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Changbin's laugh is shrill and cute and trembling behind him.
"Yah," he says, nudges Jisung hard enough to knock him off course for a few steps on the icy ground, arms still deep in his pockets. "Yongbok's fucking steaming!"
Felix turns just in time to see realization dawn, half blinded by the useless winter sun, grins at the dramatics that follow. "That's— is it just cold as shit? What the fuck? Wait, are you— why are you so hot? Respectfully."
Entirely unsurprised— somewhat tickled—, he shakes his bangs out of his eyes, throws him some finger guns. "Preheat, baby."
"No," Changbin is the first to protest. Felix snorts, which gets him sputtering. "No, no, seriously— I refuse to house Edward Cullen when you have a perfectly good apartment! Why can't you two just—"
Something on Felix's face makes Jisung move, hand reaching out to touch Changbin's elbow.
"Hyung."
It shouldn't be a big deal— it's probably not, these many years into it; it's clear Changbin simply has no idea how to act around that part of him, what color to mark it with. It has to be red, he probably thought back then, but Felix mostly takes their prodding in stride, so— yellow, green? But the secret is stark against his openness. Sometimes, he can see the question in the dark of his eyes, and he wonders what would change, if he knew. If he was met with it at the wrong place, the wrong time, caught sideways by teeth.
More than that, perhaps— Felix wonders what he would do in the face of loss, or worse. If he'd be able to look him them the eye and find that devastating softness of always.
"No, no— it's fine, I get it. Like, from where you stand, it's super simple, right? Alpha likes omega and omega likes alpha. Roll the credits." He turns back to walk, and the other two follow quietly, each taking up a side of him. Their beat up shoes tap along the quiet streets, and it makes Felix feel less like a last man standing. "But to me it's like— it's like having a kid around me everyday dying for a drink of dish soap. He doesn't fucking know what's good for him."
Jisung scoffs softly. "He's a grown man, Lix."
Felix nods. It's true. It's indescribably worse that he knows that. "He's a grown man without context."
Changbin isn't as gentle, comforted by their longstanding bond. "Then give it to him!" he pouts, yanks Felix's clenched fist to rest together in his warm jacket pocket.
"Sometimes I think— I mean, if he knew, maybe something would actually give, right?" he confesses quietly, ashamed and small, "but then I just— I'm too much of a coward, I think— 'keep chickening out."
"I wish you would tell us about it, at least."
He gives it some thought for once. He hums, acquiesces: "… maybe someday," and all the while his mind runs a familiar path:
No truth comes alone— everything would change. What if they push you away— what if they don't?Can you keep from wanting to eat the world, if it doesn't deny you a bite?
He doesn't allow himself time to consider what ifs. Clearing his throat like his shames lay there, waiting for him to open his mouth to jump out, Felix bats his lashes some. "Can you keep him safe for me this weekend, Binnie-hyung?"
The groan speaks for itself. "Fine," Changbin gives in, "will you stay safe this weekend?"
Felix grins. That might just be the loveliest stupid question he's ever heard.
"Always am."
Felix's first heat intersected quite perfectly with his rebellious phase.
He was nineteen, then, head over heels for some rockstar wannabe alpha who in hindsight didn't treat him all that well, and he's always known himself enough to understand change, upcoming or unfolding— dreamed of being as special and as loved as he could be when he texted the suspicion and got an excited reply. A plan.
He meant to stay out for the whole week on nothing but an insolent note to his parents. He packed his cutest and sexiest clothes, shaved every inch of his body, painted his nails pretty cherry red, and left in the dead of night. Whenever he thinks of it, of how much luck he relied on for his choices, he feels the urge to send his parents some gift cards for their troubles.
Though, in many ways, he supposes his luck ran out when it happened.
Two days into his heat, Felix had a kitchen knife embedded in his shoulder.
It's cold enough that, by the time Chan arrives, grocery bags perched on his elbow, his entire face is splotchy pink. Felix hears his hushed cursing taking off his winter gear and thinks of bleating lambs.
"You okay?" He calls out. Chan startles a bit, then lets his shoulders slump, sheepish smile taking over his frown. Soft, soft, soft.
"Slipped down the stairs coming in."
Felix sits upright at that. "Oh, shit, are you hurt?"
A soft little wheeze. "Eh, mostly my pride," Chan reassures, fighting the zipper of his coat, then nods to himself in concession, "and my bum."
Felix giggles right back, warmed with affection, beckons him over. "C'mere."
There is never much fight with them. When one calls, the other comes; when one needs it, the other is there.
"Oh, you…"
Except.
"Yeah," he tells him, one hand moving to his neck, self conscious, "you mind?"
Chan looks for his eyes right away. "'Course not, Lix," he says, and his voice, so quiet and earnest, makes Felix just about able to smell himself. "Are you good for food?"
"Yeah." He smiles. "Made some brownies for you. To take, I mean."
"Oh. Oh, you don't have to—"
"No, I did, I— you're, like, roommate goals, really. I feel bad."
"You really shouldn't." That wheezy little laugh again. "Binnie's place has spectacular heating."
There's a moment after the freeing of the zipper and its slide down Chan's front where they stand there, quietly, closer than usual, and Felix knows it's unfair, no more than it is to want him at all, but. Gods, look at him, he thinks, heart in his throat, he's only human.
"Wanna brave the cold one more night?" He asks. Felix, for all his bad choices, has never yearned to be like everyone else this much. For… permission. He'd love him so warm— he'd free himself from all the teeth, if he could.
