Chapter Text
It had been five hundred eighteen days since the screech of tires and the sudden, violent snapping of a soul-bond had left Levi wandering a colorless world, yet here he stood, trying to reclaim his life. Rain was pouring down, just as it had on that fateful evening…
Levi was eight months pregnant, his body heavy and aching more and more every day. He hadn’t planned to get pregnant at college, but then he met Farlan, the alpha with a lopsided grin that somehow always made Levi’s breath hitch. It was love at first sight, or first scent, or maybe both. Per the Omega Education Act of 852, every omega was kept on the legal maximum dose of pheromone suppressants to ensure there was no disrupted learning experience for alpha students. It was a policy put into effect when omega’s first gained the right to a higher education, and any students found not using suppressants were banned from campus. It turned omega’s into ghosts of themselves, scentless and muted. But even through the sterile, chemical fog, Farlan had smelled like cinnamon and pine to Levi. It was a magnetic pull that defied regulation. After a few months of courting, Levi and Farlan had decided to move in together. In hindsight, it was not the best idea. Neither knew how to cook and they were both tight on money, but their love was real and pure. They couldn’t stand to be apart. Each night when the suppressants wore off, they would sit there basking in one another's scent, content and fulfilled.
Levi’s first heat living with Farlan was magical. In preparation for the week, Farlan had purchased Levi a leather collar to lock around his neck, preventing them from prematurely and impulsively bonding. He joked that it was a kink of his, to be collared, and to his surprise Farlan let out a low growl. The pair quickly realized the growing pheromones of Levi’s oncoming heat were likely triggering Farlan’s rut. The alpha spoiled him rotten with affection and care, somehow able to grasp enough semblance of reality through the haze to make sure his omega was hydrated and fed.
In their sophomore year, having lived together and spending every day inseparable, the two decided to seal their fate. They abandoned the leather collar during Levi’s next heat, replacing it with the permanent warmth of a mating mark.
The summer before junior year was a blur of passion and haziness. In the delirium of their combined cycles, the pills sat forgotten in the medicine cabinet. It wasn’t until three months later that Levi realized something was off. His heat was a week late according to the calendar. His favorite tea started tasting bitter. His lean, athletic frame began to soften, a small but undeniable curve blooming beneath his ribs. Feeling nauseous, he went to the medicine cabinet and spotted the unopened box of birth control. Panicking, he ran to the corner store, purchased a pregnancy test, and prayed he was just late. Looking over the test, Levi felt the world drop out from under him.
He was terrified that Farlan would see this as a burden, tears staining his cheeks. They were too young for a child, still babies themselves. How could they go through with this? When Farlan arrived back at the apartment after class, he noticed a difference in Levi’s scent. It was sweeter, more intoxicating. Cuddling up against his crying omega, he crooned until Levi revealed what was worrying him. Much to Levi’s surprise, Farlan let out tears of joy, hugging and kissing his mate all over.
Farlan traded his textbooks for a tool belt, dropping out to work grueling shifts at a construction company to support their growing family.
The months that followed were a slow metamorphosis. The nausea of the first few months faded, replaced by an insatiable hunger and a nesting instinct that drove Levi to reorganize the blankets around their bed daily. Farlan would come home covered in debris and dust, always carrying a peace offering. Sometimes it was a flower, one he picked from the yard of the house he was working at, other times chocolates and teas. Farlan would always give the gifts to Levi before falling to his knees, placing gentle kisses against Levi's stomach and whispering stories about his day to the growing pup.
His third trimester brought to surface the gravity of their situation. Levi’s center of balance shifted, making the walk to his lectures a grueling trek. He could no longer tie his shoes himself, opting to wear slippers instead of boots. His scent, once muted by suppressants, began to break through the blockers. Rich, milky and sweet, signaling his impending labor. The pup was nocturnal, choosing the hours between midnight and four in the morning to practice his cartwheels against Levi’s intestines.
