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Chapter Text

The frigid air was seeping into Lance’s very core.  His toes were so cold they were now numb and the shivering of his thin body is what raised him from his fitful slumber.  As he opened his eyes, the first rays of the morning sun were shining in his face, but the cold and hunger kept him from wanting to move out of the way.  

“Get up you lazy piece of shit” Lance heard from behind him, fear coursing through his body as he tensed up, not wanting to roll over to see the face that he despises. That voice and the person attached to it had haunted his nightmares and most of his waking moments for years now, causing him constant torment.   Lance heard a small growl of disapproval and impatience that caused him to jump to his feet, causing his head to spin rapidly.  

“Yes Alpha.”  Lance manages to croak out, bowing his head to the man even though his head is still swirling.  Sendak is not an Alpha.  Their “pack” if you can call this situation a pack is made up almost entirely of betas, not an alpha in sight.  He prefers to be called alpha because he is the biggest and strongest in the pack and was therefore the leader of this ragtag group.  Hearing that word being referred to him sends a cocky zing throughout his body so therefore Lance tries to call him that as much as possible.  He can’t remember the last time he has said the man’s actual name when talking to him, for a pleased and happy Sendak is typically a kinder Sendak. 

“Go with the betas and help them collect food.  The women have nothing to cook.” Sendak continued with a disgusted look on his face as he looked down at Lance.  “Yes, Alpha'' is Lance’s only reply once again.  With that he takes his leave, trying to keep himself collected as he passes by that man’s body.  As Lance looks around the disheveled camp he can see just how badly they are managing.  

This “pack” of theirs consists of not even a full ten houses now but somehow there are still about 100 people living in less than ideal conditions.  Their clothes have long since been worn and tattered, having not been washed or changed in at least a couple of years, each person only has one set after all and they’d rather not try and brave these conditions naked to find a stream to clean them in.  They need those streams to remain clean for drinking water.  The people themselves have also not been bathed in ages, the grime and dirt from living in the cold mountains is caked in layers at this point.  Even the women have not been able to properly wash the blood from their periods off of their legs in a long time.  They are only allowed a small amount of water to rinse it off, not nearly enough to fully clean it.  

Their beds have long since been torn apart, and their blankets also tattered, making it hard to keep warm during the cold winter months that they are in right now.  Most of them sleep on the dirt floors of the houses, they have been falling apart for awhile now, the floors had been raided when society first fell and again, most of the windows are somewhat boarded up as the sides of the houses are struggling to stay standing.  

Walking outside of the houses, the stench of everyone’s waste fills Lance’s nostrils, making it hard for him to remain composed.  Surprisingly, Lance could see a few of the children running around but all he could hear was the constant crying of the few babies they had in their pack, always hungry and needing more warmth.  Everyone was hungry, all the time.  They couldn’t seem to find enough food around these mountains to keep the hundreds of people fed enough to maintain weight, and they couldn’t grow anything in these frigid conditions.  This pack was a desolate waste of a pack, the “leaders” doing a shit job of managing the amount of people they were supposed to look after.  It was hell living here but it was better than trying to rough it out in the woods alone.  The vampires that dwelled in these parts would ensure that you would be their next meal if you didn’t stay in a pack.  

Lance realized that he had stopped running, standing in a daze looking at the little ones in the camp that he wished he could help.  He shook his head, realizing that is not a good thought to dwell on as it just causes him to become even more depressed than he already was, and continued running towards the outskirts of their dwelling to find the hunting party he was supposed to be with.  As he spotted a familiar head of silver hair he picked up the pace a little bit more.  “Hey Lotor, Sendak sent me over to you, I’m supposed to be helping the hunting party out today.”  Lance said cautiously.  Although Lotor was one of the few good betas in charge of their pack you can never be too weary of how these men will react around the others.  

Lotor simply nodded in response, sparing Lance a small upturn of the corner of his mouth before glancing back at the rest of the betas in the group, “Alright, let's head out then.”  One of the other men, Throk, opens up their meager gate and closes it when the team of five step through.  Their community only has one gate that allows access in or out of the grounds, with walls surrounding the rest in a big circle.  Flimsy tin panels were placed all throughout the walls and barbed wire coils sat atop the fencing.  Even though it was bare bones and looked like it could fall over at any point, it still proved to be effective against the vampire attacks, none of them managing to get past the walls.  

Lance would later find out that the true reason their base was never attacked was because of the sorry state of the people who lived in it, not healthy enough to be worth the trouble of attacking.  Looking at the barbed wire causes Lance to shudder in terror at the memories of being hooked onto the barbed wire and left to hang there for days when he would do something to displease the “alphas” somehow.  They thought that he would make good vampire bait, but again, he was too dirty and malnourished to become their next meal.  Still though, he has the scars on his back to remind him of the days as any movement would cause the steel to bury itself deeper into his flesh.

Lance tried to push past the memory as the team started to move, the gate finally being opened.  The second his foot steps past the threshold of the base, Lance is on edge.  He hasn’t been outside of the compound in months.  Every noise he hears or smell he doesn’t recognize grabs his focus.  The vampires might be asleep right now but you never know when you might accidentally step into their coven, not to mention the fact other shifters might be around these parts as well.  Mix in the dangerous wildlife such as bears or cougars that still live in these mountains as well, and it will put any person not used to surviving the wild on edge.

“This way” Lotor called out, giving a signal to the group to crouch down and be quiet for now.  He began to sniff the air, catching the scent of some sort of game they can hunt.  As they followed Lotor the shrubs and trees that they had been walking through opened up to crumbling skyscrapers of a city that once stood proudly, old Seattle.  The scene before him caused Lance to be overcome with sadness, remembering what it used to be like to live in the bustling city before the apocalypse began.  It all started with a team of scientists focused on studying vampires as a way to find the key to immortality for humans.  What they instead created was an extremely volatile virus that thrived in oxygen rich conditions and could travel through the air that would kill a human in less than 1 hour after exposure.  It was incredibly difficult to contain and extremely complex to find a cure to, causing the human race to become extinct in less than two years.  It really is ironic that a drug that was supposed to preserve humans and cause them to live forever caused their end.  

Surprisingly, shifters such as werewolves like Lance and his pack, to bird shifters, were completely unaffected.  The same thing happened to all other paranormal beings that had been living in the shadows of society for millenia now, such as vampires, or selkies, or even mermaids and sirens.  Unfortunately though, any half-breeds of paranormal and human were affected as well, causing many families to lose most of their people since many paranormal beings had found ways to live with humans.  There weren’t a lot of pure-blooded paranormals left, causing the population of Earth that was around 9 billion to dwindle down to only 2 billion.  While that might sound like a lot of people still, it was hard for them to maintain society how it used to be, as most of them before the apocalypse lived sheltered lives with humble jobs.  Humanity did not like paranormal beings, believing them to be myths of the old days as their ancestors had forced everyone to go into hiding so it was hard for any of them to keep society maintained.  

The population of people was stretched out too thin throughout all the countries on Earth and the sudden extinction of humans caused a lot of bloodshed as everyone turned on each other now that they no longer had a common enemy to be angry at.  These wars caused the vampires to rise as the “leaders” of the world, but really they just wanted everyone else to live in their blood farms or risk it out in the wild with the feral vampires that would attack anyone they could so long as they were hungry.  Hence why Lance lived in his shitty pack instead of trying to find other shelter, for he had joined this group shortly after the fall when the wars began.  At the time they had alphas in the pack to fight and protect them, but they all slowly died in the many attacks they had to fend off.  