They already know the answer, but Chan tells him anyway. "Yeah," he whispers, scent an autumn home, soft. The paradox of him— of needing Chan bigger and stronger and ruthless and violent, and knowing he wouldn't want him were he not exactly like this— is a cruel punchline. "Movie?"
Still, Felix smiles. He's bore worse for love.
Felix has about twenty minutes of semi-conscious bliss before he's knocked on his back again.
"It's— shit."
Chan is on the phone somewhere behind the couch. Though his voice sounds molasses-like, still sweet and sleepy, his scent is all over the place. Felix swallows the saliva that bursts under his tongue.
"I know Sung, but— you know him. He wouldn't do all this for no reason," he pauses to listen. Then: "I'm not! I just… if— if you think of anything, let me know? Thanks, man."
"'S wrong?" He slurs, trying to unstick his eyelids open. The curtains are still drawn, but cool light spills through anyway. Chan's face is a chiaroscuro vision in their living room.
"Hey," he says, oddly placating. Felix is sat up right away.
"What, what's wrong?"
"I can't go to Bin and Sung's place today. I'm sorry."
"Did they say something?" He groans; they have no time for this shit. "I'll talk to them—"
"It's snowing," Chan says instead, and Felix can almost hear his own heart drop. That familiar glass bounce before a shatter, the mess scattering all over the floor, under the furniture. "Pretty badly at that. Can't see fuck-all outside."
Dread threatens to take over, at once and completely. He rushes to the window, as if there'll be a detail to be missed, an escape plan not obvious to everyone else— maybe they're just not desperate enough—
No such luck, though.
This is all his fault. He got complacent, indulgent; he should've expected godforsaken snow in winter. He presses his forehead to the cold glass. "This can't be happening."
"Hey. Hey, it's okay. We'll figure something out, it's okay." Chan's hand is warm and light on his back, coaxing. His voice, though, is a knife's edge. Afraid, but not the right way. "And if— I promise I won't— I would never—"
A sob nearly makes out of his mouth. Felix swallows it painfully, presses the heels of his palms over his eyes. Then, he takes a big breath.
"Okay. Okay," he tries again, pulling Chan by the hand to sit on their couch. "I need you to listen to me, okay?"
"Lix, I'm—"
Don't say that, you can't say that.
"Listen." The grip on his shoulders is slightly tighter than it should probably be. Chan looks at him like the apology is still stuck sideways in his gullet. "I'm gonna sound very crazy, but I need you to humor me as best you can, can you do that?"
"... Yeah. Of course. What do you need?"
"When it hits. I need you to lock my bedroom door for me."
"Oh."
"And then lock yourself in your room. Preferably also in your bathroom."
He tries to tell him. His mouth opens, an explanation ready, but his tongue abstains, as always.
"Hey," Chan says, and the softening of him is so complete. He is so painfully good. "Talk to me."
He swallows the words back down, and the lump of heartbreak with them. "One more day," he tells him, "if we can't get you out in one more day, I'll tell you, I promise."
They have breakfast in tense silence, the brownies Felix baked last night tasting like soap in his mouth. He's in a tank top despite the shitty heater, some light exertion away from sweating; there's not a lot of time left, now.
What Felix tells people is preheat isn't, actually— he calls that stage warming up, for obvious reasons—; real preheat can't have him outside, around people and their endless pool of scents; real preheat must be had in the comfort of his home, usually in bed before the nesting begins.
To be completely honest, he doesn't mind all that. He feels almost normal in its little bubble, suspended above, cradled, pleasantly busy of mind— but that's probably just because he's alone for it. Now, with Chan sitting stiff across from him, eyes a hundred miles away, he can tell the difference.
The most alarming one is the realization that, were their friends to show up at their door right now to pick up his roommate, Felix would not be pleasant about it. He knows now that time will only make it worse.
Snowfall has made the apartment so quiet it's driving him a little mad, like they are the only two people left in the world, together in the middle of nowhere. He can hear Chan chewing his toast clear as though from inside of him— the thought should not be welcome, but it is, and it fizzes like freshly poured soda before he makes it fade.
He doesn't have a day.
The power goes out around four, and they pull back the curtains to help with visibility. Chan hasn't said much, has given Felix a wide berth he's starting to resent.
When his hands slide up the wide back of a sweater, Felix wishes he could say it's never him who does these kinds of things. That he is possessed every few months by some demon, some violent succubus dying to find a new victim.
He can't.
Chan shudders violently, startled, and turns his head to watch whatever his face does to itself when he wants this badly.
"I don't…" he shudders again. "I don't think this is a good idea."
It's not. It's not why Felix does it.
He brews tea— peppermint—, pours it for them both in tall mugs, then adds some honey because it seems like an occasion for extra sweetness. Chan sits across on the kitchen island's tall stool (they only had money for one back when they bought it, and are still trying to find a matching pair) and waits for the explanation promised.
It's surprisingly easy to admit it, now: "I've claimed you."
The silence puts them at opposite ends of infinity, such is its suddenness. Felix tries not to feel abandoned just yet.
"What?"
"I guess… somewhere along the way, my omegan instincts have decided that you are mine," he tries not to preen as he says it, and then not to sink too much into the backlash of shame.
Chan looks… for once, Felix can't tell for certain what he looks like. All that openness, that sleeve of hearts— all gone, for a moment. The part who fiercely believed he'd find a smile waiting for him begins to choke.
"They can't come, hyung— or, I guess— you won't be able to leave, I'll get… upset. Violent. I'm sorry."
The silence is so painful. It is only absence, he knows, like the cold is only the absence of heat; his body feels it all the same. Deeply. Wrenching.
And so, he starts rambling.
