The work horn jolted me awake, its metallic wail cutting through my dreams like a blade. One week into this job, and I still wasn't used to it. I dragged myself from my cot, wincing as the wire frame dug through the paper-thin mattress. With sleep-clumsy hands, I grabbed my leather provision sack from the rickety table beside me, its contents clinking together. At breakfast, I hunched alone over my food, pretending not to hear the whispers questioning my sanity for trading comfort for labor. The bench suddenly rocked beneath me as someone dropped onto it. I looked up into a face framed by wild blonde curls. She was powerfully built, all strength and curves, beautiful in a way that made my throat go dry.
"Hi, Mary," I squeaked, my voice catching in my throat like a trapped bird. She laughed, a warm, rich sound that seemed to vibrate through the wooden bench between us.
"Hi, darlin'," she drawled. "You finally excited to be done with training?" Her strong teeth tore into the dense brown bread of her rations, crumbs catching in the corner of her full lips.
"Yes, I'm more than ready and willing to do my best," I managed, watching her calloused fingers work deftly with her knife. She gave me a slow wink that made my cheeks burn.
"Good. Now Crystal," she said with a pause, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper as she slid a folded slip of paper across the table, "I have here in my pocket your head foreman's name, but..." Her expression darkened as I unfolded the paper with trembling fingers. The name written there in bold, slashing letters made my stomach drop.
"Charlie..." I read aloud, my voice barely a whisper as the name turned my insides to ice.
I hadn't seen Charlie since my first day. He'd appeared in the foreman's booth—arms crossed, jaw set, radiating authority from his battered coveralls and the greasy streaks painting his forearms—and assigned me to Mary's crew for training with nothing more than a lifted eyebrow, as if my existence barely registered. I remembered thinking, briefly, that he must have been disappointed I was still in his presence, I remembered the way his gaze lingered on the scar across my eyebrow, the one that split my eye in a way I tried to tell myself was rakish.
Every muscle in my body protested as I hunched over the slip of paper, knuckles whitening, and looked up into Mary's face, desperate.
"Can't I just stay working with you?" I blurted, heat rising up my neck. I hated how thin and desperate my voice sounded. "I mean—I'm good at following orders, and you already taught me the routine. Please, Mary..."
She went very still. For a second, the joking, flirtatious edge vanished from her eyes. It left behind something melancholy and serious, the kind of sadness that only came when you thought about things you couldn't change. "I wish I could keep you, little mouse," she whispered, her broad hand reaching across the table to briefly, lightly, squeeze my wrist. Her palm was rough and warm, and the touch lingered in a way that made my stomach lurch. "But his word is law around here. If he wants you, there's nothing I can do. You don't say no to Charlie."
"Why not?" The words burst out of me, too loud, and several people at the surrounding tables glanced over. I ignored them. "You're older. Stronger. And—may I mention—way less psychotic than he is? How did he even get this much power over everyone?"
Mary choked mid-swig, water spraying from her lips in a fine mist. For a moment, she could only splutter and cough, and then she tipped her head back and laughed, a huge, unselfconscious sound that filled the entire canteen. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, grinning wide enough to show the chipped tooth she'd once told me was from a rockfall accident.
"Sweetheart, that's the funniest thing I've heard all week," she said, still grinning. "Less psychotic, oh gods—if only the bosses saw it that way. But you gotta understand, Charlie's not just the head foreman. He's got a knack for getting things done. Always has And he was the best surveyor on this side of the Rift before..." she trailed off, her gaze growing distant for a heartbeat, "...well, it's complicated. But people listen to him. Even when they shouldn't."
I stabbed at the gray lump on my plate. "He makes my skin crawl. Every time I look up, his eyes are on me, like he's just waiting for me to slip up."
Mary's expression shifted, shading into something like caution. "He keeps a close eye on rookies. Sometimes he gets ideas about what they're capable of. Sometimes he's right, sometimes he's dead wrong." She leaned in, her voice barely a breath. "Just keep your head down. Don't give him a reason to look twice at you."
"You're making it sound like he's some kind of monster," I shot back, though my own words made gooseflesh prickle up along my arms.
Mary shrugged. "He's not a monster. Just very, very broken. Some people think that makes him predictable, but I'm telling you, it makes him dangerous." Her gaze softened again. "Don't be afraid and don't let him underestimate you."
I wanted to say something clever but instead just stared at the rough grain of the table, pressing my thumb into a splinter until I felt the skin go numb. "Thanks," I mumbled, though I'm not sure she heard me.
Mary nudged my foot under the table—a secret signal we'd developed over the past few days—and her smile returned, faint but real. "You'll be fine, mouse. Promise. If you survive, breakfast is on me tomorrow. Assuming you still have all your limbs."
