Milo

Milo smirked to himself as the plastic water bottle hit its target with a satisfying thump. 

“Can you give it back, please?” Milo asked in an overly sweet voice.

“No.” 

“Come on man, I’m thirsty.” 

“You said that last time,” the Alpha somehow growled every syllable. 

Milo tried to remember what he was taught in all those sickening omega classes. 

“Please, can I have the water bottle back, Alpha?” Milo added an excessive amount of blinks to really ham it up.

Wordlessly, the Alpha handed the water bottle back to the bed-ridden, pitiful omega. Who, once again, chucked the damn thing at the side of the Alpha’s head. As he had been doing ever since they'd arrived at this cabin a few hours ago.

After the Alpha had carried Milo off like an omegan princess, he had expected to get some answers...

Okay, fine, Milo expected to be ravaged by the handsome Alpha, and then get some answers.

To Milo's frustration, neither of those predictions was correct.

Milo had been subjected to a lifetime of omega classes. Dutifully studying bullshit like the art of submission, and how to be a pleasing omega. In all his studies, Milo never once read about Alphas’s mother-henning their injured omegas.

“Just drink it. Not sure if you’ve noticed, but there are no hospitals around if you pass out from dehydration.”

The Alpha was prowling around the small cabin out of frustration, like a cat stuck inside from the rain.

Speaking of cats, Milo ran his hand down his back to his tailbone, checking for the 50th time that his new appendage still existed. 

Milo, who had at least 2 broken ribs, hadn’t been able to twist around to see his new tail, but he was surely aware of its existence.

Right on time, it started twitching in glee of the Alpha’s proximity. 

Mortified, Milo blurted, “How’d you even get this cabin out here, anyway? Or all the water bottles?” 

Prowling to the edge of the bed, the Alpha replied, “The military drops off supplies at the edge of the woods. Most Alphas are too lost in their instincts to trust them.” 

“And you aren’t?”

“No.” The Alpha answered curtly. 

“And what about the cabin?” Milo swore he could see a blush blooming on the Alpha’s tan skin. 

"I built it." The Alpha spit out before he resumed his prowling and fussing over Milo, cutting off the conversation. 

Too bad for him, Milo wasn’t finished. “So now I’m just stuck here, with you, like this.” Milo flung a hand towards where his tail would be if he wasn't smothered in blankets.

The Alpha seemed to carefully think over his response, “there are other Omegas here you could visit… but I don’t think their Alpha’s will let you see them.” He finished lamely. 

“Would you let me see them?” 

The Alpha finally stopped his pacing. “Yes, I would.” 

Well then, Milo was at least placated to learn that he had some power in this fucking situation. 

“What happens now?” 

The alpha once again got that constipated look that meant he was carefully thinking over his answer. 

“Now,” he finally replied, “we wait until you're healed.” 

“And then?” Milo pushed.

Milo swore he saw the Alpha's eyes flash. 

"And then we become mated.” 

"And if I don't want to become 'mated'," Milo made air quotations around the word.

Before Milo could question what the hell that meant, the Alpha dipped out of the cabin, muttering something about catching dinner. 

If Milo let his eyes wander down the expanse of the retreating Alphas' broad back, that’s nobody’s business. 

Milo tucked eagerly into his meal of deer. The lack of any seasoning made the meat a little tasteless, but Milo was too hungry to care, tearing off another piece of the roasted animal.

The staring was getting unnerving, however. Glancing up again, Milo checked again that yes, the Alpha was still staring raptly at Milo. 

The Alpha had begun the odd, one-man staring contest since he had returned to the dilapidated cabin. The biggest damn deer Milo had ever seen slung over his shoulder. 

A strange, secret part of Milo shuddered in pleasure at the show of strength. The deer was huge and could feed the both of them for at least a week. 

The growly Alpha was dead silent as he prepared the animal, roasting it on the makeshift fireplace before he presented it to the omega.

The moment felt deeper than a simple offering of food. More significant somehow.

