Archive of Our Own ^beta

Matthew Murdock is a terrible alpha.

Broken. Damaged. Flawed.

Weak.

Blind.

He’s never stopped long to consider what his prospects might have been like if his father hadn’t….

If he hadn’t lost his dad.

Alpha education, to Matt’s understanding, has always been a mix of parental influence and a well researched societal primer taught to kids in school from when they first present until they graduate. It’s designed to teach young, hormonally laden alphas to control their base instincts, learn the skills to attract and care for a mate, to be good providers. At least, that’s what Matt has heard from the other young alphas in the orphanage.

Matt was never allowed to take those classes. Why bother educating a blind, broken boy with no family about how to attract an Omega? He had nothing to offer. Matt took the other classes. The ones designed for the outliers who were specified as being “Not breeding material.” He was a class of one.

For a long time it was just Matt and Stick.

Stick who taught him, “Connections make you weak. Aren’t you weak enough already?” And, “This world isn’t going to give you anything Murdock. The world takes. It doesn’t give. You have to bleed for what you want to keep.” For a long time Matt believed him. He buried the urges that told him to seek out affection. The memories that reminded him that his father was an alpha, a strong one, but had always been kind. Matt suffered through every training session that was really just an old man beating up on a little kid. He practiced night and day to pass tests when he didn’t even really understand the material. He failed. He bled. He got back up.

Matt was 13 when he had his first rut. He spent five days locked in his room desperate for a release he couldn’t find. Every noise echoing in his head until he thought his ears were bleeding, his skin feeling burned, blistered, overheated and agonizing against the cheap sheets, the rough floor. His sense of smell so out of control that his own scent, reeking fear, arousal, and desperation made him gag over and over. He cried, screamed, and finally prayed. Matthew Murdock never told anyone that in the end he hadn’t prayed for strength or endurance in his role as a weapon for the Lord. He defied what he had been taught he was supposed to want, supposed to be.

He had prayed for comfort, for someone to cling to, for the love, peace, and safety of someone who would choose him. Someone who would want him. Someone for whom he could be enough. Matthew Murdock had prayed silently for a mate and never uttered a word of it out loud. Stick must have known anyway, somehow.

He was gone before they unlocked Matt’s room.

Matt spent a lot of time wondering what his prospects might have been like if Stick hadn’t left him behind. He never really knew where that path was going. Instead, he was dosed with legally required suppressants and given his inheritance at the age of 18.

The money didn’t make up for losing his dad. But it gave him a place to start. He could have gone anywhere and done anything. But the one alpha he had ever respected. The one person in his life who had ever provided the love and safety he craved had wanted him to be smart, to study, to make something of himself.

So Matt went to college. For his dad. He was in charge of his own prospects now.

********

Franklin “Foggy” Nelson is a fantastic omega.

Warm. Caring. A dedicated nurturer. One day Foggy is going to make someone the best mate.

Well….that was the plan anyway.

Was.

Instead of his first heat Foggy got cancer at the age of 13. Cancer...and not the “hey kid, that leg’s got to go so you can lead a full and happy life” kind either. No. Foggy got the long stay in the hospital, look all your hair fell out, wow that’s a really attractive PICC line, We should call your grandma because you’re dying and we don’t want to tell you kind.

Foggy kicked cancer’s ass.

Kicked it hard. And don’t get him wrong, he was happy to be alive. But then there was a lot of medical mumbo jumbo about chemicals induced into a young omega during early development and the removal of his ovary. At 14 Foggy hadn’t really thought much of it. It wasn’t like he planning for a brood any time soon and he was more than breeding stock. After all, who wouldn’t want a Foggy?

His parents thought maintaining as normal a childhood as possible was important. So Foggy went to his omega classes like all the others filled with a sense of excitement and looking forward to learning how to be a good mate. Then high school happened and hormones came with it. Foggy’s peers suddenly overwhelmed with attention from the young alphas in the their school.

People paired off. Relationships got built. Futures were being planned. For everyone but Foggy.

It took until his junior year for one of the nurses aids to tip him off that he smelled funny. Not funny haha. To the best of his understanding Foggy smelled bland, uninteresting, flat. Another round of medical intervention later and he knew.

Foggy lacked the skills to attract a mate. Sterile.

He walked into his family home to find himself surrounded by what he was never going to have, couldn’t possibly accomplish. Well wishing relatives of all kinds plopping babies in his lap and reassuring him that he was a vital, important part of the family, that he would never be alone. The Nelson clan full of “good breeders” you could barely breathe in the house at any given time without bumping into someone.

He’d never felt more alone in his life.

So while his classmates picked out bonding dates and started planning for families Foggy did something different.

Foggy went to college. Maybe he couldn’t be the most fantastic omega ever. But he could still be something even if it was only to himself.

*****

Roommate needed. Utilities included. No cable. Must be willing to keep apartment clean. Call Matt at 555-867-5309.

Foggy starts talking the moment Matt opens the door to the apartment. He’s sounds better in person than he did during their brief earlier phone call. The words don’t register as more than cheerful, a pleasant tone, with nice pitch in Matt’s head because he’s too distracted by something else. Something way better than Foggy’s voice.

The smell.

Foggy’s smell.

In a world where he can smell donuts from five blocks away, where the sewer in the heat of summer makes the subway something he simply cannot ride, where the even with the suppressants the scent of an omega in heat can leave Matt aching from the other side of campus Foggy Nelson smells….divine.

Subtle, mysterious, a hint of earthiness like wet moss mixed with a strain of something else, something richer, sweeter that Matt can’t quite make out. And when has he ever not been able to make something out? He’s entranced, frozen in his place with the door halfway open. Foggy’s stopped talking now. Matt should say something, anything. His brain supplying horrible ideas like simply stating “Mine.” or even worse saying nothing and pressing closer to this strange, wonderful omega. Closer. Close enough to touch him maybe. Would Foggy let him? How badly would the rejection hurt if he didn’t? Matt’s not sure. He’s never wanted to be close to someone like this. Close is too strong. Close makes his nose bleed sometimes. But he wants. He wants so badly. He feels himself sway forward.

