It took more than a week before Lance felt confident enough to ask Keith what he planned to do. He'd let him stay with him at the house to recover from almost a year travelling alone through less than friendly areas, and Lance wouldn't openly admit it but he didn't really want the Alpha to leave. Of course he wouldn't stop him if that's what Keith wanted to do, but the thought of going back to being so alone made Lance feel sick to his stomach.
"I'm looking for someone." Keith said, to the point as usual.
"Oh? Who're you looking for in the middle of nowhere?" Lance's curiosity was piqued.
"My brother was in Arus somewhere for work, but he wasn't allowed to tell anyone exactly where so... I'm sort of just looking everywhere." Keith said at length, picking at a whorl in the wood of the coffee table.
"What the hell sort of work did he do that he wasn't allowed to tell his own family what he was doing?" Lance couldn't imagine not knowing where his loved ones were. The thought made him uneasy even now. Not that any of them would move from where they were ever again.
"He worked for the government. Sort of like the military I guess? But uh... not? I'm not sure really." Keith shrugged and Lance watched the motion of his broad shoulders, transfixed.
"Sounds illegal to me." Lance slid down in the armchair he'd thrown himself into after lunch. "Wait—He's not blond is he? Or like... a weird sort of salt 'n' pepper brunette?"
"What? No, why?" Keith sat back too, leaning more neatly against the couch cushions.
"Oh thank god he's not one of those assholes." Lance said.
"What assholes? What the hell are you even talking about right now?" Keith always made this funny face when he was confused. Scrunching his nose and lifting his left eyebrow. Lance thought it was sort of adorable.
"The ones who came along and stole my food. I managed to break the first one's nose and he ran away but the second one had a woman with him and they knocked me out. They stole my chickens Keith!" Lance waved his hands in the air, punctuating his words animatedly. "Who steals a man's chickens I mean c'mon!"
Keith was frowning, his gaze fixed on Lance for long enough that the blue eyed man felt self-conscious.
"W-what?" Lance asked, staring at Keith and shrinking away from him slightly at the intensity of the scowl.
Keith's answer was a mumble and he ducked his head to look away.
“Nothing.”
"Why didn't you try it?" Lance blurted.
"Why didn't I try what? Knock you out to steal your poultry? You seemed to be trying to do worse to yourself when I found you."
"I meant taking my stuff!" Lance crossed his arms, shame about his fumbled suicide attempt colouring his cheeks. He wasn't proud of it, nor was he over the feelings that had led him to try in the first place. It was a bit better with Keith around, though.
"You could have just left me to hang and had free reign of this place and to food."
"I could have, but you looked like you didn't actually want to die. Plus I'm not in the habit of attacking people first." Keith stood and Lance thought he'd offended him for a moment.
"I'm getting coffee, you want some?"
"Oh, no thanks..."
Lance chewed on his lip and started jiggling his knee as he lapsed into thought. It was true that Keith didn't seem like a typical posturing Alpha, but at the same time the small scars he had in various places were a testament to the fact that he wasn't a stranger to fighting either. Not that Lance actually wanted Keith to attack him or anything, he was eternally grateful that the other man had cut the rope and stuck around for a while. The problem was that Lance didn't know what he'd do when Keith decided he was going to leave now.
Things between them were still awkward sometimes since it had only been a week since their less than conventional meeting, but they'd also sort of started getting along more easily too. Lance was getting used to Keith's long silences and his overall presence in the house, even if it was still weird to have an Alpha around leaving his scent all over the place.
Lance had known that the ability to pick up on pheromones would be more intense after presentation, but he hadn't realised quite how much. Either that or Keith just had a really strong scent, or Lance was just super sensitive—he didn't know since Keith was the only person he'd met who wasn't a Beta since he'd had his first heat. Maybe he'd go with Keith when he left, if the other man would allow it. Lance wasn't sure if he could contribute much on the open road, but he was in shape and had already dealt with zombies even if it wasn't a whole lot.
But even though he didn't want to be alone again, Lance also wasn't sure he wanted to leave his home for good. There were a lot of memories for him on the farm not to mention his family's graves and if he left someone could come along and trash the place. The animals would starve unless he left their enclosures open but if he did that the chance that they'd be killed by predators was just as high—at least for the chickens. His two horses would likely fare better.
Lance sighed and scraped a hand back through his hair, grimacing at the slight sensation of grease and sweat.
He decided that it was time for that bath he'd set up to heat a while earlier and got up just as Keith was coming back into the room with his mug of coffee. The other man paused for a moment and gave Lance a once over before shaking his head minutely as if clearing his thoughts.
"I'm just gonna go wash outside. Feel free to read one of the books or whatever." Lance shot Keith a smile which he hoped was as charming as ever and not belying his muddled thoughts.
Keith shrugged a shoulder and took a sip of his coffee, eyes downcast.
