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Chapter Text

It was when Ukyou chided Gen over the cell phone that Senku had a bad feeling about all of this, yet he kept pushing forward with his plans involving the mentalist regardless because it was too late to make last minute changes in their quest to beat the Tsukasa Empire once and for all. 

It flashed in his mind nonstop as red flags went up instantly the moment the young alpha man had chided the omega, “Why are you back here, Gen? You know it’s not safe for you as a male omega in this empire. Why are you risking everything—your freedom, your livelihood—for this one person?” 

He had said this after calling out the omega on his impression of Lilian, but it wasn’t said out of a tone of derision or disdain. No, it was spoken out of genuine worry. The moment Senku heard it in his voice, he knew there were questions that needed answering, but he didn’t ever think Tsukasa would make his new empire a place where omegas could be discriminated against given two factors: his little sister was an omega and, in their world, discriminative laws, practices, as well as views of omegas were enough to ruin an alpha’s life. They could stand to lose their job, their livelihood, their home, and their place in society if they dared to have any such discrimination against omegas. 

In their old world, omegas were seen as equals and alphas were expected by society to treat them with respect. There were laws in place to protect them and their rights world over with countries lacking those laws facing economic sanctions as well as international isolation. 

For Tsukasa to not carry this mindset from their culture into the stone world felt odd to Senku. Knowing Tsukasa as well as he does, he knows that the man is not a bad guy nor is he a sexist. Why would Ukyou be lecturing Gen right now if things weren’t terrible for omegas back in the Tsukasa Empire?

Gen’s response had been, “Because I know Senku will be able to give me a world where I can have my cola as often as I please.” 

“…Cola? There has to be more to this than just cola. There’s no other reason for you to risk everything like this. You know I can only keep you safe for so long before things boil over. I don’t care if you’re needed in a plan—you shouldn’t be back here.” 

Ukyou had every right to be exaggerated with Gen, even Senku felt this way at times with him despite being able to make accurate guesses about him from time to time. That being said, maybe it was Senku’s alpha instinct kicking in, but something about this entire conversation was making a side of himself he was fighting hard to contain slowly seep out as he took the phone away from Gen to speak to Ukyou himself, because no way in hell is he allowing anyone to give a love confession to Gen. 

Of course, this has nothing to do with jealousy—no, that’s too irrational. It’s all done to keep Gen focused on the task at hand, not whatever it was he had endured in the past which could trigger him. 

Senku was fine with this. He will speak to Gen about his time in the Tsukasa Empire later. They have a good enough relationship to where he knows the omega will speak to him about it on his own time when the time is right.

The conversation had gone by great, though Ukyou had asked one request of Gen, one that had his instincts flaring, “Gen, if you are going to participate in this war…then I don’t want you to be alone for one moment. Stay by my side so I can keep you safe.” 

Senku had answered in Gen’s place, not caring for the longing in Ukyou’s tone or the croon he was hearing as he spoke, “No can do. The mentalist is a vital part of this plan. He doesn’t need to be babied by anyone because he will be in the safest position in the entire battle. He will be safe, that much I can promise you.” 

Ukyou had been hesitant and yet he agreed in the end, “Alright, I’ll trust you with him…keep him safe for me and I will be fine.” 

After their conversation ended, Senku decided to explore this little thought bursting in his head at Ukyou and Gen’s interactions, “I never knew you had so many admirers, mentalist. Who would have ever thought Tsukasa would revive a fanboy of yours?” 

To this, Gen chuckled, “Oh Senku, jealously curious, are we? How eet-sway! I know Ukyou may come off as a fanboy of mine, but he honestly isn’t. He’s a good guy who kept one too many alphas away from me, that’s all.” 

“Why would I be jealously curious of anyone? I was wondering because I don’t want any romantic feelings to interfere with the success of our war.” Senku scoffed at the idea and yet he couldn’t find any satisfaction in what Gen told him. 

No, all he had felt then was nothing but a surge of instinct attempting to overcome him to the poorly answer he had received. 

Though he does wonder, “Who were these one too many alphas?” 

Gen pauses, wondering if it is better to tell the truth to Senku or lie for the sake of their kingdom’s success against the Tsukasa Empire. All he could come up with was to say, “If I were to say, I’m positive it would only upset you. Are you sure you’d want to know the truth?” 

“I can handle it, mentalist.” 

The male omega is a bit hesitant when admitting, “The Tsukasa Empire wasn’t too good for omegas… Sure, Tsukasa himself and Ukyou held the same views the majority in our old world had about omegas and their rights, but other alphas who were revived didn’t. Maybe they had in the past because of societal pressure to conform or because they were desperate to get a mate—either way, when certain revived alphas woke up in the stone world, they decided that omega rights didn’t matter anymore. As azy-cray as it sounds, these alphas firmly believed omegas were meant to be barefoot, pregnant, and obedient to their alphas at all times, though they had a gender based hierarchy system in place: omega women were treated as being more equal to alphas because of the nine months a pregnancy from them takes, but omega men like myself…we had a standard put to us: either we be useful or we get pregnant by an alpha since our pregnancies only take four to five months to complete.” 

Hearing this shocks Senku, but then again, he supposes a situation like Gen’s was always going to be inevitable in the stone world. Many who had darker views and desires will use this reset of the planet as a way to forgo the rights put in place to protect others from their discrimination. 

He does have to ask him, “How were omega women treated as more equal to alphas when the alphas thought they had to be barefoot, pregnant, and obedient to their alphas?” 

“Simple: there were enough omega women who had objected to this standard because birthing for an omega woman in the stone world without modern medicine is far too dangerous and comes with too many complications. The mother and pup could die, they could miscarry, or the pup could be born with a devastating condition that will kill them later on in a world without medical science. Because of this, omega women do not have to prove their worth outside of the pup rearing game like omega men do and they are far more protected since the alphas know they can’t stand to lose the majority of the omega population.” Gen then looks to the ground, “It sounds ad-bay, but as an omega man, my pregnancy would go far quicker, smoother, and without the many risks of miscarriage, deformities, or birthing complications that are far more common in pregnancy for omega women. Omega women have a lot more to worry about in our world with pregnancy whereas omega men never had to in our world and the stone world.” 

“It doesn’t sound bad; it sounds like you know the facts and how everything is stacked against you as an omega man being around revived sexists. Tell me, are there any alphas we will have to keep an eye on during this battle? I need to know in case if any have the intent to kidnap you like Ukyou almost did to Chrome.”

Right—he would have to know this, even though recalling it is enough to make Gen feel sick to his stomach in pure disgust, “Well, not many alpha men were interested in me…the omega women Tsukasa had revived were all drop dead gorgeous tens, so I had no room to orry-way about that. That is, until Hyouga showed interest in me—he’s really the only one who ever did. If it weren’t for Ukyou, I’m convinced he would have tried to approach me during my heat.”

Senku feels on edge to hear this and yet, he doesn’t change his plans. It’s too late to send Gen back to the village and they need him to drive the steam gorilla tank. If Gen isn’t around, they will lose this war.

It still doesn’t explain why he has a nagging feeling about Ukyou and his intentions in showing so much concern for Gen’s safety.

When they meet up with the rest of their group, Senku takes Chrome aside, hoping to figure out what exactly Ukyou could want with Gen. Of course, this has nothing to do with the fact he is an alpha who showed such great care and concern for him nor does it have to do with that burning feeling in his chest wanting to implode. No, it’s to see if Ukyou truly is as trustworthy as he makes himself out to be.

Chrome—being one of the villagers—does not have a secondary gender. It appears that over time, they evolved to have none and as such, certain things about the old world confuse the villagers whenever things such as omegas, alphas, heats, ruts, and instincts are brought up. With this fact in mind, Chrome is the one who understands the explanations given about secondary genders far better than the rest of the villagers. Because of this Senku feels as though he can go to him about this without there being too many questions needed to be asked on Chrome’s end.

The brunette young man asked him, “What is going on, Senku? Is there something urgent you need to speak to me about?”

“Actually, there is. You said Gen, Magma, and yourself managed to escape Ukyou after you guys got the cellphone set up at my ‘grave’. Mind telling me if anything strange happened at all?”

Senku isn’t one to beat around the bush. Chrome always figured Senku would have guessed that he would have figured out there was something more to his tale of escape than what he had said.

He feels guilty for not telling him sooner, but he was afraid of scaring Gen with what he had been told and he didn’t want that to happen, “There is something strange that happened when we escaped. Gen managed to get away first, with Magma following second, and I was the one who was stopped by Ukyou. I know I told everyone he let me go after I tricked him, but that’s not what actually happened. He caught me and I was released by him because he had asked me something pretty big.”

“What was it?”

Chrome hesitates, giving Senku a condition to hear the secret, “If I tell you, you cannot tell Gen, okay? I don’t want him to be scared off or anything.”

Senku can do this since he has a feeling it wouldn’t scare Gen off to begin with and knowing Chrome, he’ll blab it out in due time, “He caught me, and he asked me if Gen was marked or not. I said he wasn’t, then he asked if Gen was in danger or not, I told him he was perfectly safe and that there were no alphas with bad intentions towards him in the Kingdom of Science. Then he let me go but only if I could promise to keep Gen away from here. Luckily, we haven’t ran into him once, so he thinks I kept my promise to him.”

It’s a very paraphrased, streamlined version of what happened that night. In truth, it was a bit more complicated than that, particularly since he could tell Ukyou was specifically concerned with the issue of Gen’s safety to a degree he hadn’t ever seen coming.

It had been nightfall when they encountered Ukyou. They had been too loud when carrying out this mission and as such, they had the military man on their backs. While Gen and Magma did manage to escape, Chrome was caught by the archer with the impressively sharp hearing.

At first, he had thought it was over for him and he’d be taken as a hostage.

What happened instead was something very different, “I smelled Gen’s scent earlier and I can smell it on you now. Don’t lie to me about anything and you will be released to go back to your friends.”

He doesn’t seem hostile… If he wants answers to his questions, then Chrome will answer them in order to avoid being taken hostage, “I won’t, but what do you want to ask me? What could I know that you want to know?”

The young man sighs deeply, finally letting it out as his hold on Chrome slacks in the slightest bit, “…Gen. I need to ask you questions about Gen because he is a male omega in the stone world where omega rights are no longer a guaranteed thing. I know he is with you and he has probably been staying with you at your home ever since I last saw him here in the empire. Answer me some questions about Gen and I will release you.”

“What questions could you want answered about Gen? Just because my people don’t have secondary genders doesn’t mean I don’t know about what alphas will do to omegas in this world if given the chance. How do I know you won’t use this information to harm him?”

His grip tightens and his jaws clenches when explaining to him, “I would never harm Gen. There are many things I am willing to do for this empire but harming Gen has never been an option for me. Gen is someone very special to me, so please be honest and answer my questions…or else I will be forced to take you hostage.”

Chrome has a feeling Ukyou may care for Gen more than he is letting on, but he doesn’t comment on it. Instead, he asks, “What do you want to know? Tell me and I’ll answer you honestly.”

“Has Gen been marked by anyone at all? Is he still single or is he courting with someone?”

“No, Gen is still single, he hasn’t courted with anyone, and he hasn’t been marked anyone.”

Now he really believes Ukyou cares a lot more about Gen than what he is letting on. Who actually asks questions like this about a person they are curious on if they don’t like them as more than friends or acquaintances?

“Alright: is Gen safe in your village or is he in danger of falling prey to any predatory alpha? I know Hyouga went back there and he made a comment about seeing Gen to others around here…did he get close to Gen at all? Did he try to mark him?”

“He is safe in our village because there are no predatory alphas there. Hyouga coming over was a one time thing and even if he did come back, we would be more than prepared to take him on. We have weapons of science on our side—I highly doubt Hyouga can outlast attacks from them.”

His grip loosens upon hearing this and he asks him his final question, “Did he get close to Gen at all when he was there? Did he try to mark him?”

“He didn’t, though I’m not sure why you would think he would try that… Did he do something to Gen back when he was in the Tsukasa Empire?” Chrome is only asking because his interest is piqued, but then Ukyou says, “That’s something for only Gen to tell if he chooses to.”

He gives Chrome a piece of material used to make clothes, and tells him, “Give this to Gen for me. I know he is with your group and I want him to get this right away. Can you do that for me?”

“I can.” Chrome is then released with a warning from Ukyou, “Keep him out of whatever plan it is you have. I don’t want him ever coming back here, not until I can be sure this place will be safe for him to be here one day. Promise me that and you’ll be a free man.”

“I promise, Gen will not come back here, and I will give him this gift from you.”

“Good.” Ukyou says out of pure relief, “Now leave before anyone else arrives.”

He does, but it’s not without thinking the alpha could be as in love with Gen as he is with Ruri.

Senku won’t tell him about the conversation with Ukyou until later on. For now, he will store this information in his mind and save it for when they do have to drive the tank to where the miracle cave is located.

Chrome does comment to Senku, “I think he is in love with Gen…but I have no other proof of it, really. Ukyou seems to care about Gen in a way that reminds me of how I care about Ruri. I don’t know what happened between them, but I wouldn’t be shocked if he does love Gen.”

Senku doesn’t say anything to this other than, “Thanks for the info, I’ll make the most of it that I can. Come on, I have something to announce to everyone.”

The alpha informs everyone of Ukyou being on their side by explaining the conversation they had over the cellphone. The entire time, he keeps his gaze on Chrome and Gen to gauge their reactions to the news. Gen had been pretty nonchalant about it whereas Chrome’s eyes widened and he asked Gen, “Wait—he knows you are here and he’s not mad at me? He’s still willing to help us?”

“He is, but I don’t know why he’d be mad at you for anything. Mind telling me why you think he would be, Chrome?”

The fledgling scientist answers him sheepishly, “Okay, so I wasn’t being completely honest because I didn’t know what you thought of him… The truth is Ukyou caught me and he asked me questions relating to you and your safety with us. I told him you were safe, unmarked, and I promised him I wouldn’t bring you back here. I also told him I’d give you this when I was released by him.”

He took it the piece of material that Chrome had stuffed down his shirt, opening it, and reading it for himself—not without Senku’s watchful eye on him, of course.

Because Senku is not jealously curious of anything Ukyou would have to say to Gen, nor does he care if it’s anything romantic at all. He wants to know if Ukyou has an ulterior motive, that’s it, nothing more, nothing less.

Gen’s eyes widened for a moment, then they returned to normal size as he cleared his throat, “Ah…Ukyou certainly is a hopeless omantic-ray, but I would have to speak to him about this in person. There’s no actual way he meant any of what was written here.”

This piqued the scientist's interest enough to head over to Gen's side to see what message he had left for him. On the piece of cloth, there was something written in charcoal that caught Senku’s eyes and made that awful feeling in his chest come back stronger than it was before.

Chapter Text

“What does it say, Senku?” Chrome’s question snaps him out of his trance and leaves him rolling his eyes, “It’s irrelevant romance mumbo-jumbo. Nothing to be excited about or interested in. I’m amazed Gen even wasted his time reading it.”

“Romance? Ooh, Gen, read it for us!” Suika begged, with Ruri calmly joining in, “Gen, a man from the enemy camp is in love with you? Wow, that is so strange and yet…exciting. I’d love to hear what was written on the letter.”

Ginrou, not being one to miss out on anything, isn’t really interested in the romance as he is in what life was like in the Tsukasa Empire, “It would be good for us to know what the enemy’s intentions were with you long before that phone call was made. Also, you never did tell us about what life was like over there in the Tsukasa Empire…don’t we deserve to hear it?”

Despite not wanting that dreaded saccharine garbage read out loud, Senku cannot deny his own curiosity on the issue. Gen never brought up what his life was like in the Tsukasa Empire—all he ever did was give information on their strongest alphas and omegas as well as how the place was ran from a more political/social point of view. Nowhere did he ever reveal what exactly it was he lived through over there before coming to the Kingdom of Science.

As much as he loathes to admit, he wonders if Ukyou was onto something when he voiced his disbelief at Gen only joining his forces for the cola. Now he wonders if there is more to it that he could never pry out of the sneaky mentalist, who seemed to use information on others as a way to avoid having to speak about himself, “I agree with Ginrou here: we deserve to hear what life was like in the Tsukasa Empire for you in case if Ukyou’s warnings are based off of fact and not simple misunderstanding.”

Gen believes Senku could be jealous of Ukyou, but he’s not going to tease him about it here—that’d be too cruel to do, even for him. For now, he may as well as tell them what Ukyou had written down in charcoal on the cloth before explaining his backstory at the empire, “I’ll start with the juicy stuff first—we all love a good tory-say, don’t we?”

He clears his throat, and begins to read the message, “Gen, it’s been far too long. All the time I wonder and worry over your safety, the clock in my mind ticking down to when Tsukasa plans to strike at the village you are believed to be staying at. My mind always races through all the possible scenarios, but none are as sorrowful than the thought that your death could become reality should you stay there. Despite this, what horrifies me more yet is the possibility of Hyouga coming back one of these days, with you as his mate… I vowed to protect you from such a scenario happening and I intend to keep it. I know this is informal, but Gen I want you to be my mate, so you and I can start over away from the violence and death of war. If I manage to steal some miracle fluid, we can revive enough people to have our own civilization, one not tainted with hate and supremacist ideals. Meet me at the beach at sundown after receiving this letter so we may speak more on the issue at hand, Ukyou.”

At the end of the reading, Gen shrugs his shoulders carelessly, “Like I said, he’s a hopeless romantic.”

At first everyone is silent, that is, until Suika cries, “How sweet! He’s in love with you, Gen!”

“She’s right, that man loves you and he deserves to have a response from you! Just think, the day after you managed to escape with Chrome and Magma, he was waiting there at the beach at sundown for him to finally confess his love for you before being married and starting a civilization of your own, only for you to never appear—it’s so tragic yet romantic all at once.” Ruri responds right after Suika, “You need to make it up to him and explain why you weren’t there! Don’t let his beautifully written letter be in vain.”

Senku huffs to this and no, it’s not because he’s jealous. It’s because he’s deeply annoyed with how they are taking it, “Which beach was he supposed to meet him at? On what day was he supposed to meet up with him? How was he intending to get a hold of the miracle fluid without drawing Tsukasa’s suspicions all while creating a civilization of their own in a new location? If he wanted Gen to agree with it on the spot, he should have been more specific instead of being vague and speaking in flowery language in some pathetic attempt to appeal to his omega instincts.”

“Senku, shame on you! That man is in love with him and writes up such a beautiful letter for him only for you to disgrace it? How dare you! Do you not care about what Ukyou feels?” Kokuyo snapped at the young man.

Senku didn’t need to defend himself on this end since Gen came back with his own idea to the letter, “Ukyou knows me well enough to know I wouldn’t have met with him at the beach like that. He knows what I would have done instead is leave him a letter in reply to which he would reply back with more specifics or his true motive behind what the letter entailed. It’s why I can’t believe he actually meant any of this—it’d be too azy-cray if he did.”

He gains a look that is in between mild fondness and disappointment when going further, “Ukyou was the only good part about the Tsukasa Empire during my time there. Everything else wasn’t too great and I wound up finding myself wanting better very early on.”

All listen in with interested ears as Gen recalls his time in the Tsukasa Empire with a blunt honesty he hadn’t done in the past.

When Gen woke up in the stone world at the feet of Tsukasa, he had thought things wouldn’t be too bad. Tsukasa is strong, rational, and believes firmly in equal rights for omegas. Hearing Tsukasa speak of the type of civilization he wanted to create had him unsettled, but since Tsukasa was the one with the army and miracle fluid, he kept his criticisms to himself. Besides, as long as he has the same rights he did in his world, then he can make this work for now.

Except it didn’t work this way. A majority of the alphas Tsukasa revived were clearly closet sexists who saw the stone world as a way to subjugate omegas behind Tsukasa’s back. No matter what omegas did to report them to him, they would be framed and sabotaged by the alpha in their life, leading them to being punished while their oppressor walked freely.

Gen was lucky enough to be considered ‘ugly’ when compared to the stunning omega women that had been revived. Because of this, not many alphas took any interest in him. As long as he kept being useful, as long as he kept doing his duties Tsukasa assigned him to do, then he wouldn’t be met with alphas assuming he is slacking off and therefore, useless for anything outside of pup rearing.

It should have been this way because he did all that he could to be useful, to be constantly working, and yet—it was not enough to stop Tsukasa’s second in command, Hyouga, from approaching him.

The first time he had encountered Hyouga personally was when he had been gathering firewood for the people in the empire to use on a sunny afternoon. He hadn’t been assigned to it, but whenever he wasn’t assigned to any task, he took up small tasks as a way to keep proving his usefulness as an omega man.

If only he were lucky enough to be ridiculously strong like this much talked about Taiju…then he wouldn’t have to work so hard to avoid some random alpha accusing him of being a deadweight who’s better off barefoot and pregnant.

He had been reaching for a branch when it was grabbed away from him, “Asagiri Gen, correct? Mind telling me why you are gathering sticks like some lowly slave when you are not required to?”

The omega then looked up and saw the silver haired man he caught speaking to Tsukasa more than once in perfect agreement on what they wanted their ideal world to be like. Regardless of the intimidating, strong scent of the man, he remained calm throughout the entire conversation, refusing to allow this alpha to unnerve him, “I am Asagiri Gen, but please don’t ask me to do my mentalist work, I am saving that for whenever Tsukasa needs me on a serious task. I do find it strange you think this work to be beneath me—being Tsukasa’s right hand man, I figured you would be the type to not care what a lowly omega like me does.”

“Lowly omega? Oh no Gen, you are not some lowly omega at all.” Hyouga states with a small chuckle when moving in closer to him, making Gen’s instincts flare as he threw the branch to the ground to grab his right wrist instead, “In fact, I view you to be someone who is far better than many omegas here. Unlike the lazy omega women who use medical reasons as a means to avoid proving their worth, you have shown your skills as a mentalist in many situations time and time again. I have observed you on these tasks in the past, only to be left impressed by your skills. You never fail to disappoint no matter what it is you do and I find that to be as desirable about you as your scent, appearance, and what I remember from our world of your cute, petite body shape.”

“Whoa, wait—you’ve been watching me like some creep this entire time? Talk about alker-stay.”

“I wouldn’t view to be the actions of a creep or a stalker, but rather a prime alpha looking for the perfect mate to birth their pups.”

Gen’s blood ran cold to this because honestly? He could deal with Tsukasa wanting him as a mate. He could deal with any other alpha in their empire wanting him as a mate. Tsukasa part two but scarier is not what he had ever wanted in a mate, especially since it’s painfully obvious to him he is one of those closeted sexists that feels free to subjugate their omegas as freely as they desire to.

Hyouga continued on, making Gen’s alarm bells go off as he speaks, “Homura could have been a great match, but she’s an alpha, therefore there’s no use in ever considering her since she cannot give me pups. While other omegas here are beautiful, they are not as intelligent, skilled, or what I view to be attractive like you are. In all truth, how was I supposed to resist you when you look the way you do, possess the addicting scent you have, and have what I remember to be a nice figure for birthing pups underneath these baggy clothes?”

He had said this with a hand running down his face, making him freeze on the spot as he racked his mind for any retort to this. In the end, all he could say to counter this was, “I’m sorry, but I am not looking for a mate. I wasn’t back in our old world and I’m not now. You have plenty of other omegas to choose from, including some who would die to be your mate. Someone as prestigious as yourself shouldn’t be asting-way your time on lil ole me anyway.”

Hyouga was silent for a moment before tightening his grip on his wrist, pulling his body flush against his own when snarling, “If I didn’t know any better, I’d believe you are trying to weasel your way out of mating me.”

“If I am, how can you blame me? You did come off far too strong and you made some very disturbing comments to me just now. You cannot expect me to be okay with that, let alone anyone else, that’d be too outrageous for you to ever demand out of anyone.”

“…Too strong, in a world where strength is everything? You’re naïve but that’s endearing to me. I’ll be sure to make the most of it when we are mated.” Hyouga then states a fact Gen didn’t need to be stated out loud by anyone like him, “I believe you are forgetting where you are at. Since you find my approach to be awful, who are you going to call about this: HR, the police, the media even? In a stone world, none of this exists anymore. You are an omega; your only purpose is to breed pups of those worthy enough to pass their genes down into future generations. I am more than beyond worthy—therefore, you will become my mate and breed my pups for me.”

Gen is quick to remind him, “While there are many who share this view of yours, they know better than to voice it out loud or act upon it in such a brash manner because Tsukasa does not share this view and instead wishes to adhere to the rules protecting omegas that were present in our old world. If you dare try to force me to mate you, Tsukasa will have your head.”

“Only if he believes you over me. Tell me Gen, do you know how many lives I have ruined for much lesser reasons than this due to my own exploitation of Tsukasa’s immense trust in me? I’ve ruined far too many, long before you were revived. If you dare try to take me to him, I will ruin you the same way I did to them.”

Feeling trapped in his situation, Gen didn’t know what else he could do or say at this point. He had heard horrible stories of Hyouga ruining people’s lives long before he was revived, but he didn’t think it was true or had any merit to it. Now that he knows this, he is more than convinced there isn’t much he can do against a beast such as this.

Maybe he can try to play into whatever sentimentality he has, “You could force me to mate you, but I will never love you nor will I ever come to.”

