Primal Instinct

7– PAINS

By the time the sun dipped toward the horizon, the office was starting to thin out. People logged off, said quiet goodbyes, and drifted toward the elevators. Freight Tech wasn’t one of those places that pretended work-life balance was a thing. It just had people who knew when to be ghosts and when to be present.

It was after six when I finally logged my last note, shot off my last email, and sat back in my chair. My brain buzzed. My body did, too. I checked the tablet. No new flags from his inbox. No last-minute calendar additions. I’d survived day one.

I turned off my monitors, gathered my things, and glanced toward his office. The door was mostly closed, just a sliver of space open. Light spilled through it, warm and muted. I should’ve just gone.

Instead, I raised my hand and gave one soft knock.

Come in,” came the reply – that same deep, composed tone that carried more weight than it should have.

He was standing at the window again, jacket off this time. The mountains outside were nothing but black silhouettes and dying light, the faint reflection of his outline framed against the glass.

“You’re still here,” he said, not turning.

“Wanted to make sure there wasn’t anything else you needed before I left.”

He finally looked at me, eyes catching the light — not brown, not silver, just dark enough to see everything I didn’t want him to.

“Do I look like a man who needs reminders?”

“No,” I said. “Just trying to do my job.”

He hummed under his breath, something low and amused. “You’re eager. That’s good. Lets not confuse it with useful.”

My jaw tightened. “Yes, Mr. Steele.”

He then moved slow, deliberate steps until he was close enough that the air around me felt heavier. He smelled like cedar and smoke and something colder underneath it, like metal.

“Do you always seek approval, Ms. Carter?”

I blinked. “Excuse me?”

“You seem to crave for permission to breathe. You wait for praise before you do anything else. You think that earns you safety.” He tilted his head slightly, studying me like he was dissecting a problem. “It doesn’t.”

I swallowed hard. “I don’t need safety. I need clarity.”

His mouth curved, but it wasn’t kind. “Clarity,” he repeated softly. “Here’s clarity, I am not your mentor. I don’t need or want to reassure you. I don’t care if you feel comfortable. You work. You adapt. You survive. Anything else gets eaten alive in this building.”

The words were a punch wrapped in velvet. I should’ve hated him for it, but part of me, that traitorous, ridiculous part, felt a shiver run through my stomach at the sound of being eaten alive.

“I understand,” I managed.

“I doubt that,” he murmured. His gaze dropped briefly, lingering a moment too long. “You look like you bruise easily.”

I took a step back, pulse hammering. “Is there anything else, Mr. Steele?”

“Dismissed,” he said simply, turning back to the window.

That one stung more than it should’ve. I left before he could see it.

The elevator doors closed with a quiet hiss. My reflection in the mirrored walls looked flushed and tired. Angry. Something else I didn’t want to name. By the time I drove down the mountain to the estate, the ache in my chest had settled into a dull, inexplicable tension. I told myself it was adrenaline. Exhaustion. Whatever it was, I didn’t want to think about it anymore.

Dinner didn’t help. The food sat untouched, my stomach still knotted. The shower scalded and still couldn’t wash off the day. It was sometime after midnight when the first wave hit. It started like a flicker under my ribs, nothing more than a strange tightness I thought was anxiety. But within seconds, it spread.

The first wave hit so fast it stole the breath from my lungs. A hot, searing pulse ripped through my chest and radiated outward, like my veins had been filled with molten glass. I doubled over, clutching the edge of the bed, a strangled sound slipping from my throat.

“What the hell—”

The pain didn’t behave like pain. It didn’t stab or burn in one place—it moved, alive and aware, winding through every nerve in its path. My heart raced hard enough to blur my vision. My skin flushed, then chilled, like my body couldn’t decide if it was freezing or fevering, every nerve lighting up.

I stumbled toward the bathroom, catching myself on the wall. The air felt heavy, too thick to breathe. I turned on the cold water, splashing it on my face. It steamed off my skin, as if the heat beneath it was burning through the surface. My reflection in the mirror shimmered, edges bending under the light. For a second, I didn’t recognize myself.

“Calm down,” I whispered, but my voice trembled. “It’s just—panic. Or something.”

Except panic didn’t crawl down your spine like electricity. Panic didn’t make your blood vibrate.

Another wave struck, stronger. My knees hit the tile. I couldn’t even scream. The air punched out of my lungs in a single gasp as my muscles seized. My hands pressed flat against the cold floor, but even the tile burned beneath me.