I rolled my eyes and tried to smile back, but my chest was hollowed out by dread. The canteen was emptying, the shift bell echoing through the concrete walls. I slid the paper into my breast pocket and gathered my things, nerves jangling.
Mary stood, stretching her arms overhead so her sleeves rode up, revealing the intricate blackwork tattoos spiraling across her biceps. "Show up to the main shaft entrance at seven sharp," she said. "And don't let him catch you daydreaming. He's got no patience for it."
I nodded, then lingered, reluctant to leave the fleeting safety of her presence. She gave my arm a friendly squeeze and strode off toward the locker bay, leaving me to finish the last of my cold tea and contemplate my doom.
Moments later, I was alone in the canteen, save for the humming neon lights and the echoing footsteps of the janitor mopping up spilled broth.
The conveyor platform spat me out the base of the mining cavern, where the air reeked of sweat and ambition. I scanned my badge at the checkpoint and passed through the dermal scanner's cold, sterile tunnel. The guard with the blank patience of the chemically sedated barely glanced in my direction.
I stepped into the mining facility's locker room, the harsh flickering fluorescent bulbs overhead buzzing and casting sterile pools of light that danced across my face, illuminating the pale scar tracing my eyebrow. The recycled air tasted metallic, heavy with the tang of oil and sweat. I moved confidently between rows of lockers—each one battered and dented. Around me, pressure valves hissed rhythmically, punctuated by the distant, earth-shaking rumble of drill rigs far below.
Three miners with weathered faces and oil-stained coveralls turned as I peeled off my jacket, One spat on the floor; another's knuckles whitened around his helmet. I caught the tallest one's eye,
"Don't worry, boys. This antique hardware's about to get the workout of its life." my fingers trembled slightly as I yanked on the stiff armored overalls, the material creaking with newness. Across the room, Kai's familiar silhouette appeared—his left shoulder slightly higher than his right from years of hauling drill bits. He tapped two fingers against his chest in their childhood signal before disappearing through the airlock with his crew.
As I snapped the last clasp into place, my holo-screen flickered to life at her wrist. The message from Charlie glowed in electric blue: Late! fingers froze, my jaw tightening as annoyance flared in my chest. I let out a silent eye roll—yet under the glare of the lights I felt my pulse spike, a tight vibration against my wrist where the screen pulsed.
I caught Charlie watching me from across the prep area, his features stark against the sulfur-yellow emergency lights. He stood against a riveted support beam, shoulders squared beneath faded coveralls, his dark eyes following my every move. When I approached, he straightened like someone had yanked a chain, positioning himself between me and the other miners.
"Took you long enough," he said, voice low enough that only I could hear it. The background noise—grinding machinery, hissing vents, hammering hydraulics—seemed to dim around us.
I crossed my arms over my chest plate, feeling the cool ceramic against my knuckles. "I'm right on time Charlie."
His hand moved toward my arm but stopped short, hovering there. His eyes locked on mine.
Heat rushed to my face. "Ok … lets go then" I said firmly, ignoring the flutter beneath my ribs and went to move but he grabbed my wrist.
I recoiled so fast it made my vision tremble.
He scoffed and bent down to my ear and purred "what rather have kai's hand around you"
"Fuck you," I spat, and the words rang out much louder than I intended, ricocheting off steel and composite until I saw the glances from the other miners. I shoved past him, putting every ounce of adrenaline into the gesture; he staggered, caught off guard by the force, but his reflexes were vicious and he snared my wrist in a grip again that left half-moon welts. His eyes flashed with something wild, some old animal hurt, and just as quickly he dropped my arm as if I'd burned him.
I stumbled into the next tunnel, pulse hammering against my ribs, acid churning in my gut. My fingers found the rough-hewn cavern wall for balance. Every nerve ending in my wrist still burned with his touch—the pressure of his fingers. When I reached my assigned tunnel, the doors hadn't finished their pneumatic sigh before he materialized on the other side. There he stood, arms locked across his chest, mouth twisted into something between contempt and hurt.
"Real professional, Crystal," he said, each word precise as a drill bit. Though he moved aside—giving me enough space to pass without brushing sleeves—I felt his eyes boring into my spine with every step down the ramp.
The tramway to mining shaft L-10 stretched before me, aluminum mesh ringing hollow under scattered footsteps. I ducked my head and fell in with the flow of miners, but Charlie's presence haunted my peripheral vision like a persistent afterimage. When we reached the entrance, he brushed past me and addressed the others, his voice level and commanding enough to silence everyone else. I caught myself studying him—the tight angle of his jaw as others spoke, the way he buried his hands deep in his coverall pockets as though he didn't trust what they might do if left unrestrained.
He caught me staring, and his eyes narrowed, unreadable. For a wild moment I thought he'd call me out in front of everyone, drag me into some public pissing match. Instead he nodded, almost imperceptibly, and jerked his chin toward the cage elevator. I got the message.
