Dirty Switch

Nothing. Nothing at all anymore.
Joo Taehyun’s voice, murmuring in vague amazement, sounded like it came from a great distance.
“…What do you mean?”
Seo Baekhan was too stunned to speak for a moment but finally managed to gather himself.
“That’s impossible.”
The denial came out reflexively, without time to think. Because truly—it was impossible.
“I'm being literal.”
One by one, Taehyun peeled Baekhan’s fingers off his torso, turning his head away.
“I can’t feel your pheromones anymore.”
His expression—somewhere between crying and smiling—made it impossible to tell what emotion he was even feeling. He said it as if it were a simple fact: not only could he no longer smell Baekhan’s scent, no matter what he did, he could no longer perceive his presence at all.
“That… that’s not possible.”
Baekhan couldn’t understand what Taehyun was saying. The room was still thick with his scent. Their pheromones had intermingled, the fragrance of fruit and trees wafting through the air. It clung to their skin, their breath, every nerve ending—so heavily concentrated, and yet Taehyun was telling him it had become a void?
“I reacted like an Omega. I even got pregnant. So maybe becoming a Beta isn’t entirely out of the question.”
Taehyun’s voice trembled faintly, his throat catching as if he were still crying. Then he let out a short, bitter laugh.
“Or maybe… the imprint broke.”
He added the words like he was grasping at a slim thread of hope—hope that it was that rather than something worse. It was obvious, and it hit Baekhan in a strange way.
The Taehyun who once looked like he would die if he didn’t confess he liked him. The Taehyun who had pretended to be casual when he proposed. The Taehyun who’d clung to him the first time they had sex and asked if he could be held. The Taehyun who buried his face in Baekhan’s robe just to feel his scent when they were apart.
That same Taehyun was now visibly relieved at the thought of no longer being able to sense any trace of Baekhan. Crying and smiling, as if something inside him had finally loosened.
“…That’s not true.”
Baekhan pulled Taehyun [N O V E L I G H T] back into his arms, denying it firmly.
“That’s not how it works. Even if the imprint breaks, you’d still be able to sense the other’s pheromones.”
Being this close still made him feel like something was filling up the empty spaces inside him. How could that mean the imprint was gone? That his pheromones were useless to Taehyun? It didn’t make any sense.
“There are temporary cases where the pheromone glands go numb.”
“…”
“After a miscarriage… the hormonal system can react with shock, and endocrine functions can misfire.”
So it can’t be that. Whether it was reassurance or delusion, he kept speaking. Just as he finished, the hospital room door swung open.
“Young Master? What happened—”

Dr. Woo, who had rushed in after a few urgent calls, came to a halt at the sight of them.
Had they simply been hugging, it might’ve been easier to understand. But instead he saw a dazed, hollow-eyed Joo Taehyun and a wide-eyed, hyperfocused Seo Baekhan clutching him as if possessed. The whole scene looked like something painted by a mad artist pouring his soul into a final, manic masterpiece.
“Is it… pheromone shock?”
That was the only plausible reason to summon a physician while forcibly holding your imprinted partner. He asked cautiously, and Baekhan nodded stiffly.
“Something like that. Please bring in equipment that can simultaneously measure both Taehyun’s and my pheromone levels.”
Like flipping through a mental database, the symptoms Baekhan feared began surfacing in his mind. But he didn’t voice any of them—every single possibility felt too ominous.
“And also…”
He drew out the sentence, then gave a faint smile—one that tugged only at the corners of his lips, making him seem all the more unnerving.
“Does Donghwa Hospital carry AP-S series injections?”
“…What?”
Dr. Woo blinked. That request had caught him completely off guard. What Baekhan was asking for was an Alpha pheromone enhancer.
It was a drug usually prescribed for teenagers going through first heat. It forcibly circulated hormones by inducing pheromone release. To administer it to an adult, especially in this context, was highly unusual.
“If your levels have crashed, that’s not the kind of injection you should be taking—”
“No. I’ll be using it.”
