?”

You stare blankly. “No?”

Zanka wants to die. You have to be playing dumb. But then again, you've never been in a relationship, so maybe you're just astonishingly ignorant about certain mating rituals. He has half a mind to tell you to ask an omega, but then he realises there are none besides you in HQ.

“Like,” he starts, struggling. “We can't scent ‘em so other alphas stay away. Or make ‘em feel protected. Or take care of them during… you know.” During heats, he wants to say, but can't get out. Zanka’s pretty sure that he's already red up to the tips of his ears; if he goes anywhere near the topic of knotting, he’ll probably combust. “Anyway—omegas never pay attention to me. Don't ya think that says something? I'd never be enough for one.”

“I think you’d be enough for anyone,” you grouse. “I wish you'd stop talking about yourself like that, Zanka.”

“Like what?” He gives you a bewildered look.

“Like you’re always looking down on yourself. Saying you’re a mediocrity, or you’ll never be enough, or whatever.”

Zanka shrugs. “I ain't lookin’ down on myself—just sayin’ the truth. Nothin’ wrong with bein’ a beta or a mediocrity, but everyone’s gotta acknowledge their own limits.”

“I think you were raised to believe in too many limits,” you say, actually sounding a little sad. Zanka would hate hearing that from anyone else—his family’s business isn't anyone’s but his own—but he knows you mean well. And anyway, you were probably raised with infinitely more limits than him. You're an omega, after all.

“Doesn’t matter much now,” Zanka tries to console you. “I’m with the Cleaners now, ain't I? And stuff like that doesn't matter to most people here.”

Though it does matter to him. He's not one to forget about his limits. Even if he's fine with being a beta, a mediocrity, a disinherited nobody—he knows it wouldn't be fine for you, eventually. Or at least he wouldn't be fine giving you that kind of life.

Sometimes, though, when you smile too long at him or stare at him in that pretty way of yours, Zanka wonders if that could someday change. After he's different, after he's powerful, after he's more than some failed heir—then maybe he'd have some kind of business looking at you. But it feels pointless to think about it as he is right now.

After all—he's a beta anyway.

Whenever you go into preheat, you ask Zanka for his sweaters and T-shirts. The fabrics of your clothes are so nice, you always say, nuzzling into whatever you've stolen off his body. Makes for good nesting material, you know?

Zanka’s never thought too hard about it. He's always heard that omegas want comfortable nests, after all—it keeps them feeling safe during a vulnerable and sometimes painful time. It's no skin off his back if you want to borrow some old clothes that would make you feel a little better during your heats, especially since yours are so brutal. You're already looking ill right now, before it's even started. Practically shivering on the couch, deep bags under your eyes from all the sleep you've lost over the past couple of days. When he drapes his cardigan over your shoulders, you immediately burrow into it—pull it tight around your body and press your nose against the blue cotton. You breathe in deeply, sighing with relief—something he's seen you do plenty of times.

Zanka’s never quite understood this particular habit of yours. “Why d’ya always sniff my clothes?” he asks. “Is it an omega thing?”

“Kinda,” you murmur. “It's comforting.” You're so tired that you sway a little bit; he allows you to lean against him and rest your head on his shoulder. “Omegas like familiar scents during their heats—don’t you know that?”

“No,” he admits. “Talkin’ about heats was real taboo in Kamuatari District. I know the broad strokes of what happens, but nothin’ else.” Which is probably a good thing: Zanka thinks he’d die if he did learn, in detail, what happened to an omega during their heat. It's a calculated decision when he asks, “Anyway, whaddya mean you like my scent? Betas don't have scents.”

You frown. “What are you talking about? You totally do. It's just very faint.” As if to prove a point, you close your eyes and lean in very close to his nape. He can feel the soft tickle of your breath against his pulse, your lips inches from his throat.

Zanka stops breathing.

Your voice is low, almost velvety, when you speak again: “None of your alpha friends or family ever told you about your scent?”

“N-nah,” he says. He's stuttering and his face is burning, but you don't comment on it, merely staring up at him in a way that’s making him pray—again—that he won’t get a boner. “It was real taboo to talk about scents in Kamuatari District, too.”

You tilt your head. “Taboo?”

“Yeah. Ain't it rude? It's like commentin’ on someone’s body.”

You let out a laugh: faint, tinged with amusement, and maybe derision too. “That’s awfully silly. An omega’s body is already everyone else's business—wouldn’t you agree?”

You give Zanka one of those long, penetrating looks again, leaning into him. He becomes acutely aware of the obvious view down your shirt and tries to think about literally anything else. You always get extra touchy with him during your preheats: you’ve had some downright horrifying experiences with alphas during previous ones, and it eases your anxiety over it when you're physically close to Zanka. It makes him feel extra scummy for checking you out. You're going to him for comfort; he should definitely not be thinking about the way your curves feel against his body.

“Uh,” he replies.

You press your lips to the shell of his ear, voice soft: “Do you wanna know what you smell like, Zanka?”

“Uh.”

You inhale, breathing out a little sigh afterward that has him shivering.

“Like incense,” you murmur. “Sandalwood, I think. It's very pleasant. Calms me down during my heats.”

He swallows. Hard. “Y-your heats?”

“Mhm.” Your hand brushes against his thigh; his heart jumps. “Mine are really bad, you know. It always hurts so much because of how empty I am. But your scent always helps my body relax. Makes me feel better.”

Zanka is going to die.

He knows you're not trying to make any suggestive comments. Incense helps everyone relax; that's why so many people burn it in the first place. And there's no way, biologically, that Zanka’s scent could provide any kind of sexual or physical relief to you during a heat—he isn't an alpha, after all. But holy shit does everything about this moment feel suggestive. He pulls back, face burning, pants mortifyingly tight. Thankfully, you don't look at his lap.

“Zanka?” you ask, blinking. “Is something wrong?”

You look so innocent—and even kind of worried, like you've done something wrong. Guilt floods him.

“No,” he says quickly, trying to adjust his pants as subtly as possible. “Nothin’ at all. You just made me think—aren’t ya uncomfortable right now? Since you're in preheat. Maybe I should get ya more clothes for your nest, and you could get around to making it faster.”

You blink, then smile a little.

“Sure,” you say. “Why don't you help me build it, actually?”

Zanka ends up giving you half his wardrobe and spends most of the evening watching you meticulously arrange and re-arrange a pile of blankets and sweaters on your bed. He can't determine what makes you satisfied with certain parts of your nest and what makes you decide to demolish others, but that's fine since he isn't helping with actually building it. His only role is to rub his wrists along whatever shirt he's donating to your cause, or holding it against the crook of his neck until you deem it ready to use.

“This is how you scent things,” you explain patiently. “You rub your scent glands on it, or you press your whole body against it. Easy work.”

“But I don't have scent glands.”

“Of course you do. How else would you have a scent?” You frown. “Wow, you really don't know anything about mating biology, do you?”

“It ain't like I need to know about it,” Zanka points out, “since I'm a beta and all.”

“It could still come up,” you insist. “Sometimes omegas and alphas will try to mark their beta mates on their scent glands. Almost never takes, but it happens.”

Zanka imagines, almost against his will, the feeling of your teeth and lips on his neck; he can feel his cheeks going pink. “Sure,” he replies, hoping he doesn't sound too affected, “but omegas ain't ever interested in me, alphas don't look my way, and betas don't do any of that. My ex never wanted me to scent anythin’ for her.”

You freeze. “You have an ex?”

“...yeah?” Zanka is understanding, all of a sudden, that he's said something wrong. From the fleeting twitch of your mouth and the way your breath stops, he can tell you're upset. He wonders what tuberose and bitter orange would smell like together; Enjin had once said, when you had shut yourself into your room for three days straight, that it was very easy for him to tell when you were depressed. Zanka had then decided that since he couldn't smell your moods, he'd simply learn your microexpressions instead—and they’re alarming him right now.

