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Jude is seventeen years old by the first time Erling Haaland thinks about him as anything other than a particularly promising teenager. Still young and unpresented, while Erling is twenty and already the established alpha everyone expects him to be. It happens on a scorching hot morning in Dortmund, during a training session so routine that Erling will struggle to remember any of the other details in the future—the weather, the drills, the score of the practice match. None of that will really matter.
The only thing that sticks is Jude.
Jude is on the opposing team, playing with the same ferocious, unselfconscious brilliance that has marked him since he arrived from Birmingham. He tackles an older midfielder—an alpha, Erling notes, a twenty-six-year-old with a temper—and comes away with the ball cleanly, already turning and scanning for the pass. The alpha snarls, chest puffed, and for a moment it looks like things might escalate. Jude just grins, all sharp edges and challenge, and says something that Erling can’t hear from across the pitch. The thing is, whatever Jude said, made the midfielder’s face twist and then, inexplicably, retreat.
Erling just watches. Watches the way Jude’s eyes track the alpha’s retreat with an almost unnerving flicker of satisfaction; the way he jogs back into position as if nothing happened; the way his shoulders loose as he smiles effortlessly, utterly unbothered. He also takes notice of how a few of the other alphas on the pitch give Jude a slightly wider berth than necessary, their body language careful in a way it usually isn’t around each other.
Later, in the locker room, Erling overhears two of the older players talking. He doesn’t really mean to, he’s there just for a change of kit, but he ends up swallowing every syllable he hears.
“Damn kid’s going to be a nightmare when he presents,” one of them says, shaking his head. “Alpha through and through. Did you see the way he stared down Emre? That unruly brat’s barely got his growth spurt and he’s already throwing his weight around.”
“Textbook alpha, really,” the other agrees. “Maybe even a dominant. Poor bastards in the Bundesliga won’t know what hit them.”
“Seems like Haaland’s getting competition,” the first beta's eyes squint, a frown forming on his forehead. “Gods, having one dominant alpha here is terrible enough, I don’t want to deal with two.”
Erling doesn’t comment. He sits on the bench by his locker, unlacing his trainers with deliberate slowness, and instinctively turns his head up when he hears a melodious chuckle that makes his spine shiver. He sees Jude across the room, laughing at something Sancho said, his head thrown back, eyes bright, chest vibrating from the laughter. He looks young, in a freedom sense of the word. Happy. Nothing like the snarling, posturing alpha the others are describing.
But Erling can see it too—the steel beneath the smile, the instinctive command in the way Jude carries himself. There is a predator inside him, something ferocious and near bloodthirsty. It would be easy to assume he is an alpha. The clear and obvious outcome. It is, in fact, what everyone assumes.
Erling is not so sure.
It is not like he has any evidence. Jude hasn’t shown any of the telltale signs of a presenting omega—no particular sensitivity to alpha pheromones despite being surrounded by them every training, no instinctive deference to bigger and wider players, no softening around stronger personalities. If anything, Jude seems to bristle at authority, pushing back against coaches and older teammates with a confidence that borders on arrogance. He’s quick to argue, slow to back down, and utterly unafraid of the alphas who tower over him. Truly thriving in violent, oppressive environments. It is undeniable, how all of it points to alpha.
But Erling’s alpha, the instinctive part of him that he’s been slowly learning to trust over the years, whispers something different. It watches Jude move across the training pitches and thinks, not prey, but something to protect. It catches Jude’s scent on the wind—still neutral, still unpresented, the blank canvas of adolescence that smells more of soap than something unique—and imagines, unbidden, what it might smell like sweetened with omega pheromones. It sees the way Jude’s dark eyes flash with a challenge and promises of danger and thinks, mine.
It is a problem. Erling is very much aware.
He is twenty years old. He is the starting striker for one of the biggest clubs in Germany. He has a reputation to maintain, a career to build, and absolutely no business developing a possessive, borderline-obsessive hyperfixation on an unpresented teenager who is, by all accounts, going to present as an alpha and probably punch Erling in the face if he ever finds out about any of this.
So, it is his ultimate decision to do his best to ignore it.
He fails spectacularly.
The first time Erling deliberately scents something of Jude’s, it is an accident. Or at least that is what he tells himself.
They are on an away trip for a match, sharing a hotel room because the club’s travel coordinator has a sense of humour and a limited budget. Jude is in the shower, the sound of water running through the thin bathroom door. Erling is half-lying on the bed, his upper body leaned on the bed’s headboard, scrolling through his phone, trying very hard not to think about the fact that the Jude Bellingham is naked approximately ten feet away.
He tries keeping his eyes on the phone, really does, but from the back of his vision he takes notice of black and yellow.
Jude’s training jacket is draped over the back of a chair. It is a standard-issue Dortmund jacket, identical to the one in Erling’s own bag, only a few sizes smaller. He has an exact to a fault one so, logically, it shouldn’t spark any interest in him. But it smells like Jude. That clean, neutral scent, still unpresented but already carrying the faint musk of exertion, the lingering trace of the body wash the younger uses, something citrusy and sharp. And Erling finds himself staring at it, almost tearing holes from the intensity of his gaze. The primal thing inside him stirs.
He tells himself he is just going to move it. The chair is in the way and he… he needs to get to the window! Yes, the breeze coming from the window will be too cold on Jude’s skin once he leaves the shower, which might cause him to get the flu from temperature fluctuation. As Jude’s teammate, he obviously has to close the window and avoid getting his midfielder sick, right?
