spaces_between | We're all going to Hell

We're all going to Hell

Who: Brock Rumlow & Sam Wilson
When: 6+ months post-TWS
What: Tans knows. I know. Yet another reason we have poor life choices because of conversations with each other.
Warnings: Rumlow, dubious science, sex no doubt.

Time was a slippery mistress to chase when one hadn't seen the outside world in a long time. The Hive was a facility that was designed to be both a prison and a feast of scientific advancement, buried in the ground and having little need to have any come to the top three prison levels for any more than resupplying. It was a revolving door of fresh faces and experimentation, hidden within plain sight and maintained by an apparent good standing in a functioning if hard penal system.

Rumlow hadn't had a chance to look at the date when he was stolen from the hospital room, not exactly his first priority. He knew upon awakening and being told he was at the Hive that he had been traded to another division to use up what was left of him. That was fine by him as all previous estimations were that he would never been fully functional as an agent again with the extent of damage that he had suffered. He was fine living out the rest of his life being of service.

Except he didn't die.

HYDRA was always on some advancement, and it seemed interested in the relative youth of the super-soldiers and the limited youth effects of Centipede. It had a good serum made up that was in test phase, and who better to test the effects on then the washed out remains of soldiers from the Washington D.C. failure. It began slowly at first and earnestly when responses were recorded. Alphas, fueled by testosterone and aggression and dominance, showed little production and response, though there was some age-stopping effects noted. Betas, the middle ground that swayed between nature and nurture, were moderately successful and lost a few apparent years and maladies that were associated with age. Omegas, nurturing and estrogen based and designed to take all manner of punishment, responded better than anyone expected. Years bled away (literally), they returned to prime 'breeding' years as it was called and they were suddenly on great interest.

Brock had healed well, his scarring bleeding away with the years that reversed him. Aches, pains and old injures sorted themselves out. He was a rarity. Among the omega population, only twenty percent were born male and the rest were all female, who had a more nurturing nature. His rarity had been a curse for most of his life, only HYDRA saving him from life in the underbelly. He had joined first because he had been guaranteed heavy duty and very experimental suppressants; as one of the few male omegas, he had first crack at them and disregarded any danger associated with them. It was better to be on them than risk heats every three months in his prime.

Now with the experimentation at its peak, he was back to where he had started when he was twelve and showed his nature. He hadn't been on suppressants since the Triskelion had fallen on him, and his highly regarded and coveted 'maleness' fell away. His hips ached constantly, the scent glands on his neck had developed out of forced dormancy, a considerable amount of his old musculature had not returned despite his aggressive attempts, and looking every bit like the man he had been when he was twenty-five or so, even his facial hair, once so prized by him and always left somewhat rugged, struggled to grow.

Worse, his second heat in twenty-five years had come and gone, leaving him in isolation so as not to send all the other omegas (all female but one other) into heats of their own.

The worst of it was the itch that he had spent most of his time ignoring getting stronger. At first, he thought little of it until the noises of doctors and guards alike giving orders and hurried moving equipment and paperwork. Within hours, the itch grew and Rumlow knew. The Hive had been discovered and was being taken down by whatever remained of SHIELD or the Avengers or whatever organization was giving HYDRA the chase around at this point. He had hoped that he wouldn't come, but the thin thread of bond that was still so new and foreign was searching and crawling through his mind. It was deep already.

Wilson.

Rumlow remained at the back of his cell, his knees pulled up and his arms resting across them as he stared at the door. The prison jumpsuit was almost threadbare and at least see-through in more than a few places, an indication of the time that had passed. It was probably too much to ask that he would be passed over in the raid, and he huffed softly at the sound of gunfire and the invasion. Perhaps Wilson would consider him a lost cause and let him go, but no... even with only thirty minutes of contact, his near death and then disappearance, the bond remained unbroken. Who would leave their bond behind? Him maybe.

Maybe not with his hormones running on full, and while he certainly wasn't a typical omega, he still was one. Certain rules of his nature applied even after thirty years of neglect of them and the same amount of time hating them. He had learned long ago how to manipulate with his hormones; he could do so again as long as his bond didn't step in. Chances? Slim to none.

"Don't do it. You'll regret every single moment of it," he whispered at the closed door. "I'll make you regret."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

“Don't play that card when we both know you're the old one here.” Sam's lips were conspicuously away from Rumlow's neck. The warmth of the bond couldn't wipe away the sheer terror that'd flared at even a hint of a mating bite being laid and Sam didn't want a repeat performance.

