He was dead. That was the only logical explanation.

Rian did his best to breathe, to try and remember… anything. He remembered calling Ysemna. He remembered praying for her to hurry up and get to him. He thought he saw the car door open… but that was impossible.

Rian turned to look at his very locked car door, now covered in red hair. He took a deep breath, doing his best to gather the omega’s hair into… well, something. Something that didn't make his car look like a holiday bow someone had shredded in frustration. Once he had it out of the way, he shifted carefully, his member still throbbing deep in the warmth of the omega in his lap, and reached for the door. 

He pulled, and then pushed. 

Locked. 

“I’m dead.” Rian finally said out loud, collapsing back into the seat. There was no other way to explain how this omega had gotten into his locked car, not died, and why Rian was suddenly able to think right now. Because deltas don’t get to blip during their cycle. Rian knew this. He’s lived it more than three times now; once it started, he blacked out for a month, walking up to a hotel room that looked like a tornado lived in it, not a man. 

So. He had to be dead.

Rian glanced back down at the man in his lap, doing his best not to… well, move. They were still connected, and both still very much in their cycles. And there was a knot. Something else impossible. Because if he was knotted, that meant he was paired. And Rian couldn’t be paired. 

The knot ached with every movement and eventually Rian gave up, focusing on breathing as slowly as he could. There was a chance if he moved too much, then this moment of clarity would fade and he would fall back into his rut again. And even if he was dead, Rian was not going to hurt someone if he could help it. That much, at least, should carry over into the afterlife.

The omega shifted slightly against him, a small whine catching in his throat. Not pained thankfully, just heat. The kind of soft, high sound that twisted somewhere low in Rian’s belly and made the whole theory about being dead feel a little shakier. Rian sucked in a breath and pressed the back of his head to the seat, staring at the fogged-up windshield like it held the answers to literally anything.

“Okay,” he whispered, to no one, to himself. Maybe God. “We’re going to assume I died. That’s fine. Totally fine. This is hell. Or maybe heaven. I don’t know which one has me in a locked vehicle with an omega I just marked.”

There was another noise, this one a little breathier, and Rian instinctively shifted his hand to the small of the omega’s back, steadying him. The omega went quiet again, and Rian clenched his jaw.

“Nope,” he said, this time louder. “I’m dead. Definitely dead. That explains everything.”

The omega's face was hidden beneath the tumble of red hair, with the kind of deep breathing that came after a body had been running on empty for too long. Rian frowned as he noticed it; too heavy, too uneven, like the body was still trying to catch up from somewhere far away. The rise and fall of the omega’s back didn’t match the calm Rian was trying to pretend existed in the cab of the car.

He didn’t move his hand. Just kept it there, right at the small of the omega’s back, warm and steady. Grounding, maybe. He hoped.

Because if he wasn’t dead, then there were a lot of things that weren’t making sense, and that possibility was rapidly turning into a worse option. Death, after all, was clean. Final. Made everything someone else’s problem. Alive meant he was the one who had to figure out what was going on. Why there was an omega in his car with his mark on their hand and his knot keeping them together. 

He didn’t even know the omega's name.

Rian turned his head as he heard heels on the pavement outside his car and he sighed. Of course death would be the form of his boss. He listened as she cursed and fumbled with the key fob only she had, which was supposed to be the only way to unlock his car once he put it in lockdown. The omega in his lap disputed that. 

But he was dead. So it didn’t matter. 

The locks clicked, and Rian squinted as sunlight filtered in the open door and he smelled fresh air for the first time in hours. He stared as Ysemna knelt door to look in, 

And froze. 

Well, either Rian was not dead, or Ysemna had followed him into the afterlife. And based on the expression on her face, she was extremely unimpressed with the accommodations.

She blinked once. Then again. Slowly.

Rian blinked back.

“Rian,” Ysemna said, voice flat and firm in the way only hers could be. “What the fuck.”

He stared at her, then looked down. Still deeply connected to the unconscious omega in his lap, red hair spilling over his thighs like a blanket stitched from shame and sweat and something too fragile to name. Rian pressed the back of his head harder into the seat, as if maybe if he pushed hard enough he could disappear into the upholstery. 

“I don’t know.”

