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BJ knew that Hawkeye was an omega the same way he knew lots of things: intellectually. Knowing the way arteries flowed through the body was different than sewing one up while a man bled out on your table. Knowing Hawkeye Pierce was an omega was very, very different than waking up one morning five feet away from him and smelling his heat, visceral and warm.
It was rare, even in Korea, to smell an omega. Koreans kept their omegas locked up tight, especially with GIs sniffing around, and the Army sent over enough heat suppressants to keep a village sedated. Or they did until they didn't.
He'd known it was coming for over a week, and still when it happened BJ was shocked. It started the way most things in this war did, already bad and destined to get worse.
He was in post-op with Hawkeye and Margaret when Radar stuck his nose in and said, all in a rush, "No heat suppressants this month. Supply chains are cut. I'm going to tell Colonel Potter." He vanished before any of the three of them had a chance to process. It was Margaret who acted first. "When I catch him, I'll keep him on the phone until we get enough supplies for the rest of the war!" She tore off after him.
BJ studied Hawkeye. The man seemed calm enough, but BJ knew him better than that. "Well," he said with a twitch, "suppose I'll have to get to know someone in the camp real well."
It was different than the sex Hawkeye had with the nurses, or even the time he snuck off with a visiting doctor like BJ wouldn't notice, like he wouldn't smell it on him. BJ also knew that intellectually. "Want a drink after your shift?" he asked.
"If you're buying, I'm in."
Nominally, BJ was meant to be leaving post-op so Hawkeye could take over his shift, but he stayed and filled out reports at their desk in the corner. Hawkeye didn't stop by the way he normally would have, joking and grinning and lighting up BJ’s day. When Margaret came back, she wasn't surprised to see him there. She just leaned over and said, "BJ, we need to find an alpha."
BJ didn't point out the obvious, that both of them were alphas. He nodded.
That post-post-op drink didn't materialize. The three of them and Radar found themselves in Colonel Potter's office. Hawkeye lounged, the way he always did, and said, "I'm afraid you'll need a replacement doctor, Colonel."
"That's the least of my concerns. You've been on suppressants for more than ten years, Pierce. You'll have one hell of a time if you do go into heat."
"One I can't weather myself," Hawkeye said, somehow still cheerful. It was a marked difference from his mood in post-op. "I'm afraid you'll have to import a big, strong alpha."
"I've got some right here," Potter had said and BJ's stomach had dropped out.
"I'm married—”
"I didn't mean you, Hunnicutt. We've got a whole camp of alphas. Someone's got to be able to put up with Pierce for a week."
"You think it'll be a whole week? Lil ol' me?"
"Maybe," Potter said, gearing up for a lecture, "if you took your suppressant breaks the way you're supposed to, we wouldn't be in this situation."
Hawkeye didn't feed the flames. It surprised even BJ. All he said was, "You're probably right."
"Well, the damage is done. We need to find Hawkeye an alpha." Margaret flipped to a new page in her notebook. "BJ is out, married. I'm out."
"You don't want to show me a good time, Margaret?" Hawkeye was always crass, but without his usual innuendos and bravado, it fell flat.
Radar shifted uncomfortably. "There's an alpha doctor at the 8063rd."
"We don't need a doctor. It's not like they'll be talking sutures between the sheets." Colonel Potter folded his arms.
"We might. You don't know what gets my engine revving."
"If it's surgery, you can spend the whole week in the OR, then."
Hawkeye shifted. "Who else is on your list, Radar?"
"Some of the MPs are. Johnson—"
"Didn't Johnson say he had an omega?" BJ interrupted.
Radar nodded. "But she's stateside."
"Doesn't mean she'll share." Hawkeye's word on the matter was final. Unfortunate, when they ran through another nine alphas Hawkeye rejected for one reason or another.
"Maybe we can get an alpha from another camp after all?" Margaret hadn't written down Johnson's name. Or the other nine.
Hawkeye stood up suddenly. "While you're all discussing my blind dates, I'll go take care of the problem myself. Radar, come on."
Radar followed Hawkeye out, close at his heels like an obedient puppy. BJ, Margaret, and Colonel Potter all looked at each other. "If it's for Pierce," Margaret said after a long silence, "maybe I could..."
"I can't have my chief surgeon and my head nurse out at the same time."
BJ shifted his weight. He couldn't do it either. Neither of them even looked at him as a possibility. Finally, Colonel Potter sighed. "If Hawkeye and Radar don't find someone, I'll call the 8063rd myself for that doctor. We've got a week before his suppressants run out."