He’s stopped by a firm hand on his shoulder as the omega. Foggy. God, Matt hopes he can call him his roommate after how badly this meeting is going so far. As Foggy pushes his way into the apartment and softly shuts the door behind them before leading Matt to the couch and pushing him gently down.

Matt. Aggressive, defensive, independant Matt as docile as a lamb.

“You okay?” Foggy questions. And his voice. Oh. It’s so much better now that Matt’s paying attention. He’s a fool for not being more focused earlier. “You look a little pale.”

“I’m fine,” Matt mumbles. “Sometimes I zone out it’s a...thing.” He’s vaguely aware of waving his hands in front of his face like that single gesture will explain his blindness, his supposed weakness.

“Oh!” Foggy sounds interested. He pats Matt on the head, smooths down what is possibly some wild hair that Matt himself has never been able to tame. “I get it.” And there is tone to his voice that makes Matt think maybe he does. Whatever happened to Foggy is certainly different than Matt’s experience. For one, Foggy can clearly see. But something has altered this omega somehow. His muted scent is a dead giveaway and there’s something about the white hot way he shines in Matt’s world of fire that’s different than everyone else Matt “sees” on a daily basis.

Foggy is unique. Matt wants to keep him.

“Umm..” He swallows. This might be a deal breaker. “I’m an alpha. I’m on regulated suppressants and well...I’m blind. I didn’t specify first or secondary gender in the ad because it doesn’t matter to me but If it does to you then we should probably just stop right here.”

There’s a moment of tense silence. Foggy’s heart beating more quickly and then slowing down well past a normal heart rate to a sluggish almost drugged rhythm. Matt feels his muscles tighten one by one starting with his toes. It takes until his jaw clenches for the omega to answer.

“Well,” Foggy sighs. There’s teasing drama in the sound that Matt can tell is forced and false. “Since you’re just going to throw it all out there. I’m sterile. No heats. No whimsical urges to climb the first alpha tree I can find and spend the rest of my life barefoot and pregnant.” Another pause. this one shorter but it feels more charged, more painful. “Point me to which room is mine, Handsome Duck, and don’t skimp on the tour. I want the full six minutes it’s going to take you to walk me around the place before I admit to the inevitable and move my stuff in.”

Matt chuckles. It’s been a long time since he felt the urge to smile much less express joy. He wonders, for just a moment, while Foggy is plucking his sleeve and tucking his hand into the crook of his arm if he might still possess the capacity to laugh. Or if Foggy might be able to teach him how again somewhere down the line.

“Ouch!” Matt blurts as Foggy walks him into the wall of the hallway leading to their rooms. Sometimes pretending not to be spatially aware is painful.

“There’s a wall there,” Foggy offers through what Matt can only assume is a smile. Matt cocks his head, contemplating what he might have just gotten himself into. “Too soon?” Foggy asks. There’s just a hint of anxiety in his scent. He wants this to be good too.

Matt feels his forgotten, tense muscles relax so quickly he gets a head rush. “Nope,” Matt Snorts. “Perfect.”

And so they go.

******

It takes Matt six months to realize that Foggy is wrong. Well, maybe not Foggy but Foggy’s team of doctors for sure.

He might be sterile. Matt doesn’t know enough about omega biology to be sure. He was raised in a catholic orphanage after all. But Foggy does have heats.

Or rather, is having one. Right now.

He just doesn’t know it.

Matt doesn’t blame him. He’s heard all the stories about the sweat slicked, leaking, desperate to be filled up by alpha cock omega. Foggy is sweaty, down right clammy in fact. But he’s not leaking. Not by any means, and Matt is so not going to think about that because oh. Oh no. Just the thought makes him start to hyperventilate. He’s desperate all right but it’s not for an alpha. The omega is nauseous, feverish, and chilled. He’s not doing any of the things Matt has read about omegas doing in heat. He’s weak and worse. Foggy is scared.

“I should go to the health center,” Foggy whines from where he is curled in on himself on their beaten to hell sofa. “It might be…..it could have come back. I should go to the hospital.”

Matt’s on the border of agreeing with him when he takes another deep breath and is assaulted by the difference in Foggy’s scent. Mocha latte. All the way. Matt wants to drink him down. Suck him up.

Even with the suppressants that wrestle Matt’s alpha sexual urges down to that of a beta he still wants to snuggle Foggy down and lick him all over. But that’s not what Foggy needs. “I think you’re just a little sick,” Matt offers instead. “Maybe I could make you soup or something?”

Foggy snorts. They both know Matt would live off of delivery food items if Foggy didn’t look after him.

They end up spending the first night of what Matt thinks might be Foggy’s first heat watching stupid movies that Matt barely remembers from his childhood with Foggy huddled on the couch covered in three blankets and still shaking.

After he finally falls asleep Matt spends the rest of the night looking up ways to comfort omegas during heat. It’s not a skill he thought he would ever need. The next morning Matt does something he’s never done before.

He cuts his suppressant pill in half.

The scent of safe and friendly alpha is supposed to help ease the discomfort omegas feel during the mid to late stages of heat. Matt wears the same shirt from the day before all day. That night before he drags Foggy to bed he stuffs it under the fitted sheet on Foggy’s bed. Foggy sleeps all night without shaking or whimpering. Matt sits outside his bedroom door keeping watch. The odds that another alpha could smell Foggy are almost impossible. The odds that they would be attracted to Foggy's scent even worse. Add on top of that the fact that they would have to invade another alpha’s territory to get to him and Matt is pretty sure he is worried for nothing.

Either way, it doesn’t matter. If another alpha comes in here Matt is going to kill them.

Foggy is his. In every way that he can be. There’s the possibility he’s more affected by Foggy’s pheromones than he initially thought. It’s hard to think rationally, all his instincts tell him to comfort, protect, mate, breed. Matt’s never had these urges, never understood the draw. The medication stopped that.

