The Omega Awakened: A M/M Omegaverse Erotic Short Fiction (Omegan Tales Book 1)

by Elijah Stierne

  “No, that’s not what I mean. I just - it was an Intractable Mating.”

  Oliver sighed, relieved. Then he reached out and tweaked Micah’s nose playfully, groaning, “Oh, thank god. That’s ten times better than what I thought was going on here.”

  Over his shoulder, Micah could see a group of alphas sizing them up. Oliver was speaking a tad too loud, interrupting the serenity of the library. Funnily enough, even when Oliver wasn’t talking he got a lot of attention. His body was shockingly androgynous, curvy in some areas and lean in others. His hair was just long enough to be tucked neatly behind his pierced ears, and he looked… precious. Frail. Alphas gravitated toward people like that. It was in their nature to want to care for their omegas, though it often lead to an overabundance of control.

  For a second, Micah wondered if he looked weak, too. He didn’t feel weak. He felt quiet stable and quite strong, and Jackson never seemed to imply otherwise.

  Micah’s phone vibrated loudly in his pocket and he cursed, yanking it out automatically. Another message from Jackson. This time, it was slightly inquisitive - a question about where he was and if everything was alright. Micah unlocked his phone, ready to type out something short to let Jackson know that all was well, but then Oliver said, “Oh my god, look. Look, look!”

  Beyond their little bubble, right at the checkout desk, an alpha waltzed his way up to an unsuspecting omega and leaned against the desk. It was like watching a documentary, the way he moved, swaying confidently from side to side as he approached. Oliver wiggled excitedly and bit his lip as he watched the scene unfold. The alpha smirked and said something that Micah and Oliver couldn’t hear, and the omega worried her bottom lip beneath her teeth. Her friends were frozen by the exit, hands on the door, ready to leave, and the omega flashed a quick smirk over her shoulder to them. A moment of deliberation, a shy tilt of her nose back towards the alpha to scent him, and then the omega snagged a pencil from the cup holder by the register. When she took the alpha’s hand, it was with a gentle grip, just caressing for a second before she flipped it over and scribbled something on the palm, and the alpha…

  The alpha was a mess of smiles. He looked dazzling and confident, and when he grinned down at his palm, it was with a deep breath in his chest.

  Micah smiled gently.

  A situation like that was what omegas lived for. Being approached by an alpha and finding their gorgeous scent compatible with your own, their eyes focused only on you, their words tailored only to you. A modern courting was just a few shy looks and a few fluttering eyelashes, and still, though Micah wasn’t completely behind it, he couldn’t lie and say that the scene didn’t give him butterflies.

  “You know what I just noticed?” Oliver asked suddenly.

  “Hmm?”

  “The library isn’t segregated. A lot of the classes are split up by alpha and beta, and then omega, but the library is kind of the wild-wild west of campus hangouts. They don’t even try to split it.”

  Micah hummed again and said, “I know. Just another one of their outdated rules.”

  “Yeah,” Oliver said, mulling over it for a moment longer. Then he turned back to Micah and extended his hand, waggling his eyebrows as he waited for the other omega to take it. “Wanna go grab lunch? Maybe you can help me find an alpha like that. Since you’ve got yours already, we don’t really need to scout for you.”

  Micah sighed dramatically, smiling only when Oliver hissed at him to shut up. Eventually, he nodded and agreed to go, knowing that the time with an old friend would only do him good. He pocketed his phone, moving to pack up his things with his mind on everything but the fact that he hadn’t replied to Jackson at all.

  4

  Jackson

  Jackson hadn’t planned to be like this.

  He’d always wanted to be an exemplary alpha. The type that he’d read about in books when he was young. Strong, muscular, level-headed. What alpha didn’t want to be that?

  Honestly, what omega didn’t deserve that?

  In truth, to become that type of alpha was hard. Adulthood was full of so many sticky corners that seemed to catch Jackson by his ankles and drag him down. His Intractable Mating had been one of the more shocking curve balls he’d had to catch, but it wasn’t alone in making him feel as if he were inadequate, or as if he might never actually live up to the expectations of an alpha. For fuck’s sake, he couldn’t even control his own rut, and now he was sulking like a child because his mate had gone quiet on him.