The week had passed in a blur for BJ. Every time he looked at Hawkeye he imagined some other doctor, faceless, rutting into him. The other man wouldn't be gentle enough. He wouldn't know that Hawkeye would never say if he was in pain. And he wouldn't care about Hawkeye. He'd leave at the end of the week, his purpose done, and he wouldn't even note that the literature all said that it was important for an omega to be cared for after their heat. BJ could do that part, though, could hold Hawkeye and make sure he ate enough.
Except the enemy didn't just cut supply lines. They'd only gotten the call the night before. Their doctor was stuck, the clerk insisted to Radar. No one was getting through. And taking an omega who could go into heat at any moment was a suicide mission. So Hawkeye went to sleep in the Swamp. And that was what brought BJ to his current predicament.
Even Charles sat up after a moment. "You are not spending your heat in here," he announced as if it would change anything.
BJ stood and grabbed his boots and his robe. "Buzz off, Charles. At least you don't want to—" He cut himself off.
"Don't want to what, Hunnicutt?" Charles's voice was precise and cold. "His alpha didn't make it. Have you changed your mind?"
Hawkeye thrashed on his cot, suddenly and violently awake. "Trap?"
BJ's pulse was thrumming in his ears. He knew what it most likely meant every bit as much as Charles did, but neither of them spoke. Hawkeye thrashed again and said, "Beej?" His voice was soft, desperate.
After that, BJ couldn't leave him alone. He knelt at Hawkeye's side. "I'm here, Hawkeye."
Hawkeye grabbed a fistful of his robe. "It started. You need to lock me in the VIP tent."
That had been their vague plan. But Hawkeye hadn't wanted to acknowledge this was actually happening. He'd spent more time trying to get painkillers for the soldiers than he did heat suppressants for himself and the other omega in camp. "I'm not sure I can get you there," BJ said. It was too honest.
"Charles," Hawkeye murmured. "Charles'll help."
"Charles will not help," the man himself announced.
Hawkeye reached into his shorts. "I'll ride it out here then."
"I've reconsidered," Charles said immediately. Between the two of them, they were able to get Hawkeye upright and into his boots and robe, even though the clothing did nothing to mask the scent. BJ was stuck half carrying Hawkeye as they set out.
He did his best to breathe through his mouth, but there was nothing in the world that could stop him from smelling Hawkeye when he was in his arms. The scent was overpowering and more erotic than anything BJ had smelled before. By the time they made it out of the Swamp and across camp, BJ was hard. He angled his hips away from Hawkeye as best he could, but it didn't stop his erection from pressing against the other man's ass more than once.
The moment they dumped Hawkeye on the cot, Charles was out of the VIP tent like a shot. "See you in a week, Pierce," he called over his shoulder.
BJ didn't leave. He wasn't sure his feet would obey him if he tried to. "Do you need anything before I go?"
Hawkeye wriggled out of his robe. He didn't look at BJ when he said, "You could stay. If you wanted."
It was news to BJ that he wanted, but he did. He couldn't take his eyes off of Hawkeye as he stripped off his sweat soaked shirt and his boots, which neither Charles nor BJ had bothered to tie.
"Are you sure?"
Hawkeye didn’t answer BJ’s question. He didn’t need to. BJ could smell the answer for himself, the way Hawkeye’s smell changed subtly, becoming warmer and somehow, impossibly, more welcoming.
BJ's hands were shaking, but he eased Hawkeye's shorts off of his hips all the same. Hawkeye's dick was hard, curved slightly to the left. BJ had seen it before, but he'd never let himself look, let himself drink Hawkeye in. He knelt to lick it and Hawkeye made a loud, keening noise. "Beej," Hawkeye managed. "I need you to," his hips bucked as BJ gave up on slow and took Hawkeye's whole dick in his mouth.
He'd done this before, in college, when he could laugh it off. You can't laugh off things like sucking your best friend's dick while he's in heat. It was a stretch, still, but BJ liked it even when Hawkeye's hips jerked and he ended up swallowing way more of Hawkeye than he was ready for. He pinched Hawkeye's side in retaliation.
BJ sucked, hollowing his cheeks. Hawkeye's hips jerked again, but this time he was prepared. He guided Hawkeye, letting the man fuck his mouth. Hawkeye thrust in again and again, gentle now, until he choked out, "I'm going to—"
BJ pulled back and let Hawkeye come on himself. He couldn't help himself then. He licked it, once, tasting Hawkeye.
Above him, Hawkeye groaned. "You like it, don't you? Being on your knees for an omega."
