The couple's first morning together. Basically what happens when Will wakes up.
UPDATING LIKE A FUCKING BOSS.Love me for it. I gave up sleep for this.
Not beta read. About scheduling update(because someone asked) I never do because I don't like lying or making false promises. I basically work two jobs(if I'm not at one restaurant, I'm at another) so I don't have an abundance of free time. And quite honestly, mama likes to drink and is sometimes too hungover to write gay porn. So there you go. On the plus side, I've already got this story outlined and written so it will see completion. Maybe not this week or next but soon.
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When Hannibal stepped out of his personal bathroom ready for bed, it didn't come as a surprise to him find Will bodily wrapped around a pillow, clutching at it to bury his face into its plush surface, half hidden under another at his back. The analytical part of Hannibal's mind took note of this, the depth of the Omega's trauma, filing it away for later. It would be important to remember. It would mean there was a very good chance that Will would have a desperation for touch, a skin hunger that Hannibal would be able to use to his advantage.
For far too long, Will had been left on his own in the woods with nothing but dogs to keep him company. That much was obvious. Omegas were meant to be with another, were physically conditioned for it, biologically coded with the need for contact. To inflict that state on one, isolation self imposed or forced, was beyond cruel. Will's suffering went far beyond his mind, whether he realized it or not. The damage ran deep, deeper than muscle memory right down past bone marrow to the cracked foundations of his soul.
The Alpha part of Hannibal's being, the predator that resided within, the other him snarled at the damage done to the Omega, his Omega, his mate. He could feel the wrongness of it and it wounded him in an unexpected way. Hannibal was not used to hurting, disliked it. It felt filthy, like a sickness that coated him from the inside out. Will should be wanting and reaching for his touch, not hiding or protecting himself from it.
Instead of nesting in the center of the bed needing his Alpha with open arms and parted legs, the Omega sought out Hannibal's pillows and found comfort in the corner of his mattress, taking no covering for his own, though Hannibal knew he kept his bedroom cool. Even now Will shivered as Hannibal slipped in between the sheets.
Any thoughts of leaving Will where he was, like Hannibal had originally intended to do their first night together, were dismissed. Careful to keep his movements slow, the Alpha reaching over to gently hook his hands around the Omega's waist mindful of his still healing wounds, pulling Will across the bed until his back fit flush to Hannibal's chest. He could already smell the panic spilling into Will's scent, his body stiffening in the hold upon him though their bodies fitting together neatly like prayer and faith. Will's noise of surprise was muffled by the pillow he refused to relinquish. Hannibal wondered if Will was trying to smother himself into unconsciousness with it.
"Shhh…Go to sleep." Hannibal murmured softly, nosing at soft chocolate curls to delight in Will's scent. Underneath all that new sweat, terror, and stress were the softer odors of pure Omega. Earthen and sweet with too ripe peaches ready to burst their fuzzy skins and that of dust being hit by rain with just the slightest metallic edge to it like bright new pennies being held in the warm palm of hand. Will remained tense with his face buried in the pillow though, his skin becoming slick with renewed sweat as he tried to curl away from Hannibal, becoming a moist trembling ball of strung out nerves.
This would have to be addressed if Hannibal wanted to remain dry and comfortable while he slept in the future. "I'm not going to force myself upon you, Will. I wouldn't do that." Hannibal soothed the words into the back of Will's head. Freeing an arm, he took to slowly running a light hand up and down Will's side, over his ribs which were too prominent in Hannibal's opinion, personal and professional, the bone cage producing a rhythm under his fingertips.
Hannibal knew Will didn't trust him, much less believe him, could smell it on the Omega's scent and read it in the rigid lines of his body which were not going to be conducive toward slumber. Will had been lied to and disappointed too many times by alphas to start believing one at face value now. Sighing for so many different reasons, Hannibal rested his forehead to the sodden nape of Will's neck and settled the Omega firmer in his arms before falling asleep. One of them had to be well rested for this endeavor.
