Chapter Text
He sat in the chair on the raised platform, overlooking the strategy table where black-clad lieutenants argued. They’d been trying to hammer out a detail for breaking up the resistance’s hold in their cities, or expanding the empire’s own reach. Either would be good at this point. Anything to tip the scales of power in their favor.
As always, the frustration began as a low stirring in his belly. Cyclical and rhythmic. He tapped his finger against the armrest of the chair, in tandem with his growing annoyance. Maybe a public display of force would help. Strangling someone always made him feel better. But the strategists stopped their murmured disagreements as soon as they noticed his tapping. They were too well trained, which only spiked the displeasure in the pit of his stomach. Except for one, it seemed, who hadn’t gotten the memo. Some idiot who hadn’t seen everyone else straighten up and silence themselves, who had his back to the front and was still trying to whisper-argue with someone that was pointedly ignoring him.
Even as his anger ignited, Kylo Ren let himself smile behind the mask.
He didn’t need to speak. Instead he rose from his seat, and across the room the man did the same, held captive by the force ringed on his neck. Kylo flexed his fingers, turning the man like he was screwing a lightbulb, and delighted at the reddening of the flesh as he clawed at his neck. But he was not yet sated. He wanted to—
His stomach heaved and then suddenly dropped, as if he’d stepped off a very high mountain. His mask smothered the rush of breath that escaped him as he suddenly lost grip on the idiot, that fell gasping and thanking him. He couldn’t focus. A sudden flush was crawling up his limbs, and it was becoming alarmingly difficult to think. He stumbled back as his stomach surged again, and as the lieutenants' expression flickered from controlled fear to confusion he knew he had to get away.
“I’m leaving. No one may disturb me,” he announced, as if it hadn’t taken everything in him not to let his voice shake. And he strode out of the room.
Down the hallway. Ignoring officer genuflection, stormtrooper salutes. The farther he went the worse it got; the light stung his eyes, his stomach wouldn’t sit still, and his body seemed to cry out for something he couldn’t even name. He was rushing now, uncaring for how violent he looked, tearing down corridors to get to his quarters. It wasn’t until he’d gotten in and sealed himself in that he allowed himself to think it:
He was in fucking heat.
Fuck! He tore his helmet off and threw it at the ground. Years of careful planning, never skipping a day of medication, force-shifting people’s scents away from him, and it all came crashing down because—?
Because of what, exactly?
His fingers were shaking as he ran his hands through his hair. Wait. He could still fix this. He'd prepared for this eventuality, as unlikely as it was, as sneering as Snoke had been when he'd taught him.
For dire situations, little omega.
This was as dire as it could get. His temperature was quickly rising, his core beginning to—no. He paced to his bathroom and twisted the tap handle quickly to open his secret cubby behind it, the place where he kept all his most shameful secrets, mostly gender-related. He needed to reverse it somehow, stop this biological nightmare from happening before—
His door opened. Kylo froze.
From the camera in his secret place he watched a woman step into his quarters without any of the fear or reverence that usual empire acolytes would. Her confidence belied the dark green worker’s uniform she had on. It suited her dark complexion. He vaguely remembered ordering for a technician to work on his wiring; he’d been getting hot flashes in the middle of the night. He melded his shaky hands to his head as he realized that had been the onset of his heat.
Of course they’d schedule it to be during the meeting that was supposed to run for hours, but now she was here and he needed to get himself under control before he ordered her out. As he frantically looked for his pills, Kylo started breathing exercises.
Meanwhile, the technician slowly surveyed the room, her gray eyed gaze coolly disinterested at the room’s furnishings, or lack thereof. Her eyes lingered a little on something on the ground, something covered by the bed, and when she took a step and picked it up Kylo realized it was his helmet.
His heart rate skyrocketed and undid all the good work he’d managed.
She dusted away some dirt on the base, and when she tilted her head some of her locs slid loose of her bun, obscuring her face with their gold-dipped ends. Her cheeks were highlighted with that same shade of gold, and so were her nails.