“Sure thing.”
With that as the only response it seemed he was going to get, Lance gave a shrug of his own and left the room. He fully intended to make the most of some relaxation and the quickly dwindling supply of soap that he still owned. What he'd do once it was all gone Lance didn't know, but his toiletries were in much the same shape and that was just one more thing tempting him to go out into the wider world. As shallow as it seemed, Lance wanted to try to cling to as much normalcy as possible, even if he knew that the world would never be the same as before again. At least not in his lifetime.
︶꒦꒷♡꒷꒦︶
Two days later Lance walked in on possibly one of the most unexpected and unfortunate scenes of his life—if he were to ignore the whole apocalypse thing that is.
Keith was standing at the sink in the bathroom with a pair of scissors in one hand and a fistful of hair in the other. More hair was in chunks around him, littering the floor and the inside of the sink as he looked at himself in the mirror. Lance stared for a moment before being able to react.
"Ahh!"
His voice came out much louder than he'd meant it to, but the shock of the utter mess Keith was making of his hair had been enough to literally make Lance scream.
"What are you doing!? Your hair!"
"Fuck! Lance! I almost cut my goddamn finger off!" Keith dropped the scissors and the bit of hair he'd half chopped through into the sink and turned to face the Omega with a glare.
"S-sorry" Lance mumbled, then spoke more clearly again. "What are you even trying to do, though? It looks like someone took a hedge trimmer to your head."
"Very funny." Keith deadpanned.
"It's too long, it was getting annoying. It doesn't look that bad, Lance. Who even cares anyway? As long as it's out of the way."
"I can't believe you just said that." Lance shook his head and looked pensive. He'd secretly really liked Keith's long hair and that messy little man bun he wore it in. "Here, let me fix it so it's functional and still looks good."
Keith actually protested much less than Lance had anticipated as he stepped properly into the room and grabbed the scissors from the sink. The other man's hair was now all different lengths and Lance didn't know exactly what Keith was trying to go for with his self-inflicted haircut but it wasn't working for him at all. Lance spent the next half an hour trying to tame the mess. Combing and cutting and then eventually using some battery operated clippers. Not as good as mains powered ones, but still better than nothing.
When he was done, Lance stepped away to admire his handiwork and he couldn't be too mad about the loss of length. Not when the undercut Keith was now sporting suited him so well, the fact that Lance had got to spend a while running his fingers through Keith's hair and stroking the soft fuzz of the undercut was just a plus. Lance had been very careful, however, to avoid touching Keith's neck. After all it was a bit weird to go around brushing up against other people's scent glands unless you knew them well and that was even without actually scenting each other. Not that Lance wanted to do that with Keith... much.
Okay he sort of did.
Lance couldn't really deny that he was attracted to Keith, though he was reluctant to acknowledge it too much. In the past Lance had had no problem flirting and professing his love to men and women alike, but he felt far more vulnerable in many aspects now. He wasn't even sure if his level of attraction could be put down to the fact that Keith was (genuinely) physically attractive, if it was because he was the first non-aggressive person he'd come across since everything happened, or if it was because Keith was an Alpha. Perhaps it was a mixture of all three things.
"Lance?" Keith leaned in close and Lance jerked away, blinking rapidly at the sudden proximity.
"Woah, what?" He wrapped his arms around his midsection self-consciously, hoping he hadn't been spaced out for long enough for it to be weird.
"I said thanks, you did a good job but uh... are you okay?" Keith tilted his head like an inquisitive puppy and Lance's heart fluttered because of course it did. "Hey, honestly, are you getting sick?"
"No problemo! I'm good, great actually! Sorry I guess I'm just tired or someth—" Keith touched him. Which wasn't exactly weird in itself but with the thought process he'd just been having and how close they were standing Lance had still been unprepared.
"You're sorta hot, I think maybe you should rest, I can make food for us." Keith said and Lance couldn't help the shiver that made him tremble as he jerked away from the hand on his forehead.
"I know I am.” Lance joked about the ‘hot’ comment awkwardly before responding more seriously. “I uh... yeah I think I'll go lie down for a bit. Thanks Keith." Lance ducked his head and left the room without waiting for an answer.
He was acutely aware of the warmth in his face as he shut his bedroom door and threw himself face first onto the double bed. Lance suspected what was going on but he prayed he was wrong. He did not want a heat triggered just because he got a bit too happy about cutting Keith's goddamn hair. Maybe it was just because he was due one, though Lance had been hoping it would come late and give him some more time to prepare.
But he hadn't had any urges yet either. No need to clean everything and build a nest, no cramps and thankfully no extended toilet trips either. Perhaps it was just a pseudo-heat. A hormonal blip that would knock him off kilter for a few hours but ultimately go away before anything awful happened—like Keith hearing him whining and jerking off, or worse, smelling him all horny and needy. Lance wasn't sure how the Alpha would deal with it.