He pressed his cheek and and his nose into skin, muttered back with a rumble of annoyance too soon smoothed by Rumlow allowing the touch in his hair. Those little intimacies had always been his bread and butter with relationships even if none of them had been the bonded sort.

They rumble along for a few more minutes before Sam eased himself up, pulling Rumlow with him by his bound hands. Strange as it was he hadn't been thinking about mating in the least as they calmed down but the glint of the metal made him catch on a possibility, a want. “I can't stay braced like than for an hour an a half.”

Sam reached down, picking up his fallen jacket. “Scoot. On your side.”

"Yeah, practically robbing the cradle," he said with a roll of his eyes. They were hilariously close to thirteen or so years apart. He chortled at the idea that he had differentiated into an omega in and around the same time that Wilson had been born, his own private joke. "You were in diapers when I was being productive."

He grumbled back at Wilson in their own little disapproving language, and he save the question of getting his hair cut the way that he liked it for the time being. However, his grumbling noise of disapproval was back when Sam moved away from him, forcing his face away and he reluctantly followed.

"Is that how long it's going to take to get wherever we're going?" Half an hour wasn't that long. He eyed the jacket and settled down, putting his back to the truck where it was more defensible and folded his bound hands close to his chin. "Don't think you get to order me around all the time."

“Don't think you can go and be an asshole to everyone I know all the time,” Sam shot back mildly enough. He sat himself on the floor on the van right next to where Rumlow's head was and shoved his jacket at him until there was a lift and proper pillowing. After that he left his arm where it was, half-draped over the edge of the cushion in a position that wasn't really more comfortable but far more sustainable.

He could pet, touch and keep mingling their scents like this which is all he felt like he couldn't get enough of.

“But yeah, about that long.” Sam added to answer the question. “How old are you, anyway?”

"Well, I'm going to act like myself whenever I want to, so if the people you know are close, you better warn them that my natural state of being is that of an asshole," he replied with a hint of regret about it. He wasn't going to change who he was just because someone didn't like how he happened to act. That was just the way of things.

Yet, he huffed and lifted his head until the jacket was under his head, a comfortable enough pillow. He could even give himself the illusion it was safe for a sleep and God knew he was tired enough. He felt the brush of Wilson's arm when he moved his head, eyeing the other man resting close by.

"Haven't read my file yet? It's all kiss and tell in there," he said with a smirk. He closed his eyes and sighed. "I'm forty-five."

"Well, that's fair warning for one," Sam replied, glancing over to where Steve was watching with his personal brand of dry amusement. One of the most important save for his family. The thought of them made him sober a bit. He hadn't told his family who had a long and strong tradition of impressive bonds about his own. Classified for one and the second-? How was he supposed to explain?

They'd want to meet him, know him, make him a part of the family and at this immediate moment he's really not sure how to mesh both parts of his life with limited bloodshed.

And he'd honestly kill the man if he did anything to his family. Bond or no bond.

There'd been a hint of a smirk on Sam's lips until that train of thought, by the time Rumlow gave him his age it had faded. He whistled though. Not too far off from what he'd estimated. "People offered to give it to me. Turned them down. Didn't want to get too attached."

For a severe bit of irony.

Rumlow shrugged, figuring that Wilson didn't particularly need a warning about him. He was practically a walking warning by now, given his history and now his presence here with Sam as a far younger looking man than he should have been. He hadn't been coherent for test result details, but he knew that the doctors had tested on him more than the others.

He expected that there would be little to no life for him beyond wherever SHIELD threw him. They'd want to test him of course, keep him isolated so that there was no contact to the outside world. The bond might make things complicated at first, but suppressants might shut it down.

Or maybe Wilson was going to have to be stuck on a time table close to him.

"Ah well, that's a good policy to have," he agreed soberly. "It's a good policy to keep especially now. This is... deeper than it should be."

Probably the latter.

His world was about to narrow down a whole hell of a lot and not all of him could resent Rumlow for it at the moment. More, he chafed against knowing what was waiting once they climbed out of the van at the end of this little trip.

Sam sighed out, laying his head on his outstretched arm. “No joke, man. This is nuts.” To be perfectly frank.

Can we-? The question still echoed in him. Another one started to form which didn't have the easy answer it should have: if they can get this thing dissolved, would they? He figured Rumlow would in a heartbeat for his own freedom, couldn't blame him. He wanted the same but... “You don't reach and I won't. Can't promise it'll keep things as they are right now but it certainly won't add to the process.”

He couldn't imagine much worse than the way that the bond choked him when it was hitting him full force. Even now, he felt it warm and pulsing at the back of his mind, a constant presence despite all he was doing to ignore it. It felt like he was about to overheat at any moment if he paid too much attention to it or worse... he'd go back to being unable to breathe.