He stands, crosses the room, picks up the jacket, completely ignoring said window. The fabric is soft and worn, and Erling’s fingers tighten around it involuntarily. Against his better judgement and before he can stop himself, he brings it to his face, pressing his nose to the collar, inhaling deeply. The scent floods his senses—neutral and clean and oh, somehow so essentially Jude—and his alpha settles, just slightly, the restless edge smoothed over by the proximity of something that smells like his. It shouldn’t appeal to him that much, he is sure it smells no different than any unpresented teen, but something about its owner makes Erling’s insides ignite.
He sniffs it loudly, burying his face so deeply that there’s almost no distinction between the skin of his nose to the fabric of the jacket. But then, he feels the faint breeze of the window hitting his nape, and the unexpected cold shiver takes him back to reality. He suddenly realises what exactly he is doing, the implications of his unrestrained and thoughtless action. He drops the jacket like it has burned him, heart pounding, face hot.
When Jude emerges from the shower ten minutes later, towel swung around his hips, a few drops of water falling down his neck, Erling is sitting rigidly on his bed. Staring at his phone with an intensity that probably looks psychotic, an absolutely unnatural stillness.
“You alright mate?” Jude asks, one eyebrow perched up. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“Fine,” Erling manages. “Just tired.”
Jude shrugs, and Haaland isn’t quite sure if it’s from apparent satisfaction or utter unconcern. He starts rummaging through his bag of clothes, muttering something that sounds like ‘bloody hell, where have I left it?’ until he seems to remember something and turns his body to the chair. He pulls the jacket, pauses for a minute, and then frowns. “Huh.”
“What?”
“Nothing, just-” Jude lifts the jacket to his nose, sniffing it, and Erling’s heart stops. Absolutely dead and mortified at the same time. “Smells different. Like… pine? I think? Or something. Must have been the hotel laundry.”
“Probably,” Erling answers, and his voice sounds normal, he thinks. Maybe. Hopefully. “They use too much detergent.”
“Yeah, I’ll ask them to tone it down next time,” Jude agrees while shrugging, pulling the jacket on. Erling watches him zip it up, the fabric settling over his shoulders, and feels something possessive curl in his chest.
His scent is on Jude’s jacket. His scent is on Jude. His alpha purrs.
“... or maybe not.” Jude comments after a few seconds, raising one sleeve close to his nose while starting to lie down on his bed. “I’ll have to ask what brand they use. Smells quite nice, I’ll give it to them.”
This is going to be a problem.
It gets worse before it gets better.
Erling starts finding excuses to touch Jude. A hand on his shoulder during team meetings. A nudge in the ribs when Jude makes a dry comment under his breath. A brief, casual brush of his wrist against Jude’s neck as he reaches past him for a water bottle—wrist, where the scent gland is stronger, where his alpha pheromones are most concentrated. Jude never seems to notice, or if he does, he never comments; not that he could expect much pheromone awareness from a seventeen-year-old. He just grins, nudges back, treats Erling like a friend and a teammate and nothing more.
Erling tells himself that is enough. It is not.
Unconsciously, he starts growling at other alphas. Quietly, subtly, a low rumble in his chest he makes sure only the target can hear. When an opposing player gets too physical with Jude during a match, Erling is there in the blink of an eye, inserting himself between them with a glare that promises he will choose violence. When a teammate claps Jude on the back a little too hard, Erling’s hackles rise, and he has to force himself not to snarl and bare his fangs like a rabid animal. When an alpha from the youth-squad—barely eighteen, already presented, full of swagger—tries to flirt with Jude in the canteen, Erling appears at Jude’s elbow like a summoned eldritch horror, radiating menace until the younger, less-worthy, waste of space alpha retreats with a stammered excuse.
Jude notices, of course. With how obvious it is? Anyone would.
But he misinterprets it magnificently.
“The alphas around here are so weird,” Jude says one day, dropping onto the bench beside Erling after finishing his full lap. He’s sweaty and flushed, breath coming in ragged puffs, and Erling has to stop himself from staring where he should not. “They keep avoiding me. Like, I’ll walk into a room and they’ll just… scatter. It’s weird, right?”
Erling makes a noncommittal sound, still avoiding direct eye contact.
“I think they’re scared of me,” Jude continues, and there’s a note of satisfaction in his voice. “You know, because I’m going to be an alpha. A dominant one, probably. And I think they can sense it. Like, they know I’ll be above them in the hierarchy soon.”
Erling’s chest tightens. “Is that what you think?”
“Obviously, duh.” Jude grins, bright and sharp and all dangerous teeth. “Why else would they all be so terrified? I haven’t even presented yet and they’re already backing down. Dude, just imagine what it’ll be like when I’m a full alpha!” He nudges Erling’s shoulder, a little too hard, but said alpha shows no reaction. “Even you’ll have to watch out.”
“I’m not scared of you, Jude.” He answers back, the words coming out rougher than he intended.
Jude’s grin softens into something warmer, and Erling swears he sees a million stars inside his huge, lovable doe-like eyes. And how, how could this adorable creature ever be an alpha? “I know. That’s why you’re my favorite.”
He stands, slinging his bag over his shoulder and jogs off toward the locker room. Haaland can (and should) do nothing but let him go, his chest aching with a want so acute it feels like a wound.
Jude is wrong. So terribly mistaken. The alphas aren’t, and have never been scared of him. They are scared of Erling—of the possessive, territorial alpha who has been marking Jude as his own without said unpresented teen even realizing it. They can smell Erling on Jude’s clothes, on his skin, in the air around them. They can hear the warning growl he emits whenever they get too close. They are not avoiding a future alpha. They are avoiding an existing one; one who has made it very, very clear that Jude Bellingham is not to be touched.
And Jude, blissfully unaware, truly believes it is because he is intimidating.
Faen. It would be funny, Erling thinks, if it wasn’t so heartbreaking.
It becomes a ritual.