“Love? Why would that matter to me?” Hyouga laughs at what was said, making Gen feel his heart drop to his stomach, “I’m not mating you for love—I’m mating you for breeding purposes only. All I ask is you be ready and pliable whenever I need you. That is all I wish to have from you as a mate, not love.”

Sentimentality didn’t work with him, then nothing else will. Gen is at a loss of what to do, but before Hyouga could go further, things would be interrupted by the one person he would come to view as being the only good part of Tsukasa’s empire.

“Hyouga, getting mated like this is rather beneath you, isn’t it? Perhaps you should pick a better time and place. One that isn’t so hot and uncomfortable out—it would certainly help your case in winning over Gen, right?”

When the white haired alpha with the lively jade green eyes looked in his direction, Gen instantly knew what to do to get out of this, “He has a point… I’m an omega who prefers to be swept off of my feet and if you want a chance to mate me, you better be willing to put in the work for it. Who knows, maybe if you did, I could mate you with my consent someday.”

Hyouga glanced in the other alpha’s direction, his response being a simple, “Leave, Ukyou. This has nothing to do with you.”

“It does when it affects the overall peace in this empire. Gen is a valuable asset to Tsukasa—mating him now and getting him pregnant would hinder any and all progress needed for our empire to succeed against all threats.” Ukyou then comments, “I suppose that is something you haven’t thought of, given your lack of military training that I happen to possess.”

Before Hyouga can counter back with anything else to be said, Ukyou beats him to it, “If you do mate Gen now when Tsukasa needs him most and impregnate him when he is needed for the success of this empire, Tsukasa will not spare you, Hyouga. He will be mad at you—mad enough to believe me when I tell him about how you forced him to be his mate before forcibly impregnating him. If you’re smart, you’ll leave him alone right now and rethink this entire thing you have planned with him.”

While Hyouga would love nothing more than to kill the other alpha, he holds off on it, knowing it would damage his reputation in Tsukasa’s mind if he did so. As such, he releases Gen and says a simple, “Fine, I will find better ways to approach making Gen my mate. For now, I will leave you be. Goodbye, Gen.”

When he is confident Hyouga is gone, Ukyou asks him, “Are you alright?”

“I am, but only because of you. Why did you help me just now?”

“Because I am tired of the violence, murder, and sexism going on in this empire. If I can make it at least a little bit better for someone, then I will.”

Before he can leave, Gen introduces himself, wanting to get to know this mystery alpha far better than he does now, “I am Asagiri Gen, mind telling me who you are?”

He is nonchalant when replying, “I know who you are—you were famous when we were in our world, after all. I am Saionji Ukyou, it’s a pleasure to meet you Gen. If Hyouga or any alpha ever bothers you like this again, make enough noise and I will be there.”

“Alright, but you wouldn’t mind if I get to know you a bit better, right?”

“No, not at all.” Ukyou then takes his hand, “Here, I know of a great place where we can speak alone in peace.”

Ukyou wound up taking him to a pretty beach where Gen grew to learn more about the military sonographer who had a sharp sense of hearing as well as amazing archery skills and a strong sense of justice. It was after this day where he met Ukyou that he grew to depend on the man far more than he ever initially believed he would.

Chapter Text

After he had met Ukyou and spent some time with him, Gen found his time at the empire being a bit more bearable.

Ukyou did all that he could to break up fights, to prevent alphas and omegas alike from killing each other, all while countering sexist conversations and viewpoints with those of his own. Gen did not know if he could believe Ukyou at first on everything he said about being sick of the violence and sexism here but seeing him stand up to it made him believe in the young man’s sincerity.

They had taken up to chatting in the trees or the beach if they could sneak away long enough without drawing the attention from the watchful eye of Hyouga.

It was on a particularly warm night that Gen has asked Ukyou—the man who he had come to enjoy the company of very much—something that has been on his mind, “Mind telling me if you had been watching me for as long as Hyouga had been? Because apparently, it’s quite normal for the higher ups in the empire to be complete eep-crays.”

Ukyou had admitted to him something Gen himself didn’t expect to hear, “Honestly, I didn’t. I was keeping an eye on Hyouga because unlike many others here, I could spot out the differences between himself and Tsukasa right away. Tsukasa is what many would have called a ‘prime’ alpha back in our world—tall, strong, chivalrous, with a firm belief in equality for omegas. Hyouga, on the other hand, is a great candidate for being a ‘prime’ alpha in our world, but he’s a closet sexist who’s far better at hiding it. If I hadn’t overheard him speaking to you when I did, I wouldn’t have ever had my suspicions confirmed to be true. Hyouga and Tsukasa may agree on many things, but they are two completely different beasts. It’s only a matter of time before something happens that makes Hyouga snap at Tsukasa.”

Now Gen’s curiosity is piqued, “Really, you came to save me that day like a knight in shining armor? How sweet of you to be so considerate of me, Ukyou-chan! Though I confess I never quite saw how Hyouga was a closet sexist…I never had any reason to suspect it until he approached me. Mind cluing lil ole me in on this?”

The white haired young man smiles to this, chuckling slightly, “Well, I suppose I can explain. I don’t mind cluing lil ole you on this at all—perhaps it can help you to better spot out these things in other alphas who may approach you whether you notice them or not.”

“Like they would! Ever since Hyouga approached me, the alphas have been avoiding me like the plague. The only ones who ever speak to me or come near me now are you, Tsukasa, Homura, and Hyouga.”

He isn’t as sold on this as Gen is, “I know it seems that way now, but if Tsukasa truly is going to send you out to figure out if this Senku person is still alive, then you have to be far more careful than what you were around Hyouga. I understand that in our world you never had a reason to keep your guard up around any alpha in general. I don’t know what kind of alpha this Senku is, but in a stone world, it’s more like a war zone than Tokyo Japan for omega rights. You should be on guard more often than not because we don’t know if this man possesses the same closeted sexist views Hyouga does.”

Ukyou speaks with in pure seriousness as he took Gen’s hand into his own from his spot on the beach, “Hyouga ticked me off on having closeted sexist views because of the way he acted towards anything regarding omegas—he would eye them up as though they were pieces of meat with an intense stare, he would agree with Tsukasa on omega rights, but all the things he said were basic slogans that any liar could use to make themselves sound good, while he did at times reprimand some alphas for speaking of omegas in the way they did, he also didn’t punish them for it, and he had a tendency to scent omegas without them knowing it. He’s very subtle and discreet about his views while taking care to avoid speaking out about them around the wrong people.”

The omega cannot deny feeling a bit on the last part there, “What do you mean by ‘scent omegas’? If he had scent marked me, I would have known right away since it does involve direct physical contact.”

“It’s not the same as scent marking—what he did was scenting.” when Gen still didn’t get it, Ukyou further explained, “Right, you weren’t ever in the military…all of us had to learn what it is in case if we ever went to war with a nation that didn’t have omega rights. It was to better protect everyone from predatory alphas like Hyouga. In short, scenting is when an alpha leaves their scent in an area around the omega. It keeps alphas away because it gives off the illusion of an omega having been scent marked by an alpha when they haven’t. I noticed you had been smelling like Hyouga before I stepped in to stop him. At first, I thought you had chosen to be his mate and I didn’t think much of it. Then I overheard him approaching you in the manner he did—and it confirmed to me then that I had been wrong at first.”

Gen never knew he had smelled of Hyouga—he couldn’t smell it on himself even, so, “How did I smell of Hyouga? I never smelled him on myself once.”

“Because omegas cannot smell it on themselves if it’s done right. Hyouga was smart enough to get close enough to you to leave the right amount of his scent for alphas to smell. He would have needed only a rather small amount for them to catch onto his scent being mixed with yours, which wouldn’t have been enough for you to smell it on yourself. However, scenting is not permanent. It goes away within a few hours—since you always had enough of his scent on you for others to assume you were with him throughout many different periods of the day, that means Hyouga had been by you far more often than any of us knew.”

Hearing this had the mentalist taken aback by his own disturbance at the thought of Hyouga having been so close to him without him ever once noticing it. He hides it well enough to where he can say, “He’s a bigger eep-cray than I ever thought, then…”

After a moment of silence, he smells the scent of soothing lavender and burnt amber—calming pheromones? Is Ukyou…trying to calm him down?

He hid his discomfort so well, though! How could he—

“Gen, it’s alright to be disturbed by this. I know it would bother me if I was an omega and I heard everything I just said now from someone else. Hyouga is a closet sexist creep, but I promise you I will not allow him or anyone else like him to ever mark you or take advantage of you.”

He had said it with such sincerity, such conviction, that it made Gen take pause. That look in his eyes…he’s truly serious about this, isn’t he?

He doesn’t know how to really respond to this—Gen had been famous back in their old world, so he was accustomed to crazy fans writing him confession letters, dirty old men trying to grope him, and people sexualizing him online. He had never had anyone actually promise to protect him from such creeps before. Having never needed such extreme protection in their old world, but suddenly realizing how much he will need it with Hyouga around, he feels grateful to know Ukyou has his back. At least there are more alphas than just Tsukasa who actually view omegas as human beings.

Gen responds to this in the only way he can think of, “You don’t have to promise me anything, but…I am grateful you did. It’s nice to know someone else here doesn’t view omegas as being operty-pray.”

“I would never do that to you, Gen. You are the only good thing I have found here in the stone world… I am more than willing to keep you safe no matter what.”

Ukyou did mean this. Whenever Homura or Hyouga approached him, Ukyou was always there to get them away from him… Even during his heat, when he had a fear of Hyouga discovering it, Ukyou took him to a safe space where he did spend his heat with him upon Gen’s request. He felt safe with the young military man, who had done all that he could to keep Hyouga away from him.

It was sometime shortly after his heat where Gen would be sent on a mission by Tsukasa to confirm if Senku was truly dead or living amongst these humans who had no secondary genders or petrification scars. While Gen had a hard time believing people without secondary genders could exist in general—secondary genders have been around since the dawn of humanity—he was more than willing to see if Tsukasa got this right or not.

Before he left, Ukyou approached him and gave him his farewell, “Goodbye, Gen…come back to me if you can. If you can’t, then I will do all that I can to keep Hyouga here.”

“Ukyou, you don’t have to do that.”

“No, I do. I made a promise to you and I intend to keep it.” Ukyou says without any room for argument. He gives Gen a chaste kiss, telling him, “I’ll miss you and the time we spent together.”

“Such a hopeless omantic-ray! But…thank you for the beautiful farewell.” Gen says to him, hiding the fact he felt pretty flustered by the kiss he gave him, “I’ll see you soon, Ukyou. Farewell for now.”

“I left after that and I wound up in Ishigami Village where I now reside as a citizen of the Kingdom of Science.” Gen ends his tale there, with the rest of the citizens looking at him in a bit of awe…as well as…tears, “Is everyone okay?”

Ruri is the first one to say it: “That was so sweet and sad! Ukyou is so thoughtful, kind, and romantic—you are so lucky to have someone like him to be so deeply in love with you.”

“I bet he’s extremely handsome too.” Suika chimes in, “He sounds so great, why didn’t you ever come back to him or at least bring him back here with you?”

“Because I knew I could get in trouble if I did bring him back to the Kingdom of Science when he was one of the top three leaders in the empire. If I did return for good, it wouldn’t have ended well for me either. Hyouga has a strong sense of smell and if Tsukasa thought or knew I was lying to him, there’s a good chance Hyouga would have been in charge of my punishment…and I don’t want to think about what he would have done.”

Ginrou comments to himself, muttering under his breath, “I should meet this Ukyou guy to see how he is so great with omegas… Maybe his tips will help me with the ladies!”

Kinrou can admit with a small bit of reluctance, “I’m not sure about this new ally just yet, but any person who is that good to one of our own is someone I can think highly of.”

Chrome can agree with Kinrou on this, “He’s not a bad guy at all…he could have taken me hostage and he didn’t, all because he wanted me to give that message to Gen. He really is in love with him, isn’t he? I don’t think there will ever be anyone else as in love with Gen as Ukyou.”

Kokuyo is firm when speaking, a few tears falling from his eyes when he speaks, “I may not understand all of this secondary gender, alpha, omega, scent stuff—but that man is a good man who is in love with you, Gen. He does deserve to have at least one conversation with you before we take back the miracle cave.”

Before Gen can defend himself on this end, Senku speaks up with a roll of his bright red eyes, “The mentalist doesn’t owe him anything. If Ukyou wanted to confess any form of love for him, then he should have said it when he had ample chance to do so. Besides, we don’t have time to be focusing on this romance thing. We have a miracle cave to take back: we can address this whole ‘Ukyou-Gen’ thing later.”

Gen exhales a bit in relief, explaining to them, “Listen, I can have a conversation with Ukyou whenever I please. What we need to do first and foremost is get the miracle cave back before we can make any move to speak further about whatever it is he meant on the piece of cloth.”

As the majority of the people groan and begin to ask intrusive questions about his relationship with Ukyou—such as what was spending his heat with him like, which Gen had absolutely refused to speak on—Kohaku was not so easily swayed. No, she instead focused on Senku, who seemed to be rather…upset…by everything.

He isn’t showing it clearly in his voice or facial expression, but his overall aura seems to be radiating anger, annoyance, and possibly…jealousy?

Is he jealous of Ukyou?

No, that can’t be right! Not Senku, he’s not the type!

Though it couldn’t hurt to ask…

“Senku, are you alright? You seem to be upset by everything right now.” she asks him with a certain level of caution.

He answers her neutrally enough, “I’m fine, there’s no need to worry about me.”

“It’s just…ever since Ukyou came up…you’ve been upset. Are you jealous of him?”

The scientist pauses to this and laughs, “Me, jealous of some alpha I’ve never met? Why would I be jealous of some alpha I’ve never met?”

Kohaku does counter this with a calmly spoken, “Because you’ve never been this upset before. I have never seen you clench your jaw or grit your teeth—you seem to be angry and I don’t know why. All I know is it came up ever since Gen started talking about Ukyou.”

“If I am upset, it’s only because people would rather speak about whatever it is Gen had with Ukyou as opposed to focusing on our plan to take back the miracle cave. I’m not upset, and I’m not annoyed. I don’t care if Ukyou is in love with Gen and I don’t care if they ever do get mated or not. I’m a man of science, not romance.”

Now she feels really good in her idea of Senku being jealous of Ukyou. If this is correct, then it is only safe to assume that when they do meet Ukyou for the first time tomorrow that it could end up in Senku getting jealous and sectioning Gen off and away from him.

As for Senku, he’s not too impressed.

Ukyou is a military man with impressive hearing who managed to keep Gen safe from Hyouga the entire time he was in the Tsukasa Empire. He also happens to be a bit of a subtle flirt and is someone who appears to be good enough with words to be able to spend a heat with Gen…not that he cares about this! It’s not like he would ever care about who Gen shared a heat with, whether it be perfect Ukyou or not—

“I’m not telling you about my heat with him, that’s too ersonal-pay to speak about with just anyone!” Gen snapped at what had to be the tenth time he’s heard this question being asked.

On Senku’s end, he is a bit curious, “Why would you choose to spend your heat with him? The entire time you’ve been at the Kingdom of Science, you haven’t been open to letting anyone touch you during your heat.”

Of course, he’s not bringing this up out of jealousy. He’s bringing this up because he wants to know why he would spend his heat with anyone in the Tsukasa Empire.

Gen sighed when explaining it to him, “Well, for starters, in the Kingdom of Science I don’t have Hyouga to worry about. I felt safer spending my heat alone there than I did in the Tsukasa Empire where I had to spend a heat with Ukyou. When I did go into my first heat in the stone world, it was intense and happened at random in the forest… If I hadn’t been taken away by Ukyou, Hyouga would have found me and done who knows what to me. Because it was very intense and painful, I begged Ukyou to spend it with me so I could have some form of relief. Ukyou was afraid he’d be taking advantage of me if he did, but I reassured him he wasn’t. I had to remind him I trusted him enough to allow him to spend a heat with me, which was good enough for him to feel okay with following through on my request. Overall, that’s why I spent a heat with him.”

…Nope, Senku is not jealous in the slightest bit, not even by one percent. Gen can spend his heat with whoever he please—if he happens to have bad tastes in alphas, then that’s on him. Besides, who knows if Gen and Ukyou will even have the same chemistry they did in the past? For all they know, Gen and Ukyou could be extremely awkward around each other in person again or Gen could have moved on from Ukyou to someone else, someone more suited to him…

Of course, that’s a possibility he’s throwing out there. It’s a logical possibility that is not based off of any jealousy whatsoever no matter what Kohaku and her all knowing gaze implies.

Chapter Text

The night was long and hard…mainly because no one could stop chattering about Ukyou. Even when Taiju did arrive, there were too many people asking about what Ukyou looked like, what did his voice sound like, and whether or not Ukyou was as good of a guy as Gen had made him out to be.

Back in their old world, he could handle people gossiping about celebrities, he could handle people gossiping about other people in his classes, he could handle the human nature of gossiping in general! Why this gossip is bringing out something dark and ugly in him, he doesn’t know. All he knows is, all of this Ukyou talk is starting to make his instincts come out in a darker manner than he thought was possible.

Senku never had any issues controlling his alpha instincts. If of anything, he never felt them in the way Taiju did—Taiju was deeply connected to his instincts whereas Senku wasn’t. He didn’t have that sort of sixth sense about everything and he never felt any real instinctual urges outside of his ruts—which were pretty sterile in comparison to other alphas he knew.

Why his chest feels on fire, why his instincts are prompting him to want to hiss and snarl at any mention of Ukyou—he’s not certain. He believes it could be a malfunctioning of his hormones, much like how Gen’s heat was clearly caused by hormonal imbalance that drove him to choose Ukyou when he doesn’t think he ever would. He’s pretty positive Gen wouldn’t ever choose Ukyou as a mate or boyfriend of any sort.

Not that he would ever care about such petty things. If Gen decides he wants to be mates with Ukyou, then he’s fine with it. It’s Gen’s choice, not his.

The following morning, he was dreading their travel to the miracle cave because at some point or another, they would meet with Ukyou to discuss the plan with him.

The last thing he wanted to deal with was everyone making a huge deal out of the military man. He knows that while he may be a good person like Gen and Taiju made him out to be, he is also a major potential distraction for everyone else there.

Despite Kohaku’s knowing glances, he is not jealous of Ukyou and he never will be. It’d be illogical of him to be jealous of someone he’s never met before—for all he know, he could be a bumbling Taiju in person. Nothing to get worked up over or stress out about.

“Alright, let’s head out everyone! We’re going to the miracle cave!”

While everyone got in the position they were needed, Senku felt better knowing that he had Gen there in the tank with him…not because he wants him close to himself, but because he believes the Ukyou talk will come to a halt if he is near them.

When they did meet up with Ukyou before reaching the miracle cave, all in the group who had been walking there were rather stunned by the sight of him, especially when he saw Senku and asked, “Where’s Gen? There’s something I need to speak to him about in person before we move forward with anything.”

Suika tugged on Taiju’s clothing, whispering, “Is that Ukyou?”

“Yep, that’s him alright! He’s a really cool guy when you get to know him. I bet Senku and him will be best friends soon enough!” he cheers happily while Senku rolls his eyes at his needless optimism.

Senku answers Ukyou right away, “You can see him later. For now, we need to go over the plans.”

“If I cannot see Gen now, then I have no reason to go along with your plans.” he states with an air of confidence that enrages Senku’s alpha, “I haven’t seen him in a year—don’t you know how long I’ve been worrying over him? Don’t you know how many nights I’ve spent with all of the worst case scenarios situations flashing through my mind? I need to see Gen for myself to be sure you are somebody I can trust and not another Hyouga in disguise.”

Senku didn’t get the chance to object to this because Gen was getting out of the tank at that moment to address him, “Ukyou-chan! There’s no need to be so ostile-hay! I am just fine—see? Senku wouldn’t hurt me because he’s not a closet sexist like Hyouga and the many others Tsukasa revived.”

“Gen…” Ukyou whispered in amazement as the omega got out of the tank.

Ruri couldn’t hold back her excitement any longer, “It’s happening! Ukyou and Gen are reuniting!”

He approached the omega and with that same damn confidence Senku hates, gave him an easy smile when addressing him, “It’s been too long…how have you been?”

“I have been great. At Senku’s place I get cola and ramen—it’s not like the same ramen we had in our world, but it’s good enough. There’s so much I have there that I didn’t have in the Tsukasa Empire…but I’d have to say the best part of it all is not having Hyouga around to make things miserable for me to exist.” Gen then wonders, “What about you? How have you been?”

Ukyou cannot deny it to him, his smile fading when recalling it, “Awful, actually. Ever since you left, things got harder to deal with—the infighting, Tsukasa killing the people still trapped in stone, Hyouga being himself, and not having you around to lighten the mood or make my day better… It’s been awful for me to deal with, especially since I did worry over you all the time. I didn’t know if you were safe or not with this alpha named Senku. Now that I can see you are, I can breathe easy for the time in a year.”

Gen does wonder, “What about the letter you wrote me on that cloth? It so eet-sway that I almost died from a sugar overdosage! Did you really mean it or did you only say that so we could become pen pals?”

The white haired alpha chuckles, “You know me too well…yes, I didn’t mean much of anything that was said. I only said it so you’d reply to me and we could establish a line of communication between us. I will admit I hoped to see you in person at the beach to see if everything the villager told me was true or not, but when you never replied to my letter, I assumed it was never given to you. I knew if it had, you would have said something about it to me over the phone.”

Gen shrugs, “You know me well too, then…because I would have wondered if you went azy-cray over there in the empire and I would have replied right away. I assumed you meant to leave a reply on the beach that’s the halfway point between our different homes, am I right on that end?”

“Yes, you were correct on that assumption. It’s the same spot we used to talk together at back when you lived in the empire and you were always accessible to me.”

He then gets serious when talking to Gen and it makes Senku’s skin crawl as the fire in his chest burns brighter than ever before, with his instincts demanding release in an intensity he never felt once in his lifetime until now, “A lot has changed ever since we were petrified. While I long for my old world back, I can say I am happy here because I got to meet you, which is something I wouldn’t have been able to do unless if I had been a guest on with you on TV for my ability to spot out your mimicry. Meeting you has changed a lot for me and now that I have you back a year later, I can finally say what I didn’t get to back then.”

Jade green eyes meet blue grey when he asks, “Gen, I’d love nothing more than to be your mate someday, but it would go against everything in me to do that without dating you first. Do you want to go out sometime when all of this is over?”

Gen doesn’t know what to say to this. After he became famous, he had no time for dating or relationships—his contract with his agency was very strict (much like an idol’s in Japan to be exact) and a part of it was he could not date, mate, or be seen alone with an alpha in public unless if they were security, his manager, or someone at his talent agency. If he did any of the above, he’d lose his contract with his agency and everything he worked hard for.

He had put off dating for so long that he didn’t quite know what to say to this. He had been asked out by fans in the past, but they were all creepy and intrusive so it was easy for him to reject it. Ukyou’s request is so sincere and genuine that he doesn’t know how to comprehend it all.

Ruri, Suika, and Kokuyo are all awing at the sight, whereas Ginrou is making mental notes about what to do when he wants to ask a girl out on a date. Kinrou, on the other hand, is rather impressed by Ukyou so far and finds him to be a respectable, good human being. Chrome really wants Gen to say ‘yes’ so the poor guy doesn’t get his heart broken—being in his shoes in the past, he completely empathizes with Ukyou in his situation with Gen.

While Taiju watched on in shock at the sight since he never knew about Gen and Ukyou’s relationship together, Kohaku kept a close eye on Senku.

She could tell he was furious, and in all honesty, he wouldn’t deny it.

At first, he thought Ukyou would be a clumsy, awkward, bumbling fool stuck in puppy love like Taiju had been with Yuzuriha. He didn’t think Ukyou would be confident, suave, self assured, bold, and upfront in the manner he had been with Gen.

“Haven’t you ever dated, Gen?” Ukyou wonders with a curious gleam in his eyes, which prompts Gen to clear this up, “I did back in middle school, but those were three month relationships that never went beyond that time period and only went as far as kissing. I couldn’t date when I became famous because my contract with the agency that managed me specifically forbade it… I haven’t dated ever since middle school, actually, so this is a lot for me to take in.”

“You haven’t dated since middle school? Wait—was I your first?”

Gen’s pink blush was a giveaway to everyone there and his stammering response didn’t help matters either, “I mean…if by first time you mean sharing a heat with an alpha…then yeah, but I’d rather not talk about the past for now!”

Ukyou can read the room well enough to know this, thus he respects Gen’s wishes, “I understand, we can talk about that later in private. Will you at least consider my offer to go on a date?”

“I will, but I think Senku wants to speak on his plan now. Maybe we should be focusing on that instead for the time being. After everything is over, I will get back to you on the offer, okay?”

“Great, take all the time you need, Gen. I can wait.”

Senku didn’t get to speak on his plan because Ginrou was already swooning, “Wow, you’re so effortlessly cool with an omega like Gen! How did you get to be that way?”

Ukyou grins at the blonde man, telling him, “Experience: I did date when I was in middle school, high school, and the military. I have a lot of experience with people, that’s how I got to be this way.”

“Whoa—was Gen your first too? How did you manage to be cool through something as hot as a heat?”

Ginrou didn’t understand how heats and ruts worked all that well. He tried to grasp it, but Senku and Gen always got a bit too flustered when trying to explain in deep enough detail for him to understand. As such, he tended to think of heats as fevers that would make everyone too hot to function properly. Though he understands heats and ruts are sexual in nature, he cannot figure out how it would be so when Senku and Gen explained in the relatively vague way they did.

