#macklin celebrini and owen pickering and brayden yager are the core of the future btw

[malk1ns]

mkay but sid giving mack the talk about alphas and how they can push the limits sometimes with omegas - just gentle patient, motherly sid.

gosh did this ever hit the spot for us all tonight!

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Sid takes Mack out for lunch after practice one day in December, just the two of them—he's waiting outside the trainer's room when Mack emerges from getting his calf cramp rubbed out, and they're in the car and halfway home before Mack realizes what's happened.

"Where's Geno?" he asks, dropping his phone in his lap and twisting his torso to peer back over the center console, as if maybe Geno somehow snuck into the backseat without anyone noticing.

"His good friend Sergei Gonchar is in town, they're spending the afternoon together," Sid replies, changing lanes and serenely ignoring the cacophony of honks as he cuts someone off. "He'll be over for dinner, you'll meet him then. Sarge was on the team for the '09 Cup, and then he—"

"Oh!" Mack interrupts. "The d-man, he ran point on that power play, right?"

Sid's looking straight ahead, but Mack can see the corner of his eye crinkle and one side of his mouth tick up. "Yeah, and he was on staff for a few years, too. G lived with him for his rookie year."

"Cool," Mack says, mind racing as he imagines it. He's seen pictures and old grainy footage, but it's so hard to picture Geno as a rookie. "So what are we doing this afternoon?"

"I'm taking you to lunch," Sid says, jerking the steering wheel barely in time to make an exit. Mack winces. "There's a pizza place, you'll like it."

Mack settles back into his seat, but there's a growing pit of discomfort in his stomach. Sid smells normal, not like he's angry or disappointed or anything, but this is unusual, and it's making Mack anxious.

Sid doesn't say much outside of some bland commentary on a drill they ran until they're tucked into a corner of the restaurant with their pizzas. Sid had bought Mack a beer, but by now his mouth is so dry that one sip almost sent him retching to the bathroom, so he hasn't touched it yet.

"I wanted to talk to you about Owen," Sid says, and Mack chokes on the overlarge bite of pizza he'd crammed into his mouth.

Sid waits patiently until Mack has his breath back, then nudges the beer closer. Mack grabs it and downs half in one gulp, churning stomach be damned. "What about him," he finally manages, setting the glass down with shaking hands.

Sid carefully saws a piece of pizza off with his knife and fork. "You two have gotten close," he says, delicately placing the pizza in his mouth, chewing and swallowing. Sid's disgusting at home and around the team, just like all the guys, but the way he acts in public reminds Mack of old movies, like those rom-coms from the 2000s when omegas all had to act a certain way, prim and proper and well-mannered in public at all times, or they got in trouble. "And it's good, you two are part of the next core here, you and him and Brayden, but I wanted to make sure you're careful."

Mack's face is burning hot. He tries to cool it off with the rest of his beer. "I don't know what you're talking about," he mumbles. He's lying.

"Okay," Sid says kindly. "Well, then I'm just going to give you some general advice. I know he's a few years older than you, but he's still young, and alphas that age..." Sid hesitates, frowning absently as he looks at his pizza. "They're impulsive. They push. A lot of times they want to rush things, things that maybe you're not ready for, but it's easy to get caught up, even if you don't mean to."

Mack wants to die. "Owen wouldn't—he's—we're just—"

"I'm not trying to say you're doing anything wrong," Sid interrupts, leaning forward and catching Mack's gaze, eyes wide and sincere. "Not at all. And neither is he. But Geno noticed...and I agree with him...and I just want you to be careful. Don't rush into something that you might regret. If something happens and ends badly, the team isn't going to get rid of a valuable player just because your heart is broken."

Mack fumbles with the cloth napkin. "There's nothing to worry about," he mutters. Jesus. Him and Owen are just friends, nothing like what Sid thinks, and the idea that Geno thinks something's going on is too mortifying for words. "He's...it's not like that."

Sid's quiet for a minute, and when Mack looks up, Sid's looking at him steadily, face and scent unreadable. Mack doesn't even want to think what he's projecting right now; he hopes he can control and mask as well as Sid can someday. "Alright," Sid finally says, nodding at Mack's plate. "Finish your lunch, and I'll drop it. I'm sorry. But if anything changes, and you want to talk...I've been through it, I'm here for you."

"Okay," Mack says, wondering how fast he can eat and end this mortifying encounter without putting himself in danger of actually vomiting. Hopefully Geno and Gonchar are out long enough for him to lock himself in his room and scroll TikTok until he's forgotten all about this.

He wonders what Geno thinks he noticed, though. Geno's, like, the alpha on the team. He'd know if something was up with any of the others.

Probably just a misunderstanding. Sid and Geno have been mated for so long, they probably don't know what alpha-omega friendships look like when people are single anymore.

Nothing to worry about.