“Met her in the city while I was out on a job, before ya joined the Cleaners,” he says carefully. “Didn't last long.”

You relax. “Oh,” you say. “I guess that's fine.”

Zanka isn't sure why his dating history is being judged or the criteria by which you're judging it, but he feels like it's a bad idea to ask. “Anythin’ else I can do to help here?” he says instead, studying your nest carefully. He still can't see any rhyme or reason to how it's arranged, but if he memorises it, he could re-build it for you next time anyway.

You hesitate. “I mean… you could…”

You don't often get shy—at least, not compared to Zanka. It's weird watching you fumble with your words. “I kinda thought… you know, when my heat comes for real… it’s always really tough since I'm alone…”

Oh. Of course. “Is there anythin’ I can get ya?” he knows to ask. He asked Enjin once how to help an omega through their heat, so he knows the basics: “Water? Snacks? Meds? I'll run out and get whatever ya need.”

“No, I've got all of that sorted. But… company would be nice, you know?”

Zanka stares at you for a little bit before he realises what you're asking, and he has to swallow a lump in his throat. “Are ya askin’ me to help you find a heat partner?”

You give him a dumbfounded look. Probably surprised he's already intuited what you're about to ask, given how clueless he is about other mating rituals. “What? Well, I mean—”

“There's a lot of alphas here who'd be happy to help, I think. I could ask one of them for ya, if there's someone you're thinkin’ of?” Zanka tries to sound casual, even though the idea is unsettling to him. Heat partners weren't a thing in Kamuatari since omegas got married so young there, but they make sense out here in East Ward, where omegas tend to stay unmated for longer. Zanka’s not judging anyone for it. The thing is, when he tries to picture you spending your heat with any of the alphas he knows and trusts—Enjin or Tamsy or Semiu—

—he’s realising that he'd want it to be no one other than himself.

Which is stupid. He's got no business looking at an omega. No business looking at you. What could he do to help you through your heat?

Maybe his mood is showing on his face, because your eyes go soft.

“No, I'm not asking for that either. I'm fine spending it alone.”

“But you should have an alpha take care of ya. Nearly all omegas need it.”

“I don't.” Then you give him an uncertain look, which borders on shy, and which makes his heart jump in a way that feels like it might require medical attention. “But it'd be nice if we could talk a little through our chokers, while I'm going through it?”

Your heat runs its course over the next week. You'd ordinarily hole up in your room the whole time, completely alone, and Zanka would have no clue what's happening in there other than the fact that you’re suffering. It always makes him feel on edge. So this time around, it's a relief when you call at night and he hears your voice—even though it's always ragged and exhausted, like you've been completely wrung out by heatsickness.

“Wish you could hold me,” you murmur once, sleepy and wistful. “It always makes me feel better when you do.”

“I don't think I could actually do much for ya,” Zanka tells you, trying to ignore the funny squeeze that his heart’s doing at your words. “Betas are pretty useless for heats.”

“I don't think you're useless,” you say. “And you always do a lot for me.”

Your voice is so small. It reminds Zanka of that one time where things had gone really sideways for you—stranded and alone in the desert due to a trash storm, weak from an early preheat. You were an impossibly good find for the traffickers who came across you: there's nothing on the market more valuable—or vulnerable—than an unmated omega in heat. Zanka, Enjin, and Gris had found you locked up in the trunk of a car, curled into a ball and trembling in pain. Your entire body was burning with fever and fear, and you screamed when Enjin and Gris tried to untie you. You’d been too delirious to recognise their faces or even their scents: all you knew was that there were two alphas trying to grab you, and they could have done whatever they wanted with you.

It was Zanka who'd helped you in the end. He hadn’t had a choice: he was the only beta among them, the only person who didn't smell like a threat. He took you into his arms—carried you, because you were in too much pain to walk—and delivered you to the clinic, your scalding tears pressed into the crook of his neck the whole time. Please don't go, you'd begged, crying against his pulse. I’m scared, I'm so scared, please don't let them touch me. But his mother’s words rang loud and clear through his head—It’s dangerous for an omega to see anyone other than their alpha during a heat—and Zanka had left, in the end, trying not to listen to your wounded pleas.

You hadn't held it against him. If anything, you trusted him more coming out of the whole ordeal: that's when you started getting all touchy with him, clinging onto him because it made you feel safe despite being constantly surrounded by alphas. But he feels shitty about it to this day, and he’s only been thinking of it more since your latest heat.

He thinks that's what’s gotten him into such a bad mood lately. Your heat’s finished up and you're perfectly healthy now—but Zanka feels agitated, somehow, whenever he sees you.

Specifically, he feels agitated when he sees other people near you.

Now, Zanka considers himself pretty friendly with everyone, unless your name is Rudo and you steal Lovely Assistaff and call it a dumb stick. Then Zanka might try to beat your ass. But otherwise, he's never felt badly toward any of his fellow Cleaners. It's confusing, then, how he gets antsy when he sees you talking with Semiu. How he catches himself frowning when you light a cigarette for Enjin. How his eyes narrow when he watches you and Tamsy sparring and you're clearly on the defensive, brow pinched, breath short. He stares at the two of you, hawklike, every muscle in his body tense.

Please don't go. I'm scared, I'm so scared, please don't let them touch me.

You're strung up by Tokushin, wailing at being bound, and suddenly Zanka’s staff has the other Giver trapped against a wall, its spikes dangerously close to his body. Tamsy seems unfazed, whistling—as if impressed. His eyes lose their golden glow; you yelp a little as you fall to the ground, and Zanka’s gaze snaps to you as you land on your feet.

“Zanka?” you ask, running up to him. “What's wrong? What happened?”

Your eyes dart between him and Tamsy. Tamsy shrugs, nonchalant. “Beats me.” He tilts his head, his keen eyes roaming over Zanka’s form. “Did I do something to offend you?”

Zanka realises that he has no answer. He tries to retrace his thought process, but can't come up with anything concrete—it’s like he blacked out between the time you got strung up and this moment, when you ran to his side.

He remembers being worried, though.

“You were bein’ awful rough with her,” he says, voice tight. “Sounded like she was in pain.”

Tamsy hums. “But we’ve sparred a million times, and she always screams like that. You've never gotten so worried before, Zanka.”

There's nothing he can say to that. He feels like a crazy person. He had no reason to attack Tamsy, but he doesn't want to release him—not until you’ve gotten away from him. I'm scared, Zanka keeps remembering. I'm so scared, please don't let them touch me. You weren't just saying that about the traffickers—it was also about Enjin, and Gris, and everyone else in the Cleaners who tried to crowd around you and nearly suffocated—

“Zanka?” you say softly. You touch his arm, and all the tension leaves his body. Anima and rage drain out of his vital instrument; Lovely Assisstaff returns to its original form, fragile and benign. Zanka tracks Tamsy’s movements carefully in his periphery, but stays turned to you.

“Were you worried about me?” you ask, peering at him curiously.

He shifts, uncomfortable. “Yeah. I know it don't make sense, but—”

“That's alright,” you dismiss. “No harm’s been done.” You give Tamsy an apologetic look. “Honestly, I was kinda tired from my heat anyway. Zanka probably just noticed. Let's call it quits and get back to it tomorrow?”

“Sure,” Tamsy says neutrally, then inclines his head to Zanka. “As long as Zanka’s fine with it.”

I'm not, he nearly says, for some reason he can't fathom. Now that he thinks about it, he also can't fathom why Tamsy would ever defer to him in the first place. It's strange, though Zanka's feeling some of the tension leave his jaw, hackles receding. Weird.

He tries to ignore it, turning to you. “Whatever ya feel comfortable with. I just don't want ya tirin’ yourself out.”