Now, at eight months, every move was a calculated effort. The nursery was nearly finished, a second-hand crib tucked in the corner of their bedroom along with a pile of soft blankets and stuffed animals. They were driving to the store to pick up a few more essentials for the nursery; diapers, wipes, lotion. Small things that made the looming reality feel real. The sky broke open in a vicious rain. Levi gripped the edge of his seat, his anxiety spiking with every flash of lightning. Sensing the jagged edges of Levi’s nerves, Farlan reached across the center console. His hand was rough from his job, calloused, yet he gently placed his hand over Levi’s. He stroked his thumb back and forth over the omega’s knuckles, a rhythmic, grounding motion.
“Nearly there, Lee,” he murmured, his voice a steady anchor against the roar of the storm. “One more month and we’ll be pulling all-nighters. Instead of cramming for exams, though, it’ll be with a crying pup. You ready for that?”
Levi let out a long, shaky sigh, leaning his head back against the seat. “He’s already keeping me up at night. He’s got your kick,” Levi whispered that last part, a ghost of a smile touching his lips.
Farlan laughed and turned to look at Levi, his eyes glowing. The soul bond in Levi’s chest was humming. Steady, bright, love. Everything was right.
Suddenly, there was the scream of a freight truck’s horn. Levi looked up from his belly to see a wall of white metal hydroplaning across the median toward them. He closed his eyes tight and held Farlan’s hand tightly.
The impact wasn’t a sound; it was a total sensory erasure. Levi felt his body jerked violently against the seatbelt, his head hitting the dashboard before the airbag deployed, slamming him back against the seat with a sickening force. The world turned into a kaleidoscope of shattered glass and screaming metal.
Levi was slumped against the door, his vision blurry and reddened from the blood dripping down his head. The first thing he noticed wasn’t the pain, it was the cold. The warmth of the soul bond didn’t fade; it snapped. Vanished. Replaced by an agonizing and hollow vacuum. He reached for the mark on his neck, but his fingers were numb and cold.
“Farlan?” Levi choked out.
He turned his head. Farlan was slumped over the wheel, his eyes open but vacant. There was no scent. No heat. No warmth. Just the smell of burnt rubber and gasoline.
Levi let out a broken animalistic sound, but it was cut short by a blinding pain in his lower back and radiating across his stomach. It was a pain so sharp it sliced through his grief.
The stress of the impact, the sudden severing of the bond, and the physical trauma had forced his body into a violent, premature labor. His hands flew to his stomach as a fresh wave of contractions tore through him. He was trapped in a cage of twisted steel, his mate dead beside him, and his body was trying to force a life into the world before it was ready.
“No,” Levi cried, his head falling back against the headrest as tears streaked down his cheeks. “Not yet. Not like this.”
He was alone. For the first time in years, he was truly, terrifyingly alone. He sat in the wreckage of his life, screaming for help into the rain as the first stage of labor began, his heart breaking for the man he’d lost while his body fought a desperate, bloody battle for the son he had yet to meet.
The months following the accident were lived underwater. The air felt heavy, the light was too bright, and every sound felt like an assault on his raw nerves. He spent most days in a corner of the living room, curled into a ball on the floor of the makeshift “nest” he had built out of Farlan’s old hoodies and unwashed gym shirts. The scent was fading, becoming a ghostly echo of cinnamon and pine. He was withering, as Kuchel put it. His cheekbones had become sharp and hollow and his skin had taken on a grayish hue. He was a man composed entirely of ash, waiting for the wind to scatter him.
Kuchel moved into the small apartment without asking, once Levi and the pup were released from the hospital, and Kenny took on a second job to cover the expenses of a new pup and an unemployed omega. They functioned like a well-oiled machine of survival, stepping into the void Farlan had left behind.