“What the fuck do you mean you don’t know?”

“I don’t know.”

“What is his name?”

“I… don’t know.” Rian didn’t like this. He hadn’t felt this embarrassed since he had to be pulled out of school when his cyphora activated. “He… opened the door and jumped in.”

“He did what?”

“Opened the door. Jumped in. Closed it.” Rian repeated, not sure what else he was supposed to say. He didn’t really remember much after that, and he wasn’t even supposed to be lucid right now. Ysemna seemed to remember that too, because Rian heard as she opened her mouth, and then closed it. 

“Rian, look at me.”

He obeyed, letting her see his golden eyes. 

“You are still rutting.”

“Yeah.”

“How are you aware?”

“I don’t know.” Rian was starting to feel like the only words left in his vocabulary were “I don’t know,” and if that was some kind of post-death punishment, it was extremely effective.

Ysemna leaned in a little further, resting a braced hand on the edge of the car’s roof as she studied him. Not like she was looking at a person, but like she was reading over a schematic that had just exploded in her hands. She took in the sweat slicking Rian’s skin, the gold bleeding hard around the edges of his irises, and the slow, barely-checked movement of Rian’s hips like his body still hadn’t fully gotten the memo that he was supposed to be thinking right now.

He forced himself to stop.

“This doesn’t make sense,” she muttered, more to herself than to him. “You shouldn’t be able to hold a conversation. Deltas don't blip. You should be feral.”

“I was feral,” Rian said, voice just this side of petulant. “I was struggling not to do anything while I waited for you. And then, he… got in somehow and now…”

Rian gasped for air. The full reality hit him like a freight train to the chest. He wasn't dead and this omega had his mark. They were knotted. They were paired. 

“No, no no nononononon–”

“Rian, breathe.”

“No, fuck. Fuck fuck, I can’t be paired to a regular omega. I am going to kill him, I am–”

“Rian.” Ysemna’s stern voice cut through the haze like a slap. “Breathe. Now.”

He sucked in air. Sharp, fast, like it would help, like oxygen could fix the irreversible. His chest rose too fast, his heartbeat pounding against the cage of his ribs, still pressing up against the fragile body draped over his lap. The mark on the omega’s hand burned in his vision now. His mark.

Paired.

“I can’t,” he whispered, panic scraping his throat raw. “I can’t be. You know what happens, Ysemna. I’m not stable. I don’t even remember most of my cycles. I black out. I lose time. I destroy everything. You know what I become.”

“I do,” she said, and there was something so infuriatingly calm about it, like she’d already had this conversation a thousand times in her head since she opened the door. “Which is why I’m telling you to calm the fuck down before you trigger yourself again.”

Rian listened. Not because he wasn’t still terrified, but because he trusted Ysemna and he put his hand on the omega’s back. He took the deepest breath he dared, and held it like it was the only thing tethering him to sanity. His body was already starting to ache again, and Rian resisted the urge to move his hips. The knot hadn’t gone down at all yet, and he was terrified of what he would do. He didn’t want to hurt them.

“Okay. Neither of us know what is going on, and he looks like he’s out of it. Given… circumstances, I don't think we can separate you. We don't know when this blip will end,” Ysemna’s voice was calm when she spoke again and all Rian could do was nod. This was easier to accept when he thought he was dead. “So, I’ll call Jess to come pick up my car. And I’ll drive you and the redhead back to your apartment. I know you may want to press charges, but we both know that's not safe right now. Your best option is to keep him until your rut ends.”

“Ysemna–”

“I don’t have many options, Rian. Paired alphas can’t use the shelters, you know that,” there was a level of fear and resignation in Ysemna’s voice and Rian just nodded. He leaned his head back as she closed the door, staring at the roof of his car like it held all the answers. He wanted to be grateful he had his mind. That for the first time in his life, climax had brought clarity. 

But all he felt was fear and anger. Fear of himself. Fear for the omega in his lap. Fear that this would all end suddenly, and he would hurt the man he had just marked. Anger that he was in this situation at all. 

He had done what he was supposed to do. Done everything right, and despite that, he was now paired. Rian leaned forward, breathing in the sea of red hair around him as he waited for Ysemna to call her wife. 

“Fuck.”