Times Six

3

This chapter contains brief depictions of penetrative and oral vaginal sex, including descriptions of pornography.

Namjoon spends the rest of his heat alternating between hating himself and loathing himself. The initial pangs of embarrassment fade away and make room for knife-sharp stabs of guilt. He resolves not to get off for the rest of his heat – partly to punish himself, partly to atone for his deeds, and partly to prove to himself that he doesn't need it. He lays ramrod straight and still on the cool cotton of his sheets, achingly hard and empty, and does nothing about it. It hurts, makes his balls feel tight, like his skin is about to split open. But he can't bear to do anything about it. He doesn't need it. He doesn't, he's not an animal. He's still a person, and he's still him.

Kind of.

He feels different, like he'd given too much of himself and taken too much of the others. He'd given in to these base instincts that had laid dormant for centuries and now he's not sure of who he is or how that person fits into the pre-existing structure that the old him helped to create. How does he rejoin the rest of them, after what he's done? He considers, briefly, that maybe he doesn't rejoin them, but quickly dismisses the thought – it would damage their careers, too, and he can't take that from them after all he's already taken.

They stop knocking on his door after the first day, but he can still hear their soft feet pattering up to his door – sometimes alone, sometimes in groups – to listen, to smell. Their shadows linger long after they leave.

He does have to leave eventually, though. Sejin makes a rare appearance in the apartment on the third day of his self-imposed imprisonment under no pretenses except to see how he's doing. The others said he was in heat and sick on top of it, so was he ok, he asks. Namjoon doesn't know how to answer the question, but Sejin seems satisfied with the promise that he'll be back at work the next day. He knows he can't wait any longer, anyway. His heat ended yesterday and he's still locking himself in the dungeon of his room.

Namjoon times it so he's left a little later than the others the next morning, who are all going to practice before going to the studio in the afternoon. He doesn't want to be alone with them in a place they can ask him questions that he doesn't want to answer with apologies he's not sure how to formulate. So he leaves shortly after they do, long enough to ensure that he'll walk into the practice room just as the choreographer is warming up. On his way out, he sees that the cushions on the couch have all been flipped over.

Their heads all swivel towards him, perfectly in sync, and he's out of step. He thinks he's going to vomit but he smiles instead, not looking at any of their eyes, looking past them, looking at their ears instead of their eyes.

"Ah, sorry I'm late!" he says to the general room, including the choreographer, a nice beta who presented late, who they'd all teased about her crush on her omega colleague who sometimes joined rehearsals for critiques. She waves him off.

"Namjoon-ssi, it's fine, you've really been through it, from what these guys tell me." She doesn't mean it like that, probably, but it takes a lot of self control to not let his smile drop completely off of his face. "Just come and get warmed up while we start. Jump in when you're ready!" He bows his head and walks as smoothly as he can to the back of the room, the weight of their gazes threatening to trip him with every step.

Namjoon takes longer than he should to warm up, watching and not-watching the others dance. He's afraid. He's afraid that they hate him, and he knows that's what they'd be right to do. He's afraid that they don't hate him, too, and that he won't be able to self-flagellate under the guise of their hatred; he'll just have to accept that he did something terrible.

They're starting up again and Namjoon falls into his place between Seokjin and Yoongi, who barely react. He can't tell if that hurts or not. Why can't he just decide what he wants? Why can't he do the right thing? The music starts and they move together, breathing and writhing as a unit.