"I— I now I've been such an asshole, never denying that I'm afraid of being taken advantage of, but. Well, I'm not, that's… something I've never had to worry about, to be honest. And I've been meaning to tell you, I swear, but— you'll change, and I'm so afraid of what that will look like—"
"I… what?"
He presses his eyes shut so tight, body a ball of tension. Yanks the words out at the root.
"I will try to mate with you, Chris. Really relentlessly. I won't stop if you cry, if you— if you tell me you don't want it, if I touch you somewhere you're not down to be touched. I will take a knot however I can, I— I need as many doors between us or I will kick them down. But if you leave— I can't, I can't—"
"St— Just." Felix startles. Chan's hands reach out, nearly placating, and his face is pinched so badly. Oh, gods. "Stop— stop talking for a second."
Felix's mouth snaps shut, just like that. He tries to reason with himself that this doesn't have to mean rejection— Chan is speaking so gently— even though that is an integral part of who he is as a person, and could mean the end all the same— no. He has to breathe through this, he can't let fear breed upset, because his upset, like this, isn't pretty. The very naming of it is a stupid platitude.
Chan blinks so much. Felix, quickly avoiding the very sight of him, wonders if he's fighting his own stinging eyes, if he's doing a better job than him. If there's betrayal there, too. The silence is back, the world outside strangled by the snow making a mockery of this moment.
"Can I ask you something?"
Felix nods. The pit of his chest threatens to yawn open wider, swallow them both. "Go ahead."
"I, uh— why…" the words trip out of his mouth, "why me?"
He looks down at his hands, fidgeting to mask their need to reach out, to grab, to claim, to own.
I love you, that's why.
"Because, I guess… you're you."
"What if… if I was down for it?"
Felix fumbles the Tupperware he'd been filling. It explodes sauce and rice and meat into the sink with a rather disproportionally loud bang!, splashing thin, greasy droplets all over his shirt and some of his face, but thankfully doesn't crack or shatter.
Chan is on him right away, and Felix has to physically step away from his reaching grasp. He notices with a startled, sudden awareness, how his focus is beginning to narrow around Chan's bare neck. He grips the edge of the counter behind him, hard.
Fuck.
"No," he breathes, closing his eyes. It feels wrong to deny it, it really does, but many things feel right that shouldn't, too, at a time like this. He can't trust himself. "You… gods, I can't even think about that right now."
"But," he swallows. "I thought you… "
I do. I want you. I want you so much, I want you, I want you I want you, you're mine, mine mine—
The shitty wooden countertop begins to creak under his grip. He flinches, lets go. "You're an alpha," he reminds them both, "you lot are just a bunch of bits of pride stuck together. You don't… you won't. Want it."
The slicking had started much sooner than preheat; the warming period is also the wetting period: he is always, somehow, a little damp between his legs, underwear always lined with scent-blocking pads. After so long of it, one tends to make peace with it, really, hardly an issue if it doesn't hurt, if the weather isn't too hot. And so to notice it happen— to worry it'll leak, such is its intensity— these are shark infested waters they are treading.
"Want what?" Chan's voice is a rasp, a scratching nail inside him. Felix has to remind himself that he does not know better. Every explaining word that leaves his mouth is cradled and softened and rounded by his— the alpha's feelings. Like this, he will never know better.
He should.
It takes two and a half steps to reach where he stands, twelve seconds to kick his feet from under him and sit on his lap when Chan lands on the unforgiving kitchen tile, a possessive hand on his throat that he really can't help. The wince smooths out at the sight of Felix's face, uncloaked at last, heartbeat a kicking drum.
"I'll manhandle you on your back." He hisses, pressing down in warning when Chan squirms, "be all over your neck, your chest, your face, between your legs— until you smell like me. Like mine. But what alpha wants to be owned?"
To say it like this, palm on the heat of his skin, feels like some perverted prayer, some heretical ritual— a confession, above all else. That each heat he dreams and yearns for it, however unreal and unfair, however violent and indulgent; that each day he fights the dark side of his sun. That for all he cares and loves he too wants to take and claim. That Chan might as well have just learned his real name.
He is shaking. "I'll take dozens of knots, and if you can't give me them, I will make you. You will not stop me, unless you seriously hurt me, unless you try to kill me. Which you won't— you have morals, I have teeth."
Chan looks down suddenly, before closing his eyes with a hissing breath, both hands in fists at his sides. Felix's pad has finally failed him, and his slick bleeds steady into Chan's sweats, a dark gray spot where they meet. It must be about then that he realizes it. The gravity of it all. Felix's body is peppered with red warning stickers, for those who look at the right moment.
Wrong. At the wrong moment. There is no rightness in his need.
When this happened back then— though rather than warning it was an undoing—, his boyfriend had growled so loud Felix still remembers the way it shook him all the way down like a dirty bass. How it spurred him on, made his body sing— the challenge, the display of strength. He wanted him twice as much, then. That was not a fair equation for that alpha. For anyone, really.
Felix has only ever hungered in the wrong measures and at the wrong moments.
But then he feels a swallow under his grip. A smooth, boneless body— an offering.
Chan never says a word, but he doesn't have to.
And suddenly Felix finds himself terribly misguided all along. Chan's eyes are deep, dark pits set in his handsome face.
He, too, meets him anew.
Chan's hair is a mess, as it's been since he woke that morning, heart rabbiting against his skin. Unfairly, his scent has sweetened some, endless buttery spice soaking the space under Felix's tongue; he leans down, hands sliding to thick, strong pecs, and takes a good sniff, straight from his gland.
