The hospital room was a stark, sanitized bubble, a world away from the heated darkness of the car. Sera lay in the bed, asleep now, her features finally relaxed, the terrible tension of her heat replaced by the deep exhaustion of its passing. An IV drip fed fluids and regulated hormones into her arm.
The doctor, a brisk older Beta woman with kind eyes behind smart glasses, finished her scan and turned to Kaelen.
"You're lucky you got her here when you did," the doctor said, her tone professional but edged with concern. She pointed to the holographic chart displaying Sera's vitals. "I see here she's been taking suppressants daily. High-dose, Formula X. It's incredibly bad for a Dominant Omega's system. It's like putting a lid on a boiling pot and clamping it shut. Eventually, the pressure has to blow."
Kaelen's stomach twisted. The memory of that first night the empty Heat-Surge canister, the Bonding Bracelet, the frantic search for the suppressants flooded back. She's been taking them every day since I got here. The original Kaelen's abuse had set this catastrophic chain of events in motion.
The doctor looked at Kaelen, her head tilting. "Are you her Alpha? If you're this involved, a temporary mark would have been a far safer solution than this." She gestured to the IV and the sleeping Sera.
The question was casual, but it felt like a trap. Kaelen shook her head, the lie coming automatically, woven with a thread of her own newfound truth. "No. I'm just her... arranged fiancée. I would never do that without her explicit consent."
The doctor's eyebrows shot up. She looked from the powerful, elegant woman in the expensive suit to the vulnerable Omega in the bed, then back to Kaelen. A slow smile of genuine respect touched her lips.
"My goodness," the doctor said, her voice softening. "What a rare DOMINANT ALPHA you are."
The word DOMINANT hit Kaelen like a physical blow. It panged in her mind, a cruel joke. I'm not, she screamed internally. I'm just a recessive fraud, pumping myself full of illegal gel. The doctor's praise was meant for a person who didn't exist.
She managed a tight, uncomfortable smile. The doctor, mistaking her reaction for modest pride, nodded and left the room, leaving Kaelen alone with the sleeping Sera.
The silence of the room was deafening. The adrenaline of the crisis was fading, and other sensations were beginning to register. A deep, throbbing ache. A persistent, uncomfortable pressure against the seam of her tailored trousers.
She looked down. There was a distinct, undeniable bulge straining against the fine wool.
Is this what they called an Alpha Spur? she thought, her mind reeling with a fresh wave of panic and disgust. But I already took a suppressant earlier. Why is it still... hard as wood?
The biology of this world was a nightmare. The Dominion gel suppressed her recessive traits and mimicked dominant pheromones, but it seemed it couldn't completely override a primal, physical response to an Omega in peak heat especially not after the intimate, manual relief she'd just provided. Her body was reacting on a level the chemicals couldn't fully control.
Physiological response detected.
The System's text appeared, clinical and unhelpful.
Recommendation: Seek release to alleviate discomfort and restore cognitive focus. A private lavatory is adjacent to this suite.
Kaelen stared at the words in horror. The System was suggesting she… what? Here? Now? In the hospital bathroom while Sera slept steps away?
Of course, she thought, a hysterical laugh dying in her throat. This was supposed to be a rated 18 story. The System doesn't care about shame. It cares about functionality.
The throbbing was becoming a distracting, painful pulse. She felt flushed, her skin too tight. The scent of Sera, though fainter now, still clung to her, a maddening reminder. She had no choice. The discomfort was too acute, too physical to ignore.
Feeling like she was moving in a dream, she slipped into the ensuite bathroom, locking the door behind her. She leaned against the cool marble sink, staring at her reflection a pale, wide-eyed woman in a rumpled suit, looking utterly terrified.
Her hands shook as she fumbled with her belt and the button of her trousers. The reality of the anatomy she now possessed was something she'd been able to ignore, to treat as a clinical, external fact. Now, it was insistently, undeniably present.
She touched herself. The sensation was alien and overwhelming. It was nothing like her old body. It was a strange, foreign nerve cluster, hypersensitive and demanding. Disgust warred with a shocking, involuntary pleasure. Every stroke was a violation and a relief. She bit her lip to keep from making a sound, her eyes squeezed shut, trying to block out the world, the hospital, the sleeping woman in the next room, the horrifying reality of what she was doing.
It was fast, frantic, and utterly clinical. A means to an end dictated by a heartless system. The release, when it came, was a wave of intense, shameful relief that left her breathless and hollow.
She slumped over the sink, gasping. The throbbing was gone, replaced by a deep, settling disgust that coiled in her gut. She looked at her hand, then up at her reflection. The woman in the glass looked like a stranger, her eyes shadowed with self-loathing.
She turned on the tap, scrubbing her hands over and over with the hospital's harsh antiseptic soap, the scent of lemon and bleach trying to erase the memory of Sera's heat and her own transgression. She washed until her skin was raw.
When she finally emerged from the bathroom, her body was calm, but her mind was in turmoil. She avoided looking at Sera, unable to face her after what she'd just done because of her. She sat in a chair in the far corner of the room, pulling her knees to her chest, a lonely figure in the sterile light, waiting for the woman she was bound to to wake up, drowning in a shame that was uniquely, horrifyingly her own.