“No, Gen wasn’t my first, but that’s something I will tell you later on if you like. For now, we should be focusing on this Senku’s plan like Gen said, but I do have at least one question before we listen to it.”

Ukyou’s gaze meets Senku’s and for some reason, his alpha takes it as a challenge against himself, which is illogical since he knows Ukyou isn’t challenging him in any way, shape, or form, “Will Gen be on the front lines of this battle? If so, then I cannot support this plan at all. The risk of Hyouga coming is too high to have Gen anywhere that would endanger him; if you cannot guarantee his safety, then I will not give you my support in this.”

First he’s experienced, then he’s cultured from having been in the military and most likely seeing the world, and now he’s questioning him about Gen’s safety without hearing his plan—all while having been Gen’s first time on top of it all.

Yeah, he’s more than a bit irritated with Ukyou right about now.

No, definitely not for being an experienced man who happened to be Gen’s first or for the fact he was so confident about everything when speaking to Gen. It all has to do with that irrational instinct of his trying to come alive when it shouldn’t.

“Gen will not be in danger. He will be the one driving the tank, that’s why he’s important to this plan. I can tell you right now that Gen will not be fighting anyone, that much I can guarantee.”

“Fine, but if Gen does wind up in danger, I cannot guarantee I will not have some choice words for you.”

He doesn’t know why but Ukyou gets underneath his skin in the worst of ways. He knows Ukyou means nothing bad by this—the guy clearly cares a lot about Gen and has legitimate reasons to be worried over his safety. The alpha scientist can admit he has his concerns as well after learning everything he did about Hyouga from Gen the day before. Despite this, everything Ukyou says manages to annoy or irritate him. It feels as though Ukyou is trying to undermine him, but he knows this is instinct talking because his rational mind says that’s not true at all. He knows the guy means well and yet…he’s getting annoyed with him all because of these stupid instincts of his that he cannot keep under control right now!

It must be a hormonal malfunction, or something related to some sort of imbalance within himself because he is not jealous of Ukyou for any reason at all and he never would be because that’s incredibly ridiculous for him to ever care about Gen’s love life in such a manner.

“You can say it to me if I don’t keep my word. For now though, this is the plan.”

He does his best to explain it, but it’s near impossible to do when all his instincts can do is scream at him at full blast for not doing more about Ukyou for being so close to Gen.

Chapter Text

After laying down the rules of his plan, Senku was more than ready to move forward with it…and yet, he couldn’t stop himself from being annoyed at the way the certain ones who had chosen to come along—Ruri and Suika—could not stop obsessing over Ukyou and speaking to the military man as though he were some form of gift to mankind.

It grates on him, because he knows they only came along to speak to Ukyou as opposed to actually doing anything to help them in their battle.

Even Chrome cannot help himself when asking about the guy, “So, Ukyou’s like a super badass or something, huh?”

“He is.” Gen answers neutrally enough but then Chrome has to comment on what he heard, “I am in Ukyou’s shoes right now, you know. I understand where he’s coming from and I think you should accept his offer to go out on a date. It could help our mission if you said ‘yes’ to it right away.”

“You could let me decide that for myself. I’m not here to be ossed-bay around on my love life just because I’m an omega.”

“I’m not trying to boss you around; I am trying to give you advice as guy who is going through what he is with Ruri. I want you to try to be understanding of his feelings because it’s hard to be a guy in love with someone who may reject them if they get the chance to.”

Gen went silent to this, uncertain of how to answer other than with one that slipped off the tip of his tongue, “I know I have to considerate of his feelings, but I have to think about what I want too. If I go out with him just to spare him from rejection, then I’m leading him on and being cruel. That would evil of me to do to him, don’t you think?”

While this is a smooth answer, Senku does allow that instinct of his to break through this one time because he cannot mentally handle any more talks of Ukyou at this point, “Chrome, I know you’re in love with Ruri, but right now, what matters most is our mission to take the miracle cave. We’re not here to peer pressure the mentalist into making a decision he hasn’t decided on yet—we’re not like the alphas in the Tsukasa Empire. We have to let him make this decision on his own whenever he gets the chance to.”

Gen breathes a sigh of relief while Chrome nods, “Alright, I understand.”

“Great, now, no more romance talk, okay? We’ve got a war to win.”

While they do stop this, it doesn’t stop the feeling Senku gets at the very thought of Ukyou and Gen going on a date together after this. Ukyou is well travelled and very skilled—any omega would love to have him as a mate, but to think that he could mate Gen…

No, Senku doesn’t care. No matter how powerful that negative, instinct driven feeling inside of himself is, he cannot and will not allow himself to act upon it. He’s better than this, he knows he is, he can overcome this—but what’s the scientific solution to this? Can he even make one in the stone world?

He can if he tries, but how can he get rid of these feelings in his chest for good when it seems Ukyou is going to be a permanent resident of the Kingdom of Science?

When they did get to the miracle cave, everything went by according to plan—they were able to get the tank as far as they could, they were able to make a hit that successfully had the men guarding the cave anxious on the spot, and thanks to efforts of Nikki, Taiju, and Yuzuriha, they had more people on their side from the Tsukasa Empire who did take them on.

Everything was going so good—good enough to the point where Ruri was smiling widely, “Now Gen and Ukyou can get married! Wouldn’t that be so wonderful? As the village priestess, I can make it official between them.”

“They can now! Oh, we should make Gen something really pretty to wear when he does marry Ukyou!” Suika muses, “How about something pink or green? I think he’d look good in that.”

Ukyou has a good laugh to this from his spot in the tree, “We didn’t have marriage in our world—all we had was mating. Though, I do appreciate the enthusiasm, but it’s all up to Gen at this point, not me.”

As the girls begin to wonder what they should do to help Ukyou win over Gen, Senku grimaces at the thought of it—no, the very mention of it, actually.

He doesn’t want to think about Gen and Ukyou being mated or married or even dating. It’s too much for him to mentally handle and with each mention of it, the instincts inside of him keep getting harder and harder to control and repress…

He can’t do it, not underneath these circumstances. Not when he knows Ukyou could very easily win over Gen with his charm, personality, and looks.

No, he will have to work on a scientific solution to his problem. For now, he cannot run the risk of snapping at Ukyou—he could lose both Gen and him as allies if he does.

Forced civility it is then, no matter how severely he has to repress his own instincts.

Well, it would have been had things gone according to plan fully. Before they could do much, Ukyou was already warning them, “Gen, you have to get out of here right now—”

It was too late by then.

Tsukasa and Hyouga had arrived with reinforcements by their side.

Hyouga had also stabbed Ukyou, causing the man to fall off of the tree.

Which had causes Ruri and Suika to gasp, “Ukyou!”

They were by his side immediately, with Suika glaring up at the silver haired alpha who had stabbed the archer, “How dare you attack the man who loves Gen! After all you’ve done to make him feel uncomfortable, you have to do this as well… Have you no shame?”

Tsukasa muttered to the shocking news, finding it rather odd for someone without a secondary gender to get so upset over, “Ukyou loves Gen? How would they even know of this?”

“Simple, they know of it because Gen is here, and he told them of it. Had Gen been absent, Ukyou wouldn’t be here right now, fighting alongside your enemy.” Hyouga deduces before switching his focus, “Funny thing they act as though this is all fact—last I checked, I was the alpha who loved Gen, not him.”

From his spot inside the tank, Gen is panicking, panicking enough to try to divert his attention away from him, “Hi ya’ll, this is Lilian Weinberg! And I’m here to tell you the US is on their way right now, so hang tight and—”

“Ah, so you really are here, Gen?” Hyouga drops the cell phone they had dug up from the ground, “Did everyone truly believe this lie when there’s no possible way the US could have gotten a hold of them with such primitive technology? If so, then I’m more disappointed than I already was with those who betrayed us.”

From his spot inside the tank, Gen is horrified and trying to remain calm, trying to not think about the worst case scenario, trying—

“Gen, you can come out now. I do love you, after all. I would never lay a hand on the one I intend to mate.” hearing this from Hyouga makes his internal panic build up further as he goes on, “If I didn’t love you, I would have killed you when I found you at Senku’s village and I would be trying to kill you now, wouldn’t I? Come out and let me see you, a year is far too long for any alpha to go without the scent, sight, and touch of the one they love.”

He knows Hyouga doesn’t love him, he knows this is some strange, bizarre strategy to get him to come out, but…he has a feeling Hyouga may know where he is hiding…

That chuckle sets him off and makes his skin crawl, “You’re in the tank, aren’t you? How cute that your safety was thought of this whole time. There’s no need to worry over it anymore, just come on out and let me see you.”

Gen doesn’t want to leave the tank now. He knows this is all a set up and he will regret it with every fiber of his being if he dares leaves the safety of this tank…

Ukyou’s voice breaks through next, with the alpha calling out to him, “Gen, come out. Staying in there won’t make matters better, not when he knows you are in there.”

Ukyou wouldn’t lie to him and while he doesn’t know what happened to him, he knows he can always trust the alpha to keep him safe from Hyouga. As long as he has Ukyou he will be fine…as long as he has Ukyou he will be fine…or so the cheer in his head goes when exiting the tank.

Ruri and Suika are tending to the white haired alpha’s wounds when he gets out of the tank. It’s enough to make Gen regret coming out of what was once his safe space, but he knows he has to be strong now until Ukyou is better. He doesn’t appear to be hurt too severely, so if he holds out for the time being, he will be able to recover in time to save him from Hyouga.

Hyouga’s gaze on him feels like a laser beam freezing him in place the moment he is under it. He cannot move as freely as he thought he would be able to and he cannot take his eyes off of the alpha in the tree who appears to be far more…terrifying than what he usually is.

He feels suffocated, small, like prey about to be hunted underneath that gaze. Hearing Hyouga speak further didn’t help matters on this end either, not when he asked, “Were you forcibly mated during your time away from me? Were you ever abused at all?”

Seeing this faux concern really has him on his toes because he knows Hyouga doesn’t mean it. He’s not like Ukyou in the slightest bit, so why is he pretending to be like him now?

Senku, not caring at all for the way Hyouga has been acting, replies out of that damned instinct of his—the one that says to protect Gen, “I would never forcibly mate anyone nor would I abuse them. Gen was fine with me, but I have to wonder why you care so much when Gen made it clear to us you saw him as a breeding machine.”

Tsukasa’s eyes narrow to the news, “What? Is this true, Hyouga?”

The masked alpha shakes his head, “No, not at all. I believe Gen may have misread some of my flirtations, but other than this, I never saw him as a breeding machine. Given his tendencies for trickery, how do we know he did not pull such a thing with yourself and others when discussing me? How do you know he didn’t only say such slanderous things about me in order to aid in his survival at your Kingdom of Science?”

…This is why Gen never went forward with anything to Tsukasa. He knew it’d only be a matter of time before Hyouga turned everything back on him and made it out to be his fault that everything happened to him. He knew he wouldn’t be believed over Hyouga—maybe it’s best if he runs with Ukyou now and starts over somewhere new…

“Gen wouldn’t lie about that, not in a billion years. He may tell lies to benefit whatever scheme or plan it is we have in mind, but he doesn’t do so to be malicious or cruel. That’s not who he is, and you’d know that if you claimed to love him as much as you say.” Senku counters, catching Gen off guard completely.

Knowing Senku believes him has him feeling all sorts of light and fluttery all over, whereas Senku at the moment is fighting his raging instincts at Hyouga and his manipulations.

His recently formed suspicions about there being more to Hyouga and Gen’s background together at the empire only grew stronger the longer the alpha spoke.

He doesn’t know what happened, but one thing is for certain: both his logic and instincts are demanding him to protect Gen from the vicious alpha, which is something he will do.

Chapter Text

Hyouga kept his calm despite Senku’s challenge of his account of events. Choosing to remain true to his story no matter what, he challenged back with a comeback of his own to Senku’s assertion, “Gen did pretend to be Lilian Weinberg just now…how do we know he did not pretend to be her and get everyone on board with your Kingdom of Science through lying about the hopes of an American rescue mission coming for Japan?”

“He did, but why would that matter? We did what we had to do to bring people over to our side.” Senku counters, trying to figure out where Hyouga is trying to go with this—surely he would have known this wouldn’t be a good argument to make with him, “If you ask me, I think Ukyou was right—you and Tsukasa are two completely different beasts.”

“How so? I haven’t found anyone I agree with more than Tsukasa in the stone world.” Hyouga may be calm, but Senku senses there is something deeply off within him that is slowly starting to unravel.

Senku is clear when addressing it, “Simple: according to Gen, Tsukasa believes in omega rights. Going off of this, I’d say he believes in it to the point where he’d like to make a world where his sister can live in peace, free from the flaws of our old world including any form of sexism. If I were to give him the chance to revive his sister with the possibility of her being healed, he’d agree to it. You, on the other hand, are a closet sexist who sees people like Gen as being breeding machines. You wouldn’t revive her because she’d be seen as incompetent for breeding in the stone world.”

Things became tense then despite nothing changing in Hyouga’s stance or scent. It was obvious this was a stand off between the scientist and the one many would call a prime alpha under any other circumstances. However, what made the tension burst was Gen speaking up, “If you have any doubts about this Tsukasa, I do have something to tell you that I never could back when I was a part of your empire.”

Ukyou shoots a glance at Gen, calling out, “Gen, you don’t have to do this! You shouldn’t traumatize yourself over him!”

He shakes his head, answering the military man as confidently as he can, “I’m fine with telling everyone now, Ukyou. Besides, it’s time for everyone to know the truth, isn’t it? You were right all along: it wasn’t just because of the cola.”

It was sometime after his heat and before he would leave for the mission Tsukasa had given him: it had been particularly hot that day, the air humid, and most people had spent their day cooling off at various areas where water was present.

At sundown, it had started to cool down but not by much.

Gen had been lucky that day—he was able to cool off in the waters of a river with some other omega men. The only alphas who had stopped by were Ukyou and Yuzuriha, but they were universally trusted by all omegas so naturally, everyone felt safe around them.

It was sweet how Yuzuriha had been so kind and loving towards Taiju right from the beginning to that point. He couldn’t deny finding their relationship endearing, even if they did have to leave at random times to do other activities.

Such as when they left the river together, “Sorry guys, we have to get going now. We have some stuff to do still, but we’ll see you later tonight for dinner.”

“Sure, you can two can go ahead.” Gen had told them at the time, only for the other male omegas to leave over time. It seemed Taiju was a life of the party of sorts for them…

Ukyou didn’t leave him though, which made him feel a bit safer being in the river, “Looks like we’re alone now, huh?”

“Yeah, so it seems.”

After sharing a heat with Ukyou, he didn’t feel awkward or uncomfortable around the man. He instead felt more comfortable around him since his scent was good enough to keep Hyouga away from him and warded off Homura from approaching him to pressure him into mating Hyouga.

Yes, Homura has done this more than once ever since he first rejected Hyouga. Yes, it is annoying and yes, he is tired of hearing it from her. However, he is happy to announce that thanks to Ukyou hanging around him as often as he does, she hasn’t been around as much.

Ukyou asks him then, “Have you ever been out of the country as a celebrity?”

Gen recounts it as, “I have been, but probably not as much as you. It’s a ame-shay really, I would have liked to see more than what I did.”

“I would have wanted that for you too, especially if I could have been the one going with you to these places.”

“Where would we have even gone?”

“I would have taken you to Paris, Croatia, Corsica, or maybe even Manhattan…possibly Malta. Anywhere with beautiful architecture or scenery, really.”

“That’s a lot of places, actually.”

“I wish I could have taken you to a lot of places. I can’t help but to believe it’d have been far less lonely if I had been able to.”

Gen pauses, feeling a bit bad then, “You were lonely when you travelled?”

Ukyou shrugs, taking it all rather well, “Not at first, but after a while, it was impossible to not feel lonely. Seeing all of the people on my squadron with their mates and dates, it wasn’t hard to wish I had someone to experience all of it with.”

“I guess I can understand…travelling alone can be onely-lay, especially when one is banned from dating or being alone with an alpha that isn’t management or security.” he admitted in a rather saddened tone, thinking this part of celebrity life would be so easy to live with, but in the end finding it hardest part to deal with.

“Yeah…” he paused and made a move to get closer to the omega, “Maybe we could—”

“Ukyou! We need your archery skills right now! Someone has a large deer cornered and we need it for dinner tonight!” an out of breath omega woman exclaims while trying to catch her breath.

He glances to Gen, asking, “Is it alright if I go?”

“It’s fine, Ukyou-chan! You go ahead and get me a good meal, okay?” Gen teases him, only for the alpha to smile at him, “I will be sure to do just that. I’ll see you later.”

“Good luck with that hunt!” he called out to him as Ukyou left the river. Without anyone else there, he was able to relax in peace for a while, but this moment of peace was interrupted when he got out of the river.

He had been about to get his clothes back on—they didn’t want to get them all wet and gross when they went into the river, knowing they’d be eating soon—when a strong hand grabbed him by the shoulder and a too nonchalant voice was heard in the silence of the forest, “Gen, it’s been a while, hasn’t it?” 

Hyouga.

No, but he had been leaving him alone as of late, hasn’t he? Didn’t Ukyou keep him away?

“You smell different…as though you’ve been spending too much time with Ukyou…mind telling me why this has been a recent development?”

“Ah, I’m not one to kiss and tell, sorry.”

“So there was kissing then between you two? Interesting—and here I thought you weren’t interested in mating. Which is it: are you interested or are you not interested?”

“I’m not, but—”

“Because if you spend a heat with an alpha, it indicates you are interested in mating. Now tell me, Gen, which is it: are you interested in mating or not?”

“It never indicated that in our time, so why would it indicate that now?” Gen is panicking because Hyouga’s not letting him go and his grip is tightening as he gets closer to him in such a vulnerable position.

Hyouga comes too close to him, the hand on his shoulder now on his hand as he forces him to face him. Gen is then met with the scent of a rut about to start and everything in him screams at him to do whatever it takes to get out of this, “Because in ancient times, in ancient settings such as this, omegas only shared a heat with an alpha if they were interested in mating with an alpha. Given that omegas are incapable of handling a heat alone, it seems to me that they are made for pleasuring and being pleasured by an alpha. Why else would such a gender with such a disadvantage exist otherwise?”

“Whether you want to admit or not Gen, all omegas who share a heat with an alpha only do so because they are programmed by birth to need one to have as a mate. You can lie and tell me you don’t want a mate, but the mere fact you spent a heat with Ukyou only proves you can’t lie to yourself no matter how much our old society had you believing otherwise. You want a mate and who better than myself in this world to be yours than yours truly?”

He’s getting too close, he has to get out of here now, but how can he when Hyouga is dead set on his sexist beliefs of omegas?

“How did you know I spent a heat with Ukyou?”

“Let’s just say…your scent wasn’t exactly discreet. Neither were your moans, for that matter.” the grip on his hand tightens as he slams him against a tree next, his body caging him in, leaving him feeling as though he were about to have a panic attack from all of this intensity.

As Hyouga uses his free hand to undress himself, Gen tries to bargain with him, does all that he can to make him listen to him before he does something awful, “Hyouga…there are many, many other omegas you could revive at any moment to be your mate…I’m sure there’s some pretty stunning models and sexy beach babes you can get instead! We can go down to the miracle cave and find the perfect one to share your rut with you, my treat, of course. If omega women aren’t your thing, I’m positive there’s plenty of sexy omega men like Taiju who would be better suited—”

The laugh he heard made his heart drop to the pit of his stomach because he knew then he could not talk his way out of this, “Why would I want any of them? You don’t get it, do you? An alpha like myself wouldn’t want someone as bulky or masculine as Taiju because they’re not easy to dominate, nor are they suited to carry pups as efficiently due to their narrowed hips. You, on the other hand, are the perfect one to bear my pups.”

He grips his hips in a strong grab with both of his hands, with Gen knowing he will have bruises there when this is all over, “Your hips are the perfect shape for bearing pups—not too narrow, curved, and with the perfect amount of width. Your softer body means you will be able to produce more milk to breastfeed my pups and your softer voice will allow you to give my pups a soothing lullaby whenever they need to sleep.”

“But me? Are you sure you’d want me when you can have any other omega man trapped in stone with the same physical attributes as me?”

“It amazes me how you just don’t get it…” he releases his right hip to fully strip himself, his manhood on full display for Gen to see when he speaks, “I don’t want anyone else trapped in stone. Why would I? You’re the only one who makes the most sense for me: you’re cute, funny, and know how to talk your way out of a bad situation. Considering you’re far more successful and intelligent than many other omega men here, why wouldn’t I choose you over everyone else? Who would have ever thought in our world that I would be the one to mate the unmateable Asagiri Gen? I’ve always appreciated challenges, but I’m tired of this one so I’m going to end it here.”

“Wait, Hyouga—” he was cut off by the man moving his hand from his left hip to his pelvic area, getting ready to shove his long fingers past his lips and inside of him, “Don’t worry, I’ll make this far more enjoyable than anything Ukyou could have given you.”

He managed to get three of his fingers in him, making Gen scream out from the manner he had done it, when there was the sound of an arrow being shot that caught them off guard. 

It had narrowly missed Hyouga, but managed to graze the skin of his arm. With a fire burning in those jade green eyes, Ukyou stood firm and tall, his hiss strong when addressing the alpha in front of him, “Let Gen go, Hyouga. I don’t want to kill anyone, but if you don’t stop, then I’ll shoot you right through the heart.”

”Weren’t you supposed to be out on a hunt?” 

“It was an easy kill for me to make and when I saw Gen wasn’t anywhere near the fire pit, I figured he had been staying at the river a bit longer since he’s always there first whenever there is a meal. I came back here to check on him, to tell him our meal is ready, and I find you naked, in a rut nonetheless, trying to assault him!” 

They hear the sound of an arrow being pulled back on a bow, Ukyou’s threat hanging in the air, “Let him go or else I’ll kill you and take Gen far away from here to start over.”

Things are tense and quiet, Gen can feel his heart pounding against the confines of his rib cage, wondering what will happen next. 

“…Very well then. I will leave him be for now, but only because if I kill you in my current state, Tsukasa will become suspicious of me and that’s the last thing I need.” 

Hyouga let him go and got dressed in his clothes before heading out of the general area of the forest. 

When he was out of earshot, Ukyou approached Gen with his clothes and told him through a croon, “Gen, we don’t have to stay here anymore. We can leave now, we don’t have to tolerate this behavior from him. They can’t track us in a stone world, I can take you anywhere you please and we start over, just the two of us. That’s always an option.”

”…I wouldn’t want Hyouga chasing you, trying to kill you, Ukyou. It’s for the best if we keep our current system going for now until Tsukasa sends me out somewhere. That’s the only way this will ever stop. I will let you know if I ever do go out somewhere on his orders because that’s the only way I can think for us to start over without Hyouga breathing down our necks.”

Ukyou nods while Gen gets dressed. When he is fully dressed, he gives the alpha a small, “Thanks for stopping him for me, again. I’m lucky to have you in this new world.”

”I made a promise to you and I intend to keep it. Don’t worry, Gen: Hyouga will never mate you as long as I am around.”

“I’m sorry I never told anyone this, but nobody wants to talk about such a subject at all if they don’t have to, especially in a world where omegas have no one in their corner to help them stand up to alphas.” 

Taiju pales then, his voice loud when addressing everything he’s heard, “No way! Is that why you smelled really strongly of Hyouga that one time?” 

Gen nods to this, “You are correct. I would have told Tsukasa, but I knew I’d never be believed over Hyouga and I knew far too many alphas in the empire who thought just like him when it came down to omegas.”

All eyes are on Tsukasa and Hyouga, awaiting to see what will happen now that the full truth of Gen’s departure has come to light.

Chapter Text

Tsukasa was cautious when beginning to face Hyouga about what they all had just heard from Gen, “Ukyou, is it true what Gen said?”

“It is.” he answers without second thought, making Ruri and Suika swoon over him even more, “Wow, to have saved Gen from such a fate while not being a complete pervert…you truly are a good, pure hearted man, Ukyou.”

“You really love Gen and it’s so sweet!” Suika cheers as Ruri gets done bandaging his wounds. (Senku did only agree to let them come along as a form of medical support, after all…even though he knew they wouldn’t stop gushing over Ukyou the entire time.)

Senku ignores this, as much as he ignores the part in Gen’s story that has to do with Ukyou…which is a lot of it.

For now, he keeps his eye on what Tsukasa will do next. If Hyouga messes up, then there’s a good chance he will side with the Kingdom of Science and end this war. If he’s smooth enough of a talker, then they’ll be left to fight the two of them.

“Hyouga, Taiju is not one to lie—he claimed to have smelled your scent on Gen one day and Gen claims it was related to the time where you tried to force yourself on him. Ukyou too is a man of honor and integrity, I have no reason to believe a man against violence would lie about threatening to kill you if you didn’t leave Gen alone.” Tsukasa begins, only to be met with the harsh derision of Hyouga himself.

“You’re taking the word of traitors who have lied to you?”