Suddenly the group in front of him abruptly stopped, causing Lance to startle out of his thoughts of the past as he tried not to bump into the man he was following.  He followed everyone’s gaze were Lotor was pointing and saw a group of plump brown hares grazing on the patch of grass in front of them.  Their next target.  Lance’s fangs started to lower in his mouth as saliva pooled and his stomach rumbled as he imagined what it would be like to sink his teeth into the flesh of one of them.  He hadn’t eaten in a few days so it couldn’t be helped.  It had been even longer since he had proper protein.  The group silently fell into formation as they slowly circled the group of hares to surround them.  Lance remained where he was as he had never been out hunting with the betas and didn’t know the tactics.  

Lotor held up his hand and Lance realized that it was the signal to hold until the time was right.  Then his hand swooped downwards and that is when everyone, including Lance charged.  Even though he hadn’t moved the others made sure to cover the other areas so Lance still had a job to do and thankfully he knew the signal to strike.  Unfortunately though, Lance was too weak to move at his full speed and the two hares that had ran in his direction just barely managed to slip through his hands.  He saw one small hare that was still standing in the middle of their circle, confused in the flurry of the fight and lunged for it.  Lance managed to grab it by the ear and clung to it desperately, trying to pull it in closer to his body.  The hare kept trying to wriggle its way free from his grasp and was almost successful when Lance got distracted by the sound of necks snapping as he saw Lotor kill the two hares he had grabbed.  That sound caused the terrors of the beginning times to rush back, when he had heard too many people around him be killed in the wars.  

Lance struggled to hold on, however, knowing he would be the one who received an awful beating if he came back to camp with nothing.  Lotor graciously came over and helped to kill the small hare in Lance’s grasp for him.  Lance looked around and saw that the other three betas had all managed to kill one hare each, meaning that their group would at least be bringing back six hares for their people to eat.  Lance was grateful even if he was saddened at the loss of the hares’ lives, but he knew that some of the people would be eating tonight because of their efforts.  He would have to wait and see if he would be one of the lucky ones to eat.  

“Let’s head out further and see if there’s anything bigger that we can hunt.  Lance, bring these back to the camp.” Lotor said, tossing the six hares to Lance who struggled to hold all of them.  “Are you sure?” Lance replied, knowing that if the team didn’t manage to find anything else to hunt, they would be in deep trouble with Sendak.  Lance would potentially get all the praise for killing the hares while they would get no sympathy, even though Lance didn’t actually kill any of the small animals he now held.  

Lotor gave him a soft half smile, knowing that this would help Lance to potentially be on Sendak’s good side for once, “Yeah, go.  Let Sendak know that we will be back in a few hours, hopefully with a bigger kill.”  Lance beamed back at Lotor, eternally grateful to Lotor for helping him out.  He wished he could get to know the man better, but Sendak doesn’t allow Lance to mingle and get cozy with the other betas in the camp, Lance is his prize for being leader and he is too possessive of his trophy to let the men who could challenge him interact.  Even though Sendak despises Lance he wants Lance to only be around him.  Maybe Lance could sneak out at night and wake Lotor up to give his thanks.  Do whatever he wishes in return to repay back his debt.  

Lance hadn’t felt kindness directed towards him in so long he didn’t know that others saw him as an actual person anymore.  That act alone caused him to have a bit more pep in his step as he walked back to the compound, glancing back at the group one more time with a soft smile still lingering on his face.  As he got closer to the base however Lance was filled with more dread as he contemplated even returning.  He was tired of being treated like shit in that place, too miserable to want to go back.  I could run away and hope that there’s another werewolf pack close by that could take me in before the vampires or other paranormal find me.  Lance quickly lost hope that anyone could save him and realized it was better to live in a hell that you knew rather than live in constant fear of an attack trying to survive on his own.  

Still didn’t mean that Lance would drag out his return, trying to take in the beautiful landscape around him before returning back.  He couldn’t appreciate it fully with the fear of something attacking him, but he liked this escape from his normal routine even if it was only for a little bit.  Lance’s stomach tightened as he saw the tin walls of their base, he was so sick of living with no control over his life in constant filth and hunger, and cold.  What if I ate one of these, would anyone notice? Would the betas rat me out when they got to camp and learned that their kill included one less than they thought? He decided it wasn’t worth it and continued forward. 

As an omega Lance knew that he would be lucky if he got any of the meat from the hares currently in his grasp.  Omega are considered worthless to society, the scum of shifters all around.  They are at the lowest point of the social hierarchy that still exists even during the apocalypse apparently.  This is especially true of the pack Lance is a part of.  He’s the only omega left in the entire camp, the rest having died from neglect, starvation, or other means as the “alphas” of the pack considered them the worst scum that could grace their presence.  Even though Lance himself is currently starving and would likely have no remedy for it even though he helped hunt he was alive and he should be eternally grateful for that.  He somehow managed to not piss off his leaders too much with his existence that he can still experience the dreary state they are all in and while that might not sound like a life worth living for, for Lance it is everything.  

When the apocalypse hit Lance was just a freshman in college, managing to get a full ride scholarship through his accomplishments in swimming and surf competitions back home in Cuba that he was able to get into the University of Washington in Seattle.  He was majoring in immunology with a minor in marine biology.  He wanted to work back home in Cuba after he graduated and help determine and potentially cure why rare diseases happen in marine life.  He was especially excited to try and help rare and exotic marine animals that aren’t well documented to determine how their illnesses differ from other marine life (he most definitely didn’t want to just study mermaids and figure out if they can get both marine animal diseases along with human diseases, no sir).  

Because of this, Lance has no idea if his family is alive or where they might be, but he continues to hold out hope that one day they will walk right through those barely holding on gates of their camp and come rescue him from this place.  That or maybe he might be able to get out of here one day and search for them himself.  So no, Lance cannot die.  No matter how miserable he might be, even to the point of wishing he wouldn’t wake up from his slumber the next day, he must stay alive.

So many people had died before him, especially omegas.  They were the ones first targeted when his own kind turned on each other in the beginning of the destruction of humanity, what they all refer to as the pack wars.  As stated before, all different kinds of paranormals turned on each other in the fight for resources and most of them had their own little civil wars amongst each other as the vampires kept rising to the top.  For werewolves, there was the pack wars.  So many people were killed during this time.  On top of inter-personal turmoil amongst the same beings, other paranormal attacked each other as well.  Fox-shifters attacked werewolves, bird shifters attacked the strix, and so forth.  There was just so much needless bloodshed on top of the destruction and annihilation of all humans.  

As Lance began to depress himself even further with the thoughts about all the fighting at the beginning he realized that he had made it to the gates outside of their camp.  They easily opened up for him as he walked inside with the hunting party’s kill; hopefully they’ll have more when the rest return.  The guards who opened the gates stared down heavily at the six hares in his grasp.  Lance instinctively held them closer to his chest, knowing how hungry they all were.  As they began to crowd around him and fearing that they might attack him for the hares he immediately ran to their so-called leader, the one he slept with; Sendak.  

Sendak had by far the best house out of everyone in their camp, perks of weaseling your way to the top when the strong die out.  While the slanted rooftop had shingles sliding off of it, the roof itself barely hanging onto the frame of the house, and most of the windows were cracked, at least it still had a roof and windows.  Everyone else could only manage boards over where there used to be windows, a couple of them lucky enough to have some remaining as well.  And the walls of his house were actually pretty sturdy.  This house was the best at keeping the awful elements and conditions from outside where it should remain, outside.  It was a stark contrast to the “house” Lance lived in that didn’t even have any boards covering the windows and many of his walls had long since fallen down.  