He snorted and kept his eyes closed, pretending like he could sleep but unwilling to let his guard down that much. Instead, he slid his arms under the jacket and his head to increase the firmness of his 'pillow.'

"We've survived isolation before," he said simply, as if it were just that easy. His fingers flexed and brushed against Sam's arm on the other side of the jacket. That too was just that easy. "If this doesn't dig any deeper, we'll just... have to avoid contact or something. It can't get worse that way, right?"

He opened one eye and peered at Sam. "Right?" He was showing his ignorance on bonds because he had no idea how to stop or even start the process.

Both of Sam's brows were raised in response, mouth slightly open with an incredulous air.

“Yeah, we survived. But we barely even were near each other for what? Fifteen minutes and the bond still didn't fail.” Something that new and tremulous would have had every reason to unravel like it did for even for normal pairs. There was a lot of talk and speculation (and even more marketing) behind soul resonance and probability for a strong lasting bond to form. Sam had only kept up with it because of his requirements down at the VA, but personally? Dating alphas made the whole thing moot.

Rumlow talked about avoiding contact at the same time he reached out to touch him, making it hard to think about going back to the cold fog of not having that contact or the whole warming in the back of his head.

“You can only stay away from your bond so long before it starts eating at you. We were lucky it was only as strong as it was before.So we'd have to at least see each other. I'm not going nuts just because of this. ” And you aren't either. went unvoiced but felt.

“That's Bonding 101, though, man.”

He wouldn't voice the fact that their bond had formed when he had been on heavy suppressants, the new experimental ones that deadened pretty much everything that could and would be omega. He hadn't even considered the possibility that he could take a bond at all like that, but here they were, sitting around a truck talking about it.

Like some bond pair. Or civilized adults. Maybe he slept through the bond lessons? Or better yet, maybe he'd just skipped that day entirely.

"Are you saying because we had that little... episode, that we're not going to be able to be separated for long periods of time?" He frowned at that because it was going to make life difficult given where he was going to end up. He was going to bring Wilson down with him, was that it? Would Steve allow that? Would Wilson?

"Once I get my suppressants, maybe it will dumb down."

"Maybe the kind your were on." For people with normal-level bonds? People who weren't suddenly shifted People tried not to damper them. The bond was sacred, a good thing. So on and so forth.

Maybe for them it wouldn't be too outrageous to find ones that could damper a bondlink. Just for something less intense, less pulling. Sam looked back at his bonded with a flatness that clearly spoke to Rumlow answering his own question while he was asking it.

"But it's possible. I don't know. I haven't done this before, fyi. Cap says it's manageable but... he's sort of different too." Steve wasn't keen on being experimented on so he'd been told it was largely untested but there were loose theories of how the supersoldier serum enhanced the synchrony of bonding while allowing bondmates to survive apart with less strain.

Or it was just Steve being Steve.

Sam chewed on the inside of his mouth, wanting to mention the secondary plans that were in place just in case SHIELD didn't let both of them go in a way that was actually reasonable, which he'd been doubting the whole mission. They needed to tag along on the run to get Rumlow out, they didn't need them much after figuring out if Rumlow was going to stay stable.

"For the record, I'm going to say it makes no sense that this happened to us." And he'd heard of some cooky bonds.

"I want those suppressants again," was all he said because everything else about the bond and how little sense it made was news to him. He hadn't been in one until a few months ago, and this was the closest and most cordial they had been to one another. The bond was also digging at him more, warming him and giving him the false notion that he was safe and could let his guard down.

That was a lie. He was in the hands of the enemy being taken to only HYDRA knew where to be pulled apart bit-by-bit. It didn't stop him from shifting his arm deeper under the jacket he was using for a pillow and grip Wilson's wrist, his thumb passing over the scent gland for the remainder of their trip as he closed his eyes and pretended to sleep. He was no where close to it as much as he knew he needed it.

He didn't know how long they spent in the van, but his eyes snapped open when it stopped. He pushed himself up and allowed himself to be drawn away to a SHIELD facility, one that he knew only from the books and little else. It was a medical center, and he suspected it now doubled as a prison and a military outpost to launch missions from. Of course, he would only see two ends of that, and he glanced back only once to Wilson as they were separated in the hallway. It was a lingering glance.

He was stripped down, given an opportunity to bathe under supervision, do his teeth, brush his hair and shave what little hair he had managed to grow on his face. Then the tests started, blood tests first (how the hell did they need that much?), questions about his project at the facility. He was read his rights around that time, impressing upon him that he had no other option but to cooperate and the only way that he was going to get the one thing that he wanted (suppressants) was to at least give them everything on what had happened to him in the Hive.

