The Hunt of Love

Turning Tides

  I had known all about heats and how they came in cycles and I would need the company of another to satisfy it. My first heat had hit after I turned 23 and had left me feeling miserable. I was baking pancakes for me and my boyfriend Balthazar, an alpha, in the kitchen when suddenly I started feeling very hot then I felt the slick drip onto my boxers and had fallen to the floor, grabbing onto anything I could as I felt the world pour down on top of me. Next thing I knew Balth was racing into the room after hearing the clatter. He looked down at me then scented the air and gave me a lopsided smile. I don't want to talk much about what followed that week because it left me feeling hollow and dirty. I had lived with him for three years after I turned 23 and he had helped me through all of my heats but now, I live alone and refuse any Alpha, Omega or Beta that comes my way.

  Writhing in the scent of home after coming back from a hunting trip, I bounded upstairs and shifted feeling my bones break apart and be put back together and my black fur tumbling to the ground and dispersing. I rolled my neck and grabbed my sweatshirt and boxers to put them back on so I could sleep for the rest of the day. Knowing full well that I had another heat coming up shortly, I was expecting this one to last and be worse then the others. An Omega taking on half a year of heats alone was unheard of because most would spend it in company of another or their mate but I don't have a mate and I really don't enjoy the feelings I get after sharing my heat with somebody. Flopping lazily onto my nest of pillows, I found a cold spot and comfortably curled up and pulled a blanket over my legs and up to my chin. Falling into a deep sleep I finally felt relaxed as I slipped into a dream letting the Panther take watch. Shifters rarely ever let their animals keep watch whilst they sleep but I've formed a strong bond with mine, an understanding...

  Feeling the Suns rays burrow warmth into my skin, illuminating my face and making me smile into the warmth. It was a pleasure of living so high up. Reaching around for my clock was kind of a consistency of thumping noises until I hit the plastic and grabbed it.
"7:30 in the morning, well just shoot me now!" I groaned but there was somebody knocking on my hatch downstairs, sadly I didn't quite make it down the stairs. I was almost half way down when my heat punched me in the face knocking me forwards. I tumbled down the stairs and into the wall at the bottom where I sat horridly still. The hatch opened and Gabriel opened the door, my packs alpha and my brother, looking around frantically for the source of clatter. He saw me laying limp in the corner and rushed in, full well smelling my heat but cradling my head under his arm none-the-less. Gabriel just recently turned 46 but he is still the strongest here, as he proves every so often by still lifting and playing with the adults with ease. He grabbed me up, gently lifting me but I groaned in pain as it shot along my spine and out through all my limbs. The panther was annoyed that he could heal us easily, but there was something foreign in my system that was preventing him from doing so. He ran as fast as he could to his wife's house where he rapidly knocked on the door until Renae opened the door smiling at first at seeing her husband but her expression fell as she saw me laying limply in his arms. He moved inside the Omega's house and sat me gently on the couch.
"Gabriel what happened?" Renae flung herself into the cabinets in search of her medical equipment.
  "I was going to check up on him but I heard banging before he let me in so I jumped in. He was laying limp in the corner, all crumpled and everything oh god Renae he can't die..."
  "He won't as long as we can help... Wait... Gabriel, gods no he's... He's in heat! He refuses to let anybody help him through them and if he's bedridden then... He'll die." She whispered the last part but my ears perked up to it nonetheless causing me to move and promptly fall off the couch and onto my shoulder where I landed on something sharp that shattered when I landed on it. Reaching behind me I pulled a needle out of my shoulder and dropped it on the floor, looking at the blood staining my fingers. Gabe ran over and picked me up before depositing me on the couch and looking at my shoulder where he gently started plucking shards of glass out of my skin. I whimpered and squirmed against it but he just said I'm sorry and plucked the last piece from my back. He started picking up all the pieces as Renae came over and held out my arm before gingerly placing a needle into it and using tape to hold it secure. That's about when I blacked out...
I woke up back in my own nest of pillows and blankets but I was still in heat and it was hard to breathe and my everything pounded with pain. I let my panther take over and they dragged me up, woefully on-wards to some unknown destination. I soon fell onto my hands and knees out of breath, my vision darkening, and my head reeling with pain. I looked up meekly at the house but all the colors I saw blurred into one blob of browns, greens, and yellows. But that was okay, the colors were soothing. Struggling to hold myself up any longer I flopped onto my face, putting dirt into my hair and face but I didn't really care, my panther didn't either. I heard a door open then somebody shout in surprise and rush over to me, pressing two cold fingers against my neck. I tensed as a pain tore through my body leaving me to make a strangled sound then fall completely limp, my eyes falling shut. Somebody snapped their fingers in front of my eyes making my ears perk up and my eyes open as much as they could to find the source of sound.