Would Keith leave? Lock himself away? Or would he try to get into Lance's room and fuck him? As nice as that thought was in theory, Lance wasn't really the type to want to have sex with someone he'd known for so little time, heat and attraction or not.
Lance valued a deeper connection. He'd grown up knowing he wanted to fall in love and settle down and have a family, be it biologically or adoptive. Which was why he was still a virgin even in his early twenties. Not that he'd been open about that, preferring to project a more confident playboy image to avoid the inevitable teasing in high school and then that way of going about things had just sort of stuck. It became second nature to flirt and throw innuendo around casually other than around his family and with Hunk and Pidge of course.
It was easier now to toss that aside and act more like he felt inside, but being vulnerable still wasn't a feeling that Lance enjoyed, so he still tended to act up a bit.
Hearing the back door slam with a gust of wind, Lance guessed that he was safely alone in the house for the moment and groaned in frustration. He shoved a hand down his body and pressed at himself through his jeans, pushing his hips into his palm and biting his lip at the pleasant pressure on his rousing dick.
Jerking off had not been the plan when he left the bathroom a few minutes ago, but the longer Lance thought about being in heat and Keith and the fuzzy warmth in his body, the more he wanted to. He was a weak, weak man and he hadn't done it for quite a while even before Keith turned up. So Lance shuffled up the bed and rolled onto his back to get more comfortable. He'd gotten over the guilt of doing this in his parents' old room months ago now, after all he'd already had a messy first heat in there.
Lance undid his jeans and shucked them down over his hips to mid thigh along with his boxers. There was no time for teasing with Keith still in earshot—Lance tended to get noisy when he really indulged—so he took himself in hand and began a steady rhythm. It wasn't long before he was fully hard and leaking precum, but Lance spat into his palm and smeared it over his dick for good measure, the extra slickness making his thighs tremble as he squeezed his tip.
Lance covered his mouth with his free hand and panted harder the closer he got to cumming. He was unable to completely stop the soft sighs and groans from erupting, though, despite knowing Keith was only outside. Mere meters away from him on the other side of the wall and he wondered what the Alpha would do if he caught Lance right now with his dick in his hand.
Lance keened—soft and restrained—as he came hard at the thought of Keith watching him. Cum shot over his t-shirt and dribbled down the knuckles of his left hand as his strokes slowed to a stop, and Lance sagged against the bed with a satisfied sigh and a tinge of guilt. Thinking about Keith whilst he came sort of felt like a taboo even when Lance knew other people did the same towards those they fancied all the time.
With a grimace, Lance peered down at his soiled shirt and pulled it off carefully so as to not get any cum in his hair or something equally embarrassing. He used the garment to wipe off his hand and then rolled to stand up and pull his pants back up again, tossing the shirt to the floor and moving to put a fresh one on. He'd bundle the cum covered shirt in with the other washing in the main bathroom when Keith was sleeping, though for the moment Lance left it on the floor and went to the ensuite to wash his hands off. He used the clean bucket of water he kept next to the toilet to pour down and flush it with when he used it. Thankfully the sewers hadn't blocked or anything so far.
When Lance left the room a while later at Keith's call to eat he did his best to act the same as usual, as if he hadn't jerked off thinking about the man sitting next to him. But Keith was eating much slower than usual and kept shifting in his seat, pointedly not looking at Lance and the blue eyed man began to wonder if he'd done something to offend the Alpha.
"Uh... you okay there buddy?" Lance hedged before stuffing some fried potato into his mouth.
"I think..." Keith's tone was quiet, careful. "I think you might be in preheat..."
"Mngh!?" Lance choked on his mouthful, slapping a hand to his chest to try and dislodge the chunk he'd swallowed before he could finish chewing it properly. "I'm not! I think I'd know thank you very much!" Lance squawked when he'd managed to gulp the food down.
"You're still wearing blockers, right?" Keith mumbled, finally turning his gaze towards Lance and eyeing the patches stuck over his neck and then wrists with a nod.
"Mnh, even with those on I can smell it, Lance." Keith continued before Lance could answer him and he seemed embarrassed, but it was unlikely he was anywhere near as embarrassed as Lance was.
"Well you're wrong. I feel fine." Lance shoved another big helping of potatoes into his mouth, stubbornly ignoring Keith for the rest of the meal. He wondered if what Keith was smelling were the aftereffects of his 'self-care' session, though Lance was sure that a heat or rut smelled different to just a plain old jerk off. Right?
They had all those extra pheromones oozing from all over the place after all. Lance sort of wished he could smell his own pheromones since other than a bit feverish still he felt fine. None of the fatigue or cramps or obsessive cleanliness. Then he wondered if the patches he was wearing were just defective.
