Chapter Text
Minho's apartment is warm, almost stifling, despite the fall weather outside. Jisung wipes the sweat from his brow, trying to focus on the textbook spread across the coffee table, but his body feels heavier with each passing minute. He's been feeling off all day—flushed, restless, a persistent ache settling deep in his bones—but he'd chalked it up to exhaustion from midterms. His heat isn't due for another two weeks. He's been meticulous about tracking it.
They're supposed to be studying for their anatomy exam. Minho shares this place with Changbin, Chan, and Hyunjin, but the others are out for the evening. Something about a movie night Jisung had declined to attend because he needed to study. Because he wanted an excuse to be alone with Minho, if he's being honest with himself.
Not that it matters. Minho has never looked at him that way. There are better omegas, prettier ones, ones who don't ramble nervously or make too many jokes. Ones who would be a better match for someone like Minho—put-together, smart, devastatingly attractive in a way that makes Jisung's heart stutter every time he walks into a room.
Jisung has been wanting Minho for months now, maybe longer. Since that first group project in their sophomore year when Minho had stayed up all night helping him finish the presentation. Since every casual coffee run, every study session, every moment of Minho's dry humor that made Jisung laugh until his sides hurt. But he's never said anything. Could never say anything. Because why would someone like Minho want him?
"You okay?" Minho's voice cuts through the haze, and Jisung looks up to find the alpha watching him with narrowed eyes.
"Yeah, just tired," Jisung says, but even he can hear how breathless he sounds.
Minho frowns, setting down his highlighter. He crosses the space between them—they're sitting on opposite ends of the couch, textbooks and notes scattered between them—and before Jisung can protest, Minho's hand is on his forehead, cool against his burning skin. The touch sends a shockwave through Jisung's system, and he has to bite back a whimper.
"You're burning up," Minho says, concern bleeding into his voice. "When's your--"
He stops mid-sentence, his pupils dilating as he inhales sharply. The air between them shifts, charged with something primal and undeniable. Jisung watches in horror as Minho's carefully maintained control begins to fracture, red creeping into the edges of his vision.
"Minho," Jisung breathes, but it comes out wrong—needy, pleading. His heat is crashing over him like a tidal wave, weeks early and devastating in its intensity. "I don't—I didn't know—"
"Fuck," Minho growls, and Jisung can see him fighting it, muscles tensed as he tries to pull his hand back. But his rut is triggering in response to Jisung's heat, biology overriding reason. "Jisung, I need to—I should go—"
"Don't." The word escapes before Jisung can stop it, his omega instincts screaming at the thought of the alpha leaving. His scent spikes with distress, sweet and desperate, and that is Minho's undoing.
The alpha's control frays, then snaps entirely.
Minho pulls him close, and Jisung goes willingly, desperately. Minho buries his face in Jisung's neck, breathing him in like he's oxygen itself, like he's been drowning and Jisung is air. "I can't—" Minho's voice is wrecked, barely human. "I can't leave you like this."
"Then don't," Jisung gasps, fingers twisting in Minho's shirt, pulling him closer. "Please, Minho, I need—"
"You don't know what you're asking," Minho says, but his hands are already moving, one sliding up Jisung's spine, the other cupping the back of his neck. His touch is reverent, desperate. "Jisung, I—I've wanted this. Wanted you. But not like this. You deserve better than this."
The confession makes Jisung's heart soar even through the haze of heat. "Wanted me?"
"God, yes." Minho pulls back just enough to look at him, and his eyes are more red than brown now, his rut taking hold. "For so long. But I thought—there are better alphas for you. Ones who aren't closed off and difficult. Ones who can actually express their feelings. Ones who—"
"I don't want other alphas," Jisung interrupts, reaching up to cup Minho's face. His hands are trembling. "I want you. I've always wanted you. I just thought you didn't—that you couldn't possibly—"
"How could I not?" Minho asks, and then he's kissing him.
It's desperate and messy, all teeth and tongue and barely restrained hunger. Jisung moans into his mouth, and Minho responds with a growl that vibrates through Jisung's chest. Books and papers scatter to the floor as Minho pushes him back against the couch cushions, covering Jisung's body with his own.
The weight of him is perfect, grounding even as everything else spins out of control. Jisung can feel Minho's cock hard against his hip, and he rolls up into it, seeking friction, seeking more.
"Tell me to stop," Minho says against his lips, even as his hands slip under Jisung's shirt, mapping skin he's clearly been dying to touch. His palms are hot, possessive. "Tell me you want me to go, and I'll—I'll lock myself in the bathroom until this passes. I'll call Felix to come get you."
"No," Jisung gasps, arching into the touch. His skin feels too hot, too tight, and only Minho's hands seem to bring relief. Slick is already gathering between his thighs, his body preparing itself. "Don't stop. Please don't stop. I want this. I want you."