When he resisted, he was taken to a prison cell that doubled as a ward room. He was hooked up to an intravenous fluid drip to replenish his fluids and a bland meal that looked like something they would feed the asset. He picked at it, mostly because he was distracted by the bond that linked him with Wilson.

He didn't like being separated. He gritted his teeth, insisting to himself that it was an 'omega' thing and once he had the pills, he'd be just fine again. Ah yes, his blood results were back hours later. His hormones were all over the place, and not just from post-heat either: he was showing long term signs of deprivation. He was also malnourished, dehydrated but enviously functional like any good twenty-five year old. That he expected and still didn't answer their questions about how he was what he was. They'd take more samples soon enough he knew, once the tubes of blood already taken led to no real results.

He sighed and picked at the edge of the tape holding his catheter in his vein, ignoring the pull to reach out or call out for Wilson. Just an omega thing. No big deal; he'd handled it before. You know, when he was like seventeen.

Sam liked being separated just about as much as Rumlow did - not much at all.

And he was about as conflicted, twisting over how much effort it took to sit in his plastic chair and stay put through the beginning session of their debriefing. He could still feel the weight of Rumlow's eyes on him before they were set in opposite directions - his hair had been mused from sleeping on the jacket Sam didn't even try to let him keep, his face continuing along in its soft guise which wasn't quite right but still appealing. It'd been a glance though it stuck for a moment. Even after Rumlow was lead off he stared after him, only nudged into moving by Steve's hand on his shoulder and his voice softly calling.

Debriefing was always the most annoying part of the whole mission, even past the wearying grind of waiting boredom. Hill headed it, each of the three teams reported with Steve giving theirs on the isolation and Specialized Projects wards. Rumlow was mentioned, a few of the other HYDRA agents recovered had still been fitted with their own self-termination triggers, which they hadn't hesitated in pulling once they realized who their rescuers were.

All in all the mission had been fairly successful and unsettling like anything dealing with HYDRA was. Though it raised a fair number of new questions there were still some answered.

After the formal debrief came the individual one with Coulson on tap through a holographic screen that made HD look pretty paltry. That's when attention turned sharply towards him and Rumlow, towards the bond. Did he learn anything? (Not much) Did Rumlow elaborate on what was done to him? (Minimally) How deep was the bond?( Significant. Though Sam started to find himself hedging, feeling too exposed under the scrutiny and the bonding expert brought in).

He echoed Rumlow's demands for suppressants, arguing that he might actually be more manageable on them than not. He did so with his hand right on Rumlow's file, which he was flipping through to find exactly what he'd been taken before. "He wasn't always like this and an omega, he's probably not able to balance himself-"

Which is when Hill cut in with a pinch between her brows. Then she told him, told him that Rumlow was always an omega to Sam's uncomprehending stare.

She slid back several pages in the electronic file on the tablet he held to the HYDRA one, not SHIELD"s which still clearly listed Brock Rumlow as Alpha.

Omega.

With the line of the suppresants he'd been taken typed in neatly. He wasn't familiar with the brand (or rather, not-brand) but it had Omega in it's designation.

Sam's eyes flicked over to the date. Last updated a good year before Project Insight came crashing down.

"...Always?"

"By birth."

"He never said that."

Sam wasn't quite so proud at how he mostly tuned out after that. Tactful and perhaps sympathetic, Hill kept the rest of the briefing short but Sam found himself chafing with the combination of side-looks from Coulson, Maria and Steve.

He was dragged to medical just the same, blood was drawn and the promise of results soon but one look over from the doctor had him saying that he looked bond-starved.

Sam was severely tempted not to follow the thread pulling at him towards where he felt Rumlow was, let him rot. Let him just stay there and be a lab toy because he didn't want to look at him.

Except for he did.

They weren't all that enthused to let him in when he showed up on the medical floor of the facility but some low steady insistence and maybe whatever the agent saw in the flat look of his eyes convinced him to give them at least fifteen minutes. Everything was sterile, without the twisted rank of the Hive laying underneath. Chrome-blue walls and glass fronts to the cells. Part-prison, part-med ward, part-lab. Rumlow was the sole occupant all over again. He found his cell and came near with his boots scuffing light.

He leaned on the glass wall, one arm bent up and bracing flat against the cold surface. "Hey."

