Chapter Text
Peacemaker and Vigilante charge into the barn. They’re on a suicide mission to stop the Butterflies from teleporting the cow elsewhere, and hopefully killing it to put an end to this save the world from itself bullshit once and for all.
Peacemaker and Harcourt find the stairwell that leads downstairs and Vigilante follows. When they land on solid ground they’re momentarily transfixed by the thing. It’s monstrous, and looks like it’s being held against its will.
Harcourt charges, and Peacemaker moves to follow when he’s hit with a shapeless but dense green plasma, making him feel out of step with his body, like he’s dreaming and his legs are made of lead. His eyes momentarily flicker around the room and he sees Harcourt looking back at him, mouth agape, yelling something he can’t hear.
And then suddenly, he’s gone.
The next sensation he feels is his fingers touching wet grass and his eyes adjusting slowly to the light. He’s groggy, as if jet lagged.
He looks up. He’s in a field, the same field from last night, except there is no barn.
”Where the fuck are we?” He hears Vigilante say behind him.
He rolls over, and sees that he’s alone in the field with Adrian. They’re wearing the same clothes they were the night of the mission.
Adrian takes of his mask to get a better look around. “Did you get hit with that green light too?”
Peacemaker sits up. He doesn’t feel like he’s just been in hand to hand combat. His body feels good, like he hasn’t been on mission in a while. “Yeah. What the fuck was that?” He notices that he can still smell the grass even while sitting up. He can smell a lot of things, good and bad, around him.
Adrian stands up on wobbly legs. “Hey, I think my toe is back!”
”What?”
”My pinky toe. It’s grown back?” Adrian says, catching himself mid-sentence. “Where are we?” He takes his glasses out and puts them on, getting a 360 degree view of the field.
“I don’t know Vig. But let’s get the fuck out of here, before whatever got us with that green light figures out it worked.”
”Ooh good idea.” Adrian puts his mask back on.
”Hey do you always use Irish spring or is my nose just more sensitive today?” He asks, following Chris into the wood line.
============
They find Adrian’s shitty car parked in the woods where they left it and drive to the office. On the way they notice small differences—a coffee shop that’s a post office, a statue that’s different, but nothing radically strange.
”Maybe we went through a worm hole and we’re in the past, or the future!” Adrian exclaims.
”You watch too much Star Trek. It was just a glitch. Maybe the Butterflies transported everyone else and only we got left behind.”
Chris notices a vehicle following behind them.
”What’s this guy's fucking problem,” he says, tense. It looks like a normal car, not threatening in anyway.
Adrian checks the rear view mirror.
”LEFT!” He screams, and Chris instinctively rams the steering wheel left and they turn down an alleyway, screeching the tires but losing the car behind them.
”Jesus Vig, you scared the shit out of me.”
“We lost him though, didn’t we?” He says, grin on his face.
Chris finds his way back to the road and shortly parks in front of their office. They head to the side door before anyone sees them. It’s early, so there’s no foot traffic.
Chris types the code into the door but the key pad lights up with an angry red.
”Hurry up,” Adrian hisses behind him. “That guy from before just parked by our car.”
He looks over Chris’s shoulder. “553–“
”I know the code dude!” Chris shouts, furiously typing it in again. It fails for the third time.
”Fuck, did it get changed?” Chris looks up toward the blacked out window above them.
”Hey!” The man from before shouts, looking down the alleyway.
The door suddenly opens, and Harcourt’s surprised face is on the other side. She pulls them both inside and slams the door shut.
They hear the man pounding his fists against the door not a second later.
”Where the fuck were you?” She asks, leading them into the office.
”Where were we, where were you?” Chris counters.
”Yeah, we woke up in the field and everyone was gone. The barn was gone. My toe is back!” Adrian squeaks.
Harcourt and Chris both look at him, and ignore him like usual.
”I don’t know what you’re talking about, but we had a mission brief last night and you didn’t show up, and neither of you answered your phone.”
Harcourt pauses, and then starts sniffing the air around them. “Are you off your suppressants?” She asks, wide-eyed.
“Uh what?" Chris looks at Adrian confused, and he shrugs.
”You both smell like you just went through puberty. Did you stop taking your suppressants?” She asks again.
“I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”
Just then Economos walks in.
“Oh look who decided to show up.” He mocks them, before stopping in his tracks.
”Woah. Jesus. You guys reek.”
”What the fuck! I shower,” Adrian responds defensively, sniffing his own arm pits.
”You can’t smell yourself,” Harcourt and Economos both say in unison, rolling their eyes.