BJ shrugged. "All in a day's work."
Hawkeye sprawled on the cot. He was fully nude, but he was past modesty. And BJ had seen his body before. They lived together and showered together. Nothing about Hawkeye should have been a surprise. "A day's work? So what's next? Post-op to check up on my patients?"
"If that's what you want." BJ was so hard he ached. It has been a long time since he had wanted someone so desperately that a single touch could make him come. But if he undressed, let Hawkeye put a hand on him, he wouldn't last long.
Hawkeye didn't meet his eyes. He studied the ceiling. "Well, I am feeling a bit empty. And if there's a perfectly good alpha right there, there's no need for my omega self to suffer. Unless, of course, you've got someone more important to do."
Was there someone more important than Hawkeye in the world? BJ couldn't remember.
He reached for his own belt buckle. "That's the best proposition I've had in a long time."
"And only."
Hawkeye was half hard again already.
BJ shucked off his pants and then his shirt. "Hawk," he said. He untied one boot so he didn't have to look at his best friend. "If you want to stop I can. I'm not going to do anything you don't want."
Hawkeye's response was low, the sort of voice he only got when they were moments away from losing a patient. "I won't be able to stop. I can still talk to you now, but two days in? Three? I'll have the conversational ability of a mollusk."
BJ didn't know what to say to that. He took off his other boot.
"I'm not kidding, BJ. I'll lose it. I won't even know what I'm asking you for."
"Then I'll figure it out." He kept undressing.
Hawkeye let out a pained noise.
BJ was only in his shorts, suddenly. He fingered the waist band, but didn't slide them off.
"I want you inside me," Hawkeye said. His eyes were fixed on BJ's crotch.
Even in college, BJ hadn't done anything like this. He knew the mechanics, but in practice, staring down at Hawkeye, it was entirely different. "Tell me what you want me to do."
Hawkeye stood and yanked him into a kiss. It wasn't romantic or even particularly pleasant. Their noses bumped and then their teeth. It was BJ who pulled back, who held Hawkeye's head and repositioned it. He leaned in then and pressed their lips together gently. Hawkeye's mouth was so soft and warm.
It was Hawkeye who kept pushing. BJ could have stayed there and kissed him forever, content. Hawkeye's hands roamed everywhere, but drifted further and further down until he was gently stroking BJ's cock with one hand and holding his hip tightly with the other. BJ wanted to pull him closer, to feel their bodies lining up. When he’d made love to Peg, she had always been so much smaller than him and soft against his skin. He had to duck his head to kiss her, lay her down and climb atop to explore her body thoroughly. Hawkeye was almost as tall as him and hard against his body in more than one way, muscle from lifting patients suddenly present now that he was naked, on top of his more traditional hardness.
“Hawk,” BJ managed, “I didn’t bring anything with me to prepare you.”
Hawkeye kissed his Adam’s apple, which shouldn’t have been an erogenous zone. But it made BJ shiver. “Shh,” he said. “Radar put everything I would need in here.”
BJ had never wanted to think of Radar during sex. When he pictured the tiny corporal sneaking in and preparing a tent for Hawkeye, though, all he felt was gratitude. A tent was hardly a place to ride out a heat. If it weren’t for BJ, Hawkeye might have had alphas climbing under the flaps to get to him. He growled at the thought.
“Down, boy,” Hawkeye said. He’d moved his other hand up to BJ’s chest. His right hand was still on BJ’s dick but lightly, holding it. BJ wanted to move, wanted the friction, but he held himself back. Hawkeye kept talking, of course. “It’s just Radar. The kid wouldn’t know what to do with an omega if he had an instruction manual and two weeks to practice.” Hawkeye’s hand tightened on BJ’s dick as he moved just his thumb. BJ whined at it, a small involuntary noise. He’d never been loud during sex, almost never made any noise at all. “I bet you know what to do with an omega. Why’d you marry a beta?”
“Love,” BJ said. He thrust into Hawkeye’s hand, an aborted movement when Hawkeye started to draw back.
Hawkeye shoved BJ onto the bed. It seemed they were done talking. Hawkeye settled himself on BJ’s lap, straddling his thighs. He had lube in hand, a small Army-issue packet that Radar had managed to scrounge up somewhere. He stayed there, holding himself up over BJ, his knees on the bed, as he prepared himself.
“Let me see. Let me see you.”
Hawkeye didn’t adjust himself. He just leaned forward into BJ so that his dick was pressed into BJ’s stomach. “Need you,” Hawkeye murmured. “You can be in charge of this later.”