Which he wasn't pushing alpha tones, they were there shadowing the bottom of that single word without any effort, pulling on the bond, shifting though the speaker that turned on once he reached over to the side and placed his hand on the light-blue patch of glass that turned it on. His position was still up and braced, caging without touch.

"You got anything else you need to tell me?"

One more shot.

There was something in the bond, a sort of stillness from Wilson that he couldn't pinpoint as something in specific. He often spent as much time as he could ignoring it that it was completely second nature to him now, though the weight of it was much harder to bear than it ever had been when he was a younger man. Back then, it had been about survival and keep his proverbial tail tucked between his legs so no one even thought of sniffing after him like he was easy prey to take for a ride.

HYDRA had been his salvation, the one place to offer him the only things that he wanted: purpose and physical ability to deny what he was. He had given everything that he could to HYDRA because it had given him what he needed, and his commitment was for life without a hint of wayward thought on the matter. He served well and easily. No one bothered him because of his status but bothered him when he wasn't measuring up. Otherwise, he earned his place and his lumps like everyone else.

The bond tugged at him, foreign but familiar now. The distance between himself and Wilson was closing, and he tried vainly to squish the pleasure of knowing that his bond was close and getting closer. Why would anyone else want to visit him aside from to plumb for information on what he knew?

Something was off in that bond though, and it was curious enough that he turned his head to view the glass that separated his little cell with the halls and rooms. It was a nicer prison but still one, and he had no doubt that he would be kept here for as long as it took to tease the details of his existence and current appearance out of him. Maybe Wilson was coming to say good-bye, off on another mission somewhere and leaving him behind to endure. It was what he was good at.

His dark eyes took in his bond when Wilson appeared at the window, and he stood from the bed, grabbing the IV pole to pull it with him over to the window. As he came closer, he stopped a few steps away and knew that the truth was out, that Wilson knew what he was and how they happened to be a real match rather than a really natural oddity. Alphas didn't bond with alphas; alphas bonded omegas and sometimes betas.

Rumlow sighed heavily, meeting Sam's gaze despite the fact he probably shouldn't. He approached the rest of the way and leaned his arm against the window, letting his temple settle on the glass near Wilson's arm.

"I've been on suppressants since I was nineteen. I've wanted them since I was seventeen," he said simply. "HYDRA asked only for my loyalty if I got what I wanted; we both won, so it came to be." He knew that anything he said could be used against him, but that part should be obvious by now, if Sam knew that he had been born into his world as he was.

"The only one to hate my status more than myself was... my old man," he said very softly. "Always wanted a son, he said, then I turned twelve and... well, whatever." He shrugged his shoulders like it was all water under the bridge for him, something long ago accepted as just another aspect of his past which he so often didn't look back on. "My suppressants are all experimental. Before Insight washed out, I was basically killing myself with that shit, but I didn't care. To everyone, I could be alpha so long as it didn't kill my liver and they got to know how that shit worked in real life situations."

He huffed and cast a glance at Wilson. "Then I was transferred to the Hive where the serum they created worked best on omegas. Anything else you want to know?"

Something inside of his clawed slaw and frustrated at the division due to the glass. He could see and hear Rumlow but he couldn't touch him when he leaned near his hand and he couldn't scent him like this. Their bond thrummed strong, though. That didn't give a shit about the glass.

Sam's right hand curled into a fist and lightly thumped against the wall. He closed his eyes and drew in a long breath,.

“I was up there pushing for that shit without a clue. I asked you back there.” He was going to ask if Rumlow was just going to let him keep on thinking that he'd always been an alpha until recently but the answer was clear enough through demonstration and recent explanation.

“We're so fucked.” There had been some hopeful shred keeping him calm when he thought that maybe the serum or at least the designation could be reversed but now that was gone and he felt trapped. Trapped and wholly unsure how they were going to make this work. His laugh was short and tight and only amused in the most obscure sense. “Even when you were on them back then we still bonded.”

The glass allowed him to hear the way that Sam's fist thumped, though he couldn't tell if the cause of it was the information that he was only now revealing or something else entirely. He supposed that it didn't matter because Sam was unfortunately stuck with him until the debriefings were all over and his bond was ushered off once they had learned to accept separation.

Bonds did that, right? He would perhaps actually request information on it.

"I answered one of your questions, but I didn't specify which one. HYDRA de-aged me, and they technically turned me back into an omega by denying me suppressants." It was a weak technicality that wouldn't even hold up in court, but it had been his choice to do as he pleased, the first time in awhile.

