Chapter 1
Shinichi sat on the floor in his father’s library, trying and failing to concentrate on his book. Try as he might to focus, his attention kept getting drawn to the boy sitting beside him. The boy in question, Kaito, was the son of his mother’s teacher.
When they had first been introduced a year ago, Shinichi had immediately noticed how similar Kaito looked to him. It wasn’t uncommon for them to be mistaken as brothers by strangers. The biggest difference in their appearance was their hair: Kaito’s being wild and unruly while Shinichi’s was much more neat except for a small bit that stuck up in the back. But while their appearance was similar, their personalities were anything but. Kaito was always bursting with energy and unable to keep still. Shinichi, on the other hand, tended to save his energy for the soccer field. It made playing with the other boy difficult sometimes. Sure, Shinichi loved playing tag as much as the next kid, but sometimes he just wanted to sit and read. What was wrong with that? They’d tried to compromise and play soccer, but Shinichi had given up when Kaito refused to follow the rules and kept touching the ball with his hands. In the end, Shinichi had resigned himself to the fact that when his friend came over, he wasn’t going to get any reading done that day.
Today was no different. Kaito was over, so of course he wasn’t making any progress in his book. Except this time it wasn’t because Kaito was demanding his attention.
Actually, today the opposite was the problem.
After watching him for several minutes in silence, Shinichi finally spoke up, “Kaito, what are you doing?”
Kaito glanced at him over his shoulder, “Ah, sorry Shin-chan. Am I being too loud?”
Shinichi puffed out his cheeks in a pout. “Kai, I told you to stop calling me that! I’m 7 years old already. I’m getting too old to be called Shin-chan.”
“No fair! Your mom still calls you Shin-chan,” Kaito whined.
“I told her to stop too but she just does what she wants!”
“Well I’m older than you, so that makes me your elder, meaning you have to listen to me. And I want to keep calling you Shin-chan,” Kaito declared with satisfaction, as if he had just won.
“You’re only a year older than me! You can’t use that to win every time!”
“Can too!”
Their argument quickly devolved as both boys ended up wrestling on the floor together. It wasn’t long before Kaito was sitting on top of Shinichi, giving the other boy a large grin that spelled trouble.
“Say I win and I’ll let you up,” Kaito taunted.
Shinichi kicked his legs in an attempt to throw the other boy off him, his arms not much use as they were pinned at his sides and under Kaito’s legs, but Kaito barely moved.
Kaito’s grin grew and he stuck one of his fingers in his mouth before holding the wet finger up for Shinichi to see. “Say it, or you get the wet willy.”
The pinned boy shrieked and doubled his efforts to throw Kaito off. Kaito in turn brought his saliva-coated finger closer to Shinichi’s ear and wagged it threateningly. Shinichi shot him a glare, but seeing no way out of it, he said through gritted teeth, “Fine! You win.”
“And?”
“And you can keep calling me Shin-chan. Now get off me!”
Kaito grinned in victory, calling out, “No take-backsies!” and ruffling the other boy’s hair before he got up. “So Shin-chan , you were saying?”
“Oh, right,” Shinichi answered while smoothing his hair. He‘d forgotten about his original question. “I was just wondering what you were doing?”
“I’m trying to do this magic trick my dad showed me. It’s where I make a flower appear out of nowhere!” Kaito said while throwing his arms up in the air.
“Oh,” Shinichi said with a blink, surprised at what had been keeping his friend so quiet for so long. “Can I see?”
“Sure!” Kaito said with a broad grin before he screwed up his face in concentration. He gave his wrist a clumsy twist and a small pink daisy appeared. His grin returned and he gave Shinichi an expectant look.
Shinichi himself looked unimpressed, “It was in your sleeve.”
“Hold on, I wasn’t ready yet! I’m still practicing! I’m going to keep practicing until you can’t see how I do it,” Kaito declared before he turned his attention back to the flower, deeply focused.
Shinichi watched his friend for a moment longer before he shrugged and went back to his book, but he smiled to himself thinking about his and Kaito’s new game.
0-0-0-0-0
“What about you, Shinichi?”
“Huh?” The boy looked up from his book in confusion to Sonoko, who was staring at him expectantly.
“Stop reading that stupid book and talk with us! Sensei said since we finished our work early we could use the last few minutes of class to do whatever we want!” The girl reprimanded.
Shinichi’s expression slipped into a deadpan, “Yeah, whatever we want. And I want to read this book I took from my dad’s library.”
“What are you reading?” Ran peered over curiously.
He turned to his friend with a smile, happy someone was taking an interest, “It’s a book about a detective named Sherlock Holmes.”
“Bor~ring,” Sonoko said in ridicule, but was promptly ignored. She scowled and tried to bring the attention back to herself again. “What’s so great about that book anyway? He’s just a detective.”
Little did she know, she had just said the perfect phrase to bait Shinichi into talking to her again. He turned to her with a scowl, “ Just a detective? My dad said he’s considered the best detective!”
“So that’s why your dad gave you the book? Because you’ve been interested in detective stuff recently?” Ran asked.
“Well, he didn’t actually give me the book. He said I was too young to read it and might not understand it very well. He said I should try reading it maybe when I’m 10,” Shinichi grumbled.
“But that’s only a few years away. We’re already 7 years old,” Ran said patiently.
“I can already understand stuff that older kids read! I’m super smart!” Shinichi argued.
“And so humble,” Sonoko said with an eye roll.