Kuchel never pushed, never lectured, never overstepped her boundaries. She simply stayed. She knew her place was to try and keep her son alive, and to nurture her grandson as much as possible until Levi was ready to be a single mother, no matter how long it took. When Levi’s tremors became too violent to hide, she would hum lullabies from his childhood and let her soothing pheromones run wild, the scent of lavender and black tea acting as a thin, fragile veil from the rest of the world. She was the one who woke at 3:00am when the pup wailed for a father who would never answer. She changed the diapers, sang the songs, and made sure the boy didn’t grow up in an unloving household.
Kenny provided a different kind of support. At first, he was able to help hold and nurse the pup, scarred hands looking absurdly large as he tried rocking the tiny infant to sleep. “The kids got his father’s eyes,” he grumbled, staring down at the pup with a look of tenderness. “Strong hands, too. He’s an Ackerman. He’s a fighter, Levi, even if you aren’t right now.” Levi was staring into the void, physically present but mentally elsewhere, Kenny’s words never registering. Kenny never judged Levi’s collapse. He knew what it was like to lose a piece of your soul to the world’s cruelty. He carried all the weight Levi couldn’t lift, ensuring there was a roof over their head and keeping it from caving in on them all. As the pup grew larger and sprouted teeth, he began biting Kenny. The alpha quickly learned he could no longer hold the pup and maintained his distance, unless the pup initiated contact.
Every morning, Kuchel would bring Levi a pill with a cup of tea. The antidepressants didn’t feel like a lifeline, they felt like a thin veil which did nothing to stop the bleeding. They turned his jagged, screaming grief into a dull, flat hum. A state of grey, where the highs were nonexistent and the lows were simply a heavy, stagnant fog. He wasn’t living; he was merely existing in a state of biological suspension, his body performing the basic functions of survival while his spirit remained trapped in the wreckage on that rain-slicked road.
The emptiness where the soul bond had once been was a physical cavity. Without the constant, warming presence of Farlan’s tether, Levi felt untethered from reality itself, drifting through his days like a ghost haunting his own life.
His monthly sessions with Dr. Hange Zoe were a grueling exercise in futility. Dr. Hange’s office was filled with the clutter of a mind that moved too fast and too excitedly for Levi’s grief. Levi would sit in the same stiff chair every month, staring at a fixed point on the floor which Dr. Hange paced or perched on the edge of their desk, watching him with an intensity that made him want to crawl out of his skin.
“The weight hasn’t shifted, Levi?” Dr. Hange would ask, their voice surprisingly gentle despite their chaotic experience.
“It’s not a weight anymore,” Levi answered, his voice sounding like it was coming from a great distance. “Weights can be lifted. This is just…. The new shape of the floor. There’s nothing under me.”
Dr. Hange scribbled furiously in their notebook, brow furrowed. They tried everything; cognitive behavioral therapy, adjusting the dosage of his SSRIs, even suggesting sensory “grounding” exercises that felt insulting to a man whose entire sensory world had been decimated. They spoke of “neuroplasticity” and the brain’s ability to reroute emotional pathways after the trauma of a severed bond, but to Levi, it sounded made-up.
After a year and a half of sessions, the air in the room always felt the same: heavy with the scent of Levi’s static grief and Dr. Hange’s frustrated empathy. Levi would leave each appointment feeling more hollow than when he arrived, walking out into a world that continued to move forward while he remained frozen, a permanent resident to the moment the light left Farlan’s eyes.
It was a Tuesday in mid July, just five weeks before the fall semester would start. Levi had crawled out of his nest to get a glass of water, parched from another afternoon of sobbing. He caught a glimpse of himself in the hallway mirror and stopped. He looked unrecognizable. His hair was matted, his eyes were sunken pits, and the bond mark on his neck, once vibrant and warm, was grey and cold. As he scanned over the rest of his body, noticing how frail and thin he had become, he heard a sound from the living room.
“Ba? Ba-ba?” The boy was looking for his mother. Not the ghost in the nest, but the one who held him in her womb. And when he didn’t find her, the boy’s lower lip began to tremble. He didn’t turn to Levi, he turned to Kuchel. He didn’t recognize the hollow corpse in the hallway as his parent.