“Pardon? Director Seo, why would you—”
But Baekhan fell silent, clearly not intending to answer.
He glanced at Taehyun as if to prompt him to explain, but Taehyun simply closed his eyes, too exhausted. He looked like a man far older than twenty-six.
***
There was no need for additional medical staff.
For Taehyun, it was a matter of adding one more lead to the room’s vital sign monitor, and Baekhan was already skilled in operating the device.
Taehyun stared blankly at the screen. He’d seen the machine enough lately to understand the numbers and graphs. His eyes remained fixed on the bottom portion—where the pheromone levels and imprint data would appear. The imprint section had been preset to activate only when measuring both subjects simultaneously.
“See? Everything looks normal.”
Taehyun’s pheromone levels were completely within range.
Baekhan inserted the testing port and pressed a patch to the inside of his wrist. The sticky pad twitched faintly like a living thing. The screen split in two, and Baekhan’s readings began appearing on the right side.
“Mine too—normal.”
“…”
“It’s probably just temporary stress. If you rest and recover, you’ll be fine. I’ll help you.”
Of course. The idea that Taehyun had turned into a Beta was absurd.
Only now did Baekhan realize how tense his nerves had been. His neck and shoulders were so stiff they ached from clenching.
“The imprint—”
BEEEEP—
He hadn’t even finished suggesting they measure the imprint data when a piercing, screeching alarm rang out.
The graph on the screen went wild in jagged red spikes. Even a layperson could tell something was very wrong.
What… what is this?
Baekhan stared in disbelief.
The individual pheromone levels still showed as normal.
But the imprint graph had plummeted like a crashing star. More precisely: Baekhan’s imprint status was unchanged—but on Taehyun’s side, the imprint had all but collapsed.
“I guess… not being able to sense your pheromones right now could be due to stress, or… well, lots of factors…”
Maybe because he’d cried too much—Taehyun’s voice cracked like metal cooling in water. Painful to hear, yet he forced the words out.
“But either way, something’s definitely wrong with my imprint.”
Apparently seeing no reason to continue, he started peeling off the monitoring devices and looked Baekhan square in the eye.
“…It’s broken, isn’t it?”
Baekhan didn’t answer. He just stared at the screen as the wild graph gradually flattened into a lifeless line.
“Hyung.”
At the exact moment Taehyun softly called his name, Baekhan snatched an alcohol swab.
“Hyung!”
Without hesitation, Baekhan retrieved the injection from the tray and drove it deep into the vein inside his wrist.
The moment he pulled out the needle, a violent energy surged through his body, enough to make him sway.
Unlike Taehyun’s side, Baekhan’s graph skyrocketed. His own pheromones—their heavy, almost cloying fruit scent—filled the room like a wall.
And yet, Taehyun remained unbothered. Startled by Baekhan’s recklessness, yes—but the overpowering pheromones? Nothing. He didn’t flinch. Didn’t gag. Didn’t drown in it like he once would’ve.
It was impossible to believe.
The last device still attached to Taehyun’s hand indicated that his pheromone glands were functioning. Yet even while being flooded by Baekhan’s pheromones, Taehyun showed no reaction. Not disgust, not arousal—nothing.
He just sat there. Like a Beta. Alone in bed.
“I’m… going to discharge myself.”
“…”
“There’s no point in staying if I can’t even feel your pheromones anymore. Sticking around just for the sake of recovery would be strange.”
“…That’s not true.”
“Not true?”
“Losing the ability to sense a specific partner’s pheromones is serious. And the imprint reading—look, it’s dropped, but the connection is still technically there. So—”
“Yes. I understand what you’re saying. But just like before, there’s no reason for you and me to keep sharing a space anymore.”
Taehyun turned off the buzzing machine and looked back at Baekhan. His lips curled faintly, forming a smile eerily similar to the ones Baekhan often wore himself.
“Given how things turned out… I’m sorry, too.”