Shinichi continued on as if she hadn’t said anything, “And my dad doesn’t think I can do it, which isn’t fair at all! I’ll show him that I can read these books. And someday I’ll be an even better detective than Sherlock Holmes!”
“Well I think that answers that: you’re definitely going to be an alpha,” Sonoko proclaimed.
“Eh?” Shinichi asked, confused by the sudden change in topic.
“That’s what Ran and I were discussing while you were reading your dumb book!” Sonoko explained, “We were talking about what we thought everyone might be when they grow up. And I bet you’re going to be an alpha.”
Shinichi raised an eyebrow, “There’s no way you can know that. We aren’t going to present our secondary genders until we’re much older.”
“Yeah, but this magazine I read said that alphas are stubborn, confident, and aggressive, and they don’t back down from a challenge! That proves you’re going to be an alpha,” Sonoko said with a little nod, as if she had just proved her point. She then seemed to realize something and turned back to Ran, “Oh, so that means you’re going to have to be an omega if you want to marry Shinichi. Because alphas marry omegas.”
“Sonoko, I don’t want to marry Shinichi. He’s just my friend,” Ran said with a frown, this clearly not being the first time they’d had this discussion.
“But you two have been friends since you were in preschool, and you’re always together!” Sonoko argued.
“Shinichi has been friends with Kaito almost as long, and they’re always together too! The only reason I see Shinichi more is because Kaito doesn’t go to school with us. But that doesn’t mean Shinichi wants to marry Kaito!” Ran countered.
For some reason, Ran’s statement made Shinichi blush, though he wasn’t sure why. ‘I wonder if Kaito is going to be an alpha, beta, or omega?’ he thought to himself. Then he realized what he’d just thought and shook his head, wondering why he cared. He didn’t notice Ran watching him.
“Anyway Shinichi, when you present as an alpha, you better protect Ran. Because it’s an alpha’s job to protect the ones they love,” Sonoko continued, choosing to ignore Ran’s denial.
Shinichi snorted. “Ran can protect herself. She’s amazing at karate and super strong.”
Ran beamed at the praise, but Sonoko rolled her eyes. “I swear, you don’t have a romantic bone in your body. I feel sorry for whatever omega you end up with someday.”
‘So does she want me and Ran to marry each other or not?’ Shinichi thought but wisely didn’t ask. He didn’t want to encourage Sonoko to ship them even more than she already did. He and Ran both had already explained to her many times that they were just friends, but the young heiress never listened. Worse, with how loud she was, some of the other kids in the class were starting to take notice and also thought they liked each other.
Shinichi’s thoughts circled back to Sonoko’s previous statement, that alphas marry omegas. Originally he hadn’t paid it much attention, focusing instead on the rest of her declaration, but he thought back to it now.
He still was thinking about it even hours later.
“Hello! Earth to Shin-chan,” Kaito said while waving his hand in front of Shinichi’s face.
“Ah! Sorry Kai, I think I spaced out for a moment there.”
Kaito flopped down next to him on the couch and took out some juggling balls. He began to toss them into the air, but immediately dropped one. Not at all discouraged, he picked it up and tried again, able to juggle them for a couple minutes this time before dropping one. Every time one fell, he would pick it up and try again. Shinichi watched out of the corner of his eye, secretly impressed. Kaito’s skills were already better than they’d been last week; his friend had obviously been practicing a lot. He felt a swell of pride for him.
Kaito shot him a grin, clearly not oblivious to Shinichi watching him. He stopped juggling and asked, “So what do you think?”
“You’ve gotten better, but you still need to practice a lot more,” Shinichi answered honestly.
Kaito just chuckled, “Still as harsh a critic as ever. Someday, I’m going to become so good, even you will be impressed by me!”
Shinichi cocked a grin in return, “I look forward to it.”“So now are you going to tell me what you were thinking about?” Kaito asked.
“Huh? Oh, that. It’s just something Sonoko said,” Shinichi answered.
“Did she say something about you and Ran-chan getting married again?” Kaito asked, looking a little grumpy.
“She did, despite us both telling her again that we’re just friends, but that’s not what I was thinking about.”
“Oh. So what was it?” He asked, his mood suddenly improved.
“Well, it’s just… do you believe alphas can only marry omegas?” Shinichi asked a little self consciously.
Kaito snorted.
“Hey! Don’t laugh!” Shinichi protested.
“Sorry, it’s just, that’s what you’ve been worried about? My dad said that anyone can marry whomever they want. Doesn’t matter if they’re an alpha, beta, or omega. Alphas don’t have to marry omegas, and my parents are proof. My mom’s an omega, but dad is a beta,” Kaito said.
Shinichi blinked, “I didn’t know your dad was a beta. Both of my parents are betas too.”
“Yep! So why were you thinking about it so much anyway?”
“N-no reason!” Shinichi said hurriedly and buried his face back into his book.
0-0-0-0-0
Shinichi stood next to the grave, listening to Kaito’s open sobs while tears trailed down his own cheeks. Kaito was squeezing his hand so hard it hurt, but he didn’t say a word of complaint. He would gladly let Kaito break his hand if he thought it would bring his friend any comfort.
After some time, hand holding no longer seemed to be enough, and Kaito pulled Shinichi against him and threw his arms around him. He rested his head on Shinichi’s shoulder and continued to sob, soon leaving Shinichi’s shoulder soaked with tears.
Shinichi wrapped his own arms around Kaito, holding the young magician just as tightly. He vowed at that moment that from now on, he would always protect his friend. He wasn’t sure if that indeed made him an alpha, but at that moment, he really didn’t care.
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