Unbidden, a growl builds, excited, before tapering off into a purr, nails digging into the soft meat of him. He's so perfect— the muscles of his back unwind like ropes. He follows the path of his jaw, magnetized, and Chan turns to meet him.
They kiss. Felix licks into a hot, willing mouth, humming and purring, legs framing his hips so they can grind, so he can feel his thick, alpha cock through his boxers, a promise. When he pulls away, Chan's face and neck are an endless drunk-pink, and he chases him again for more. Felix indulges.
Arms wind around him tight, slow and wanting as all else. It is like they're melting into each other. He's going to cum.
"I'm sorry," he tells him, then. It's a forethought. This tenderness will not last.
"You don't..." sound sorry, he probably means.
And it's plenty fair, too. "'m not," he slurs, scent-drunk, kiss-drunk, love-drunk, "I guess I just say that. It's a ritual."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah, like," he licks his lips, then Chan's, unable to help himself. Their tongues touch— he's so close. "When you're on your third serving at a dinner party. It's polite. You feel bad."
"It's okay if… if you, you know."
Felix watches him for a moment. Pink, sweet lamb; not a tooth was lost in this affair. He smiles against his lips. His cock spurts release into his underwear, and he has to keep his agape mouth from the shape it wants to make. Lips over teeth, safe, not like—
No. "What?" he huffs, amused somewhere far within, though shallow enough for light to hit— mostly babbling. "Take a bite?"
The roll of hips begins anew. The half-pain is soothing, grounding. Chan just about unravels. "Ah— yeah," he breathes— surrenders. "Take a bite."
Felix doesn't realize he's scared, at first.
They move to his bedroom, his nest yet to be built for once. It's cozy deeper into the apartment, and he knows the scents trap better, will spread nicely, hopefully.
He helps Chan take off his sweater to the clear symphony of his breaths, eyes hungry and gums tingling. With winter, his body is as pale as it gets, his daily life turned into a collection of little bruises.
They're so few, tonight, the big swathes of skin unmarred like a snowy landscape.
The sight alone makes him tear up, heart balled up like a scrap of paper. He wants him, and he loves him, and he knows he might tear him apart in the motions of it— to look at him betrayed is unbearable, even in his mind.
Maybe it's why he can't truly, truly confess the way he wants to. To admit he loves before he— he can't imagine what that'd do to someone like Chan.
"Hey," comes the voice, again, a balm. "What's wrong, Lixie?"
"If," he swallows down the suffocating guilt, says: "if I get. When I change. Don't let me hurt you."
When Chan wraps him in an embrace, he lays a weary head onto his shoulder, turned away from his neck lest he ruins everything before it starts.
"Is that what you're afraid of?" he asks. "That you'll hurt me?"
Felix nods. It's the smallest he's felt in a while. "Yeah," he mumbles, brings a thumb up to gnaw on. "Want you too much."
They begin to rock softly; left and right, left and right. The quiet makes their hearts so loud.
"I'm afraid too," Chan whispers, then, voice wavering and nervous, "that I… want you to. Want me. Like crazy."
His hand slides up a shorn nape, into the scorching heat of his scalp, and he grips, hard, brings him into a kiss, an old thorn removed, a sin forgiven in advance.
"What's this?"
Chan watches him work leaning against the headboard, wearing only boxers and socks, a blanket thrown over his shoulders to chase away the waning chill, and maybe his shyness too. His fingers trace the raised scar by Felix's collarbone, face cute and curious.
"Oh," he blinks, following the path of Chan's touch, "stab wound."
A charming, charming grin makes it to Chan's face, keeps Felix rooted to his spot for a good few seconds, smitten. "Ehh, stop fucking around," but then he pauses. His eyes go wider than Felix has ever seen them. "Wait."
He laughs, then shrugs. It's not a good memory, mostly in the way he barely remembers the motions under the heartbreak of rejection. Being left behind two days into it, dragged away from his nest and into the unsafe sterility of a hospital only because his parents had the foresight to track his phone when he left— he didn't even feel the wound, if he's honest, he could've shrugged it off if his ex had come back. To disastrous consequences, sure, but still.
"I told you, I'm the big bad wolf."
"Oh."
The silence is a bit sudden, then. Hits him the wrong way.
"Is it," he can't bring himself to really ask, this far into it, so he simply waddles close on his knees, eyes searching. Is it too much yet? You won't leave me like this, will you?
Too sudden to predict, a shy tongue traces the raised texture, Chan's eyes low, lashes fluttering slightly. Felix's entire body explodes in goosebumps.
"Are you going to eat me?"
The moment he's satisfied with his nest, it's a slow descent into madness— or, with some grace spared, freedom.
They sleep around two in the morning that night, as close as Felix deems it necessary, crotch to crotch and chest to chest, legs a tangle beneath the comforter. The need is there, clawing, as is the fear of chaffing too soon, so he behaves until he's too gone to care.
It's barely morning when Felix blinks awake, the only sounds the crackle of the snow outside, the rustling sheets. Without a word or much thought, he tugs down Chan's underwear just enough, tips their bodies until he lays above.
Chan is usually a light sleeper, curiously enough. If Felix had much of anything in mind, he'd be expecting a sudden gasp and worried eyes, would be finding it odd that they never come.
His cock is a masterpiece, is what takes up thought-space instead. Seemingly pinker than he's ever seen them, tipped to one side, flaccid— sweet like all the rest of him. It takes barely any friction to get him there, though, and Felix needs.
