Alpha Assignment (BL) Chapter 28 (Early Access) (Patreon)

Another Tuesday arrived with blustery weather that could almost be heard through the double glazing. Morning routine coming to a close, Quinn slung his bag over his shoulder and headed to the front door. Bumping and thumping from upstairs brought him to a halt, hand on handle. Round the corner came a sweet and sleepy face. Remi skipped down the stairs, modelling the first of his new made-to-fit clothes, fresh out of the hands of the postie the day before: a terracotta pyjama set of shorts and top. Quinn didn't manage to hide his shock at seeing that topknot at a time that had 'AM' after it.

"Good morning," he called up the last few steps. "This is a surprise."

Remi laughed, and it lightened Quinn from the inside. "I wanted to say goodbye before you left." He hopped onto the final stair and drew up onto his toes. Quinn bent down for him, and received a kiss to his cheek. "Have a good day," Remi whispered. His face was red-tinged, it matched his PJs well.

"Thank you, you too." Quinn kissed his forehead and opened the door behind him without looking away from Remi retreating back upstairs. "Are you going back to sleep?"

"Yep!"

Quinn laughed to himself all the way to his car.

"You're in a good mood," Jordan said over their desk crack.

Quinn halted his enthusiastic typing. It had felt as though he were in a trance until then, surrounded by numbers and spreadsheets and graphs, boring tasks that let him think about more important things - like Remi. Remi kissing him first, while sober. Remi going against his body's natural sleep cycle to see Quinn before he left for work. Remi in his adorable PJ set and how the shorts still left just enough room for Quinn to see to the tops of his thighs when he had run back upstairs...

"Earth to Quinn."

Quinn blinked. Jordan came back into focus opposite him.

"Sorry."

Silence sat between them.

"Um, how is your day going?" Quinn asked.

"Fine. How's yours?"

"Fine."

"I'll let you get back to your daydreaming, then." Jordan winked. "I apologise for interrupting."

The air conditioning in the office didn't keep Quinn's body from flashing hot for a few moments. He ignored it, pretending to focus intently on his screen.

The end of his work day finally arrived, and Quinn was ready to leave on the dot. When he stood from his seat, bag already hanging from his shoulder, Jordan jumped up, too.

"Do you have a second?"

Confused, Quinn hesitated. "Is this... a work thinkg?"

"No."

"Oh."

"I wanted to ask… if you had plans tonight?"

Oh. Quinn had heard that line before on TV, it was usually followed by the suggestion of a date. The conversation he had been dreading was happening now. In the office.

"Remi and I go to a painting class on Tuesdays," he answered.

"Ah, bad timing then..." Jordan shifted on the spot for a moment, glancing around as though looking for assistance. "Are there.... any other nights you have free?"

"Um, I think I understand what you're asking.” Quinn stepped a little closer, and kept his voice low. “And if I do, I should be transparent because... you're my friend and I really appreciate having one like you.” For a breath’s pause, he ran through ten different ways to say what he needed to say. “Something has changed with me and Remi, I don't quite know how to describe it right now but-"

"I get it. Totally. Thank you for being... your always honest self." Jordan smiled, but it made Quinn feel instantly guilty. Not a happy smile.

It seemed wrong to linger if he had nothing to say to make Jordan feel better, so he said he'd see him later and hurried out. Best case scenario: nothing had changed when he was next in the office. Losing a friend was the worst option… but Jordan had said to Remi that he feared the same thing… Quinn drove home in silence, hoping hurt feelings wouldn’t change them.

Halfway through painting class, Quinn felt emotionally wrung out. Starting the day off with a floating-on-air high, to then plummet into the awkward rejection of his closest friend, and now... the painting was chewing at his insides.

The emotion was indescribable. Was he sad? Angry? Longing for his past? Desperate to never see it again?

Instead of a release of hidden feelings, this stupid project had infected him with new ones, festering in his gut. He was scowling at the canvas when Remi enquired, "What place are you painting?"

Quinn sighed. He didn't want to say, he didn't even want to continue.

"A place I don't want to see anymore," he said quietly. He caught Carla's eye as she bustled past. "Can I start again? I made a mistake."

"Mistakes can be fixed!" Carla announced cheerfully, making her way to Quinn and Remi's corner.

"Not this one. I chose the wrong place to paint."

"It's a nice painting, though," Carla offered. Remi nodded at Quinn's elbow.

Quinn glared at the rolling hills. "It needs to be thrown away."

Carla snatched up the canvas protectively. "Sometimes art needs breathing room, let me hold onto it for now and maybe you'll want to come back to it in the future."

Quinn was adamant that he wouldn't, but as long as he didn't have to look at his past anymore, and instead could watch Remi create a country lake in acrylics, he was fine. Or he would be, with enough Remi therapy. It was soothing to observe his process, both random and thoughtful in the additions he made to his piece.

In the car, Remi still taking the back seat, Quinn could feel the urge to interrogate coming from behind. He didn't have the energy to explain how he felt, mostly because he didn't know yet himself. He ignored Remi's inquisitive gaze burning a hole in the back of his head.

"Mmm, we need petrol," Quinn grunted. There was enough in the tank to get home, but he wouldn't be confident getting to work on Thursday. "Mind if we take a quick detour?"

