God, did she have to waste her life away paying for her mother's bills? Did she have to sacrifice her fucking fate? She could run, surely. Surely, after all the shit her mother had spat at her. Her abandonment would be justified.
"I still stand by my words," her mother had hissed, pushed down halls by a wheelchair right out of the doctor's. The wheels squeaked refusing to turn, probably a hundred years old. "You need the Alphas that fucked you to take you back. It doesn't matter which one. Just take one."
"I know," Rue had responded sharply, head darting to the three. Three rich emperors, if her mother knew what she'd squandered, she'd die. "Did you have to be so fucking mean about it?"
"Child," her mother had snorted. "Have I ever been nice?"
"Suppose not," Rue'd murmured.
The hour before that had Rue scowling at her account, dwindling – 50 thousand credits, enough to live a life in planets nearing a hundred. Not enough to pay for even a day of the medical bills her mother needed. She had considered taking from the lizard, but he was the sort to gamble his den to ruin. Their coffers were empty because of him for he lived paycheck to paycheck.
There was no money to steal.
Rue'd growled for answers, digging angry hands into fists. Her mind twisted back to the shithole. She could crawl a little closer to safety and hide under the emperors' noses. But there was no doubt that she'd still have had to settle on the lower slopes of poverty if she were to live in the hidden areas blackened by crime. She'd have to live in the stew of bourgeoise and the poor, of labourers and criminals, in slums where women were so humble that they'd part their legs for broth for seven babies back home.
Perhaps, she could get an Alpha's job, overseeing factories and working long hours for pennies in the face of her mother's fat hospital bills. But how much longer till her Heat would hit her and her secrets would be revealed at the back of an office? It didn't matter whether or not Rue needed to hide from the seven.
The truth was to even survive as a fake Alpha, Rue needed to stay on planets 20 and up. For that was where their true jurisdiction lay, shiny and expensive, where people inched and worried, so rich that they had morals. Money was no relic of happiness, but it could be a prison when she didn't have enough of it. And everyone knew that; her mother knew that.
And her mother was right, she needed to go back to school.
"Had you wanted me gone?" Rue'd wondered out loud. "Not know of your conditions?"
Her mother had been silent, angry, and quiet. "You should just let me be." Her eyes had swayed to her. "If you find yourself in Heat and then collared to this ground by an Alpha on 69, do not come to me crying with a fat babe suckling on your tit and no richness to live for it."
"Of course," Rue sighed.
"And if you run back to those Alphas now, and they each throw you out for the insolence of your behaviour. I will tell you I told you so."
"I know."
"You'll go back to school, it's the only thing you have." Her mother sneered. "The Alphas might not talk from your voice, but they'll try to find ways out of it. And there are ways. I've played with the command, toyed with the limits." Her eyes were dull. "It's not absolute, even if it feels like it is."
"I suspected." Rue hummed. "Pretty sure I told one of them I would never see them again."
"And he stood in front of you."
"He did."
"They could set up a coincidence, to show up here. They might struggle with your orders, but they'll find loopholes in your words. There are always loopholes unless you read a contract in their faces."
"They could." Rue paused, then shrugged. "I could read that contract."
"Their Alphas will stop you," her mother remarked. "That's another one of those loopholes. If their Alpha believes your Omega to be in danger. They'll push through. When your Heat hits, they might be able to find you, they won't give you up for another Alpha. They'll impregnate you, claim you. And even if you disappear for good, there are ways."
"Their Alphas…You're talking about the second gender itself?"
"You were sick once," her mother muttered. "Had to go off planet, my Omega agreed, how else do you think I could bypass his call? It worked because you were his kid, and we had to protect his kid."
This gave her an opening for questions. "He didn't know about me?"
Her mother sneered. "No."
"Why didn't you tell me you were claimed?"
Her mother remained quiet, and Rue sighed. Her mother was a claimed Omega that needed her Alpha. Her eyes widened turning to her mother to speak.
"If you could bypass his words, surely you can look for him?"
Her mother had shuddered at that, eyes blank, stare hard. Her lips curled into an angry snarl, rage trembling through her like lightning. "You little bitch. I'm an Omega. And the galaxy is huge. Do you think I have the money or the means for such luxury? I'm struggling to put food on the table, and you think I'm capable of searching for a fucking person just because I might, just because I think I could? I don't even know where to fucking start combing through the lands like a man in the desert looking for the sea."
"I could find him for you."
She'd laughed, head thrown back. And her voice only went colder as she looked Rue in the eye. "He's dead."
Rue blinked and licked her lips. The words were caught in her throat. A claim should draw her mother towards her Alpha like a ship towards a lighthouse. But her words ended her queries and had her rendered unable to speak.
"Anyway, he was a lying little shit. He'd be awful, taking all my cash, drinking it away if he could." Her mother didn't speak after, hands itching a scar on her elbow, and now Rue noticed the dips of a bite. The teeth snagged into the flesh.
Rue could spend years running away from her problems. But was that a life worth living? Her Heat, she could satisfy it with strangers on the streets. But could she hide her truth without the drug? And Rue wanted to go back to school.
Her eyes swayed to the families in the halls, the Omegas so thickly clouded in the scent of their Alphas she could barely smell the Omega on them. Her frown deepened. To pretend to be an Alpha, she needed stronger scent blockers, needed an Alpha to scent her so good, that no one could smell her truth—flavoured sweet in her skin. Her fist had thumped hard on the counter in the den after that, curses ringing.
And even now in the light of the sun, she could smell Kieran lingering at the furthest edge. Waiting for a chance to pounce. If her Heat arrived, would he be able to leap through to take her? Would they fuck a babe in her as her mother had predicted and then leave? Rue'd shivered at that thought. She needed money, she needed security, she needed to know how far they could break through her voice. And she needed an Alpha's help to be an Alpha.
She needed to go back to school and get her degree as an Alpha for a better job, and a better life. She needed to provide them a deal that would keep them quiet and listening, never breaking their promises until she had her fucking certificate, until she was a qualified bitch. And then, she'd figure out the restrictions of her voice, and how the fuck she could avoid a predestined future.
Poseidons were never wrong—she'd scoured libraries for information and had spent hours online. Seraphim was the best, and all his prophecies were true. All of them. No pure-blood Poseidon could ever read a false reading, it was blasphemy. The books that she was allowed to read outside their realms, had censored that information with poetries, myths and children's bedtime stories. There was no fucking book on the emperor's weaknesses. And so, to everyone and his enemies outside of his realm, Seraphim was a God who was all-knowing. A baby inside her must be real unless he was fucking lying.
Rue decided he must be.
He had to be.