“Tomorrow, then.” You tug on Zanka’s arm, leading him away from Tamsy. “Let's get out of here.”

Zanka watches Tamsy the whole time as the two of you leave, tracking the movements of his feet, his eyes, his hands. It's only after the door swings shut behind the two of you that he finally relaxes. He tastes something in the air as you pull him close—sweet, fleeting, foreign. It's gone before he knows it.

It takes Zanka some time to realise that you've started to wear perfume.

“It’s nice,” he compliments you once he does, sitting next to you as the two of you do maintenance on your respective vital instruments. His staff is shiny with linseed oil; its earthy scent layered with your fragrance is pleasant. He finds himself watching you work, his eyes lingering on your nape as you bend over your desk, biting your lip in focus. “Where’d you get it?”

You blink at him. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, where's your perfume from? That stuff’s real pricey, right? S’hard to make.” That's what Enjin told him, anyway: his own cologne was terribly expensive, its ingredients imported from some faraway village. When Zanka asked what was even the point of using it, Enjin said it was just for polish. Then Bro ratted him out and said it was actually for picking up betas.

Zanka hadn’t thought much about it at the time, but now it's making him uneasy. It’d be crazy of you to seek the attention of a beta when you have so many alphas around you, who are much more qualified to mate with you—but then again, maybe that's why you're always so curious about people's stances on mismatched relationships. Maybe you've found a beta you're interested in. You've always been a little unconventional, after all.

He swallows at the thought, thinking back to all the interactions you've had with him. The touchiness, the nesting, the way you seem to long for his presence during your heats. It really wouldn't make sense—not when there’s Enjin and Tamsy and Semiu, not when omegas never look his way, not when you should have been married long ago to an alpha who could take proper care of you—but maybe, just maybe—

“I got it in Canvas Town, from a specialty perfumer,” you say smoothly, watching him carefully. “Can you pick out any notes?”

Zanka frowns. “Not really. I'm not good with noticin’ that type of thing. It just smells sweet to me.”

“Give it a try,” you say. “I'm curious what you get from it.”

You offer your wrist to him, and Zanka studies it, swallowing. He's for some reason mesmerized by the sight of it—staring more openly than he ever has at your legs or scandalously low-cut tops—and his hand almost trembles as he takes it and gently angles your pulse toward his face. He reminds himself that you hug him and sit on his lap and hang off his arm almost every day. It’s not a huge deal to smell your wrist, in comparison. It should be a quick and casual thing.

But then he breathes in and his mind goes blank.

Your scent is fucking heavenly.

Zanka didn't know a perfume could smell so good. Enjin’s cologne is underwhelming to him, as have been most other ones he's smelled. But yours is rich and soothing and beautiful—made from some kind of flower, he guesses. But not one he's ever known. It's strange and overpowering and it makes him feel fucking ravenous—like he wants to drink it all in. Or drown in it.

Zanka only realises he’s pressed his lips against your skin when you make a small noise.

He doesn't know how it happened. It's like he blacked out again—but now that he's awake, he jerks back, as if you’d just slapped him. “Sorry!” he yelps, mortified, because what the fuck did he just do? (Something that was definitely an HR violation, he thinks.)

But you don't look mad. You look… flustered. Your eyes are hazy; your lips are parted, breath heavy. Something shifts, and Zanka glances down to see you pressing your thighs together.

If he didn't know any better, he'd think you were aroused.

Zanka swallows, trying to ignore the thought. But it's hard when you're looking at him like that—eyes hooded by your lashes, pupils blown—and harder still, with how good you smell. You've tugged away your wrist but for some reason he can still practically taste your fragrance in the air—heady and almost cloying, now. Springtime bloom, fresh juice on his tongue. It's painfully distracting.

“It's okay,” you say, clearing your throat. “The insides of my wrists are just a little sensitive. There's a scent gland there, remember? Usually only a mate would touch that spot directly.”

Zanka is going to die. Or he's going to get sued for harassment.

“I’m real sorry,” he blurts out. “I dunno what came over me. I shouldn't have done that—”

“No, it’s really fine.” Your voice is gentle. His panicked breath evens out, and he takes in your new fragrance again: mellow, sweet. He feels himself relaxing, focusing on your questions: “What did you smell, though?”

“Flowers,” he says immediately, “and a couple of other things.”

“Like?”

“I dunno. Honey and fruit, maybe?”

“Citrus?”

He thinks for a minute. “Yeah.”

You give him another one for your long looks. He wonders what you're thinking, but you don't let it on, only nodding to yourself.

“I see.”

Zanka feels like he's going insane.

Whatever new fragrance you're wearing is overpowering. Ordinarily if a fragrance permeated everything like this, it would make him annoyed at best, nauseated at worst. But something about this particular scent—syrupy, heady, the memory of your skin against his lips, the sensation of your pulse beneath his mouth—is driving him toward some dangerous edge. He tastes the air and he thinks of you: fingers petal-soft, eyes citrus-bright, voice honey-sweet. The dip of your collarbones, the soft lines of your body. He feels like he'll fall off a cliff whenever you're around.

It makes him feel so, so scummy—like a real scuzzball. All you're doing is existing around him and it's giving him the worst thoughts about you—thoughts he has no business having.

The worst part is that your scent is ever-present, lingering even when you, yourself, aren't there. It's in the dining hall, in the common area, in the threads of his clothes. It's in the training room, when he's trying to focus on sparring. It's in his sheets when he's trying to sleep at night, hoping he's not gonna have some kind of filthy dream about you—waking up mortified when he does, his cock throbbing and leaking, aching to be inside you. It's even there when he's meditating, trying to focus on the weight of Lovely Assisstaff but thinking instead of how your weight feels on his lap—how it'd feel if you sat there, straddling his waist, moaning pretty in his ear as you ride him.

It makes me feel so safe when you hold me like this.

Man. He really is a scuzzball.

He thinks his guilt over this might be responsible for his bad mood lately. He snaps at people when you aren't in his line of sight. He flattened Rudo during training, the other day, after he spotted the two of you having lunch together. He saw you share a cigarette with Enjin—Enjin! His fucking hero!—and he accidentally crushed the glass in his hands.

Zanka tries to get your perfume out of his clothes, but it's not coming out no matter how much he scrubs things. He's forced to stop trying, because if he wears out the threads then your nests won't be as comfortable anymore. But it's driving him fucking crazy.

He's in the canteen, scowling and sleep-deprived, when Enjin comes upon him and whistles at the piss-poor state he's in.

“Alright,” he says in that knowing tone of his, pulling up a chair. “What's going on?”

Zanka can't respond at first. What the fuck is he supposed to say? I’m smellin’ my friend’s perfume everywhere and it's makin’ me so horny I can't focus? It sounds insane. He feels insane. So he ends up just saying, vaguely, that he wants to get your new fragrance out of his clothes, and it's annoying him that he can't figure out how.

Enjin blinks. “New fragrance?”

“Yeah. I'm sure you've smelled it—it’s everywhere, ain't it?” Zanka wrinkles his nose. “S’nice in small doses, but distracting as hell like this.”

“What do you…” Enjin takes a beat, studying him. Then he smiles. “Yeah, it is pretty distracting. But are you really sure you wanna get rid of it? Lots of guys would love it, you know.”

“‘course I do,” Zanka lies. “I don't want people thinkin’ I wear perfume anyway. Ain't my style.”

Enjin nods. “I get it. Well—perfume like this is hard to rid of, but it's doable. I've done it plenty of times before. You gotta take a really hot shower—scrub your neck and wrists especially. And your hair, obviously.”

“And my clothes?”

“You'll need to go shopping—or use bleach.”

Zanka feels nothing but despair looking at the state of his wallet—being disinherited means he can't spend the way he used to—but he goes to buy new casual wear anyway. He makes sure it's all nice—not only because he's still got the instinct of presenting himself like a noble scion, but also because he doesn't want to loan you anything of shitty quality during your next heat. You should be comfortable.