"I don't mind!" Remi chirped.

This late at night, the petrol station was almost empty.

"Do you want to stay in the car by yourself or go into the shop? There won't be many humans around," Quinn asked as he rolled the car to a halt beside the closest pump.

"Will you be there?"

"In a few minutes, gotta put the petrol in the car first, then I'll come in to pay for it."

Remi hesitated. "Okay."

"See if you can find a windscreen scraper for me while you're in there, it's going to start getting icy in the mornings soon."

"Okay!" As expected, Remi was ten times more enthusiastic when given a chance to be helpful. He hopped out of the car when Quinn held the door open for him, and headed up to the small shop, glancing back over his shoulder every few steps.

Humans thought petrol stations were scary places at night, Quinn mused, filling up his tank, but what they're scared of is just other humans. Quinn wasn't scared of humans, and Remi didn't need to be as long as Quinn was nearby. He tapped the nozzle side to side, pulled it free, checked the price, and walked up to the glowing building advertising cheap sim cards and seasonal plushie gifts. Yet another establishment his father felt was permanently ripping him off, along with the human-owned utility companies.

There were only three aisles Remi could be browsing in, but Quinn found himself dead still in the first at the hissing voices he could overhear on the other side of the magazine racks.

"-play dumb. We know it was you that tattled to the Assembly, you little rat!"

Remi's reply was whispered. "I'm sorry-"

"Sorry? Is that it?” A woman, young, and on the verge of a very quiet combustion. “You ruined our fucking lives, you idiot! We all got split up because you couldn't handle your fucking place."

"I didn't know you'd be split u-"

"And why aren't you with us? Or the girls who got sent to the mega packs? How come you're on your own?"

Another scathing voice jumped in, "He's gone rogue!"

They both gasped, but it sounded half like laughter. "Oh, we're so telling."

"No!" Remi pleaded. "I'm not-"

The first woman cut him off. "And after you ran away that time?"

"He's got priors!" The second woman laughed cruelly.

Quinn rounded the aisle, pulse pounding in his ears, and threw his hands out like the lunge of a viper, catching both women around the backs of their necks and jerking them backwards. Both stumbled and threw their heads back with wide eyes that got a lot wider after a sniff.

Quinn dropped both his chin and his voice low, speaking directly into their ears. "I don't know who the fuck you think you're talking to, but that's my omega. Any problem you have with him, you have with me,” he growled. “Do you have a problem with me?"

They struggled to shake their heads with Quinn's grip so tight on their necks. He released them with a shove, sending them to their hands and knees at Remi's feet. His hands were cradling his elbows tightly, and his topknot shook, clutched to his side was a red, plastic ice scraper.

"Looks like you found what I asked for," Quinn said, nodding at the item. "Good job. Let's go pay."

Remi nodded and scurried after Quinn, who didn't take a great deal of care in avoiding the two women on the ground when he stepped over them. Whether he caught a bit of hair or a pinky or two was none of his concern.

By the time they had paid, the women were still hiding in their aisle. Remi and Quinn returned to his car in silence, climbed inside in silence, and Quinn drove in silence for the first minute, shocked at his own aggression. It wasn't even a snap, it was the most natural reaction his body had to hearing Remi being spoken to that way. Blamed for a pack dissolving-

"They're wrong. You know that, right?" he said to the darkness on the other side of the windshield.

"Wrong?"

"It's not your fault they got split up, that's just what happens when packs have to be re-allocated."

"It’s my fault the pack was re-allocated,” Remi confessed.

"No, it's not," Quinn argued softly. "Alphas die, it happens. Unless you killed him, the pack dissolving has nothing to do with you. No alpha means no pack."

"My alpha didn't die."

Quinn frowned at the road ahead. "Remi..." he said, slowly and carefully. "The Assembly can't re-allocate pack members if they have a living, capable alpha. It's one of very few things they can't involve themselves in. The alpha rules above all until they die or get sick to a point they can't rule - and most alphas are too proud to get that sick in the first place." He'd only heard of it happening once, and his father and his alpha allies had talked of it in disgust. They'd rather go lay down in the woods to die than waste away before the eyes of their pack.

"My alpha is alive, and he's not sick."

"Remi, I promise, the circumstances for the Assembly to get involved and break up a pack are so few - it would have to be a criminal offence, and a severe one at that - for them to be allowed to remove a healthy alpha from his place in his pack. He probably lied to keep face, too proud to admit he wasn't well... he's probably in some Assembly medical centre right now-"

"No, he's not."

Quinn glanced at his rear-view mirror. Remi's expression was set.

"Remi… Do you know where he is?"

Remi nodded.

Something told Quinn he didn't want to ask this question. His voice turned thin when he forced out the word, "Where?"

"Assembly holding cell number: one-one-three," Remi answered, as though reciting his date of birth.

And then, the snap came. Because while Quinn was no longer under any illusions that Remi could have been treated well by his previous pack, for the Assembly to insert themselves in a pack’s business, to remove the alpha, the severity of abuse had to be obscene. It soured Quinn’s stomach. And those women hadn’t been grateful to be removed, which meant only one person had been the victim of the alpha’s tyranny.

The wheels of his car screeched at the swing of his steering wheel, cutting a u-turn in the middle of the empty road.