Clarke steadies herself.
Her ears perk attentively, twitching restlessly and straining outward in the night for focus. The wood is quiet, mostly – the comforting chirp of a particularly noisy cricket; the soft, occasionally eerie hoot of an owl into the darkness; the creaking and groaning of the forest's swaying limbs – but Clarke carefully listens, anyway.
She knows that there is more out there, and she is swiftly proven right.
A twig snaps far off to the west, and Clarke predatorily lowers her stance in answer. Her ears flatten in strict, aggressive warning, quiet growls vibrating across menacingly bared teeth. The pure white fur of her belly weaves between threads of rain-dampened grass and through the warmth of darker fur beneath, paws braced directly above her charge and clawing into the earth, ready to defend if needed. Her lips twist into a gruesome snarl – an evident challenge to anyone brave enough to approach.
Clarke doesn't even know this girl.
The wolf below her is not Pack; her scent is heady and overwhelming, but distinctly unfamiliar. Still, the mahogany-shaded omega Clarke so protectively guards is definitely hurt, and undoubtedly in heat, and the alphas of Clarke's Pack have tirelessly tracked the heavy, honeyed lure of her need through half of the forest, already. The snow white wolf hears at least one of her brothers in the distance nearby, and the others surely won't be long to follow.
This omega isn't safe here, and Clarke knows it.
Her wolf knows it, too.
A small, tortured whimper snares Clarke's immediate attention, azure blue eyes flitting rapidly to the injured girl beneath her. Clarke quickly tempers her defensive stance, nosing reassuringly into the pretty wolf's flank, and the girl trembles visibly with a long, instantly grateful purr. The white wolf preens, satisfied with the comfort that she has offered, but Clarke disregards her inner alpha's pride and frantically curses their location.
They're deep in the woods, too far out to seek refuge among the humans, even if the weakened omega could find the energy to make the shift, in the first place. Clarke has options, she knows, but they are limited, and neither of them propose enough chances to work in her favor.
She can fight off the other alphas of her pack, and she might keep this omega safe long enough for her to flee, but the probability of that is slim. A dark red slash, four marks wide, bleeds from the torn flesh of the wounded wolf's neck, and another matches it along the plane of her heaving stomach. Dark brown fur mats around the injuries, blood caking together only to offer another way for Clarke's Pack to track her, and even if Clarke manages to fight off some of the alphas who seek to have her, the girl is too hurt to make it far enough to escape them. Even if she could withstand the journey, Clarke considers rapidly, the consequences of defending her would leave Clarke Packless – and as questionable as Clarke feels her Pack's decisions often are, she thinks that being of no Pack cannot actually be an option.
The only alternative is to find shelter. To hide. To shift, and expose her humanity to this strange wolf long enough to move her. It's Clarke's best choice – she knows that – but it acts against every custom that she's ever been taught.
Shifting outside of Pack company is against Pack law, but Clarke knows she has no choice, and she's running out of time.
She releases a single, feral growl – soft and irrefutably dangerous – and the omega underneath of her rumbles with instantaneous greed, neck folding left to expose her neck to Clarke's teeth in deeply yearning submission.
The white wolf snaps her jaws, temptation luring her to just do it – just bite her, mate her, knot her; make this beautifully scented omega belong to her – but Clarke forces the shift, anyway. Her wolf rages internally, swearing its ability to demonstrate strength; swearing its ability to please this omega better than Clarke is able – to protect her better than Clarke is able – but Clarke snarls impatiently and shoves it further within.
There isn't time for her wolf's wounded pride, even if Clarke's heart thunders beneath her breast in growing fear that the white wolf might be right.
She crouches, long blonde hair curtaining off the moonlight as her nails dig into the soil beneath. The mahogany wolf watches with dark, bleary green eyes, curious and confused, hurt and clearly desperate for an alpha's touch. She writhes in the dirt, small whines tearing hungrily from her soft muzzle, and Clarke reaches tender hands outward to stroke soothingly through the fur just behind her ear.
"Shh," Clarke coos softly. "It's alright. It's okay. I'll keep you safe," she promises, then swallows thickly and prays that she can keep her word. "Trust me," she pleads earnestly. "I can do this, but I need you to trust me. Can you do that?"
The wolf whimpers again, but her soft brown snout pushes gently into Clarke's palm, and Clarke instantly breathes a sigh of relief.
"I need to mask your scent," Clarke tells her shakily. "Or as much of it as I can," she murmurs in morbid afterthought, curling her fingers more firmly into the earth and coming up with a handful of mud, which she slathers generously across soft, pleasingly thick fur.
The omega trembles under Clarke's cautious attention, and Clarke's body shakes in answer.
She could never take advantage – could never succumb to her alpha's need to take from this omega, with or without her consent – but the blonde can't deny that she is tempted. The brown wolf's pelt is luxurious and beautiful, her green eyes are wary but wanting, and Clarke had drooled over her sweet, delirious scent from more than three miles out, upwind.