Enjin’s advice does work. Zanka still tastes you in the air wherever he goes, but at least it's not clinging to him. It's enough to stop his daydreams about you, at least. Most of them. He's still having ones at night, and he's still waking up with raging boners, but at least it's something. He finally has some semblance of nonsexual peace.

The next time you run into him, you freeze.

“Hey,” he greets, waving, “how’d your mission go? You went to Canvas Town, right? I heard that things got kinda—”

You march up to him, ignoring him completely. He squirms under the intensity of your gaze, the tightness of your jaw. You layered a new perfume with your usual one, he notices. The citrus is stronger today.

“Zanka,” you say, “has something been wrong?”

He flushes, because the answer is yes, but he can’t exactly say that his dick gets hard whenever he smells your perfume anywhere—and that he's been smelling it everywhere.

He lies—badly: “N-no…?”

“Are you mad at me?” you ask tightly.

“What? Of course not.” He frowns at the crease in your brow. You're distressed. “What's even makin’ you think that?”

You ignore him—again. “Then are you seeing someone?” you try, and his jaw drops.

“Huh? No! Of course not.” He pauses at his own words—’Of course not?’ Why would it be obvious to you that he isn't? Though it's plenty obvious to him, given that he's been fixated on the thought of you for the past two weeks, and smitten for nearly the past year—but you relax, and he lets it go.

“What’s wrong?” he asks earnestly. “Yer anxious about something.”

You seem to think for a little bit, and then you sigh. “I am,” you admit, voice small, and it sets him on edge immediately.

“What's wrong? Is someone botherin’ ya? An alpha?” He nearly pauses again, because what a weird fucking question. Why would it be an alpha? It's probably more likely all your paperwork for the collateral damage on your missions, which you truly suck at doing. No alpha with the Cleaners has ever given you any issues; Enjin, Gris, and Bro have always made sure of that.

You don't seem to question his suspicions, though. “No, not exactly,” you say. “I can handle it myself, but I've been feeling kind of stressed.”

“What can I do to help?”

You look at him through your lashes, pleading. He realises he'd do anything for you in that moment.

“Can you hold me?” you ask. “Just for a little bit. I just need a hug.”

“Of course,” he says immediately, and you loop your arms around his neck and press your face against his shoulder, hair and breath tickling his jugular. It’s oddly pleasant. He swallows as he's surrounded by that perfume again—pulled in, all dreamlike. He thinks about separating from you, but you take one of his hands and lace your fingers with his. He shivers when your thumb runs delicately along his wrist, lingering on his skin.

His mind feels halfway to fraying by the time you let go. You seem happier. Satisfied.

“Thanks,” you say brightly. “That made me feel better.”

You look content—refreshed, almost. Zanka feels himself relaxing as you wave goodbye, rounding the corner so you can run an errand for Semiu. It's only after you're gone that he’s realising the scent of you is clinging to him again, and he nearly holds his head in his hands.

Back to square one.

After another week, Zanka feels like he's getting close to his limit.

For nearly twenty-one days, he's been suffering from intrusive thoughts of you, most of them wildly inappropriate. And as if it isn’t bad enough to dealing with your new fragrance and the sudden, mortifying spike in his sex drive—he now has to deal with your new wardrobe choices. You have a sudden preference for wearing very tiny skirts, and it’s been giving Zanka catastrophically high blood pressure since you keep bending over and giving him a full view of your ass. He always scrambles to get you to straighten up so he’s not looking up your skirt—and also to stand behind you so that no one else is tempted to do the same.

It’s starting to become a struggle to exist around you—but he doesn't exactly want to avoid you, either. He likes being near you. And he's on edge when he's not. After all—if he, as a beta, is thinking about you this way, what are the alphas around you fantasizing about?

Still. He wishes, at the very least, that you'd stop sitting in his lap and squirming around. It gives him a genuine heart attack every time you do it: what if you notice his dick pressing against your ass? But you seem none the wiser, just rubbing up on him anyway.

It’s torturous. And wasteful. He's running up the water bill with how many cold showers he's taken lately—but he doesn't have a choice. He is not gonna be that creep who jacks off to the thought of his friend, who trusts him pretty much unconditionally even during heats. He’s not a total scuzzball, alright? It's a line he won't cross, no matter how good you smell or how nice you feel or how pretty you are when you smile at him.

Then you return his clothes—the ones you borrowed for your nest—and he finally hits his limit.

You're so nonchalant about it. A little careless, even. “Sorry I didn't get the chance to wash them,” you fret, placing your basket of laundry at the foot of his bed. “I've just been so busy since my heat finished, you know, all these missions and then the paperwork… but you must be running out of clothes, huh? You keep buying new ones.”

Zanka swallows. He hardly wants to admit the fact that he's been trying to smell less of your new perfume—it’d be a dick move, and anyway, it's really nice—so he shrugs and says, “I don't mind it.”

You frown. “I'll pay you back anyway.”

“Nah, don't worry about it.” He nods at the laundry. “Don't worry about this, neither. Won't be a big deal to wash some clothes.”

You smile gratefully. “Thanks. When I get back from this next mission, I'll make it up to you, okay? I'll take you out to dinner. My treat.”

Zanka thinks the last thing he wants to be doing is sitting in public with you, trying to hide his boner under some restaurant table, but he nods. “Let's do barbecue.”

You grin. “You got it.”

He signs in relief after you've gone: your fragrance is a little fainter now in the absence of your body. Just another cold shower later and he’ll be fine—he’ll do it after he gets the laundry started.

Then he actually starts sorting through his clothes, and he almost loses his damn mind.

His clothes are doused in your fragrance, flora and honey permeating every seam and stitch. So sweet it's nearly cloying. So strong it's almost like you're still here with him—breath sweeping across his collar, thumb trailing along his wrist. An omega’s body is everyone’s business—wouldn’t you agree?

He doesn't realise he's buried his face in his shirt until he’s closing his eyes and inhaling—groaning as he does. He nearly throws it on the floor as soon as he hears the noise he's making, because what the fuck is he doing? Zanka absolutely has to stop. But his whole body’s gone hot and his mind has gone foggy and he can't stop breathing in the smell of you—like he's some kind of addict, drunk on just the ghost of your presence.

Then he catches another scent layered into the fabric, and his eyes snap open.

It smells like sex.

He rifles through every piece of clothing in the basket; all of them carry that very specific, unmistakable scent. Like you lovingly built that nest with his clothes and brought someone to bed and let them fuck you in it. Except that doesn't make sense—you hate it when anyone other than Zanka comes near you during your heats, and anyway, he'd have noticed if you'd gotten a heat partner. You spend way too much time around him for him to miss it.

What do omegas do during their heats without a partner, anyway? People in Kamuatari District never talked about it; he’d always assumed they just slept through their discomfort and tried to ignore all the symptoms of heat sickness. He hadn't known enough, at the time, to realise that that wouldn't be very realistic. He hadn't known that heats were so painful until he saw you crying in the trunk of that car, sweating and trembling. Until he picked you up and listened to you whimper against his neck. Until you crawled into his lap two months ago, whispering into his ear: It always hurts so much because of how empty I am, but your scent always helps my body relax. Makes me feel better.

Zanka is a beta. He’s biologically incapable of giving you any kind of relief during a heat. But now he's putting two and two together, your words with your scent, and now he can't help the mental image he's forming: you, in a nest built with his things, panting and filling yourself up to chase away that emptiness. Wet and messy and getting slick all over his clothes. Warm and fragrant as you wear his shirts and take care of yourself with your fingers, crying into his fabrics.

Calling him afterwards, fucked to exhaustion and wrung out by countless orgasms, to tell him you wished he could hold you.