He sinks down without effort, relief bleeding up his spine, starts rocking right away, his own cock twitching between their bodies. Chan makes sleepy little noises, jerks every once in a while, blonde hair a bird's nest upon the sheets. It's so sweet, how open he is— though it is probably a reaction to his scent, clove and star-anise burrowing into Felix's skin like moisture. The pattering outside makes way for the wet fwop fwop of their bodies meeting, and it is as though carrying a sun inside one's body through the unforgiving winter. A relief.
He gropes a ruddy chest, leans down to suckle lovingly, eyes rolling in bliss. His legs feel no strain, his hips know better than to ache. He was built for this, could go on forever— wants to, wants the infinity of moments like these.
When he knots, Chan starts awake with a moan, jumping to hold Felix against him and drive himself as deep as he can, twitching. He whimpers, shudders, slurs confused half-words; he gives, and gives, and gives.
Felix takes until he overflows with it, cock spurting both release and claim, biting down on the flesh of a pec so he won't tempt himself any higher in his need. The growl that rings out has him hot all over: an alpha's growl, so deep and good and close. His muscles tighten with excitement all over again.
Chan obliges the kiss he demands of him, face pinched obscenely, possibly before proper awareness settles in.
Warm, strong, soft, giving, perfect, perfect alpha, mine, mine, mine; his mind runs in circles.
Felix pulls back to look at him. The bite is so red that it gets him wondering if it's blood what he's looking at. His mouth is so wet with drool that it escapes their next kiss, slides along the cliff of Chan's jaw. Felix's hips kick still, just a little, to remind himself of the stretch, the non-pain, the safety of it all. He's trapped, his alpha; he's not going anywhere.
"Whah—" Chan breathes against his teeth. "Oh, fuck, baby, did you— oh, fuck. Yes, yes."
Knot-drunk and stupid, he reaches his neck, his scent gland ripe and savory with sweat when he mouths at it, tempts fate. "Mine," he hums, a spell. "Mine."
A full body shiver, then. "Yours, yeah, yes."
The knot deflates with time. Felix doesn't allow Chan to pull out; instead he lays on his chest in a daze for some time, watching the shadows change quickly as the day begins.
He thinks he cries, or simply lets out a wounded sound— Chan's arms tighten right away, his body twists so he can see his face.
"What's wrong, baby?" he asks, voice sleepy still. "Not feelin' good?"
Felix presses his eyes shut tight, nosing any skin he can reach. "Than' you," he whimpers, mouth feeling as though stuffed with cotton.
For the care, the want, the sacrifice— he is so thankful, so settled.
"Oh, Lix…"
Chan's lips are hot, changing the topographic map of his skin with goosebumps wherever they land their adoring kisses. Felix closes his eyes and lets it wash over him.
Chan, much to Felix's dismay, has to eat soon enough.
He follows in case he tries to leave, sits on his naked thighs for good measure once he's gathered his portion; though the fear is a muted one, somehow, and he's surprisingly clear headed throughout. Chan looks conquered when he smiles up at Felix, one hand holding a coffee mug and the other the back of his neck.
"You're awfully sweet like this, you know," he teases gently, thumb stroking the skin behind his ear. "Like a big kitty."
The humor makes it through the fog— won't last, though. Still he smiles, all teeth, whispers: "if you try to run I'm breaking your legs," and even manages a punchline: "meow meow."
The mug lands hard on the table behind him, the sound echoing when Chan leans up to kiss him again. He tastes like a coffee shop during the holidays, smooth tongue seeming to almost coax out a hunger Felix battles on instinct.
Perfect, perfect alpha, he sings in his mind, like always, mine, mine, mine.
His purrs grow teeth the more desperate they become, Chan's free hand sneaking under his compromise oversize shirt to smooth over his naked thighs, his hips and waist. Feverish as he must be, Felix still feels the touch scorch a path up to cup his chest, thumb at his pebbled nipple. He is noisier than ever in turn: moaning, humming, hissing, purring, growling— Chan brings it all out of him, makes harmony of his mess.
Then comes Chan's other hand, the one on his nape; once he seems sure Felix won't pull away— a ridiculous, preposterous concept, really— he smooths it along the bent line of his spine and past the gathered fabric at the swell of his ass, into the slick heat between his cheeks. The pads of his fingers are gentle when they rub at his rim, mixes the mess of now with the mess of less than an hour ago before sliding inside, middle and pointer at once. It's hard to divide his attention between Chan's lips and his fingers, and that too feels like a stretching that he enjoys. He pushes back into the sensation, sucks a sweet tongue into his mouth. Between their bodies, his cock bobs.
"So open, babe, fuck," Chan mumbles against him, chest rumbling as if he's the one at the verge of going feral. "Want alpha's knot again? I'll give it to you, baby, anything for you—"
The sound of fabric tearing seems to overtake the entire house like a crackle of thunder. Chan's chest comes into view, a bite mark angry and red right above his heart. Felix looks at it as it goes up and down with his breath, and then up to Chan's eyes, and it's like all words become obsolete. In a rush, Chan's hands are on the meat of his ass, dragging his entire body up and open at once, both of them scrambling to adjust. Felix reaches behind himself, confident in his alpha's strength, and presses Chan's thick cockhead against his hole, for it to swallow into where it belongs. The slide is smooth, aided by the cum left inside and Felix's unending need for him.
The chair is barely wide enough for his knees to find purchase, but he manages, body bouncing as soon as Chan bottoms out. He yanks his sweaty shirt over his head, then helps Chan with his tattered one, eyes locked onto him even when Chan's roll back, even when they wander down to Felix's cock between them, when he takes it in his hand and nearly topples them both with the aggression it brings out.
