sunspotted | a/b/o but make betas more relevant

"Jean."

That's Marco wrinkling his nose a little for the second time in ten minutes, looking at the other boy in exasperation. He knows it can't be easy for Jean to just sit here while Marco scents him and tries to smother it, but he could stop squirming so much. Marco needs to get a read on his scent if he's going to try to cover it up with his own!

That's what Instructor Shadis has entrusted (or outlawed, to hear Jean put it) to them today - scent training. More specifically, for Marco's ability as a Beta to suppress Omega and Alpha hormones if they were getting too out of control. Jean just had the unfortunate luck of having recently presented as an Omega and gone through his heat a few weeks ago.

Marco was still getting used to his own ability - out in Jinae, Betas hadn't been anything to really make note of, and he'd been a little disappointed when his notably calm, even demeanor did belie the noted calm, even demeanor of many Betas. Shadis had insisted differently in their training classes. In a group like the Survey Corps, the Betas ability to smother things like Alpha and Omega heats until they were back within the walls was worth its value in horses, to hear him explain it.

(And, well, he'd heard enough schoolyard talk from others about how they could do the opposite. How a Beta could drive an Alpha or Omega straight into a pseudo heat if they messed with their pheromones enough.)

He could recognize the scent coming off Jean now - something akin to boredom irritation annoyance - and leaned back a little further, putting out his own soothing scent, urging Jean's irritation to smooth out. "Do you wanna take a break?"

Threaded | Flat

"I don't want to be doing this at all."

They've been banished, Marco! Thrown out of the Training Corps and abandoned to doing this stupid exercise that isn't going to work and is just wasting both their time! More importantly, it's wasting Marco's time, and that feels like a much worse insult than simply wasting Jean's. He's still uptight and jangled over having a recent heat--which was the most godawful embarrassing thing he's ever had the misfortune of suffering through, he showed his ass to Reiner of all people before being swept off to the infirmary to suffer it out alone--and now Shadis is pointing it out again and making them do this.

He can't even be mad at Marco, much as he wants to be. Marco is just following orders; it't not his fault the orders suck.

Jean puts a hand to Marco's face and shoves him away. "Get off me, I'm going to suffocate if you keep rubbing your chin on me."

in which Jean abuses italics mercilessly