Zanka inhales sharply at the thought. Notices that his cock is fucking aching.

His sex drive has been unmanageable over these past few weeks, but it's still never been like this. His dick is pulsing and twitching and painful, and he can't stop breathing in your scent, and he keeps imagining the little sounds you must make in your nest while you touch yourself, and holy shit he is a scumbag for doing this, but—

—he’s unzipping his pants and freeing his cock.

Guilt wells up in him when he wraps a hand around his length. Shame burns across his face. He’s going to hate himself for this later; hell, he already hates himself. But he's just so hard, already leaking prespend everywhere, and it's only getting worse the more he presses his face into his fragranced shirt. Zanka can't help his reaction when he squeezes his cock and finally starts to stroke himself: he makes a noise that's halfway to a whine, his hips bucking toward his hand. Just the smell of you is making his whole body feel sensitive—almost possessed.

He finally caves with the fantasies. Imagines stuff that would make him die if he actually tried it in real life, but he's now convinced you've been intentionally making him think about: squeezing your curves whenever you sit pretty on his lap in public; rolling his hips against your thighs as you squirm on top of him; bending you over whenever you wear that little skirt around him and taking you like that.

It's confusing. Zanka’s not even really a fan of doggy style. He’s a missionary kind of guy, would want to look at your face and hold your hand if he ever did somehow get to sleep with you. But he’s been thinking nonstop about fucking you from behind lately for some reason, and he's thinking about it now as he fucks his fist and groans into his used shirt, as if drunk on you.

It doesn't take long to finish—he’s been pent up for weeks, after all. His cock is twitching and his hips are stuttering and now he's spilling himself into hand, his whole body burning with shame as he cums to the scent of you. But he's relieved, almost—desperate to be rid of the non-stop tension that's been plaguing him these past few weeks. Finally free of all his fantasies, which he hopes to tuck away and never think of again.

But as his panting subsides, Zanka realises something horrible:

He's still incredibly hard.

After his third orgasm, Zanka reasons that something must be physically wrong with him. He just can't quite figure out what. Did he accidentally ingest an aphrodisiac? Get hit by a weird vital instrument? Went too long without jerking off? He has no idea, and he can't really think well enough to figure it out. All he can focus on is fisting himself toward his next orgasm, face still buried in the shirt that you wore during your heat. He’s already dripping and messy with cum—it’s gotten all over his fingers, his length, and now his abs, after getting rid of his shirt—but somehow he still needs more.

His blood is scalding, his body is aching with tension. He feels like an animal. All he can think about is bending you over and fucking you, and he's glad that you've left on a mission with Follo or else he'd be at risk of going to your room and—

“Zanka?”

His eyes snap open. You're in his room, for some reason—eyes wide, jaw slack. Your gaze is darting between his lap and the shirt he's holding against his face.

Damning evidence.

“What are you doin’ here?!” he yelps. He finally drops his shirt, and fumbles to pull his pants up, face burning. “l didn't want ya to see—”

You do that thing where you ignore him again, opting instead to watch him intently. The door locks behind you with a click, and for some insane reason he can't fathom, you walk over to him and lean toward his neck.

Dread and arousal pool in his gut. His whole body goes stiff; he's trying not to grab you and pull you toward him, which is very hard when he can feel your breath on his neck and smell so much nectar in your hair. He almost can't process it when you look at him and point out, “You’re in rut.”

Zanka blinks. “What?”

“You're going through a rut, Zanka.” Your brow furrows. “Which isn't surprising.”

He gapes at you. “What do ya mean, ‘not surprising’? Of course it's surprisin’, it ain't even possible! I'm a damn beta—”

“No, you're an alpha.” You tilt your head. “You haven't noticed? Most people do, right before they present.”

Zanka’s mind goes blank. He can't be an alpha. He’s a beta—he made peace with being a beta years ago, at the same time he made peace with being untalented, pathetic, a disappointment to his entire family, the laughingstock of Kamuatari: the Nijiku clan scion who turned tail and ran away from the Academy. He’s even come to like being a beta—that’s who he is, even for all the limits it's brought him. And sure, it means he’ll never be enough for you, but at least he doesn't turn into some mindless, aggressive animal over your—

He breathes in your perfume again, and a horrible realization crashes through him.

“You really didn't know,” you say, blinking at his expression. “I thought it would be obvious. Your behavior’s been really odd lately. I wasn't sure if you'd turn out to be an alpha or an omega, but I guess we know now.”

His dick is so hard, he can barely think.

“But I've been a beta my whole life,” he protests—as if you can do anything.

You give him an apologetic look. “Some people just present late. I guess you're going through your first rut, now.” You look at him with those pretty eyes that he's been thinking about nonstop for the past month, and he swallows thickly. Realises that everything adds up. His bad moods, his antsy behaviour when he sees you with other alphas, his sudden fantasies about mounting you.

“Do you want help?” you ask mildly, and Zanka nearly jumps.

“H-help?”

“Yes. Do you want me to help you through your rut?” Your eyes flick downward, where the outline of his straining cock is visible through his pants. “I’ve never been with anyone during their rut before, but I think I could do it. It can't be too different from helping an omega during their heat.”

“No way,” he blurts out, panicked. “If I'm really an alpha”—something that still feels like a lie, even though it's getting harder to deny—

“it ain't safe for ya here, is it? Yer an unmated omega. You gotta get out before I…”

You raise a brow. “Before you do what? Something I've been trying to offer for a while now?” You sound faintly amused. “Besides—it’s not like alphas lose all sense during their ruts. You could turn me down now if you want. I'll leave and lock the door to my room, if you’re that worried.”

Zanka thinks he’ll die if you leave right now—if he's cut off from your scent, your smile, you. Still, he struggles—not only from the pain of his arousal, but also from the mad tangle of his thoughts. Alphas are dangerous for omegas, he hears his mother say. Omegas should be protected, his father echoes. There's nothing more dangerous for an unmated omega than to be near an alpha.

Please don't let them touch me.

“But we aren't mates,” he finally says, jaw clenched, chest torn.

Your eyes soften. “You’re so old-fashioned.”

“I just”—he swallows, suddenly aware of how clammy his hands have gotten and how much he's been sweating—“I just don't wanna mess things up between us. Or do somethin’ we’ll regret. I don't want ya wakin’ up tomorrow feelin’ horrible ‘cause I lost control and knotted you, or somethin’.”

“I don't think I'd mind if you did,” you say plainly, and he chokes. Feels himself going red, a full-body flush. Your mouth curls playfully, and now he's realising that you're a horrible tease. You still have a merciful streak, though: “But we don't need to go that far,” you reassure him. “I think alphas must be pretty similar to omegas—just a familiar scent would probably help a lot, right?”

Before he can reply, you're baring your nape to him, offering him the pretty slope of your neck. It obliterates all thought from his mind, leaves only hunger behind. He's been chasing the ghost of you through your fragrance for weeks; now you're here, in front of him, ripe and offering yourself.

It takes a moment for Zanka to realise that he's pressed his face to the crook of your neck, that his tongue is searing a hot path along your scent gland. You whimper, and the noise goes straight to his cock.

You tug him into sitting on the bed with you, giving him access to every scent gland in your body. He's torn between some animal part of his hindbrain that's screaming at him to pin you down and fuck you, and another part of him that’s too afraid to hurt you. Being rough with you is never something he'd thought of doing before all this. And even with his supposed new, alpha instincts, it feels wrong—this feels wrong. You aren't his mate. He hasn't even courted you a little. He should tell you to leave.

But he's also so horny he could die.

Zanka tries to spend time on your neck, not only because your fragrance is strongest there, but also because he can feel the way you shudder every time his teeth catch on your skin. He sucks gently and breathes you in; your scent blooms beautifully for him. His cock is painfully heavy in his pants, throbbing for you every time you whine.