As Lance got close to the door of Sendak’s house it opened, revealing the beta standing leaning against the doorway with his arms crossed, looking down at Lance disapprovingly and hungrily as he saw some fresh killed game.  He looked up at Lance with a scowl that seemed to permanently reside on his face, at least when he was in the vicinity of Lance.  “Is this all you got?” Sendak simply asked, a small growl slipping into his tone as he spat out the sentence.  The more Lance sat their thinking of a reply that wouldn’t piss of the man, the angrier the man got, a snarl taking place of the scowl when Lance finally replied, “Lotor told me to bring these back for you.  The other betas and himself are traveling out a little bit further to find bigger game to hunt.  Where would you like me to put these, Alpha?”  Dear god, what else do I have to do to please this man?  This is probably the best thing I’ve done yet since living here in his eyes.  Sendak licked his lips at that, his nostrils flaring and his scent flooding Lance with that putrid acidic taste that Lance cannot stand.  “Take them to the women in the kitchen.  They’re cooking dinner tonight.  Once done return here, I’ve found something more delectable standing in front of me.”  He finished, arousal joining in on that awful scent of his as he looked on Lance with an even hungrier look than before.  

Of course the image of actually eating meat again has riled him up.  For someone who despises omegas and believes they are worse than garbage, he sure likes to bed with them Lance thought, trying not to think too much about how disgusting it will be to have to sleep with him again.  Lance tries to stay in a perfect zone of Sendak’s patience and view on Lance.  Tries to make him happy enough that he won’t beat or torture Lance, but just angry and disgusted enough that he doesn’t realize that omegas used to be stereotyped for being ridiculously good in bed as that’s their biggest contribution to werewolves, being incredibly fertile and all.  Enough that Sendak forgets who his best sex toy is.  Apparently Lance went above and beyond today to get him this riled up.

As bile starts to rise up Lance’s throat the more he thinks about having to go anywhere near this man’s dick, he quickly swallows it back down and blinks away the tears threatening to spill over his eyes as he responds with a simple, “Yes, Alpha” with a nod to accompany it.  Apparently Lance hadn’t been as good at schooling his expression as he thought as he hears the deep rumble of the growl rip from Sendak’s throat as he pins Lance in place with that glare of his.  Lance manages to bow his head in submission and begins to walk in the direction of their “kitchen” to give the hares to the women in charge of cooking tonight.  

All Lance could think about was trying to gauge how angry he had made Sendak just now.  Worried about how rough he’s going to be towards him and how much he’s going to punish Lance for that exchange.  One of the oldest women in the kitchen area, which is really just a few pots resting on their makeshift fire pits, grabs the hares from him as the rest look at them with hunger in their eyes.  “Tell Sendak that these will be ready in an hour.” she replies to Lance after setting them down to be properly prepared for cooking.  “I will, thank you.” is Lance’s response as he drags his feet back to Sendak’s house.  He did everything he could to delay the inevitable reality that he would have to come in contact with the disgusting appendage of his abuser, walking slowly, taking the smallest route, trying to chat with anyone that past him, even stopping to talk to the children for a bit, but no one wanted to interact with him.  They knew how angry Sendak would be if he found out they’ve been talking to his prize.  

Sendak was waiting in the doorway once again, this time his pants and shirt were already unbuttoned, revealing his disgusting chest and stomach, covered from the top of his collarbones down to the waistline of his briefs that still managed to be fairly clean, in hair.  Hair that had matted a long time ago without proper hygiene.  His stomach had also taken on quite the beer belly in recent years which did not aid in finding any attraction in the man.  While food was low, there was always an abundance to make alcohol and their leader definitely indulged in more than his fair share of that alcohol.  What used to be a fit chiseled warrior was now a disgusting mess of a man. 

“Get in here, NOW.”  he yelled at Lance as he stared down at the young 23 year old.  Lance tried to calm his anxious body down, shaking from the desire to do anything but go inside this man’s house.  He slowly walked up the few stairs leading inside on shaky legs trying to calm himself down, it will only be more unpleasant the more worked up he is.  He’s done this a hundred times now, he should be used to it by now.  As Lance entered the small bedroom of Sendak’s home he saw the man standing there waiting for him with a glare on his face.  Lance stopped in the middle of the doorway, unsure where Sendak wanted him.  This hesitation caused Sendak to grab him by his hair and pull him the rest of the way into the room.

“Where do you want me Alpha?” Lance asked, trying to not upset the man more than he already has.  “On your knees” Sendak replied, his hand still in Lance’s hair as he forcefully pushed Lance down where he wanted him.  Lance begrudgingly realized that Sendak wants a blowjob from him.  God this is the worst position he could have wanted me in.  I might throw up all over his dick if that disgusting thing has to go inside my mouth Lance thought.  Lance saw his hairy hands unzip his pants the rest of the way as he unceremoniously pulled his semi-hard cock out of his pants.  Lance threw up in his mouth a little bit as he tried to swallow it back down.  Yep, I’m definitely going to throw up on his dick.  It’s okay Lance, you’ve got this.  You’re the best charmer around.  Time to pick yourself up now to get this over with, then you can be alone and throw up or whatever else you need to do to feel better about this.  Let’s get to work rocking his socks off.   With a new found determination, Lance began to move his head towards the tip of Sendak’s cock.  It was a short, maybe about 3 or 4 inches and thick.  Also uncut.  Lance didn’t necessarily mind his dick, it was more the person attached to it that made him sick.  

Let’s just think of something else.  Think of Cuba.  Varadero.  Family.  Mami’s cooking.  As Lance thought more about living with his family before everything went to shit, Sendak shuffled forward causing Lance to inch a little closer towards the man, a little further on his dick.  This close the stench of his dirty groin became unbearable and drew Lance out of his happy memories.  His eyes began to water at the smell emanating from the man towering above him.  As Lance begins to gag he tries to back away for a bit to catch his breath, trying to focus back on the tip to please the man for the time being, but Sendak grabs a tighter hold on his hair and forces him to stay where he is, even pushing Lance a little closer to his pubic hair.  

Lance knows where this is going when Sendak gets in this mood so he decides to just relax his jaw and give up trying to wow this man with his skills and simply let him take control and fuck his face.  Sendak gives a pleased chortle at that and even manages a small smirk at Lance’s submissiveness.  He then moves the hand that had otherwise been holding onto the base of his cock to join the other in Lance’s hair, readying himself to begin a brutal pace inside Lance’s mouth.  Just as he pulls back to piston his hips forwards there are shouts outside the house, “Alpha! Please help us!” “We’re going to die! Alpha, please come!”  Sendak staggers back away from Lance, dropping his hands out of his hair as he runs to the window, dick swinging about in the air as it remains outside of his pants.

“Oh fuck! Get up! Now!” he yells at Lance as he hastily shoves his now flaccid cock back into his pants and zips them up.  He then runs right past Lance and out the front door.  Lance sits there in both relief and shock for a moment before he regains his bearings and rises to his feet.  Turning around to go outside the door causes Lance to stagger a little as he is still fighting exhaustion and hunger but he manages to step out onto the small steps that lead to the house.  As he gets outside he becomes frozen in terror.

Not only can Lance hear all of the blood curdling screams of the people around the camp but the amount of distressed and terrified scents wafting off of everyone hangs in the air like a heavy fog.  It's so much that Lance can hardly stand and breathe properly.  “They’re coming! Hurry!  Help protect us!” is one cry that cuts through the rest in Lance’s brain.  Who’s coming? Is it finally the vampires who have found us and decided to descend on us to feed? Could it be other shifters?? Other werewolves??  

Although they have been attacked many times before in different raids Lance is still struggling with it.  Omegas are much more sensitive to the scents around them than everyone else and all of their distress is making it hard to think.  He’s able to clear his head just enough to slip back into fight mode that he’s been in countless times before.  He begins to scout his surroundings for good hiding places, he knows he’s too weak right now to actually take anyone on.  He then looks at the walls where everyone is screaming from, near the main entrance, but he isn’t able to see anyone or anything that is attacking people right now.  He then looks to Sendak, their leader, who for the first time since Lance found this camp sees he has a genuine look of terror on his face.  Lance didn’t know that this man could feel fear before now.