Matt’s a terrible alpha. Broken, damaged. He would make a terrible mate, especially for Foggy who deserves so much more. He’s a terrible alpha but he can be a good man.

He’s going to protect his friend. No matter how much it hurts him to not be good enough to do more.

The next morning Foggy stumbles out of his bedroom with an unsteady gait and a scent that has settled into something that makes Matt think of incense and dark chocolate sprinkled over salt. It says a lot about the omega’s state of mind that he heads right for Matt on the couch and collapses half on top of him. “I feel horrible,” Foggy mumbles into Matt’s armpit. “Make it go away.”

It takes Matt a long time to answer. He can’t remember the last time he had so much physical contact with another person. Foggy is a warm, solid, weight on top of him and Matt feels something loosen inside his chest, his soul maybe. Foggy feels like home. It’s not about the temptation of lust Matt feels thrumming under his skin. It’s about comfort and connection and Matt hasn’t known anything about that since before his dad was….

Since he lost his dad.

Foggy, capital F for family.

Matt scrubs his fingers through Foggy’s hair with a gentle reverence. There’s a sound like a purr coming from his friend and Matt smiles. “What can I do?” It’s whispered, hesitant.

“That,” Foggy grumbles, “Keep doing that.” He shifts, burying his face more into Matt’s side. “You smell good. I mean, I can’t ever really smell you. Maybe my nose is messed up.” Matt tries hard not to moan as Foggy rubs his face up and down his side inhaling slowly. “Weird.” Foggy mutters and Matt might have missed it entirely if not for his hearing being what it is. “Smells so good.”

Foggy drifts off to sleep in Matt’s arms, sprawled across his lap. Matt sits for the next three hours and twenty nine minutes stroking Foggy’s hair and inhaling deeply. He’s treasuring the way Foggy smells because it’s slipping back into the more benign, gentle scent that Foggy always has. Fading, being swept away.

A heat over. A relationship sealed.

*****
They date. Over the years they date a lot.

Not each other.
Foggy, capital F for family. Capital F for friend. Just a friend.

Matt has his share of beta love interests. They don’t stay long. He’s been called distant, unavailable, unreliable, and numb over the years. He can’t really say they got anything wrong. He has school, then afterwards he has work. He has the gym and later his nightly patrols. He has Foggy.

What else is he supposed to want? It’s not like they plan for it to be serious either. Matt’s clearly not mating material and in the long run and the women who date him like the facade of poor blind Matthew. That act has gotten him a lot of ass. But not a single one of them ever dig a little deeper. He avoids omegas. They aren’t for him.

For a long time Matt thought he and Foggy had an understanding about that. Not omegas for Matt. No Alphas for Foggy. But then Marci showed up.

Matt hates Marci.

Marci likes Foggy. Her heart rate picks up when Foggy is close by. She wants Foggy. Matt can smell her arousal. Marci is smart, quick, and determined. Foggy’s spending nights at her place before Matt can blink. Then he comes home and he smells like her. Smells like sex and Marci and Matt starts looking at getting his own place. They’ve lived together since freshman year. It’s been years since Matt has contemplated living on his own. But they’re done with college. They’ve passed the bar. Matt doesn’t have future plans past this point. He had never stopped to think that maybe Foggy did. Maybe Foggy wants more than what they have. His world starts getting shaky, starts crumbling apart.

Maybe Foggy is leaving him behind. For Marci.

Matt’s planning to tell Foggy about the apartment search. He’s narrowed it down to a few places and is still clinging to the hope that Foggy might at least want to give his opinion on where Matt goes. But when he comes home from the gym carrying dinner Foggy’s on the couch under the pile of blankets that say to Matt his heat is back again.

Matt closes his eyes as he puts down his gym bag and reaches out to brush his hands through Foggy’s hair. He says a prayer to someone or something that might not be listening to give him strength. Foggy’s going to want Marci. Matt’s going to make sure he has what he needs.

“I haven’t felt this shitty in years,” Foggy grumbles.

It’s true too. Foggy’s heats sometimes come every other month for half a year and then don’t come back for 14 months. It’s been over two years since Foggy has had one. He’s never exhibited any typical omega symptoms. He’s never had a full heat. Foggy still thinks he’s got the flu or food poisoning most of the time. Though after the last streak where he had gotten sick three months in a row he had forced Matt to come with him to his cancer specialist just in case. The doctor had assured them both the cancer was gone. He thought Foggy was experiencing sympathy heats or “false” heats due to the disruption to his reproductive system. Matt almost told the doctor he was full of shit. There was nothing false about what Foggy was going through. But even knowing that the cat is out of the bag now Matt can’t help but fall back on old behaviors that offer him some comfort.

“You should stop eating the leftovers that walk themselves to the microwave.” Matt offers lamely. “Can I help?”

“There’s something in my room that smells like it died,” Foggy huffs as he twists on the couch trying to get comfortable. “Can you find what it is and get rid of it please? I want to go to bed.”

“Sure.” Matt gives him one last pet that makes Foggy sigh and melt into the sofa. If Foggy thinks it smells bad it certainly can’t be but so hard for Matt to find. He works his way into Foggy’s room and finds….nothing.

Well, there’s Marci’s sweater but Matt bitterly thinks it probably only smells like death to him. The death of his future. He picks it up anyway and takes it back out to Foggy. The smell will be comforting and Foggy needs comfort.

Foggy pukes on Matt’s gym bag as soon as he sets the sweater next to his head on the sofa.

“Oh God,” Foggy gasps as he races to the bathroom. “Why did you bring that out here? It smells horrible. Throw it away! It’s bad enough my stupid body wants to give me all the shitty part of having a heat and none of the other stuff. I don’t need you rubbing stink on me.”

“But it’s Marci’s,” Matt replies dumbly. Why doesn’t he want it?

