Chapter 9

When Dean comes down the next morning Sam and Bobby have already started researching. They've each got a stack of books to go through and the living room is silent but for the occasional rustle of a page turning. Dean goes to make himself some coffee, from what he can guess about his day he's going to need it.

He's right.

Dean gave up on helping them research a few days ago. He doesn't like going through dusty old books, and besides, Sam and Bobby look like they're doing fine on their own.

He takes the time to read through the books Sam brought in. They are eerily accurate. At least they are up until the point where he met Sam. They diverge there, in reality he got kidnapped by Sam, in the books he noticed the looks other alphas in the bar were giving him and got out of there. He got through that heat alone, realized what it was quickly enough to get away from civilization, but from the book's description and having experienced heat himself, Dean knows the experience must have been extremely painful. The books Sam has are months behind current, so Dean can't tell how he dealt with the next heat, but knowing himself he's betting the him in the books tries to go it alone for as long as he can.

He asks Sam about the lack of current books, he really wants to know what happens in them. The books that just repeat his life are creepy, but the ones that show an alternate to how he's living now are intriguing. He makes so many choices every day, and there's never been a way of knowing how life would have turned out if he had decided differently, now he's holding a book that shows him what would have happened if Sam hadn't come for him that night in the bar, and he wants to know for certain, what would life have been like?

Sam tells him that the books are always out of date somewhat because the author has to wait for the book to end before publishing, but that there are probably a few more out there he hasn't gotten yet, because they're pretty obscure.

When Dean asks him to get those books, Sam gives him an exasperated look and says he's only doing that once they've found out what's been interfering in Dean's heat cycles.

They've been there for about a week before Bobby finds the answer. He calls them idjits for looking for a supernatural explanation before they looked for a mundane one. Turns out the fact that John didn't know Dean was an omega meant he stayed acting as Dean's alpha far longer than a parent normally would. Dean had an alpha and the relationship was familial, so his heat never kicked in to find him an alpha. When they separated that protection ended. Dean no longer had an alpha and his heat started so that he'd get one.

Sam's kicking himself over this one. The fact they missed it might actually be a little comical. Sam's got no real knowledge of alpha/omega, well, anything, and Dean got raised alpha so he doesn't actually know his own body's responses. Somehow they've both got a complete lack of knowledge of what to expect, it's little wonder that they missed this. Still, Sam blames himself. He knows that this world is different than his own, yet he's been subconsiously assuming things will be the same. He should have researched the differences, found out how things really are,instead of just treating this like his world's past with a few small changes.

Bobby's looking uncomfortable already, having to talk about Dean's heats. Dean would have bet that he couldn't get more uncomfortable, but he manages it as he pauses in his explanation.

"That's why he had the first heat after so long. As for the second heat... Well, have the two of you been having sex?"

Right, no wonder he looked so uncomfortable, now Dean's uncomfortable too. Discussing his heats is bad enough, having to discus his sex life with his sort-of surrogate father just takes the cake.

"Ah, no, I haven't been comfortable with it at all and Sam's been respecting my wishes on that."

Dean really hopes he isn't blushing, being an omega is bad enough, being seen blushing? That would just be... he doesn't even know an appropriate word.

"Yeah, as soon as I looked into the issue from the angle of normal omega reactions I thought that might be how it was. That's actually the reason for your second heat."

"What!?"

"You have an alpha, but you haven't been having sex with him. Your biology reacted by kicking into heat, trying to get a reaction from him. Think of it as your body's way of trying to make sure he stays interested in you. Now that you've... been through heat... again with him you should have a while before this happens again."

Dean and Sam share a glance. A "I don't want to tell him, you tell him.", "How the hell do we say something?", glance, before Sam speaks up.

"If, say, we didn't have sex during his last heat, how long until he goes into heat again?"

This earns a blank glance from Bobby.

"You're serious..."

Bobby's expression now contains the completely disbelief and shock that Dean's experienced so many times since meeting Sam. It feels rather nice not to be the only one flailing around lost about how to deal with Sam. The thought brings a small smile to his face before it's washed away in his thoughts on how he's probably going to be going through another heat soon.

They leave pretty soon after that. They've found their answers, and it's just awkward being around Bobby right now.

They pass the car ride in silence. Dean keeps giving Sam these strange glances out of the corner of his eye and even with all the experience of his brother and this Dean, Sam still can't interpret them.

They've been through a few easy hunts and they seem to silently agree that it's time to try hunting something harder. That's not normally something one should be doing when they have a lot on their mind and they aren't communicating much with their hunting partner, but it seems like a good idea in this case. Normally they wouldn't do so for fear of being distracted and botching the hunt, but in their wish to concentrate on something besides the information they got from Bobby they've actually been more focused than normal on the hunts they've done.

It really shouldn't be a surprise that things don't go well.

They're both injured. Sam is more so, but with what he is he's more worried about Dean's injuries. Sam's part archangel, part demon and while this grants him some immunity to the weaknesses of each it also warps his abilities some. He isn't very good at healing, using the powers he has requires a lot of learning and by the time he got out of hell he had few humans that he fought beside. Most of his comrades were angels, who could heal themselves, so he's never really developed his ability to heal. He's cursing himself for it now, but that doesn't change the fact that Dean is going to have to take the slow road back to being healthy.

Published: April 19, 2013