Every time Jude leaves his kit bag unattended—which is often, because Jude is seventeen and careless in the way only the very confident can be—Erling finds an excuse to be near it. He bends down to tie his trainers' laces, his wrist brushing the opening of the bag. He picks up the towel he had just used to wipe the sweat from his neck and drapes it over Jude’s things. He lingers after training, making small talk with a coach, while his hand rests on Jude’s discarded jacket, fingers rubbing tiny circles into the sleeve.
The other alphas take notice, but not a single one of them tries to interfere.
Until one afternoon, Mats Hummels—an alpha himself, older, more experienced, with a wife and children and a calm, patriarchal presence—corners Erling in the weight room. The others are long gone, leaving just the two of them, the clank of weights and the hum of the ventilation.
“You know,” Mats says, not unkindly, not gentle or subtle either. “If you’re really planning to claim him, you should probably at least tell him so.”
Erling’s grip tightens on the barbell, eyes looking elsewhere. “I don’t know what you mean.”
Mats chuckles, low and warm, but somehow not carrying any humour at all. “Erling, please. I’ve been an alpha for almost as long as you’ve been alive. I know exactly what territorial scenting looks like. Half the squad is terrified of you, and the other half thinks it’s hilarious.” He pauses, expression now softening. “He’s unpresented. You can influence it to some degree, but not force his biology to present as something he was never meant to be. If he is indeed an alpha, all of this-” he gestures vaguely at Erling, at the room, at the invisible cloud of possessive pheromones that seem to follow Jude everywhere. “-Is going to blow up in your face.”
“I know.” The younger alpha says quietly, as he indeed does know. He’s thought about it endlessly; the possibility that Jude will present as an alpha, that all his secret hopes will be demolished, that Jude will look at him with confusion or disgust or, worst of all, pity. He knows he’s setting himself up for heartbreak, the worst kind. But he also can’t stop.
“But you’re going to keep doing that anyway.” Mats says, and both of them know it’s not a question.
Erling meets his eyes, and still answers from the confines of his heart. “Yes.”
Mats sighs, claps him on the shoulder, and turns to leave. At the door, he pauses. “For what it’s worth,” he says, “I don’t think you’re wrong. About him. He’s got the fire of an alpha, but the heart of something else. An omega, maybe. Time will tell.”
He leaves. Erling stands alone in the weight room, his heart pounding, and thinks about Mats’ words. The heart of something else. He’s seen it too—the way Jude softens around injured teammates, the way he comforts the youth players when they’re struggling, the way his voice drops gently when he’s talking to someone who’s upset. It’s a quiet, nurturing streak that sits oddly alongside his ferocity.
Most people don’t notice.
Erling can’t stop noticing.
He finishes his set with renewed determination. Whatever Jude presents as, Erling will be there. But god, he hopes it is omega. He hopes it with every fibre of his being.
The incident with the hoodie happens on a cold November evening.
Jude has been in Dortmund for almost six months now, and he and Erling have no doubts about calling themselves each other’s best friend. They have developed an easy routine; they train together, eat at the same table, spend evenings to mornings playing FIFA in whichever hotel room they’ve been assigned on away trips. Jude is easy to be around—funny and sharp and surprisingly thoughtful beneath the bravado. He asks Erling about Norway, about his family, about what it was like to him having to leave home so young. He listens with an intensity that makes Erling feel seen in a way he hasn’t in years.
And Erling, in turn, learns everything he can about Jude, storing all of it in a secret archive inside his mind. He learns Jude has a younger brother he adores, he learns his favorite dessert is chocolate fudge brownie (fitting, his alpha decides), that he would rather pick daisies and make flower necklaces than play football as a child (also fitting). He learns that Jude’s presentation anxiety is a quiet, constant hum beneath his confidence—what if I’m not an alpha, what if I’m something else, what if I disappoint everyone—and Erling’s heart breaks a little every time Jude mentions it.
“You’re going to be whatever you’re meant to be,” Erling tells him one night, when the conversation drifts to presentation. They’re in Erling’s apartment, because Jude’s mom, who he shares his flat with, has some friends over for a ‘girls night’ and Jude showed up at Erling’s door with a sheepish expression and a bag of takeaway. “There’s no point worrying about it.”
“Easy for you to say,” Jude mutters, poking with little to no interest at his curry. “You presented before you even were sixteen. A dominant alpha, no less. You’ve known what you are for years. I’m almost eighteen, and I’m still—nothing. Blank. Neutral.” He completely gives up on eating, the fork falling uselessly on the table. “What if I never present at all?”.
“That’s rare.”
“Rare, not impossible.” Jude’s jaw tightens. “And even if I do present—what if it’s not alpha? Everyone expects me to be one. My dad, our coaches, the media. Did you see the fucking news, Haaland? They are already plastering the ‘next alpha superstar’ headline everywhere.” His eyes close, and his next phrases are more of whispers than full sentences, Erling almost misses a word or two. “What if I’m a beta? Or worse—an omega?” The last word is spat out like it’s a curse, teeth grinding and throat closing.
Erling’s heart constricts painfully inside the ribcage. “Would that be so bad?”
Jude opens his eyes and looks up, startled. “W-What?”
“Being an omega. Would it be so bad?”
Jude just stares at him for a long moment. Then he laughs. A short, humourless laugh, and Erling feels no wish to accompany it. “No, I mean- I don’t think omegas are bad. That’s not-” He runs a hand through his hair, clear frustration bleeding into his voice. “I just don’t want to be one. Everyone thinks I’m going to be this dominant alpha, and if I’m not- If I’m an omega- They’ll look at me differently. Treat me differently. I’ll be a disappointment."