And then Kylo realized he’d spent quite a bit of time studying this woman’s face—this nobody at best and a problem to him at worst—and bit his lip, hard, to get back into focus.
What a mistake. His body exploded.
Pain—not just from his lip but from his stomach and even his skin, and a warmth that clung to him even as his pores opened up. He staggered back, needing relief and finding none. His garments were too thick, and not thick enough. He started clawing himself out of them, anything to make it stop.
It didn’t. He could smell the blood, the sharp acidity pooling in his senses from both his nose and his mouth. He could smell himself, the sudden sickly sweet scent he was oozing, hopefully contained, stars please let it be contained, he thought as he slid down to the floor. What wasn’t contained was that roiling heat in his lower belly, and as he finally got to the cool floor he felt the first trickle of wetness in his inside thigh. He was going to die.
You are not going to die, his logic screamed in desperation. With his tenuous grasp it registered as the grating voice of his dead master. Find the pills, eat a hundred of them, and bring yourself under submission!
Kylo reached up to the console, preparing to hoist himself up, and saw the technician looking directly at the hidden camera. Her nose twisted, and she sniffed the air.
It was as if time stopped, because a certainty replaced the confusion in her eyes, and then it of nowhere it hit him.
A sandalwood, earthtone musk eviscerated his senses, attacking his brain and rendering his body useless.
Even though thoughts were becoming difficult he knew it was her on an instinctual level. If he’d been hot before he was burning now, aflame with the scent of her stirring the need to be touched. He was soaked clean through his underwear as he finally crawled out of his tunic, half swaddled and trying to simultaneously kick it away and wrap himself.
What had he been doing, or thinking? He couldn’t remember. He couldn’t recall anything before the burning need between his legs, the brightness of everything attacking his eyes and nose and the shaking heat and fuck he’d give anything to be filled—
The door to the secret place slid open and she was there, standing above him.
This close she smelled like heaven and he just wanted a slice. He shakily reached out, hoping she’d come closer because he didn’t have the strength to close the distance. She crouched to get closer and the tempo in his veins doubled as he skipped a breath.
“Pipe the fuck down,” she said flatly, and only then did he realize he’d been whining, possibly the entire time. “Unless you want to get caught.” Her voice was smooth bass that scratched an itch at the back of his neck.
Kylo swallowed hard, but his mouth felt dry. He rubbed his elbows in a sad attempt to get warm and inched closer to her, to her wonderful smell. A pitying smile tugged at her mouth, and something about it—Kylo Ren recorded it for when he was in his right mind. Currently he didn’t care whether she looked at him with condescension or disgust, he just wanted her to touch him.
She arched an eyebrow. “Desperate little thing, aren’t you.”
Words couldn’t describe the effect her words, tone, presence had on him. Yet he could also feel a silent boundary: she didn’t want him to touch her.
He tried to squash the wail building deep in his throat and it came out as a choked whimper.
She stood and stepped around him, further into the den. The distance nearly hurt, physically, but thankfully it was brief; she paced back over and dumped some blankets on him. He burrowed into them, driven by some base instinct, clinging to the layers and pretending that they could hide him.
It was hard to see, probably because his eyes were beginning to water and it was dark in the den and she was standing above him. He’d starting clenching around nothing, shaking fingers reaching down in his own clothes, sensitive and aching.
The word was unfamiliar. It was mentally punishing to say. But his fundamental instinct denied what was left of his pride—shattered in the presence of potential relief. Curled up in front of her, swaddled in blankets and his own clothes, Kylo Ren squinted up at her and grated out, “please.”
A flicker of something in her expression. Some layered emotion in the painted dark of her eyes.
It melted away as she sighed, rubbing her temples—and then carefully lowered herself next to him. “No one can enter your room, right?”