Levi felt a cold, sharp jolt of terror. It hit him like a brick. If he stayed in this nest, if he continued to wither away, he wouldn’t just be losing Farlan but also his son. He was becoming a shadow in the boy’s life, a source of grief rather than safety. He remembered Dr. Hange’s voice, “if you don’t find a rhythm again, you’ll hollow out.”
He decided then and there that he needed to change, for his son’s sake. He wanted the boy to grow up happy, healthy and loved, it’s what Farlan would’ve wanted, and in order to achieve that he needed to take care of himself first. Without uttering a word, he took a shower for the first time in weeks, ate a sandwich from the fridge, and sat down close to his son who was babbling at a toy.
Levi wasn’t whole, he wasn’t healed. He was still vibrating with a frequency of pure, unadulterated pain. But for the first time in nearly two years, he had a direction. He wanted to be present and to provide as good a life as he could for his son, which meant two things: He had to get healthy and he had to get a degree. Omega’s were practically unhireable without a higher education, as they were still widely expected to be housewives. Over the next five weeks, he made sure to take care of himself the best he could while also being present as much as possible, helping Kuchel to feed and bathe him, playing with him on the floor, and taking him for walks. As Levi gained the weight and color in his face back, the pup started to call for and cling to his mama again. With one week until the start of the semester, Levi called the university to enroll in whatever classes they had space available in to complete his degree requirements, which is how he ended up here.
Levi clutched his almost two year old son tightly against his hip. The toddler was a mirror image of the man Levi had lost. Same sandy hair, same bright spark in his eyes that Levi felt had gone dark in his own, same goofy smile.
“Please, stay quiet, love,” Levi whispered, pressing a kiss to the boy’s forehead. He pulled open the door and snuck into the back row of the lecture hall, mentally prepared for his son to have a tantrum and needing to abruptly leave the room. He handed the pup his keys and unpacked his bag: notebook, pen, sippy cup, and Goldfish.
Levi was too distracted getting himself organized that he didn’t notice the hush that fell over the room. He didn’t see the dozens of other omegas sit up straighter, their pupils dilating as a rich, grounding scent, one of earl grey tea and rain, began to filter through the vents.
“Good evening.” The voice was a deep, resonant baritone. Levi’s head snapped up. Standing at the podium was a man who looked less like a philosophy professor and more like a student himself. He was broad-shouldered, impeccably dressed, with icy blue eyes that seemed to hold a terrifying amount of intelligence.
“I am Dr. Erwin Smith,” the Alpha continued, his gaze sweeping the room before settling, for a fraction of a second, on the silver-eyed omega in the back row. “I am aware that an Alpha teaching Omega Existentialism raises eyebrows. I’ve studied all over the world learning from omegas for my thesis. My work in Marley focused on the intersection of biological imperatives and the philosophy of ‘The Self.’ I am not here to tell you what it is to be an omega, I am here to provide the framework for you to define it for yourselves.”
The students in the front rows, mostly Alphas and Betas who had taken the course for the prestige of the “Smith” name, exchanged skeptical glances. Professor Smith was a rising star in the field of Philosophy, the idea that he had studied under omegas sounded like a radical departure from the traditional, alpha-centric scholarship that usually defined the university’s curriculum. They leaned forward, waiting to see if this was a genuine academic shift or merely a clever bit of intellectual theater.
The word “Marley” usually signaled a lecture on biological limitations, a “know your place” sermon disguised as science. Hearing an Alpha claim he wasn’t there to define them caused a ripple of quiet, nervous murmurs among the omegas in the classroom.
In the very back, Levi didn’t join the murmurs. He remained still, eyes locked onto Professor Smith’s with a flat, unimpressed stare. He didn’t care about Professor Smith’s world travels or his high-minded thesis; he only cared if the man at the podium was going to be another expert telling him his grief was a biological malfunction.