“You could never,” Erling says, almost as quietly as Jude.
Jude’s expression, thankfully, softens a small little. “You’re biased.”
“I’m honest.”
The conversation drifts elsewhere, but Erling can’t stop thinking about it. The way Jude had flinched so violently at the word omega. The way he’d said it like a failure, like a fate worse than anything else. Erling has spent months secretly hoping Jude would present as an omega, but it had never occurred to him, not once, that Jude might not want that. Might fear it. Might see it as something to be ashamed of.
He lies awake that night, staring at the ceiling, and tries to untangle the knot of guilt and longing inside his chest, both in equal measure. Jude is asleep on the sofa, having declared himself too tired to walk the three blocks back to his own flat. Erling had given him a spare blanket and a pillow while Jude mumbled something incoherent and burrowed into the cushions exactly like a cat. He looks young in his sleep, somehow even younger than his seventeen years, face relaxed and expression peaceful. Erling watches him from the doorway, his alpha purring contently at the sight of Jude wrapped in his own blanket, surrounded by Erling’s scent, safe inside his territory. The blue of the blanket suits him well, his mind decides.
He should wake him. He should send him home. He has no business in letting a young teen crash in his apartment. And most of all, he should stop letting his alpha dictate his actions. Instead, he crosses the sofa, pulls the blanket up to Jude’s chin, and presses a silent kiss to his forehead. It’s feather-light, barely a brush of lips against skin, and Jude doesn’t stir—will never know. “Whatever you are,” he whispers. “I’ll still want you.”
It is the truth. His alpha may long for the scent of omega, but Erling Haaland is sure he would want anything as long as it had Jude’s soul inside it. Jude doesn’t answer, but he doesn’t have to. Erling isn’t ready to hear it anyway.
The next morning, Jude wakes up to find one of Erling’s hoodies draped over the back of the sofa, an unspoken offering. He pulls it on without comment, the sleeves falling past his wrists, the hem reaching his thighs. Erling watches him from the kitchen, a mug of coffee forgotten in his hand, and feels his alpha settle with a deep, primal satisfaction.
His scent is all over the hoodie. And now all over Jude, too.
It doesn’t take long for Jude to catch him staring, though. “What’s so funny for you to look at, you moron?”
“Nothing,” Erling turns back to the coffee maker, hiding his wider than the world smile. “You look good in my clothes.”
“Shut up,” but Jude is smiling too, a faint dark blush coloring his cheeks. “I would look good on anything, don’t dare take too much of the credit.”
“Yeah. Yeah, you would.”
Erling thinks, not for the first time and nor the last, that he is utterly, completely, irreversibly doomed.
The thing about Jude Bellingham, Erling learns, is that he is spectacularly, almost impressively, oblivious.
Months pass. Erling's possessiveness becomes an open secret among the Dortmund squad. The other alphas give Jude a wide berth, not because they're afraid of him, but because Erling Haaland—their star striker, their dominant alpha, the man who could probably break all of them in half without breaking a sweat—has made it very, very clear that Jude is off-limits. He has scented Jude's training gear so thoroughly that Jude smells faintly of pine even after laundry. He has growled at so many people that the beta coaching staff have started preemptively warning new players: Don't get too close to Bellingham. Haaland gets... territorial. He has, on one memorable occasion, physically inserted himself between Jude and an overzealous fan who tried to grab Jude's arm outside the stadium, his growl so low and threatening that the fan had fled without looking back.
And Jude?
Jude remains completely clueless.
“I’m so sure the alphas are scared of me because I’m going to be a dominant,” Jude tells Erling one day, nodding sagely. “They can probably sense my alpha energy.”
Erling chokes on his water, an ugly, gurgling sound leaving his throat. “Y-Your alpha what?”
“Alpha energy,” Jude puffs out his chest, grinning. “It’s a thing, my brother told me about it, said it’s all they talk about in school. The strongest alpha gives off this energy other alphas can feel, and they naturally defer to it. I must have it already, no? Even if I haven’t presented yet”.
“How… how would he know? Your brother is also unpresented.”
“Yeah, but Jobe’s smart. And he has an actually presented alpha friend, early bloomer.” Jude’s grin widens and he brings his hand up to rub the back of his nape. “And aren’t you also like this? I mean, all the alphas always look terrified of you too, so that must be it.”
Erling has no answer to that, so he just stares at him. Jude stares back, utterly sincere, and Erling realises with a mixture of despair and adoration that Jude genuinely believes this… utter bullshit. He wholeheartedly believes that the reason the Dortmund alphas tremble before him is because they are intimidated by his latent alpha dominance. Not because Erling has been systematically marking him as his own for months. Not because every alpha in the squad has seen Erling’s possessive behaviour and decided that Jude is, for all intents and purposes, Erling’s territory.
“Jude,” Erling starts slowly. “That is not what is happening.”
“Of course it is. Why else would Emre practically run away when I walked into the weight room yesterday? He’s like a scaredy-cat near me.” Jude crosses his arms, looking insufferably pleased with himself. “I’m going to be the most dominant alpha in the Bundesliga. You’ll see.”
Erling opens his mouth to argue. Then he closes it. He could tell Jude the truth. He could explain that Emre wasn't fleeing Jude's 'alpha energy'—he was fleeing Erling, who had growled at him three days earlier for patting Jude on the back after a training goal. He could explain that the reason Jude's training kit always smells like pine is because Erling has been scenting it when Jude isn't looking. He could explain that the reason Jude hasn't been approached by a single alpha suitor in six months is because Erling has been silently, jealously, relentlessly warding them off.
But if he says any of that, Jude will want to know why. And Erling is not ready to answer that question. Not yet. Not when Jude still flinches at the word omega. Not when Jude is still hoping—praying—to be an alpha.
