Content Warning: omegaverse, alpha/beta/omega dynamics, eventual mpreg, breeding kink, breeding instinct, outdoor sex, post-apocalyptic far future setting, genetically engineered humans
Author's Note: did quite a bit of world building at the start but I promise it ends with smut XD
The world was a mess in the latter half of the twenty-second century, though admittedly not as bad as it could have been.
Climate change did irreparable harm to the planet but belated policy changes on the part of governments world-wide were finally enacted and kept the world from becoming
completely
uninhabitable. This was, unfortunately (and predictably), far too late for vast swaths of humanity-- those living nearest the equator and along coastlines were hit particularly hard. The advent of the twenty-second century saw the battle for resources hit a fever-pitch and those who could afford it fled towards the poles while ice caps melted and entire governments went defunct. Petty dictators rose and fell while more resource rich countries, clinging to what stability they still had, took what refugees they were able.
Daniel Smith was, in a way, a direct result of the worst years of the resource wars circa 2164. Desperate to protect lands that had skyrocketed in value in the face of collapsing ecosystems further south, the newly founded Canadian-American Union launched an ethically dubious super-soldier program that used experimental gene therapy to create a new breed of human that was not only better suited to surviving extreme conditions-- but was faster, stronger, and hardier than naturally born humans.
Unfortunately for the program, they were exceptionally intelligent as well-- something that rarely made for soldiers that followed orders without question.
The existence of program was leaked to the public by its own creations and ostensibly shuttered in the face of the ensuing outrage. Daniel himself had no doubt the program would have made a come-back eventually-- he himself was shuffled between different branches of the military after it all came out. He'd been an officer in the marines but had been ill-suited to the role given his penchant for asking questions and, on more than one occasion, refusing to carry out orders when he'd been told to use force to turn refugees back at the border.
He'd wound up a medic eventually, putting his 'bleeding heart to use' as his previous commander had put it, and he might have stayed there indefinitely if not for mother earth taking another swing at the bee-hive that was humanity.
Her bat of choice was a vicious little virus resurrected from the ice of Antarctica as the last of the glaciers melted away, freeing it from a prison of millennia old ice to ravage the helpless inhabitants of the modern day. Worse, exposure to UV light mutated it into something new and strange that laid all humans low but hit those with xx-chromosomes particularly hard.
Women died by the millions, all but demolishing the already beleaguered human race within within five years. In the face of extinction, scientists pivoted from chasing the illusive cure to developing something,
anything,
that would allow the species to persist-- even if they had to become something entirely new to do so.
The last Daniel heard they had been using gene therapy and any other tool they could get their hands on to establish a way for the surviving men to reproduce without women, a stop-gap against extinction until a cure for the virus could be found. He, and the surviving members of the program that had made him, were put in cryogenic stasis as specimens of humanity's very peak to be defrosted at a later date when things finally stabilized-- for better or worse. The virus was killing off people with y-chromosomes too, after all, though at a significantly lower rate-- and the super soldiers were too valuable to lose.
Unfortunately, 'later' never came.
~~~
Daniel woke to a rush of cool, stale air and inhaled deeply on reflex. He regretted it almost immediately as the dust caught at the back of his throat and sent him into a paroxysm of coughing before he even opened his eyes.
He could hear voices around him but he couldn't make out what they were saying-- not unusual for someone fresh out of cryo-sleep, though still annoying. Daniel rolled onto his side and hauled himself mostly upright with the help of the handrail built into the cryo-pod and multiple pairs of unfamiliar hands on his arms and shoulders.
Someone spoke again and still Daniel couldn't make heads or tails of what they were saying so he forced his eyes open and blinked rapidly in an attempt to focus on the figures gathered around his pod.
There were three of them, all men, and they were dressed very strangely for a visit to a military deep-freeze facility. Wearing a blend of rough fabrics, leather, and furs, the trio looked more like they were dressed up for Halloween or living displays for some sort of 'ancient man' display at the local museum. All three men were on the shorter side, though the tallest of them was very muscular and covered with scars. On closer inspection, the other two looked to be quite strong as well, though in a leaner sort of way, and all of them had the look of people who spent a great deal of time outdoors.
The closest man reached out to him and placed his hand on Daniel's, drawing the soldier's attention to him as he spoke. Daniel had no idea what the man said, but as his eyes finally made a full recovery he noted that the stranger was quite beautiful. So much so Daniel might have mistaken him for a woman at a glance, but the sharp edges of his tan face and his build marked him as male.
"I'm sorry," Daniel said when the beautiful stranger tried to speak again. "I don't understand what you're saying."
The three men shared a surprised look and conversed amongst themselves for a moment. While they did, Daniel strained his ears but, despite being fluent in several languages himself, and more than capable of at least identifying the rest by ear, he couldn't follow them in the least. There
was