  Jackson thought he’d been a logical and well-rounded person until now. Apparently, he’d been wrong. Either that, or something about him had fundamentally changed. Glaring down at his phone, watching the small check mark next to his sent message and waiting hungrily for a response, this was the antithesis of a cool alpha.

  Micah was busy. It was the first week of school. From what Jackson had gathered during their time together in their theory course, the omega was a bookworm, and he spent a lot of his time trying to keep up with his studies. Without so much as asking a question to clarify this, Jackson knew it was true. So why the fuck was he feeling so anxious all of a sudden? Why was he feeling as if his and Micah’s last good conversation the weekend before was a sign of impending doom?

  Maybe he was being a tad dramatic.

  But there was no way for him to block the incoming wave of apprehension.

  Jackson scrolled back through his messages for what felt like the hundredth time, watching as immediate responses tapered off to sporadic responses tapered off to no responses at all. It seemed that the human in Jackson was feeling alright about it; he could look at the times and line them up with class periods, study periods, or even just relaxation periods. The alpha, on the other hand, was feeling particularly rejected, and Jackson huffed, locking his phone and tossing it on the desk in front of himself. It clattered loudly, bumping up against the keyboard, and Jackson almost reveled in the sharp sound cutting through the silence of the computer lab.

  He really, really fucking hated hormones.

  They were shit.

  “Jax,” someone mumbled from beside him. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

  As if a coil had been lit beneath his ass, Jackson jerked fully upright in his seat. He’d forgotten he was in the middle of a study hall. His friend and study partner, Ben, was looking affronted, glancing between him and the upturned phone on the desk. Jackson didn’t have an immediate response, instead looking nervously over his shoulder to confirm that, yes, every other alpha in the lab was staring at him. Some were curious, others were aggravated, and then there was the tiny gap of them that didn’t look as if they had any emotion at all.

  Jackson cleared his throat and raised his hands, muttering a quick “sorry” to all of them in apology. When he looked back to Ben, the alpha was shaking his head.

  “Uh, no offense,” he said slowly, “but you smell like sour grapes. You’re starting to stink up the room.”

  Jackson raised his arm and sniffed his clothing, pulling away when he realized it was true. His stress was starting to leak out of his clothes. Fuck. Ducking his head in embarrassment, Jackson grit his teeth and reached for his phone. He slipped it in his pocket and then said, “Sorry.”

  “No problem, dude. Just… I don’t know, cool it.”

  Jackson leaned forward in his seat with every intention of taking the man’s advice. His setup was a bit like his thoughts, a scattered mess. He seemed to be surrounded by piles of old and tattered books, or open binders that were marked up with nonsense. Jackson did his best to pick up where he’d left off, scared to check the time and see how much of it he’d burned through waiting for the omega to respond to him. Even though his hands were starting to shake and he was feeling tense as hell, he restarted his required reading, some boring chapter of a book called The Rise of Alphan Cinematography. The content was so dry that several times, Jackson had to stop his brain from wandering by going back a page and making himself reread.

  He just couldn’t fuc
king shake it. Micah was upset with him, right?

  That was what they’d talked about. That Micah was starting to question their longevity, and that he was shocked that Jackson wasn’t doing the same.

  And the omega wasn’t wrong to question it. In fact, Jackson was shocked that he hadn’t taken more than two seconds to ask: what the fuck were they going to do when the hormones wore off? A few weeks in and already, the strains were starting to show. It seemed that now was as good a time as any to start considering these things, if only because strangers to bonded lovers in the course of a month seemed like a terrible foundation for a relationship.

  Ben sighed dramatically and bent over to reach into his book bag. When he straightened up, he was already yanking the cap off of a small spritz bottle and pressing the nozzle directly in Jackson’s face. Jackson sputtered and quickly raised his hands to cover his eyes and his nose as his friend depressed the nozzle.

  “I might be crazy for asking this,” the alpha said as he clogged the air with whatever god awful scent was in the bottle. “But did something happen? Or did a stick just suddenly and randomly form in your ass?”