So he just shakes his head and lets Jude believe what he wants to believe. It's easier that way.
Jobe Bellingham is fourteen years old, unpresented, and already a pain in Erling Haaland's ass.
He arrives in Dortmund during the winter break, a gangly teenager with Jude's dark eyes and a smile that is all youthful mischief. Jude has been talking about his visit for weeks—my little brother, you'll love him, he's annoying but in a good way—and Erling has been quietly dreading it. Not because he dislikes children. Because he knows, with the same primal certainty that told him Jude was meant to be his, that Jobe Bellingham will be an alpha. The kid carries himself like one already—shoulders back, chin up, eyes assessing everything with a sharpness that belies his age. When Erling meets him for the first time in the players' lounge at the training ground, Jobe shakes his hand with a grip that is just a little too firm, his gaze just a little too direct.
"So you're Erling Haaland," Jobe says, voice still high with youth but there's thorns underneath. "Jude talks about you all the time."
"Good things, I hope." Erling keeps his voice neutral, pleasant. His alpha is already on alert, sensing a potential rival, and he has to consciously relax his shoulders.
"Mostly." Jobe's smile doesn't quite reach his eyes. "He says you're really good at football. And that you're tall." He looks Erling up and down, clearly unimpressed by the height difference. "I'll be taller."
"I'm sure you will." Erling glances at Jude, who is watching the exchange with an expression of fond exasperation. "Your brother is charming."
"He's a menace," Jude corrects, ruffling Jobe's hair. Jobe ducks away, scowling, for once acting more his age, and Jude laughs. "Come on, little rascal. I'll show you the pitch."
The tour is uneventful. Jobe asks pointed questions—how long have you known my brother, do you always sit next to him on the bus, why do you keep looking at him like that—and Erling answers them with as much patience as he can muster. Jude, oblivious as ever, chatters happily about training drills and upcoming matches, completely unaware of the silent battle of wills happening behind him.
The confrontation comes later, in the car park. Jude has gone inside to fetch his bag, leaving Erling and Jobe alone for the first time. The winter air is cold and sharp, their breath misting in front of their faces, and Jobe rounds on Erling with a ferocity that would be intimidating if Erling weren't almost a decade older and a full foot taller.
"I know what you're doing," Jobe says, his voice low and fierce. "With my brother."
Erling raises an eyebrow. "What am I doing?"
"You're scenting him." Jobe's jaw is tight. "I can smell it. Even though I haven't presented yet. You've been marking him like he's yours."
Erling doesn't deny it—there is no point. This kid, unpresented or not, has the instincts of an alpha already, and he's seen straight through every careful pretence Erling has constructed. "Yes," he says simply. "I have."
Jobe's eyes flash. "He's not your omega."
"Not yet."
The words hang in the air between them. Jobe's hands curl into fists at his sides, and for a moment, Erling thinks the kid might actually try to hit him. But Jobe is smarter than that. He takes a deep breath, visibly forcing himself to calm down, and when he speaks again, his voice is steadier.
"Jude doesn't know," Jobe says. "Does he? He thinks all the alphas are scared of his 'alpha energy' or whatever stupid thing he's convinced himself of."
“Weren’t you the one who started all this stupid ‘alpha energy’ thing?” he asks, eyes squinting a little while sizing up the kid, his gaze holding a judgement he has no right to have.
“I thought telling him that would make him scared of getting too close to the alphas of Dortmund. Wary, less likely to approach them. Implant an ‘alpha equals violent’ image inside his head.” Jobe admits, a deep frown on his too young face, giving his expression more wrinkles than it should have. “I never thought the dumb idiot would think he is the scary one.”
“Yeah, that totally backfired.” Haaland comments, quietly chuckling as he remembers how Jude has, never once, backed off or scattered away from alphas, instead interpreting all as a challenge and diving head first into proving himself as the most ferocious one. "And no. He doesn't know."
"Why haven't you told him?"
Erling hesitates. It is a question he has asked himself a hundred times, in the quiet of his apartment, in the moments between sleep and waking. "Because he's not ready," he says finally. "He's still unpresented, still hoping to be an alpha. If I told him now, I'd be taking that hope away from him. And I won't do that. Not until I have to."
Jobe stares at him for a long moment. Something shifts in his expression—the hostility fading, replaced by a grudging, reluctant respect. "You really do care about him."
"More than anything."
"If you hurt him," Jobe says, and his voice is quiet but no less dangerous, "I'll kill you. I don't care how famous you are. I don't care how tall you are. I'll find a way."
Erling meets his eyes, unblinking, and he knows the small menace is telling him the truth. "If I hurt him, I'll let you."
Jobe holds his gaze for another heartbeat, then nods slowly. "Good." He steps back, shoving his hands into his pockets, like a moody child. "Jude's an idiot, you know. He thinks no one could ever want him as anything other than an alpha. He thinks being an omega would make him weak." And just like a moody child, he cares about his brother too much to admit with nicer, gentler words, instead resorting to insincere insults.
"I know."
"He's wrong."
"I know that too." Erling's voice softens. "When he presents—whatever he presents as—I'll be there. I'll make sure he knows."
Jobe looks at him, and for the first time, there is something almost like approval in his dark eyes. Not completely, maybe closer to a temporary truce. "You'd better," he says. And then Jude emerges from the building, bag slung over his shoulder, and the moment is over.
"What are you two talking about?" Jude asks, looking between them with mild suspicion.
"Football," Erling and Jobe say in unison. Jude rolls his eyes and drags them both toward the car where his mom is waiting.
It is more like a myth.