At some point you must have pulled off your shirt—or maybe Zanka did, eager to access more of your skin. Faintly, he notes that you weren't wearing a bra, for some reason; he's too distracted to linger on it, kissing a trail down to your bare tits, his mouth hungry on them. You cry when he does, back arching as he sucks your nipples. The noise makes him groan, brings back his hindbrain instinct to pin you down and fuck you. But he’s just worried enough to stop himself: afraid of hurting you, knotting you, messing things up.

He starts touching himself instead.

He doesn't notice it until he's begun fisting his cock again, his hips jerking as he continues to mouth your tits. He’s leaked so much by this point—through his boxers, all over his hands, onto the sheets—that there's no point in trying not to be messy. Apparently you don't care much; he feels your hand gently touching his own, trying to palm his cock. He lets you, almost gasping when he feels your thumb playing with the head, teasing him. Then your grip firms up, warm and tender as you slowly start to pump his cock.

He whines.

It's embarrassing. Probably. He’s too desperate to finish right now to really care. Zanka focuses on your touch, on the taste of your skin, on the little noises you're making as his tongue swirls around your nipple. He ends up panting into the swell of your breasts as he climaxes—so hard that his spend ends up covering your fingers and stomach and skirt. He keeps mouthing at you as he cums, littering your honeyed skin with marks.

He only stops when he comes down from his high. Vaguely, Zanka notices that he finally feels better, but not by much. His cock is still weeping, balls heavy even though he's just had his fourth orgasm—his strongest yet. Even though he just got to touch you in a way he never thought he'd be able, something he thought he'd only ever experience in his dreams.

“Sorry,” he pants, “‘m so sorry, I dunno what's wrong with me.”

“It’s fine.” He feels your fingers run through his hair, comforting. “I’m like this during my heats, too. You don't have to feel sorry for what your body’s doing. Just keep going until you feel better.”

The words do something to him. Makes him give up on his self-control, or maybe it's just his alpha instincts winning out over his rational mind. Everything passes in a drunken haze: he's aware of you squirming and moaning as his mouth trails over your body again, as he presses his nose against every inch of you. He smells flowers and incense the whole time, tastes his cum on your skin, licks a path down to your thighs. Desperate to smell more of you, he pushes up your skirt, and breathes a sigh of relief when he sees your pussy exposed and twitching for him underneath it. No panties. Without thinking, he closes his eyes and presses his face against you—nose flat against your clit, mouth salivating against your glistening cunt—and he inhales. Takes one deep, long ravenous breath, then groans. The scent of you goes straight to his cock.

He's not really thinking when he starts to lick.

He's too far gone to use any real technique, guided by pure hunger as his tongue works on you. You react immediately: body convulsing, voice squealing, scent blossoming. Vaguely, he's aware that you're grinding your clit against him, that his hips are jerking against the mattress—humping the sheets as you fuck his face, cock twitching and balls tightening just at the taste of you. He shudders as your fingers tighten in his hair and you pull him closer to you, drenching his face in slick. He licks and sucks at you, drinking it up greedily as be thrusts his hips against the mattress, and he's closer and closer and closer to—

—his vision goes white.

When Zanka comes to, he's vaguely aware of his cock spurting against the sheets, his abs growing stickier as he cums untouched just from the taste of you. There's so much of it. It's fucking unbelievable.

But it's still not enough.

Zanka needs more. He feels like he’ll die if he doesn't get more of you. He keeps eating you out through his impossibly long and messy orgasm, which he's not sure will ever end. He starts sucking at your clit—all instinct, not intention—and you whine and jerk your hips. Your body is so sensitive, pussy gushing with slick. Vaguely, he's aware of you crying his name, thighs squeezing around his head—I’m gonna cum, I'm gonna cum, Zanka, Zanka, oh—

Zanka only takes his mouth off you when you push him away, face pinched and exhausted. He's vaguely aware of you saying something about being overstimulated, but it's neither your words nor the strange quality of your scent that brings him back to reality—it’s the fact that tears have pearled at the corners of your eyes.

“What's wrong?” he says, leaning over you. He rests a hand over your cheek. “Did I—did I hurt ya? Did I—”

“No,” you reassure him. “No, I just—just needed a break.” Your eyes are still shiny, a little wet. Zanka’s never liked it when you cry, but right now it feels agonizing to see your tears, closer to a physical discomfort than an emotional one: as if it's hardwired into his body to fix whatever's upsetting you.

He crawls up and takes you into his arms, allows you to bury your face into his neck. You kiss him there—his scent gland, he guesses, from the way he shivers—and now he can smell the incense in the air changing, somehow. It shifts from sandalwood into something gentler.

“You don't have to worry,” you murmur. “I really am okay.”

“It’s still botherin’ me,” he replies, disconcerted. “I know it don't make sense, but it's freakin’ me out to see you cry even a little.”

“I know,” you reply. “Alphas instinctively can't stand to see their partners in distress. It's the same with omegas. But you'll get used to it. It gets easier to ignore over time.”

He makes a face. “Why would I wanna get used to seein’ you cry?”

You smile at him, looking sly. “Well, most of the crying I do in bed isn't ‘cause I'm sad.”

Zanka feels his brain short-circuit. His concern evaporates, immediately replaced by mental images that fill him with immense guilt, even with the mind-screw of his rut. He can't help it, though—if just his mouth was enough to get you tearing up, then what would happen if he were to use his cock instead? And he isn't going to—he really, really can't—but if he were to knot you—

Zanka inhales sharply. Tries not to let the mental image affect him, but of course he's been throbbing and leaking this whole time anyway. You evidently notice it, rolling your hips against his so his cock is pressed against your abdomen, smearing cum and prespend across your skin.

“You're still hard,” you murmur. “You need more, don't you?”

“I don't wanna bother you no more,” he says. “Yer tired enough already.”

You shake your head. “I'm fine.” Then you wrap your legs around him, adjust your hips and shimmy a little beneath him. “Let me help you, Zanka.”

He has a mind to protest, but his hesitation disappears as soon as you start moving—lining your pussy with his length. You don't push yourself onto him; you just let the head of his cock catch against your folds, warm and sticky for him.

Zanka shudders. He nearly thrusts inside you, but the last thread of his self-control stops him. There's so much cum coating his cock; he'd push it all inside you if he fucked you, and that would be terrible, given how fertile omegas are. Plus there's no way he'd last inside you: he'd cum almost immediately.

“We can't do this,” he grunts out, trying desperately to cling to his senses. “I could get ya…”

“We don't need to,” you reassure him. “We can just do this.”

Zanka doesn't have it in him to resist. He sits up, takes his cock in hand and starts moving immediately—dragging the head back and forth between your soft folds, smearing cum all over your clit. You're so wet that your pussy is making the filthiest noises just from this, squelching with each movement of his length. And somehow, you're getting even more aroused—you whimper as more slick starts to leak out of you, your body unable to control itself.

He can hardly process it. “Omegas really do need alphas,” Zanka says, dazed. “Look at how you're reactin’ just to this.”

You shake your head, voice breathy as you reply: “It has nothing to do with you being an alpha. My body’s just always like this around you.” You gasp as his cock slips inside you on accident; his jaw clenches as he feels your pussy twitching around his tip, and it's all he can do to stay still, panting. Nearly impossible, with how warm and soft you feel. “Even when you were a beta, I was like this.”

His breath hitches. “Y-yeah?”

You nod, looking a little embarrassed. “When I go into preheat and I sit on your lap,” you admit, “I always ruin my panties. And during my heats, when I'm wearing your shirts and smelling you, I end up getting slick everywhere. I can't help it.”

“But I’m—was—a beta,” he argues, even as his cock keeps running between your folds, even as he presses his face into your neck again.