Finally, as Lance looks back at the wall where the fight must be happening he sees someone move out of the way of the circle around the commotion and sees what is happening.  There, he sees Lotor stumble as a huge gash has ripped through his chest, causing blood to flow all over the ground.  Lance moves on instinct at that point, rushing towards him and is able to grab and support him over his shoulders as he rushes to the house that is their makeshift hospital.

“Don’t worry, I’m sure the women in the hospital can help you.  Just hang on!” Lance says to Lotor, trying to do anything to keep him conscious.  “They’re coming, they’re coming, they’re…” is all Lotor can say, repeating it over and over like a mantra.  That’s when Lance hears the roar behind him, causes ice to rush through his veins, all the hairs on his body standing up in pure fear.  But he manages to push on, not looking back as he maintains his focus of getting Lotor treated.

But that sound is unmistakable, an alpha roar, from a true alpha wolf.  Another wolf pack was here.  But again, Lance maintained focus, as an omega werewolf, he was the only one out of the three dynamics that couldn’t shift.  If the other werewolves have shifted into their wolf form than he served no purpose in this fight.  They’d tear him apart in no time if he tried to rush in to help.  No, he’s better off running to the hospital to try and save Lotor.  He’s better off trying to keep their pack alive.

Lance chances on look back after he had made it a considerable distance away from the commotion and sees the betas, even his wannabe alpha leader shift into wolves as well.  Good, hopefully they can hold the pack off long enough for me to get to help Lance thought.  He managed to get to the hospital without trouble and rushes towards the only doctor left in their camp.  He sees that the children and the women looking after them have all packed into this building to hide from the intruders.  “I need help.  Lotor has been hit across his chest.  A deep and large gash is there.”  

Most of the people in the building ignored him, some even somehow giving him nasty looks even in a time of duress, but thankfully Narti stepped forward.  She had been a surgeon before the apocalypse.  “Set him down here and then get out.  We don’t need more people in the way taking up space.  Find somewhere you can be of use.”  Lance looked at her in shock, unable to form a response as she coldly shoved him out of the way.  He saw the look of disgust on her face, the hatred in her eyes.  Knew that it was simply because of his secondary gender.  Omegas a useless, no need for one to take up space in here.  There’s no way he could be helpful in sewing this man up.  

At that Lance rushed out of the building to go hide somewhere until the fight was over.  He couldn’t take it anymore, sick of this treatment he’s felt all his life simply because of what he was.  At that moment he couldn’t care what was happening outside to the others fighting the intruding pack, couldn’t care whether Lotor would make it or not.  He could only simply slip into despair at his life, how shitty it was.

Chapter Text

As the body of what is assumed to be the leader of this pack judging on how the others protected him until they could no longer, the group of hostile wolves transformed back into their human forms.  

“Is that really all of them? Only betas in charge of this camp, not a single alpha in sight?” one of the wolves asked the rest of the group.

“Seems like it.  Maybe we shouldn’t have followed that hunting party back, they didn’t seem to actually be a threat to our camp.  Look at them, they’re all withering away, if we’d have left them alone they probably wouldn’t have survived more than a month longer.  I kinda feel bad for them now.”

“You did what you had to Keith.  You were trying to protect your pack,  your camp, your family .  You made a split second decision to attack.  No one could blame you for taking out a rival group that is close to our camp. I’m sure most of us here would have made the same decision, which is why we decided to follow you.  Now let’s try and find the survivors and see what they want to do, how does that sound?”  The first werewolf explained, placing a hand on the shoulder of the werewolf now known as Keith to comfort him.

“Hah, yeah you’re right, thanks Shiro.” Keith responded.  “Let’s go get a count of all the remaining members of this crappy camp.” he then commanded the rest of the group.

As the group walked around the camp they saw just how bad off these people really were.  They made their way through the “houses” of the camp but found no one in there.  Eventually they made it to the assumed infirmary where they saw around 80 women and children huddled together to try and protect themselves.  It now made sense why the group couldn’t find anyone hiding in the houses since it seemed like everyone had taken shelter in the makeshift infirmary during the fight.  There were around 15 children of varying ages in the group and about 10 elderly women.  The rest of the people there seemed to be all women ranging from age 20 to around 50 years from what Keith could tell.

Keith had stepped back while he let his other pack members approach the group in a calm manner and try to talk to them.  He hasn’t always been that good at interacting with people and has been told he can come across as quite scary.  As he observed the infirmary here he noticed one of the beta men he fought was lying down being treated with a dirty rag.  He seems to still be clinging to life somehow.  Keith thought about whether he should let this man live or take care of him too but ultimately decided to help him.  If he had managed to survive the attack this long he might make a good ally. 

Keith sighed deeply before speaking up a little too loudly compared to the hushed, soothing tones of his packmates.  “Acxa, go help treat him.” he said with a small nod of his head towards the man in question.

“Understood sir,” she replied.  As she bent down with a clean gauze to clean out the wound, the woman trying to treat him jumped in front of Lotor’s body, “Please don’t hurt him.  He might be a little brainwashed from those other beta men but he really is a good guy deep down.”

“I know.  That’s why I’m helping to treat him.  You’re doing much worse by cleaning his wound with that filth covered rag.  Please move so I can do my job.” Acxa replied in a monotone voice.

“You’re going to help someone that was your enemy just a few minutes ago?” the woman continued, lowering her arms slightly; her resolve lessening.  

At that the man known as Shiro stood up from the group of alpha women he was talking to, “It may be surprising to you, but we don’t like to kill people if possible.  Your men were actually the ones who attacked us first, we were simply trying to negotiate a conversation with the leader of this camp to assess the risk you might have posed to us.  They wouldn’t accept peaceful talks so when they charged at us we had no choice but to attack.”

“Really? Well I honestly wouldn’t be surprised with those idiot men.  So you really didn’t mean to harm us if they had been smart about dealing with an outsider pack?”

“Yes, we would not have attacked if they had agreed to speak with us.  And we don’t intend to harm you now.” Shiro replied.  This seems to lower the women’s guard enough to let Acxa through to treat Lotor.

Shiro continued to address her and the rest of the group once he saw that the woman was willing to let Acxa help.

“That’s what we have been trying to discuss with the rest of the group here as to what your next steps plan to be.  As we see it you have three options, one, you decide to stay alone in this camp here with whoever else chooses to stay and try and survive without any of the men left.  Two, you leave this camp on your own or with others to try and seek out a new camp or place to survive.  Or three, you come back to our camp to live there.  We are prepared to bring all of you back if you choose to do so.  We will provide lodging and food, a safe space to live in conditions that I’m sure are far better than what you have been living in for some time now.  But if you decide to come with us there are a few things to know.”  Shiro paused for a while to make sure those options had settled a little in their minds and that they were paying attention to his next words.

“First, the trip from this camp to ours is around half a day’s trip away.  We have a few horses and carriages but not enough to fit all of you so some of you will need to walk that distance.  We have enough rations and water to help you guys gain the strength to make the journey but the terrain is fairly tough so it will be a somewhat difficult journey.  Second, our camp is like a family to us so if that dynamic does not fit with your ideals you will not be accepted into the camp.  Finally, you will have to help out in our camp, there are many different jobs that you can take up and we can have our people help train you if there are ones that interest you but you don’t know how to do yet, but everyone must do something in order to keep the camp sustained.  We can help figure those specifics out later once you get settled but this won’t be a camp you can just hang out in.  Your children have smaller, easy tasks they can do but there are many little things that need to be done so if they are old enough they will need to help too.  Again, we can figure this out later but it is important you know these things before wasting our time joining us to our camp only to find out that our living situation does not fit your lifestyle.”