The strange, lesser-known side effect of prolonged exposure to a single alpha's scent—especially an alpha who is subconsciously trying to influence an unpresented person—is that the unpresented person's scent can begin to shift. Subtly. Almost imperceptibly. But to a sensitive nose, the changes are there. That is a dubious claim, though. Not enough clear evidence to be completely true, just a few rumours and tales being passed from mouth to mouth.
Haaland had clung to that small hope for so many months. And it seems like he finally has a clearer picture.
Erling notices it first during a routine physio session. Jude has pulled a hamstring and is lying on the treatment table, leg propped up, while the physio works on the muscle. Erling is on the next table, receiving treatment for a minor ankle issue, and he can smell Jude from across the room. Not the usual clean, neutral scent. Something warmer. Something faintly, impossibly sweet.
He sits up so fast the physio yelps. "Jude."
Jude looks over, eyebrow raised and confused. "What?"
Erling doesn't know how to answer. It was instinctive, not any thought put into it, and now he can’t continue his wording. He can't say, you smell like an omega. He can't say, I think my scent is changing your biology and I'm not even sorry. So he just shakes his head and lies back down, heart racing.
Later, in the locker room, he catches Marco Reus giving him a knowing look. Reus is a beta, but he's observant—always has been—and Erling suspects he's not making it subtle that he’s known about the scenting for a while.
"Be careful," Marco says quietly, passing by Erling's locker. "You're playing with fire."
Erling doesn't answer. He knows Marco is right. He also knows he's not going to stop.
The next day, he notices small scent patches being tightly held by Jude’s fingers. Little clear squares in a sealed plastic, brand new, the kind that presented players sometimes use to avoid having their pheromones influenced by oppressive atmospheres. Jude has never worn them before, never had a reason why.
"New fashion statement?" Erling asks, aiming for casual and probably missing by a mile.
Jude shrugs, looking almost embarrassed. "The physio recommended it, at least for when I’m inside the club. Like, training and official matches. Said my scent was starting to fluctuate, and they want to keep it stable until I present. You know, to avoid any... interference." He puts a hand behind his nape and starts to scratch it, so obviously an action coming from anxiety and nerves. “I… don’t really believe that is happening, but they ordered me to.”
Interference. Erling knows what that means. The physio has noticed Jude's scent changing. Has noticed the pine and salt clinging to him. Has put two and two together.
"Do they know who?" Erling asks, before he can stop himself.
Jude frowns. "Who what?"
"Who's... interfering." The word tastes like ash on his tongue, sour and accusatory.
"No." Jude's frown deepens. "They just said it could be environmental. The training centre, the locker room, being around so many alphas all the time." He pauses, and something flickers in his eyes. "Why? Do you suspect anyone?"
Erling forces himself to meet Jude's gaze. "No," he lies. "Just curious."
Jude holds his stare for a moment longer, then shrugs and turns back to his locker. Erling watches him apply the patches—wrists first, then neck, pressing them down carefully—and feels a strange, bitter mix of guilt and satisfaction. The patches will block any new scenting during their time spent in the Dortmund fields, but they can't erase what's already been done or their private moments that will surely come. Jude's body has already started responding to Erling's pheromones. The shift has begun.
And Erling, God help him, is glad.
The away match in Leipzig changes everything.
It is a colder than usual, agonizingly bitter January evening, the kind of cold that seeps through layers of clothing and settles into the bones. Dortmund are winning 2-1, and Jude is playing with the controlled, ferocious brilliance that has become his trademark. Erling has already scored once, a header from a corner that Jude delivered with pinpoint precision. They are in sync, in the way they always are, moving together like two parts of a single machine.
And then it happens.
Jude goes in for a tackle on a Leipzig midfielder—a burly alpha with a reputation for dirty play—and comes away with the ball. The alpha snarls, rising to his feet, and before anyone can react, he shoves Jude. Hard. Jude stumbles, feels his knees hitting the ground and the skin tearing even through the socks. It’s not a severe injury, but dang it, if it doesn’t sting. He rises up by himself and turns with a look of cold fury, but the alpha is already in his space. Chest puffed, finger jabbing at Jude’s sternum, mouth shaping words that Erling can’t hear but knows, instinctively, are a threat.
Erling moves before he can think. He crosses the pitch in a heartbeat, inserting himself between Jude and the Leipzig alpha. His growl is low and deep, guttural, full of a menace he usually keeps leashed, and the alpha—who has at least three inches on Erling—takes a step back. His eyes widen.
“Back the fuck off, drittsekk.” Erling says, more of an animal snarling than human language.
The alpha mouth opens, a retort forming, but then he seems to catch Erling’s scent—the full, unrestrained force of a real dominant alpha in protective mode—and the comeback dies heavy on his lips. He takes another step back. Then another. Until the referee arrives and, brandishing a yellow card at the Leipzig player for the initial shove, ends the moment.
Jude is still staring in disbelief at Erling, eyes wide and mouth agape.
“What on earth was that?” he demands, as the teams separate and the referee consults with the linesman. “You can’t just- You’re going to get carded-”
“He shouldn’t have touched you.” Erling’s voice is still rough, his alpha snarling inside his chest with a fight that hasn’t quite yet left and the need to lash out. “He had no right.”
“Erling.” Jude’s voice cuts his thoughts, razor sharp, the assertive, almost rude tone he usually uses on everyone but Haaland. “I can handle myself. You don’t need to fight my battles for me.”
“I know you can.” The alpha’s jaw is sharp, a rebellious vein bulging from his neck. “But you shouldn’t have to.”