He tilted his head and closed his eyes, feeling the stirring that had never quite gone away in the lab the last week. It was getting stronger again, a slow burn that first crept awareness up his spine. "Clearly you and I were really meant for each other," he said sardonically. He suddenly shoved off the glass and gripped his pole again. "And if we want to keep from the fucking part of your statement, you better get out of here."

Sam's lips thinned at that answer, which was splitting hairs as finely as they could go. Technically was bullshit and they both knew it, but if Rumlow insisted on sticking to that then fine.

He watched Rumlow close his eyes with wary discomfort, trying to figure out where they go from here. What they're going to do and if he should give Steve the tip off to move them out. There was no guarantee that Rumlow wouldn't just make a beeline for the nearest gun once he a longer leash and off himself- or Sam and drag himself through the ramifications if it didn't immediately take him down too.

It's hard, really hard, to believe they were meant for each other.

He almost missed what was being implied with that last statement. There was an automatic flare, Sam reaching for the scent of it though he couldn't with the glass between them. "You just had one, you can't be on the edge of another."

But even normal omegas could end up grossly irregular when they got off suppressants...

Sam pressed his hand flat to the glass, carefully pushing himself back.

In HYDRA, splitting hairs was a good way to keep from under another man's boot, little white lies that allowed them to negotiate around each other without violence. It was a skill mastered more for his years of service in SHIELD where the wrong word, tone or sentence could expose everyone. The game had to be played precisely. It was a habit long ingrained.

He walked back to his poor excuse for a bed and seated himself, pretending to be interested in the tape when he was far, far more interested in either staying near the glass near Wilson or wait for the alpha pointedly at the door. He had enough self-control to avoid both, to give his bond time to rush away and save them any sort of action that they would no doubt come to regret.

Could they...? No, they couldn't. In the truck, they had proven how bad it had been, how strong the tide was that would swallow them both if they just let it happen.

"I am," he said simply. "I figure us being thrown together and then suddenly parted again helped, though... you can't deny that you almost rutted in the van. You considered biting me. If my brain picked that up, you can't damn well be sure my body did."

He was so screwed. He needed those suppressants badly if he was going to head this off. He doubted anyone as severely and chronically bond starved as he was was going to get what he wanted, not when it played most into the hands of the people wanting answers. He wondered if Wilson was also showing signs of bond starvation. He knew alphas could, but it was after a life-bond, wasn't it?

The fatigue. Increased appetite and even a subtle loss of muscle-mass that Sam had noticed were all outward signs that he was bond-starved. They'd been confirmed in his evaluation with the doctor giving sympathetic eyes and Sam trying to ignore them. The strain of the distance and maybe the fact it was half-formed and constantly working to keep the thin, stubborn tether made his daily expenditure of energy about one and a half instead of just one. Fine for supersoliders but not for normals.

All of it screamed life-bond.

"Considered. It wouldn't have happened." But that was a tiny point that didn't do anything to help the fact that it was likely a good source for inducing a fresh new heat for Rumlow's body. He'd wanted to bite and rut and his instincts clamored to have what'd been denied for far too long.

Sam backed up. He didn't want to, he wanted to open the door as much as Rumlow wanted to be there waiting for him but it'd only make it worse.

"You give them something you might actually get suppressants," he reminded him. It didn't have to be anything big. Sam was all for Rumlow splitting hairs in a thousand of ways if it could make sure he would be operational when they needed to move. "It doesn't have to be lab rat for the rest of your life."

He didn't mean with SHIELD but he couldn't come right out and say that with their monitoring fixated on the both of them. It was tempting to reach out and try to tell Rumlow directly, through the bond but he didn't want to chance that - not with the memory of what happened in the van here brought up anew.

It wouldn't have happened because of how badly they had reacted, stumbling around in their own bond and freaking one another out. It hadn't been anything like the smooth brushes and nudges in his cell before fresh air had been introduced and the full measure of his situation had come crashing down around him and the bond had opened like a gully before him.

"And what am I going to give them, huh? I give them something while I'm like this, and it's all the more reason to squeeze me for more," he replied sullenly, drawing his legs up towards his chest and draping his arms across his knees. "They've already taken more blood than they need for simple tests on my health."

He looked to the window despite his better judgement to keep staring straight ahead. If this went where it seemed to be, it was going to be a rough ride. Already he was exhausted and hungry from his last heat and if another came on for the full four days, he wondered if he was even going to be sane on the other side. He'd have to make do; if he got tired enough, he'd just pass out. That might be the only blessing.

"Just... maybe you should put distance for three or four days. It will remove temptation." It wouldn't wouldn't it? He had no idea with the bond now stronger still.

