Page 16 of The Hive

This was the second time that someone had called me that, and as much as I had fought against it before, after what I had witnessed, I found myself warming to the idea. Being touched and held and purred for like I had watched wouldn’t be bad at all. Especially if it was Lex or even Ghost. Shadow’s unexpected vulnerability from earlier was gone, and it saddened me that he had retreated into the shadows once more. This cold side of him scared me a little, but there was something about the darkness in him that was soothing even while it unsettled me. Thinking about all of them caused my belly to clench, and slick trickled down my thighs.

Both drones took deep breaths, and their pupils widened, swallowing their irises as they stared at me. Oh shit, this was bad.

The door to the exam room whooshed open and Grey strode in. He took in the obvious tension between the three of us, his sable brows rising upward in surprise. “Is everything all right?” he asked, glancing nervously from the alphas, back to me.

“She’s coming into her nature,” Shadow said, turning his attention to my handler.

Shame filled me, like it was somehow my fault, and my eyes dropped to the floor. I couldn’t look at any of them as they stood there judging me like a science experiment.

“I’ve heard better news,” Grey said. “I may be able to help with that, but you’ll have to remain calm, Saphyra.”

Stay calm, he said. Did he not see who I was forced to share my nest with every night? The odds were stacked against us, but at least I couldn’t scent their pheromones like I had in the vents. With no other option, I replied the only way I could. “I’ll try.”

Grey shook his head, running his fingers through his hair. “This isn’t going to work if you emerge before we can get you all out of here, and we’re still no closer to a solution than we were yesterday.”

Finally, something I could help with. “Actually, Lex, I mean your commander, gave me an idea. He said that there were tunnels under parts of the station for moving supplies. Do those show up on the blueprints you have?”

Grey walked over to the display and flipped through a few sections. Ghost and Shadow joined him, studying the readout. As much as I wanted to look, I also did not want to be in close proximity to the alphas. Once they backed off, I edged closer. The shafts lit up on the map, running in a strange, jumbled pattern below the main level.

Ghost shrugged. “It might work.”

Grey finished flipping through the diagrams and turned toward us. “It’s too dangerous. The lifts move through most of those shafts. There has to be another way.”

“Another way that we can find in the next couple of days? We already knew that Saphyra was close to her heat, but the unfiltered alpha pheromones she was subjected to in the vents seem to have had a significant effect.” Ghost looked at me with hunger in his eyes.

We needed to hurry. Even without their pheromones, these two alphas were imprinting on me. Before long, I would be just as bad as Zillarah, begging for alpha cock over the dinner table in the mess hall with my entire class looking on.

I banished that thought from my mind and tried my best to concentrate on the problem at hand. “Do you know what sort of lifts move through those shafts?” I asked, and leaned closer to the screen.

Grey motioned to the intricate map. “These are mostly personnel and freight, as far as I’m aware.”

“Okay, but what about these?” Now that I was familiar with where the drone cells were, I could see that each of those rooms had a shaft that terminated against the cabin wall opposite their entrance door, right where that omega and her nest had been. I had a theory. “See how these connect over here?” I pointed to a number of massive clusters of cells near where the syrupy sweet smell of omegas saturated the air in the vents. “But also here.” I indicated the row of decoy quarters. “I’m almost certain the nests are like pods that can be sealed to transport omegas through the shafts to the drones. All we have to do is get the keepers to think I’m going into heat, and then make sure my nest is assigned to Lex’s cell.” It all seemed so obvious now.

“That is a lot of conjecture, Saphyra. You might be onto something, though. It would put you all in the same place, but then how do you get out of the drone cell, assuming I can make the rest happen?” Grey asked.

I shrugged. This wasn’t my area of expertise, but I saw the connections because I had been there and witnessed the cells with modular walls and the nest opening like the bedding capsules used in the dorms. “We just need to get Lex in the pod and then send it somewhere else that’s not locked.” It seemed like a long shot, but if Grey could find a way to make it happen, it might work.

“I’ll look into it. We’ve been in here far longer than we should have already, so you need to go back to your room. I’ll excuse you from your classes for the rest of the day. Soak in the coldest bath you can handle. Wash yourself with the scent neutralizing soap that I gave the alphas. You’re driving them crazy.” Grey chuckled, but it was an uneasy sound. He knew what would happen if Axion or Valyx lost control. Everything they had been working toward would be ruined.

Chapter Sixteen

Alexi

Her sweet honey scent lingered, growing fainter every time the scrubber kicked on. Something about it stroked instincts that coiled inside me. Mate. I knew it down to the marrow of my bones. She was mine. Her perfume called to me, daring me to chase and claim her even as it drifted away through the filtration system.

I fisted my cock, which grew harder with every breath of sugar-soaked air. Saphyra. Her name was a familiar balm. How she had kept her birth name was beyond me, but I loved the way it tasted on my tongue.

The beautiful omega with glowing amber eyes and honey-gold hair was everything I had dreamed she would be. My thumb slid through the precum coating the slit of my cock and eased the slickness down the shaft. I imagined her lips wrapping around my length and sucking me deep into her throat while she looked up at me through thick lashes.

I shouldn’t have fantasized about her that way. I didn’t know her anymore. But the silhouette I had glimpsed through the mesh of the vent—perky tits and flared hips perfect to grip as I fucked her roughly just like I knew she wanted—had my hand increasing its pace as more pearly fluid seeped and coated my length.

Her scent alone was enough to drive me to rut. My fist grasped more tightly with each stroke, thinking about her taking every inch into that tight little omega pussy. My knot swelled, and I squeezed it with my other hand, milking it while I fucked my ever-tightening grip.

The hypnotic, sugary scent of arousal lingering in the air drove me crazy, knowing I couldn’t go to her like she needed. She would be ripe with slick by the time she made it back to Axion and Valyx. I wondered if they would see to her needs. The thought of them tending to her should have filled me with hatred and jealousy, but instead, my cock throbbed with anticipation. I knew they wouldn’t, but the image of my two friends fucking her through her heat made me even harder. Imaging them filling her full to bursting with their cum pushed me over the edge.

I clasped my fully formed knot, squeezing it roughly. My orgasm erupted in a torrent of milky white ropes coating my bare chest and abs. What a fucking waste, and it barely took the edge off, but her perfume finally receded to a manageable level. Her scent was faint, hardly detectable anymore, allowing my sanity to return.

Even in my lethargic and sated state, I was surprised to find that I missed her. I missed that smell and the sound of her voice. I needed to see her for myself and know her as I once had. So many years had been stolen from us. All I had were fantasies about what she would be like as a woman. And it wasn’t enough.

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