Minho's eyes flutter closed, his jaw clenching with the effort of maintaining control. When he opens them again, the red has almost swallowed the brown entirely. "Jisung—"
"Please, alpha," Jisung whispers, and the title—the acknowledgment of what Minho is, what Jisung needs—breaks something in both of them.
Minho strips Jisung's shirt off with shaking hands, tossing it aside before doing the same with his own. When their bare chests press together, Jisung whimpers at the contact, at the feeling of Minho's skin against his. It's not enough. It'll never be enough.
Minho's mouth moves to his neck, kissing and sucking at the sensitive skin, and Jisung tilts his head instinctively, offering himself. The alpha groans against his throat, teeth scraping over his scent gland but not biting. Not yet.
"Have you..." Minho pauses, his hand hovering over the button of Jisung's jeans. His fingers are trembling. "Have you done this before?"
The question is gentle, careful, so at odds with the rut Jisung can see taking over. It makes him love Minho more, makes him want this even more desperately.
"No," Jisung admits, and he feels Minho tense above him. "But I want to. I want it to be you."
"Fuck," Minho breathes, and his hands are trembling harder now. "That's—god, Jisung, that makes me want you more. But it also means I shouldn't—you should have someone who can take their time, who can make it good for you, not someone who's barely holding onto control."
"You're holding on though," Jisung points out, reaching down to unfasten his own jeans since Minho seems frozen. "You're asking. You're making sure. That's more than—Minho, please. I've thought about this. About you. So many times. I want my first time to be with you. I want you to be the one."
Something in Minho's expression cracks, and he helps Jisung push the jeans down, off. "You're going to kill me," he mutters, but there's something reverent in the way he looks at Jisung in just his boxers. "You're so perfect. How did I get this lucky?"
"We both got lucky," Jisung says, and then he's hooking his fingers in Minho's waistband, tugging. "Now stop overthinking and touch me."
Minho helps him, stripping off his own jeans, and then they're both in just their boxers. Jisung can see the wet spot on his own, can smell the sweet scent of slick in the air. Minho's boxers are tented obscenely, and Jisung wants to see, wants to touch.
They end up on the couch, Jisung spread beneath Minho, both of them down to nothing. Jisung can feel how wet he is, slick coating his thighs, dripping down onto the couch cushions. His body is preparing itself for what it needs. What he needs.
Minho stares at him for a long moment, and Jisung can see the struggle playing out across his face; Minho’s rut is demanding he take, claim, knot, and the part of him that's still human wanting to do this right.
"You're beautiful," Minho finally says, running his hands up Jisung's thighs. "I've imagined this so many times, but nothing compares to the real thing."
Jisung flushes heat crawling up his chest. "You imagined me?"
"Constantly." Minho leans down to kiss him again, slower this time. "In my bed. On this couch. Every time you bit your lip while studying, every time you stretched and your shirt rode up. I wanted you so badly it hurt."
The confession makes fresh slick gush from Jisung, and Minho groans as he feels it against his thigh. "I imagined you too," Jisung admits. "Late at night in my dorm. I'd touch myself and think about your hands, your mouth, your—"
Minho kisses him to swallow the rest of the words, grinding down against him. The friction is overwhelming and Jisung moans into his mouth, spreading his legs wider.
"Let me prep you," Minho says against his lips. "I need to make sure you're ready."
"I'm ready," Jisung protests, but then Minho's hand is between his legs, fingers sliding through the slick, and Jisung gasps at the sensation.
"So wet for me," Minho murmurs, and Jisung feels a finger circling his entrance. "You're dripping, sweetheart. Is this all for me?"
"Yes," Jisung breathes. "All for you. Only you."
One finger pushes inside, and it's not enough, not nearly enough, but it's also perfect because it's Minho. Minho touching him, inside him, claiming him in the most intimate way possible.
"More," Jisung begs, rocking down onto the finger. "Please, more."
"Patience," Minho says, but his voice is strained. He works the finger deeper, crooking it, and Jisung sees stars. "I'm not going to hurt you. Even if it kills me, I'm going to do this right."
He adds a second finger, and Jisung moans at the stretch. It's still not enough, but it's better. Minho scissors them, working him open, and Jisung can feel more slick gushing out, easing the way.
"That's it," Minho praises, and his free hand comes up to wrap around Jisung's neglected cock. "Taking my fingers so well. Look at you, so desperate for it. So perfect."
The dual sensation of fingers inside him and a hand on his cock makes Jisung writhe. He's never felt anything like this. His own fingers have never compared, and now he understands why. This is different. This is Minho.
Minho adds a third finger, and Jisung cries out at the stretch. It's bordering on too much, but then Minho curls his fingers and hits something inside him that makes pleasure explode behind his eyes.
"There," Jisung gasps. "Right there, please—"
Minho hits that spot again and again, and Jisung can feel himself getting wetter, looser, opening up for the alpha. "You're doing so well," Minho tells him, and the praise goes straight to Jisung's cock. "Taking three of my fingers. Think you can take my cock, sweetheart? Think you can take my knot?"
