Two weeks had passed since Jared's rut and that Wednesday he returned to university. The first thing Leo noticed was that he had changed, and not for the better.

During the period he was absent, Leo had sent him several messages and hadn't gotten a response to any of them. When he crossed through the door, Leo called to him immediately.

He was pale.

"Hey," Jared responded listlessly.

"Long time, I sent you several messages. What happened? Were you incommunicado?"

"YES," he responded dryly.

Jared let out a snort and fixed his gaze on him. For a moment he seemed to be his old self again, his tone softened.

"Leo, let's meet at lunch. I have a meeting now with one of the professors. I'm fed up, honestly."

Jared turned around and left. Leo followed him with his gaze, a bit worried.

The chat became active again—it was the undeniable sign that Jared was back.

"Let's meet at the usual bar, at 8 PM."

North sent one of his funny memes, and before he could respond, Jared wrote:

"No strangers"

North sent a crying kitten and Leo couldn't help but laugh. The chat went silent. At midday, despite waiting for him, Jared didn't appear. Lenny was sitting next to Leo as usual, and looked at him from time to time, puzzled. When Leo returned his gaze, he pointed to his plate of food. At that moment Leo realized he had spent almost the entire lunch with the same piece on his fork, and almost the entire break had passed. North, who lived like all alphas in his own world, had been talking about one of the lessons they'd had about something related to legal systems. The topic was interesting, but Leo felt strange. 

Why was he suddenly so focused on Jared? It didn't make sense. Maybe it was because of the knotting—he'd have to look for more information when he was home.

During one of the last breaks, while looking for one of his female classmates to give her a book she had asked for, he overheard her talking about Jared with her companions. They quickly fell silent when they saw him. Leo smiled at them kindly as usual, but on the way back he remained thoughtful the entire way, the same sentence repeating over and over in his mind:

"In the end, what happened to Jared is likely rut dissociation..."

He tried to erase the phrase from his mind, but where had he heard about rut dissociation? Though he knew that one of his two female classmates was very interested in the blonde, so it was possibly unfounded gossip.

Once he left the campus and went home, he managed to clear his head a bit. He showered, ate something though he had very little appetite, and changed to go to the bar. Jared hadn't written in the chat again. When he arrived at the place, North was already waiting for him. They waited for Jared, who finally arrived half an hour later—also unusual for him. His face was the same as always, and Leo breathed with relief. He approached and sat next to Leo, looking at him with a wide smile and commenting:

"My spot, finally free."

Leo looked at him incredulously and shook his head.

"What? Did you go back to kindergarten?"

"5th grade actually!"

Leo looked at him and started laughing. It was true—he had completely forgotten about that time, when they became friends and Jared started monopolizing the spot next to Leo in the cafeteria. Sometimes he even fought if he arrived late to the cafeteria and someone was already sitting next to him. Leo remembered that on two occasions he ended up with warnings for wanting to hit a classmate who wouldn't give up the spot. The third warning never came because he started being in the cafeteria before or at the same time as Leo.

North commented while already drinking his second beer:

"Where were you these two weeks?"

"Recruited, again, in a hospital. Besides, my parents put people at the university—they have me monitored 24 hours a day."

Leo almost choked on the beer with lime he had ordered.

North was quick to ask questions:

"What did you do to have them monitoring you?"

Jared shrugged as if he didn't care.

"No idea, something happened but they say I had a rage attack or something like that during the rut and the building security called my parents. I don't remember anything, but it seems I broke some things in the office... I don't know if I didn't break the elevator too..."

Leo looked at him horrified. Jared smiled amused:

"Oh, it's not that big a deal either. Nothing happened to me, and my parents already paid for everything."

North asked curiously:

"And your parents didn't ask you to move back in with them?"

Jared laughed.

"Of course they did, but I told them that if I do that, I don't plan to get married and I'm going to sabotage all the dates. They already have problems getting rid of all the rumors circulating out there."