After his long speech the room fell quiet except for a few groans and wheezes from Lotor every once in a while.  As they were all mulling his words over to decide the best course of action Keith spoke up again.

“You do not have to decide right now.  We will set up a small campsite in the middle of your settlement for two hours to rest and recharge.  After that we will be leaving back to our camp so you will need to choose what your plan is then.”

With that Keith turned around and left the building towards his horse to set up a few tents, the rest of his pack following behind.  As he began walking he noticed a putrid scent coming from one of the houses that was nearby, and that was saying something considering how awful the camp smelled in general.  He started following the smell once he noticed it was the acidic scent of fear and anxiety, realizing it must be another member of the camp that they missed in their first walkthrough to find survivors.  He can understand how they could have missed this person once he got close enough to pinpoint the spot, it was a poorly concealed hole in the ground with a few boards piled on top.  He thinks it must have been a part of the deck of this house but is now completely fallen apart.  It was easy to miss that someone was in the hole though if you weren’t looking for them.

Keith approached the hole cautiously like one would to a scared animal and slowly lifted off the boards to reveal a bony, pale figure that looked close to being on death’s door.  One sniff of the air made Keith realize the person in the hole was an omega, a male omega.  This shocked him as they have become incredibly rare since they were targeted in the pack wars.  His shock caused him to halt in removing the boards just long enough for the figure to lunge at him.  Keith just let it happen as he realized this person isn’t much of a threat in the state he’s in.  

The small omega pinned Keith to the ground, straddling his hips and pinning his arms above his head before leaning down to growl defensively in Keith’s face.  Keith became frozen in place as he got a good look at the offender’s face when he was busy looking at Keith like he was ready to tear his throat apart.  This was the most beautiful face he had ever seen even with the sunken cheeks and hollow eyes.  When Keith gazed into the eyes of this man he became lost in them, he felt like he was diving head first into the ocean of the deep blue irises and couldn’t find a way to get to shore.  You would think this would cause feelings of panic to arise, feeling like he was drowning in that vast ocean, but instead Keith felt a sense of calm wash over him, like he knew the ocean would take care to keep him afloat; allowing him to remain in her waters for eternity.  

That was until Keith was rudely snapped out of this illusion with a swift punch to his cheek.  

He realized that the man no longer had his arms pinned but instead was starting to wail on him.  Some of the members of Keith’s pack saw the scuffle taking place and rushed over to help Keith out but he simply held up his hand to tell them to stop; to let him handle it.  They stopped immediately, simply watching the interaction take place.  The person was weak with starvation so the punches hurt but didn’t cause any lasting trauma.  Keith would most likely have a bruise to his cheek later but he simply laid there and let them take their anger and distress from their invasion into the camp.  Keith figured they probably hated him for killing the betas of the camp and thought it was best that they let out their emotions now rather than bottling it inside.

After a solid minute into the assault, the punches began to slow down and Keith could now hear sobs escaping their lips and felt salty tears fall into his face.  Keith didn’t know how to handle a crying omega so he continued to lay there in shock like an idiot.  He thought about trying to comfort the man but comforting people has never been Keith’s strong suit.  When he raised one of his hands up to rub their shoulder he heard the faintest of sounds come out of their mouth before realizing that they were saying a sentence.

“Please don’t kill me, I’ll do anything.  Please don’t leave me here.”

Keith then got his shit together and gave one of his patented awkward shoulder pats, “Ah, it's okay, um do-don’t cry, we’ll take care of you?”  Keith realized that he was going to do everything in his power to make sure this man came back with them and he could take care of them for the rest of his life.  As the person continued to softly cry Keith realized they were still straddling his hips and were actually fully sitting on top of him now.  “Uhh, would you, mind getting off of me?” he tried saying gently but could tell his irritation had slipped through slightly when the boy flinched.  

“Oh, yeah, sorry.” he responded as he tried to contain his crying into small sniffles. 

“Oh, come on Keith!  I knew your people skills were bad but that was unbearable.”  one of Keith’s pack members said as they walked up to the two, deciding to put Keith out of his misery.  “Hey there!  The name’s Matt, how about you come over to our little camp to settle down for a bit?”  the pack mate then said to the figure that was still somewhat crying, extending his hand out for them to grab.  They accepted it shakily and Matt led them over to the little campsite the pack had set up.  Matt handed him a cup of water and a few pieces of the jerky they had packed while Keith just sat up, continuing to sit in the spot he was attacked in.  Shiro walked over and gave his signature dad shoulder pat, that is much better than Keith’s attempts to emulate and tried to comfort Keith in his failure to interact with a stranger, “It’s okay Keith, better luck next time.  Though it does seem pretty on brand for you to get attacked while just trying to help someone out.” he said with a slight chuckle.

Keith just continued to pout with a sigh, making sure to deliberately look away from Shiro.  After a few moments Shiro helped Keith to his feet and the two walked over to the little camp as well to settle a bit before the journey back to their compound.  Keith kept his arms crossed the entire short walk over and sat down forcefully and kept his arms crossed as he continued to pout when he saw how the omega was already opening up to Matt as they began to actually have a small conversation.  Why can’t I talk to people that easily? How am I supposed to eventually take over the pack if I can’t comfort one survivor from a newly liberated camp?

“Lance”

Keith was snapped out of his thoughts as he heard the man give Matt his name.  So his name is Lance? It's a nice name. Keith thought as a small blush rose to his cheeks that he firmly ignored.  

“Well Lance, do you have anything you want to grab from the camp before we get ready to set off? I think we’ll be leaving in a short while now, right Keith?” Matt stated and looked towards Keith for confirmation.

“Uh, right.  Let’s start packing up camp and get ready to set off back home.  Acxa, Shiro, do you two mind letting the rest of the survivors know to get ready to leave in a few?” Keith responded, standing up and brushing the dirt off of his pants.  “Yes sir” “Roger that” the two replied respectively.  Keith saw Lance jump up to his feet and rush off to one of the houses that seemed to be the best in shape compared to the rest.  Well hopefully he had some better living conditions than the others. Keith also then had a small group go gather the bodies of the betas they had killed earlier and transport them a ways away from the camp with one of the smaller carts.  Since some of the people from the camp had expressed their desire to stay in the camp Keith figured they should try and deter vampires from attacking by moving the dead bodies to lure them in an opposite direction.  After he gave the group instructions on how to catch up to them on the road once their task was complete he decided to go make sure all the wagons and horses were ready for the journey. 

By the time everything was set Keith looked around to see who all was coming with their pack back to their compound and was shocked at the amount of people there were.  He noticed that all of the children and their parents were coming with, as well as eight of the elderly women.  Keith overheard one of them explain that two of the women were in too poor of health to make the journey and decided to live out their remaining days in the camp with the other people staying behind.  Overall, there were about 48 people out of the 80 from the camp that had decided to join Keith’s pack.  He figured that was a pretty good turnout.  Keith also saw two of the women carrying the wounded man they called Lotor on a makeshift stretcher.  With one nod of his head to a pack mate they saw the two women and ran over to help guide them to a wagon to put Lotor in for the journey.  Keith saw that about 10 of the women were quite elderly and directed them to take a seat in two of the three carriages they had.  This is going to be quite a slow journey he realized with how many people will be walking and began thinking of safe zones they can rest in for the night as this trip is most likely turning into a whole day’s journey rather than half a day.  And of course of the people joining them, there was Lance.

Keith was shocked to see him run directly up to him.  Once Lance got in front of Keith however, he became quite sheepish, looking down at the ground and cradling what looked to be a small backpack against his chest, locked safely in his arms.  “Uh, I just wanted to say sorry for attacking you earlier.  I was worried you were going to attack me so I kind of lost it there.  Sorry if I hurt you or anything.”