"Yes," Jisung sobs, tears leaking from the corners of his eyes from the overwhelming sensation. "Yes, please. I need it. Need you inside me. Need your knot."
Minho pulls his fingers free, and Jisung whimpers at the loss, feeling empty and bereft. But then Minho is positioning himself between Jisung's legs, the head of his cock pressing against Jisung's entrance, and Jisung's breath catches.
He looks down and—oh. Minho is big. Bigger than Jisung expected, thick and long and already leaking precum. For a moment, panic flutters in his chest. There's no way that's going to fit. But then he sees the look on Minho's face—desperate and loving and scared—and the panic fades. This is Minho. Minho will make it good.
"Tell me if it's too much," Minho says, his voice barely recognizable, torn between human speech and alpha growl. Sweat drips down his temple, and his whole body is shaking with the effort of holding back. "Tell me if I need to stop."
"Don't stop," Jisung breathes. "Don't you dare stop."
Minho pushes in slowly, and Jisung feels himself stretch around the intrusion. It's big—so big—and for a moment, Jisung thinks it's too much, that he can't possibly take it all. The stretch burns despite all the slick, and he gasps, fingers digging into Minho's shoulders.
"Breathe," Minho instructs, pausing. "Just breathe for me, sweetheart. Your body knows what to do."
Jisung breathes, forcing himself to relax, and feels himself open up more. Minho pushes in another inch, and then another, and Jisung's body accepts him. The burn fades into pleasure, into a feeling of fullness that's intoxicating.
When Minho is finally fully seated inside him, they both freeze. Jisung can feel every ridge, every vein, the thick length of him splitting him open. It's too much and somehow not enough all at once. He feels so full, so complete, like this is what he's been missing his entire life. Like he was made for this, made to take Minho's cock.
Minho is shaking above him, his hips stuttering in these tiny, aborted movements like he's fighting the urge to move, to thrust, to take. His eyes are squeezed shut, jaw clenched so hard Jisung worries he'll crack a tooth, and Jisung can see the moment the rut nearly wins, can see Minho's control hanging by a thread.
But he waits. Despite everything—the rut, the heat, the biological imperative screaming at him to move—Minho waits for permission. His muscles are locked, trembling with effort, and a broken sound escapes his throat.
That display of control, of care, even on the edge of losing himself completely, makes something in Jisung's chest crack wide open. This is Minho. His Minho. Perfect and careful and so desperately trying to do right by him even when instinct is screaming at him to take what he wants.
"Minho," Jisung says softly, reaching up to cup his face. He wipes away the sweat, traces the sharp line of his jaw. "You can move. Please move. I want to feel you."
The sound Minho makes is broken, relieved, grateful. He pulls back slowly, and Jisung feels every inch of the drag, the way it sets every nerve ending on fire. When Minho thrusts back in, Jisung moans at the sensation, at the perfect slide of him.
Minho sets a rhythm—slow at first, careful, each thrust measured—and Jisung can feel him fighting to maintain control with every movement. It's sweet and maddening and not nearly enough.
"Harder," Jisung begs. "You won't hurt me. Please, I need more."
Minho groans and picks up the pace, his hips snapping forward with more force. "You feel so good," he pants, his voice rough and wrecked. "So perfect around me. Like you were made for me. Made to take my cock."
The words are filthy, but they make Jisung clench, make fresh slick gush out around where they're joined. "Yes," he gasps. "Yes, I was. I'm yours. Made for you."
"Mine," Minho agrees, and he starts to move faster now, harder, the careful control slipping. "My omega. My perfect omega."
Every thrust sends sparks of pleasure racing up Jisung's spine, and he clings to Minho like an anchor in a storm. The alpha is murmuring things against his skin—sweet words and praises that make Jisung's head spin, make him feel cherished and wanted and perfect.
"So beautiful like this," Minho pants, his hips snapping forward with increasing desperation. "So desperate for me. Love watching you take me. Love feeling you clench around me." He hits that spot inside Jisung again, and Jisung nearly screams. "That's it, sweetheart. Let me hear you. Want to hear all those pretty sounds you make."
"Minho," Jisung whimpers, and he can feel tears streaming down his face from the intensity of it. His cock is leaking between them, untouched and aching. "Feels so good. You feel so good inside me. I never knew—never knew it could feel like this."
"Yeah?" Minho's hand wraps around Jisung's neglected cock, stroking in time with his thrusts. The dual sensation is overwhelming, and Jisung sobs with it. "You like being full of me? Like being stretched around my cock?"
"Yes," Jisung gasps. "Love it. Love you. Love you so much."
The confession slips out unbidden, but Minho groans like it's the best thing he's ever heard. His rhythm falters for a moment, and then he's pounding into Jisung with renewed intensity. "Love you too," he gasps. "Wanted you for so long. Dreamed about this. About you under me, taking me so well. You're perfect, Jisung. So fucking perfect for me."