“It doesn't matter,” you say through your panting. “You could have turned out an omega and my body would still act like this. I want you, Zanka—”

Your voice cuts off into a strangled moan. He doesn't fully understand why until he feels your walls squeezing around him, his cockhead pressed up against what must be your cervix. He groans as your slick drips all over his balls, which are now flush against your body.

“Zanka,” you whine. “Zanka, I’m gonna—”

You don't need to finish your sentence. Zanka feels you start pulsing around him, trying to milk him. And he's only been inside you for all of thirty seconds, maybe, but his balls are getting tight and his cock is starting to twitch—and he manages to pull out right as he peaks again, shooting cum all over your body. It splatters all over your breasts and stomach, his scent clinging onto your skin—now stronger than ever, incense and musk—but you hardly react. You're too caught up in your own orgasm, shaking beneath him, covered in his marks and spend.

He's made such a mess of you. He'd be mortified if he weren't being driven mad by his rut—which Zanka is now convinced won't ever end. He's still hard, still throbbing, still needs to be inside you. You look like you're no better off, thighs rubbing together, a puddle of slick beneath your ass. You’re just as delirious as him.

You act on it, too. Zanka’s widen as you roll onto your stomach, then stick up your ass up for him. He doesn't know much about mating rituals but he knows enough to understand what's happening: you're presenting yourself, offering your pussy to him. It's some kind of omega breeding instinct, he faintly recalls. And suddenly he's thinking of all those times you bent down around him, skirt revealing your ass and thighs, lacy panties barely covering your core. It finally hits him:

You've been presenting yourself to him for the past week.

You turn to look at him, eyes glassy, pupils blown. “I want you inside me,” you whimper. “Please.”

Something tickles the edge of his mind. His brow furrows. “But—”

“You don't need to knot me,” you whine, “but I need you to fuck me. Please, Zanka, I'm so empty—I’ve been empty for so long, for so many heats, please—”

The crying does something to him. Again. He needs to take care of you, to make it stop. He’ll do anything.

You whimper when he presses against your entrance again, then moan, loud and guttural, as he pushes inside you. He can't think of anything other than his intense need to fuck you, suddenly: he starts mindlessly rutting into you, his cock splitting open your pussy, wet and filthy noises filling his ears as skin slaps against skin. Zanka’s convinced he's become some kind of beast—unable to focus on anything other than being inside you.

You keen when he noses your neck again, breathes and pants against your scent gland. He can feel your cunt tightening each time he mouths at you like this—your skin between his teeth, fragrance blooming under his tongue. Suddenly he realises he needs to sink his canines into you, his entire body screaming with an instinct he doesn't really understand. There's a distant, human part of him telling him that's a bad idea, but it's drowned out by the boiling pressure of his rut.

Zanka opens his mouth—and he bites.

You cum when he does. Gush all over him, your arms and knees giving out. You're getting tighter and tighter, somehow—almost as if you’re trying to push him out—and it's making him desperate to stay inside you, his thrusts getting aggressive, erratic. He groans when he finally manages to bottom out, cock deep inside you, your pussy impossibly tight. Relief floods him as he finally—finally—spills himself inside you. He collapses on top of you as he does, pumping you full of cum as he licks at the mark he's left on your neck.

Some faint part of him tells him to pull out, but he realises that he can't. Something’s stopping him from moving his hips back, keeping the two of you locked together as he fills you up. He’s got no choice but to lie there, letting his cock twitch and spurt inside you for what feels like forever. He's vaguely aware of you drooling onto the pillow, your eyes glassy, as you're made to take it all.

Zanka's panting and exhausted when he's finally done. Doesn't know much time has passed or how much cum he's given you, but it must have been a lot: his spend leaks out of your overfilled, twitching pussy as soon as he pulls out, and you whine as it does. He flushes at the sound and sight; he doesn't know what came over him, to leave you in a state like this. He’s going to miss being a beta.

Zanka’s so fixated on the sight of you, it takes a moment for him to realise his erection’s finally gone down. The haze of his rut is beginning to recede; he can hear his own thoughts again.

“It finally worked,” he murmurs, relieved.

“Figures,” you mumble. “You needed to knot me.”

This makes him freeze.

“W-what d’ya mean?” he asks, although he's already sorting through his memories of his last twenty—thirty?—minutes. Being locked inside you. His orgasm lasting as long as it did. His sudden, inexplicable urge to bite you: something he's never thought about before.

Then he blanches, looking at the mark on your neck.

“I—” He swallows. “Did I…?”

Every horrible thing he's ever heard about alphas suddenly floods his mind. The things they do to omegas in heat. Taking advantage of them while they're weak. Claiming them against their will. Knotting them and getting them pregnant. Locking them in the back of some trunk, leaving them tied up and crying.

Zanka feels sick.

You seem unconcerned though. You notice the line of his sight and touch your neck where it's still swollen and tender with his bite, wincing. “Oh, this? Don't worry about it. It won't take since I'm not in heat.”

He swallows, still not allowing himself any relief. “But… ain't you worried about bein’ knotted?”

“No—it’s also low risk, since I'm not in heat. And I take meds for this kind of stuff, too.” You smile at him, reassuring. “Promise you won't be a baby daddy in nine months. You can relax.”

But Zanka can't bring himself to, somehow. Now that his head’s clear and his body’s calm, he can't think of anything other than the fact that he's never had any business looking at you—and definitely no business touching you like he has. And it isn't like he hasn't been pining after you anyway—like an idiot—but even in his craziest dreams where he did have a proper chance at being with you, things didn't play out this way.

You must sense his anxiety—maybe in his face or his scent or his body language, he guesses—because you’re frowning at him, now.

“Zanka,” you say quietly. “Do you not like me?”

He stares. “What?”

The question feels absurd. Crazy, even. Zanka just spent a month chasing after your scent and the better part of the evening knotting you. He wonders if you're joking, but you’re looking at him with an expression that can't be described as anything other than hurt.

“You aren't happy about knotting me or biting me,” you observe. “And you've been ignoring my signals for months. Is it that you don't want me?”

The air is starting to change. He tastes citrus now, sharp beneath the sweetness of flowers and honey. Zanka swallows. “That ain't it,” he blurts out. “I—I only didn't say anythin’ for so long ‘cause I thought there'd be no way you'd be interested in someone like me… I mean—you'd be better off with an alpha, wouldn't ya?”

“But you're an alpha now,” you point out, voice small. “Shouldn't you be fine with giving us a chance? Or are you just going to make up some other reason that you aren't going to be enough for me?”

Zanka goes quiet. His first instinct is to argue with you: But you could be doin’ better for yourself. You're surrounded by people who are stronger than him, more talented than him, more than him. You're so sweet and kind. And you're an omega. You could get yourself engaged to any alpha of your choice—not the disappointment of the Nijiku family. Not the noble scion who turned tail and ran away from Kamuatari District. Maybe it'd be different if he’d already overcome all that, like he's trying to do. But as he is right now? Zanka’s got no right to be looking at someone like you.

His jaw tightens. “I ain't makin’ anything up… it’s the truth I gotta be better than what I am. How am I s’pposed to ask you to give me a chance before I make somethin’ of myself?”

You frown. “Is it so hard to accept that I simply want you as you are?” you ask, and every retort that Zanka had lined up dies in his throat.

The air is thick with the scent of oranges; you've pulled your knees to your chest, and you're staring at the door. You're trying not to let it show on your face how sad you are, but Zanka knows every dip of your brow and twitch of your mouth: your heart must be hurting bad.

Zanka sighs. He truly is a scuzzball.

He pulls you in, holds you the way you like during your preheats—with your face close to the crook of his neck. You breathe in deeply, and he feels you shuddering against his body.

“I've been real unfair to ya,” he says.

“You have been,” you agree, and the corner of his mouth twitches.

“I just don't wanna do things half-assed with ya.”