This caused a blush to rise to Keith’s cheeks, not used to someone actually apologizing to him.  “Oh! Uh, it's okay.  You didn’t hurt me, don’t worry.” 

“Wow, okay, rude.  You could’ve said I hurt you just a little bit or I wounded your pride.  At least make it seem like I was a threat when I went feral there.” Lance responded sassily.  

“How are you upset by that? Look at you, you couldn’t hurt a fly in your condition.” Keith snapped, starting to get riled up by this cocky attitude this dude just seemed to exude.

“It’s not my fault I’m like this.” Lance whispered under his breath.  Keith just barely picked up what he said, “Huh?” he so eloquently responded.

Instead of responding Lance went back to his loud, boisterous attitude, “Well are we getting this show on the road or what?” Weird, I wonder what that’s about.  He actually seemed to be somewhat happy to leave this place.  I mean it makes sense with the state of things but still, I wonder how he was treated here.

“Yes, let’s go!  Everyone got everything they need? Said your goodbyes?” Keith said loudly, directing it to the entire group.

A resounding chorus of “Yes sir!” rang out from Keith’s pack.  A few quiet, yeah’s and yes’ were heard from the group joining their pack, with nods from the remaining people joining.  

And with that they set out on their journey towards their new home.

Chapter Text

It’s been a few hours into their journey and Lance has been freaking. Out. Ever since he attacked the leader of the pack that invaded their camp before realizing he wasn’t fighting back Lance has gone through the entire spectrum of emotions.  Embarrassment because the entire crowd of this new pack saw him go crazy on their leader and just watched it happen.  Fear that they were actually going to attack him or better yet feed him to the wolves once they started their journey back home and realized he was an omega or that he was too annoying.  Confusion because these people are acting really nice towards the people they attacked not too long ago.  Relief that the betas of their pack, and better yet Sendak, seem to be gone.  Lance assumes they were killed based on the sheer power everyone in this pack seems to emit.  He still hasn’t evaluated how he quite feels about that yet but it's been pushed into the vault in the back of his mind for later.

Lance has felt more emotions in the span of an hour with this new group than he has in years.  He’s still weary of them and their intentions, finding it so odd how nice they are so he has decided to put the old razzle dazzle to good use and play along with them for now.  If he can make them believe that he’s charming and nice then maybe he can figure out what they’re about and create an exit plan if he needs to run away during this trip.  One big thing that is worrying Lance is how none of the people in the group have mentioned his secondary gender once.  He’s been so used to hearing how much scum male omegas are from his current pack, been used to the abuse because of it.  He can still remember how awful he was treated because of it when he was trying to find a place to survive before he arrived at this camp.  How people thought he was useless because of it; weak because of it.  How just because he was an omega they thought he couldn’t hold his own and help the camp out.  How he was nothing more than a pretty thing for an alpha to own.

Lance doesn’t remember this much prejudice towards male omegas before the apocalypse but he also didn’t have much interaction with other supernatural beings before everything went down.  Before coming to university Lance only knew his family and a group of werecats down the street.  Once he got to university he saw all kinds of different beings that he didn’t even know existed but he never got the chance to really hang out with any of them.  All of the people in his classes were mostly humans or a few different types of cryptids like mermaids or selkies.  He didn’t know any werewolves that he regularly hanged with.  There was a group of alpha frat bros that would always loiter in the school’s main grounds that would try to pick up chicks or try and convince other bros to join their fraternity.  They were mostly obnoxious but they were no different from the human frat boys, just maybe a bit rowdier and more eager to show off their masculine alpha energy.  But they never commented on Lance and his secondary gender, just tried to convince him to join the frat.  So Lance didn’t know how toxic many of the beliefs werewolves held were in terms of secondary genders.  Especially the older generations of werewolves.  His family had raised him to be very open minded but apparently many were stuck in the old ways.  

So Lance was curious if these new people were actually open minded about secondary genders or if they had an ulterior motive for being nice to Lance.  He decided to play it safe and get them to like him or better yet fall in love with him so that he could figure out their motives and bail if needed.  For now he’ll stick with them cause staying with a pack like this that seems to be healthy and strong is a better chance for survival than him trying to brave it in the wild by himself.  He had been on such a tight leash with Sendak that before the hunt earlier that day, he hadn’t ventured outside the walls of the camp in many months.  Therefore he doesn’t really know the lay of the land anymore, the location of hostile supernaturals; how to survive on his own.  Plus, he was super malnourished and wearing tattered clothes.  He would be in trouble in a few days if he tried to brave it on his own right away.

So far this new pack that randomly stumbled upon their camp seem like nice people.  He has actually been getting along quite nicely with the one named Matt.  The guy was funny and seems to be genuinely caring.  The one named Shiro he can already tell is the dad friend of the group.  Acxa is the one Lance can’t really get a read on.  She hasn’t really said a word to him, just sometimes stares at him for a long time from a distance.  He also can’t get a good read on her smell, she doesn’t really seem like a were at all, but she had to be right?  He knew the leader and a few others were a werewolf and werewolves tend to stick together.  But come to think of it Matt didn’t really smell like a werewolf either.  But it was also hard in general to pick out the scents of this group anyways.  There was a thick stench in the air from Lance and the others who decided to tag along with this new pack.  It's been so long since any of them have been able to properly shower so their stench permeated Lance’s senses.  But one person’s scent that has been able to easily penetrate through the grime is their leader.

And his scent, wow.  Lance had never really taken too much stock in scents before the downfall of society.  Again, he didn’t really know many of his own kind and humans all have very muted scents, so Lance didn’t really believe in all the teachings he learned growing up that omegas and alphas will have scents to draw each other in.  He certainly wasn’t drawn in by the scent of the frat boy alphas; they always had a thick stench of beer to mask their true scents.  So hearing the love story of his parents, how they caught a whiff of each other through the thick crowds of their freshman orientation and were immediately drawn towards each other sounded like an exaggerated fairy tale that all couples tell when describing the first time they met each other.  Surely it wasn’t their scent of all things that drew them together, maybe they locked eyes or his mom was her loud, boisterous self and that drew his dad in.  But smelling their leader he now knew what his parents were talking about.

Lance had heard the other packmates call him Keith, the dumb idiot still hadn’t properly introduced himself to Lance.  Keith’s scent was otherworldly to Lance.  It was so intoxicating and enticing to him that it was hard to not gravitate toward the man every second.  It was hard to describe his scent but it was a smoky heat, like the smell of smoke when sitting next to a campfire.  But it was mixed with the salty smell of the ocean in a way that you would think would be gross but just continues to draw Lance it.  It’s warm and inviting to him, reminding him of his home he has not been to in so long.  Of the late nights down at the beach when his family would sit around a campfire in the sand playing songs and sharing stories as the children ran around until they grew tired.  It was infuriating Lance because he was supposed to be sizing this guy up, seeing if he was a threat or just another shitty leader who thinks highly of himself.  Instead Lance and his stupid omega were just wanting to fall in love with him already.  Like c’mon man, we don’t even really know him.

As the journey continued though, Lance did start to learn more about Keith.  And man, this leader is something else.  Lance definitely had many emotions towards him and the list grew as time went on.  He was confused why the guy didn’t try to defend himself from Lance’s attack even if it was weak.  Then annoyed with how rude the guy was when Lance was feeling upset and vulnerable.  But there was also an aspect of excitement and joy that Lance thinks he feels while arguing with this man.  It feels like he’s back in college arguing with his friends about silly things that didn’t even matter.  He feels like he could comfortably slip into a friendship with this guy and that scares him.  Lance has been too used to trusting no one and relying only on himself for so long since the apocalypse started to believe that Keith and his pack could be genuinely good people.