Jisung clenches hard at that, at the image of Minho wanting him, thinking about him, touching himself while imagining this. Minho's eyes roll back, his mouth falling open in a silent cry. He slows down, grinding deep, rolling his hips in a way that makes Jisung see stars.
He looks so lost in the sensation, so completely overcome, that Jisung's heart soars. He wants to be the one to make Minho feel like this forever. Wants to be the one who makes him lose control, who brings him pleasure, who makes him look like he's found heaven.
"You like that?" Jisung manages to ask, clenching deliberately around him. "Like how I feel?"
"God, yes," Minho groans, his control slipping further with each passing second. "You're—you're everything. Better than anything I imagined. So tight and wet and perfect. Don't ever want to leave this. Want to stay inside you forever."
Jisung can feel it building, that impossible pressure low in his belly that demands release. His body is singing, every nerve ending alight with pleasure. Minho's thrusts are losing their rhythm now, becoming more erratic, more desperate. The rut is taking over completely, and Jisung can see it in his eyes—the red swallowing the brown, the alpha coming to the forefront.
Minho's mouth finds Jisung's neck, kissing and sucking at his scent gland. The sensation makes Jisung's toes curl, makes his omega instincts sing. And then Minho's teeth are there, scraping over the gland, and Jisung knows what's about to happen even through the haze.
His omega instincts are screaming yes, yes, yes, claim him, make him ours, bond, bond, bond.
"Yes," Jisung hears himself saying, tilting his head to bare more of his neck. "Yes, Minho, please—bite me. Make–Make me yours. Bond with me."
"Jisung," Minho says, and it sounds like a warning and a prayer all at once. His hips have stilled, and he's trembling all over. "This is permanent. I can't—if I do this, I can't take it back. You'll be bound to me forever."
"I don't want you to take it back," Jisung gasps, meeting his eyes. He pours everything he feels into his gaze—the love, the want, the desperate need to be Minho's. "I want to be yours. Forever. Please, alpha. Claim me."
Minho's eyes flash red, and then his teeth are sinking into Jisung's neck, right into his scent gland.
The pain is sharp and bright, but it's swallowed immediately by overwhelming pleasure. Jisung feels the bond snap into place like a key turning in a lock, like puzzle pieces finally fitting together. He can feel Minho—actually feel him, his emotions pouring through the new connection like a flood.
Desire. Possessiveness. Love so intense it steals Jisung's breath. Relief, like Minho has been waiting for this his entire life. Joy. Completion. Home.
Minho's knot begins to swell, catching on Jisung's rim with each thrust. The sensation is overwhelming, the knot growing bigger with each pass until it catches and won't pull out. It's big, so big, stretching him impossibly wider. Jisung can feel Minho's release flooding into him, hot and endless, filling him up.
It's on the edge of too much, bordering on pain, but he feels so complete, so utterly full and claimed and owned. The knot locks them together, plugging Minho's release inside him, and Jisung can feel it—the warmth spreading through his belly, the sensation of being full in a way that satisfies something deep in his omega hindbrain. This is what he's dreamed of. This is perfect.
Jisung comes with a sob, his orgasm rolling through him in endless waves. His whole body convulses with it, clenching around Minho's knot, and the sensation prolongs his orgasm until he's sobbing with it. He feels Minho follow, the alpha's teeth still embedded in his neck, another pulse of release flooding into him, marking him, claiming him, binding them together permanently and irrevocably.
When Minho finally releases his neck, licking over the fresh bond mark to soothe it, Jisung is trembling. The bond is humming between them, golden and warm and alive, and he can feel everything Minho feels—the satisfaction, the love, the bone-deep contentment, the possessive pride of having claimed his omega.
"I love you," Minho whispers against the mark, and Jisung can feel the truth of it through the bond, can feel how deeply Minho means it. "I love you so much. My omega. Mine."
"I love you too," Jisung breathes, and for the first time in his life, he feels completely, utterly whole. "Yours. Always yours."
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For the next three days, they barely leave the apartment. Minho locks the door at some point, texts his roommates not to come home, and they build a nest of sorts in his bed with spare blankets and their own discarded clothes. Jisung's heat rages on, and Minho's rut matches it, and they lose themselves in each other again and again.
Between waves of heat and rut, there are moments of startling clarity.
Minho holds him during these moments, fingers tracing the fresh bond mark with something like wonder. The mark is beautiful—a silvery scar in the shape of Minho's teeth, claiming him for anyone to see. "I didn't mean for this to happen," Minho whispers, but his hands are gentle, reverent. "Not like this. I wanted to court you properly. Take you on dates. Ask you to be mine when we were both thinking clearly."
"I know," Jisung responds, nuzzling into the alpha's chest, drunk on his scent and the warmth of the bond humming between them. Through their connection, he can feel Minho's sincerity, his regret that it wasn't more romantic. "But I don't regret it. Do you?"