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Against all odds and reasoning, Hannibal seemed to be asleep, his breathing even and his body still against Will's back. The Omega's forehead rested against the back of his head so that he was nosing the velvet of his nape. Careful not to dislodge him, Will shifted experimentally to find that Hannibal's grip upon him was still just as tight in slumber as it was in waking. He was trapped against Alpha for now who was like a solid muscular line of warmth upon Will's back.
It didn't feel…bad though. Will released his death grip on the pillow so that he could breath a little easier. It was unusual, unwelcome, unexpected, but not necessarily bad. Despite everything, Will felt protected, which he knew was just the soft squishy part of his Omega biology, the side of self that yearned to be dominated and sheltered by another. Try as he might to keep himself vigilantly on edge, it was like a burden had just been suddenly lifted from his shoulders, his body relaxing traitorously into the solid warmth that was Hannibal. The Alpha's scent was more noticeable to him now, the Omega's body answering to Hannibal's presence as moisture collected noticeably between his thighs and Will had to keep his hips from pressing back into Hannibal's groin. Grimacing as the slick's sensation, Will knew it was all chemical pinging between his skull's interior and gray matter, his long ignored instincts and bodily demands responding to the stimuli like a man dying from thirst stumbling upon an oasis. Instead of taking sips, he was drowning.
Resolutions to stay awake and scoot away from Hannibal as soon as possible were forgotten as Will's eyelids grew heavy and his body turned defector on him. Thankfully, his body seemed more interested in getting some rest than getting fucked. His muscles grew pliant and lax, and his skin's surface dried off as an air of calm evaporating the last remnants of his nervous sweat.
Despite all his fears and trepidations, Will fell into a peaceful sleep.
oOo
Will woke up fuzzy, but not his usual 'wtf' kind of fuzzy from strange dreams and even worse nightmares. It was the unfamiliar sensation of having slept well and long, for hours upon hours of uninterrupted healing sleep. No blood, no horrible half remembered crime scenes, no exposed viscera glistening in the mind's foxfire. Will couldn't remember the last time he had committed himself to such a slumber and wasn't that depressing.
The warmth that surrounded him was unexpected as well, Will's waking mind noticing that he was blanketed in it. For lack of a better word, it felt nice, being so soft and toasty. Held lightly in that comforting sensation, his body seemed to melt into it like chocolate into marshmallow.
Still foggy and waking, Will snuffled closer toward the source, expecting soft fur and cold noses. His rousing brain tried to make sense of how or why his dogs were now hairless and smelling spicily like an Alpha. No, not just any Alpha. The scent was very distinctive, recognizable even though he was only just acquainted with it. His brain finally waking up enough to helpfully supply a name to him, Will found that Hannibal's musk held a certain spice to it. His odor was concentrated more so but not unpleasantly after a night of sleeping beside someone who's body heat ran naturally high. Will opened his eyes to find his visions filled with the crook of Hannibal's neck, Will's nose pressed up to the pulse point of it and becoming very familiar, breathing in cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg, the musk of sleep bringing out tones of vanilla and cedar in it.
If that wasn't bad enough, Will could feel that he had given up on the concept of a bed to replace it with Hannibal, the Omega scrawled out over across the Alpha's body, their legs entangled with one another so thickly he didn't know where he ended and Hannibal began. The Alpha's arms were still around him, but being held loosely at his waist, one hand resting on the small of his back. The other, Will noticed with some discomfiture, was cupping his ass rather firmly, tips of fingers brushing light and ticklish between smooth mounds. Neither of them seemed to have morning wood though, so thank whoever was listening for small favors and all that. Which started Will on an entirely different line of thinking.
Shit.