His mind nearly blacks out with the force of it. An impossibly wide maw gapes open— Felix's desire has him grabbing thick arms, digging his nails in, hard, lest he shakes apart into a million little bits of want, sharp as those parts of him have always been. Chan doesn't have the opportunity to thrust up, knot yanked out of him one frothy-wet slam at a time. He presses his eyes shut, gorgeous lips open to whimper and moan. His grip is just as bruising, and it feels so right, so good, if he could just—
"Want—" he gasps, growls right in Chan's face, feels his fat cock kick inside of him. "Do it—ah— gotta—"
It takes some time for him to comprehend Felix's lackluster attempt at speech, but he gets the message in the end. Chan's answering growl has him soaking all the way to the wooden seat. They bare their teeth, nip each other's lips, chins, shoulders— Felix's insides feel like the unfurling of a flower when it happens.
His chest feels like a handful of bees; like this, the knot catches and catches without much way to slip inside, and for a second he feels the fleeting dread that it won't take before it swells fully, won't fit, won't take, won't take—
Chan's hips thrust up only once through the entire ordeal— when Felix needs it most, face buried in his neck. The knot sets so deep inside it draws a punched out noise from his mouth, and the lips on him make him think for a second that a bite will come.
Felix's body shakes so much when he cums that Chan has to press him close so he won't fall, cock spraying release between them for what seems like an eternity.
The disappointment that all he gets is a kiss to his neck can't withstand the hormone bomb that lands on him. He goes limp, legs slipping out the sides of the chair, twitching when that only drives Chan deeper.
Between the warmth of tender arms and the warmth of fresh release beginning to warp the line of his lower stomach, Felix dozes off.
Chan is considerate enough not to use wet wipes when cleaning the worst of them, choosing a damp towel instead. Their scents remain unchanged, and he feels refreshed when climbing back into the nest, dried slick no longer pulling at his skin.
He's fed from their prepped meals, stroked like a cat each time he takes a bite, purring all the while. He's not one to eat much during heats, and he told as much when he was still able to, so Chan doesn't push when he's done, instead choosing to eat some himself while Felix sips on some water.
They cuddle for a handful of minutes, Felix's nose buried in the cut of Chan's armpit, but soon enough slick comes to warn.
Chan, still flaccid against the inside of his thigh, lets Felix do as he pleases, sighing softly when he licks at his pecs, sucks sweet little nipples into his mouth. He's so soft— skin, flesh, even the violent bruises forming seem to do so with a certain tenderness; or maybe it's Felix's mind that's too gone for sense.
He peppers kisses along the planes of his abs, follows the line of his adonis belt. When he takes Chan in his mouth, less flaccid than just a moment ago, a hand lands on his hair, gathers it in a loose fist and away from his face. Felix looks up and immediately begins to purr again. Chan's face is a slack-jawed dream.
Tongue laving at the tip, mostly to follow the little ridges there, Felix can feel it growing in his hands, bobbing and glistening, half from spit half from precum that he spreads with his lips. Without meaning to, Chan has began to curl up and over him, body bending like an old tree; the sounds he makes— broken whines, gasps, little 'ah, ah, ah's— might as well be pressed to Felix's ear.
He's not really— this isn't much sucking dick the way he does outside of heat, the kind with a goal in mind, and technique and finesse, no. This time, Felix does it mostly because he likes the taste, the weight on his tongue. He doesn't try to deep-throat it, doesn't really see the point; most of his ministrations remain at the tip.
For some reason, that seems almost worse for Chan.
His legs are slightly shaking beside his head, and when he looks up it's like a sunset: all he sees is bruised up pink. The noise has ramped up, and his excitement is building from it, and next thing he knows he's grabbing Chan by the meat of his thighs, yanking him on his back, hips higher than his chest, slightly propped on Felix's shoulders.
The yelp-growl goes pretty much unnoticed. He smells so good, here, each thigh flanking Felix's head diffusing spice topped with Felix's overwhelming ginger. Chan's cock pops out of his mouth with a wet, kissing noise; Felix sucks soft balls into his mouth, licks a fat stripe along his taint. Further up the nest, Chan's back bows, strong hands gripping the sheets hard. Maybe he should be concerned.
But Chan's ass cheeks are so thick, soft meat swallowing his hands when they grip them apart. Felix buries his entire face in the space between, huffing himself high on alpha musk and licking Chan's twitching hole to the shaky sounds of his name muffled by the thighs pressing on his ears.
He could stay like this for the rest of his heat— his life, he thinks for a moment. His cock is so hard and heavy between his legs— whatever it is that cumming means right now cannot happen without tearing him apart.
Chan's gentle hand yanks with a violence that Felix has never experienced from him before; the feeling is so jarring he nearly blows his load right there on the sheets.
He lets himself be pulled up, teeth bared and all, and takes the kiss like a challenge. Chan's cock bullies into him right away, begin pounding just as quick. Felix's nails make hell of his toned flanks, refusing to let Chan take over completely and meeting his frantic pace with ease, their hips meeting almost painfully.
Chan, this far into it, still doesn't seem aware of the danger: when they're no longer able to kiss, his hand slides up Felix's nape to tangle in his hair, yanks his face down to his neck.
Felix couldn't say how the bite lands on his shoulder— perhaps some higher power has taken pity on him at last. The sharp sting has Chan knotting at the same time the exploding taste of blood does Felix in, violently, to the point that Chan begins to paw at his hips because he simply won't stop moving, accidentally milking Chan into a mess under him.
But he's— he keeps cumming. He doesn't know how, there's not even any cum left to spurt, but it's so intense he can't help it.