My chest ached and every breath came ragged, my skin slick with sweat. My ears rang. Somewhere in the ringing, a sound threaded through, a low, rhythmic thrum that wasn’t coming from me. A heartbeat. Steady, dominant, other.

The realization terrified me so much it snapped something in my chest.

“Stop,” I rasped, pressing a hand over my heart like I could push it back down. “Please—stop.”

But the pain didn’t listen. It coiled tighter, pushing and pulling in waves of unbearable pressure. I could feel it all—heat, pulse, need, betrayal—all tangled together until I couldn’t tell which feeling belonged to me and which didn’t.

And then, just as suddenly, a hollow ache opened inside my stomach. A burn that wasn’t physical. Loneliness, sharp and bottomless. I gasped against it, realizing it wasn’t just pain—it was absence.

Somewhere, someone was taking something that should’ve been mine.

The air shifted. A knock.

“Nahiry?” Lyric’s voice, soft but urgent, through the door.

“I’m fine!” The lie came out broken, wet.

The lock clicked. Lyric stepped inside, silk robe trailing, hair pulled into a loose braid. A faint shimmer of pink in her glass as she knelt beside me. Her eyes scanned me fast, no sign of judgment, just worry.

“Panic attack,” I choked out. “Or maybe food poisoning—”

“Shh.” Lyric crouched beside me, eyes scanning my face, my hands, the sheen of sweat across my skin. “You’re burning up,” she whispered, pressing a cool hand to my forehead. “How long?”

“I—don’t know. Minutes? Feels like hours. It feels like I’m dying.”

“You’re not.” Her tone was gentle, but there was something else underneath it, something she wasn’t saying. “You just… need to cool down.” She pulled out her phone and pressed a quick call. “Damien, I need a tonic. Now. Bring the one with the silverleaf base.” A muffled voice answered on the other end. Lyric hung up and turned back to me.

“What’s happening to me?” I managed.

“It’s the altitude,” she said softly, a bit too fast. “The air here can do strange things to people at first. Sometimes it messes with the blood. The drink will help. You’ll acclimate to it.”

The lie was too practiced, but I didn’t care. The pain made everything hazy, heavy.

Damien appeared a minute later, moving with a kind of contained urgency that made me think this wasn’t the first time he’d seen something like this. He handed Lyric a glass, steam curling off the surface in faint pink wisps.

Lyric knelt again, tipping it toward me. “Sip.”

The first swallow was cold, almost metallic. It hit my stomach like ice, spreading outward until it reached the burn under my skin. Slowly, the fire dimmed. The heartbeat—the foreign one—faded too, receding into the quiet edges of my consciousness.

My muscles loosened. My breath evened out. I sagged against the wall, eyes fluttering shut.

“Better?” Lyric asked softly.

I nodded weakly, still trembling. “Yeah. I think so.”

“Good.” She brushed a curl from my forehead. “You’ll be fine. Just rest. Don’t think about it.”

When she turned to Damien, I didn’t miss the look she exchanged with him. It was quick, tense and most of all heavy with things unsaid. As they stepped aside, I caught their voices, low but distinct enough to hear.

“You don’t think she’s—” Damien started.

“No,” Lyric cut in fast. “She’s human. There isn’t a way can be someone’s ma-.”

“Then what was that?”

“I don’t know.” A pause. “We’ll look into it. I’ll ask my mother.”

Their words blurred as the pain faded to nothing, gone as suddenly as it came. My body sagged, drained. My vision tunneled, the room spinning softly.

Lyric turned back just as my knees buckled again. “Hey—hey, easy.”

“I’m fine, seriously. I just need to-” I murmured, even as exhaustion dragged me under.

“No,” Lyric said gently. “You’re done for tonight.”

Between the two of them, they got me into bed. I barely registered the sheets, the pillow, the sound of their footsteps fading. The last thing I remembered was Lyric’s voice, quiet and worried, somewhere near the door.

“Nothing in this town happens without reason.”

When I finally closed my eyes, the pain was gone but something else pulsed faintly beneath my skin, steady and foreign, still repetitive like a heartbeat that didn’t belong to me.

And somewhere high above, in that glass-walled office overlooking the valley, I could’ve sworn the mountains themselves exhaled.

When I woke hours later, to a duller pain, the room was silent. My skin was still cool to touch but I was still sweating. My body light. The ache wasn’t fully gone, but it felt as if it had never happened. As if it was just really bad cramps but deep in my chest, a pulse lingered–– faint, steady, not mine.