That was going to change the longer he lay there on top of Hannibal, his nose pressed up to a wealth of scents that were playing merry hell with his senses and he was now fully aware to enjoy them. Will could feel his body already welcoming the idea in a confusing array of responses as some parts harden while other softened but all grew flush and wet. His Heat was going to be a hot mess, Will was already placing mental bets with himself. He hadn't experienced one in almost two decades, only faintly remembering his first and only in his late teens. Up to that point, he and everyone else presumed that he was a beta until one fateful night Will woke up from a dream of fire and ice, his body on fire, and his sheets and lower half slink soup.
Fortune seemed to favor the bold that day. Hiding himself during his Heat turned out to be depressing easy, Will being a social outcast with his peers and even the other social outcasts at school. His teachers' attention was begged off by excuses of flu, not that any of them wanted the weird kid back in their class anytime soon. His dad was never home either and when he was, the old fisherman was too drunk to find his own bed, much less become aware that his only child was experiencing his first Heat. So no one had noticed Will's absence or questioned it. After his Heat, Will placed himself on heat suppressants, acquiring his first batch by raiding the nurse's office at school until he found himself a reliable dealer or so he believed.
One bad batch and here he was, trying to decided how to climb off a slumbering Alpha without waking him, the one who had bought him for a ridiculous price and claimed that they were mates. Everything Will had worked so hard to avoid, all acquired in one humiliating evening. The mask had almost been a blessing in disguise, the Auction's last resort to his constant insubordination and mouthing off. The product's face was meant to be shown and the guards had been very careful not to mark his face during their beat downs after his many failed escape attempts. Will hadn't had to look out on the ocean of faces appraising his worth, watch them discuss the market price of his flesh. He hadn't had to see Chilton, metaphorically rubbing his plotting palms together, while in a state of wounded undress and vulnerable.
Though blinded by heavy leather that was soaked through with his sweat, Will could still hear everything going on around him just fine. Had heard what was being said about him, how the brothels would use him and for how long before he was discarded by them, what was expected of him if someone did happen to buy him. That had all been echoing and circling in Will's mind as he had been led out onto the stage, practically carried since his legs were hobbled at the ankles and his wrists bound together. He had been distracted by the pain and humiliation of it by wisps of baking spices that seemed to hang on the air, calling to him. Just the fact it had been there had somehow calmed Will, made him grow still and waiting as flesh was sold off all around him to the highest bidders.
There had been such certainty that no one would purchase him for any other reason outside of pleasure or entertainment. Will had not only heard but felt the stunned reaction of all around them when Hannibal made his bid, had taken the stage to basically threaten everyone there into giving him Will without further delay. While Hannibal held their audience in a near thrall with his power, his presence had informed Will of who he had been scenting all night. This man, this Alpha, was the source of the alluring spice that had stirred Will up, tracking it with his nose and perception. This Hannibal was pure, the apex of his gender. Just like Will. Something special. Unique.
Could a scent define a relationship or even begin one? Will had never been a believer in it, though the idea had been the canon fodder for every sort of media since time was time. There was some basis for it biologically speaking, an Alpha being able to tell how fertile an Omega was and an Omega how virile an Alpha was in return. It also sorted out some issues of compatibility and worth of bonding.
And there was another frightening pack of thoughts. What would happen to him, his sense of self, once they were bonded? With his empathic disorder, would he lose himself entirely to who and what Hannibal was? Will worried that he would fade away if a bond was introduced. An identity that society would have denied him, the one he had spent a lifetime building in spite of everything, to just end up becoming whatever an Alpha wanted him to be. That was more frightening than any horror that lingered in his skull. More frightening than death really, now that Will thought about it. It was horrible thing to lose sight of who you were, of not knowing your place in your own existence, like being suspended in a living death really.
Not that he would be given an option. They would be bonded. Will could sense that much, knew that much to be true. It wasn't a matter of 'if' but of 'when'. Hannibal believed that they were mates, even seemed to treat them as such, but his patience would eventually run out with Will. Nothing was endless and the Alpha struck Will as the type who was used to getting what he wanted, whether by his own hands, serendipity, or fate.