Kylo nodded frantically, sidling up to her—she caught his reaching wrist and set it behind him.
Her touch was ice-cold relief to his feverish skin. He gasped as she trailed her hand down to the folds of tunic bunched up at his waist, arching involuntarily.
“Settle down,” she murmured, sounding amused, but how could he when the smallest contact was electricity, lancing from his skin straight to the tip of his dick?
Her fingers skimmed the base and his whole body jolted involuntarily, straining for her touch.
“—ssStars—”
She shifted so she was behind him, his back against her chest. He twisted in her grip, put out that he couldn’t look at her, but then her scent enveloped him, a cloud of comfort. “I’ve got you,” she murmured into his ear, and a thrill rode his spine.
She hiked up his thighs to spread him out, trailing her fingers down to his weeping hole. “How’re you so wet already?” She muttered, and then pushed her index finger in.
Stars exploded behind Kylo’s eyes. He stutter-gasped as he momentarily lost what little grip he had, arching back into her firm chest to give her more access. It was everything, and felt like it—sensation of need being met.
“Open up for me a bit more,” she murmured as she started pushing in and out of him. Still panting, he relaxed into her frame, lulled by her voice.
“Good lad,” she said appreciatively, and gave the nape of his neck a broad lick that sent tingles through his body. He didn’t have time to think about it because she pushed a second finger in and everything doubled. The intense waves that were riding through him were more drawn out, more focused now.
“Ohffffuck,” he moaned, letting his head drop back against her shoulder, left arm clutching her calf for support.
“You like that?”
He didn’t have the mental faculties to formulate a reply. Something was stacking in his belly, sensations ratcheting up to a fever pitch. He turned his face to bury his nose in her neck and her scent seemed to take over all his senses. He couldn’t get enough of this, of her, never mind that he didn’t know what it was building to.
What he knew was that she was warmth and relief and amazing and now she was curling her fingers and electricity was shooting through him so his hips were bucking into her hand. His shaking was back and worse and he couldn’t stop the groaning noise he was making and everything was going blurry and—
“Are you close? Are you going to come for me?” Her voice was low and...rough when she murmured into his ear. That alone would’ve done it, and then she licked his earlobe for good measure, sending him tumbling over a waterfall.
Kylo gasped as his limbs locked up—and then came, his body jerking through a hard orgasm, hips bucking forward as his tunic became even more soiled than it was.
She hadn’t stopped stimulating him, just slowed as he’d climaxed. Aftershocks were still cresting over him, involuntary spasms rocking him back into her. He exhaled, hiccupped, and buried his nose into her neck again and felt her breath hitch in her throat.
“Just one more to put you to sleep,” she murmured, and that edge that his body paid attention to was still there. He didn’t know when, but the stimulation was building again and he wanted more. Her own breathing began to quicken as he rocked back and forth into her hand, against her chest.
She exhaled a quiet epithet when he whimpered, his nose nudging the spot in her neck that smelled so good.
“Shit. I am not going to fuck you, Kylo,” she growled, and he gasped because as soon as she said it he recognized that as what he wanted.
She sounded angry, that edge roughening her voice, but that only stoked the fire in his lower belly and made him want her more. He whined a wordless complaint into the crook of her neck. She muttered something he couldn’t make out and shoved another finger in, while increasing the pace.
Kylo keened through gritted teeth, choking back a sob when she commanded him to shush.
“Don’t be so bloody greedy,” she growled, reaching up to tweak his nipple. Kylo was a wreck—“You’ve already come once and I haven’t even touched your dick.”
“Gods—just. Fuckin starssshit,” he babbled nonsensically. It was becoming too much, all the different stimuli, and then with her left hand she gave his shaft a single smooth pump.
He jerked, some more nonsense spilling out of his mouth.
“Yeah? Like that?” She prompted, finger fucking him through the copious amounts of slick he was producing. He nodded jerkily, gave a long moan when she pumped him again before rubbing his weeping slit with her thumb.