Chan's pleading babbling doesn't give him any pause. Hands braced on his chest, Felix grinds down until he's spent, and it seems to take forever. Chan cries at some point, gives up at trying to stop him from moving, chest jumping with sobs, cock still cumming inside dutifully. Felix's licking of his tears smear his red, scrunched face with blood.
"Can," Chan huffs, winded, "can we wait just a bit, baby? I want it— want it so bad, but I don't think… I'll give it to you in just a moment, yeah?
Felix stays right there, sat on his haunches, and reckons with the jarring realization that he is about to nod. Not growl and take him in his hands, red and overstimulated, not flatten him to the mattress and try to coax his cock inside until he's able to. There is no danger, like this. Chan won't leave, he knows. He knows.
His hands grab at the back of his knees and lift instead, gentler than he's been, nosing the fast-bruising skin, sucking marks afresh. Savoring. He's so perfect, so strong and heavy in his grip— drool catches at the corner of his mouth as he scents the glands from the inside of his thighs. Chan's eyes are fond, his hand on Felix's hair so tender he can't help but follow the touch. So good it's purr-worthy, his body seems to decide as he climbs up for more, and for kisses, and for that smile that never wavers.
Well. Almost never.
Chan's body jerks suddenly, eyes flying down to Felix's lazy thrusting against his taint, the back of his balls, still slippery with slick and spit and spend. Hot— hot enough he feels like melting.
The tongue in his mouth is sudden and welcome in equal measures, as are the whimpers that follow. Felix, happy and fully hard again, kisses back with gusto, leaning down to press Chan against the bed with his weight. He just can't help himself.
"Wan—" Chan babbles, voice catching and breaking. So gone, so gone, Felix loves him so much. "Wanna fuck me? My thighs? I can, I—"
And halfway it stops being a question; their kiss strains until it breaks the more Chan turns around, bends the endless hills of his back and ass— black and blue from their tussle in the kitchen, from the tumble down the slippery stairs, however long ago that was— and presents.
Felix's entire body is overcome with a feeling he isn't sure has a name anymore. It might've had, back when they were half feral and instinct-driven, saving words for things that mattered— but perhaps it wasn't something omegas got to experience much. When he folds himself along Chan's back, hands on each side of his of his thighs to tighten the space between them— when he slides in their warmth— Felix feels it echo down the line of time. His drawn, overcome moan rings like a howl.
His stomach grows pink fast from how hard he slams into him, dragging out staccato little sounds, slick a little dried by now but not worse for it at all, gods— his body sings, his voice pitches, his chest rumbles in a possessing harmony. Chan's body is so soft, so giving, slumping down a little because it must feel good and he's not sure what to do with himself— he's so good and he is Felix's now more than anything else in the world.
As though in gift, the approaching high disturbs his rhythm, and he ends with his cock sliding up, snug between Chan's ass cheeks. When he cums, some of it squirts up, over his tailbone, and slides down a bent back like a river of claim.
Without much thought, Felix pushes Chan down by the hips, bends over and lick-spreads it all over the skin.
As it turns out, Felix can't take Chan on all fours, no matter how soothed.
Whenever the position even hints at itself, a deep unsettling feeling unravels. And it's not that the position feels wrong inherently, so much as it is simply unsafe. If he is on top, he can see Chan there, can hold him if he tries to leave, can feel his warmth and his care and taste the tears that slip out when Felix starts moving too soon.
With him at his back, he just— he can't risk it, he can't— his alpha smells right and talks right and feels right, but he can't— if he left, Felix's world would crumble on itself again. Just thinking about it makes his throat swell with upset.
His tongue, much like his mind, is too rough for the delicate affairs of speech by now; can't explain why they never end up with Felix underneath, or presenting, why whenever they try the entire room explodes in distress.
Still, Chan understands. Maybe not the specifics, the context, but he catches with that smart eye and that is that. Chan remains right where he wants him, secured. Felix has just enough mind not to mate him right there— lick fragrant blood off his gland, sweetened impossibly by promise, spell love with his teeth—, and even that it is a tough affair, the replacement bites piling up on his shoulder, chest— one dangerously on his jaw.
Instead, Chan mouths at just about any inch of his skin he can reach, lips even plumper from their shared restlessness. Felix likes the feeling, yes, yes, he does— but Chan is ruining his scenting work without really meaning to.
It's not with a plan in mind that Felix feeds his cockhead past spit-slick lips, but as soon as it happens, it makes him relax into the reassurance. Every kiss he lays will taste and smell like Felix, just how every other part of his body must by now. Chan takes him like communion— all reverence.
Chan is on his back, propped slightly by the headboard side of the nest walls, Felix's legs instantly wrapped by strong arms. His hair is damp with sweat, but even then his scent struggles to diffuse under Felix's rule. He cards gentle fingers as his hips begin to rock, stomach shivering when his angling fails and he ends up on the side of Chan's cheek, dark eyes glassy and gone turned up to him. Felix is happy with his size most days and he especially is now: he doesn't need the care alphas do; he can fuck Chan's mouth with abandon and it'll barely choke him, just enough for a couple tears to streak.
He loves being an omega. He loves the small hands he can wield the brunt of his violence with, his nimble body that makes him just about impossible to catch in a race, his short cock he can fuck his alpha's mouth with, as hard as he needs without worry; he loves, particularly, that he is an omega right here, right now, in this world with, at least, Chan beside him.
His thrusts slow naturally as he gets close again. Chan lets him pop out of his mouth, string spit down to his thick pecs, give a few grinds between them, and then shoot his load on his neck, cheeks— and then one last spurt when he licks and sucks at the tip.