So for now Lance is being nice and trying to remain on this pack’s good side.  One thing that is still confusing Lance now that he has been hanging around this group for the past couple of hours as they walk to their destination is how he can’t scent everyone in the group.  Over the last couple of hours in the fresh open air as they get further from their old camp Lance has been able to tune out the stench of his people.  So he would have thought he’d be able to smell this new pack better, but some of their scents he still can’t make out.  Some of them seem to not have a secondary gender at all.  Even with betas you can still smell that unique scent that makes that person them, although it is a lot more minute than alphas or omegas.  But for Acxa and Matt he still can’t smell what their secondary gender is at all.  He can still differentiate them by smell alone but it doesn’t have the distinct smell that comes from shifters like werewolves.  They seem almost human in the way they smell but they still don’t seem quite human in their smell either.  Matt almost has this scent to him that Lance can only describe as grief.  It doesn’t smell like he is grieving, but more just the smell of grief in general.  Like how a funeral smells.  But there’s also something brighter in there as well that Lance can’t pick out.  Shiro also has a weird smell to him.  Lance can tell that he has the distinct smell of an alpha werewolf but there’s something off about it as well.  It also has that distinct tang to it that Acxa does as well.  Their weird scents are keeping Lance on edge, making him uncomfortable since it's something unknown and different and it's driving him crazy.

The rest of Lance’s pack doesn’t seem bothered with it or they haven’t noticed.  He just can’t figure it out, can’t place what it is.  It seems weird that a werewolf pack would have so many people that don’t seem to have a secondary gender.  It’s basically unheard of for were-creatures to not develop a secondary gender, so to have this many people in one group without one is very suspicious.  It sets Lance off edge and the more he thinks about it the more he feels like he’s smelled a scent like Acxa’s before.  Once very early on when their camp was first attacked by vampires.  They have a very distinct tang of blood to their scent.  But surely that can’t be it?

Later that day when the group decides to take shelter for the night in an area that has apparently been designated a safe zone (Lance didn’t even know that there were designated safe zones) he finally decides to bring up the thing that has bothered him since they met.  

“Why can’t I smell many of you?”  He directs it to the entire pack but looks pointedly at Matt, Shiro, and Acxa. 

“Huh, what are you talking about? Oh! Do you mean why don’t they have secondary genders?” Keith responds.

“Yeah, like Shiro I can pick up his scent but something else is mixed in it.  I can’t figure it out.  I thought maybe it was just the smell of our camp mixing in but I’ve gone nose blind to those scents months ago.” Lance replies with confusion lacing his face.  

“Oh, that’s cause they don’t have secondary genders.  You do know that not every supernatural being has secondary genders right?” Keith says, tilting his head to the side like Lance was insane for not knowing that basic information.

“Of course, but this is a werewolf pack, therefore shouldn’t everyone have secondary genders?” Lance snaps back.

Keith looks around his pack members in confusion before saying incredulously and slowly, “Who said we were a werewolf pack?”

That caused one of Lance’s pack mates to perk up, “We saw you all shift when you attacked us! What do you mean you’re not a werewolf pack??”

At that Shiro decided to intervene before this became even more confusing, “You all saw Keith shift in the fight but ran away after that.  Keith isn’t being quite correct.  We are originally a werewolf pack, and the wolves are the ones who currently run the group but we aren’t solely a werewolf pack.  Keith’s family is very accepting of any shifters seeking refuge.  The reason my scent smells weird to you Lance is because I’m a half breed.  My father was a werewolf that is related to Keith’s family but my mother is a vampire.”

“WHAT! You’re a vampire!? Oh my god you’re not actually taking us to your camp are you, you’re going to feed us to your coven!” one of Lance’s pack mates cried.  This caused hysteria to spread across the entire pack as many of them began to scramble away from Keith’s pack. 

Lance was actually pretty calm compared to everyone else, simply thinking through the new information.  Oh that’s what that smell is mixed in with his alpha scent.  The iron like smell of blood.  Keith’s pack simply looked at each other at a loss for how to calm everyone down.

“Did we not explain this to you all? I thought you already knew?” Keith asked.

“You absolutely did not! How would we have known if we didn’t see the fight happen?? I don’t know if I want to follow you anymore! I think I can have better chances out in the wild.” someone from Lance’s pack exclaimed.  Many of the other members of the pack seemed to agree.  

Another member piped up, “Wait so what are the other members that we can’t scent then?”

“Uh, there’s many different types here but most of them are vampires or rare and obscure cryptids that don’t have a family to rely on.  We actually have many fey creatures here.” Keith supplied.

“What are those two? They seem to be one of your generals or something right?” someone asked, referring to Acxa and Matt.

“Acxa is a born vampire and Matt is actually, umm, believe it or not a fallen angel?” Keith tried to say without laughing.  No one ever believes Matt’s origin.  

“WHAT! You had a vampire treat a bleeding, dying man??? I knew not to trust her, how could you have been so stupid? She’s probably going to kill him tonight when we all go to sleep!” the lady who shielded Lotor from Acxa earlier that day said.

That caused Acxa to address the group then, “No you’re the one who’s stupid.  You lot really don't know much about the world around you.  Not all vampires are complete savages.  How do you think we were able to blend into human society for so many years? As long as we are well fed blood doesn’t actually appeal to us.  It’s only when we let ourselves starve for days that we become uncontrollable around the sight of blood.  It’s stupid stereotypes like that that can cause harm to vampires and other people.  It’s been the cause of a lot of unnecessary wars for thousands of years.  Oh, and by the way in case you have a bunch of other myths in your heads we can be sustained just fine on animal blood” 

That caused the group to quiet down for a few before someone had another opinion, “Then how come at the beginning of the new age vampire covens were crowding everyone into blood camps.”

“Not every vampire was responsible for those camps.  A good majority of us continued to just live our lives the same way we did before the extinction of humans, living off of willing participants and animals.  The vampires that you are thinking of are from one coven that we don’t associate with.  They call themselves the Galra, a group of crazy religious vampires who worship their coven leader and believe that he is the first vampire.  Their leader and followers believe that all other supernatural beings are below vampires and should bow down to them.  The coven I used to belong to was working on taking down this organization before I decided to join Keith’s pack.  This just goes to show how sheltered you lot have been in your sad excuse for a camp.  Now, if you still have a problem with vampires, now's your chance to leave because we have a whole lot more back in our settlement.”

Everyone was silent after Acxa’s explanation.  Simply mulling over the facts, trying to figure out if it is true.  Many of the pack members realized that they were probably telling the truth as they had joined Sendak’s pack shortly after the apocalypse had happened.  They realized that all of their knowledge of what was happening outside of the camp was based on what Sendak told them.  Some of the members had sought refuge with Sendak because they were almost forced into one of the blood camps, which caused them to assume that everywhere had blood camps popping up.  They also thought that the vampires had become the ruling members of the new society.  Realization hit that all of these thoughts were because Sendak had told them that their assumptions were reality.  But how could they know if these occurrences were happening worldwide.  Sendak certainly wouldn’t have known, for he also stayed isolated in the camp, but when you become desperate enough to join Sendak’s camp, you’ll be eager to believe everything he says is true. 

After a while some of the members started talking to each other again, trying to learn if their memories were fabricated from Sendak or if it was common knowledge.  Over time most of them came to the agreement that they truly did not know what was actually occurring in the world, they had been isolated in their crappy camp for far too long.  They never left for fear of vampire attacks and believed that whatever knowledge Sendak was feeding them was given through outsider information.  It never occurred to them that he might have been making up lies to keep them in fear so they would never leave.  Through their discussions most members had decided to hear this new group out, to believe that society has been able to come together over time.  It wasn’t too far-fetched of an idea, after all before things went to shit cryptids and supernatural beings had worked fairly well together so that they could be kept out of the radar of humans.