“Gen never lied to me, and while Taiju may have kept Senku’s being alive a secret from me, he never lied to me on anything else.” his gaze narrows in on Hyouga, leading the alpha to come to his own conclusion, “I’m not one to doubt omegas who come forward with stories of abuse from alphas. I would never do that to any omega, nor would my purified world ever contain anyone who would slander omegas coming forward with such allegations like the one Gen made of you.”

“What are you saying?”

“I believe Gen and your reaction to it all has me believing I made a mistake in reviving you. If you never did anything to him, he wouldn’t have had to be forced to leave the tank nor would he be shaken by you like he is now. I have no reason to believe you, not after this.”

“I see…” Hyouga then stabs Tsukasa right in the chest, “It looks like you are stuck in the old ways of omega rights and believing lying omegas over your fellow alpha. I have no reason to keep you alive any longer, not when you stand in my way of my goal of making my perfect society.”

As Tsukasa falls off of the branch, he calls on his backup, “Q-Quick, stop Hyouga!”

What shocks them all is none of them obey his orders.

Instead, they listen to Hyouga when he says, “Finish him off for me, I have no use of such simpletons in my society.”

When they charge to kill Tsukasa, the injured alpha cries out, “Stop, Hyouga is the one who—”

“Why the hell would we listen to you?”

“Yeah, if you ask me, I’d rather live in a world where alphas aren’t oppressed by omegas like we were in our old world. Hyouga makes a lot more sense to us than you ever would with your pathetic pandering ways.”

Hearing his men speak like this has Tsukasa’s eyes widening in horror.

The people he revived…they were all closet sexists with some extremely small exceptions…this isn’t the world he wanted Mirai to come back in. This isn’t the world he wanted for her at all.

“You see, Tsukasa, you revived alphas who happened to share my point of view as opposed to yours regarding omegas and their supposed ‘rights’. You can say it’s all for your sister, and I wouldn’t doubt you on it, but omegas are meant for breeding. If she cannot breed, then she has no right to be revived nor exist ever again as anything more than finely ground up dust.” Hyouga calmly asserts as their reinforcements go for the kill, “I had been intending to kill you and assert my position as head of the empire before the war could even start, but this works just as well.”

When the men charged on in, those from the Kingdom of Science stood up in defense of Tsukasa, leading the alpha to question, “Why? Why…are you…defending me?”

“Stop exerting yourself! You’re bleeding a lot everywhere and I don’t know if we can stop it or not!” Ruri orders him firmly, her focus off of Ukyou for the time being, “We’re helping you because we made a promise to ourselves that there would be no bloodshed, no death on any side, even if it is you.”

She didn’t know if a simple bandage could fix this or not, but she at least did her best to try to make the bleeding stop. As the Kingdom of Science residents prepared to fight off the men who coming to finish the job of killing Tsukasa, Hyouga made his move.

He jumped off of a thinner end of the branch, landing far away from the fight, and making his way over to Gen at a speed unlike anything those born without secondary genders had ever seen before.

Gen tried to run, with a few from the kingdom trying to stop the faster than usual alpha, only to wind up with deep stab wounds on their arms from his spear as a result. Since they had been born without secondary genders, they didn’t understand where Hyouga’s enhanced physical abilities came from until Taiju screamed out, “Don’t go near him! He’s an alpha running off of feral instincts! He’ll be faster, stronger, and able to recover from damage more quickly than the average alpha would all thanks to his instincts taking over everything else in him, like a feral animal.”

Senku gets on them over this as well, “The big oaf is right, don’t go anywhere near him! We don’t need any more casualties as is, and that will come if you try to take him on now as someone who doesn’t have a secondary gender.”

“What do you expect us to do? He’ll capture Gen if we don’t stop him!”

If he can get to the miracle cave, then he can try to invent something that will stop Hyouga, but he has to get to the cave first—

Except, he didn’t get to make a single step towards it.

Hyouga had already grabbed Gen in a vice grip, refusing to let him go as the omega struggled in vain to get away from him, “Looks like we’ll be mated anyway, Gen… You ran away for a year, but even you had to know the inevitable would happen whether you wanted it to or not.”

His feet couldn’t carry him to the miracle cave, not when Hyouga had Gen in his grasp.

Something foreign built up inside of him as he watched the alpha man hold the omega too close to himself, with a scent that reeked of rut. Out of the burning inside of his chest that had been building up thanks to the constant Ukyou-Gen talk comes a growl—his first ever real alpha growl—at Hyouga, “Let the mentalist go.”

Hyouga pauses in his actions and meets Senku eye to eye, “Ah, I see…you want me to let Gen go? Well, I’m afraid I cannot do that. You see Senku, I have no intention of starting a war with you or killing you even. All I want is your cooperation to make a world where those who are enlightened—such as yourself—exist whereas those who aren’t—such as Tsukasa—don’t. I don’t believe those who can benefit society in any meaningful way deserve to exist as much as I don’t believe in the ridiculous arbitrary views of ‘omega rights’ that only serves to punish alphas for being alphas.”

“I won’t let Gen go because he is an omega and since the only reason why humanity exists is to reproduce, he has to fulfill his role in society as an omega by bearing my pups. Omega men are clearly meant for breeding, if not, they wouldn’t have evolved to be so efficient at it to the point where the women seem to be only a pointless preference.”

Tsukasa’s idea of a pure world was bad enough in Senku’s eyes, but he could at least rationalize it as the guy wanting to do what best for his sister. On that end, Tsukasa wasn’t really a bad guy, but merely a guy who had a naïve view of the fact that science doesn’t make the world an awful place, awful people do.

Hyouga…he doesn’t know where he is getting this from. He doesn’t understand how on earth anyone could come up with such a horrible take on how society should be. He is trying to figure out if there is something that happened to him, something that made him tick and become this way when revived or not.

“How does a guy like you get views like this? Tall, handsome, strong, a real prime alpha who could have everything he wanted in our old world. Aside from your views, you are ideal by the standards of our time. Did you get rejected by omegas all of your life or something?”

“No, not at all. I have no tragic backstory, nor do I have any familial reasoning pushing me to believe the way I do. If of anything, I have always had these beliefs dating back to when I was a child. Seeing all of the useless people getting special treatment, alphas being punished based on any omega’s claim of them being sexist or abusive, it sickened me deeply. I always wanted to change things in our world to make it better for the good alphas out there and those who are enlightened, now that I have the chance to do it, I intend to follow through with it.”

Senku eyed him up, his answer to what he had heard being, “So you’re a sexist, social Darwinist then. Good to know; now I know what I’m dealing with.”

Hyouga does make some demands of his own, demands that he hopes Senku will abide by so this doesn’t get any more difficult than it has to be, “You can view me as negatively as you please, but if you side with me, I will end all fighting, I will grant you access to the miracle cave, and I will allow you to leave unharmed. There can be peace between us, Senku, but only if you are willing to help me create the society I want.”

“It all depends on one thing only for me: are you willing to give up Gen? Because I cannot work with any guy who is going to forcibly mate someone.”

His response to Senku’s rejection?

“Oh, you want to mate Gen as well? I can share as long as I have him most of the time.” he then holds out Gen’s right wrist on full display for Senku, “Omegas have two wrists like the rest of us. If I press hard enough, I can find out if Gen has scent glands on both wrists or only one. If he has them on only one, then I don’t believe it’d be possible for you to be his mate as well, but I am willing to allow you to have sex with him whenever you please if this is the case.”

Gen always knew Hyouga had piggish views of omegas, but to know he was this horrid had him genuinely stunned. He thought there was some chance he wasn’t completely an awful person, but knowing he is leaves him shaken to his core.

“Like I’d ever agree to anything that disgusting! I’m with Tsukasa on this one; I believe in omega rights and I’m not some closet sexist like you and your lackeys are.” Senku is firm on his stance, “I don’t care what you think or believe—I’m not working with anyone as abhorrent as you. You’re repulsive in every way imaginable. I’d rather have an alliance with Tsukasa than be anywhere near you.”

“I understand…” he shrugs this off, taking Gen’s wrist away from Senku, “I will mark Gen then and find a different manner to convince you to join my side. I’m sure there’s some interesting methods I can use to convince you otherwise—I’m certain I can find a way to remove some teeth or fingernails if I try hard enough.”

Senku was getting ready to come back with something rather witty to this when an arrow flew past them and managed to tear off Hyouga’s mask with speed and force alone.

“I meant what I said back then…let him go or else the next one goes right to your jugular.”

Hearing the familiar snarl of Ukyou has Gen calming down on the spot, whereas Senku tries to be appreciative of his support yet cannot bring himself to do so as long as the man provokes that strange, terrible feeling in his chest.

Chapter Text

Hyouga kept his calm despite the fact he wanted nothing more than to kill Ukyou for trying to halt his negotiations with Senku. If that man had not been here, he wouldn’t have had to make his move in killing Tsukasa right then and there because he wouldn’t have to worry about that damned alpha trying to run away with Gen.

While he didn’t want anyone to see the petrification scars around his mouth, he didn’t care in that moment because Ukyou had recovered and was getting ready to try to kill him for trying to mate Gen.

He says ‘try’ because he knows the man won’t succeed in it, not when he’s in this enhanced state.

Ukyou is firm when threatening him, “I mean it, Hyouga, I know where to strike to kill you. I made a promise to Gen and I will keep it, even if it means going against my original conditions for joining the Kingdom of Science in their side of the war.”

Senku cannot stop himself from being utterly annoyed with Ukyou and his knight in shining armor qualities. He’s not jealous of him, of course, he’s simply…annoyed, that’s all. It’s an annoyance which will go away when this whole mess is over and they have Gen back safely.

For now, he needs to figure out what he can do to get Gen away from him.

Gen squirms in his grasp, trying one more time to reason with the unreasonable alpha in his desperate attempt to flee him, “H-Hyouga…Homura is super into you. She’s an infertile alpha, so she’s rare with the added bonus of having the same anatomy as me—ow!”

“An alpha mating with an alpha, even having sex with another alpha, is disgusting, abhorrent, and an affront to nature itself. Any alpha attracted to another alpha regardless of rare infertile status has no place in a perfect society, neither do omegas who are attracted to other omegas regardless of the rare infertile status amongst themselves.” Hyouga chuckles lowly in his ear, “Nice try, Gen, but you’re mine now so you may as well give up.”

As the omega begins to release distress pheromones in the air, Kohaku rushes to their side and with a knife drawn out, challenges the alpha, “Come on, Hyouga! Let Gen go or else I’ll be the one to take him from you!”

With a jump in the air and the knife in her hands, Kohaku is aiming for Hyouga’s right shoulder, but then, the alpha partially releases Gen to use his spear to fight off the young woman lacking in secondary gender. Knowing she wouldn’t be able to keep up with him even as he held Gen close to himself, he kept fighting her nonstop, not letting up once.

Senku was caught off guard from trying to stop Ukyou from killing Hyouga by a heavy hand being placed on his shoulder, “Senku…you have to take the remaining villagers, Taiju, and Chrome and leave.”

He turns to see Tsukasa, the wound having been one that hit him in the lungs and one that Senku knew would be incredibly difficult to fix in the stone world.

Despite this, he is able to reply, “No can do. I’m not abandoning the miracle cave and I’m not giving up on saving your sister. I can find a way to do it all, I know I—”

“It’s admirable to me that you still want to keep your promise…but Senku, this is too dangerous. Hyouga has reinforcements and men who will always agree with his viewpoint…all of this is my fault. In my attempt to make a perfect world for my sister, I made one far worse for her than our old one would ever be. You don’t have to keep your promise to me anymore, I will aid you from now on because I refuse to allow anyone else to pay the price for my mistakes.” Tsukasa speaks to him in a wavering tone, doing his best to try to get him to listen.

Except, Senku doesn’t, “No way. I’m not settling for that… Stay here, I’ll get Chrome and we’ll make a weapon of science to stop Hyouga and revive your sister.”

“Senku—”

He couldn’t stop him from breaking out of his grasp and heading to the miracle cave with Chrome while Taiju and his recruits get the tank out of the hole it was in.

Tsukasa knows this battle with Hyouga will only get worse over time. As such, he tries to work with Ukyou, “Ukyou, we need to work together if we want to stop Hyouga from mating Gen.”

The shorter alpha isn’t answering him, his scent one of pure rage and hostility, leaving Tsukasa knowing that he will have to wait for Senku to return if he wishes to stop the man before it’s too late.

Chrome was with Senku, trying to figure out what he was doing with remnants of the cell phone Hyouga had broken. He knew he had obtained as much miracle fluid as possible and stored it away in a bag, but watching him now like this has him wondering, “What are you doing?”

“Making a stun gun to hit Hyouga with. Before you ask, it won’t kill him, but it will stop him long enough for us to escape with Gen.”

Chrome finds this interesting and is willing to do all that he can to help him. Though he does comment to him, “If you want to escape with Gen, I know there’s no need to make a weapon of science for this one. Ukyou will save him, that much I know.”

Hearing Ukyou’s name and Gen’s in the same sentence is enough to make his snarl, “We don’t need Ukyou killing people to save the mentalist. I can devise a superior way to save him than with simple murder.”

The brunette man sighs to this as he gets to helping Senku, “I know you think that, but Ukyou is a good guy who is in love with Gen. I know he will save him—”

“I need you to focus on this now or else we won’t be able to make a stun gun, okay? No more Ukyou talk, got it?”

“…Sure. Tell me what you need help with, and I’ll help you.”

Regardless of his willingness to help Senku, Chrome got the feeling there was something more with his shortness whenever Ukyou was brought up. He doesn’t know what is going on, but he does intend to find out before it can disrupt whatever fragile connection the Kingdom of Science has with the military alpha who will flee with Gen if he feels things are not going to end well here.

Kohaku did her best in her fight against Hyouga, but even with one arm keeping a vice grip on Gen, he was too much for her to take on alone thanks to the enhanced speed, strength, and agility from his alpha nature taking over.

“Pathetic, really. I knew you could take down my pitiful reinforcements, but it seems you without secondary genders are truly inferior to those of us with them.” he mocks her with all of the condescension in himself as he holds his spear to her throat, “Did you actually believe threatening an alpha in the manner you did would help your cause? Didn’t the scientist teach you anything? If he didn’t allow me to explain something incredibly basic: no threatens to take away an alpha’s mate or lover without dire consequences happening to them. You will see for yourself just how dire it will get!”

Taiju interrupts then, his anger flowing out into his scent as he growls at him, “Stop! Who do you think you are to force someone who’s clearly terrified of you to mate you? Who do you think you are to kill anyone in general? I may not agree with Tsukasa, but he’s not a bad guy like you.”

The buffed omega is met with the glower of an alpha who refuses to take such rebellious behavior from one he views to be beneath him, “Stand down, omega and I might go easy on you. We all know that no matter how strong you are, you will always be inferior to the strength of a prime alpha like myself.”

Taiju is not the typical omega. Indeed, he is far from ideal in the eyes of closet sexists like Hyouga: too buffed, too masculine looking by Western standards of masculinity, too loud, too rowdy, and lacking in the basic sweet scent that traditionalist alphas such as Hyouga prefer.

Unlike the traditional omega, he doesn’t submit to the threat. Instead, he stands tall and charges at him in an attempt to make let Gen go, “Let him go!”

With his shield from Senku in hand, he charged at Hyouga at high speed, hoping it would be enough to make him stumble enough to allow Gen the chance to run.

It wasn’t, at first.

Hyouga had to use his spear to create distance, but the stubborn omega kept pushing on it no matter how much pressure he applied to it. He did all that he could to try to hold him off the strength of one hand alone, and yet in the end he could not. In his battle against Kohaku, he could still use at least one or both of his legs in a direct weapon-to-weapon battle. In this fight, he didn’t have the ability to rely on anything against the stubborn omega other than his one hand. At this point Gen was nothing more than dead weight standing in the way of his shot to victory.

He threw him harshly to the side, harshly enough to where he wound up hitting the exterior of the miracle cave.

Though it hurt and shocked Gen for a brief moment, he was quick on his feet to run over to Ukyou’s side as though his life depended on it, “Ukyou!”

The alpha man had been ready to fire his arrow at Hyouga right into his heart, but when he heard Gen cry out his name, he immediately put the weapon away, “Gen!”

Rushing over to his side, he hugged the omega tightly and immediately went into military mode…well, military mode if it had a ‘protect my mate at all costs’ side to it.

“It looks like Taiju and his allies got the tank out of the trap. We should use it to escape right now to get to safety.”

Gen is hesitant about this because, “What if Senku and the others need my help? I am better with people than he is—”

Ukyou shakes his head in response, “We can’t do that. As long as Hyouga is here, he will keep trying to catch you and he will keep trying to forcibly mate you. That won’t help Senku and it won’t help me not kill Hyouga if you get marked by him during this fight.”

Tsukasa—who had been doing all that he could to reason with Ukyou the entire time he stood there in stoic silence, ready to kill Hyouga—had spoken up then, making his presence known to Gen, “You have to leave right now…he will mate you by force and kill everyone here if he has to. Listen to Ukyou: get in that tank and leave while you can.”

“You really look you need it more right now than I do! You’re eeding-blay really badly and—”

“I don’t care. You are the one he wants right now, and you are the one who is in the most danger here, not myself. Everyone fighting Hyouga is doing this for your sake, for your safety, and your chance to escape him unmated. Listen to us and leave, Gen.”

Seeing Taiju keeping the fight despite having to deal with Hyouga’s enhanced strength and watching as Kohaku rejoined the battle as a back up to him all had him realizing then they were all doing this for him…to protect him from being mated by force to Hyouga.

He had been so caught in his panic, his anxiety, his mind going blank as Hyouga’s scent began to overpower his own that he completely tuned out everything around him while thinking of a way to get out of this unmated.

The omega man knew then that he couldn’t let their efforts be in vain, not after all they’ve done—and are still doing—for him. It is with a heavy heart that he leaves the battle, but he does so with a small, “Alright, I’ll leave with Ukyou…but at least promise me you’ll tell Senku why I had to go. I don’t want to isappoint-day anyone.”

Tsukasa could see how badly it was upsetting Gen to go, and thus, he decided to keep this promise, “Alright, I’ll do that for you.”

Gen nods and heads over to the tank with Ukyou, with the duo getting inside it and heading on out as Hyouga got caught up in what is now a three way battle against Kohaku, a pissed off Magma who couldn’t stomach not getting some form of revenge against the guy, and a determined Taiju who wasn’t backing down once.

Tsukasa may not know these people, and yet he is deeply grateful for all they are doing to hold off Hyouga until Senku finishes his weapon of science to defeat him.

Chapter Text

Inside the tank, Gen is driving and Ukyou is sitting where Senku had been. He can detect a slight bitter scent in there, making him wonder if Senku was angry or annoyed at something.

It doesn’t stop him from asking, “Gen, are you sure you want to drive? You don’t have to; I can do that just fine. You weren’t the only one with a license in our world, you know.”

“I know that, but I am the only one who knows where the other villagers would have gone after the fighters in ours took down Hyouga and Tsukasa’s reinforcements. Makes more ense-say for me to drive then, doesn’t it?”

“I guess…”

Ukyou did have something to get off his chest, something that he felt the omega by his side deserved to hear, “I know you have a lot of faith in Senku, but I can’t say the same for myself. I know he’s intelligent, I know he’s resourceful, yet I don’t believe for one second he understands how dire the situation is for omegas in general at the Tsukasa Empire. The fact he even brought you here to the battle is something I cannot believe anyone as intelligent as him would do.”

Gen does possess the need to defend Senku on this end for many reasons, one of them being, “You don’t know Senku…he can be very particular. I’m sure he only wanted me to come along in case if he needed someone to negotiate—”

“He seemed perfectly capable of doing that when speaking to Tsukasa and Hyouga. He didn’t need to endanger you, Gen.”

“He can be too blunt and ruin negotiations without meaning to, though. I’m sure you saw that when he spoke to Hyouga after he had caught me. I know Senku probably brought me along just for that reason alone.”

“I know you didn’t tell him about the situation with Hyouga’s rut because I could see the shock in his eyes when you spoke of it to Tsukasa. Didn’t he know how dangerous being near Hyouga was for you? If he did, why didn’t he care enough to keep you away from him?”

“I did tell him about the first incident I had with Hyouga and why I didn’t like the guy…I didn’t feel exactly comfortable about speaking up on the rut incident unless if I absolutely had to.” Gen is a bit exasperated when saying, “I don’t know why you think Senku did this on purpose to harm me…he probably needed me for some form of backup or something.”

“He has Chrome, he doesn’t have a reason to put you in a situation where Hyouga could show up and could make a move to try to mark you by force like he did not too long ago.”

Gen is reaching his limit here. He understands Ukyou was very concerned about his safety right from the beginning, but he knows Senku well enough to know he wouldn’t intentionally endanger him over nothing. All he can say in defense of the scientist is, “I’m positive if he knew about the rut incident, he wouldn’t have ever allowed me to come to the battle. He probably thought it was all mild and Hyouga would be above force. You can’t blame him for something I didn’t tell him about.”

Ukyou is giving some leeway here on that one, “Alright, I understand that. I won’t blame him for it, but this doesn’t change the fact that something dark and ugly overcame me when I saw Hyouga with you…it doesn’t change the fact that I almost killed someone just to kill him when I was running off of instincts alone.”

Now the mentalist is stunned, “What? You almost killed someone to kill Hyouga? Are you idding-kay me? Is this some sort of dark joke?”

Gen doesn’t want to believe Ukyou was actually serious because that doesn’t sound like something he would do. At least, he never believed he would be the type to do anything like that.

What he heard next from Ukyou really took him off guard, “In the military, we were all trained to control our most base alpha instincts, one of them being the one of keeping a mate or a potential mate safe from another alpha since it’s said to be the hardest instinct to control of all. I always knew how hard it would be to control, and in basic training, I was the top cadet in controlling it. In that situation, it was far harder than any training I ever went through.”

Ukyou is not exaggerating anything when he says this. He really, truly meant it: controlling his instincts had been far harder in the situation with Hyouga than what he ever endured in training. If of anything, he’d take the training exercise any day over what he had actually endured there instead.

“…It was that bad, huh?”

“You wouldn’t know it. I really did my best to contain that instinct, that primal urge inside of me to do whatever it took to kill Hyouga when he had his hands on you.” he looks down when admitting, “I know omegas don’t have the same instinct, so I don’t expect you to understand it. I only wanted to be honest with you, that’s all.”

“What made you hold back?” Gen is only wondering because if things were as bad as he said…then why did he hold back? What allowed him to retain control over the civilized, human part of himself?

“You… I didn’t want to try to kill him when he was holding you.” the young man confesses in pure honesty, being completely vulnerable when speaking further on the subject, “I was so afraid I’d hit you, hurt you, or kill you…that fear allowed me to not kill him. He was moving so fast, even when I thought I could get him, the chances of hitting you were too high. I couldn’t move forward with it knowing that I could hit you.”

The omega driving the tank was stunned to hear this, and yet Ukyou went further with his explanation, “When I was in that state of trying to control my instincts, my mind went blank: all I could see was Hyouga holding you and all I could hear was Tsukasa trying to reach out to me the entire time, trying to keep me calm by doing all that he could to make me snap out of it. When Taiju got close to him to try to stop him, I almost fired then, but at the angle I would have shot the arrow…it would have hit Taiju before striking down Hyouga. If Tsukasa hadn’t kept reminding me of this, I would have fired the arrow and harmed—if not killed—Taiju while managing to land a kill shot on Hyouga.”

He’s not exaggerating on this end either.

The entire time he held the arrow in his grasp, with the bow pulled back, everything around him was tuned out to the extreme as all he could see was Hyouga holding Gen and refusing to let go. It felt as though he were in an alternate dimension, one where the outside world didn’t affect him any longer, and he could act as freely as he pleased to fulfill that instinctual desire to kill Hyouga for trying to force a marking on Gen. Taiju coming up had been the perfect moment for him to strike because at that moment, Hyouga had slowed down in his movements enough for him to make a kill shot and end this for good.

Had it not been for Tsukasa trying to reason with him when he heard the deep growl underneath his breath, he would have fired the shot.

Initially, Tsukasa appeared to quit on him, and he was fine with this for it made killing Hyouga that easier for him to do in the moment. When he had growled deeply, Tsukasa was alarmed by it and did all that he could to speak to him, his voice sounding muted when he did, “Ukyou, I know you’re enraged, but if you strike now, you’ll hurt someone.”

“I know you probably can’t hear me, and your self control must be running out, but you have to listen to me! Killing Hyouga like this won’t make Gen happy, it will only upset him deeply… Listen to me on this, I know it’s hard, but you have to try to suppress that urge to kill him!”

“This isn’t you…stop while you still can, stop before you kill an innocent omega trying to save the one you clearly love! Stop, don’t fire the arrow, Ukyou, don’t growl at me whenever I try to stop you—there are other ways to end this, if you’d just wait for Senku to come back, we wouldn’t have to resort to the measures you are about to do.”

Ukyou hadn’t been snapped out of that moment. He had almost fired the arrow, almost killed people, and yet what it took for him to stop was Hyouga throwing Gen aside to better fight against an omega he had always underestimated in strength due to his secondary gender.

When he heard Gen’s voice calling out to him, he was suddenly back in reality and all he wanted to do was run away from there and start over elsewhere, far away from the fighting and drama.

“All it took was hearing you cry out my name to get me back into reality when I was disconnected from it during a moment where all I could obsess over was killing Hyouga… You single handedly stopped me from making a grave mistake, Gen. I will forever you owe my gratitude for that.”

