Chapter Text
In the end, their plan succeeds. They take out the demogorgon, close the gate and get the lab shut down without losing any of their people. Steve takes El back to his house to hide out but his heat hits him quickly once they get back. Nancy agrees to stay the night at his to look after both of them but she does not help Steve with his heat like she had the first time around.
Hopper stops by the second day to check on both El and Steve to give Nancy a break and let her go home. Steve was struggling more than last time. He had not really let his body take its natural course last time around. After his first heat he had chosen to hide his designation from everyone including his parents. He had gone on strong suppressants right away and never been through another heat since that first time with Nancy. This time, he was going it alone and it was much harder to deal with the changes to his body by himself.
He was, however, surprised that the presence of one of his pups was helping to calm him. He could sense El in the house even though she knew to stay out of his room and let the adults help him if needed.
Steve also missed Robin through it all. He knew her presence would help ease his pain as well. She would distract him by rambling off facts about alphas and omegas while giving off her neutral beta scent. He ached for his best friend like a missing limb, and in his more lucid state he tried to come up with ways to approach her in this time line without scaring her away.
He made plans of his own on how he wanted to do better this time around. He knew his life needed a drastic change if he wanted to live up to the man he wanted to be.
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Once Steve’s heat had passed he knew his parents were due to be home the next day so he called a meeting of the whole party one last time at his house.
He was not sure how being out as an omega would change things with his parents and he didn’t want to give anyone false hope of his home being available to them long term.
Once they were all assembled, Steve took lead of the meeting to get them all on the same page.
“So, I have to return to school tomorrow and this time around I am not going to be taking any suppressants. So that means I’m not sure what will change on the timeline we have. I know we have already changed a lot by stoping the mind flayer from infecting Will. And we saved Barb and Benny. We have no idea what more changes to the time line will do the events that happen later. I know I’m not the planning person, but I think we will need to move El from here before my parents return tomorrow and we may need to come up with a new meeting place. I don’t know what they will do when they find out I’m an omega. I hid it from them last time but they are going to know this time.” Steve finished. He knew he was possibly messing up their plans by changing more events than just the upside down related incidents, but he had to take this opportunity. He could not continue with the lies he had lived last time. He had to be true to himself.
Dustin, Mike and Lucas all interjected at the same time, all with different opinions.
“If they kick you out you can always come live with me and Ma, Steve. This is not really an issue right now” Dustin said with his usual tone, suggesting he thought Steve was an idiot for worrying about this.
“Why can’t you just do the same thing you did last time?” Mike asked. “We don’t know if we change too much how much we will be affecting. We really need to keep as much the same this time as last time so we can better prepare using our advanced knowledge of the future.” He seemed to also think Steve was an idiot.
“Why did you hide that you were an omega last time? It’s not like there is anything wrong with being an omega? And what would your parents do to you? Why are they not here now?” Lucas asked. He seemed mostly confused by Steve being worried about his parent’s reactions. Steve knew Lucas’s parents were good people and had raised their children to be proud of who they were and not let people treat them differently because of things they could not control.
Hopper, Nancy and Joyce all seemed to be done with the kids antics and the meet up had only just begun. Steve sighed as he settled in for a long evening.
“None of that is important right now,” Steve said warily. “We need to come up with a plan for El, and a new meeting place we can use if my house can’t be used. My choices on my body are my own and are not up for debate. Understood?” He leveled the three boys with a glare and then took a seat down by El who also glared at the boys.
“Alright everyone, let’s get to work. We also need to plan for the next attack from the mind flayer as well as what to do if the government comes for us,” Nancy said. She stepped in to take charge of the meeting from there and kept them all on track.
In the end, the group decided that they were going to move El for now to move into the Wheeler’s basement until they had Hopper’s cabin built or Steve’s parents left again. Hopper said he should have the cabin ready for her within the month. Until then, Nancy was tasked with looking after her and her and Mike would keep El hidden.
Joyce and Johnathan were going to reach out to Murray early and fill him in on the going’s on in Hawkins. They knew they would need his help to keep tabs on the government and be a safe house if they needed a place to run to.
Steve planned to work with the boys on training up with weapons. He also told them he planned to try to reach out to Robin early and see if he could convince her to help him out. He wanted to learn and study Russian so that if they were going to come to Hawkins again, they would be more prepared. Dustin wanted to learn as well so he wanted to tag along if Steve could convince Robin to help him.