Chris grows even more confused, and annoyed. ”Look I don’t know what the fuck is going on but Vig and I woke up in a field this morning. Last night we were fighting the Butterflies with you guys—we almost had the cow and then Vig and I got hit with a green light and then poof—we were gone.”
”Yeah and my toe grew back. And everything smells weird here,” Adrian adds, completely unhelpful.
Harcourt looks at them curiously, and then heads to her computer. A second later, Economos makes the same face and then gets behind his. They both start furiously typing.
”What the fuck?” Chris asks. Neither respond. He suddenly notices that he’s dying to piss, and heads to the bathroom.
”This isn’t over. You owe us an explanation," he says in vain, pushing open the bathroom door.
Not even a minute later he pushes the door back open with alarm on his face.
”I need to go to a doctor. Immediately.”
“What?” Adrian asks.
”Immediately, there’s something wrong with my dick." His face is pale, like he's seen a ghost.
“Really? Let me see,” Adrian says. Chris, so freaked out, lets him look.
They return 30 seconds later.
Adrian blurts out: “the green ray gave him dick cancer. We have to go to the ER.”
Chris slaps him on the chest.
”What?” He squeals.
Harcourt rises from her seat. Up until this point she's ignored their bathroom antics.
”Ok listen. I think I know what’s happened here.”
“Cool, but can you tell me enroute to the hospital. My dick is going to fall off," Chris pleads, reaching for her elbow and motioning for her to follow him.
”No. You’re fine. I think. We’ll talk about that later. What’s more important is that I think you’re from an alternate reality," she says slowly, realizing the impact of her words in real time, as if someone else is speaking.
Economos rises. “There was an anomaly last night, right near Baker’s field. That would explain it.”
”Explain what? Why I have a tumor on my genitals?” Chris is getting desperate imagining the surgery to remove his dick and living his life a real-life ken doll.
”Your dick is fine. Can you listen?” She pleads. ”What was your world like, the one you came from?”
”My world? I don’t know. We were fighting the Butterflies. And you were there, and Economos, and some things were different. It smelled less, and my dick was fine", he tries to explain.
Harcourt and Economos look at each other, struggling to find a reference point to understand the differences between their realities.
”Ok. Here we don’t have Butterflies. Or we do but they’re just bugs, and maybe it’s not that things smell worse here, maybe our sense of smells are stronger?” She says, trying out the theory.
”Yeah. And we have to take suppressants or our secondary genders make us a little crazy. Do you have those in your world?” Economos asks gently, as if he's talking to two children.
”Uh…We only have one gender in our world. At least I think. Some people are weird and are furries and shit,” Chris says.
“Oh we have furries here too,” Economos adds, a little too quickly. They all shoot him a look.
”Shutting up now," he says, bowing his head.
”What’s a secondary gender?” Adrian asks.
”Like Alpha, Beta, Omega,” Harcourt explains.
”Like a frat house.” Adrian’s face lights up, his brain making a false connection.
”Uh no. Alphas are…supposedly the most dominant secondary gender, although I’ve met more impressive omegas in my lifetime…betas are second, with no real remarkable secondary gender characteristics, and omegas are subservient, supposedly, and produce offspring.”
”What are you guys?” Chris asks.
”I’m an alpha,” Harcourt answers, apologetically.
”And I’m a beta,” Economos follows, slightly ashamed.
Chris snorts. “Of course you are dye job.”
Economos rolls his eyes. “Great to know you’re a dick in all realities.”
”Shut up,” Harcourt orders.
“So if we showed up in this reality, does that mean we get secondary genders?” Adrian asks, suddenly excited.
”Do you just have female and male in your reality?” She asks.
”Yeah. Well, sort of,” Adrian responds.
”And who produces offspring?”
”Only females,” Chris answers.
She wrinkles her nose. “Oh that sucks.”
”Yeah. Wait so how do we know what we are?” Chris asks, remembering the dick cancer.
”I mean you’re probably beta but from the smell alone I can tell you might be an alpha. Is that thing, on your dick, is it at the base?” Harcourt asks.
Chris looks down. “Yeah.”
“Economos, go look."
He groans. “I don’t get paid enough for this shit.”
While they’re in the bathroom, Harcourt inches closer to Adrian.
”No thing on your dick?” She asks him, sniffing the air like a dog.
”Nope! Guess that means I’m a beta. Figured I wouldn’t be an alpha like Peacemaker.”
She gets about two feet from him and then backs away quickly, keeping her distance.
”What?” Adrian asks, walking toward her.
”Stay back," she orders, arm outstretched with the other covering her nose.
Economos and Chris reenter the room.