"No." Minho's answer is immediate, fierce, and Jisung feels the truth of it through the bond. "I could never regret you. I just—I worry that you'll regret me. That when your heat breaks, you'll realize you're stuck with me and—"
"Stop," Jisung interrupts, pulling back to look at him. "I'm not stuck with you. I'm bonded to you. There's a difference. I chose this, Minho. Even through the heat, I chose you."
Minho's eyes shine with something that might be tears, and he kisses Jisung softly, pouring his love through the bond. "I chose you too. I'll keep choosing you every day."
They talk in fragments during those clear moments—about their fears, their dreams, silly things that make them laugh. Minho tells him about the first time he realized he had feelings for Jisung, how it had been during that group project when Jisung had fallen asleep on his notes and Minho had just watched him for twenty minutes, heart aching with want. How it had terrified him because Jisung was so bright and open and everything Minho wasn't.
Jisung confesses that he's been half in love with Minho since they met, but convinced himself it was hopeless. "I thought you were way out of my league," he admits. "I thought you'd want someone better."
"There is no one better," Minho says fiercely. "You're it for me, Jisung. You've always been it."
"We're both idiots," Jisung says fondly, and he can feel Minho's amusement through the bond.
"Yeah," Minho agrees, tucking Jisung's sweat-damp hair behind his ear. "But we're bonded idiots now."
Minho feeds him between waves, coaxing him to eat crackers and fruit even when Jisung insists he's fine. He makes him drink water, hold him in the shower when Jisung's legs are too shaky to stand on his own. He holds him through the overwhelming surges of heat, whispering praise and promises against his skin. And when the heat rises again, Minho is there, giving him exactly what he needs—his knot, his body, his love.
On the third day, as Jisung's heat finally begins to break, he feels truly safe for the first time in his life. The bond is a golden thread connecting them, and through it Jisung can feel Minho's contentment, his protectiveness, his unwavering love.
Exhaustion finally claims them both, and Jisung falls asleep wrapped in Minho's arms, the alpha's heartbeat steady beneath his ear. The bond pulses between them, warm and alive, and Jisung's last thought before sleep takes him is that he's home.
When Jisung wakes, he is alone.
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The apartment is cold. That's the first thing Jisung notices—how empty it feels without Minho's warmth. He sits up slowly, his body aching in new ways, the bond mark on his neck throbbing with a dull pulse.
He can still feel Minho through the bond, but it's distant, muted. Like Minho is deliberately pulling away.
Jisung's phone sits on the nightstand, and with trembling hands, he unlocks it. Fifteen missed calls from Felix, twenty texts from various friends asking where he is. Nothing from Minho.
He types out a message with shaking fingers.
[9:07 AM] Jisung: where did you go?
The message shows as read almost immediately, but no response comes. Jisung stares at the screen, waiting, his heart sinking with each passing minute.
[ 9:10 AM] Jisung: minho?
[ 9:11 AM] Jisung: are you okay?
[ 9:12 AM] Jisung: please talk to me
Read. Read. Read.
The bond feels hollow, like screaming into a void. Jisung can sense Minho on the other end, alive, present, but the alpha has thrown up walls so thick that barely anything can filter through.
He gathers his things with numb fingers—his clothes scattered around Minho's room, evidence of what they shared—and makes his way back to the dorm. Felix takes one look at him and pulls him into a hug without questions.
"Where's Minho?" Felix asks quietly.
"I don't know," Jisung whispers, and his voice breaks on the last word.
Days pass in a blur. Jisung tries everything. He calls Minho thirty-seven times over three days. Each call goes to voicemail. He texts until his fingers hurt, messages ranging from confused to worried to angry to desperate.
[ 11:08 PM] Jisung: did i do something wrong?
[11:34 PM] Jisung: please just tell me what happened
[ 12:19 AM] Jisung: the bond... i can feel that you're shutting me out
[ 12:28 AM] Jisung: minho please
[ 12:57 AM] Jisung: i need to know if you regret it
That last message he deletes before sending, but the thought haunts him.
He sees Minho once, in passing on campus. Jisung's heart leaps, and he calls out, but Minho's head snaps up, their eyes meet for one agonizing second, and then Minho turns and walks away. Quickly. Like Jisung is something to escape from.
The rejection burns through the bond like acid.
Jisung goes back to his dorm in a daze, and Felix is there, waiting with concern etched across his features. "Jisung, what's going on? You were gone for three days, now you're back but still gone, you're not answering your phone–" He stops when he sees the bond mark, his eyes going wide. "Is that–did you–"
"I don't want to talk about it," Jisung says quickly, moving past him to his room.
But Felix follows. "Jisung, that's a bond mark. Who–is it Minho? Where is he?"
The question makes Jisung's chest constrict. "I said I don't want to talk about it."
"But—"
"Felix, please." Jisung's voice breaks, and Felix stops, looking stricken.