Hawkeye lowered himself onto BJ without warning. He took BJ’s dick slowly, a controlled descent, angling his hips sinfully. He rode BJ like their bodies were built to fit together, teaching him a heretofore unexplored new pleasure.
“Hawk,” BJ moaned. “I’m not going to—”
“You can come,” Hawkeye said. He was smiling. “I won't be offended if you fall prey to my omega wiles.”
If it weren’t Hawkeye, if BJ were any more in control of himself, if if if, he may have lasted. But he came to the sight of Hawkeye’s large grin, to the way he laughed even with BJ inside of him. Seconds later, Hawkeye came, untouched, onto BJ’s belly.
Hawkeye pulled away and collapsed onto the bed. His voice was thick as he said, “It’s only going to get worse, Beej.”
BJ just laid down behind him. The cot was barely big enough for two grown men, even with BJ plastered up against Hawkeye. “I’ll be here when I can.”
Hawkeye didn’t respond. When BJ sat up to look at him, he realized that Hawkeye’s eyes were already closed and he was fast asleep.
BJ didn't stay. He wanted to curl into Hawkeye's back, tuck his nose into the crook of his neck, and sleep. Instead, he found himself in the shower, staring blankly at the ground. Then, without quite realizing when he decided anything, he was in the Swamp staring at Charles.
"No," Charles said immediately. "Simply no. You've created your own mess, Hunnicutt."
He didn’t have words for what he wanted to ask, so it hardly mattered. There was something wrong with him. He could hear every beat of his heart in his ears. He wanted to go back to Hawkeye, to treat him the way he craved.
For BJ, sex had always been fun. With Peg it was a way to connect, sure, and he had wanted it. But he hadn’t felt his world tilt on his axis. “It’s probably an omega thing,” he said aloud.
“I am not listening!” Charles said, with the inflection of someone who absolutely was listening, largely hated it, but didn’t want to leave. “Your post-op shift is next, Hunnicutt.”
He relieved Potter. They were working extra, the three of them, to cover for Hawkeye being gone. They only had ten patients, eight of whom would be leaving the next day, so it was hardly bad at all. It would be, if they had a wave of wounded and BJ didn’t get his head on straight.
Colonel Potter did not rise in the ranks by accident. He was excellent at reading his staff, especially those he had seen every day for almost a year. He took one look at BJ the moment he walked in and said, “Your face is longer than a horse’s ass, Hunnicutt. I suppose you went and did it. I won’t expect sense out of you or Pierce for a week, at least. Not that I ever do.”
He left before BJ could offer a rebuttal. Fair enough, considering that BJ’s brain was working about as fast as the pace of molasses. He spent his whole shift composing a letter to Peg in his mind. Had a grenade gone off, he would hardly have noticed. It was lucky enough that none of the men remaining needed very much care at all. In his letter, in any iteration of his letter, he never got further than, Dear Peg, Funny story, or Dear Peg, Last time this happened Hawk said I shouldn’t write a letter. Sometimes in war people do things—or people—they regret—
BJ tossed that draft right out, mentally. He couldn’t bring himself to regret anything with Hawkeye. He went back and forth, to and fro, but the end of his shift found him outside of the VIP tent no matter his initial intentions.
Hawkeye was awake, but feverish. He had two fingers inside of himself, stretching, moaning indecorously. He spared the time to look up at BJ’s entrance and said, perhaps a little bit too knowingly, “You came back.”
“I came back,” BJ agreed. He couldn’t take his eyes off Hawkeye, off those fingers he was working inside of himself languidly. That could be BJ. He had fingers. He even knew what to do with them. And he’d listen to Hawkeye, time his thrusts to the other man’s moans and make sure it was good for him. Make it last, until Hawkeye was so fucked out he slept through the rest of his heat.
“Let me touch you.”
Hawkeye didn’t stop moving his fingers. He stared at BJ, his eyes half-lidded. “Make me.”
BJ was well aware he was an adult man. He knew he was meant to be above dares, especially when one came from a mouthy omega covered in his own slick. He didn’t care. A dare was a dare. And so he took Hawkeye up on his challenge. It was days before they surfaced for air.
He couldn't regret it. He tried his hardest, but there were some things even BJ couldn't manage to regret. Hawkeye was always going to be one of those things. BJ was only a mortal man. He was destined to stumble and fall, to make mistakes with abandon. Or so he told himself as he and Hawkeye kept going long past when Hawkeye's heat ceased to be an excuse.