Inside the cramped mining lift, the air was stifling. The steel cage walls vibrated as we lurched downward, every groan echoing in my chest. Pipes overhead rattled, sending streaks of condensation dribbling onto the grated floor. One by one, the others spilled out at intermediate levels, their boots clanking away until only Charlie and I remained.
Every jolt of the lift made the grated floor tremble beneath my boots, sending shivers up my spine. When I stumbled, Charlie's hand shot out to steady me—his calloused fingers gripping the reinforced sleeve of my mining suit. The pressure of his touch shot through me like static from the drill cores below. I felt the heat of his palm radiate right through the thermal-resistant fabric, his fingers lingering where my shoulder curved into my arm.
My breath hitched as I realized how close we stood. My chest plate pressed flush against the weathered insignia on his suit. I smelled his regulation soap mingled with machine oil. One of Charlie's hands slid down to circle my waist, his thumb pressing into the flexible panels at my sides.
"Charlie, what—" I tried to speak, but the words died in my throat when I saw his pupils dilate, swallowing the amber of his irises until only black remained. He closed the remaining distance between us, his rough palm—etched with tiny scars from years of mining accidents—sliding up to cradle my neck. His thumb pressed against my pulse point where my suit collar gaped open.
"Hush," he growled. The vibration of his voice traveled from his chest into mine, resonating through my ribcage like the low-frequency rumble of the drill cores. His face hovered a breath away—close enough that I could taste the metallic tang of his exhale mixed with the bitter sting of synthetic coffee still clinging to his breath, his face now inches from mine.
The moment stretched taut, like a titanium cable under maximum strain—then snapped. The lift doors slid open with a hydraulic scream that echoed off the cavern walls. Charlie stepped out first, shoulders hunched like armored plates.
"Don't come to me crying if you hurt yourself."
I remained frozen, my lungs burning for air I'd forgotten to inhale. The phantom pressure of his grip lingered on my skin, branded like a thermal imprint. Between us yawned a chasm deeper than the mine shaft beyond.
After that, L-10 tunnel felt heavier—and not just from the increased gravity. His presence changed everything. I'd toss iron into the loader and catch movement at the edge of my sight: him, watching, waiting for me to slip up. Ignoring it only made the skin on my neck crawl. Despite the tunnel's chill, my coveralls were soaked through before our first break. By noon, I crouched near the ventilation ducts, choking down a protein pack with trembling hands, the drill's vibration still living in my bones. For a stupid moment, I'd imagined Charlie greeting me with open arms instead of a facepalm. The absurdity made me snort.
"Something funny?" Kai appeared beside me. Kai's eyes flickered, catching the static white of the lantern. The way he hunched his shoulders, you'd think he was afraid of being overheard. Maybe he was. "Protein's expired," I told him, poking the sludge for emphasis. "Tastes like someone's foot."
Kai smiled with just his lower lip, eyes darting past my shoulder to where Charlie's silhouette paced. "It's always expired." He held out a flask, the battered kind that screamed contraband, and I was about to decline when I remembered I didn't give a shit anymore.
We shared the silence, punctuated by the tremor of distant excavation and Charlie's clipped barks. Kai leaned closer, his voice barely more than breath. "He didn't pick you for shift-mate at random. You're supposed to screw up."
The laugh ripped out of me before I could stop it—sharp, raw, the kind of barking sound that bounced hollow off the tunnel walls and made my own ears ring. For a second, it was the only noise in the world louder than the machinery or Charlie's insistent, distant voice. I could feel it in my ribcage, shuddering out the tension I hadn't realized I was holding. When I looked up, Kai's mouth twitched wider, the ghost of a real smile trying to break through his practiced caution. He looked oddly proud, like he'd just taught a cornered animal how to bare its teeth.
"Supposed to screw up?" I said, my voice coming out hoarser than I liked. "Well, lucky for him, I'm a natural." Kai tipped the flask at me in salute. The gesture was so casual, so out of place here in the underworld grit and haze, that I almost laughed again.
A shadow moved at the edge of the lamplight, and both of us tensed without moving. Charlie's boots scraped over gravel, his structure briefly eclipsing the yellow glow. For a heartbeat, I thought he'd come over to gloat, to remind us both who owned the air, but he just hovered thirty paces off, jaw working as he chewed over his next move. Watching us, always. Even the rocks seemed to lean in, listening.
Kai's hand drifted toward mine, stopping just short of contact, his pinky finger barely grazing my knuckle like a question. Heat bloomed between us despite the tunnel's chill.
"He'll keep testing you," he whispered, leaning close enough that I caught the faint scent of contraband liquor on his breath, "waiting for you to either give up or cross a line." His eyes, half-lidded and knowing, held mine a beat too long. "Either way, he doesn't want you out of his sight." Kai's mouth quirked into a dangerous half-smile. "Kind of romantic, in a way." I found myself mirroring his smile.