The idea was enough to give pause and to take into some consideration though as Will lay somewhere in-between warmth that was making his body feel like jellied sponge, the sensation in direct conflict with the pitted battlefield that was his head. He never felt so safe, so protected before, and all that from just listening to Hannibal's even breathing and the scent that was all over Will's skin and in his nose now. Will knew nothing about the Alpha that had claimed him as his mate and that should be scaring the shit out of him, but against all reasoning, he was experiencing a sense of euphoria and dependence from this. Even worse, Will found he wanted more.
Turning his head slightly, Will brushed his lips against the soft skin of Hannibal's neck. Lips parting, his tongue darted out to tentatively taste the Alpha at the heart of his scent. Though he knew it was wishful thinking on his part, Will had been expecting sweet. The tip of his tongue picked up salt and the tang of night sweat though, laden with natural chemicals that made Will's mind pop and sizzle. His tongue tingled from contact, his head becoming fuzzy as he savored a heat that coursed down his throat into his belly. He suddenly felt too full, too something more that made his joints loose and weak. The center of what he was began shifting, lower parts of him unfurling for what seemed to be the first time, his body more willing to accept the inevitable than he was. Will could feel it and it scared him, making the Omega turn his head away, his action marked with shame and more than a little self disgust. By taking advantage like this, he was doing exactly what he didn't want Hannibal to do.
As far as Will could tell, Hannibal seemed to still be asleep though he didn't know for sure. His point of view was limited to the curvature of Hannibal's fragrant neck and some wayward locks of his silvery ashen hair, kept longer than Will would have expected. Attempting to extricate himself stealthily, Will raised himself up, wincing when his knees knocked into Hannibal's legs. He risked a glance to find the alpha's strange maroon eyes upon him, staring him down with an unfathomable look, the Alpha's body going tense as steel wire underneath him.
Movement woke him up instantly, an unfamiliar weight upon him, making inborn instinct ready to react to the possible threat, Hannibal's finely tuned body preparing itself to deliver a killing blow. Yet control was another deep facet of Hannibal, his impeccable memory informing him of who it was above him attempting to crawl off of his body stealthily and failing at it. Opening his sanguine eyes, the Alpha's nostrils flared, breathing in the scent of his reluctant mate which was now spiked with fear. Will's blue eyes were wide though still glossy with sleep so the omega must have just woken up, his dark curls a soft messy halo.
"I'm sorry…." Will muttered quickly, ducking his head to break eye contact as he scooted off of Hannibal like the Alpha was on fire and into the furthest corner of mattress. "….I didn't mean to…."
His body language was defensive and the Omega held himself like he was expecting a blow, his arms ready to shield his head and face if need be. Waking that close to Hannibal, of course the sensitive empath was able to pick up warnings on his true nature. Keeping his face carefully neutral, Hannibal cursed vividly and viciously in every language he knew within the safe inner confines of his head, his mind palace's halls ringing from verbal onslaught. The damage had been done though so best to move forward and fix whatever damage he could.
"It is I who should apologize. It has been a long while since I have shared a bed with another. I would dare say that I am more unused to it than you are." Hannibal said softly, careful in his movements by telegraphing them openly, and keeping to his side of the bed to allow the nervous Omega space. Will was so close to the edge he was liable to fall off if he got too scared. Embarrassment served on top of fear would not aid Hannibal's agenda. "Did you sleep well?"
"I doubt that." Will muttered, ignoring the polite inquiry to comment on the first part. Fear made the omega rude, Hannibal reminding himself, that it was a defense mechanism on Will's part, produced out of fear and not a place of hate or anger.
"Why?" Hannibal willing to tolerate the behavior for the moment but he certainly was not going to encourage it.
Will's eyes flitted about the room before settling on the mounds of crumpled sheets on the bed between them, the deep blue stained with salt. The omega grimaced at the ruined material, knowing he was the source for the white rings in the soft high thread count silk. "Because you're an Alpha." Will finally answered, the words mumbled, mollified a touch from discomfiture.