With plans laid out, the party agreed to meet up again in a month to go over any updates or changes to their plans. They agreed to meet up at Joyce’s house as long as Hopper and El could do a full scan before they all arrived.
Once everyone had left for the night with plans in place for the coming month, Steve went to bed knowing that tomorrow, everything was about to change for him.
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Steve arrived at school the next day and took a deep breath before he got out of his car. He knew the moment anyone caught wind of his new scent, word would travel fast.
He made it to his locker before Tommy and Carol cornered him.
“Well, well, well” Tommy said, eyeing Steve up and down. “This explains so much.”
“Does it?” Steve asked.
“So that’s why you were gone all last week?” Carol asked loudly “you were in heat?!” Her voice echoed around the hallway as everyone near seemed to stop to hear the gossip. Steve swore he had never heard the school be so quiet before.
Steve took a brief moment to glance down and prepare himself for his next move. He had decided that he was just going to play indifferent to it all. Like it was no big deal. But it was hard when faced directly with Carol and Tommy’s cruelty. “Yeah, I was. If you don’t mind, I need to get to class. I have a lot of work to make up for from last week.”
Steve pushed past Tommy as he made a break for his classes. He hoped they would just drop it and move on but he didn’t seem to be that lucky. They both followed him down the hall asking questions of him.
“Wait, did you have your girlfriend help you through your heat?” Carol asked, again making sure everyone could hear her.
“Did you let her fuck you?” Tommy asked with a disgusted face.
“No” Steve replied at a normal volume. “Nancy and I broke up before I presented.” He said. It was true after all. Really they had been broken up for years now.
“Did she break up with you because you’re a freaky male omega now?” Tommy asked. That turned some more heads in the hallway.
Great. So the whole school was going to know before the first bell rang at this point.
“You know Tommy,” Carol said, “I did hear that Nancy was hanging out with that Byers weirdo. Maybe she likes the freaks at this school. Think she’ll go for Munson next?” Carol asked with a laugh.
Steve had to try really hard to tamp down his protective instincts. He didn’t care what they said about him, but Nancy was off limits for these two bullies.
“Don’t you guys have anything better to do right now?” Steve said. “Carol, I’m sure you have a math test to fail today and Tommy, don’t you have to go drop off that check from your daddy to the basketball coach so he lets you on the team this year?” Steve couldn’t help but get a few jabs in at them. Hopefully they would keep their focus on him and leave Nancy out of it.
Carol’s face screwed up and she started loudly crying her fake tears like she always did. “You are a disgusting freak Steve Harrington and I can’t believe we used to be friends!” She screamed as she ran off. He knew she would be spinning a story to anyone who would listen that Steve had insulted her for no reason. It was her go to move after all. Steve took a few cautious steps back from Tommy. He knew Tommy was likely to start swinging if he had an opening.
“Who the fuck do you think you are, Harrington?” Tommy said. “You think coach is going to want some omega slut on his team? I bet you just want to get passed around by the whole team, don’t you?” Tommy sneered at him.
“Whatever man,” Steve said, not taking the bait Tommy was trying to lay out. He knew Tommy was just trying to get Steve to throw the first punch. He wasn’t going to fall for it this time. “Are we done here? I really do need to get to class” Steve said.
“Yeah we are done. Don’t fucking talk to me or my girlfriend ever again you sick omega freak. I wouldn’t want to be caught dead with you. I can’t believe my best friend turned out to be some loose, omega whore,” Tommy spit out at him before turning and walking after Carol.
Steve let out a breath he had not realized he was holding. He had made it through his old friends. Now he just needed to make it through everyone else at school. And the people at his work tonight. And his parents when he got home tonight. It was going to be a long day.
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Steve had not been sure where he would sit at lunch. Normally he would have sat with Tommy and Carol. Last time around, after he and Tommy fought about Nancy, Steve had sat with Nancy and Jonathan at lunch. Now, he didn’t want to interrupt her time with Barb, who Steve remembered did not like him. So Steve decided he would take his lunch to the library to catch up on studying for his make up history test for tomorrow.
As luck would have it, he was not the only one who was taking lunch in the library. He saw Robin sitting at a table alone with a paper bag lunch and a huge book open in front of her.
“Mind if I sit with you?” Steve asked. He didn’t really wait for an answer before sitting down himself and pulling out a paper bag from his backpack.