Throughout this whole exchange Lance had stayed quiet, simply observing the chaos.  Lance had always been taught by his mami to not be biased towards others, especially those that were special compared to humans.  She believed that every type of cryptid has their own roses and thorns, therefore it’s not fair to judge the group as a whole because of one potentially bad apple.  So, even though Sendak had told them the horrors of vampires and that they were coming any day to knock down the camp’s walls and attack, he chose to believe that there was a bigger reason as to why they hadn’t been attacked.  They could have easily taken him as easy bait when Sendak would hang him up on the camp walls but Lance had never even heard any approach him.  He chooses to believe that they didn’t attack him out of kindness, rather than that he looked like a disgusting meal.

Lance could see how Acxa’s words affected the group and could tell how many had resigned in believing them.  He also observed Keith’s pack, can they even call themselves a pack? He saw when Shiro had sighed in relief as he saw the group calm.  Saw how Acxa became less defensive as time wore on and she could see they were actually analyzing her words instead of continuing to be defensive.  He could see how Matt was rather indifferent to the whole exchange.  Could see the other members lowering their fighting stances.  But it was Keith that confused him.  The entire time he was staring at Lance.  He could feel the heat of the man’s stare bore into him as Lance watched the rest of the camp.  For some reason Keith’s sight never left his form.  It worried Lance, as he wondered if Keith was figuring out his second gender and was going to throw him out of the group come morning.  Lance just couldn’t read his expression or scent.  Lance continued to try and mull over Keith’s odd behavior as the other members were still trying to figure out their feelings towards vampires.

“I’m sorry but I just can’t live side by side with vampires.  They almost killed me!  If it weren’t for Sendak I would’ve been dead by their hands!” 

“And that is fair of you to have that opinion towards vampires.  We aren’t forcing you to join our camp, simply offering our hands.  You are welcome to stay the night here in the safe zone with us and go your separate ways come morning, or you can try and brave it outside the safe zone if you aren’t comfortable spending one night with vampires.  You are free to make your choice but my group will be getting ready for sleep now to prepare for the rest of the journey ahead.” Shiro had finally spoken up again.  

Lance had counted about 15 people who nodded their heads in confirmation to the former pack mate.  After Shiro’s little speech, eight people promptly stood up to leave.  

Shiro saw this and began stumbling to get up, “At least let us give you some provisions so you can survive the night and whatever journey you will be going on now!”  He tried but as he reached a hand out one of the people slapped it away.

“We don’t want any help from your filthy kind.  It’s bad enough that we drank some of your water and ate your food today.  Just leave us alone.”

And with that the eight people were gone.  

Silence filled the camp, all eyes trained on the spot where the group had left.  

The rest of the group that decided they couldn’t stand vampires huddled together in a group off to the side but made no move to leave.

Lance could see some members give a quick prayer before starting to get ready for bed, Keith’s pack already turning to slumber as well.  This group had gotten up to try and hand the elderly of the group some spare sleeping bags and fur skins that they kept on the wagons so they could sleep more soundly.  Surprisingly, even the members that wanted to leave had graciously taken at least a sheet of cloth to cover themselves with.  After a few Keith had walked up to Lance and offered him a sleeping bag as well.  The item was outstretched to Lance while Keith was looking in any other direction, but at Lance. 

“Here” was all he said.

“Thank you, but surely there are other members that deserve this more than me.” Lance replied but reached for the bag anyways; looking forward to potentially not shivering the night away and actually getting real, deep sleep for the first time in what had to be years.

“It’s fine, we’ve already given though who requested something.  You are so skinny you probably don’t retain any heat.” and with that Keith walked away.

Lance shook his head in disbelief in this man.  He really was bad at interacting with others.  As he began to lay the sleeping bag out on the ground to crawl into, Lance paused.  As he looked at the bag he realized it was different from the ones that had been handed out to the others.  While theirs were all a muted forest green color, this one was a bright, cherry red.  As Lance stared bewildered at the object he heard someone come up behind him.

“You know, that’s Keith’s personal sleeping bag.  It’s not just any old bag we had lying around, he gave it to you for a reason.” Lance realized it was Matt, especially with how he had sing-songed the last part of his statement.  Before Lance could respond he was also gone.  Lance decided not to think too deeply about it yet, still worried about the implications it could mean.  He decided to instead quickly open up the bag, jump in, and close his eyes.

Lance would be getting the best sleep he’s had in a long time, for once not shivering all his calories away.

 --------------------------------------

When the morning sun rose Lance woke rested and with some actual energy in his step.  Now the half day’s journey ahead of him didn’t seem so daunting.  He had woken up once that night, his body too used to poor sleep and looked over at the group that had graciously taken them in.  He had seen that Keith ended up sleeping on the bare ground without any protection to the elements.  Lance felt bad for him, he had taken the man’s sleeping bag afterall.  Maybe he could have offered they shared or something.  But looking at the man he saw that he wasn’t shivering in the slightest.  Did this man just radiate heat or something??

Unfortunately, when morning came Keith was up before Lance so he was unsure if he had slept as well as Lance thought.  As Lance rose up from the bag, he saw that some rations were being cooked over the fire that went all night long.  He saw his other pack mates also looking better rested.  Even Lotor, who had been moaning quite frequently in the night, seemed to be doing better.  

The group of dissenters were offered a quick snack from Keith’s pack and even accepted some provisions to take with them before they said their goodbyes to those they cared about before leaving in some direction.  They had taken a map from Shiro and decided on some sort of direction to travel.  Lance realized he probably wouldn’t see any of them ever again, but he also didn’t have any attachments to them.  

And like that, the original group of 48 turned into 33 in a matter of a night.  Hopefully this wouldn’t be a continued trend once they got to the camp.

--------------------------------

The rest of the travel had been rather uneventful, but in Lance’s head, it was a circus.  As the trip wore on and they got closer to the camp, Lance got more nervous.  He realized that Keith must feel at least some levels of attraction for Lance in order for him to be so interested in him.  It had been Lance’s goal at first to charm him just so that they wouldn’t throw him away, but now he’s realizing another kind of fate might be in store.  He became worried that he would have to play a similar role as to what he did in Sendak’s camp.  He’s not sure yet if they have learned his secondary gender yet; if it's easy to pick out from the stench of the group.  They haven’t said anything yet so he’s hopeful that they don’t know but if they have a way of bathing at the camp then they definitely will know then.  But with this, comes a sense of dread at thinking he’ll have to play his role once again.

If he’ll have to be Keith’s plaything to fuck whenever he feels the need.  He is the alpha leader after all and Sendak chose Lance to be his plaything because of the same dynamic.  Shiro had said something about them having to work to earn their keep in the camp and maybe this was Lance’s way.  He got nervous to do so because unlike Sendak, Lance actually felt attraction towards Keith.  He was also well cleaned.  So, Lance wouldn’t totally despise having to bed the leader to stay in the group.  But he also was so tired of men just having their way with him, he was an educated young man before things went down after all, he’d like to use his brains for once too.

But he was an omega man and it’d been drilled in him that they have no place in the new society of the world.  He was scum who should just offer his body because that’s the one thing he was made for.  So Lance became nervous at having to perform for a new guy, hoping Keith would like what he was putting down, but Lance would do anything to stay in this camp.  He couldn’t make it out on his own, at least not until he built muscle back up.

As the trip wore on, Lance was quiet, still lost in his spiraling thoughts.  As they got closer he became increasingly nauseous.

When Lance heard the sound of a horn blast as the group slowed down to towering, strong gates, nothing like the sad gates of their previous camp, Lance ran over to a nearby tree and promptly threw up.