“Mhm, mhm, mhm,” he whimpered desperately as he felt the coil in his core begin to tighten, much faster this time. She quickened the pace on both her hands until he was spun tight like thread in a spool, and half of the words tumbling out of his mouth was the word ‘please’ over and over again. Then she licked his earlobe again, told him to come, and he exploded for the third time.
He spilled semen into his tunic again, almost definitely ruining it for good as he twitched uncontrollably, toes spasming with the waves of orgasm taking over his body. Kylo collapsed back into her solid chest, gasping for breath. He was exhausted, but the awful ache was dulled, the burning need in his belly reduced to embers as sleep began to tug him away.
He fought it—he definitely had something important to do—but ultimately lost as he burrowed into the crook of her neck again. As he drifted off, he could’ve sworn something was poking him in the lower back.
Denali closed the door and walked confidently down the hallway. If life had taught her anything it was that confidence was a better excuse than most, and it proved true once again. No one questioned her until she got to a fairly common area and it was easy to say she was coming back from a job. Which she was.
Just more of a job than she’d expected.
“Stupid fucking Kylo Ren,” she muttered as she keyed in the job as complete on her datapad. It was hours after closure—cleaning up and putting him to bed had taken longer than she’d realized. All while fighting her own nature.
She liked to think of herself as coolheaded. She actively worked to keep her impulses under control, even nongender-related ones. She credited herself for not losing control, but seeing Kylo in heat had...done something to her, and she needed to figure out what.
She shut the door to her small living space behind her and sighed. Then she unclasped her overalls to look down at her raging hard on.
She really didn’t want to encourage it.
The supreme leader or whatever he called himself was bad news, and anyone with half a non-washed brain could see it. Not that she had the self-sacrificial motive to join the Resistance, mind you. She was a contractor on hire, and the First Order paid more than a group of hopeful idiots constantly on the run, that’s all.
She took off her clothes as she paced to the bathroom.
But Kylo Ren, an omega? Surely she’d have heard something. It was either so commonly known that she’d missed the memo, or a huge secret that he was balancing on his own. Maybe with a few close advisors.
She set the shower to cold and climbed in, willing herself to soften. But something popped up in her head: in either case, why had she stayed to help him? She should’ve left him to figure out himself and then decided whether or not to keep his secret later. Now, he’d likely be infuriated no matter what when he woke up. She idly wondered if she’d have to go into hiding, but interrupted herself remembering the panicked look in his eyes when he’d begged her the first time.
Almost as if it was his first, she mused. Stupid. He was in his late twenties. But the thought had set her on the track of remembering—the feel on his nose on her scent gland, his arm clinging onto her thigh, his shaky pleas—
Her cock throbbed and she swore. She didn’t even find him attractive. Maybe it was just because of his reputation; seeing someone so powerful beg for her intervention was a definite kink, but also—
She closed her eyes and remembered the way he smelled. At first it had been so faint she’d thought it was a refresher, a sprig of lemongrass for his room. She’d thought, What an amusing scent for him. But then she’d found him and his sour-sweet scent had flooded her nose, thick and cloying at the back of her throat and—fuck. It was a wonder she hadn’t rutted.
Her lip curled over her teeth as she wrapped a hand around herself, giving up on self-control for the day. She let herself imagine what would’ve happened if she had gone into rut, with Kylo right there and begging to be spread out underneath her.
She spread a hand against the tempered glass as she gave into the fantasy of fucking Kylo Ren senseless, biting his scent gland and claiming him instead of small snippets of his taste. He’d be soft and pliable and—stars, how he lost control when he came. She growled softly in her throat, imagining him squirting on command, and then she came all over her hand in a cold shower.
She steadied herself as she caught her breath—perhaps unsurprisingly she came harder than expected—before actually starting to shower properly.
As she finally softened, she chuckled in wry amusement. At least she could lord something over him when he inevitably tried to kill her.