Clarke has never smelt anything like it.
Still, it's that same scent that troubles Clarke; there's only so much that a little bit of mud can mask, and, frankly, this omega's pheromones are winding through the forest's trees like fog, heavy and thick and everywhere. There's little Clarke can do to contain it here, but there's a bunker not far out – Clarke tries not to think about the night Finn had shown it to her – and if Clarke can just get them there, she thinks it will seal most of the girl's scent inside. Clarke can lock her in, shift back, and confuse the scent with her own; the searching alphas will follow in Clarke's path, she knows – because she is Pack – and when they find her, Clarke will swear up and down and straight out of her ass that the pungent omega's scent had faded at the edge of the woods.
Clarke will tell them that the omega shifted, and escaped.
Clarke will lie.
She will lie to Pack.
With determined resolve, Clarke bears blue eyes into rich, leafy green, and tells the wolf quietly, "We don't have much time. I need to carry you, and you need to let me," she says, uncompromising. "You're hurt, you're in heat, and you're not strong enough to move on your own. I want to keep you safe," she swears quickly, "but I need you to help me make sure that I can."
The wolf beneath her slowly comforting palms whines – long and urgent and needful – and Clarke knows that it is more in wistful agony than anything else, but she chooses to accept the noise as one of agreement.
"I know," she murmurs in sympathy, bracing her hands against the omega's neck and hind haunches. "I know, it's not the kind of touch you need," she whispers thickly, and effortlessly raises both herself and the wolf in her arms from the ground, never more grateful for her alpha's physical strength than she is now. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," Clarke shakes her head in guilt, sighing deeply as the omega cradled in her hold squirms restlessly, a sharp whimper crawling from low inside of her chest at the close contact.
Clarke strains some small tuffs of dark fur through her fingers as best as she can for comfort. She still has to carry the girl – still has to keep her from writhing so much that she won't merely tumble her way from Clarke's hold, back to the forest floor all over again – but Clarke tries.
She tries her best to be soothing, strictly platonic, and kind, but she knows it means very little to the aching omega in her arms. Omegas are sensitive to touch regularly, but in heat–
In heat, any sort of touch feels sexual, to an omega, even when it isn't; even if they are hit, or burned, or scratched, or bitten, the touch of an alpha is all that an omega can think about, while in heat, and – at least in that moment – the omega will thrive on any sort of touch that an alpha is willing to offer.
Clarke loathes it.
She is an alpha, too – a strong and uncommonly attractive alpha, her wolf boasts proudly – and she more than understands the insatiable desire to mate with a mewling omega in heat. Still, Clarke also knows that there is no measure of desire that could rightfully grant an alpha permission to take from an omega what they are not fit to willingly offer.
Clarke is one of few among her own Pack who honors that.
Clarke will never support the way that her Pack abuses the sacred union of alpha to omega. She will never understand how they believe it right for alphas to brutalize them for temporary, personal satisfaction, or how it is supposedly fair that the omega pays the lifelong price for it; how the toll it takes over the omega in the aftermath is enough to make them turn docile with shame, and how that docile behavior is the ultimate goal in treating them that way, to start with.
Clarke doesn't understand that, and she doesn't want to.
She can resist, even when it's difficult; even when this gorgeous omega thrashes with want for her in Clarke's arms, and even when her scent curls through Clarke's nose like wisps of smoke that seem to linger on purpose.
"It's not much further," Clarke whispers shakily. "Just hang on for me, okay? We're close," she promises with earnest.
The wolf answers with a gentle extension of the neck, wet nose pressing into Clarke's cheek before a soft tongue laps once, slow and tender, from the blonde's fluttering jaw up to her ear. The omega growls softly – Clarke guesses at the musky, very distinctive taste of alpha now burning against her tongue – but Clarke spares a soft chuckle for the greedy noise, anyway, and fights the way that her muscles tighten with the effort to keep a leash over her own desires.
She focuses on her task and listens as intently as she can, but Clarke's senses are weakened slightly, outside of her wolf. She thinks they have enough of a head start, and she doesn't hear anything quite yet, but she pushes her feet a little faster, just in case, stepping carefully to avoid marking the earth with her trail.
It's another three minutes before they find the bunker, and Clarke sweetly lowers the injured wolf near the trunk of a tree as they approach.
"Give me a second. I'll be right back," she vows.
She doesn't wait for the wolf to answer. Clarke knows the distance will agitate the omega – knows that Clarke is the only alpha here, and that the omega needs her touch, in whichever form she chooses to deliver it – but the separation is unavoidable. Clarke needs her hands for this.
She scrambles swiftly over the ground on all fours, feeling for the casual bunch of leaves and the thin layer of soil that mask the entrance to the small hideaway. When she finds it, Clarke drags muddy palms through the displaced patch of earth to expose the bunker's door. The blonde eases it open as quietly as she can manage, and hurries swiftly back to the twitching, wriggling omega by the tree, hoisting the girl back into her arms. The contact is enough to calm the omega, if only briefly, but easing her through the hatch and down the ladder is still a challenge.