Strange that Sam's first reaction to that suggestion is extreme reluctance that goes even beyond the push of instinct. Even putting up his hands and stepping back from the cell (which it really is, no hemming around that now) was an effort. It was all over his expression, an unhappy set etching deeper by the second.

Hilarious, simultaneously wanting to be with someone and not.

"Maybe."

A very doubtful maybe. " Definitely won't help if I just stand here and breath on you." So, he'll go.

"If it gets worse..." There was an honest desire in him not to know Rumlow would have to suffer through a full-blown heat on his own again. But he sighed, scrubbing his face. "Let's just hope it doesn't. And for the record? Sounds like your dad was a real asshole."

He'd mention that it might run in the family but that mix of an odd empathetic insult went unsaid.

There wasn't much else to say. They certainly weren't at the point for tearful goodbyes so Sam left with one last look. Ignoring the itch scratching at the back of his neck and his palms at putting space between them like the bond was physically protesting it all.

Three days was just three days. What was that on top of the six months they'd already gone through? Three days to work out a plan and that was a damn near luxury considering the past half-year.

Rumlow nodded, accepting that their self-control was about all that was holding them apart at this point. It was probably good that he wasn't in full heat yet or he didn't think either of them would stand up too well. He smirked at Sam's comment about his father, but it wasn't a topic to discuss with his bond about to leave.

"Hurry up and get out of here before you make it worse with your hovering," he commented, but Sam was already leaving. It twisted the bond inside of him to see Wilson up and leave him. He was still logical enough to know why and said nothing, reigning in the temptation to reach out. He was stronger than that.

Except when he wasn't. That weakness almost reduced him to cussing loudly.

His heat came on hard and fast, not entirely previously settled from the last time. Within eight hours, he had moved from the bed to the floor, pulling at his shirt to fan air through it as sweat beaded on his skin, drying as fast as it arrived. His legs were spread, his current hospital scrub trousers wet with slink and his breathing deep and frequent as any reasonable mental processing had been reduced to being aware of the bond and the horrible all consuming want of something hard and thick inside of him.

SHIELD let him suffer for a few hours, eyes glazed and uncomfortable. He endured well enough until their alpha agent entered, reeking of pheromones but wearing a mask to prevent any kind response to him. He groaned and arched on the floor as he was bombarded with questions about HYDRA, the Hive and where operations and personnel were stationed.

There was a lot of swearing from him in response, and he backed himself literally into a corner and ended up seizing his hair and tugging on it to concentrate on a little pain as the questions just kept coming. Worst goddamn torture ever as he was wound higher and higher into his own hormones with the presence of an alpha stinking up his room and pressing command after command on him.

Despite himself or because he was himself, he gave up very little information even when crowded in his corner. He had ended up biting his lower lip until it had bled, still tugging on his hair and hiding part of his attention into the very bond he loathed, hiding himself in Wilson and not caring how he did so.

The next real town that had a suitable safehouse was thirty miles through more fading moonlight and rising sunrise which Sam barely noticed and it wasn't enough. On his way out he let the handlers in the ward know that Rumlow was clearly in pre-heat, that he needed suppressants and his concerns noted readily enough but it was clear even as he talked that they had little intentions of carrying that further. A bad heat wouldn't kill someone unless it got completely out of control and since Rumlow had survived the fresh slew of heats without anything in the Hive, what was one more?

He was HYDRA, he and his team responsible for no few deaths of numerous SHIELD agents and associates. There was little love lost and just enough put in towards his conditions. The good guys looked shaded pretty gray in his opinion, even if he could understand.

And the sooner they got away from the mess of it, the better.

Idealistic notions of three or four days went out the window as a possibility ten hours later. Maybe there wasn't enough distance between them but he's pretty sure he'd have to be in Asia not to feel Rumlow. Sam woke up in the dim, blind-shut air of the safehouse he and Steve took themselves to, tangled in the blankets and sweating- reaching down to grip himself and the pounding ache that echoed the one in his head. He was barely awake and processing what's going on before he came hard, thickly into his hand and his sleep-shorts after a few seconds. It left him shuddering, gasping while his brain caught up and the obvious finally clicked.

The next groan wasn't pleasured but pained.

Worse. Worse. So much worse than it ever had been before. Sam dragged himself through the next few hours on obvious edge after cleaning himself up in a chilly shower, unable to keep from pacing the safehouse which was really just a small condo flat not meant to hold two alphas when one was on the edge of bond-induced rut. Anyone else and Sam was sure they would have been already at each other's throats. Despite that, Steve still leaves to take a long walk for both of their sakes and get dinner on the other side of the small Arizonian town. Sam only lasts another fifteen minutes with Rumlow's presence now digging into him like the glare of a high-beam blasting from the side of his vision.