”Yeah he’s an alpha,” Economos confirms. Chris beams. My dick isn’t sick and now I have this cool knot thing? Hell fucking yeah.
”What?” He asks, noticing that Harcourt is huddled in a corner like Adrian is diseased.
“He’s omega. And about a week from his heat. He needs to stay away from me, and we need to get him on suppressants and find a safe house.”
”Woah cool! Does that mean I can have babies?!” Adrian exclaims. His smile reaches from ear to ear, unbridled excitement bubbling over.
Chris scoffs. “Only you would get excited about that.”
”What? Male seahorses do it!”
“Yeah. Except no omega walks around without suppressants, bonded or not, except in the ultra orthodox communities,” John explains.
”Bonded?” They both ask.
Harcourt sighs. “Alright. I’m going to find something to stick up my nose. In the meantime, John is going to look up the health video they show eighth graders in school and you guys are going to watch it so we can speed run this alpha omega shit. Ok?”
They both nod.
”Are you ok? To be around him?” Harcourt asks, pulling Chris aside.
”Yeah, why?”
”You don’t smell that? Feel that? His heat?”
”Uh idk. He smells sweet but I feel alright?” He says, suddenly doubting himself.
She eyes him suspiciously. “I think you’re senses are still coming online. We should take precautions anyway. I’m going to bring you some suppressants too. And you should stay away from him. Don’t touch him. And if you start feeling anything…down there, put something in your nose," she instructs, motioning toward his crotch.
"Oh, I don't swing that way," Chris responds, giving her a once over.
Harcourt rolls her eyes. "Shut up. That's not how it works here. Everyone fucks omegas."
"Well not me, and not Adrian," he responds forcefully.
"Yeah we'll see whose straight once he goes into heat," she chides, looking over at him. "I'll be far the fuck away from him. He can't interact like that with anyone from this reality. It's not safe, I don't think." Her forehead knits in confusion. "I'm honestly not sure."
A thought pops into Chris's head.
"Hey, where is...us...from this reality?" He asks, motioning toward himself and Adrian, who is sitting dutifully in front of Economos as he struggles to turn his screen around for them to watch the video.
Harcourt's brow wrinkles, and her face strains. "I don't know. I'm trying to remember...but the details are slipping. She yells for Economos. He hustles over.
"What?"
"What were Peacemaker and Vigilante like? Before this morning, the ones who belong in this reality, quick."
"Uh uh uh...” He stammers. The information is slipping from his brain as he struggles to hold onto it.
"Quickly!" She yells.
"I don't know!" He screams, frazzled. "I can't remember anything about them before today."
"Yeah. I thought so. It seems like whatever brought you here is actively removing our memories, something to look into," she says, and turns to leave.
Economos blinks a couple of times, trying to recover from the mental strain.
"Come on, let's watch the video."
Chris sits down next Adrian, who sways his feet back and forth in the chair like a child.
The video starts. The graphics and audio are outdated. An old man with gray hair enters the screen.
"Today we're going to learn about secondary genders: Alpha, Beta, and Omega, the building blocks of our society," he calmly states.
When the video gets to the safe sex portion, Chris watches, enraptured, as the man explains what knotting is. Adrian squirms in his seat during the demonstration, uncomfortable and a little scared. When it talks about female alphas' knots Chris feels weird, not exactly turned off, but confused, almost like he's looking at an uncanny valley version of something his brain is wired to find sexy.
When the video gets to the part about how male omegas give birth, it's Chris's turn to squirm in his seat and Adrian is the one watching, engrossed. He quietly repeats, "so cool," over and over again.
"Jesus V, we gotta get you out of this reality before you get pregnant," he says, noticeably scared about how excited Adrian seems to be.
Adrian turns to him, his eyes bright and excited. "God that would be so cool. But yeah, that's smart."
The both watch attentively when it gets to the part about bonding.
"Metal" Chris says.
"Yeah. Hardcore," Adrian adds.
Economos turns off the video.
"Ok, what did we learn?"
"I can poop a baby!" Adrian exclaims.
"Uh, yes, but we don't say that."
"An alpha's knot can rip someone's asshole apart," Chris answers.
"Ok, Jesus. You guys are sick," John turns, gagging.
Adrian raises his hand.
"You don't have to do that."
"Hey, why is my butt wet?"
Economos’s eyes go wide. "Ok. This is way above my pay grade. I think we need to call Adebayo and Keeya." He turns to grab his phone, murmuring under his breath. "Keeya can talk to you about all that omega shit."
Harcourt enters the room, back from running errands.
"Alright," she says, holding a plastic bag aloft. "Who wants to take some pills?"