Clarke knows it's probably uncomfortable, but she is more concerned about this mahogany wolf's safety than her comfort, so she hauls the omega's neck onto her left shoulder, arm braced across her lower spine, positioning the wolf's paws onto her chest. Her hind legs fold against Clarke's left thigh, pressing into it for stability, most likely, and Clarke carefully lowers herself onto the ladder, cradling the wolf to her chest like a toddler. She murmurs a swift apology for the indignity, all while doing her best to speed the journey along as much as possible.
Clarke clenches her teeth as she descends through the latch. The omega is so warm, pressed against her like this, and her scent is more powerful and tempting than anything Clarke's ever known. She's never felt like this – has never had her resilience tested, like this – and until Clarke has a second to gather herself, she thinks it's safest to breathe as little as possible. She closes the latch as they ease their way down, and Clarke navigates the ladder as quickly as she can manage with a medium-sized wolf still braced in her hold.
It's a relief when her feet finally touch the floor.
The small bed is in the corner, just like before. There's a desk, and a few cupboards, with a once-useable kitchen that really only boasts a stove that no longer has gas left to fuel it. Clarke thinks there's water, a few cans of non-perishables, and some dried meat in the cabinets – assuming no one has been here since she and Finn last visited – and after she gently settles the omega over the sheets of the bed, she quickly moves to make sure.
The omega might be here for a few days, and Clarke wants to be sure that she has everything she needs for the duration.
Everything in the cabinets is exactly as Clarke remembers, though, so she nods her satisfaction and steps into the bed, palm instinctively falling to the omega's injured belly in her approach. The wound is mostly shallow, though the ends drag deep into the wolf's skin, and Clarke whimpers as her alpha mourns the sight.
"I'll clean this for you when I get back, okay?" Clarke swallows thickly, eyes flitting toward the bunker's entrance. "I need to lead them off," she murmurs with a pained sigh, loath to leave the hurting omega behind, but knowing that it's necessary. "I'll be an hour, maybe two," she tells the wolf tremblingly. "And I'm sorry that I have to leave you here alone, but there's no other way. I'll be back soon," Clarke promises hoarsely, tugging reassuringly at mahogany locks, "and I'll make sure that you're taken care of, okay?"
Devastated green eyes peer up at Clarke from the mattress, so the alpha reflexively kneels and presses her nose into the fur of the omega's neck. Her scent is so strong there – so immobilizing; so enchanting – but Clarke inhales deeply once, and tells herself that it's enough. She tells herself that this contact, however weak and brief, is enough to sate her thirst for the lovely omega whose name she does not know.
The last thought is grounding, for Clarke, and so she focuses on that. This omega is a stranger, and Clarke won't allow herself to forget that she has no rights to her wolf's body, or to her heat.
Clarke's only job is to keep her safe. And she hasn't accomplished that, yet.
"I will be back," Clarke swears with conviction. "I won't leave you here longer than I have to, but I need to go now, or they'll catch up with us too quickly. Do you understand?"
Heat doesn't make omegas irrational, exactly, but Clarke knows that it's difficult to find focus beyond the urgent need to be satisfied, and she wants to be sure that her charge is able to hear Clarke's words. She wants this omega to know that Clarke will return for her; that Clarke will not leave her to suffer her heat alone, without any of her Pack nearby to soothe her.
The blonde shouldn't have worried. While her own alpha is one of, if not the strongest in Clarke's Pack, she thinks that this omega is unnaturally strong, too. Her body suffers for her heat, but the mahogany wolf's mind doesn't appear to suffer as greatly. Her belly arches pleadingly into Clarke's soft caress, but her tortured eyes calm mildly in the wake of Clarke's promise, and she arches her flank around to nip agreeably against Clarke's wrist.
"I'll come back," Clarke promises one, final time, before she instinctively drops her mouth to press between the wolf's burning hot ears.
She doesn't look back – can't look back; can't watch the omega's heart break as her salvation abandons her, if only for a short time – because Clarke doesn't think that her alpha can bear it. She is less possessive than most alphas, Clarke knows, but she is also more protective than most, too, and she knows that it hurts her more often than it helps.
Clarke's wolf thrashes from within, begging Clarke to stay at the hurt and aching omega's side if for no other reason than just to guard her, but Clarke won't let it. The benefit of being part human is that Clarke is able to think far beyond her wolf's more basic desires, and Clarke knows that her plan will keep the omega safer, in the long run.
It still isn't easy for Clarke to leave, but – with a deep, final breath of the omega's sweet, honeyed scent – she pushes her feet up the ladder and shoves her shoulder into the bunker's entrance to part the door.
Author's Note: This is my first omegaverse fic, so please be gentle, but let me know honestly what you think!