For Gen, learning of this has him amazed at all of the information he has heard just now. Maybe he does owe Tsukasa some thanks after this is over because he did keep Ukyou calm during the worst of his instincts taking over and if it weren’t for him…who knows what could have happened.

“Aw, Ukyou-chan loves me!” Gen teases him lightly, hoping to lighten the serious mood between them.

Ukyou being Ukyou handled it with aplomb: he laughed to what he had said, “How can I not when Gen-chan is too cute?”

Gen chuckles to this, used to such banter with him by now, and not really reading anything else into it, “Oh, I think we’re getting to the camp we have set up here! It should be coming up soon.”

“I hope it is…I’d like to see where you were living and what standards Senku had for a temporary setting.”

He doesn’t understand why Ukyou seems to believe Senku couldn’t devise a way for him to come along to this war without him being harmed. Unlike the military alpha, Gen has a lot of faith in Senku and he knows the scientist alpha will always keep the best interests of others first no matter what.

When they arrived at the camp where the villagers were at, Ruri and Suika had been the ones who were joyous.

“Look everybody, they’re back! The war is over and we won!” Suika cheers as the tank pulls up and parks in the middle of the base.

Ukyou gets out first with Gen following afterwards, the alpha greeting everyone with a kind smile, “Hello everyone, how did you guys manage to escape? I was sort of blacked out for a moment there when trying to get Hyouga away from Gen.”

Ruri is the one who fills him on this, “After we had bandaged you up, I had worked on Tsukasa, but his wound was too deep for me to help him. Ginrou, Kinrou, Magma, Kohaku, my father, Taiju, Nikki, and their allies fought off the reinforcements ordered to kill Tsukasa successfully. When that was done, Suika, myself, and others who would be hindrances on the battlefield left back to the base camp to wait for everyone to return. Of course, we didn’t do it alone—Ginrou and Kinrou went along with us to be sure we got back safely. Last I heard, they left to return to the battle…why are you two the only ones back now? Did we lose the war?”

Gen answers the priestess this time, explaining to her, “Actually…Hyouga went azy-cray after you guys left… Ukyou almost killed him to save me from his grasp, but if it weren’t for Taiju being as strong as he is, Hyouga wouldn’t have released me in order to fight him properly. The battle is still going on as we speak except we have Tsukasa on our side now. Where are Nikki and her allies from Tsukasa’s Empire?”

“They stayed behind to be sure none of the prisoners they caught escaped.” Suika fills him in, wondering, “Where’s Senku?”

“We don’t know, actually. All I know is, if they try to come here, I will handle Hyouga myself so no one ever has to live in fear of him ever again.” the green eyed man vows to all there, making them all swoon…except for Gen, who’s used to him by now.

Though it doesn’t stop Gen from worrying over Senku and how the others back at the battle are doing against an enhanced Hyouga.

Chapter Text

Senku came out of the miracle cave with Chrome, but he was stunned to see the sight he did.

Taiju was holding his own against Hyouga, while Magma and Kohaku were doing their best to help. Except without secondary genders, the two strongest fighters in the village wound up losing when the alpha eyes dared to dart back at a certain area…one that has Senku wondering, “What the hell happened here?” before Hyouga growls and speaks in his alpha voice—a voice that makes Taiju almost submit on the spot due to instinct alone, “Gen…you people allowed Gen and Ukyou to run away together, didn’t you? You without secondary genders, who are you to interfere with anything regarding this situation?”

His voice is almost monstrous sounding, his outrage seeping out of him and being made known by his scent alone. It makes Senku go on edge, having to really fight to restrict his own hiss at the scene Hyouga is making about Gen…not that he would care about that, of course, he only cares about Hyouga knocking down Magma and Kohaku for not having secondary genders.

Taiju, forever being the stubborn omega he is, refused to back down. He’s fighting his own instincts, that much Senku can tell as he wavers so slightly in his stance and yet all it does draw Hyouga’s attention to him, “You, fighting your nature, trying to defy me by pretending to be an alpha—how abhorrent can you be? Submit and leave, omega, and I’ll possibly spare you.”

Tsukasa grabs him by the shoulder and tries to speak to Senku, hoping he’s not too lost in outrage over Hyouga’s behavior like Ukyou had been before he left with Gen, “Please, Senku…this is going on long enough. Hyouga’s going to snap and if Taiju doesn’t leave right now…things will get ugly. A closet sexist like Hyouga will kill a disobedient, improper omega like Taiju. Please tell me you have something in mind to stop this from escalating further.”

“I do, actually, but I’ll need everyone’s help with it. An enhanced alpha like him isn’t going to go down without a fight and the only way I can think to take him down isn’t exactly my usual way of doing things.”

“Tell me and I’ll do all that I can. It’s all I can do for reviving him and the many other closet sexists who hold his views, for making a world I’d never want Mirai back in.” before Senku can object to this given the injured alpha’s state, “Let me do this for you…after all, I was the one who broke my promise not only to you but to Mirai as well…”

He is reluctant about involving a heavily injured Tsukasa in this, yet at the same time, he knows he can be as stubborn as Taiju. As such, he agrees even if it goes completely against his better judgment, “Alright, I’ll need you to distract Hyouga long enough to get him in the perfect position. I’ll call off Taiju and Magma since they can’t take hints well enough to—”

Just his luck, he didn’t need to call off Taiju or Magma. The ferocious, angry alpha had successfully gotten a cocky Magma away from him with little effort and pounced on Taiju next, with his spear up to his throat, “I might spare your life if you tell me right now where Gen and Ukyou went, omega. Tell me and you might live long enough to see your alpha again.”

He’s trying to force him to speak using his omega instinct against him. Senku and Tsukasa had heard of such things happening in the olden times back in their world, but actually seeing it happen in real life, right in front of their eyes, to someone they know…it sickens them deeply.

Kohaku attempted to make a move but was halted by Hyouga’s threat, “Make one move against me and the omega dies.”

Senku orders Tsukasa in a sharp whisper, “Tsukasa, stand down. I have an idea on how to defeat him that will spare Taiju’s life, but I need to buy you time before you can restrain him along with the other closet sexists we’ve captured, okay?”

“Okay.” Tsukasa replies, reeling from the fact this is what he had revived, this man is the one who would have dictated the sort of world Mirai would have woken up to…a man who views omegas as being nothing than chattel meant to reproduce and tend to household duties.

It disgusts, horrifies, and dismays him all at once to know of the grave mistake he had made in reviving Hyouga along with the other closet sexists.

Chrome asks them once the shock has subsided, “What should I do?”

“Stay by Tsukasa’s side, leave Hyouga thinking he’s on death’s door to keep him away. I’ll lead him out to the forest, that’s when you and Tsukasa can come along to help me take him down.” Chrome did as he was told, leaving it all to Senku now to stop Hyouga, “I know where Gen and Ukyou are at, Hyouga. If you release Taiju, I will take you to them right now.”

Kohaku had almost snapped to this, but upon seeing Senku’s glare in her direction, she backed off and held her tongue.

“Really now? You’ll take me to them without any hesitation? How am I to believe this from you?” Hyouga asks in a calmer voice, his hostility appearing to be gone in a mere second.

“Yeah, I will, but only if you let the big oaf go.”

Hyouga releases Taiju to a cry from the omega, “Senku, no, you can’t—”

“I have to do what needs to be done.” Senku speaks easily on the topic, “Don’t worry so much about it and let us handle it on our own.”

“I’d listen to him omega if you wish to live.” Hyouga speaks in his calmer tone, but it had an edge to it that made Taiju freeze on the spot as he followed Senku into the forest.

Senku knows he has to be extra careful about this, as do Tsukasa, Chrome, and Kohaku.

What happens here will decide the fate of the war.

Gen was practically exploding in anxiety that Ukyou could hardly soothe while waiting for Senku to return. When he did, he felt immediate relief.

“Senku, how did you—whoa, you actually caught Hyouga and Homura? Wait, I thought she was already captured…” Gen begins slowly, finding this to be an odd development he didn’t see coming.

Hyouga and Homura both restrained by tight ropes around them, being led to the camp by Taiju and Kohaku. It stunned him because he didn’t think a win against Hyouga would happen so easily.

“She escaped at some point from her prison then… Anyway, she tried to kill Tsukasa and I after we brought Hyouga down with a stun gun.” Senku explains as though it were the easiest thing in the world. In reality, it was rather messy.

Tsukasa had to fight Hyouga in a forest clearing and with his injured state, he did struggle, but he managed to get Hyouga’s guard down long enough for Senku to use his stun gun on him. Despite the victory, it came at a price for Tsukasa, who is currently back in the forest with Chrome and Magma.

“A stun gun, really!” Gen exclaims before shaking his head, “Ah…who am I idding-kay? It’s you, Senku—only you could have come up with something like this.”

Hyouga wasn’t allowed to be too close to the camp, and for good reason. The moment his eyes landed on Gen, he was already crooning, “Tell me Gen, will you be the one to give me my food and drink when I am in the same prison you apparently kept Homura here in? I would prefer the gentle hand of an omega to make my food for me and bring it at just the right time. It is what your kind excels at, after all.”

“Gen won’t be doing that, but I will.” Ukyou speaks up with a small growl in his voice, “I’ll even be making your meals as well—enjoy that thought, Hyouga.”

He was about to say something right back to him when Senku took hold of the situation, “Taiju, keep him by Nikki and the others. I don’t want him anywhere Gen or Ukyou, got it?”

“Got it, Senku!” he replied cheerily while leading Hyouga away, Kohaku wound up following his lead with Homura as well.

Senku announced it to everyone then, “Hey, everyone, the war is over! The Kingdom of Science has officially won, which means we’re just getting started…so get excited, because we have a lot of work to do to bring back humanity!”

While everyone is cheering and asking Senku questions about how he had won the war, Gen is relieved. Now that the threat is gone, it means he has nothing to worry about anymore regarding Hyouga.

As for Ukyou, he was happy the war ended because now he work alongside Gen and possibly get that date in there somehow, somewhere if he tries hard enough.

He says to Gen while all the attention is on Senku, “I’m glad it’s over…now I can rest easy knowing we have Hyouga under control.”

“You opeless-hay omantic-ray…but I’m glad he’s under control too.” Gen confesses to something he never thought he would since he hadn’t in the past, “Being in his hold back there was terrifying, it felt like I was about to be assaulted during his rut all over again. I’m glad you were able to snap out of your trance when I needed you because all I wanted at that point was to leave and I knew you’d get me out of there in one piece.”

“I know I can be overprotective when it comes down to you, but I had all the reason in the world to be. The one time I let my guard down, he almost sexually abused you during his rut. I couldn’t trust him or anyone else in a situation against him to be able to keep you safe like I can.” he meets Gen’s gaze when saying it, “I’m sorry for doubting Senku in the way I did earlier. I didn’t know him well and I made assumptions I shouldn’t have.”

He raises a brow to this, “Why are you apologizing to me?”

“Because I upset you when I did that and I never want to be on a bad term with you.” the military man then asks something Gen didn’t see coming so soon, “When we have to do whatever work it is Senku wants to do next, I know we will both be busy, but I’d like to work together with you if I can. You don’t have to say anything right now, but I would like to date you sometime soon, Gen. Are you at least open to considering that?”

“Um…I don’t know, I’ll have to think it over…” Gen stammers, not sure what to do in this case since the last time he had been asked out on a date was in middle school and he feels a bit awkward around the subject, especially since Ukyou is far more experienced than he is.

The alpha by his side accepts this, more than willing to wait, “I’m fine with that. Take all the time you need to think it over, just let me know when you come to your conclusion, okay?”

“Okay, I’ll be sure to do that then.” Ukyou changes the subject then, noting his slight discomfort, “What do you think Senku will have us do now that the war is over?”

“Ah, who knows what he would make us do!” Gen chuckles, “You’d be amazed at all the azy-cray things I’ve done while away from the empire over the past year.”

“Tell me all about it then. We have the chance to really talk now, so why not tell me what it was like to live in this Kingdom of Science?”

As Gen begins to tell Ukyou of his time in the Kingdom of Science, Senku cannot help but that feel that tightening, burning feeling in his chest at the sight of them speaking so casually despite his announcement.

What he didn’t know was Taiju, Yuzuriha, and Kohaku had all caught onto the momentary frown on his face when he dared to look at Gen and Ukyou as they spoke, each one of them coming to the same conclusion on the same spot…

…Senku is completely jealous of Ukyou's relationship with Gen. 

Chapter Text

Confronting Senku about his jealousy towards Ukyou’s relationship with Gen was not as easy as Taiju, Yuzuriha, and Kohaku thought it would be. 

After the battle was over, Senku immediately put everyone to work. A prison with metal bars was made inside the old fortress where Tsukasa once lived to hold Hyouga, Homura, and their fellow closet sexists in a prison for attempting to kill Tsukasa. Senku then got busy with building the refrigerator for Tsukasa and it turned out to be an emotional time for him, something that made the others not want to go near him for respect of what he was about to endure. 

As for Gen, he was busy with helping Ukyou recover the pieces of all the statues Tsukasa destroyed, but it was no easy task. It definitely gave the two all the time in the world to catch up and yet he couldn’t help but to worry over how Senku was doing the entire time. 

Ukyou did all that he could to keep him distracted, which he appreciated very much. It still did nothing to ease the worry building in him, wondering if Senku was as okay as he thought he was.

At night when they are eating—a deer Ukyou had caught them, making Ruri and Suika awe in coos of ‘he’s handsome, romantic, and a provider? How can Gen not go for him!’—Ukyou asks him, “Gen, I don’t have a place to sleep for the night. You wouldn’t mind sharing your tent with me, would you? I’d rather sleep somewhere comfortable that my old room at Tsukasa’s place.”

“Aw, Ukyou-chan can’t live without me that much!”

“Only because Gen-chan is the sweetest!” he jokes back, but it’s not without Kohaku catching a glance at Senku in that moment before he makes it clear, “The mentalist isn’t sharing his tent with anyone.”

“Why not? Gen told me you two slept in the same hut together. Why can’t I sleep in the same tent with him for one night?” Ukyou asks with a curious glance in Senku’s direction, trying to piece together the alpha’s sudden interest in Gen’s sleeping arrangements, “Before you say I’m untrustworthy, keep in mind, I did keep him safe from Hyouga long before he joined the Kingdom of Science and Gen himself trusts me. What issue would there logically be for us to not share a tent together?”

Senku, Kohaku can tell, has a problem with this. He’s been staring at them as they ate around the campfire, watching as they sit side-by-side, observing quietly, and generally not contributing much to the conversations. She is convinced he’s jealous of Ukyou, but maybe this will be enough evidence of strange behavior to speak to Yuzuriha and Taiju about later on in private.

His whole body seems tense when he replies to the other alpha and yet his tone is surprisingly even, “I know there’s no logical reason to not want you in a tent with him. I’m only saying this because we don’t have enough mats for anyone else but the people who came along with us to the battle and no way in hell am I giving up mine.”

“Now that’s just mean!” Gen quips, but it’s resolved by Suika cheerfully offering, “Ukyou can have mine! That way he can sleep with Gen in the same tent as him.”

“You don’t have to do that.” Ukyou begins, only to be stopped by Suika, “I don’t have to, but I want to. I want to do all that I can to make sure you two are happy together.”

“Suika, it’s fine. I can sleep in my own place, there’s no need to worry—”

“Suika doesn’t have to give up her mat.” Ruri cuts in next, more than willing to follow her lead, “I’ll give up my mat and share one with Kohaku. It’ll be just like when we were kids.”

Ukyou raises his hand, waving it all off, “Guys, it’s fine. I don’t need a mat to sleep on. I’ll stay in my old room at the fortress for the night.”

Gen does make an offer, one that he hopes will settle it, “How about you and I stay at your room then? I’m sure it won’t be that ad-bay.”

This suggestion only seemed to rile Senku up more if the ever increasing stiffening and tensing of his body is anything to go off of, “No, you don’t need to do that. Why would you want to?”

“Why wouldn’t I want to? I used to share a room with him at nights because I was aranoid-pay of Hyouga trying to mark me in my sleep. His room was a safe space for me back then and it is now, why would I say ‘no’ to spending one more night in there?”

Ukyou seems to be picking up on this tension surrounding Senku as Kohaku is if his ever careful gaze is anything to go by. Gen gains a look of concern when asking, “Senku, why don’t you want me to share a room or tent with Ukyou? Is something wrong?”

Senku doesn’t say anything to this other than, “I know you’re the type to be open with people and I don’t want you to be taken advantage of. There’s nothing wrong here, I’m just trying to keep all omegas safe like I said I would after I announced my victory to the people in the empire.”

Gen doesn’t really buy it from what Kohaku can see, but he doesn’t push his suspicions, “Okay, I can appreciate that…but Ukyou is not the type to do that. If he were, he would’ve done something to me a long time ago. There’s no need to be so otective-pray. You get that, right?”

“I do and I will let you decide whatever it is you want to do regarding your sleeping arrangements.” Senku conceded to what Gen had said, but not without a little compromise of his own from what Kohaku saw.

He took a seat on the log next to Gen, with the duo being pretty shocked at this, “Senku…you actually want to sit here?”

“Don’t read too much into it, mentalist! This spot is closest to the fire and I’m feeling a bit cold.”

“Alright.” Gen replies before continuing to speak to Ukyou.

Now Kohaku is pretty convinced she has enough evidence to speak to Taiju and Yuzuriha about this. They could possibly help her confront Senku on this issue before it spirals into something ugly.

Kohaku was about to go find Taiju and Yuzuriha to schedule a sort of intervention for Senku regarding his jealousy over Ukyou’s relationship with Gen when she happened upon an interesting sight after their dinner was over.

Gen had confronted Senku, thinking they were alone when he spoke, “Are you sure you’re okay? I know what happened with Tsukasa was rough…do you want me to spend the night in your tent like we would back at the village? Because I can do that if you want me to.”

“No, that’s fine.”

“Are you sure?”

Senku seems to be hesitating in the face of Gen’s genuine worry. She can tell by the way he doesn’t respond right away and by the way he seems to want to move closer to Gen, only to restrain himself, “No, I’ll be fine. I don’t need to be coddled like that; you should know me better by now than to think I would need to be.”

Gen accepts this with aplomb and yet she has a feeling his concern hasn’t gone away, “You’re right, I should know better than that by now… I’ll see you tomorrow, Senku…goodnight.”

“Yeah, goodnight.”

Kohaku immediately fled the scene after this to avoid being seen by the alpha and omega duo, more ready than ever to discuss her discovery with the two people that would know Senku well enough to confirm her strong suspicions.

It didn’t take her long to find the couple. In fact, all she had to do was head over to the fortress to see if they’d be around and they were, right at the entryway actually, when she found them.

“Taiju, Yuzuriha, can I speak to you for a moment?”

They both paused in their steps, with Yuzuriha taking the lead in case if something bad is happening, “Is there something wrong?”

She does her best to explain it, hoping they will be able to help her out with this conundrum she in, “No, nothing is wrong in the sense of everyone’s lives are on the line… Something is wrong with Senku and I think it’s him being jealous Ukyou’s relationship with Gen.”

Both of them are quiet for a brief moment before Taiju spoke up, “Yeah, I think he’s jealous of him too… He stared at them when they spoke together after he made his announcement and there were times where he was distracted because he was constantly trying to keep an eye on Ukyou and Gen. What happened tonight at dinner was just the thing that confirmed it for me.”

“Yeah, I noticed the same things you did, Taiju.” she then asks her, “Kohaku, did you notice anything wrong with Senku when Ukyou first came into the picture?”

She thought of it and came back with, “After Gen first told everyone about Ukyou, I could tell he wasn’t too happy with it. That was my first hint of it. When they first met in person with the rest of the villagers who had come along, I saw he wasn’t comfortable around him. It was almost like watching a father wolf reluctantly allowing another male wolf to come near the mother of his pups. I know everyone else was really excited to meet Ukyou, but I couldn’t stop thinking he was of him for how close he was to Gen. The things that happened recently after the war ended really confirmed it for me. I was wondering if you two thought the same way.”

Yuzuriha agrees with her on the spot, “Of course I do because I’ve never seen or known Senku to act this way and neither has Taiju for that matter. I do wish he’d reign it in somewhat because if he is jealous of Ukyou’s relationship with Gen, then that means it will only be a matter of time before one of them snaps and it could turn deadly if that happened.”

“You’re right on that one…Ukyou is far more in tune with his instincts and he knows how to control them too. Senku is so disconnected with his instincts I don’t think he’d know how to properly handle a situation with another alpha wanting Gen.” Taiju comments, feeling worried for his best friend, “We have to talk to him tomorrow before this gets worse for everybody here.”

“Right, how about we do it when he’s by Kaseki? I know they usually work together to come up with new ideas.” Kohaku suggests, to which Taiju agrees, “I think that’d work best. Senku is more likely to listen to us or want to talk to us when he has something to do.”

“Yeah confronting Senku when he’s not working never worked in our world, so I suppose it wouldn’t work now.” Yuzuriha acknowledges, “But we should ask to speak to him alone no matter what so he doesn’t feel humiliated or hurt when we do speak to him about our concerns.”

“We should do that, that way he will be more prone to being honest with us.”

“Great, then it’s settled! Tomorrow, we will confront Senku about his jealousy over Ukyou and Gen’s relationship.”

“Right!” Kohaku confirms after Taiju’s proclamation, “I’ll see you two tomorrow morning then. I hope everything goes well in our plans to speak to Senku.”

Taiju is honest when saying, “It probably won’t go over well because he won’t like to hear that he could be jealous or attracted to anything other than science… It will take some time, but once it sinks in his head, he should come to accept it and come up with a plan to do something about it.”

Kohaku is placing her trust in Taiju being right on this issue because she doesn’t want to let her fears of Senku not taking it well and getting mad at them to come true.

Chapter Text

The following day, Senku told Ukyou, Taiju, and Yuzuriha, “I need you guys to find and assemble more statues for us to revive. Ukyou and Taiju can work together on this, Yuzuriha can work with Nikki to assemble the statues.”

“Gen and I usually gather statue pieces together. Why should we stop now?” Ukyou questions to which Senku rolls his eyes, “Do you really not want to work with Taiju?”

“I don’t mind working with him. What I do want to know is why Gen can’t work with me on this like he has in the past.”

Senku shrugs this off easily, “I need the mentalist here to better help the revived people get used to their environment.”

Ukyou raises a brow to this, “You know that won’t happen until after all the pieces of a statue are placed together…that takes a lot of time to do to be sure we have every single piece in place. Gen can come with Taiju and I, we could use the extra hands.”

Yuzuriha is trying to come up with a way to get Senku out of this situation before something ugly happens, “Hey, why don’t we all try to keep things peaceful here? Gen could always help Chrome gather stuff—”

“Senku, you don’t want me to work with Ukyou, do you?” Gen interrupts her with a side eye to the alpha, “I am going to be safe with him—no one is more otective-pray over me than Ukyou, so there’s no need to worry about that. What reason could there be to be against my working with him?”

Yuzuriha is mentally panicking right now, as is Taiju who tries to prevent this from getting weird in his own poorly executed manner, “Hey, let’s head out right now! That way we don’t have to talk about how jealous Senku is or why he doesn’t want Gen to work with Ukyou!”

She was about to slap her hand over his mouth when Gen’s eyes widened, “You’re jealous of Ukyou? …Why? I didn’t think you were the type to be attracted to anybody…don’t take offense, but I thought you were asexual like Tsukasa.”

The scientist is quick to deny as he is to defend himself, “The big oaf got it one billion percent wrong. I’m not jealous of Ukyou and I have no logical reason to be.”

Ukyou seems to be finding some interest—if not suspicion—from this claim, “Then why not allow Gen to work with me if Taiju is wrong? You didn’t care when you didn’t know we were working together. If you’re not jealous, you wouldn’t care now.”

“I am not jealous and I only care because Gen is needed elsewhere.”

“Senku, why not act like adults about this and resolve this right now for everyone here? If you are jealous of me, then say it and give me the reason why so this doesn’t spiral into some greater conflict down the road.”

Despite Ukyou’s exasperation, Senku holds firm on this end, “For the last time, I am not jealous of you and I have no logical reason to be. Science is all I care about, not love or mating or dating, not even omegas or other secondary gender stuff. Gen is needed elsewhere: if you can’t handle that, then that’s on you, not me.”

Before anything else can be said, the red eyed alpha does remark, “I don’t know why you need to work with Gen all the time or be by him at all times…it’s all suffocating, if you ask me. Maybe there’s something you need to address here because I know I don’t.”

“Alright.” Ukyou replies, turning his attention to Gen, “Gen, you mean a lot to me and I know you love to joke that I’m a hopeless romantic, but in all reality… I would want nothing more than to be your mate if you’ll ever have me as your mate someday. I have been wondering this for a while—do you want to go on a date with me now that the war is over, and things are progressing as well as they are?”

While Gen will never admit the reason why it did hurt and disappoint him to hear Senku say why he wasn’t jealous of Ukyou, he can at least acknowledge that even if Senku did prove him correct on his idea of what he is attracted to and where anything with them could stand…he will always have Ukyou. The green eyed alpha he knows he could come to fall for if given the right time to just do this, “I mean, I think now is a great—”

Senku takes him by the wrist and drags him away, “This isn’t the time for dating, mating, or secondary gender stuff! We have a lot of work to do and I just thought of something I’ll need you for, shameless slacker.”