He wrote Steve a note instead of calling, grabbed the keys and pushed over 80 the entire time back to the compound. He edged on polite the last time he made his way down to the medical facilities where Rumlow was being kept.

He wasn't polite this round.

Maria intercepted long enough just to shove a keycard in his hand and then nothing and no one else was dumb enough to stand in his way. He wouldn't hurt anyone, or at least he kept telling himself that, but had slammed one of the front guards against the wall when he insisted that he stand still and wait for permission to be radioed up.

He didn't need permission to see his mate. Not with him all by dragging him here through the bond.

Stepping into the cell was a rude awakening , though. Sam snarled, immediately catching the sharp spike of another alpha sticking in the air and Rumlow shoved into the corner with his heat choking thick.

"Did he touch you?" Sam was on him. With him on the floor in a second, hands grasping to pull Rumlow out of that tight curl and give him the space to fit close. Swear to god, he'd kill whoever that alpha was. He'd beat their face in at the very least. They couldn't do this. They couldn't do this to what was his.

"Did he touch you?" He was an idiot for listening, for trying to stay away.

Rumlow lost track of the number of ways the same question could be asked of him, but he ended up snarling and curling tighter. It wasn't to protect himself but to keep himself from lashing out and trying to act alpha in return. It was right on the cusp, right there for him to seize, but if he took that chance and he made contact, there was a chance he would be all omega and desperate and needy. He'd rather tear his own hair out and shriek obscenities until he was blue in the face than risk his status taking over.

Just when the distance between himself and the agent was closing and his shoulders were bunching to retaliate, the alpha was suddenly called away. The scent was still heavy in the air, and he was slick and miserable, hating the world most of all despite the continued and unholy need to be slammed around and forced upon. Something in the bond he shared tipped that scale, making it very real and very close, and he shivered where he was half-curled in the corner waiting for the next assault.

He was so hot. He couldn't breathe properly again. His clothing clung to his skin, and there was a livid bruise where he had torn the intravenous catheter out and abandoned it near the bed. There was no relief, just more slick and need and want pounding in his veins and head.

At the Hive anyone who came in to check on him had been a beta and fully clothed to prevent any kind of scent reaching him. That kind of neutrality was not going to be used here, and he was going to have to tear himself out. This place was going to use every single ounce of his heat to plumb him for information, and even he knew that eventually, if he was touched and that deep into his hormones, he might actually kiss and tell some vital information.

Then the door to the cell opened, and he tensed his shoulders. It wasn't necessary, as he recognized Wilson in the link and the suddenness of possessive hormones washing over him. He growled low in his throat until the first question hit him at the same time his bond was right there in front of him, pulling him out of the corner. It wasn't why hadn't he talked, why was he resisting... it was if he had been touched.

His arms flew out to curl around Wilson's neck and clutch at the other man's shoulders tightly as he practically threw himself out of the corner into his bond's arms. His face went immediately for the crook of Wilson's neck to nose and suck on scent glands there, the wash of rightness chasing off any other thought of resistance.

"No... and you're here now," he growled. His fingers grasped and dragged down the back of Sam's scalp. "Get me out of here, Wilson. Fuck you smell good."

“Good.” Sam barely recognized the low grunt of his voice it was so buried under the deep drag of his rut. Good, no one had touched him. They hadn't stooped that low but the gross offense of sending another alpha into Rumlow's space when he was obviously in heat still clawed at him. The only thing he could do to soothe that was shove them back, push with all his strength until he had his mate caged against the wall.

The kiss was brutal, a hard grip on the back of Rumlow's neck and his head used to drag his head back so he could get at his mouth. Teeth and fighting hunger. Months and moths of pent up need and he needed him. Sam had no doubt that he smelled good to Rumlow, he should, but his bond scented five times more compelling. Hot and metal-sweet with the trace of salt from his sweat and the thick, thick musk from the slick Sam wanted to bury himself in body and mouth.

He tore at Rumlow's shirt until it was off, not carrying if stitches ripped getting it off. His skin was burning hot even through Sam's shirt. The hospital scrubs went next, dragged down soft thighs with his fingers brushing slickness which brought a groan fed into Rumlow's mouth. “God, you're wet.”

They couldn't leave. Not yet. He meant to tell Rumlow that but everything short-circuited in his brain feeling that evidence. “Tell me you want this.” Because if they needed to stop it had to be right here and right now. Sam had no idea if he was going to be able to stop himself without serious damage if they kept going.

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