Milo should have chucked the food at the Alpha’s head, should have told him to go fuck himself. Yet, he didn’t. 

Instead, unflinchingly meeting the Alpha’s burning gaze, Milo brought a piece of the pink meat to his lips, letting the tender morsel melt on his tongue. 

It was the Alpha’s turn to shudder. 

Trying to ignore the growing hardness under his blanket, Milo pivoted to a topic that would calm them both down.

“Why was the winged douchebag acting nuttier than you?” 

The Alpha paused his chewing to raise a confused eyebrow at Milo.

“The other Alpha, he acted… wilder than you were.” Milo clarified.

Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, the Alpha began, "When the Alphas first got here, most of us were not in a great headspace. Violent, bloodthirsty, dangerous to omegas. A lot of them seemed to embrace their instincts, you know, abandoning all man made shit."

The Alpha sent a significant look at the ramshackle cabin around them. "Me, not so much. I built a cabin, made use of all the government supplies, and stayed the fuck out of everybody else’s way.” 

As if in emphasis, the Alpha took a deep swig from one of the government-issued water bottles before he continued.

“As for the ‘winged douchebag’, he was one of the Alphas who truly embraced their instincts. Pretty sure he made a nest like a fucking pigeon.” 

Milo barked out a laugh before a cold thought washed over him. “What’s going to happen to the omega I was with?” 

“If your friend is caught,” a dark look thundered over the Alpha’s face, “it won’t be good.”

“It won’t be good how?”

“Well, he’s always listened to his instincts a little too much. Always talked about treating omegas like property."

Milo felt his mouth go dry. "And you disagree with treating omegas like that?"

“He isn't?” Milo probed.

“Yeah, there’s another Alpha here. Barely see the slimy bastard, but he’s a weird one. Always hisses like a fucking psychopath. A few years back, another Alpha challenged him. The other Alpha got his neck snapped by the fucker's tail in a second. Saw it with my own eyes.”

Milo tried to hide the terrified tremor in his hands, but the Alpha had already spotted it.

“Sorry, I probably shouldn’t have said all that. Not great at ... talking.” The Alpha's broad shoulders hunched in the slightest bit.

Without thinking, Milo rubbed a hand down the Alpha's back, watching in wonder as the terrifying Alpha leaned into his hand like a Tomcat.

“Thanks for being honest with me. Blunt is good.”

The Alpha searched Milo’s eyes. “Blunt is good," he echoed.

The rest of the meal passed in silence, and the roaring fire fizzled down as the night crept closer.

Milo scolded himself for letting his guard down so easily around the Alpha. For some odd reason, he just felt comfortable around the larger man. Unafraid to push the buttons of the dangerous Alpha, even in his vulnerable state.

Even as the Alpha settled down for the night, stocking the fire and preserving the rest of the deer, Milo couldn’t find it in himself to be nervous. 

The larger man gracefully crawled into bed beside Milo, unabashedly curling himself around the smaller man.

“You know the bed's big enough to spread out, right?” Milo snarked.

The Alpha only clung onto Milo tighter in retaliation, swinging his well muscled leg over the Omegas hips, effectively trapping him.

Resigning himself to his fate, Milo closed his eyes and tried to chase unconsciousness. Before he could drift off, a question nagged at Milo.

“What’s your name?”

“What’s yours?” The Alpha's voice was gruff with sleepiness, warm breath ghosted against Milo's neck.

“Milo,” the omega was breathless.

“Milo.” His name on the Alpha's tongue made Milo rub his thighs together. The crass omega imagined the Alpha saying his name with that rough voice between his legs.

Milo's mind was ripped from the gutter when the Alpha muttered a quiet, “Jasper.”

"Huh." Milo was still a bit tongue-tied by his imaginings.

“Well goodnight Jasper, I still think you’re an asshole,” Milo muttered while snuggling into the Alphas warmth.

Jasper huffed out a laugh. “Goodnight Milo.”