“Shameless slacker? I’ve done a lot for you!”

“I know you have but spending all that time with prince charming has you slacking off on things.” he leads him further away from Ukyou with a blunt, “Let’s get going. We don’t have all day to waste.”

As Gen is dragged away by Senku, Yuzuriha and Taiju can tell then that somewhere along the line, Senku developed some feelings for Gen. Whether or not they are romantic, it’s unknown at the moment. Ukyou, on the other hand, isn’t phased in the slightest bit.

He tells Taiju, “Let’s get going then. We have a lot of work to do today and I’d rather get started now than later.”

“Okay, let’s get going then!” Taiju replies warily though he does put an excited front for Ukyou’s sake.

What he doesn’t know is Ukyou didn’t fully buy Senku’s claims of not being jealous. In fact, Ukyou wasn’t convinced at all by Senku’s claims and reasonings.

For him, Senku is too obvious: the subtle annoyance he has always held towards him ever since they met in person, the way he feels the need to stop Gen from sleeping in the same space as him, and now with his ridiculous interruption of Gen’s answer to his offer…Senku is lying when he says he’s not jealous of him.

He will speak to him later on about this alone where they can have an open, honest conversation. At least, he hopes they can do this without any problems from Senku himself.

It was later in the day when Yuzuriha and Kohaku would stage their own sort of intervention for Senku, the type of intervention that involved getting him admit that yes, he is jealous of Ukyou and Gen’s relationship.

They decided to do it while Gen was busy with his tasks and Ukyou was gone with Taiju. This left Senku alone and ready for a talking to.

Kohaku was the one who initiated the conversation rather boldly on her end, “I’ve heard that Gen was asked on a date by Ukyou, but you dragged him away before he could agree to it. Why’s that?”

“Why would you care about that?” he mutters while working away on something she can’t quite see, “I care because you’ve been acting rather strangely ever since you first heard of Ukyou from Gen. Now that he’s here, in person, full time…you seem to be getting worse with him.”

“Where’s your evidence for this claim?”

“You acted annoyed with him when he saw Gen before the battle, you didn’t like him and Gen talking when you announced the victory to everyone at the camp, you actually got upset enough with Gen sleeping with the guy that you tried to stop it from happening, and you tried to stop Gen from being able to accept a date from him.”

Senku rolls his eyes to this, “That can all be explained away logically: I was annoyed because Ukyou’s incessant need to be by Gen at all times almost disrupted our entire plan to take back the miracle cave, I didn’t like him and Gen chattering away when I was announcing my plans for what we will do next because it was a distraction for everyone there, and I stopped him from accepting the date from Ukyou so he wouldn’t slack off of his work.”

She does poke a few holes here that need to be addressed, “Okay, I can understand that part, but Gen hasn’t been slacking off on his work. He’s been doing all that he can to help Ukyou whenever they do look for statue pieces together and I find it pretty convenient that you are ignoring the fact you tried to stop them from sleeping together in a tent last night.”

He scoffs in response, “I am not ignoring that part, but I did leave it out for a reason because I think you may have forgotten something here. Gen can get pregnant because he’s an omega. I didn’t want to run the risks of him getting impregnated by the prince charming and his smooth talking ways.”

Now Kohaku is a bit annoyed and offended for Gen because, “Gen is not the type to do that! He wouldn’t just have sex with him out of nowhere! The fact you even said that after all he was willing to do for you this last year… Maybe he would be better off with Ukyou. At least he would respect him enough to—”

Yuzuriha cuts in at this moment, not wanting Kohaku to cause a fight with Senku because she knows it will go nowhere if she does, “Listen Senku, we’re not doing this to give you a hard time. We’re doing this to help you avoid any problems with Ukyou in the future. Whether you like it or not, he’s a member of the Kingdom of Science now and you will have to accept him even if you don’t want to. It’s better to learn how to live with the guy than to explode at him at random one day, which is what you are getting closer to doing every time you try to stop him and Gen from being together.”

There’s silence with a low hiss, one that sounded distinctly instinct driven, one that made them both take pause because they had never heard Senku make such a feral sound in all the time they’ve both known him, “I’m not jealous and I genuinely don’t care what Gen does in his free time or romantic life. I’m here to revive humanity from petrification, not waste my time on a relationship I would never want anyway.”

Yuzuriha does at least caution him on one end of things she has a feeling he is overlooking, “I’ll take your word for it, Senku. We only brought this up because we are worried about potential conflict between Ukyou and yourself. As an alpha, I know that alpha conflicts can get messy because I’ve seen it myself enough times back in our time. I’m positive you have too, and I know you think yourself as being above ‘basal instinctual desires’, but Senku…alpha to alpha, repressing your emotions is never a good idea. It will cause your instincts to act out in a manner you cannot control. Science proved that back in our time, remember? Maybe you should try listening to that before shrugging off anything you could possibly be feeling or starting to feel.”

Senku doesn’t reply, but he does finish up on what he’s working on. After this is done, he has nothing to say to the two girls, but he does approach Gen with a blunt, “Hey, mentalist, this is for all the work you’ve been putting in.”

Gen blinks upon the sight, instantly taking it out of his hands when he recognizes it for what it is, “Cola? My Senku-chan, you didn’t have to! If I didn’t know any better, I’d assume you love me!”

Unlike Ukyou who can match his playful banter, Senku doesn’t bother to try…or maybe he doesn’t see it for what it is, they can’t tell from the spot they are standing on, “I don’t love you. I only did it to reward and motivate you.”

“Ah yes, ever the business type…how dare I think you could ever be as omantic-ray as Ukyou-chan?” Gen pauses as he thinks this comparison over, pausing when admitting, “Eh…that’s a harsh comparison to make…not many could live up to Ukyou on that end…not even Yuzuriha and she was known as the most romantic alpha in the empire. Maybe Yo would be a fairer comparison, I mean, the guy is just as lacking in that department as—”

“You want to drink the cola or not?” Senku spoke through gritted teeth, obviously fighting an urge to act on whatever instincts it is he is feeling at the moment.

“I will, there’s no need to worry!”

As Gen does just this, Yuzuriha’s worry grows as it seems in her eyes Senku maybe severely repressing whatever it is he is feeling. Eventually, she knows that will lead into him snapping at someone because of his instincts. She can only hope it’s not Ukyou or Gen—such a thing could tear apart the Kingdom of Science as they know it.

Chapter Text

Senku, though not the best at showing it or making it clear, doesn’t like the way things have been going as of late.

Ever since Ukyou came around, he’s been nothing more than a thorn in Senku’s side, but not for anything logical. No, Ukyou has been a thorn in his side because of that feeling he brings in his chest, the extent of his seemingly lessening control over his alpha that he cannot bare to handle.

He feel ridiculous for being so upset at Ukyou for something he sees as being completely invalid to be upset about in the first place. He’s been wracking his brain to figure out some sort of cure for this and in the end, all his logic based brain can do is beat the fact Yuzuriha had said to him a day ago over and over again to himself.

Maybe it’s his alpha wanting to express something for the first time in years or maybe it’s because he’s not ready to deny any form of science whatsoever, but he figures it’s best if he does address some things that have been bothering him about Ukyou and Gen’s closeness.

Okay…logically speaking, no one would be happy to hear intimate details of Gen losing his virginity to Ukyou…except for the fans he has amongst the villagers. Maybe he is the only who wouldn’t want to hear it, then, but it also bothers him that Gen seems to have this strange fondness for the young man. He understands they get along very well together. He can handle that fact without getting upset—if he’s being honest with himself, the fondness never bothered him fully until he heard Gen about to accept the offer to go on a date.

He knew they were close, but never thought they were that close for Gen to accept such an offer rather easily.

Senku struggles with knowing that Gen could be dating Ukyou right now had he not taken him away from him when he did. He has a bad feeling about why this is, yet that involves addressing something he’s never been ready to address for many reasons.

Logically speaking, he should have no reason to dislike Ukyou’s presence and yet…yet…

“Senku, would you mind if we talked?”

He doesn’t really want to speak to Ukyou, not now, not when he’s addressing himself honestly before Yuzuriha’s warning comes to fruition because he knows it’d be detrimental to the survival of the Kingdom of Science.

“No, not at all. What do you want to talk about?”

He thinks if he does this with his back to him it will make his alpha less likely to react in any negative, irrational manner. He knows it may not work, but he’s willing to try because he doesn’t believe he can face the green gaze of Ukyou’s glance right now.

“I don’t think you like me or how close I am to Gen.” he says it with such confidence, confidence that Senku knows is going to be a given seeing as how he’s worldly, well travelled, and experienced.

“What makes you think that?”

“You could face me if you weren’t. I know you’re not working on anything, Senku. Just tell me what is going on and why you have such a problem with me being close to Gen.”

Senku takes a small inhale and begins his less than stellar take down of what all bothers him about Ukyou’s accusation, “I don’t have a problem with you on a personal level. I have a problem with you assuming Gen needs to be protected because he’s an omega. I know you can try to tell me it’s not rooted in Gen’s gender, but I can’t help to think it is. He’s not a small child, he can take care of himself.”

He can practically hear the action of arm crossing in front of his chest in Ukyou’s voice when he replies, “I know I am overprotective, but that’s only because the one time I wasn’t, he was almost raped by Hyouga. I had to be on guard at all times or else Hyouga would have marked him by force either in his sleep or elsewhere when he was alone. There’s no way to reverse that in the stone world, especially in an empire that didn’t value science.”

Nevertheless, the other alpha is stoic when admitting, “I was worried about him being anywhere near Hyouga after a year of him being gone. I can admit I should have handled that better with a clearer head but knowing all that I did about Hyouga and his interest in making Gen his mate, I was too afraid of him trying to mark him by force on the spot with me not being close enough to stop it.”

Senku does bring up, “How do I know none of it had to do with his being an omega?”

“It never had anything to do with that. I had to be overprotective because of Hyouga not taking Gen’s ‘no’ as an answer. If Hyouga hadn’t been a persistent, sexist pig who viewed Gen as property, I wouldn’t have ever had a reason to protect him in the first place and we could have been dating before he left.”

Senku cannot deny that if he were in Ukyou’s shoes, he probably would have done the same thing. Hyouga is a vicious alpha who holds deeply sexist views about omegas and it’s obvious he wasn’t ever going to back off after Gen rejected him as much as he did.

Despite this, it’s not really the full reason of why he is upset with Ukyou or his presence here. His smooth confidence and ability to tackle things head on is something that’s really grating on him at the moment… Here he had always longed for Taiju to be more like Ukyou back in their time (assertive, confident, smooth, and with an ability to talk things out with her like an adult instead of a flustered teen), but now that he has to deal with Ukyou, he doesn’t like it one bit.

He has a sinking feeling as to why now that he thinks on what Yuzuriha had warned him of.

Senku wasn’t able to stop it when it slipped out of him: a growl, a quieter one, yet shocking nonetheless since he never growled back in their old world.

He had hoped Ukyou hadn’t heard it and yet he had, “…You wouldn’t be growling if this was over nothing. Just tell me what is wrong so we can be on good terms and advance the Kingdom of Science to where we need it to be. I don’t want to fight with you, Senku. I want to settle this today and I need you to work with me if we want that to happen.”

Senku wasn’t saying much, to which the other alpha had sighed, “You like Gen, don’t you? You wouldn’t have growled just now if you didn’t.”

He shrugs this off, “Me, liking an omega, wanting a mate? I’m not some lovesick child living in a fantasy world. I am a scientist living in reality and I care more about that than whoever it is Gen dates or mates.”

“That’s now how Gen has been talking about you to me lately. He’s telling me you have been doing little nice things for him, like making him cola when he wants it and giving him work that isn’t inherently terrible to do.” of course Gen would be himself and tell Ukyou all about this, “It’s interesting to me how you stopped him from accepting my offer for a date. Mind telling why you would do that if you didn’t like Gen?”

“I only did that because you seem to act as though you are entitled to some sort of relationship with him with how strong you’re being about it.”

“I don’t feel entitled to it—I know Gen and I have great chemistry together. I know we could work out very well as a couple and possibly end up being mates if given enough time. I’m not a middle schooler, I’m not going to beat around the bush with him or act coy and uninterested when I know what I want and what I would need in a relationship with someone I think could make a good mate for me.”

His hands tightens on his clothes, with his attempt to keep his voice even slowly failing him in his response, “I know that, but you’re so blunt and aggressive about it—”

He can envision the eye roll so clearly as he speaks, “Since when is being assertive a bad thing? Gen knows me well enough to know I am completely serious about my interest in him. He knows I’d love to date him—I never hid that from him…”

There’s a pause in the air and Senku cannot bring himself to face Ukyou still because he feels as though there’s a chance he will snap at the other in a purely instinct driven manner he’d rather avoid, “Senku…if you’re jealous of me for having a shot with Gen, then you’re being ridiculous. You had a full year to get to know him, to fall for him, and ask him out on a date. You didn’t have Hyouga to worry and stress about either, so if you were interested in him back then, you could have gone further than I could ever have done. If you’re jealous of me for doing what you couldn’t do, it’s not on me at all: it’s on you for not being assertive enough to begin with.”

He can hear him walking away, but Ukyou does make it clear, “I can smell a change in your scent whenever Gen and I are enjoying each other’s company. I know you’re not happy with me being anywhere near him, but since you seem hell bent on denying you have any feelings for him at all, there’s no reason to keep up this hostility on your end. If Gen wants to date me, then let it happen and see where it takes us if you really don’t care at all. I know you do and I know you will object somehow…I don’t get why you can’t be upfront about your feelings for Gen. All I am asking is for you to be civil with me if you’re not going to be fully honest with me about your dislike of me.”

Senku says nothing else because if he does, he’ll let out another growl as his alpha rages at him to do something to stop this.

He racks his brain, trying to come up with some way around this and yet in the end, it is all futile. The only logical conclusion is the one he didn’t want to come up with: he is jealous of Ukyou’s closeness to Gen and no amount of science can cure this, not when he…somewhere along the line…he actually came to like the mentalist.

He couldn’t pinpoint it down if he tried, but he knows he started growing fonder of him back at the village and it grew from there. He didn’t believe for one second he had anyone romantically interested in him back at the Tsukasa Empire…hell, he didn’t know about his history with Hyouga, let alone Ukyou! How was he supposed to be prepared for that? Here he had assumed they would win against Tsukasa and Gen would remain single until he could find out what caused the petrification and reverse it. Gen was never supposed to have two alphas interested in him. He was never supposed to have anyone else who would want to date him or consider him to be a mate.

…Ugh, Senku wants to kick himself for actually believing he was supposed to be always available no matter what! Of course Gen wasn’t going to be single forever, but he had thought he would have had more time…

Never mind, what matters now is figuring out what to do next. He knows if he lets Ukyou date Gen then the alpha inside of him will snap and cause severe problems for the Kingdom of Science. He knows he should tell Gen about this, but after all the fuss he made about not being interested in him…would he even believe him?

He’s not certain if he will or not, but he has to try. If he doesn’t, his instincts will implode.

Chapter Text

Senku didn’t know what to do after talking to Ukyou. He knew he had to speak to Gen, but it was hard to get Gen alone when so many of the villagers seemed to support Ukyou no matter what.

Chrome, Ginrou, and Kinrou had asked for girl advice from him (his advice was ‘all it takes is experience; it may seem confusing or hard at first and you will make mistakes, but all that matters is you learn from it and grow’ when asked about how he got to be so good with omegas), Ruri and Suika had gotten the older villagers back in Ishigami village to go team Ukyou with their tales of his and Gen’s ‘love story’. As if things couldn’t get worse, Gen actually almost accepted an offer to go on a date with the guy.

He didn’t know how to tell Gen he had only said those things because he didn’t want to admit he liked anyone or wanted a mate. He didn’t know how to properly verbalize the issues he’s been having ever since they first spoke to Ukyou over the cellphone and because of this, he decides to go to the one person who would know how to speak about this stuff to someone they liked.

“Hey, big oaf…I need some advice from you.”

Taiju may not be the smartest person alive, but he does have Yuzuriha as a girlfriend, so that must count as something, right?

“Sure thing, Senku! What is it you need help with?”

He’s also incredibly loud, which is something Senku doesn’t need right now, “Keep it down, will you! I need some advice that someone with a girlfriend connected to their secondary gender instincts would be able to give me!”

Taiju grins widely, lowering his voice just enough for Senku to be okay with going through with this, “Oh, I get it! You like Gen, right?”

“How the hell do you know that?”

“You aren’t subtle Senku: you didn’t like him and Gen catching up after the war ended and you got upset when Ukyou tried to ask out Gen right in front of you. It’s obvious you wouldn’t do that stuff unless if you actually liked him as more than a friend, acquaintance, or lackey.”

Yep, looks like Senku was being a bit obvious there, “Since you were sharp enough to grasp that, tell me, how can I tell Gen why I did deny having any romantic feelings for him in a way that won’t have him thinking I’m lying about it?”

Taiju comes up with an idea that seems like something he would do, “Just tell him the truth, Senku. I’m sure he’ll understand if you explain things well enough…and by well enough, I mean, no using confusing science terms to explain it to him.”

“What if he accuses me of playing games on him or messing with him?”

“If he accuses you of that, then offer to take him out on a date to prove him wrong. If he turns you down, then I’m sure talking about why you don’t like Ukyou would be enough to clear things up with him… Oh, you know what? You should just tell Gen the full truth about why you don’t like Ukyou! I’m sure he’d love to hear that!”

To this, Senku blanches, “What? Tell him the full truth about that? I’m not exactly Mr. Poetic-Hopeless Romantic here! Talking about that isn’t easy for me, anyway!”

Taiju groans, not quite understanding where Senku’s coming from because, “So? I told Yuzuriha about how I felt about her and doing that as an omega guy to an alpha girl is hard work! If I could do it and I’m nowhere near as smart as you, then I don’t get why you can’t do it.”

“Because…I can’t control my instincts whenever anything with him comes up in a conversation.”

This is embarrassing for Senku or anyone with a secondary gender to admit. For Senku it’s embarrassing because it shows how disconnected he is with his instincts and it’s a harsh reminder that he repressed too much of his instincts for all of his life to really be able to control them now that his alpha is wanting to barge out of the cage he had kept it in. For any other person, it’s a show of inexperience with romantic and sexual relationships with the secondary genders.

Taiju hums to this and gets an idea, “I know! You can ask Yuzuriha about it!”

“What? Why her?”

“Because she knows about your crush on Gen and she won’t speak about this issue of yours to anyone.”

He thinks it over and ultimately decides because he has no other choice, “…Alright, I’ll go to her about it, but I don’t know if it will help or not.”

“It’s better than doing nothing, isn’t it?”

He nods and follows Taiju out of the woods over to where Yuzuriha is located, trying to force down his own nervousness at having to address why he doesn’t like Ukyou without losing control of his instincts.

Because in all honesty, that is what concerns Senku most: losing control over something he feels he should have perfect control over.

When they do approach Yuzuriha, she is reassembling statues and she appears to be busy. Senku would have been fine waiting until later, but this is Taiju who’s working with him. Such a wait would never be acceptable in his eyes, “Yuzuriha! Senku needs your help with something!”

“Not that loud, you big oaf!” he seethes at him, which leads Yuzuriha into replying, “Alright, I’ll help you out but you have to wait for a bit… I’m almost done with this statue. When I get it all back together, then I’ll speak to you from my place at the cave Taiju and I were living in.”

“Alright, we’ll be waiting for you there, then.” Senku says before Taiju can be any louder about this.

It wasn’t a long walk to Yuzuriha and Taiju’s room in the cave. What he did do was ask Taiju when they were alone, “I don’t know, do you think she’ll be of any help? She’s always been in control of her instincts.”

Taiju handles this with a calm aplomb he wishes he had at the moment, “She will. Nobody is born with control of their instincts—you just have to learn how to control yours before confessing why you don’t like Ukyou to Gen.”

He nods and tries to think of a way to best describe this to her before she arrives. Just his luck, he didn’t have the time to do so because she appeared shortly after he tried to come up with a way to describe it to her.

“Senku, what is it you need my help with?”

He has a feeling she may already have a good idea of it, so he decides to get blunt with her in the same manner Ukyou is with Gen, “I need your help with something pretty big, actually…you see, Ukyou confronted me a few hours ago, asking me why I don’t like him and speaking about how he’s going to pursue Gen because he’s not some middle schooler playing a coy game with him. He knows I like Gen as more than what I claim to, and he doesn’t care. He’s going to go for Gen no matter what, according to his own words.”

He then exhales heavily and gets to the root of the problem, “During the talk, I had a hard time controlling my instincts around him—I actually growled at him at one point—and I didn’t like it. I don’t like not being in control of my instincts; do you think you can show me how to better control them so I can talk to Gen about Ukyou and why I don’t like him without losing control of myself?”

She grins knowingly, wanting to know one thing first, “So, you are admitting you like Gen then? Do you want him as a mate?”

A bright red blush covers his face as his ruby eyes widen, “Who asks stuff like this? Why would you even want to know?”

“You want to control your instincts, right? Well, a big part of that is being able to be expressive with your emotions in a way that helps you be able to control them. That’s why there’s no conclusive handbook on controlling instincts for every alpha and omega out there.” she pushes him yet again to answer, “Now tell me: do you like Gen? Do you want him as a mate?”

His instincts almost force him to let out some strange form of a purr at Gen’s name, and yet he is able to somehow speak through this well enough to admit to them, “Yeah…I like Gen…and I wouldn’t mind having him as a mate someday.”

“When did you start liking Gen?”

To this, the strange form of purr comes out when he speaks and he feels humiliated to keep speaking yet he forces himself to because he refuses to be some anxious wallflower who can’t confidently control his instincts around someone as confident and worldly as Ukyou, “I started liking Gen when he was at the village and I got to see more of his true self instead of the act we saw on TV in our world. I got to know him better and I liked the person I got to know well enough to sort of picture myself mating him someday. It also helped matters that he had a scent I found pleasing and he knew how to be helpful in many ways as opposed to being a nuisance.”

Yuzuriha nods and suddenly, it’s as though a light switch went off in her head when coming to her conclusions, “Senku, did you allow yourself to crush on Gen or was this done subconsciously, without you knowing it?”

When he shoots a confused glance, she explains it as, “You have a tendency to bottle up your feelings, which could be why you can’t control your instincts. Maybe you don’t need to talk to us at all about this—maybe you need to start letting yourself feel the feelings you repressed. You need to stop bottling things up and maybe you’ll be able to control your instincts better.”

The thing is, Senku’s not used to being bluntly open and honest about such things. He has always placed science first and foremost in his life; to actually acknowledge his desires, urges, and feelings for anyone is new territory he’s never touched or tried to cover. He has never allowed himself to place anything other than science first in his life so doing such a thing is far harder than what it probably would be for the average person.

“I wouldn’t know how to go about that. I always placed my ambitions and science first in my life—to actually start pursuing Gen…I don’t know. How would I go about that without losing control of my instincts?”

“Was this always a concern of yours when Gen was in the village with you before the war?”

“Not really because we were always busy with work. I thought you knew that Yuzuriha.”

She tries to think of something to be able to come up with a solution that would help Senku conquer this, something that could help him in the long run.

“Not really? I know you well enough to know that you were worried about some percentage of losing control of them if you can say that.” Taiju interrupts the alphas without second thought, giving his two cents on the matter, “Listen Senku, you gave me the best advice ever before the petrification happened: you told me to just ask Yuzuriha out and confess my feelings already. You knew how nervous I was to do it for a long time too—I think you have a hard time controlling your instincts not because you repress your emotions, but because you’re too nervous to admit what they are and risk the possibility of being rejected like I was back then.”

In the couple’s room, Senku doesn’t know what to make of what Taiju said, but then his best friend goes on to say with a hand clasped on his shoulder, “Listen, I couldn’t control my instincts well for years because I always got too flustered and nervous, but when I set my fears aside and approached the situation head on, I was able to better control them. I think you stress out too much about what could go wrong instead of actively pursuing what you want because people can’t be predicted or controlled like a science experiment can… I think that’s why you probably ignored or tried to make whatever feelings it is you had for Gen go away. The only reason why you can’t now is because Ukyou’s here and he’s clearly someone you’re jealous of, which is why you’re at risk of lashing out. If you took your own advice, the one you gave me, you’d be able to control your instincts better.”

Honestly, hearing Taiju’s response has made it a lot easier for Senku to be able to come up with something to better address his problem.

He doesn’t have the same confidence Ukyou possesses when it comes down to omegas and romantic relationships, but he can always try to find a way to better conquer this so he can have the control over his instincts that he always wanted.

“Actually…you’re completely right there. I’m not confident about this sort of thing like Ukyou is and not being able to have total control of a situation like I can with science is something I can admit makes me extremely uncomfortable. Do you have any idea how I can do this?”

Taiju’s stupid grin has him thinking he may have gone to the worst person to ask for advice on such a topic, “You know I do, Senku!”

If he’s this confident, then it means something is about to blow up in his face, which is the last thing Senku wants.

“…You know what? I think I’ll ask Yuzuriha instead.”

“I completely understand, but I’m always available for when you will need me!”

At least he’s taking this good, but going off of the look on Taiju’s alpha’s face, she has an idea that could be logical and work out well in the end for him…or so he hopes at least.