The tension peaked when a Beta student finally broke the silence. “With all due respect, Dr. Smith, ‘the Self’ is a luxury for those whose biology doesn’t put them in a nest once a quarter. How can a framework ‘fix’ a chemical reality?”
Professor Smith didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he let the student’s question–sharp, cynical, and grounded in a very real frustration–hang in the air until the murmurs died down. He offered a small, appreciative nod, as if the student had just handed him the very key he needed to unlock the semester.
“That is exactly the tension we are here to deconstruct,” Professor Smith said, his voice calm and inviting. “You’re asking if the chemistry of the body is a cage or if it is simply the material we are given to work with.”
He walked over to his desk and picked up a bright, perfectly round object that had been sitting there, largely ignored.
“To answer that,” he continued, holding the object up so the light from the tall windows caught its artificial sheen, “we have to look at the difference between an object and a person. We have to look at the difference between being made,” he paused, “and simply being.”
He turned the object over in his hand, a slight, enigmatic smile playing on his lips as he looked out at the sea of guarded faces.
“I have a very serious question for you all.” He said, looking down at the apple again. “Before it was manufactured in a factory in Marley, a designer drew it. They decided it would be red. Round. Hollow. Useless for eating. Plastic. Its purpose was determined before it ever physically existed. It is exactly what it was meant to be, and it can never be anything else.” He placed the plastic apple back onto the desk with a hollow clack. “Now,” he said, leaning against the podium and looking out at the rows of students, eyes sparkling with a touch of wit. “How many of you have ever felt like that plastic apple? How many of you feel like your essence, your role as an omega, your place in this social hierarchy, was designed and decided long before you ever had a say in it??”
He let the question hang in the air for a moment.
“Existentialism is the philosophy for people who are tired of being plastic apples,” he said, a small, knowing smirk playing on his lips. “It is the radical, terrifying, and deeply beautiful idea that for a human being, existence precedes essence.”
He stepped away from the podium, closing the distance between himself and the front row of students. “In this class, we are going to explore the idea that you were thrown into this world as a blank slate. You showed up first, and your purpose or essence is something you have to invent every single day through your choices. You are not a pen designed to write; you are the author, the ink, and the paper all at once.”
“Society will try to convince you that your biology is a pre-written script. It will tell you that the pheromones in your blood and the scent on your skin dictate your destiny. But existentialism posits that the universe is actually quite indifferent to your titles. It doesn’t care if you are a doctor or a gardener. While that indifference sounds bleak to some, I find it incredibly freeing.”
He stood up straight, his expression becoming more earnest. “If the universe has no plan for you, it means you are the only one who can judge your own life. It means, as Sartre said, that you are condemned to be free. For the next fifteen weeks, we aren’t just going to analyze texts. We are going to learn how to be the architects of our own meaning in a world that forgot to provide us with a blueprint.”
He picked up a piece of chalk and wrote one word in massive letters across the board. WHY?
“Let’s start there,” he said, turning back to the class. “Why are you here?”
The question hung in the air, a heavy, philosophical hook that seemed to snag on the conscience of every student in the room. Some shifted uncomfortably, avoiding Professor Smith’s piercing blue gaze, while others began to scribble feverishly in their notebooks.
“Is it to fulfil a social expectation?” Professor Smith prodded, his voice dropping to a low, melodic hum as he paced the front of the hall. “Is it to secure a future that was mapped out for you before you could walk? Or is it because you believe there is a version of yourself that can only be found through the friction of these ideas?” Professor Smith began handing out the syllabus, a two page document, and started answering and addressing the concerns of the students.
As the first hand shot up to ask about the grading on the mid term paper, Levi’s hand drifted to the base of his neck, rubbing the scarred, faded mark where Farlan’s teeth had once claimed him. The skin felt cold. It always felt cold. He shook the thought away and turned his attention back to the Professor, who was mid answer, “... as such it would be wise to keep thorough annotated notes on your readings.”