"Okay," Felix says softly. "Okay. But I'm here when you're ready."
Jisung nods, but he knows he'll never be ready. How can he explain that Minho said he loved him, whispered all these wonderful things that Jisung had dreamt of for so long he can barely remember a time before wanting Minho? How can he explain that it made no sense, none of it makes sense, but Minho is gone and won't answer and Jisung doesn't understand?
Over the next few days, Chan and Changbin try too. They corner him after class, asking gentle questions that Jisung can't bring himself to answer.
Where's Minho? What happened? Are you okay? Do you need help?
Jisung starts avoiding them. He takes different routes to class, skips the group hangouts they usually attend, stops responding to the group chat. It's easier than facing their concern, their questions he has no answers for.
Late at night, alone in his room while Felix sleeps in the next bed, Jisung turns to the internet. His fingers shake as he types into the search bar: alpha rejecting bonded omega
The results that come up make his stomach turn.
Forum posts, article after article, personal accounts that read like horror stories. He clicks on one titled "Why Alphas Ghost After Bonding" and wishes he hadn't.
Alphas will say anything during rut to secure a knot. The biological drive is so strong they often don't mean the things they say. Once the rut passes and rational thought returns, they may realize they don't actually want the bond.
Jisung's vision blurs. He clicks on another link.
It's not uncommon for alphas to lose interest after bonding. The thrill of the chase is over, and what once seemed appealing—an omega in heat, desperate and willing—loses its allure once they're bonded. Some alphas find bonded omegas less attractive than unbonded ones.
His hands are trembling so badly he can barely scroll. Another article:
From an evolutionary standpoint, it makes sense for alphas to keep their options open. One omega might not be enough to ensure genetic diversity. The biological imperative to bond during rut doesn't always translate to emotional attachment afterward.
Jisung reads post after post, each one driving the knife deeper. Someone on a forum writes about their alpha leaving two days after bonding, saying they "couldn't handle the commitment." Another omega shares how their alpha told them the things they'd said during rut "didn't count" because they weren't in their right mind.
Heat and rut make it impossible to think clearly, one alpha writes in a forum. You say things to get what you need in the moment. It doesn't mean you actually feel that way once the hormones clear.
Jisung's heart sinks lower and lower with each word he reads. He wants to stop, wants to close the laptop and pretend he never saw any of this, but he can't. He keeps clicking, keeps reading, keeps absorbing every awful possibility.
He finds a discussion thread titled "Did your alpha really mean it?" and the responses are devastating.
Mine didn't. Said he loved me during the bond. Left the next morning.
They're biologically driven to say whatever will make you submit. It's not personal.
My alpha told me later that he felt 'trapped' by the bond. Like I'd forced him into it by having a heat around him.
That last one hits too close to home. Jisung's heat had come early. He'd triggered Minho's rut. Had he trapped Minho? Had Minho felt forced into bonding him?
He clicks on one more article, and this one breaks something inside him: "The Reality of One-Sided Bonds."
Sometimes a bonded omega doesn't sound as appealing to an alpha as they thought. The fantasy is better than the reality. Alphas often put omegas on pedestals, and when the alpha realizes the omega is just… ordinary, the interest fades.
Jisung can believe that. He can absolutely believe that he's not enough for Minho. Minho is smart, attractive, put-together, someone who could have anyone. And Jisung is just…Jisung. Awkward, rambling, too emotional. Of course Minho would lose interest. Of course the reality wouldn't live up to whatever fantasy Minho had during his rut.
The evidence is all there. Minho left. Minho won't respond. Minho is avoiding him like Jisung is something shameful, something to be escaped.
Jisung closes the laptop, feeling sick, and curls up on his bed. He can't believe Minho would think or feel like these things he's been reading about, but what else explains it? What else makes sense?
Maybe Minho really didn't mean any of it. Maybe it was all just the rut talking.
That night Jisung feels the first real symptom. A sharp pain in his chest, right where his heart should be. He gasps, clutching at his shirt, and the bond mark on his neck flares hot enough to make him cry out.
He tries to breathe through it, but the pain intensifies, radiating out from his chest to his limbs. His fingers go numb. His vision swims. The bond mark burns like someone is holding a lighter to his skin.
Felix finds him on the bathroom floor an hour later, pale and shaking, curled around himself.
"I'm fine," Jisung lies through chattering teeth. "Just...adjusting."
But he isn't fine.
Over the next week, the symptoms multiply and worsen.
The pain in his chest becomes constant, a dull ache that spikes whenever he feels Minho through the bond, which is rare now, with Minho's walls so firmly in place. His appetite vanishes completely. Felix tries to make his favorite foods, but everything tastes like ash on his tongue. Even the smell of food makes him nauseous, and he loses weight rapidly, his clothes hanging loose on his frame.