Jude stares at him, awestruck and unblinking, for an uncomfortable amount of time. Something flickers on those dark irises—confusion, maybe, or the beginning of understanding. “Why… Why do you always do this?” His voice is quiet, apprehensive in the same way a child’s would be. “Why do you always… protect me? Like I’m some kind of-”
He stops, voice dying inside his throat. The heavy presence of the word hangs in the air between them, unspoken but somehow so loud.
Omega.
Erling doesn’t answer. He can’t. Because, if he opens his mouth, everything he’s been holding back for months is going to spill out, and this is neither the time, nor the place or even the right moment. Jude isn’t ready. Erling isn’t ready. The world isn’t ready.
The referee blows the whistle and the play resumes. Jude gives Erling one last, inquisitive look, and then jogs back into position. Erling watches him go, heart pounding.
Something is about to change. He—and the ugly thing inside his chest—can feel it.
Jude presents three weeks later.
It happens in Erling’s apartment, because of course it does. Because Jude has been spending more and more time here lately, gravitating toward Erling’s space like a planet drawn into orbit. Because Erling’s apartment smells like pine and salt and safety and somehow home; and Jude’s body, on the cusp of presentation, has been desperately seeking out that safety unconsciously, without he himself even realising his own actions and needs.
They are watching a film. Something mindless and action-packed, the kind of terrible movie they’ve watched a hundred times before. Jude is curled up on one end of the sofa, wrapped in Erling’s hoodie—the same one the alpha had offered him months ago, now permanently borrowed and branded with Jude’s initials. Erling is at the other end, trying to focus on the now boring film and not on the way Jude’s scent has been subtly shifting even more clearly for the past few days. Sweeter. Richer. The blank canvas of adolescence finally getting wiped out and beginning to develop its first hints of color.
“Erling.” Jude says, and his voice is strange. Strained, as if simply speaking is hurting him. “I don’t feel well…”
Erling pauses the movie. “What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know.” Jude shifts, his face unnaturally flushed. His dark eyes are glazed, and there’s a sheen of sweat on his forehead. “I’m hot, all over. My stomach hurts like hell. And everything feels just… weird. Like my skin is too tight and my bones are about to rip out.”
Erling’s heart, which had been threatening to malfunction since earlier, finally comes to a stop. He lunges himself to Jude’s side of the sofa, pressing the back of his hand to the sweaty forehead. It’s burning. Scalding. And now from up close, Jude’s scent is unmistakably different—that citrusy sharpness of neutrality giving way to something warmer, richer, sweeter. Something that makes Erling’s alpha sit up and take notice, mouth salivating with the need to stretch his jaw and close his canines, biting and gnawing and marking.
Chocolate.
Jude Bellingham smells like Chocolate.
“Jude,” he says, carefully, every word measured. “Don’t panic. I think you are presenting.”
Jude’s eyes fly open, black orbs wide and terrified like a cornered animal. “What? No. No, I can’t be. It- It’s too sudden, I’m-”
He stops abruptly, a small, pained sound escaping his mouth through the gap of his gritting teeth. His open palm presses down on his stomach, and Erling sees the sweat falling from his brow, the first tremor of heat coursing through his body. And then the scent hits him fully—rich, warm, unmistakably omega.
Jude’s face morphs into dread. “No! No, no, no, no—”
“Hey.” Erling cups his face with gentle cradling, forcing Jude to meet his eyes. Blue skies staring down at a tempestuous, dangerous storm. “It’s okay. You’re okay. You’re safe here.”
“I’m an omega.” Jude’s voice is small, broken, words trembling with every syllable. “A fucking omega,” he can see the beginning of crystal tears forming behind his eyes, Jude struggling so heavily to not let them fall. “Everyone said I’d be an alpha. Everyone. My dad, the coaches, the media- they all said-”.
“I know.” Erling’s thumb delicately strokes his cheekbone. “I know they did. But this doesn’t change anything. You’re still you, aren’t you? Still Jude Bellingham. The most brilliant, talented, and infuriating person I’ve ever met.”
Jude stares at him, losing the battle against his tears while they spill in long streaks over his cheeks. “You don’t understand, Erling, you don’t. I didn’t want this. I didn’t want to be—”
“An omega?” Erling’s voice is gentle, overwhelmingly so. “Is that so terrible?”
Jude can’t find the words to answer. He just looks at Erling with those alluring, tear-filled black eyes, and Erling realises that this is the moment. Has to be the moment, the one he’s been waiting—dreading—hoping for. The moment he can finally lay the truth bare.
“Jude,” he starts, quietly, “do you know why the alphas have been avoiding you?”
Jude blinks, confused, thrown by the sudden shift. “Because I’m scary?”
“No.” Erling takes a deep breath and steadies himself. “Because of me.”
“I’ve been scenting your things,” Erling says, and the words come out in a rush, as if he’s afraid he’ll lose his nerve if he dares to slow down. “Your training kit, your jacket, your locker. I’ve been leaving my scent on you for months. And whenever another alpha got too close, I growled at them. I made it very, very clear that you were mine, even though you didn’t know it.”
Jude stares at him, mouth open and shoulders starting to tremble even more violently. “You… what?”
“I’m sorry.” Erling’s voice cracks, a broken thing. “I know it’s insane. I know I had no right. But my alpha- I couldn’t stop. From the first moment I saw you, my alpha decided you were mine, and I’ve been trying to convince myself of the contrary for months, but I can’t. I want—no, need, you to be my omega, Jude. I’ve wanted it even before I knew what wanting meant.”
Jude’s breath catches, and an ugly, gurgling sound leaves his throat. “You- you wanted me to be an omega?”
“I wanted you to be mine.” Erling’s eyes meet his, for once raw and open. “I didn’t really care what you presented as. Alpha, beta, or omega, it wouldn’t matter in the end. I just wanted you. But when I started to suspect you might be an omega—when my alpha started reacting to you the way it does—I couldn’t help myself. I wanted to protect you. To claim you. That way, everyone would know that you were off-limits, even before you knew it yourself.”