  “I’m fine. I’m just tired.”

  “I’d believe that, but it’s the first week of school. You sure that’s all?”

  “Yeah,” Jackson sighed. “Pretty sure.”

  “Okay. Then I’d like to know how the hell you’re so tired when all you did was sleep all break.”

  “I didn’t… what…” Jackson sputtered. “I rested. I didn’t sleep!”

  “Personally, I’m not really seeing the difference between those two things, but go ahead.”

  Behind them, a pair of students hushed them. It was Ben who turned to apologize, saving Jackson the awkwardness of doing it twice.

  The computer lab at the dorm was packed full. There were small groups of students with their heads pressed together, discussing school assignments or otherwise chattering about their winter breaks. Jackson chalked the crowd up to the weather outside. Few people were willing to trek through the winter tundra just to sit in a heated library, especially not when the computer lab at the dorm was just as cozy and inspiring. Jackson wondered if Micah would be in the library right now, or if the omega dorms had large computer labs, too. When he’d gone in, he hadn’t traveled anywhere but the front desk and, once or twice, Micah’s bedroom. The rest of the building was a mystery to him.

  “Well whatever you did,” Ben mumbled, much quieter but no less passionate, “You need to get it together. You’re not gonna be able to make it through a semester if you can’t even make it through the first week.”

  Jackson doubted he’d be in crisis for the entire semester. But at this rate, what did he know? He was finding it hard to even guess where his emotions were going from hour to hour, curtailing from happiness to abject depression. He was an eight-ball of feelings, shaking from one thought to the next. It was irritating, but Jackson couldn’t say that he didn’t appreciate the highs.

  “Mating is fucked,” Jackson said conclusively. He leaned back in his seat and folded his arms over his chest.

  “Is that what this is about?”

  “Is that what what’s about?”

  “This attitude.”

  “I don’t have an attitude.”

  “Dude, you have a severe attitude. You’re usually a lot more mellow than this. It’s the bond, right?”

  Ben wasn’t lying. Jackson was often regarded as one of the more mellow alpha in his dorm. His parents had encouraged him to join sports so that he could explore the more dominant, physical side of his physiology. It hadn’t worked. Instead, he’d made a handful of friends that, to this day, poked fun at his demeanor. The attitude and the short temper were both new.

  “I’m guessing,” Jackson mumbled. “I was feeling so good the last few weeks that I kind of forgot the situation I’m in. Now it feels a bit like I’m crashing.”

  Ben reached out and gripped Jackson’s shoulder, shaking him and smiling at him sympathetically. Alpha students were never taught about things like these. As far as Jackson had been concerned before his mating, all he had to do was provide the bite, and then provide the emotional reassurance for his omega in the aftermath.

  If he’d have known that alphas were similarly put out by their affections, he’d have reconsidered the idea of mating altogether.

  “I don’t know,” Jackson admitted, letting out a deep breath. “I don’t have a fucking clue. I feel… jittery. You know that feeling you get when you miss a step and your stomach just drops? That’s what keeps happening. It’s like I’m fixated on it.”

  “'It’ being what?”

  “The conversation we had.”

  “…you know, mating has made you a lot more cryptic. You’re really talking me in circles here. Could you just simplify for me? Is it just the hormones fucking with you? Or did your mate actually do something to get you like this?”

  Jackson hesitated. Saying it out loud meant that there was a good chance he’d sound like an absolute clown. This whole mating shtick already felt like a performance gone tits up, and Jackson was in the middle of the stage with nothing but face-paint and a red nose to show for it. When Ben leaned forward on his elbow, chin cradled by his palm while he waited, Jackson caved.

  “Micah’s not texting me back,” he said.

  “And Micah’s your mate’s name, right?” Ben asked. When Jackson confirmed with a quick nod, he said, “Okay. And when’d he stop messaging you?”

  “…earlier today.”

  Ben laughed quietly, nodding his head slowly. Then in a comical display of shock, he paused and hissed, “Wait, what?”

  “I texted him this morning and he responded. After that, he hasn’t said anything.”