Chapter Text

Yuzuriha’s approach to helping Senku had been simple: she had him practice confessing to Gen about his reasoning for not liking Ukyou until he felt comfortable enough to do it in front of him.

Her reason for this? ‘If you don’t practice first, then how can you be prepared for whatever outcome it is you want to achieve here? You’ve never confessed to someone before, Senku—this is something you should at least get comfortable talking with Taiju and I about before you even attempt to bring it up to Gen. If you can’t talk about it with your friends, then how can you talk about it to him?’

So that’s what he did. He practiced time and time again in the cave so he could be ready for this exact moment as he makes his way through the woods. Yuzuriha had insisted on waiting a bit longer, but he didn’t care. He knew that if he didn’t do this now when his confidence was up, then he most likely would never do it at all.

For Senku, this is terrifying despite the practice he’s had. 

He’s not as confident as Ukyou when it comes to dating and relationships. He doesn’t like not being able to predict the outcome of a situation, so to have to speak to Gen in the manner he is going to attempt do so now is something that is anxiety inducing in him. 

Will Gen believe him? Will he accuse him of leading him on? Will he think he’s lying? 

He’s not sure, but he hopes this will go over well. This is his best chance to tell Gen why he doesn’t like Ukyou and why he wants him to be his mate if he wants to. 

He asked Suika where Gen was located and she told him he was in the woods, gathering up pieces of statues with none other than Ukyou himself. He knows they are all cheering for Ukyou, but he doesn’t care. He wants to mate Gen someday and he doesn’t care if Ukyou wants to or not. 

Upon seeing the omega in the woods, Senku had to do all that he could to contain his inner panic as the dread built up inside of him, everything within himself screaming to not go, to not speak to him because it could all go wrong. 

Then he hears Ukyou speaking to him, “Gen, is there any chance we could go swimming together sometime? I know of a nice beach we could go to if you’re interested.” 

Before Gen could answer him, Senku entered the clearing they were in and cleared his throat, “Can I speak to Gen alone? There’s something important I’d like to talk to him about.” 

Ukyou shrugs, telling him, “You can go ahead. I’ll give you two some privacy.” 

Knowing Ukyou’s sharp hearing will allow him to hear some or most of their conversation didn’t make this any easier for Senku, who is currently hearing Yuzuriha’s advice echo in his head ‘If you feel yourself getting nervous when trying to confess to him, think about what you would feel if Ukyou got to mate him instead. Think about the regret, the anger, and the jealousy you’d live with if Ukyou and Gen do mate. Then use that negative emotion to make you confess what you feel for him.’ 

When alone, Gen asks him with a smile, “Senku, mind telling me why you need to speak to me alone? You’re not going to make me do a really hard job for the fun of it, are you? Because I’m perfectly fine with Ukyou-chan.” 

All of sudden, this feels incredibly harder than what it should be and Senku is left struggling to put it in proper words, “No, that’s not what this is about.” 

“Then what is it about?” 

This is his chance…his one chance… 

“Are you and Ukyou dating?” 

He messed it up. He messed it up. He messed it all up—

Gen raises a brow and replies slowly, “No, Ukyou and I aren’t dating. Why do you ask? Would us dating be a problem?” 

Alright, good, so maybe he has a shot still. Maybe he can salvage this and make it work somehow, “It would be a problem because you two would be distract each other and everyone else with your relationship, but that’s not why I asked.” 

Now the omega seems to be curious if that gleam in his eyes and the slowly emerging smirk on his face means anything, “Ah, let me guess: you’re wondering why because you have a crush on me, huh Senku-chan?” 

Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap! What does he do now? Does he confirm? Does he deny? What would the result be if he confirmed it? What would the result be if he denied it? Is there any way to calculate this, to make this fit some scientific model that he can predict? 

…He’s doing it again; he’s treating this more like a scientific experiment as opposed to an interaction between two human beings to which no experiment can confirm or deny. 

He’s going to approach this with confidence, like Ukyou and Taiju would. He’s going to take the advice he gave Taiju back then and apply it to himself because there’s no logical reason not to do so. 

“…Ah, actually…” here he goes, about to do this, about to do this, “that’s not far off the mark.” 

Gen is shocked at first, then he replies, “Are you sure you’re not messing with me right now? You’ve told me that you have no interest in me before, and I know you’re not the lying type.” 

“I’m not messing with you. I am being completely honest right now.” 

“Why weren’t you when you said otherwise?” Gen once more comes to his own conclusions, “Were you embarrassed to have a crush on me or were you in denial of it? Knowing you, I’d have to guess denial…am I right on that end? Were you really in denial about it?” 

When Senku doesn’t reply, Gen has to wonder, “Why would you be in denial about having any sort of crush on me? I’m not the type to take things in a bad way, you know.” 

“I know you’re not, but…I’m used to science and experiments… I’m used to things I can predict the outcome of. I didn’t know if you would accept or reject me, so I thought I’d hold off on it until after I brought all of humanity back from the petrification.” it’s as bluntly honest about this as Senku has gotten so far and he wants to pat himself on the back for being able to do so, “I don’t like Ukyou because he’s confident and assertive. He doesn’t stress over the possible outcomes of things; he knows what he wants, and he goes for it with nothing holding him back. Knowing that he stood a strong chance with you didn’t sit right with me and I took it out on him in petty ways because I’m not the same level of confident as he is. I’m sorry about that, Gen.”

Hearing this is shocking for Gen and yet, he cannot stop himself from smiling, “No, Senku, it’s fine. I’m more than fine with it. I’m shocked because I never thought you liked me that way…when did that happen? I think I may have missed it from you—you never did say or really show all that much that you liked me. No offense or anything Senku, but you aren’t as…expressive and open like Ukyou is.”

Senku can concede this because he can admit out loud and to himself, “You’re right, I never did do anything to show I liked you because even back then, I was trying to repress those feelings. I don’t even know how or when I thought we’d be good as mates—I think it was sometime after my birthday when you gathered the villagers to make me the telescope or maybe it was when I got to know you better. I thought if I ignored it like I did in the past, then it would go away, but it never did…meeting Ukyou made it worse more than anything else because then I knew this wasn’t a passing fad like it had been in the past and I couldn’t ignore it anymore.”

Gen is amazed at what he’s learning and despite this, he is still uncertain for his own reasons, “Senku, I believe you on everything you say. You’re not one to lie about anything, especially something serious like this, but I think that before I can decide on anything, I need to know why you repressed those feelings you claimed to have for me. Being eriously-say here, I gotta say I don’t know what to make of your trying to ignore any romantic feelings you have for me. It almost sounds insulting—like you didn’t want to like me.”

“I didn’t, but not in the way you think.” Senku really hopes he won’t lose Gen with this one, but he’s doing good so far, so maybe this will work out well for him, “I didn’t want to admit I had any romantic feelings for you because I didn’t want to act on them and be rejected. I already said this before, but I’m not confident like Ukyou is, so things like this—things that I can’t predict the outcome of with science—are things I tend to avoid for my own good. I always tried to tell myself it wasn’t about that, that it was because ‘I’m a scientist and I don’t need a mate’, but deep down I knew it wasn’t ever true. That’s why I tried to make whatever feelings I had for you go away, why I didn’t want to have them for you or anyone else.”

Gen didn’t know what to say. Everything he heard made so much sense, was so perfectly explained…yet…

He didn’t know what to really make of it all on the spot.

He knows Senku will never be like Ukyou: open, blunt, honest, and expressive with his feelings for him. However, he can’t help but feel a bit hurt about hearing how Senku was actively trying to make his feelings for him go away. He understands the reason why he did it and it makes perfect sense because Senku is a man of science, not love, so he would be less confident and willing to pursue something he cannot predict the outcome of.

It doesn’t make it hurt less on Gen’s end, because Gen really never did try to make the small crush he had on Senku go away. If of anything, he was interested in pursuing something with the scientist, but that statement hurt more than he’s letting on at the moment.

In the end, all the omega could do was tell him, “I see…Senku, this is a lot to take in—can I have some time to think it over?”

Senku is reeling, thinking he did something wrong, which Gen seems to try to soothe his thoughts from this feeling with a calm, “I know you were probably wanting a direct answer from me right now, but if I give you one, then it won’t be one that I had time to think over after hearing all of this. I hope you can understand.”

The alpha calms himself, asking Gen, “Is this a rejection?”

“No, it’s not. It’s a ‘I have a lot to think about now since I know you like me in the same way Ukyou does’ sort of deal.” Gen then tells him, “Thanks for being honest with me, Senku. I am happy to hear that it wasn’t as one sided on my end like I thought it had been…I should get going back to Ukyou now. We do have a lot of statue pieces to reassemble. I’ll see you later tonight.”

“Yeah, I’ll see you then.”

It’s not a rejection and yet Senku cannot help but to feel awful nonetheless. He knows he shouldn’t be expecting Gen to give him any concrete answer on the spot and to expect such a thing from him is deeply selfish—it doesn’t make things hurt less for him as he feels like this was for nothing. It gives him a fear that maybe Gen will choose Ukyou to have as an alpha over him and that’s not something he’s sure he can really cope with after being as open and honest as he was just now.

He had been stuck in his own head for a moment there until he heard a calming voice say, “Senku, are you alright?”

Chapter Text

Senku looked at the person who spoke up, doing his best to maintain his composure when replying, “It’s nothing, Kohaku. I’m fine.”

“You don’t seem fine…did something bad happen?”

“Something did happen, but it’s none of your business.”

She takes a stab at what could be bothering him, asking, “I know you like Gen, but did he reject you? You seem really upset right now.”

Senku doesn’t see the point in hiding this from her. It doesn’t make logical sense to hide it from the one person who knows he likes Gen and may have overheard his conversation with him just now, “He didn’t reject me, but he didn’t give me a clear answer either. All I know is he needs time to think things over…it wasn’t what I had been expecting, but I guess I should have realized it was a possible outcome.”

“I think you’re worrying too much, Senku. All you need to do is give Gen time and allow him to come to his own conclusions.”

“That’s all I can do now, I know that, but it doesn’t make things easier for me…not when I know Ukyou is still an option in his eyes.”

Kohaku, who had been ready to comfort in case if Gen did reject him, decides instead to offer him, “Do you want to work on some science experiment? I’m sure that will be good enough to keep your mind off of this whole Gen thing.”

He considers this, ultimately deciding, “It’d be better than doing nothing and stressing out over this…alright, I’ll work on an experiment, but I’ll need your help with it. Are you fine with that?”

“I always am, Senku.” Kohaku admits with a smile, hoping that he will be able to recover from this as quickly as possible.

While Senku was having this talk with Kohaku, Gen was alone with Ukyou, who had seemed perfectly calm despite his suspicion of the alpha man having overheard his conversation with Senku.

He doesn’t comment on it much and for most of the time, they make small talk. That is, until Ukyou asks him, “Gen, if you’re confused about who you should date, why not try dating me for one or two dates and see if you want to have a romantic relationship with me or not? I know Senku’s confession was confusing, but if you are confused on who you want to be with, why not try one option out first to see if you like it or not?”

The thing is, Gen doesn’t really want a relationship with Ukyou if he can have one with Senku instead. Senku’s confession gave him a lot to think about, but he knows that in the end, if Senku did ask him out on a date, he would take that chance for something to happen between them.

He has been fond of the scientist for a very long time now (long before he discovered his birthday), but he always wrote off anything happen since he had long thought him to be asexual like Tsukasa. He never thought Senku could love anything more than science, so to learn on the spot that he not only likes him but actually tried to repress those feelings for him…on one end, he’s amazed to learn his feelings weren’t one sided. On the other, he cannot deny the burn of hearing Senku say he tried to repress/ignore his feelings for him.

He knows the reasoning for it is something he should expect from Senku, but it’s doesn’t make it any easier to swallow, even if he knows it wasn’t ever meant as an insult towards him.

In light of this, he’s not sure if dating Ukyou will change his mind on wanting to date Senku more than him or not. That being said, he is willing to give it a try for at least one date to see if they have a romantic connection as much as they do the friendship one.

Though if they did have one, Gen doesn’t believe he could ever choose Ukyou over Senku, not when he has liked Senku for so long and thought of them being mated more than once in his dreams—not that he would ever tell Senku or anyone that.

This being said, he does decide to at least go along with this to see if it could help clear his head up a bit from what was said to him earlier, “Alright, I’ll go on one date with you, but we’re not telling Senku or anyone else about it. I don’t want him to snap at you or worse.”

“I understand, and in all honesty, I don’t want him or anyone else to know either. I’d rather avoid problems than get caught up in them.”

“Great! So, when’s the date going to be, Ukyou-chan? What would a hopeless omantic-ray like you have planned for me?”

Ukyou grins to this, “If we were in our world, I would have taken you to a nice restaurant in Malta or somewhere five star in Manhattan. Since I don’t have those options anymore, I was thinking that tonight I could take you somewhere I don’t think you’ve been before in this area.”

Gen is intrigued because he thought he had been everywhere in this area, “Sounds interesting…mind telling me if this is going to end in a romantic dinner or a long walk on the beach?”

“I’m a hopeless romantic, not a cheesy romance novel or dating profile, Gen-chan. That’s all I’m willing to tell you regarding my plans for tonight.”

Gen pouts but it does nothing to shake Ukyou’s resolve. The young man informs him, “Sorry, but that won’t work on me. I’ve grown pretty immune to your tricks and wiles.”

The omega chuckles to this, “Says the man who is in love with me and cannot get me out of his mind!”

“You know I really am in love with you and I really couldn’t get you out of my mind for the entire year you were gone. I know you like Senku, but I am hoping to win you over with my date. If I can’t do that, and you decide you really want to be with Senku, then I won’t stop you from being with him.”

“There won’t be any petty jealous on your end then?”

“No, because I’m not a schoolkid. I know that it’s best for the two of us if you wind up with someone you actually love enough to mate; if you don’t love me as much as I love you, then there’s no way we could ever be happy as mates. It doesn’t mean I don’t want to try to win your heart over with this date, but if I fail, then I fail. I can get over that long before being stuck in a loveless mating.”

This is what Gen has always liked about Ukyou: despite being confident and assertive, he’s also calm and rational, laidback and reasonable in a manner many of the alphas in Tsukasa’s Empire could never be (especially Hyouga).

As he helps Ukyou gather up more pieces of statues, he responds to him in a grateful tone, “I’m glad you see things that way…we both know Hyouga wouldn’t have.”

Ukyou nods, his voice becoming a bit bitter when speaking about Tsukasa’s former right hand man, “Let’s face it, we both know Hyouga is a guy who isn’t reasonable enough to accept rejection from any omega. There’s no way a guy like him could ever be capable of seeing things in a rational perspective.”

It’s at this point where Ukyou hears a rustling in the bushes and Suika’s quiet voice telling what sounds like a few other kids, “Now, we have to be quiet…if we’re lucky we’ll get to see a great scene of romance between them!”

“You think?”

“I know so, now, let’s move forward!”

“Right!”

Two other kids are with her then? Well, this should be fun…who’s to say he and Gen cannot put on a good show?

“Gen, Suika and two other kids are here spying on us. What do you say we put on a little show for them?” he whispers to the omega, who is a bit caught off guard by the news.

“They are? What little eeps-cray! You do have a plan to teach them not to do that to us, right? We aren’t their personal soap opera, after all.” Gen whispers right back, with Ukyou nodding, “Don’t worry, I have a plan to teach them all about that. Just follow my lead, okay?”

Gen nods and Ukyou begins, “Hey, Gen, what do you think Suika and the other kids would like to learn about secondary genders? They did grow up without them after all and I’m positive they’d like to learn all about it.”

The mentalist grins, taking this and running with it, “Oh, I don’t know Ukyou-chan…have they ever been taught about the birds and the bees? It’s azy-cray to think they wouldn’t know about it, right?”

“Completely crazy. Hey, do you want to practice giving them the heat and rut talk?”

“Ah, yes, let’s do that! I cannot think of a better way to spend the next three hours alone together!”

Gen knows enough to know that Senku had given the kids the heat and rut talk when explaining how a male omega like him can get pregnant. It creeped out the kids a bit, sure, but they were better educated on the subject matter.

Because of this, Suika was the first one to speak up loudly from the bushes, “Run, run now! They’re gonna have a heat and rut talk!”

“Ah!” the other two kids yelled as they ran away from the scene, not wanting to have to listen to three hours of what they thought would be awkward Senku talk about heats and ruts in people with secondary genders.

When they were gone, Gen couldn’t contain his laughter any longer, “I knew that would work! Senku’s painfully awkward sex talk after I first arrived there must have scarred them mentally or something, but I don’t care. At least this will teach them to not spy on us anymore!”

Ukyou couldn’t help the chuckle escaping him either, “It must have been incredibly awkward for them to run away from it… What did Senku do? Make it incredibly awkward by getting all technical about it?”

“It’s Senku; he did that and then explained how a fetus forms in the womb during pregnancy. He used some pretty graphic images that he drew up as well—I think it was enough to scare them off from that talk for life.”

“I think any kid would be scared off from talking about heats and ruts for life if they didn’t have secondary genders.”

Gen then offers to Ukyou, “If I don’t choose you in the end…I could help you find an omega to move on from me with. Think of it as a thank you for all that you’ve done for me during the war and back when I was in the empire.”

He shrugs to this, not minding the offer, but not really wanting to take it, “No thank you. If you do reject me, I will need my own time and space to recover from it. When I’m ready to move on, I will. I have no problem with your offer, but I don’t think I’ll need it. I hope you aren’t offended by that.”

The omega across from him shakes his head, “I’m not, if of anything, I should have expected that sort of response from you given what a omantic-ray you are.”

This is the kind of ease that makes being by Ukyou easy. He is easy to talk to, easy to rationalize with, and quick to be understanding. He knows that if Senku does reject him or if things don’t work out between them, then Ukyou would always be a good option for him to go for.

Since things haven’t gone south with Senku just yet, he is going to hold out hope that maybe the scientist will accept his offer to be his boyfriend...if this date with Ukyou really does do nothing to bring out some sort of romantic attraction for him, that is. Then the situation would be far more complicated than what is actually needed for him at the moment. 

Chapter Text

When Gen and Ukyou did return to give the pieces of statues to Yuzuriha, she was the first one to ask them, “Hey, were you guys really going to give the kids some form of secondary gender sex talk? Because they seem really creeped out by it right now.”

“Oh, yeah, we only said that because they were spying on us and trying to listen in on us when we were having a conversation.” Ukyou answers easily.

Yuzuriha doesn’t say much in response as she pieces the statue back together. As she does this, Gen is left to wonder what his date with Ukyou will be like tonight, and what all they will have to do to go on it without anyone following them like Suika and the kids had.

Chrome approached them soon after, his smile wide, “Ukyou, Gen! The elders back at the village want to speak to you guys on the cellphone. They’ve heard a lot about your guys’ past together and they have a lot of questions to ask. Do you mind speaking to them?”

“No, not at all.” Ukyou answers easily, “How about you, Gen? Do you want to talk to them?”

“I see no oblem-pray with it. If you’re doing it, I may as well do it too.” Gen replies with a shrug, causing Chrome to feel a bit more excited about this.

Chrome is beyond happy that Ukyou has showed up. Ever since he did, he’s been able to speak to Ruri more casually because of her fondness of his ‘love story’ with Gen and his general support of Ukyou in his pursuit of Gen. Well, okay, he also understands where Ukyou is coming from as well and he hopes to get some tips on not only confessing his feelings to Ruri, but also asking her out on a date.

He would try asking Taiju, but the omega man is far bolder than what he is, whereas Ukyou is more relatable to him. It also helps that he can understand where the alpha man is coming from regarding his interest in Gen because it feels to be the same way he feels for Ruri.

“Great! Right this way, then!”

As the young men followed Chrome over to where the cellphone was located at, Senku and Kohaku had seen them pass on by when heading out of the woods after they had gotten what they needed.

“Looks like Chrome never quit liking Ukyou, huh?” he comments in a poor attempt to hide his annoyance at the sight.

“To be fair, he really relates to Ukyou and he admires him for being so bold with Gen. He’s hoping to learn something from him that could help him confess to Ruri…it also helps that this whole Ukyou-Gen romance thing has helped to bring them closer together. I guess he’s willing to do whatever it takes to try to get with her.” Kohaku explains in her own successful attempt to try to downplay Senku’s annoyance at Chrome.

Senku does understand this and he knows Chrome has wanted to date Ruri for a long time now. He knows he cannot blame him for wanting to emulate Ukyou on that end. He wouldn’t want to emulate himself on the whole issue of romantic relationships, not when confident people like Ukyou are around.

Truthfully, he was never any help with Chrome regarding his situation with Ruri. If of anything, he was horrible at giving advice and at times did all that he could to avoid giving him advice because he didn’t know what else to say other than ‘just tell you love her and ask her out’. So when he takes this into account…it makes sense that he would be very pro Ukyou on this end and Senku honestly can’t blame him.

(Though he won’t deny that it’d be nice if the other aspiring scientist at least showed form of solidarity with him, even if he can admit that Kohaku’s reasoning makes logical sense.)

He sighs, admitting, “You’re right there…I can’t blame him. I think anyone would want to be as confident as Ukyou is about this sort of thing.”

“Hey, you’ll get there. I know you can do anything; if you can pull off these great feats of science, then you can win over Gen.” Kohaku reassures him, but not to much success, “If you say so…”

Senku and her head back to the caves to do some experiment when they happen upon Yuzuriha on their way over there. He does ask when he sees her, “Where’s the mentalist and Ukyou going off to?”

“They’re going to where the cellphone is located. Apparently people in the village want to talk to them about their relationship.” she asks him right away, excitement in her bones, “Senku, did you confess to Gen? How did it go?”

“I did, but I don’t think it went that well…he says he needs time to think it over.” the red eyed alpha says with a hand behind his neck, “I didn’t think of that outcome possibly happening and I cannot deny feeling a bit stupid for not seeing it coming. I can’t help but to think I made things worse.”

“I’m positive you didn’t, Senku! I’m sure that all he needs is time to take this all in. I mean, I don’t think you did much to show your interest in him back at the village and now, so I think that probably surprised him to hear that you did like him all along. If you give him time, I know he’ll give you an answer.” she does give him some advice for the time being though, “For now, give Gen his time and don’t pressure an answer out of him. Also try doing nice things for him so he knows you’re serious about what you said. Try making him cola again or something else special that he’d like. I think that would work to better help Gen see you’re serious.”

He takes in her like a sponge would to water, agreeing with a nod, “I can do that…and then some.”

He heads over to the cave with Kohaku following and mouthing a quick ‘thank you’ to Yuzuriha, who smiled in return.

At the cellphone, Ruri was there waiting for them and when they finally arrived, she cheered, “Oh, they’re here! Don’t worry, they’ll be able to answer all of your questions! Who do you want to speak to first? …Gen? Okay, that sounds great to me!”

She motions for him to come forward, telling him, “Come on, Gen, they have a lot of questions for you to answer.”

He does just that, thinking this will all be perfectly innocent, boring old questions about his connection with Ukyou, “Hello? This is Gen speaking, mind telling me what you want to ask?”

“Outta the way, I have a few things to ask first!” it sounds like there was some fighting going on in the background…just what did Ruri and Chrome say about his relationship with Ukyou?

“Okay Gen, I need to know right now: what was it like to have this ‘heat’ with Ukyou?”

“What!” Gen exclaims, his face slowly turning red at the horror of the question, “Don’t play dumb with me, Senku explained how heats and ruts work back in the village. Tell me, what was this strong alpha man like in bed? Is it true that his manhood enlarged in you to form this ‘knot’ Senku spoke of? Was he large before the knot or no?”

Gen couldn’t answer this because it just…how could a little old lady ask him such things! He remembers her being one who told fairy tales to children to help them sleep at night, too, which makes this all the more awkward for him.

“Oh, did he give you oral? Was he flexible in bed? Did he really know how to pleasure you just right? What was it like to lose your virginity to such a man? Why haven’t you mated him yet? He sounds like a complete catch, if you ask me.”

“That is…incredibly ersonal-pay to ask, don’t you think?”

“Ah, don’t be like that! According to Senku we have the same parts, and if you need advice to make heat sex better…trust me, there’s some great advice we could give.”

“…Sorry, but it was just the one time and I don’t want to talk about it anymore, okay? Okay, bye!” he hands the phone to Ukyou immediately, whispering harshly to him, “They’re all erverts-pay, Ukyou-chan, each and every one of those little old ladies! Don’t let the kind voices fool you; they’re -orny-hay and ready to talk about it!”

Ukyou took the phone, this time addressing them, “Hello, it’s me, Ukyou. Is this the people from the Ishigami Village I am speaking to?”

“So polite!”

“What a gentleman!”

“What a nice young man!”

Unlike Gen, Ukyou’s conversation went in a completely different direction, “Is it true you’re great with a bow and arrow and have incredibly sharp hearing?”

“It’s all true; I am great at archery, but hearing was always my strong suit. That’s why I did sonography in the military.”

“Ah, yes, Ruri and Senku explained that to us in the past! To be speaking to a mighty warrior like yourself is a true honor.”

“I am grateful for your respect, but I find it as much of an honor to be speaking to people who managed to survive in a stone world.” Ukyou replies easily, his conversation obviously going far better than Gen’s did.