Jared seemed amused by the situation. North, who had the sensitivity of an insect, commented:

"They say you spent the rut with someone and that you're already marked."

Jared's eyes lit up dangerously.

"Yes, I spent the rut with someone and no, they didn't mark me. They simply took a chunk out of my neck. Damn vampires."

Leo started laughing. Jared looked at him, smiling.

"Can you imagine if I turn into a vampire now?"

Jared asked him, entertained.

Leo responded, shaking his head:

"No, please no." While he kept laughing.

Jared pushed him with his body.

"Don't laugh, look..." and he pointed to a bandage he wore half-hidden by his clothes. "I had a really ugly wound, they had to give me some stitches."

North looked at him, horrified.

"Jared, wasn't it some omega who wanted to get revenge for something? In rut, if they bite you in the wrong place they can kill you."

Jared's expression darkened.

"I already had two pheromone attacks before the rut. That's why it supposedly came early—I still had like a month left. Damn bitches, one of them put God knows what shit in my drink but it went wrong for her, I almost killed her under the effects of the pheromones."

Leo felt his stomach turn. It wasn't the first time he had heard similar stories, mainly about ultra-dominant alphas. They could go into heat or into an unmeasured rage attack.

"But they're supposedly from elite families..." Leo added, with mixed feelings.

Jared looked at him with that arrogant and disgusting expression he usually put on from time to time:

"Omegas are all the same, regardless of the cradle they come from." He emptied his beer glass. "Maybe I should look for a beta and have an omega for ruts."

Leo looked at him disgusted, and for a moment remembered Lenny's comments. Would Jared become someone like that?

"But then your kids wouldn't be of direct lineage," North added sorrowfully.

"That's the problem," Jared affirmed with a grave voice.

Leo looked at both of them, not understanding how for both that was the real problem.

They had finished the round relatively early, since North had some deliveries the next day. When he got home, Leo started looking for information about ultra-dominant alphas and rut dissociation. He had been thinking about it all afternoon and had been waiting to see if Jared or North would mention something, but although they had talked about the rumors, nothing similar to splitting had come up. The first result in the search engine was:

"Dissociation in rut: truth or myth?"

There were several results, however, almost the most relevant results belonged to forums and social media posts. For a few seconds he thought about Lenny, then shook his head. Finally he grabbed his phone and called him.

"Hey, it's late for the model student. Question."

"Have you heard about 'dissociation'?"

"No, doesn't ring a bell. Why?"

"Do you know what happened with Jared? Today we went out for drinks, and he said something about police intervention."

"It's true, for destruction of private property. The parents had to silence several mouths, and pay many people not to spread material."

Leo asked weakly:

"What kind of material?"

Lenny responded quickly:

"There was some recording, they say."

Leo's groan didn't go unnoticed.

"As far as I know, everything was destroyed. I'll find out and tell you. Go to sleep now."

Leo was going to respond but noticed he had already hung up.

By the time he realized it, he had already put on his pajamas, gotten into bed and was still glued to the tablet. He had definitely dismissed the forum entry—it had an extensive amount of messages, with a lot of unverifiable personal information, and Leo was looking for something with a scientific basis. Finally, in one of the hundreds of messages, someone mentioned two health professionals, one an endocrinologist specialist and the other a psychiatrist who had conducted studies related to "rut dissociation" with a certain Dr. Ghallin who seemed to be a preeminence in the subject.

He was grateful to be a university student and have free access to scientific studies that were usually paid. When he read the first case study, his blood froze.

"Clinical Case 17 / Alpha Psychodynamics Institute Registry

Male subject, ultra-dominant alpha subgender, 29 years of age. The individual presents typical characteristics of personality dissociation associated exclusively with rut episodes. According to clinical records and post-event interviews, the subject reports complete dissociative amnesia during said period, referring to the experience as if he had 'been unconscious.'