“I don’t give a shit whose it is,” Foggy commands from the bathroom door pointing his finger at Matt like there’s a chance Matt can see it. He can, but Foggy doesn’t know that. “It’s got to go. Rid us of exhibit A as quickly as possible.”

Matt doesn’t exactly run to the garbage shoot down the hall. But it’s a near thing. He might have done a little dance of victory as he listened to Marci’s sweater slide down to the dumpster. The smile on his face so big he doesn’t even care about having to clean up his gym bag or the floor.

The next day he only takes a quarter of his suppressant pill and he spends the next few days as close to Foggy as he can be. The omega humming contentedly as he leans into Matt’s side. It’s not something they have ever talked about. But it works for them. Fluid and easy like most things are between the two old friends.

When Foggy feels better he and Marci stay friends but never date again.

“I dunno,” Foggy offers one night over noodles. “She just doesn’t smell….right.”

Foggy is a fantastic omega. Capital F.

*****

“Why?”

It had started as a reasonable question. Even is his half conscious state Matt knows fair isn’t really a concept he can stand on right now. But Foggy won’t stop asking. Foggy’s scent is sharp, bitter, strange. Finding your friend bleeding out on the floor of your shared apartment hasn’t got to be a good feeling. Cross that, Matt’s not going to think about that. If he ever found Foggy bleeding out…… just no.

“Why, Matty?” Foggy sounds flat. He should never sound like that. Matt hasn’t heard him like that since his grandmother died. All Matt’s fault.

“You know why,” Matt pleads. “I told you why. I told you everything.” Not everything. Not the part about how much he wants to keep Foggy, how possessive and jealous he is, how badly he wants something he can’t have.

“Why didn’t you trust me?” And oh, that cuts worse that the blade and beating he took tonight, last night...Matt’s not sure what day it is.

“I did,” Matt offers. It’s a lie. He didn’t. Still doesn’t. If Foggy knows Matt wants to claim him then Foggy will leave. Foggy might already leave. Matt may have already lost this fight.

“Stop lying!” Foggy snaps at him. The command in his voice worse even than Stick’s had been when Matt was a dumb kid. “I’m not stupid. You hid from me. You hid all this from me. The fighting, the injuries, your senses. All of it. You never trusted me. This has all been a lie. Years of my life, Matt. Years of my life! Are you even catholic? Did your dad really die? Are you even an alpha or is it some weird spray you hose yourself down with in the bathroom every chance you get? What’s real?”

“Oh,” Matt snorts ignoring the pain in his ribs. “I’m catholic. The guilt alone. You have no idea.”

“Fuck you,” Foggy snarls. Matt senses him shifting in the chair, leaning back and pushing his hips out like he’s going to get up.

Walk away.

“My dad was….killed,” all these years and the tears still well up when he thinks about it. Hates to think about it. It hurts to cry. Matt is distantly aware of someone panting, these weak gasping breaths that are too fast, too shallow. “I’m an alpha,” He rambles on even though his chest hurts so so much. “A really shitty excuse for an alpha. That’s why they had Stick teach me, because I’m broken, not good enough, weak, stupid. Because I’m never going to be able to have a life, not a real one with a mate, with family. I was supposed to be a weapon but I couldn’t even do that right. I wanted too much. Needed too much. I just...please. Please, Foggy. Please don't leave me.”

He can’t breathe. His chest is burning. Blood pounding in his ears so loudly that Matt can’t tell where Foggy is moving to when his friend suddenly lurches to his feet. The possibility that Foggy is leaving right now is so terrifying that Matt lunges up on the couch ignoring the pain as his muscles stretch and his sutures separate. “I can’t see,” Matt cries out. A mimic of a desperate cry he made as a child. He knows it won’t make any sense to Foggy who must still be processing everything Matt has finally shared. but it’s the only thing he can think to say to describe how his world on fire is melting into ash. “I can’t see without you.”

When Matt comes back to himself he’s being rocked slowly, side to side. His face pressed into Foggy’s neck right over the gland that’s used for omegas to form a mating bond. Foggy’s hand is a persistent pressure against the back of his head, scratching at his scalp while the other man hums and croons. Matt relaxes into the comfort he’s being offered and tries to ignore that he has rubbed snot and tears all over Foggy’s favorite sleep shirt, worn soft and fragile by years of wear.

“You back?” Foggy questions softly and when Matt nods slowly Foggy sighs like the most put upon man in the world which he might just be and says, “You’re an asshole, Matty. But you’re my asshole. Mine. And I am not as stupid as you seem to have spent our whole relationship thinking I am. But you, Sir, are even dumber than I gave you credit for. How did I know my scent would help you, Matt?”

It’s a valid point. Matt has no idea. He must make some kind of vague body motion because Foggy huffs “When we first started living together every time we were in the same room you would take these huge breaths. For months I thought you had some kind of breathing disorder and then I realized you never did that to anyone else or out in public. So then for a while I thought you hated the way I smelled and you were trying in some weird, totally unsuccessful way to be subtle about cluing me in and contemplated that you were a giant dick. Then I figured it out….you like it. You like the way I smell. When you’re sad or stressed or worried you stand closer to me and breath in really slow. And since no one else ever thinks I smell interesting I started thinking about you being blind and what that might mean.”

Matt just sits there, pressed into Foggy’s neck, frozen. This can’t be going where he thinks it’s going.

“Let’s just say I did a lot of experiments,” Foggy’s chest moves like he’s holding back a laugh. “That laundry detergent that make you gag but I kept using it by accident? Yeah, not an accident. It took me five tries to be sure and the sixth and seventh were just to make you suffer for thinking I was an idiot.”

“I didn’t think you were an idiot,” Matt interrupts, pulling far enough away from Foggy’s neck to think a little more clearly without the sirens call of his sweet scent. “Never that.” Foggy shifts against him and the fear that his friend might pull away from him keeps Matt talking. “Stick told me not to tell anyone. He said people would judge me, that I would end up like some kind of circus freak. He was paranoid, always afraid of being close to people. I’m not like him. I wanted contact. I needed a friend. Then you were one, a friend, my only friend. I had started everything between us letting you think I was normal. That I was just a harmless blind guy and I was so...scared. Foggy please, I was scared you would leave me. And I can’t…..I can’t be without you. I just wanted to be who you thought I was so I hid how well I can hear and smell and that I can pick up movement because I needed to be what you thought I was so I could keep you.”