"That doesn't mean I am promiscuous any more than it means you'll let yourself be taken over any flat surface since you are an Omega." Hannibal pointed out, keeping his tone light and letting a slight smile take some of the sting out of his words. His efforts were noticed, Will glancing at him sideways.
"Touché." Will snorted, a corner of his mouth turning up despite himself.
"Now, how did you sleep? Any bad dreams?" Hannibal asked again, wanting to smooth out the last few frayed edges of this morning.
"No. No dreams. At least none that I could remember anyway. I slept…..well." Will answered hesitantly, starting to fidget with the hem of his borrowed night shirt. It was obvious he wasn't used to being asked such things. "Really well." he finished, licking his lips nervously. Will was unsure of what he should be doing at this very moment or how to escape this conversation. Any ordinary day he would have already taken the dogs out, drank more coffee than anyone really should first thing in the morning for breakfast, and be driving into work to talk at a classroom full of FBI trainees whose questions would never be answered because socialization was for other people. Now, Will had no idea what to do with himself, what Hannibal expected of him.
Despite being a true sadist, Hannibal decided to be merciful. "Well, since we are both awake, I will go make breakfast. How do you feel about eggs?" Hannibal rose, stretching his limbs thoroughly before putting on a robe. He would get dressed later when Will was more at ease and had some caffeine in his system.
"Spiritually, emotionally, or physically?" Will sniped, more worried about he was going to wear. He didn't have any clothing here besides the damn scrap of material that the Auction had forced upon him. It was either that or go out on stage naked, so Will had submitted to the indignity of it. Hannibal's pajamas(could he even call them that?) were like sleeping in sin woven out of silk, but he couldn't go out in public like this. If he was allowed to. Will knew Hannibal was letting him to return to work but they had yet to set any ground rules about his movements.
And then there was the damn issue of the collar to contend with. Sighing, Will scrubbed his face with his hands, the stubble there rasping against his palms. Now that the heat suppressants were fully out of Will's system, his scent was tell the world and alert any Alpha near him that he was an Omega. Will doubted that he would be allowed his bottle of Old Spice for a camouflaging olfactory deterrent. He had stumbled upon its helpful masking qualities after receiving it for Christmas, discovering that when combined with the use of heat suppressants, it rendered him a beta or even a low grade alpha to other people's noses.
Collars were an Alpha's way of saying of telling others that their Omega was claimed even if his or hers scent communicated that they were unmated. It was more merciful than branding, the method of marking one's mate in the past, and collars lasted longer than biting, some Alpha's preferred manner of staking a claim. Will told himself that he should be feeling grateful that Hannibal preferred collars to tattooing. He had seen more than a few of his gender's corpses inked with a possessive Alpha's claim to them.
"I was considering a protein scramble." broke Will out of his somber thinking, Hannibal obviously ignoring his snark. "I apologize but I should have asked you last night if you were allergic to anything."
Loathed as he was to admit it, Will reminded himself not to be an ass to Hannibal. The Alpha was his best ally in this, even if he was the one controlling all the outcomes. Staying on his good side might prove to be wise. Too bad getting along with other people had never been Will's strong suit, the Omega having spent his existence avoiding or becoming other people his entire life. Hearing a throat clear politely, Will realized that the Alpha was still waiting for an answer from him.
"Sorry…" Will shook himself, trying to appear like he was still waking up and had a viable excuse for being lapse in his response. "Yes, that's fine, and no. At least, I don't think I am. It would be safe to assume that you eat a wider variety of food than I do."
"I will keep that in mind. I think some coffee would be a good start for right now." Hannibal said as he pulled on a robe and toed his feet into house slippers.
Will was not above begging for caffeine. He knew how important that vice was to his existence. His body might be well rested for once but his addiction was not, nerves already twitching and a headache beginning to bloom behind his eyes from withdrawal. "Please."
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TBC