Sleep becomes impossible. He lies awake at night, staring at the ceiling, feeling the bond mark throb against his neck. When he does manage to drift off, nightmares plague him—visions of the bond snapping like a broken string, of Minho's face twisted in disgust, of dying alone and unwanted in his dorm room while everyone moves on without him.
The bond mark itself begins to darken on day five. At first, it's just the edges turning an unhealthy gray. By day seven, the gray has spread, creeping across his skin like frostbite, turning black at the center. It looks wrong, diseased, and Jisung takes to wearing high-necked shirts and hoodies to hide it, even though the fabric rubbing against it makes him wince.
By day nine, he's developed a persistent cough and a low-grade fever that won't break. His hands shake when he tries to hold a pencil. He gets dizzy walking to class and has to stop every few minutes to catch his breath.
Felix watches him like a hawk, worry written all over his face. He tries to hide it, but Jisung can see the fear in his eyes every time he looks at the bond mark, which Jisung can't fully hide anymore, the black creeping above his collar no matter what he wears.
"Jisung," Felix says carefully on day ten, sitting beside him on the couch as Jisung picks at a plate of food he has no intention of eating. "I know you don't want to talk about it, but you need to see a doctor. This isn't normal."
"I'm just tired," Jisung insists, but his voice is barely above a whisper now, his throat raw from the cough.
"You're not just tired." Felix's voice breaks. "You're—Jisung, you're wasting away. I'm scared."
Jisung wants to reassure him, but he can't find the energy. Even sitting upright feels like too much effort.
Chan shows up the next day with Changbin. They let themselves in, and Jisung doesn't have the strength to protest. They sit across from him, and Chan's expression is grave.
"Jisung, we need to talk about what's going on," Chan says gently.
"I'm fine," Jisung says automatically.
"You're not fine," Changbin counters, his voice rough. "You look like—" He stops, swallows hard. "You need help."
"I don't need anything."
"Where's Minho?" Chan asks, and Jisung flinches.
"I don't know."
Chan and Changbin exchange a look, and there's something in it that makes Jisung's chest tighten. "Have you talked to him?" Chan presses.
"He doesn't want to talk to me," Jisung says, and his voice cracks. "Can we please just drop it?"
They try for another ten minutes, but Jisung just stares at the wall, unresponsive, until they finally leave. He can hear Felix talking to them in hushed voices by the door, can hear the worry in their tones, but he can't bring himself to care.
Felix is the only one who knows about the bond mark, and he's loyal. He won't tell anyone what he knows. But he also won't stand by and do nothing. Jisung can see it in the way Felix looks at him, with those dark, knowing eyes that see too much.
"Jisung, you need to see a doctor," Felix says again that evening, genuine fear in his voice as he watches Jisung barely touch his dinner.
"I'm just tired," Jisung insists, but even standing makes him dizzy now. The room spins, and he has to grip the arm of the couch to steady himself.
On day twelve, Seungmin finds him collapsed in the campus library. One moment Jisung is walking between shelves, trying to find a textbook for a class he's probably failing, and the next the world tilts sideways and goes dark.
He wakes up to Seungmin's panicked face hovering above him, other students crowding around, someone calling for help.
That evening, his friends call an emergency meeting at the dorm. Jisung sits on the couch, wrapped in blankets despite the warm weather, shivering. Chan, Changbin, Hyunjin, Seungmin, and Jeongin are all there, circled around him with varying expressions of worry and fear.
Felix stands by the door, arms crossed, looking like he's about to cry.
"Jisung, this has gone on long enough," Chan says, his leader voice coming out, gentle but firm. "You need to tell us what's happening. You collapsed today. You're not eating. You look—" He stops, clearly struggling for words that won't hurt.
"We're worried about you," Hyunjin adds softly.
Jisung says nothing. What can he say? That his bonded alpha wants nothing to do with him? That his body is eating itself from the inside out because of it? That he's dying slowly and doesn't want to burden any of them with it?
The others can all see the mark now, the darkening edges visible even above Jisung's collar. He watches them notice it, watches their eyes widen with recognition and concern.
"Is that a bond mark?" Hyunjin asks carefully.
Jisung doesn't answer.
"Where's Minho?" Jeongin asks, his voice small. And everyone falls silent.
It's Chan who finally speaks, and there's something almost embarrassed in his tone, something that suggests he recognizes how wrong this all is. "Minho went home. To his parents' place." He looks at Jisung when he says it, and there's an apology in his eyes. An acknowledgment that it's not normal for Jisung not to know where his bonded alpha is. That it's even less normal for Minho not to be here, especially with whatever the hell is going on with Jisung.
"He left?" Seungmin asks, looking between Chan and Jisung. "When?"
"About two weeks ago," Chan says quietly.
"Two weeks?" Changbin's voice is sharp. "Jisung, how long have you been sick?"
Jisung doesn't answer. He can't. The admission would make it too real.
Every time someone mentions Minho's name, Jisung feels the bond pulse with guilt and pain that isn't his own. Even through the walls, even through the distance, he can feel Minho's emotions bleeding through. Guilt. Regret. Pain.