“You’ve never been harmless.” Foggy’s voice is adamant. There’s no room for argument there. “You can smell everything. You get drunk and you start answering questions from two apartments over. I can’t even hear them and you act like you’re a part of their conversations. When you’re hung over the next morning you complain about Mrs. James in 5C because she uses too much onion in her Sunday morning omelet. She lives two floors above us, Matt. My mother loves it when you do that thing at Christmas where you guess what’s in the packages by shaking them. You’re almost never wrong. It’s freaky weird. You’ve been walking around with me for years purposely letting me bump you into things. But you mess up sometimes when you’re super relaxed and catch things when I toss them to you.”

Foggy sighs and he sounds defeated. “I thought I knew everything. But this? This going out at night and getting the hell beat out of yourself is too much. What if something happens to you?”

It’s embarrassing that Matt is so dependent on Foggy’s help to ease himself back down to being prone on the sofa. He hurts. Everything hurts and by the way Foggy is breathing, by the scent of salt from what might be tears Matt is pretty sure Foggy is hurting too. “I don’t have anything to lose,” Matt offers helplessly. It sounds hollow even to his own ears. A flat out lie. Matt has Foggy to lose and he might be losing him right now.

“Fuck YOU!” Foggy voice angry and bitter as it rolls over Matt's senses. Matt shakes through Foggy jerking off the couch, grabbing his things, and slamming his way to the door of their apartment.

“I thought I was going to be alone for the rest of my life,” Foggy murmurs brokenly from the doorway. “Then I found you and I thought that even if I couldn’t actually have you, even if my biology stopped me from sealing a bond with you as a mate that being your friend was enough for me. But I kept getting sick and I found your shirt under my sheets and it made me feel better, made me feel safe...when the doctor told me it wasn’t the cancer coming back...when he told me it was me going into whatever kind of heat I could have I was so happy. It’s why I took you with me to the next appointment. I thought if you heard that I wasn’t as broken as we thought I was you might finally make a move on me. You might see if there was a way. But you didn’t. So then Marci. And she drove you crazy that next time. You acted like you wanted me, like you might….it doesn’t matter. I get it now, Matty. I don’t matter. This is what matters to you. The blood. The pain. The lies. You can have it.”

And then Foggy’s out the door. Matt’s whole life imploding with the quiet click of the latch.

Matt is a terrible….person.

Foggy doesn’t come home.

*****

“We’re going to finish this,” Foggy announces when he finds Matt in the gym. “We’re going to wrap this whole Fisk thing up in a pretty bow and then you, Sir, are coming off those suppressants once and for all.”

The bag Matt is beating swings back and almost knocks him down. “Excuse me?”

“You heard me,” Foggy sighs as he sits on the edge of the ring. “I’ve had enough. You have this thing you need to do and I don’t like it. No one bit of it. But it’s your thing and that makes it my thing. But once it’s over, Matty...I have a thing. A thing with you. And you’re going to help me with my thing.”

“We still have things?” Matt’s at a loss. They haven’t talked. Not for weeks. Foggy’s been avoiding him since that night. He hasn’t even come home. “You smell like Marci.”

Foggy’s been staying at Marci’s. Using her shampoo, her soap. Matt’s nose burns and the smell must be terrible because it’s making his eyes want to water.

He’s not crying. He’s not.

Foggy, capital F for failure. Matt’s failure.

“I can’t come back until we have an agreement on terms,” Foggy’s not taking the bait. He sounds like he sounds in the courtroom. Solid and sure of himself in a way that doesn’t usually leak into his normal life.

“Then give me your terms, counselor,” Matt turns to face his friend. He might as well get this over with. Whatever this is.

“I don’t want to be your friend anymore, Matt.” Said so bluntly but, oh, it hurts so much more than Matt thought it would. He flinches when he feels Foggy’s hand cup the side of his face. The omega’s thumb wiping away tears he didn’t know were falling down his cheeks. “I want the whole thing,” Foggy continues. “I want to be your mate. I can’t do that if you stay on the suppressants. So I need you to help me, Matt. Help me with this thing between us. Help me make it work for both of us in a way that’s honest and real. Show me you trust me and take a chance to be more than you give yourself credit for. Get Fisk, stop the pills, and court me.”

“Court you?” Matt feels like he’s been hit with a bat. It hurts, getting hit with a bat. It’s happened to him a couple of times. Getting hit in the head is the worst. It rattles his senses and leaves him confused and dazed. Like how he feels right now. “You want me to be your alpha.”

Foggy chuckles. It’s a warm, wet sound. Relief and maybe joy wrapped into one in that sweet laugh. “You already are my alpha. You have been for years. I just want to make it official. My doctors think I might be able to have a full heat if you go into rut. That you’ll trigger me. If it’s true then we can bond. You’ll be able to claim me. I won’t….Matty. I won’t be able to give you children. They ran all the tests again and it’s just not something I can do. But if you still want me then I’m yours. I’ve always been yours.”

“I never wanted kids,” it feels like Matt’s senses are on overload. His head is pounding or maybe that’s his heart or Foggy’s heart. He can’t even tell. “But if we change our minds later there’s got to be a kid out there like me. All alone who needs a Foggy. We can find them.”

“Is that a yes?” Foggy’s voice so tight, Matt can feel the tiny vibrations on the air that says he’s shaking as much as Matt is. “You want to give us a try?”

“He’s a part of me,” Matt wants so badly to just say ‘yes.’ But this is important. Foggy has to understand upfront, before they get into something that could destroy both of them. “I’m not going to hang up the suit and stop fighting after Fisk.” He can’t.