Good boy, he'd say, if he had the words.
Instead, Felix simply purrs. Finally.
A heat lasts, give or take, one to five days for most omegas. For Felix, it is about six— seven, if he's really stressed. He has been very, very good about it since he swore off of sharing them, at least in the middle of it, when everything is settled and he doesn't have to worry about whether everyone is safe or not.
So it is quite the shock when, only three days since the first proper wave, he blinks awake. Properly awake— without the haze, the need— stone cold.
Chan is, unsurprisingly, still inside of him, not knotting thankfully. He sleeps so deeply Felix finds it almost concerning; he's never seen Chan, like, do that. Ever. Everyone knows Chan sleeps like a little fairy and jolts at just about anything. And now…
He looks… Felix doesn't know what word to use for the sight when he pulls back to look. Guilt explodes like a firework in his chest, hot and bright, brings tears to his eyes and a lump to his throat.
"Oh, sweet boy," he whimpers, fingers gentle on his face, avoiding the ugly swelling bruise on his jaw. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," he says, and this time he means it— wishes he was gentler and meeker and safer for the millionth time.
Everything will change, his mind loves to say.
It's true.
He nudges Chan awake much later, gently, with a soft caress to his hair.
He's already showered and washed his hair, avoided the sight of himself on the bathroom mirror like the plague. The cleaning up was not fun— he's not sure their dinner chair will ever look the same again—, but the cooking was much needed. Now, he plans on taking care of Chan— if he wants.
"Hyung," he calls softly, "wanna get up? I made breakfast."
The sweetest, cutest little whine rings out, makes of Felix's heart a punching bag. Of course this gentle creature wouldn't fight back—what was he thinking?
"'Lix?" he calls, rubbing his eyes; sleep so deep it stuck them closed. His voice is rough, whether from slumber or effort Felix doesn't know. "Feeling better?"
He swallows. "Yeah, I—" and still his voice catches. "I'm all better, hyung— how about a shower, hm? How's that sound?"
A pleased hum, then. Chan finally sits up, still struggling to keep his eyes open, but with a smile this time. "I'd like that."
He lets himself be dragged to their bathroom, coaxed under the water— and it's so uncharacteristic, that he lets it happen, that he won't sheepishly act like he's a burden, waving his hyung card left and right. Selfishly, Felix lets himself enjoy it; though he has already cleaned up, he strips down to his underwear and steps inside with him, so he can be as gentle and attentive as he is allowed.
He suds up his body, turns Chan this way and that to reach everywhere, to take stock of his injuries so he can patch them up later. Chan is a standing tower of putty in his hands, sighing happily when Felix shampoos his hair, then conditions it, de-tangles with his fingers. He's so— so content, that Felix's grip on his guilt begins to slip. Chan's hands fall to his hips, slot perfectly where the few bruises Felix noticed are. His love-drunk heart swells the size of the world.
Afterwards, he pats him dry and has him sit on the toilet while he grabs the first aid kit, applies ointment and makes shoddy work at bandages to cover where he broke skin. With his teeth.
Chan only… stares at him, for most of it, eyes glazed over. Felix begins to worry he's in some state of shock, despite the happy scent, but he swallows down hard the feeling that climbs. Chan needs him steady and calm, now— if he needs him at all.
"You made me breakfast?" is the first proper sentence Chan gives him that morning— well, afternoon.
Felix even pulls back his chair —the clean one, for obvious reasons—, checks the scent diffuser that's taking care of the insanity of pheromones left behind.
"Yeah, hyung likes eggs and toast, right?"
"Oh. Yeah."
The snowfall stopped sometime ago, he thinks. Outside is still a slurry mess, but if— he fights the urge to ring Changbin over. The chair he takes across from Chan creaks weird, fluids absorbed by the wood that he couldn't get out.
And Chan just. Stares again, down at his plate, the coffee mug he chipped at the bottom when— Felix presses his eyes shut for a second on a hard blink. That's enough remembering.
But then there are tears sliding down a pitiful face. Felix is up without thinking, kneeling by Chan's chair, hand stroking his knee.
"What's wrong?" he frets, eyes wide. "Hyung, I— I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I—"
But Chan only shakes his head, the bandage on his face making the wound seem much more swollen than it is. He opens his mouth a few times before actually speaking.
"I've never—" he hiccups a little, "it's so hard to, like. Turn my stupid brain off."
Felix has to wonder, then, if it'd feel that devastating to be rejected— if a pain expected could ever come closer to the excruciating dawning of realization. It is like being reshaped, sinew stringing and snapping as the parts move around. He gasps without meaning to.
"So you don't…"
The word doesn't need to be spoken out loud, manifested between them. Regret. Chan shakes his head again, emphatically this time, pulls Felix up by the nape so they can press their bruised lips together. Softly, because now their recklessness is catching up to them and it hurts.
"I love you," Felix's heart makes it out his mouth at last. "Like crazy. You saw."
Chan laughs, then hisses a little. "Love you too, baby," he tells him, pressed so close like an ode to his teeth. "Wanna keep seeing it." Felix can't help the tears, and doesn't need to. Chan tucks him in, all of him, the weave of his clean sweater like sheepskin.
They never have to explain Felix's secret, in the end.
A few days later, Changbin and Jisung take one look at Chan in his— subtly bragging, insufferable— wide collar sweater and promptly go red, ear to neck, like twins. Not even a funny quip makes it out. As they're herded inside, Jisung trips on his own feet trying to kick off his shoes. Changbin's gaze remains down.
Felix finds Chan's eyes across the room, and they share a look.