“I know. That's why I was okay waiting for as long as I did.” You look him in the eye, uncertainty in your gaze. “Are you turning me down?”

“No. I'm askin’ if I can court ya.”

Your eyes go wide. You actually look a little flustered: a proper role reversal. “You want to court me? Like—for mating?”

Zanka flushes, probably going bright red. He didn't think this would be such a big deal: it would have been the typical order of things in Kamuatari District. “...well, yeah? You're an omega, ain't ya? And I really like ya. If we do this, I'd be serious about it. I'd make you my mate, if you'll have me.”

You give him a long, disbelieving stare—and then you smile.

“You really are old-fashioned,” you say, sounding endeared. Then you lean up, glowing, and press a chaste little kiss to his lips.

His heart nearly gives out.

Zanka’s eyes go comically wide. His face burns; his pulse ticks up. You blink at his expression, then start giggling.

“Why do you look so flustered?”

His mouth opens. “You just kissed me!”

“Yes—after you fucked me and spent half an hour cumming inside me,” you point out dryly, ignoring the way he chokes. “I thought kissing wouldn't be a big deal after all that.”

He almost splutters. “You know I wouldn't have done that if I weren't in rut!” Zanka frowns as he tries to piece together his scrambled memories of the past couple of hours; the more he recalls, the more he wants to crawl into a hole. The bottom of a well would work just fine.

“...I did this all backwards,” he groans. “This ain't how I wanted things to go.”

You hum, watching Zanka with a glint in your eye that makes him feel wary. You lean toward him, breath sweeping over his mouth, a playful little smile on your lips: “Guess we’ll need to make up for that, won't we?”

For the next twenty minutes, you and Zanka make out like you're teenagers, which actually remains fairly tame until Zanka’s cock starts twitching back to life. He then learns the hard way that ruts can last anywhere from twenty-four to seventy-two hours, and the relief that you can get from knotting an omega lasts maybe thirty minutes, tops. A full hour if you're lucky. His first rut lasts around fourty-eight hours in total; he spends most of those two days inside you, your pussy eagerly warming his cock.

“I'm just trying to give you some relief,” you tell him at one point, voice innocent, and even with his mind absolutely blitzed by rut hormones, Zanka does not believe you in the least.

But you are very good at taking care of him. You make him drink plenty of electrolytes and get Follo and Eishia to bring you both meals. You tell his alpha friends to keep a wide berth from his room, saying vaguely that he'd caught a horrible flu and doesn't want to be disturbed. You drag him to the shower even though all he wants to do is keep you pinned underneath him in bed; you wash his back and hair, trying to kiss the tension out of his shoulders and neck as you do. You take his temperature frequently: it's unusual but not rare for alphas to get fevers during ruts. Zanka dodges this risk, but maybe only because you're letting him knot you so frequently.

Apparently as soon as you’d figured out that Zanka’s presentation was about to change, you’d started “researching” how to care for an alpha during their rut—that is, you asked Enjin and Bro point-blank what you should do. This is probably why, the morning that Zanka returns to work and enters the canteen, Bro gives him a thumbs-up and Enjin mouths a ‘congratulations' at him. Or maybe it's because you're absolutely covered in Zanka’s scent and everyone in HQ can tell that the two of you had marathon sex and that he didn't bother pulling out even once.

Somehow, he manages not to die from embarrassment. But he does come close.

It's not all bad, though. Zanka doesn't mind that people know that he's yours. It calms him down whenever you pass him by and he catches his own scent clinging to you; he'd otherwise be worried about alphas giving you unsolicited attention. When he mentions this to you one day, you blink and give him a little laugh.

“But everyone's always known that,” you giggle. “I've been scenting you for ages. Why do you think omegas have never shown any interest in you?”

Zanka isn't mad about this, exactly, but he’s still surprised. “Did everyone but me know that you were wantin’ me to court ya?”

“Pretty much.”

“Even Enjin and Gris?!”

“The two of them before anyone else.”

His mouth opens, then closes. “Why didn't they tell me?”

“Well, Gris thought we should be left alone to work things out for ourselves, like proper adults,” you say mildly. “Enjin just thought it was funny. And he was wondering how long it would take you to notice.”

Zanka feels like he might die from embarrassment, after all. This doesn't stop him from going to Enjin for advice when you go into preheat though—and Delmon, too, because he's one of the few Cleaners who's been married. The two of them give very good instructions for how to take care of an omega during their heat, and Zanka is endlessly grateful for it. (He does wish that Delmon hadn't yelled it at the top of his lungs, though.)

For several days, he prepares for your heat—the first one you'll ever spend together.

He thinks it'll be fine. Probably. It shouldn't be a big deal. You've had plenty of sex and he's knotted you plenty of times before. You're both on medication so there's no risk of pregnancy. He’s bought enough electrolyte drinks to last a full week. All your favourite snacks, too. He’s also prepped several days’ worth of meals for you—apparently omegas have a weak stomach when they have heatsickness, and the canteen doesn't have any good options for you since HQ is so dominated by alphas. You burst into tears when he got you to taste-test one of his meals, then asked him to claim you once your heat started up.

Zanka is 99% sure that was just your preheat hormones talking, but it still made his entire face go red.

It'll probably be fine. There's no way Zanka could screw this up, right? Taking care of your partner during their heat should be the simplest, most intuitive task in the world. He can't be such a fuck-up that he'd fail you at a time like—

“You don't have to be so nervous,” you say, and Zanka nearly jumps. “It's just a heat. I'll live.”

“Who said I was nervous?”

“I can smell it on you,” you point out. “You smell like cedar-leaf incense when you're upset about something. Sandalwood otherwise. Oh, except when you're horny. Then you smell like agarwood.”

“You can tell when I'm horny?”

“Of course. If not by your scent, then because of your dick. You're really bad at hiding it when you're hard, you know.”

Zanka is going to die. This is one of those moments where he deeply misses being a beta, though not even that would apparently save him from the way his blood rushes to his dick every time he sees you. Truly damning evidence.

He expects you to tease him, but you ignore his mortified expression. Instead, you take one of his hands in yours, your thumb lingering on his wrist.

“It’ll be fine. I promise. I know you'll be a good heat partner.”

You stare at your bed, then, where Zanka has meticulously set up your nest—half made of his clothes, half made from sheets and blankets. He scented every piece of it, of course. He's certain that he did at least this much right, so he's confused when you give him a dubious look.

“Did you make this?” you ask.

“Who else?”

You blink. “But how did you know how to make a nest?”

“From the last time we did it together. I was still a beta, remember—so I couldn't figure out what made for a good nest. I just memorized what yours looked like.” His brows knot up. “I still don't have much of an instinct for buildin’ these things, though. Guess I ain't the best alpha, but I'm learnin’.”

Zanka doesn't expect it when you laugh—nor when you fall into your nest and drag him down with you. You're curled up in his arms, rubbing your face into his neck, when you explain, “That's because alphas don't make nests, Zanka. Alphas can help by scenting fabrics for their omegas—but only omegas do the actual building.”

“Oh.” He runs a hand through his hair, hoping his scent isn't giving away his embarrassment. “See—I still ain't the best alpha. Bet I fucked it up real bad. Let's remake it.”

You shake your head, then place a long and chaste kiss on his mouth. He tastes tuberose and honey in the air, blooming sweetly just for him. You're cradled by cotton and incense, and his heart swells when he studies the lines of your expression: safe, loved, happy.

“No,” you say. “You’re perfect.”

end

thank you for reading all the way to the end, you are truly god's strongest soldier <3 extra notes:

some thoughts on a/b/o and the worldbuilding/themes in this fic

FYI tamsy is actually an omega; he is just pretending to be an alpha. he actually noticed, before everyone else, that zanka's presentation was about to change lol

tuberose is a very commonly used perfume ingredient and is thought to be very sensual

I AM VERY RUSTY