Foggy’s hand slides around the back of his neck and squeezes gently. “I know.” The omega sounds torn, uncertain. “I’m going to have to learn to love him too. Give me time. Don’t hide it from me. I signed up for a first aid class and I want you to teach me how to fight. Just in case.”

The choked off sob that crawls up Matt’s throat is two parts relief and one part terror that he might fail. That Foggy might get hurt. But he can’t fight it anymore. No matter what they told him, Matt’s no good on his own.

There’s a mad rush that ends with them wrapped around each other. Matt’s nose buried in his omega’s (Oh so good to be allow to think that so freely) neck. He wants to kiss Foggy, wants to pour all the love he’s had for this man over the time they’ve been together into one passionate act. But Matt has a thing to finish. Fisk. Those were Foggy’s terms. Put this behind them and start over new. Matt can wait a little longer for something he never thought he would get to have. He can be patient. “I want to kiss you.” He murmurs into the sweet, hot scent of Foggy’s skin.

“I know,” Foggy hums in reply. He sounds so very smug. “My sexy little avocado.”

Matt groans. Foggy, capital F for Freaking bad sense of humor.

*****

The morning after Daredevil sends Fisk back to jail Foggy walks into their kitchen to find roses all over the counter surrounding a small red box with a blood red bow. Matt smiles as he hears Foggy unwrap the gift from where he is still curled up in his bed. There’s the sharp, sweet bark of Foggy’s laughter when he sees inside the package, and then the clang of the pill bottle as it hits the trashcan when Foggy lifts the bottle of Matt’s suppressants from inside the box and throws them away.

*****

It’s harder than he thought it would be.

Matt’s been on suppressants since he was a teenager and the rush of hormones and urges are overwhelming. His senses feel like they are on overdrive and his emotions are all over the place. There’s garbage, bathroom cleaner, the smell of urine, shampoo, body sweat, asphalt, car exhaust, food, and everything else. Matt can’t shut anything out. He can hear TV’s four blocks over, people fighting, having sex, whispering their love to each other, breaking up, proposing, screaming, crying, the sirens...God help him, the sirens are so bad.

He wears the noise cancelling headphones Foggy got him for his birthday all the time and they help to cut out some of it. But when he takes them off he’s hit with this wave of data and ends up puking. Every single time. He vomits until he cries gasping over the toilet or trash can like it might be his last breath.

Foggy cries with him. Begging Matt to just restart the pills. He won’t. They have a thing to do and they can figure it out together.

In the end, it’s Karen and Claire who come to their rescue. They bring with them hormone patches to level out his changing biochemistry helping him cut down slowly and easing the mad rush of sensation. Matt doesn’t even care that Foggy told Karen. It’s something he’s starting to understand, the need for support, the strength that comes from having family.

He’s even more grateful for the Dramamine. It kills the nausea and as an added bonus makes Matt so tired that he sleeps the sleep of the dead for the first time since the day after he stopped the pills. When he wakes up the whole apartment has been sterilized, there are special trash cans to cancel out the smell of the garbage. Karen cooked enough food to last them for two weeks and froze it all so that Matt would only have to deal with one meal at a time. She’s angry at him. Matt can tell by her heartbeat, her body tension, the fact that she leans into him and whispers all the horrible things she’s going to do to him when he feels better.

He’s loved. He can’t be so terrible. Can he?

Matt’s final frustration is his lack of ability to focus enough to meditate. It keeps him on edge and antsy. Foggy finally just sits across from him on the floor and says “Listen to how much I love you.” Matt loses himself in that heartbeat. The world fades and when he slides back into himself it’s been three hours and for the first time in a very long time Matt feels renewed. Which is important, he’s got to get his shit together. Matt has an omega to woo.

They start slow. Easing their way into more intimacy. Matt reaching out to hold Foggy’s hand as they walk even though it makes Foggy leading him a little awkward. It’s not like Matt needs to be led anyway. The hand holding allows Matt to rub his thumb back and forth over Foggy’s skin using it to ground himself as he lets the world unfold around him.

They cuddle while they curl up on the couch together listening to music. Foggy reads to him. Matt teaches him how to box. Just a few punches. It’s distracting in a way Matt’s not used to. Foggy sweats and his scent seems to go straight to Matt’s head.

Other places too. He’s never been so hard in his life.

Matt’s still fighting. He’s more careful than he was before everything changed and he doesn’t trust his senses as much. Foggy meets Daredevil and after the first few tense transitions they develop a pattern there too. Foggy helps Matt into the suit and kisses him goodbye after they pull the headgear on. Matt’s never questioned why it’s always on the cheek. He’s not ready for more yet and Foggy and Daredevil are barely just friends. When he comes home at night Foggy helps him clean up and after his shower rubs Matt’s shoulders. If it’s a good night Matt will hang his head groaning as Foggy digs his thumbs into muscles too tightly stretched.

When it’s not a good night Matt hangs his head while Foggy traces the shape of his back and shoulders without ever touching him. Just the displacement of air on his skin helping to pull Matt back into himself.

It’s not a momentous occasion that precedes his and Foggy’s first kiss. It’s a Tuesday and Karen and Claire have just left after dinner. Matt’s relaxed and for once in his life he feels content and a part of something instead of standing on the outside of his life.

“You look happy,” Foggy sounds smug from where he’s standing in the kitchen doorway.

“I’m in love.” Matt offers with a smile as he moves toward the other man. Foggy’s heart rate spikes, his scent changes, gets sharper, sweeter. Matt doesn't hesitate, not after so long. He tips his head just enough to the side to feel their noses brush and then there’s nothing but wet heat on his mouth and the taste of his omega bursting across his tongue. Foggy tastes like the strawberries they had with whipped cream after dinner and the whimper in the back of his throat makes Matt growl in response. He keeps going, wanting more. It’s not for several minutes that Matt realizes he’s pushed Foggy against the counter and nipped his way down Foggy’s throat. Matt can’t stop himself from one more lick across Foggy’s scent gland before stepping backward, hard and aching. “I’m in love with you, Foggy.” God, when did his voice get so wrecked.

