Taming the Wild Beast of Alamina

"You know, I am deeply disappointed in both of you for assuming I cannot be professional," Seven said, watching Arion and Dean over the rim of his glasses.

"Oh, we did not assume that." Dean inspected his perfectly shaped nails. "We simply know you are rarely professional with us."

"I hate you," Seven sighed. "But Palatine is correct. Their wording could have been more scientific, and I object to several conclusions they presented as absolute, but Sebastian does not have any omega compatible with his pheromone profile."

Arion remained behind his desk, his expression unreadable. "And you are not surprised."

"No." Seven settled more comfortably into the chair. "Trevor has a similar profile. So did Dax before he bonded, and so do you."

He pointed at Arion.

"You forget how difficult it was to make Dean your mate? You have enjoyed too many pleasant days without berserk instincts knocking around inside your skull."

"Mean," Dean said. "But I did not forget."

Arion’s gaze did not leave Seven. "None of us were declared incompatible with every omega alive."

"Because none of you were tested with the same standards." Seven placed a slim tablet on the desk. "Trevor’s records are ancient by modern medical terms, and no one had the courage to test Dax extensively once they realized provoking him might end with the laboratory embedded in a wall. You were already bonded by the time we understood what you were."

Dean leaned forward. "Sebastian is an alpha."

"Yes."

"Not a sigma."

"I am aware. I did examine him."

"You looked too pleased while doing it."

"He is medically fascinating."

"He threatened to break your hand."

"He was under stress."

"He was perfectly calm."

"That was the concerning part."

Arion tapped one finger against the desk. "Seven."

"Yes. The relevant information." Seven pushed the tablet toward him. "Sebastian’s results have been consistent since his first rut at fifteen. I reviewed the original data, not merely the summaries. His highest projected compatibility was twenty-five percent, and even that projection depended on suppressing several rejection markers in the model."

"So it was never a true twenty-five percent," Dean said.

"Closer to eighteen under current standards."

Dean’s expression tightened, though the result could hardly have surprised him.

"There was no interference?" Arion asked.

"None I could find. The old records are consistent with the samples we collected here. No altered values, no missing sections, no suspicious changes in methodology. Either someone began manipulating Sebastian’s biology before his first rut and maintained the same result for ten years across multiple physicians and systems—"

"Unlikely," Arion said.

"Extremely. Or this is simply his natural profile."

Dean lowered his hand to the armrest. "Then why?"

Seven looked at him for a moment before answering.

"Because the tests are searching for an omega."

Silence settled over the office.

Dean’s eyes narrowed. "That sounds deliberately vague."

"It is deliberately accurate. Sebastian’s pheromones do not behave as though they are incapable of bonding. They behave as though every omega profile presented to them is the wrong classification."

Arion’s attention sharpened. "Similar to mine before Dean?"

"Very similar, although Sebastian’s rejection response is more complete. Your body still registered dominant omegas as potential mates. Poor ones, mostly, but possible. Sebastian’s does not."

"And Trevor?" Dean asked.

"Trevor’s profile stabilized only around Lucas. Before that, his compatibility projections were miserable. Dax’s markers were almost nonsensical until Chris was... kidnapped. Rare secondary genders frequently make ordinary compatibility systems look defective."

Dean stared at the tablet without touching it. "You think Sebastian needs something rare."

"What? No." Seven looked at him with open judgment. "He may require a specific type of pheromone profile, but that does not mean the person producing it must possess a rare secondary gender. For now, Sebastian is doing perfectly well."

"Despite having no compatible omega."

"He is the same age as Arion, but he is not experiencing anything resembling the strain Arion suffered before meeting you. His ruts are stable, his pheromones remain balanced, and there are no indications that his body is deteriorating because it cannot find a mate."

Dean glanced toward Arion. "So he does not need one."

"Biologically? Not at present." Seven folded his hands over the tablet. "Emotionally, I refuse to comment. I am a physician, not a miracle worker."

Arion ignored that. "You said a specific pheromone profile."

"Yes. Compatibility is not a ladder where the most dominant alpha automatically matches the most dominant omega. Sometimes two individually exceptional profiles are simply catastrophic together."

Dean’s brow furrowed.

"For example," Seven continued, "Dax once requested a compatibility projection using Lucas’s pheromones."

Dean turned toward him sharply. "Why?"

"I did not ask. I value my peace."

"And the result?"

"Disastrous. Their pheromones did not complement each other at all. They aggravated every dominant marker they possessed. Prolonged exposure during a rut or heat would likely have ended with both of them being violent, ill, or attempting to establish authority over the same room."

"That sounds like them," Dean admitted.

"It does not make them compatible."

Seven tapped the tablet once.

"We also compared Sebastian’s profile with Nayra’s, since she possesses several of Dax’s stronger inherited markers."

Dean’s expression changed. "And?"

"Also disastrous."

Arion raised a brow. "How disastrous?"

"Four percent projected compatibility, followed by a rejection response severe enough that the program recommended they never share an enclosed space during an active rut or heat."

Dean blinked. "They get along."

"Because people are not permanently controlled by their pheromones," Seven said patiently. "Social affection, friendship, and biological compatibility are separate things. Nayra likes Sebastian. Her secondary gender would still consider his an intolerable provocation under the wrong circumstances."

"So the twenty-five percent result really was his best," Dean said.

"Yes, though under our current standards it was closer to eighteen." Seven leaned back. "Sebastian is not waiting for something rare, nor is his body secretly collapsing because he has not found it. He simply has an extremely narrow compatibility range, and no omega tested so far falls within it."

Dean remained quiet for a moment. "But someone might."

"Someone might," Seven agreed. "That is considerably different from insisting that someone must."

Dean let his head fall against the sofa’s headrest and groaned audibly. "Why is everything so complicated?"

"Because all of you are special," Seven said, peering at him over his glasses.

"What about the other matter?" Arion asked before Dean and Seven could descend into another round of banter.

Seven’s amusement faded slightly. "Sylvia Croft has begun actively using her pheromones, and her profile matches the one registered for Andrea."

Arion’s expression sharpened.

"But," Seven continued, "there is a problem."

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