  Ben sputtered into his next exclamation, completely forgetting his promise to keep it down and instead going balls-to-the-wall with his dramatism. “I feel like I’m missing something. This morning? As in he has texted you today, but just not in the last few hours?”

  “I know.”

  “And you’re throwing a fit, stinking up the computer lab because it’s been a few hours?”

  “I know,” Jackson growled. “I fucking know. Ben, it’s not like I wanna be like this, alright? I can’t help it. I just feel like something’s off and it’s driving me fucking crazy. I’m not sure what it is, but something in the relationship is different.”

  “Different how?” Ben tried. When Jackson opened his mouth to respond, Ben put his hand up and rethought his question, saying instead, “Okay, no, no, no. Don’t try to explain. I’m not gonna understand it. But I just wanna say this. In those stupid freshman courses they made us take about ruts and mates and shit, they mentioned this specifically. You know, how you shouldn’t do it young and blah blah blah, because it’s hard to cope when your body goes all out of whack for a month or two. If the bond is really fresh, it’s probably just all the hormones equalizing. You’re gonna feel a bit crazy for a while.”

  “You’re right, you really don’t get it,” Jackson responded, perhaps a bit more sharply than he needed to. “I don’t think it’s the same as what we learned in those seminars. I feel like it’s worse. Micah and I aren’t normal and I’m pretty sure our relationship is fucked, and that’s hitting me now.”

  “You had a shotgun mating. It’s not fucking traditional, but it happens. The emotional part of it sounds pretty on key to me.”

  Jackson huffed and stared pointedly at Ben. Ben raised his eyebrows and chuckled, then raised his hands and said, “Okay. Fine. Explain it to me, cause apparently I’m really, really not getting the issue.”

  Jackson laid his hands in his lap and looked down at his bracelet. Micah had been right. It was truly a hideous piece of jewelry, almost mocking him every time he moved. It rubbed against his wrist, each link in the chain making just enough noise to grab people’s attention. Jackson started to fiddle with his nails.

  “It wasn’t a chosen bond. It was an Intractable Mating.”

  “Whi
ch is what?”

  It was nice to have confirmation of what Jackson already knew. Alphas didn’t learn about this. It hurt to be ignorant of his physiology, and made him even more upset that he might’ve sounded uneducated in front of his mate because the educational standards were different. To be honest, it was never more clear to him that Micah was a firecracker. Undoubtedly aware that alpha classes were lacking, and still agreeing to - no - opting into them anyway? Ballsy move.

  “Our bond happened outside of the formal mating,” Jackson said. “So when I went into rut, my body already thought I was mated.”

  “…uhm? What the fuck.”

  “Yeah,” Jackson agreed.

  “Wow. Okay,” Ben mumbled. When he was at an obvious loss for words, he stared down at the ugly, stained carpet. “Okay. Didn’t know that was a thing.”

  “So it’s strange. We don’t know each other, but we obviously like each other. And a few days ago, Micah asked me why that didn’t bother me. Fuck. I hadn’t even thought about it at all. Now I think he’s just… I don’t know. I don’t have a clue. I’m sorry.”

  Ben chewed his bottom lip and thought long about a response. At some point, Jackson became worried that the alpha wouldn’t speak at all, and that the conversation was over, perhaps too high above Ben’s emotional pay-grade.

  Around them, a few alpha had lowered their voices to whispers and were glancing over their shoulders every few seconds as if they were waiting for the conversation to continue, and in those moments Jackson even worried that he’d said too much. That airing his laundry out in such a public place might lead to rumors or problems down the road. But then Ben took a deep breath and started to speak, and Jackson forgot all about their audience again, hungry for feedback.

  “So, first. A lot of people like their mates before they know them. Jackson, I know this is hard to believe because of the hormones, but that’s really just how people work. You see something you like, then you go get it. Yeah, it’s super inconvenient that the two of you are… bonded before you go through the motions, ‘cause what’s gonna happen when the rose colored glasses come off, you know? Is Micah still as pink as he looked when you first met him? If you’d met him first, it would have been easier to tell.”