Foggy’s heart rate is all over the place. “I love you too, Matty.” He sounds choked. Like a fish on land. Gasping. “I’m going to go take a shower.”

Matt doesn’t reach out to him when he brushes past on his way by. He’s too turned on, like somethings been uncorked inside him and if he touches Foggy they might just end up on the floor and God knows they need more time to work up the nerve to actually talk about that before anything else happens.

He pretends he can’t hear Foggy gasping his name in the shower while he comes. Matt comes in his pants with his hands over his ears as he stands outside the door.

*****

“We need to talk about this,” Matt brings up suddenly while Foggy’s stitching a wound on his shoulder closed.

“You need to duck faster,” Foggy replies. He’s distracted. Matt can tell by his breathing, his lack of movement.

“No,” Matt sighs. “I talked to Claire today. I’m off the patches and I’m feeling weird.”

“Weird how?” Great. The worry in Foggy’s tone is palpable.

“Itchy,” Matt grumbles. “Nothing bad. Distracted. I’m having a hard time staying focused and...I’m horny.”

“Yes you are,” Foggy chuckles as he relaxes. “Even if they are stubby and cute.”

Matt swats at him and misses on purpose. Foggy’s laugh is worth the frustration he’s feeling. The anxiety. “I’m going to go into rut soon. I don’t want to wait until then to be sexual with you. I don’t want to be out of control like that. So I was wondering if we could...experiment together before. Claire said she wasn’t sure how much time I had.”

Foggy hums quietly while he cuts the strings and outs the supplies away. Matt’s not sure what that means exactly. His heart rate is steady and calm but Foggy’s scent keeps changing getting richer and more alluring. Matt sways toward him without really thinking about it. “Take a shower with me, Matty?”

Matt has no idea why that’s a question. There’s only one answer. “Yes, yes, yes”

The heat of Foggy’s body pressed in next to him, the pounding of the water, building humidity, and the sound of the spray place Matt in an interesting position. He presses his face to the still cool tile and gasps. “I’m a little lost here.”

Foggy presses against his back and wraps his arms around Matt. “You’re with me.”

He swears there’s a Pavlovian response to Foggy’s touch stitched into his body somewhere. He relaxes, muscles unclenching as the omega licks along the back of his neck. Foggy’s hands run up his chest to play over Matt’s nipples. The touch makes Matt gasp and arch his back bumping into Foggy’s harden cock. The slip slide of the water between their bodies making it drag along Matt’s skin. Foggy drums across his nipples again while grinding his dick into Matt from behind.

Matt comes across the tile wall of the shower with a sob, shaking and mortified.

“Oh, fuck,” Foggy murmurs as pets down Matt’s chest with long, slow strokes. “Please tell me this is one of your things. It is right? Because that would be the best thing ever. I’m serious. Magically sexy alpha that’s so sensitive he can come almost on command….I’ll be the best omega you’ve ever had, Matty. Oh God. I swear. I’m going to take such good care of you.”

Foggy presses his teeth into the Matt’s neck and just like that Matt’s hard again. “Going to be so good for you.”

“You’re the only omega I’ve ever had,” Matt chuckles. It’s a desperate, strung out sound. “The only one I’m ever going to have. You’re Foggy and you’re perfect for me already.” He leans forward pushing his hips back and Foggy's dick slides down his ass and right across Matt’s hole. It’s so good. Just like Matt thought it would be. Foggy makes a strangled sound as he thrusts out of control and clinging to Matt. His dick rubbing up and down the crack of his ass. “Please?” Matt offers.

Foggy is reaching around him and turning off the water as soon as the question leaves his lips. Matt smiles as the omega towels them both off as quickly as possible and all but carries Matt to the bed. Then he’s stretching out face down and relaxing into the sheets as Foggy runs back to his own room for what Matt guesses must be lube by the way it sounds when it hits the bed next to his hip. Foggy’s crawling onto the bed and Matt shifts his hips up, spreading his legs so his omega can slip between them and Foggy…..

Foggy. Capital F for FUCKING HORRIBLE OMEGA. Doesn’t follow directions. Is trying to torture his alpha.

Foggy licks his way around and over Matt’s ass until Matt is sobbing and begging for more. It goes on for what feels like hours, too much and not enough and then there’s fingers, two of them at once sliding into Matt’s ass after what feels like has been forever. He doesn’t want them. He wants Foggy buried to the hilt inside of him and he must say so because there’s a groaned “Bossy,” from behind him and then those fingers curl and hit his prostate and Matt screams as he comes again harder than he can ever remember coming in his whole life.

When he comes back to himself Foggy is whispering to him some ridiculous story about his mother wanting him to be a butcher and Matt has no idea what that has to do with anything except Foggy says “But then I wouldn't have met you,” just as he grips Matt's hips and slides inside all the way to the hilt.

Foggy owns him. Grabs Matt’s hips and puts his body where he wants it. Pushes down on the back of Matt’s neck until he’s pressed to the mattress and just pounds into him like Foggy is the alpha and Matt’s the omega and it feels so good. So them. Matt’s distantly aware of sobbing Foggy’s name over and over as he grips the sheets so hard in his hands that they rip. Foggy’s relentless. “Now, Matty,” he says “Do it again for me. Come for me, Matty. I want it. Give it to me. Do it now.”

And so help him, Matt does just that gasping and crying. Foggy jerks his head to the side and bites into Matt’s neck where a bonding gland would be if he weren’t an alpha. Matt feels his skin break, smells his own blood, and hears Foggy growl, “Mine!” just before he slips into oblivion.

*****

Matt’s two days into his rut and feeling wild and unbalanced when Stick shows up through the window of his apartment. Tensions are high already without the unwelcome visitor. Foggy’s…..

Foggy’s not responding to Matt’s rut that way they had hoped.

Matt’s a wreck. He’s sweating and cold, overcome with need, and feeling weak and lost. His omega is upset. Foggy’s currently crying in the shower. He’s not in heat and they don’t know what to do. It’s hopeless.

