Chapter 8: Dual Loyalty

Kai’s POV

The stench of blood still flowed in the hallway.

Not the usual scent of wild hunt but something sharp, metallic and so wrong. It clung deep into the walls even long after Zara had left.

I should have followed her. Watched where she was going or heck! even stopped her and just hugged her tightly.

I should have said something to ease that look in her face when she asked that question.

"What happened after I left you last night?"

I shouldn't have just said that she had been wiped. I should have given her a good enough reason but no. I let the silence hang in the air. Tension building up within my core.

Now I stood alone in the dim lit corridor. My pulse wasn't racing, it was too steady for someone who had just witnessed a werewolf being killed and sucked off all his powers. This calmness only happened when the other side of me took control.

I turned around the corner and found him. He smelt like her first kill. They always had a scent. His body was still warm. His eyes were open, glassy and hollow. It seemed that there was something almost peaceful about the way he just lay there except for the blood that divided his head. It seemed the hit had cracked his head way deeper than I had thought..

“She’s stronger than I thought,” I whispered to myself.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

The device under my sweater sleeve began to make that annoying voice once again. Dr. Voss would be expecting a report before the end of the day.

Not yet!

She could wait all she wanted but I didn't think I was ready to give her what she sp desperately wanted. I knelt beside the body, brushing my fingers over the blood-spattered floor. The metallic scent stirred something primal inside me, something this academy taught each person to suppress. A growl threatened to rise, but I forced it down.

“Control,” I muttered.

Control was everything.

Control had to be everything.

Without it, Zara would end up like the other lab subjects instead of survivors.

Or she would bring destruction to whatever she came across.

Just then the image passed through my mind.

Fire! So much fire! Burning!!

I closed my eyes for a split second and heaved a deep breath.

I wiped the floor with the cloth from my pocket, erasing the blood, the evidence, the story. The camera at the end of the hallway blinked red once, then off, overridden. She’d never know how easily I could erase her sins.

When I stood, the silence pressed in heavy and suffocating. My own reflection in the dark glass stared back at me, silver eyes glowing faintly.

What are you becoming, Kai? I asked myself.

The door creaked behind me. I did not’t turn but I could feel her presence in the hall.

“Why are you here?” I asked.

A whisper answered, trembling but familiar.

“I… could not’t sleep.”

Zara.

She stood in the doorway, pale under the flickering light. Her uniform looked too new on her, too clean for someone who’d just taken a life. She seemed so so innocent.

Her eyes darted to the floor where the body had been.

She trembled a bit and I felt like just hugging her.

I cleared my throat in annoyance at the feelings going through my mind.

“It’s gone,” she said softly. “You moved him?”

I nodded once.

“No one will find him.” I said.

“Why?” She questioned.

That word.

Small, trembling, powerful.

I didn't even know what to respond in that moment.

I had to take a step back to regain myself before taking a step closer towards her.

Lowering my voice until it was almost a whisper.

“Because if they find out what you are, Dr. Voss will take you apart to see how you work.”

Her lips parted, but no sound came out.

For a heartbeat, we stood inches apart, the air thick with the smell of iron and something softer, her scent. Not wolf, not human, something else. Something that made my skin hum like static.

She smelt of honey and dangerous blood.

Fuck!!! I was attracted to her in ways that I couldn't explain.

“You don’t trust me,” I said quietly.

“I don’t even trust myself,” she replied.

Fair.

"Besides you did say that I shouldn't trust anyone, not even you." She threw harshly.

Fair again.

The skin underneath the device itched me. I knew what that meant. Voss was listening.

 Watching. I leaned in closer, my lips barely brushing her ear.

“Meet me tonight,” I whispered. 

“East wing. After curfew.”

She hesitated.

“What if this is another trap?”

I paused before biting her earlobe gently.

“Then I’ll be the one caught in it.” I said.

Her breath hitched, and for the first time, I saw it, the smallest flicker of trust. Dangerous, fragile, real.

Then she was gone, her footsteps fading down the hall.

Fuck!!! What had I just done.

Why did I want that reaction out of her again?

I waited until the sound disappeared before pressing the device on my wrist. A faint chime echoed in my ear.

“Report,” came Dr. Voss’s cold voice.

“Subject Night has crossed the threshold,” I said softly. 

“She killed without hesitation.”

“Excellent.” She responded.

A pause. 

“And her emotional state?” She said.

“Conflicted.” I responded.

“Good. Conflict breeds evolution. Continue observation.” she ordered.

“Yes, ma’am.” I replied.

The connection ended, but her voice lingered like a ghost.

I turned off the device and leaned against the wall, exhaling slowly. I was breaking Zara's trust, and I detested every bit of it.

This was the part they did not’t program me for, the ache in my chest when she looked at me like I was something safe and reliable.

She was not supposed to matter.

None of them were.

But when she looked at me, the noise inside my head quieted. The fragmented memories, the orders, the mechanical precision, they all faded, replaced by something dangerously human.

I ran a hand through my hair, trying to push it down. Love, or whatever this was, did not’t fit into the mission.

Still, I could not’t stop thinking about her eyes, the way they glowed faintly when the light hit just right, like the stars had found a place to hide behind her pupils.

Maybe that’s what scared Dr. Voss.

Zara was not’t broken.

She was awakening.

And it could either break her or build her.

The corridor lights flickered once. Then twice.

Something moved behind the glass wall.

I froze.

What's that? I thought our loud.

The boy’s reflection appeared again, the one she killed, only this time, his mouth was moving. Words formed soundlessly, but I could read his lips.

"Someone else just died in another planet."

My blood ran cold.

The light snapped off completely, plunging the hallway into darkness. I backed away slowly, every instinct on alert.

When the lights returned a second later, the reflection was gone.

The body was still on the floor but my instincts were now on high alert.

Words painted in blood were plastered close to the dead body.

"Save a planet for going into extreme extinction."

i began to shiver as a roar threatened to come out of my mouth.

I looked down at my trembling hands and realized the blood was not’t his anymore.

It was mine.