The most recent documented event lasted 72 hours, during which the subject interacted consistently with a paired omega without any subsequent conscious memories. The omega involved reports coherent, dominant and highly possessive behavior from the subject, very distant from his usual behavior. The interaction included bonding markers, explicit territoriality gestures and possessive body language—actions that the subject in his usual state considers improper or unacceptable, which reinforces the hypothesis of structural personality dissociation.

There is no evidence of previous dissociative disorder history, which reinforces the theory that the phenomenon is specific to the rut state and not generalizable to other life contexts."

He felt his head suddenly throbbing. He saved a copy of the case study and, trembling slightly from nerves, opened the next report.

"The phenomenon of personality dissociation during rut continues to be an enigma... According to Dr. Ghallin's most recent studies, this 'rut personality'—as it has been termed—manifests with markedly different characteristics, even opposite to those of the dominant personality. While the main personality is usually regulated by social norms, control mandates and rigid identity structures, the rut personality emerges as a more instinctive figure, free from censorship, and deeply connected to the subject's primary desires.

This phenomenon occurs more frequently in individuals classified as dominant or ultra-dominant, especially those who have grown up in hostile environments or have had few opportunities to develop complex emotionality outside the control paradigm. In these cases, dissociation seems to function as a release valve for accumulated pressure.

In extreme situations, it has been documented that the rut personality can develop deep emotional bonds—and even mating bonds—with a subject, without the main personality having consciousness or memory of it."

The same institute was requesting collaboration from partners or close ones who had observed some of the mentioned indicators. Leo slowly read them:

• Marked changes in speech pattern, tone of voice or body posture. 

• Manifestation of attitudes or behaviors completely dissonant from the subject's usual personality. 

• Total absence of memory of the event by the individual upon returning to their usual state. 

• Formation of affective or sexual bonds during rut, not subsequently recognized.

The memory brought back Jared's rough and honeyed voice in rut. He felt a wave of heat envelop him. He saved the hospital's contact information—maybe he could make an anonymous consultation. He looked at the clock—it was 3 AM and he only had four hours of sleep ahead. A completely crazy idea crossed his mind. It couldn't be—if it really was what had happened, he thought he would die for different reasons. He tried to fall asleep, but couldn't. He couldn't text him at that hour, he wouldn't respond. He had to sleep, he felt his heart beating violently in his chest.

"He destroyed private property."

It was another completely different personality. He felt his eyes fill with tears. The rut Jared recognized him, and sought him out. That was madness, however everything made sense.

He could barely sleep. At 7 AM he was already in the shower. He needed to get to university as soon as possible. At 8 AM he was already at the door. He saw Lenny from afar. He approached and when he saw him started laughing. It was rare to see him amused by something.

"What time did you go to sleep?"

"4 am."

"Then I suppose you really researched thoroughly. I read a bit last night, though from your expression I suppose rut dissociation does exist. But it's no excuse for you to continue in that vicious cycle. It's a personality that only exists two to three times a year. The day-to-day Jared isn't that one."

Leo added:

"I know. Were you able to find out anything?"

"Yes, and the truth is that having this extra information is chilling. That Jared destroyed the surveillance center. None of the security guards gave any kind of testimony that could help the family identify you. There are no records either. That's why they're going to send him abroad for the next rut to be sure."

"I also wasn't planning to repeat the feat."

Lenny started laughing again.

"Leo, I know you're an extremely practical and logical person, but I don't believe you're capable of saying no."

Leo opened his mouth for a few seconds, then closed it again, blushing. Lenny looked at him surprised.

"It wasn't the first time you spent a rut with him?"

Leo lowered his gaze.

"No way!... Jared is in serious trouble. If he called you a second time, it's because he already considers you his mate."

"But the conscious Jared doesn't know."

"Yes, but the rut one is the only one who can procreate. The Rickdorfs don't know their lineage just died, at least through traditional means."

Leo couldn't help feeling a certain satisfaction and hated himself a little for it, but he also wanted to allow himself to be a little selfish, even if it was just once in his life.