Their meal after that was awkward, and Lance escaped the first chance he got, going outside to wash the dishes and himself so he could make sure any residual jizz scent was long gone. He changed his blockers for good measure too. Hopefully for a set that were less obviously defective.
On top of that the longer he'd spent at the table next to Keith the more Lance had become aware of a sharp, strong scent radiating from Keith. Very obviously the scent of the other man slowly getting turned on and regardless of his crush that was not the way in which Lance wanted things to progress between them. Pheromone fuelled fumbling was pretty low on his list of desires regarding them both, after all.
Lance ducked out of watching one of the saved movies on his laptop that evening, instead retreating to his room early and hiding in bed with shame colouring his cheeks. There was no way Keith was right.
︶꒦꒷♡꒷꒦︶
Keith had been—very much so—right.
In fact he had been so painfully right that when Lance woke up with those awful, tell tale cramps and the state of his room making his skin crawl he whined. Loudly enough that there was the sudden sound of thumping and then a knock at his door before Keith was speaking. Seeming more worried than Lance thought he actually should be.
"Lance are you okay?" Had the other man already been awake? Lance had no idea what time it was.
"I’m fine!" Lance snapped, then felt guilt wash over him at lashing out. "Sorry I... I'm fine, Keith."
"Are you—in..." Keith trailed off, his voice sounded weird.
"Yeah, you were right last night. Although I really don't think you should just go around randomly asking people." Lance chuckled a little bit, his cheeks flushed.
"Noted." Keith sounded amused for a moment, but his voice still held a strained sort of edge.
"I'm going outside, I'll make food for you and bring something to drink."
Before Lance had the chance to respond the sound of the other man leaving made the Omega deflate and he slapped his hands to his face with a groan. Not only was the entire situation sort of humiliating, but the way Keith was acting made Lance think that the Alpha had actually been around less Omega's than he'd initially thought. He was acting weird, after all.
Usually Alpha's would be annoyingly persistent on trying to stay around, sometimes bordering on aggressive with their pursuits of unmated Omega's in Lance's condition. But Keith seemed to want nothing more than to run away from him instead. It made him self-conscious and wonder if maybe his scent was actually pretty awful or wrong or something. Either because he'd presented late or because of his catching and recovering from AZE. Maybe the smell just made Keith feel sick?
Lance sat up as he felt his breath hitch uncomfortably, eyes stinging though he refused to let any tears fall. He hardly even knew Keith. What did he care if the Alpha found him appealing or not? Except apparently he did care because his chest hurt and his stomach was twisting uncomfortably. Fucking hormones.
Lance didn't know if there was something seriously wrong with his body to cause him to be such a late developer and on top of that he had no idea how AZE affected people if they recovered at all. He could just be taking a while to die for all he knew, god only knew Lance had had his fair share of endless seeming nosebleeds since he'd come back to lucidity. Or maybe it wasn't anything seriously amiss with him and it was just that he was now somehow defective and thus off putting to Alpha's.
In a way Lance could try to fool himself into believing that was a good thing, because if he wasn't attractive to them then the chances of him getting assaulted if he came across any who meant him harm was lessened.
But Lance didn't want to be undesirable to Keith, too. If there was even a slim chance that they could stay together for long enough to actually form a decent connection Lance thought he'd have liked to actually become mates with the other man.
A cramp brought him out of his thoughts and Lance pressed a hand to his lower back with a sniffle. He still wasn't actually crying, but his nose felt stuffy and his eyes still stung.
Lance sat in the bed for a few moments longer trying to compose himself before the need to tidy the floor and start building his nest was too much. So he shuffled off of the mattress and did his best to clean his face and comb his hair. Then he was pulling on a too big pair of sweatpants that had been Marco's, and a t-shirt that used to belong to Veronica. The garments didn't smell like his family any more, it had been far too long, but the memories helped and wearing them made him feel a bit more secure. Plus the waistband of the sweats was far more forgiving on his cramping stomach than jeans or his own tighter ones.
Rubbing at one of his eyes with the heel of his palm, Lance left the room to try and find Keith and attempt to eat his own weight in whatever food he could find, because he was starving. In-fact Lance decided that he'd make chicken later because he remembered how weak he'd felt the last time and some meat was probably a good idea before he was too out of it to eat for two days. For the moment he was happy to just stuff his face with the eggs and vegetables Keith had been making, though.
He didn't eat with Keith. The other man looked strained and pale and Lance didn't want to sit there knowing he was making him feel weird, so he took his food into his room. Lance alternated between tidying and eating and when he was done with that he began working on turning the bed into a cosy nest. Again he used as many of his family's clothes as he could find and then he piled his pillows near the top end. It would still need some tweaking over the next day or two, but that was fine by him. Lance was sure he'd find other items he wanted to add in the meantime—between eating and the incoming hell that was the whole voiding issue.