Matt really is a terrible alpha. He’s sure of it more now than ever.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Stick snorts in Matt’s general direction. “What the fuck have you gotten yourself into now?”

Embarrassment, Hot and bright, rolls over Matt’s being. But he holds his ground. Stick doesn’t know yet. Can’t possibly have figured out that they were hoping to bond. That they can’t. “Are you here to break more of my furniture? Can we skip it? I just got new stuff and frankly, I’m not feeling so hot.”

“More like you’re feeling too hot,” Stick grumbles as he goes to the kitchen and helps himself to a bottle of water. “You’re life choices suck, Mathew. You had a purpose and you threw it all away. For what?”

“For me,” Foggy announces from the bathroom door. “He threw away your bullshit programming for me.”

The alpha inside Matt raises his head. His blood is boiling. Foggy is his. Shouldn’t be in this room with Stick. Matt has to protect his omega. Stick needs to go. “Get out,” he growls.

“Why?” Stick snorts as he turns and focuses his attention on Matt. “You’re pathetic. Broken alpha to weak to claim his destiny finds an even more broken omega and does what, Mathew? Falls in love? I taught you better than this. He’s weak, he’s going to drag you down and get you killed. You had a purpose. You were going to be something amazing and now….look where you’ve ended up. Sweating out a rut in some shitty apartment like you think you’re normal. Like you think you get to have nice things. These things aren’t for us, Mathew. He’s been playing a game with you and you fell for it. Stupid kid. What did you think this whore wanted you for? Like a real omega would want a blind…”

Matt’s not sure what Stick was going to say next. They had both been so caught up in each other with Stick yelling and Matt thinking of ripping him to shreds that they had forgotten about Foggy. Beautiful, angry Foggy with a baseball bat. Foggy who had just brained Stick so hard up the back of the head the older man was flat on the ground groaning.

“Get out of my home.” Foggy is snarling. Matt can see the outline of his body shaking. “Get away from my alpha. You don’t know me. You don’t talk about what you don’t know. Get out or I swear what happens next will be the most horrible thing you have ever experienced.”

Then it happens. Foggy’s scent plunges to a depth Matt’s never scented coming off his friend turned lover before. It’s the most amazing thing Matt has ever smelled and he’s distantly aware that he’s close to hyperventilating trying to inhale as much as he can. His senses, already painfully heightened from his rut explode with another layer of brightness and it’s all coming from Foggy. He’s aglow.

“I can see you,” Matt chokes out with what might have been meant to be a giggle if he wasn’t feeling stretched too thin. “Foggy,” He’s crying. “I can see you.”

Matt’s moving before he can really make sense of what’s happening, pressing himself into the omega’s front and tracing his fingers over Foggy’s face. “I can see your eyes, your nose. Oh, you’re smiling. Do it again. Again, Foggy, please. I can see.”

It’s not vision like regular people experience. Matt won’t ever know the color of Foggy’s eyes, or the patterns of his shirts. But he has this, this singular moment and in his own way Foggy’s whole body is like the sun, illuminating what is usually just an impression into a sharp, crystal clear image of the man Matt loves. Foggy clings to him with one arm. The other still pointing the bat at Stick.

“I’m going to get up,” the older alpha states slowly. “I’m leaving. Do not hit me again.”

Matt chuckles through his tears as Foggy growls, a low, unholy sound in response. Stick rises to his feet cautiously and slips his way toward the door of their apartment. He stops before he opens it and says without turning around. “Be good to him.”

“I will,” Matt answers, stunned.

“I wasn’t talking to you, Brat,” Stick replies. Then he’s gone. But not far.

“What’s happening?” Foggy questions as he nuzzles Matt’s neck.

“He’s on the roof,” Matt answers. This night couldn’t get any weirder. “He’s standing guard.”

It’s an old custom. Family members of both sides being called upon to guard a couple during mating. Ensuring they wouldn’t be disturbed until their bond was completed. Foggy’s family no longer thought the tradition was necessary. And Matt didn’t have any family to ask.

At least, he thought he hadn’t had any. Something in him shift, eases, and his world narrows to the other person in his arms. Come what may in the next few days, Stick will handle it.

All Matt has to focus on is Foggy.

*****

“Is it gone?” Foggy questions six days later when he and Matt are certain that their heat and rut have passed. The sheets are changed, Foggy’s slumped against his chest in their shared bed both of them still pink and warm from the shower. They’ll need food soon but Matt knows they still have some time.

“No,” Matt whispers back full of a strange contentment he never thought of himself capable of. “I can still see you all lit up like the brightest star in my sky.” He runs his fingers over the fresh bonding bite on his mate’s neck and can’t hide his smile when Foggy shivers. The bite glows more brightly than the rest of Foggy. A beacon. A signal for Matt to follow.

Foggy launches into a terrible rendition of “When you wish upon a star,” That has Matt tickling him then trying to shove him off the bed. It’s several long moments of easily shared laughter before they’ve curled back into each other comfortably. Matt spends his time trailing his fingertips over Foggy’s back and side. He can sense Foggy’s conflict.

Bonding opened the door to a sense Matt didn’t know he had. It’s more than impressions of his mate’s body. There’s the singular presence of Foggy in his mind. His mate feels worried.

“Fog?” Matt questions. Concern creeping into his tone.

“I might never have another,” Foggy whispers and Matt feels his grief before he smells the wetness and salt of Foggy’s tears.

“I won’t miss it,” Matt assures him. “The heat was great. Bonding with you was wonderful. But, Foggy, I fell in love with you a long time before this week. Falling in love with you is the best experience of my life and nothing, no rut or heat will ever come close to that. No matter what our bodies do I get to love you forever.”

“Mathew Michael Murdock,” Foggy calls out as he turns onto his stomach so he can cup Matt’s face with his hand. “You are an amazing alpha and an even better man.”

Foggy. Capital F for Finally home.