“Uhhh….” Robin said. Steve could tell she was doing that deer in a headlight thing right now and that she needed time to come up with an answer so he just started to eat his sandwich as he glanced around at the contents of her lunch. He saw her mom had packed her apple sauce which he knew she hated.
He took out his snack pack pudding cup and gestured at the apple sauce. “Wanna trade?” He asked.
“Uuuummm….. sure? I guess?” She said, sounding anything but sure. “What is happening right now?” He could hear her whisper under her breath.
Steve took the apple sauce and gave Robin his snack pack. He took a peek at the book Robin was reading and saw that she was studying an English to Spanish dictionary. ‘Perfect opening’ he thought to himself.
“So, I see you are studying Spanish? Are you any good at, like, learning languages and stuff?” He asked. Steve immediately knew he sounded like a total idiot, but he wasn’t sure how else to ask.
Robin paused and seemed to think about her answer for a minute. “I can already speak French and Italian. I like learning new languages. Why? Are you gonna pick on me because I’m a nerd? Or just use me to help you pass a class like the other dumb jocks have tried to do?”
Steve knew he had to be very careful with his words here. He didn’t want to scare her off. “Actually, neither. I was just thinking if you were, like, good at this sort of thing, maybe you could help me with a personal project?”
“What kind of project?” Robin asked. She seemed curious, but still cautious.
“Ok don’t laugh, but I kinda babysit a bunch of middle schoolers and one of them, Dustin, wants to learn Russian. Like for fun? And I promised him I would help him learn but I actually kinda suck at learning new languages. Would you be willing to help me and him study?” Steve asked.
“Russian?” Robin asked skeptically. “Why Russian?”
Steve and Dustin and talked just yesterday about a plan to learn Russian. They were all going to try to learn a little bit so they were slightly more prepared for if/when they show up. Luckily, Dustin, had come up with an excuse that some of them could use.
“So he told me that he wants to learn Russian because he wants to be like an astronaut one day, and he said that Russia is the other super power when it comes to space travel. He thinks if he learns now, maybe one day he will have access to read their work as part of like, NASA or something?” Steve gave his version of what Dustin had said. He knew he did not explain it as well as Dustin but he was pretty sure he covered the basics of it.
“So you want me to study Russian and help you and a middle schooler learn Russian for fun? What do I get out of it?” She asked.
“Uhh… what do you want?” Steve asked. Had this been someone other than Robin, Steve might have suggested a date with him. But he knew that obviously would not work for Robin. He wasn’t sure what he could give her in exchange for this. He really didn’t care if she helped with the Russian or not. He just desperately wanted to be her friend again. He just needed his foot in the door.
Robin was silent for a while and was just staring at Steve. She seemed to be thinking over his request.
“Ok, I’ve been pretty bored lately and this seems like an odd, but fun, request so I’ll do it. But you have to meet me here to study. I’m not going to meet up with you at your house or anything. And this is not like, a date or anything. We are just studying, got that?” She said.
“Really?!” Steve asked excitedly. “Absolutely! Thank you so much! I promise I will do whatever you want. I really appreciate you helping me with this.”
“I’m still not sure I get it but you do seem genuine, and like I said, I’ve been pretty bored lately. So hopefully you are at least entertaining. Also, thanks for the pudding.” She said.
They finished lunch together and chatted a bit about school. They made plans to meet up again the rest of the week during lunch. Robin agreed to check out an English to Russian dictionary from the local library after school. Steve would have gone with but he has his first shift at Bennys’s tonight after school. Then he has to go home to face his parents.
The rest of the school day passes by and Steve is overwhelmed a bit by how much make-up work he has to do this week to catch up on all his classes. He hoped his next heat he would remember to prepare ahead of time with all his classes so he wasn’t so far behind when he got back.
He made his way over to Benny’s for his first shift as well. They just took the time to train him and show him around on the first day. But he left that night with a few extra dollars in his pocket from the tips he made. He was excited to have a job already so he could prepare for whatever his parents had in store for him.
Steve pulled into the driveway and saw his dad’s car parked in his normal spot. Steve left his car parked outside tonight in case he needed to make a speedy exit from his house. He had also packed a small bag of clothes this morning and left it in his truck just in case they kicked him out. He had place to go and a plan on how to get out.
He was as ready as he could ever be to face his parents for the first time ever as an omega. With one last, calming deep breath, Steve stepped out of the car and made his way up to the house. Time to face the music