Jude is silent for a long, agonizing moment. His scent is still filling the room, rich and sweet and intoxicating. His body is still trembling with the onset of heat, but his eyes are set on Erling’s face with an unwavering concentration. Searching. Trying to understand.
“You are an idiot,” are the words to finally leave his mouth.
Erling blinks, stupidly so. “What?”
“You’re an absolute donut.” Jude’s voice is wet, but there’s something else underneath it—something that sounds almost like laughter. “You’ve been doing all this shit—scenting my things, growling at random alphas, making everyone think I’m your possession—and you never thought to just, oh I don’t know, fucking tell me?”
“I- I didn’t think you’d ever want to hear it.” Erling’s voice is small, their roles reversed as he is the one filled with fright now. “You wanted to be an alpha so badly, and I- I didn’t want you to know that I was… I was hoping to take that away from you.”
Jude laughs—a real laugh, wet and trembling and full of something that sounds like both relief and vulnerability. “You utter moron. I didn’t want to be an alpha. I wanted to be what everyone expected me to be. And that’s not the same thing.” He reaches up, hand finding Erling’s cheek, his finger pads cool against the flushed skin. “And for the record? I’ve been half in love with you since the first time you complimented my through-ball. I just thought you would never see me as anything but an annoying kid.”
Erling’s heart stutters. “You-”
“Shut up, idiot.” Jude pulls him down, pressing their foreheads together, bodies so close he can feel the heat coming through the newly presented omega seeping into his own skin. “My heat is starting, I feel like I’m going to die, and if you don’t kiss me right now I fear I might actually combust. Since all my suffering is undeniably your fault, you better take responsibility.”
Erling doesn’t need to be told twice.
He kisses Jude, slow and careful, and full of everything he’s been holding back for months. Jude’s lips are warm and slightly chapped, tasting like melting chocolate and something that is purely, unmistakably Jude. He deepens their contact passionately, his tongue licking Jude’s teeth for permission to devour. Their tongues eventually end up caressing each other in a desperate need for contact.
When the need for air strikes and they pull back, Jude’s eyes are brighter, the panic from before replaced by something equally softer and hungrier. “So,” he says, the ghost of the usual smirk Haaland adores so returning, “you’ve been claiming me for months and I didn’t even notice. That’s embarrassing.”
“You were too busy being terrifying," Erling murmurs, pressing a soft peck to his forehead. “Your superior ‘alpha energy’ was blocking mine.”
Jude groans, almost painfully. “Please don’t remind me. I’m never going to live that down, am I?”
“No,” Erling agrees, smiling against the caramel skin. “You’re not.”
The heat passes, as heats usually do, with the help of Erling Haaland. And on the other side of it is something new. Something fragile and precious, glass-delicate, steadily unfolding
Jude Bellingham is an omega.
The news spread through the Dortmund squad like wildfire, met with a mixture of surprise and relief—surprise because everyone had been so certain he would be an alpha, relief because now, finally, they can stop walking on eggshells around Haaland’s territorial behaviour. Not completely, but considerably easier. The alphas who had given Jude a wide berth for months breathe a collective sigh of relief and start treating him like a normal teammate again. Or at least as close as Erling’s possessiveness allows them to. And Jude, for his part, takes it all in stride. He is still the same sharp, brilliant, infuriating Jude he has always been. Being an omega would never change that, and Jude actually takes his secondary gender presentation as a challenge—publicly announcing without any shame, heavily rebutting the view of omegas as fragile beings, encouraging other omegas to be proud of their status and have no fear of entering the sports world. It is beautiful and so fitting of Jude, Haaland’s alpha thinks so.
The only thing that has actually changed is this: Jude wears Erling’s hoodie openly now, not because he’s cold, but because he wants to. Erling scents him deliberately, not in secret, but in a quiet, possessive pride that makes Jude roll his eyes and blush prettily. The other alphas still know better for their own safety and give them space, but it’s more out of respect for a mated pair—or at least, a pair that is well on their way of becoming mated—rather than fear of a jealous alpha.
“We’re not mated yet,” Jude points out one evening, curled up against Erling’s side on the sofa. “We haven’t exchanged bites. You don’t want to?”
“No, of course I do. It’s my dream, Jude.” Erling answers, pressing a kiss to his neck, right on the scent gland that smells so delightful. No longer the neutral, blank canvas, but smelling so richly of hot chocolate. “Just not yet. No need to rush.”
“Good.” Jude tilts his head back, meeting his eyes straight-on. “Because I want to wait. Until I’m eighteen, at the very least. Which won’t really take long, it’s almost here. Just… until I’ve played a full season in the Bundesliga. Until I’ve proven to everyone—and myself—that I’m not just ‘Erling Haaland’s omega’.” His hand pushes a few strands of blonde hair from the alpha’s forehead while he places a feather-light peck on the pale skin. “I’m Jude Bellingham. And I’m going to be the best midfielder in Europe, omega or not.”
“You already are,” Erling says, and means it.
Jude grins, bright and sharp, and full of challenge. “Just wait. You haven’t seen anything yet.”
Erling kisses him again, slow and deep, and thinks about the future. About the matches they'll win together, the trophies they'll lift, the bond they'll eventually seal. About the day Jude will wear his bite mark as proudly as he wears his number 22 Dortmund shirt. About everything that is still to come.
But that is a story for another time.
For now, there is this: a cold Dortmund evening, a warm apartment, and an omega curled up in his arms, smelling of chocolate and pine and home.
And that, Erling thinks, is finally enough for his alpha to quiet down.