Professor Smith continued going through the syllabus. “Our first few weeks will be spent focusing on the biological absurd. Specifically, the myth of the biological drive, Jean-Paul Sartre and the scent gland, and the facticity of the body. Then we will cover the phenomenology of the nest, discussing the self, the ethics of care, and dwelling. Our third module will cover the existential choice of the bond, diving into the alpha omega dynamic and our tri-gendered society. Finally, we will discuss the responsibility of raising new life while maintaining the self.”
“The structure of this course is like a ladder,” he explained. “You will write one paper for each module we cover. A chance to grapple with the theories while they are still fresh. These will build toward your midterm, and ultimately, a final paper.” He stopped at the center of the room, his expression turned serious. “Your final paper will not be a mere summary of the greats. It will be a personal essay: a philosophical defense of your own path toward meaning. I want to see how you have taken these theories and concepts and built something tangible.”
Professor Smith delved further into the minutiae of the semester. He walked through the required readings, speaking of Sartre and Beauvoir as if they were old friends he was eager to introduce, and fielded a barrage of student questions with a tireless, patient intellect. Whether it was a technical query about citation styles or a cynical challenge regarding the grading scale, Professor Smith met each one with a thoughtful nod and a pivot back to the core mission of the class. He was a master of the room, weaving the dry, bureaucratic threads of a syllabus into a narrative of impending discovery. The sharp, authoritative sound of Professor Smith’s voice, which had been clear just a moment ago, started to blend with the low-frequency thrum of the building’s ventilation. The “static” that Dr. Hange had warned him about began to rise like a tide. Levi spaced out, staring at the WHY? on the chalk board, while mindlessly rubbing his neck.
His dissociation was harshly interrupted by a sharp clang against the linoleum floor followed by a mounting wail. “Ba! BA-BA-BAAAAA!” Levi’s heart hammered against his chest, he quickly leaned down to grab the keys hoping to quiet his pup and not disturb the class, but it was no use. The pup took the keys and threw them across the room. Levi tried shoving the sippy cup toward the boy, but he pushed it away, his face turning a frantic shade of red. The pup grew louder and restless in his mama’s arms. Students began to look back at them, their expressions ranging from pity to irritation.
“See, this is why omega’s shouldn’t be allowed in university,” Levi heard one alpha mutter to a beta. “The poor thing, he looks exhausted,” an omega whispered.
Failure, the voice in Levi’s head hissed. You can’t even console your own pup.
Levi’s vision blurred and his breathing grew frantic as his anxiety spiked. He began shoving his notebook into his bag with a trembling hand, desperate to flee before bursting into tears. Suddenly, a shadow fell over his desk. Levi looked up, ready to apologize profusely and promise to never return, but the words died in his throat. Professor Smith was standing there, his large hand extended–not in a gesture of dismissal, but of an invitation.
“May I?” He asked softly.
“He… he doesn’t like strangers,” Levi said, voice cracking. “Especially Alpha’s. He’ll bite you.”
“He doesn’t look like he bites,” Professor Smith murmured. Levi turned to look at his pup, and was surprised to find the boy looking up at the Alpha, silently and awe-struck. He reached out his small, chubby arms, and Professor Smith gracefully took him and tucked the toddler against his broad chest. The room went silent. The pheromones in the air shifted, despite the strong suppressants they’re all on, because not only was their professor young and handsome, but he somehow looked even better holding that sweet little pup. Professor Smith returned to the front of the room, settled the pup on one hip, and picked up his chalk with the other hand. “As I was saying,” he continued, his voice never wavering as he began to write ‘Phenomenology of Perception’ on the chalk board. Every few moments, he paused to bounce the boy or let the toddler “help” with the lesson by scribbling on the bottom corner of the chalk board.
Levi felt like he could breathe again for the first time in years. He picked up his pen and began to write.