So Minho does regret it. The knowledge is a knife between Jisung's ribs, twisting deeper with each passing moment.
His friends try to get him to talk for another hour, but Jisung remains silent, wrapped in his blankets, staring at nothing. Eventually, they give up, but Felix stays close, and Jisung knows he's not going to let this go.
On day fifteen, Jisung finally does research. He's been avoiding it, terrified of confirmation, but he needs to know. His hands shake as he types into the search bar on his laptop: omega rejection bonded alpha symptoms
The results make his blood run cold.
Bond Severance Syndrome. Rare but deadly condition affecting omegas whose bonded alphas reject the connection. Symptoms include: chest pain, loss of appetite, insomnia, darkening of the bond mark, extreme fatigue, dissociation from the bond...
Jisung's eyes skim down to the prognosis section.
Without intervention, Bond Severance Syndrome is fatal in 60-80% of cases. Average survival time after onset of symptoms: 3-6 weeks. Treatment requires alpha acceptance of the bond or, in extreme cases, surgical severance of the bond connection. However, omegas who undergo surgical severance often experience severe psychological trauma and shortened lifespans.
Three to six weeks. Jisung has been sick for fifteen days. He's halfway to dead.
His phone buzzes. For one wild, hopeful moment, he thinks it might be Minho. But it's just a text from Felix asking if he wants tea.
Jisung looks at Minho's contact information and his eyes catch on the unanswered calls, the read messages, the last real conversation they'd had before everything fell apart. He types out a new message, fingers trembling so badly he has to retype several words.
[ 11:33 AM] Jisung: i understand if you regret the bond. you don't have to feel guilty. i'll figure it out.
[ 11:34 AM] Jisung: thank you for everything during my heat. i'm sorry i put you in that position.
[ 11:34 AM] Jisung: you don't need to worry about me. i'll be okay.
The lies taste bitter even as he types them. He hits send before he can reconsider, before he can let himself hope for something different.
For the first time since the bond formed, Minho responds.
[ 11: 36 AM] Minho: okay
[ 11:36 AM] Minho: take care of yourself
The words are casual, distant. Final. Like closing a door and locking it behind him.
Jisung reads them through blurred vision, and something inside him cracks. Not a clean break, but a splintering, a shattering into a thousand pieces that he doesn't know how to put back together.
The bond mark pulses once, twice, and then goes nearly silent. Through their connection, he feels Minho relax, as if relieved. As if he's been waiting for permission to let go, and Jisung has finally given it to him.
Jisung's breath comes in short, painful gasps. His chest feels like it's caving in, ribs collapsing around his heart. The bond—that golden thread that had felt so warm and alive just weeks ago—is ice-cold now, barely there at all. He can feel it fraying at the edges, unraveling like a rope about to snap.
Minho doesn't want him. Minho never wanted him. It was all just the rut, just biology, just meaningless words spoken in the heat of the moment. And Jisung had been stupid enough to believe them. Stupid enough to think that someone like Minho could actually love someone like him.
The tears come then, hot and endless, soaking into his pillow as he curls up on his bed. He tries to be quiet. Felix is in the next bed, probably awake, probably listening. But Jisung can’t be quiet, sobs tearing from his throat anyway. His whole body shakes with them, and the bond mark burns like fire against his neck.
He thinks about those three days in Minho's apartment. The way Minho had held him, had whispered that he loved him, had traced the bond mark with reverent fingers. He thinks about Minho saying "I chose you" and "I'll keep choosing you every day."
They were lies. All of it. Lies spoken in the haze of rut, meaningless as smoke.
Jisung cries until he has nothing left, until his throat is raw and his eyes are swollen and his whole body aches worse than before. The bond mark throbs in time with his heartbeat—slower now, weaker, like his body is giving up.
Maybe it is. Maybe that would be easier.
So that's it. Minho has gotten what he wanted. Permission to walk away without guilt. Absolution for abandoning his omega. Freedom from a bond he never truly wanted.
Jisung deletes the search history about Bond Severance Syndrome. He won't tell anyone. What would be the point? Minho has made his choice, and Jisung won't trap him with guilt or obligation. If this is how it ends, at least Minho will be free. At least one of them will be okay.
He closes his laptop and curls up on his bed, pulling the blankets over his head. Through the bond, he feels nothing but emptiness now. Minho has shut him out completely, and Jisung's body is slowly shutting down in response, like a machine powering off one system at a time.
Felix comes in with tea later, sits beside him without speaking, and Jisung pretends to sleep. It's easier than explaining. Easier than watching his friend's face crumble when he learns the truth. Easier than admitting that he's dying and there's nothing anyone can do about it.
The bond mark throbs against his neck, darker than it was this morning. It's almost entirely black now, the corruption spreading like ink in water. Jisung closes his eyes against the tears and wishes he could sleep forever.