“Give me the phone!” Ukyou hears—along with some struggling—and a breathy, “According to Ruri, you’re very handsome and experienced…mind telling me what Gen’s heat was like? Can you give us a description of what happened? I know it sounds evasive, but just because we’re old doesn’t mean we can’t talk about sex!”

“I could tell you about that, but out of respect for Gen, I won’t speak about it. It’s what a gentleman would do.”

This only resulted in a moment of silence before a loud, “Aww, how sweet!” was heard.

Then it went back to another old man, this one asking him, “Can you tell us the tales of your life as a military man?”

“Sure. I have a few good stories from back in my time that I think you will like.”

As Ukyou tells the elders in the village about his military stories, Gen is left to stare in open awe and wonder, if not pure bewilderment, “What? His conversation…it’s going…good? How? How can he talk to these perverts so easily?”

“I guess it’s just his charm.” Chrome answers easily, wishing he had half the confidence Ukyou to be able to handle all the elders at once as they ask intrusive questions about his love life.

Then, he wishes for his confidence in general. It would come in handy when he does confess to Ruri and hopefully get a date with her. He wants to ask Ukyou for some help with that, though. He figures the guy would be willing to give him some advice with this, he is nice enough to do so from what he knows of him so far.

Ruri whispers to him as Ukyou handles the villagers with aplomb by regaling his military and travel stories, “I’m going to be officiating their wedding! Isn’t it so great?”

“It is and maybe…we could do that together… I mean, I support Ukyou and Gen being together too, I always have, and I think this could be a great for two of their biggest supporters to give them a wedding they deserve, right?”

It’s rambly and he thought she’d hate the idea, but instead, she faces with a large smile on her face, “Really? You’d do that with me? Oh, thank you, Chrome, that’s so sweet!”

“Y-Yeah…it’s no problem.” he stammers out as she hugs him tightly.

He knows Senku isn’t happy with Ukyou’s presence, but for him, the man has been nothing than a blessing to his goals of dating Ruri. Hopefully he can use his presence to gain the confidence to confess and get the date he’s longed for.

Chapter Text

Before Gen and Ukyou could leave after the young alpha man had gotten done speaking to the villagers, Chrome was quick to ask, “Ukyou, wait, before you go, can we talk alone? There’s something I want to ask you.”

“I don’t see why we can’t. Wait here, Gen. I’ll be right back.” Ukyou says to him while Gen waves him off with a, “Don’t be gone too long now! I wouldn’t want to go collect statue pieces all bored and alone.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll be right back.” Ukyou replies with a small chuckle before following Chrome further down the path and over to an area that is a bit deeper in the trees. There, Chrome opens up to him, “Okay Ukyou, I’ve always liked you ever since we first met you during the war and I’ve always been able to relate to you and how you feel about Gen because I feel the same way about Ruri. I’m not as experienced as you are, but I was wondering if you could give me some help in confessing to Ruri and asking her out on a date?”

Ukyou’s response to this is something Gen feels as though he should have predicted, “You want to be a scientist, right? Are you scared of the possibilities of something going wrong during an experiment or when you’re making something with Senku?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because there’s always going to be a chance of something going wrong, but I can always try again to make it work.”

His advice to Chrome is simple, “Then there’s no reason to be scared of asking Ruri out and confessing your feelings to her. In life, there’s always a chance of something going wrong—at least with Ruri, you know it won’t get you killed or seriously injured if she says ‘no’ to you. It will hurt, but at least you have the option of keeping her in your life as a friend and one day maybe finding somebody else to move on with. If she says she wants to date you, then all it will mean is she reciprocates your feelings and wants to be your girlfriend. You won’t ever know how she feels unless if you say something to her. Approach her with the same confidence you do a scientific experiment and you’ll be just fine.”

“What would I talk to her about?” is Chrome’s question, to which Ukyou suggests, “I did overhear you two speaking about your support of Gen and I having a relationship…why not talk about us? You can tell her how you relate to me and let her give her response after that. It wouldn’t be too hard.”

“I can try that…I mean, it’s better than nothing.” he then thanks him, saying, “Thanks for the advice, I’ll be sure to try it out. I won’t keep you from Gen any longer.”

“Okay, let me know how it goes, Chrome!” Ukyou said with a smile, heading back to where Gen was at while Chrome followed behind him.

When they were having their quick chat, Ruri was quick in asking Gen, “So, any chance you might be falling in love with anyone special? You know you can tell me anything, I’m always more than willing to listen and give advice.”

The omega man catches onto this and laughs it off, “Oh Ruri, there’s no need to be so obvious! I know you ship Ukyou-chan and I together hardcore, there’s no need to play coy with me and fail so miserably.”

“You can’t blame me for trying. Ukyou is really good for you, Gen. Why haven’t you dated him yet?”

He knows he cannot tell her he is going to be going out on a date with Ukyou, but he can tell her, “I don’t believe that’s anyone’s business. My love life is supposed to be ersonal-pay, remember?”

She nods slowly, accepting this fact somewhat, “I guess so…but as the village priestess, I do believe I have some right to know what’s going on with the omega in Ishigami Village. I would like to think there’s not another threat waiting for us out there like Hyouga had been, but I can’t say for certain since you didn’t tell us a lot of what your life was like before you arrived at the village.”

Gen does feel a bit guilty for not being more honest about that. He knew he should have been, but, “I know I should have been honest about what my time was like in the Tsukasa Empire…but after all the sexism I faced there and the issues with Hyouga, I didn’t feel comfortable talking about it in depth. I knew you guys wouldn’t be judgmental of me about it, but I didn’t want to talk or think about it.”

She nails it down pretty well when connecting the dots, “Being in the village was like a mental escape for you then…you were always working with and speaking to Senku, you were interactive with the villagers, and you probably felt some semblance of normalcy that you didn’t have in the empire. I get it; you didn’t want to lose your safe space. I know I have felt similar in the past, not for the same reasons, but because I didn’t want to marry someone I didn’t love like Magma and lose the safety I had in my freedom.”

He nods to this, understanding how terrifying it would be to have her future spouse chosen by something as barbaric as a tournament amongst the strongest in the village. He felt bad for Ruri when the tournament to win the right to be her spouse was going on because it reminded him of something Hyouga and the other alphas would have done back in the Tsukasa Empire to omegas if they could have gotten away with it.

“There’s nothing else you want to tell us, right? There is nobody else who was like Hyouga towards you?”

“No, there wasn’t anyone else like Hyouga to me. I think having Ukyou around me made sure that would never happen.”

Ruri comments to him after a moment of silence, “I don’t know why you can’t quite see it, but Ukyou does love you Gen, in a pure way as opposed to the harsh lust of Hyouga. I think you’d be foolish to throw any future with him away.”

As much as he likes Ruri, he doesn’t feel right in breaking her fantasy with the information that he wants to be with Senku as a mate and he has fallen for the scientist alpha hard over the last year. He may feel tempted to tell her otherwise, but he knows better than to break her heart over this matter. He can always tell her later if he does get the chance to mate with Senku.

He was lucky to be saved by Ukyou’s presence at that moment, with the alpha calling out to him, “Come on, Gen, let’s get back to collecting statue pieces.”

“Sure thing, Ukyou-chan.” he turns to Ruri and says, “I enjoyed our chat, Ruri. I hope to have more like that in the future.”

“I hope to as well, Gen.” she said to him with a gentle smile on her lips.

When he and Ukyou were far away enough from Ruri and Chrome, Gen wonders, “What did you and Chrome talk about anyway?”

“He asked for advice in confessing to Ruri and I gave him some. It was no big deal.”

“Ah, look at you playing upid-cay! You truly are a hopeless romantic!”

“You can’t blame me, not when I have you by my side.”

Gen has to stifle a small laugh to this, “I suppose I can’t…”

They were able to walk to a new area where Tsukasa destroyed statues to gather up some pieces there whereas Chrome and Ruri were walking back from the area where the cell phone was located.

“I really hope Gen considers Ukyou to be his husband! They’d make such a lovely couple.” Ruri sighs wistfully whereas Chrome works up his courage.

Think of it as a scientific experiment and approach it with the same confidence…

“I actually hope he does too, but I think my reasons are different from yours.”

“I thought it was because you liked Ukyou?”

This is where Chrome takes his leap of faith and follows Ukyou’s advice, repeating it his head as he speaks to her, “I do like Ukyou. He’s a great guy and I respect him, but I also relate to him. I feel the same way about you that he does about Gen and that’s why I want him to marry Gen so badly, because I want to see someone who holds the same feelings I do for you succeed in a relationship.”

She’s silent for a few seconds before a shocked look is on her face, “You feel the same way about me that Ukyou does for Gen?”

“I have for years now. It’s okay if you don’t like me back, we can still be—” he’s cut off with a kiss on the cheek and a tight hug, “You don’t know how happy it makes me to know there’s someone out there who has those same feelings that Ukyou has for Gen for me! I never thought I could achieve such a thing, but now that I know I can, I am more than willing to see where it goes from here.”

“Wait, what? Are you saying you want to date me because you like me?”

“Yes, I am. Why wouldn’t I, Chrome? You’ve always been so sweet to me all of my life and so determined to cure me of my illness long before we ever knew what it was. You were willing to take a beat down from Magma for me…I can say that anyone willing to do that is more than worthy of a date with me.”

He wants to cheer this successful development, find Ukyou, and give the man the best thank you he can give for helping him with this. Now that he knows he can start a relationship with Ruri, he’s more than pleased with the advice he was given as he prepares to spend the rest of his day on cloud nine at the news of her acceptance of his offer to date.

Of course, he’s not Ukyou smooth. No, he reacts to this with a small stammer, “You mean it, for real?”

She nods, “I do.”

Then comes the loud, victorious, “Yes! Don’t worry Ruri, I’ll give you the best date ever and I’ll make sure I prove to you that I am more than worthy to be your husband someday!”

He is met with a giggle from her and a small, “There’s no need to be that full of self doubt, Chrome. You are worthy of me whether you believe it or not. You are smart, handsome, and sweet…anyone would be lucky to have you as a husband.”

He has so much to thank Ukyou for and while he thinks about asking him for advice on the date, he decides in the end not to. He doesn’t want to annoy the man with the constant asking of questions over rather small things such as this, after all. He has to be proactive now and make decisions for himself from here on out.

That and Ruri says he’s worthy of her, something he never thought to be completely true. Hearing her say it though is a major confident boost that he didn’t know he needed until he heard it. If she thinks he’s good enough for being her potential boyfriend and worthy of him, then that means she believes he is worthy and good enough to choose a date for them without messing it up.

It doesn’t mean he’s not worried about that, but he does ask, “Is there anything you want to do on a first date?”

She thinks it over and says, “Huh…I never actually gave it any thought before. Maybe we could go to the beach and have dinner there, just the two of us.”

“Yeah, we can do that. There’s no need to worry about a thing from here on out, Ruri. I’ve got this.”

Seeing him being confident in himself has Ruri feeling optimistic about their date and what the future could possibly hold between herself and Chrome. She doesn’t know if they will mesh well romantically or not, but she’s more than willing to find out.

Chapter Text

Senku was surprised by it when Chrome and Ruri returned to their current home, with the aspiring scientist telling him in pure joy and pride, “I asked Ruri out on a date and she said yes!”

He honestly is happy for Chrome because he knows how long he has liked Ruri and yet when he congratulated him, he received some information he didn’t want to hear, “Great, but how did you manage to pull that off? Did you finally do what I said?”

“No, I went to Ukyou and asked him for some advice. I followed it and it worked! He really is a great guy if I do say so myself.”

Senku has to fight back a growl when hearing about Ukyou again. He doesn’t say much at first other than, “What was his advice? Ask Ruri out already?”

Chrome shook his head, “No, he told me to approach it like I would a science experiment so I could ask her out without feeling nervous. It really helped me and I’m sure it could help you too.”

He doesn’t want to think about Ukyou’s advice in love ever helping him in anything relating to Gen, “Yeah, no thank you. I don’t need to receive any advice from him.”

“It could help to get a second opinion on things, Senku. I don’t see anything wrong with asking him for advice.”

“I don’t see anything wrong with getting a second opinion on things, but I don’t need to receive any advice from him. I’m fine on my own.”

Chrome’s only response to this was to sigh and say, “Well, okay, fine then if you insist…I have to get going, there’s a few more people I want to tell about this. I’ll see you later, Senku.”

“See you later.” Senku said as Chrome left his side, leaving him alone with Kohaku, who had her own comment on the matter, “If you think about it, Ukyou’s advice does make sense. If you can approach a science experiment with confidence despite knowing what went wrong, then you should be able to confess to someone as well. I can see why it worked with Chrome and I think it would have worked with you too had you heard it earlier.”

Senku scoffs and rolls his eyes, “It wouldn’t have worked on me. All it would have done is made me more anxious than anything else because if I did approach like I would a scientific experiment then I would have obsessing over every single possibility as opposed to the few that I did.”

Kohaku hears this and shrugs, “Okay, maybe it wouldn’t have worked on you, but it did work with Chrome. Isn’t that a good thing?”

“It is, I suppose.”

Senku doesn’t say much else than this, with Kohaku wondering what else could be bothering him. She has a vague idea about it and decides to ask, “Are you upset that Chrome went to Ukyou for advice and followed through on it?”

When Senku doesn’t say anything, she sighs out of a bit of exasperation, “Senku, come on, Chrome has always liked Ukyou because he found him to be relatable. It makes sense that he would ask him for advice, doesn’t it?”

“I know that, but it doesn’t change the fact that it’s annoying.” Senku is being honest here on why he’s a bit miffed by the fact he went to Ukyou for advice, “I thought Chrome was a bit more considerate of my side of things, but it’s okay, I guess. At least Ukyou helped him out.”

Kohaku isn’t doing this to be mean, but to better explain where Chrome is coming from, “To be fair, Chrome had no idea you liked Gen this entire time and he found Ukyou to be relatable because he had the same feelings for Ruri. Doesn’t it make sense that he’d go to the guy with relationship experience who he can relate to for advice?”

Hearing her point this out has him taking pause and admitting, “I guess you’re right there…”

“So it doesn’t make any sense to be annoyed with Chrome going to Ukyou for better advice than you’ve given him in the past.”

“Yeah, you’re right there too.” he exhales and says, “I am happy for the you, but I’m going to be less annoyed with him about that. Everything you said is correct and I was being irrational about it earlier.”

Kohaku feels relieved to hear this because the last thing Chrome needs is Senku being annoyed with him for something he doesn’t deserve.

Gen and Ukyou had planned it quite perfectly, actually.

Dinner with everyone was nice tonight: Senku did sit by them, but there was no tension there like there had been in the past and while they did retire to separate rooms, they were able to meet up at a point they had agreed upon later on in the night when everyone else was asleep or in their rooms.

Gen smiled when meeting Ukyou on a trail, “Well, go ahead and show me what it is you want to show me, Ukyou-chan.”

“What a way to start off a date, Gen-chan! Here I thought we’d be holding hands and cuddling, but I can make this work.” Ukyou teased right back with the military man leading the way, “I found this area that I think you’ll like.”

“Alright, show me it then.”

“Did you bring your tent? We may be staying the night here.”

“Yep, I have it with me.”

“Great.” Ukyou starts the trek over to this mystery spot, with the young man saying to him, “Gen, in our old world, what was your place like?”

Gen reminisces on this with a smile on his face, “It was actually my dream place. I lived in a condo with very tight security and it was very modern, but I had pops of color everywhere to make it feel more ‘me’. My place also came with a pool, gym, postal office, and tennis court all provided by my landlord, which was great because whenever I got bored, I could go outside and go to one of those places to do something fun or relax. It was so great! I miss my home every day.”

He does pause and wonder, “Did you live near me or in the same condominium by any chance, Ukyou-chan? Can you imagine that: us living in the same building and never meeting each other once, only to meet here in the stone world! It makes for a rather interesting story, don’t you think?”

“No, actually I didn’t. I live in a nice apartment in Ebisu and I wasn’t ever home much because of my military work taking me around the world so frequently. I never got to make my home mine or really live there for long. I paid rent for it, but it never felt like ‘home’ to me. It always felt more like a hotel I was paying to spend the night in.” Ukyou then comments as a way to lift the mood, “Your place sounds great, though. I actually wish we did live in the same condominium. We would have been great neighbors and who knows? Maybe great lovers and mates as well.”

“It always amazes how omantic-ray you are! If we would have met back then and I never met Senku, I could say that would have happened. I definitely would have been your lover and mate because you’re a good guy who would never hurt me.” Gen said in response to this, his mind going over the ‘what ifs’ as he continues on the trek with Ukyou.

Eventually Ukyou stops them and says, “This is what I wanted to show you.”

It’s a beautiful waterfall with many flowers he’s never seen before growing around it. It’s quiet, peaceful, and makes Gen feel calm when standing here, “It’s pretty, Ukyou-chan, but is this all you wanted to do on this date?”

“No, actually, I was thinking I could show some of my dance moves. You see, I learned ballroom dancing in Malta back when I was in the military and I thought you’d like to have a dance.”

Gen doesn’t have a problem with this, but, “Kind of hard to dance without music, isn’t it?”

Ukyou has a backup plan for this as well, “It’s alright, I can sing and dance at the same time. It’s not too hard and something I also learned when in Malta.”

“Alright, show me what you got then!” Gen teases when taking his hand, not thinking Ukyou could actually sing and dance to begin with separately.

Then he opens his mouth and starts singing in a soft, low tone, “I loved you in the morning, our kisses deep and warm, your hair upon the pillow like a sleepy golden storm. Yes, many loved before us, I know that we are not new, in city and in forest, they smiled like me and you. But now it’s come to distances and both of us must try, your eyes are soft with sorrow…hey that’s no way to say goodbye.” 

Gen is stunned by Ukyou’s singing voice and movement, amazed that he could really sing and dance at the same time. His grip on him firm enough to lead and gentle enough to not feel suffocating.

Despite his shock, Ukyou keeps leading them in a mesmerizing dance while singing more, “I'm not looking for another as I wander in my time. Walk me to the corner, our steps will always rhyme. You know my love goes with you as your love stays with me. It's just the way it changes, like the shoreline and the sea. But let's not talk of love or chains and things we can't untie, your eyes are soft with sorrow… Hey, that's no way to say goodbye.”

Gen doesn’t mind being led by Ukyou at all. If of anything, he finds the motions to be fluid and easy to keep up with given that he’s never actually danced at anything other than his middle school dance. He finds himself not really missing the music much, since Ukyou is so good at singing and he finds himself liking the song, “I loved you in the morning, our kisses deep and warm, your hair upon the pillow like a sleepy golden storm. Yes, many loved before us, I know that we are not new, in city and in forest, they smiled like me and you. But now it’s come to distances and both of us must try, your eyes are soft with sorrow…hey that’s no way to say goodbye.”

As he stopped singing, he had Gen pulled in close to him, right in his arms, and with a gentle look in his eyes, full of nothing but pure adoration for the omega in front of him, Ukyou kisses Gen outside of his heat at long last.

He knows this is romantic. He knows Ukyou is really doing his best to win him over, and yet…Gen can’t say he feels right doing this.

It’s impossible to enjoy a romantic date when all he wishes is for Senku to give him a date of his own and for the scientist alpha to be kissing him instead.

It’s because of the wariness in his eyes that Ukyou takes pause and asks, “Did I go too far, Gen? Are you uncomfortable being by me now?”

Gen shakes his head, “No, I would never be uncomfortable being by you! I’m amazed you can sing and dance at the same time—the song you chose was beautiful. I didn’t take you for a Leonard Cohen fan.”

“It was either this or Velvet Underground, but I didn’t think you’d like the one I was going to choose from them.”

“Oh? Which one was it going to be?”

“…’Pale Blue Eyes’.”

Gen sighs, “I love that song too…oh well, I think the one you chose actually fits what’s on my mind better.”

Ukyou finds this to be odd to hear and yet he has a feeling where this could be going, “Why would it?”

“Because…as much as I like you and as much as I know that if I never met Senku, we’d be together as lovers or mates possibly now, I can’t go on a date with you without wanting to be on one with Senku instead.” Gen genuinely looks guilty when replying to Ukyou, “I want you as a friend in my life still, but Ukyou-chan, I can’t help it. I’ve been Senku’s biggest fan ever since Tsukasa told me all about him and getting to know him really made me fall hard for him. Even sharing a kiss with you now, I can’t say I feel anything at all, not when I’m thinking about Senku and wondering what it’d be like if he were the one kissing me instead.”

The alpha’s answer is one that shocks the omega to his core, “You really are a hopeless romantic too, Gen.”

“What? You’re not mad at me?”

“No, how could I be? It’s not your fault that you fell head over heels for Senku. You like him and there’s nothing I can do about that. Besides, as long as I get to be in your life as a friend, then I’m fine with everything.”

Gen chuckles and says, “Well…I did learn his birthday…and I did give him a gift for it… Ah, yeah, I like him—a bit too much if you can call me a hopeless romantic. I guess this date is over, huh?”

Ukyou shrugs as he releases him from his grasp, “It may be over, but it doesn’t mean that we can’t dance some more if you want. I can sing ‘Pale Blue Eyes’ if you do want to dance some more.”

The omega exhales in relief, “Let’s do that then. Get ready to sing me some Velvet Underground, Ukyou-chan! They are one of my favorite groups and I know a lot of their songs!”

“I can keep up with you on that one. I know a lot of their songs too.”

“Great, now sing to me so we can start dancing!”

It wasn’t as formal or romantic as before, but they still enjoyed it anyway. Ukyou cannot deny the feeling of hurt and dismay he feels over being rejected by Gen, but seeing him being so head over heels for Senku made him decide to do what’s best for his happiness and let him be with the alpha he wants to be with.

Besides, if things ever do end badly between himself and Senku, then who knows, maybe he could get that chance to be his mate again…though he won’t hold his breath on it. Senku is a good alpha and he knows it will only be a matter of time before they’re mated.

The following morning, everyone is stunned because they can’t find Gen or Ukyou anywhere. Senku was about to go looking for them himself, having assumed the worst and believing they had become mates overnight, only to be stopped in this activity by the two of them arriving at the camp.

“Hello everybody! Sorry to make you worry, Ukyou and I spent the night dancing by a pretty waterfall!” Gen announced in a sing-song voice while Ukyou was quick to clear up, “Don’t get any ideas, there was nothing perverted that happened between us when we were gone.”

Ruri asks Ukyou because she’s curious and hopeful, “Why were you guys out there?”

“We were on a date, but it ended early because Gen didn’t have the same feelings for me that I have for him.” Ukyou explains to her bluntly, with the young priestess immediately freaking out over the news, “What? No, that can’t be true! You two were so perfect together! Chrome and I were going to officiate your wedding!”

The white haired young man handles this with a certain aplomb that Senku doesn’t think he could possess if he were in his shoes, “Life happens, Ruri. It’s ultimately Gen’s decision if he wants to be with me or not and he doesn’t. He wants to be with someone else and as someone who will always love him no matter what, it’s my duty to respect that decision.”

Before she could freak out, Chrome did step in and say, “He has a point, Ruri. If you love someone, then you have to do whatever it takes to make them happy, even if it means not being with them.”

“I guess you’re right…but if Gen doesn’t love you, then who does he love?”

All eyes fell on the currently blushing mentalist, who cleared his throat when saying, “Ah…I guess it may surprise you all…but I rejected Ukyou-chan for Senku…”

Everyone was stunned by this and yet, the tell tale blush on his face said it all for them. Gen wasn’t lying about this; he really did reject Ukyou for Senku.

Senku himself is the most shocked of them all, “Why would you choose me over him? I’m not good with relationships, I lack the experience he does, and I’m nowhere near as worldly or well traveled like he is. Why me over him? It doesn’t make any logical sense, Gen.”

Gen rolls his eyes and approaches Senku when telling him to his face, “Senku, if I had never met you, I would have been mated with Ukyou, but I did meet you… I did learn all about you from Tsukasa, then I got to know you after that, and I couldn’t help it if I wound up having a strong crush on you over this past year that extends into now. You aren’t any of the things Ukyou is, sure, but I like you because you’re intelligent, brave, ambitious, resourceful, and handsome. Maybe in our world we would have never met, and I’d be more likely to be mated with Ukyou, but if we had even back then, I know I’d still choose you over anyone else.”

He kisses him on the cheek and asks, “Will you have me as your boyfriend, Senku-chan, or will I have to go back to Ukyou-chan’s strong arms—ah!”

Senku had responded to it by acting on his instincts for once and kissing Gen before he could mess it up by saying something stupid. It allowed him the time to say, “Of course I want to be your boyfriend. Why wouldn’t I want to be?”

Of course, Senku being Senku didn’t really allow this moment to go on any longer, “Now that this is settled…everyone, I have a lot for you to do today!”

Everyone else was amazed that Senku could go back to giving orders so easily after Gen’s confession to him. However, they couldn’t help but to notice how much more lively and animated he seemed to be after it was said.

After his assigning them to different jobs to do, word spread like wildfire of what happened to everyone. While there were many disappointed that Ukyou and Gen didn’t work out as a couple (Suika had almost cried when she heard the news), they couldn’t deny that it was sweet to see Senku and Gen working together happily as a new couple.

Their next mission may be the most dangerous one they will face and yet, they cannot help but to smile at Senku and Gen as their new relationship blooms into something beautiful in front of their eyes.