"Funny way of showing it," I said, thumb grazing my lip, watching how his gaze followed the movement.
Kai shook his head, eyes flicking to Charlie and back.
"What can I say? Dude has no game when it comes to the ladies."
We sat in silence. The hiss of air through the vents, the distant whine of a grinder, the weight of a hundred meters of rock pressing down. In this strip of barely-lit nothing, Kai and I might've been the only two people left on the planet. I wondered if that was how he survived it.
"Kai, I'm—" The apology caught in my throat. Part of me wanted to spit it out like blood. Part of me wanted to swallow it back down.
"Crystal, it was never your fault," Kai said, but his fingers twitched against his knee. I caught the tell.
"But if it wasn't for me, you two wouldn't have been caught and sent..." I couldn't finish.
Kai's eyes narrowed, but I couldn't tell if it was anger or pain. He leaned closer, his shoulder brushing mine. "We were older. Should've known better than to drag you into it." His voice hardened, then softened. "But sometimes I think—if we hadn't—" He stopped himself as he looked at my scar, his fingertips hovering near my jawline without touching.
"I wanted to go," I whispered, remembering the marble floors I'd traded for stone. "I needed to." My eyes drifted to his mouth, then back up. "But now you're both... so different."
"Not everything's different," he murmured, his knee pressing against mine in a way that felt deliberate.
I let out a sigh as I placed my head in my hands. "but I can't help but hate myself."
He offered the flask again. This time I took two slow swallows, my eyes locked on his over the rim. A drop escaped the corner of my mouth. Before I could wipe it away, Kai's thumb caught it, lingering at the edge of my lip.
"I could never hate you," he finally spoke, his voice low enough that I had to lean in to hear him. "Not then. Especially not now." He looked at me with something in his eyes I wasn't used to—something that made the tunnel's chill evaporate between us. Something cracked in my chest—maybe a rib, maybe something softer. I'd needed to hear it; I'd needed him to say it. I wasn't sure what to do with it now that it was out there, floating between us like a live wire.
I looked away, blinking furiously at the raw concrete and the way the condensation beaded on dark pipes overhead. In the amber haze, the domes of the light bulbs made everything feel like an jail cell. If you'd asked me to name every kind of silence, I'd tell you the one that stretched between us was the kind that came after the water drained from a tank and you were left gasping, scaled and slippery, in the ruined hull.
Kai nudged my foot with his, gentle. "Shift's almost up. Don't let him see you bleed again, okay?"
He reached out, and I hesitated just long enough to notice the tremor in my own hand before his fingers closed around mine. The grip was gentle, but the pull was not—he yanked me up with a force that sent me stumbling directly into his chest, barely catching myself before we both went down. My palms slammed flat against him, the hard lines of his ribcage jarring my hands and waking something else in my bones: memory, sharp and electric, of another awkward collision years ago on polisher's row when we were kids and first learning what bodies could do. For a second, everything in the tunnel seemed to slow, the air thick with old static and the sour-sweet tang of his breath so close to my mouth.
Then his mouth was on mine, rough and hot and nothing like an accident. I felt his heart pounding against my wrists, his hands wrapping around me as if I could vanish if he didn't hold tight enough. I'd forgotten how much larger he was, how he could envelop me in one motion, how his touch could short-circuit every ounce of self-preservation I had left. The first brush of lips should have been enough, but he was greedy, deepening the kiss with a hunger that made me gasp and open for him before I could even think to resist.
The world narrowed to the little strip of space between our bodies. My mind flickered with memories—time spent hiding in the service ducts, trading secrets and Sweats and light kisses, the first time he dared touch the corner of my mouth with his thumb I bit him on impulse. I thought I was over this, over him, but now all that history roared back, swallowing me whole. His tongue traced the edge of my teeth, and I bit down, gentle but warning. He huffed a laugh into my mouth, not letting go, as if he'd been expecting it all along.
I wanted to hate him for how easily he'd dismantled me. Instead, I let myself melt into the heat, just for a second, letting my hands slide up to the base of his neck, feeling the sweat and grit and that old scar behind his ear. A sharp intake of breath—not mine, not Kai's—cut through the tunnel. Charlie stood frozen at the edge of the amber light, his face twisting through shock, rage, and something rawer. His knuckles whitened around the handle of his wrench. Kai's body tensed against mine, but he didn't pull away, instead angling us so his back was between me and Charlie. The gesture wasn't lost on any of us. Charlie's jaw worked silently before and stalked away, each boot strike echoing like gunfire. I realized my own hands were still gripping his shirt like I'd forgotten how to let go. I cleared my throat and stepped back, the taste of salt and iron lingering where he'd bruised my lip open again. By the time I found my balance, Charlie's shadow had already vanished, but I could feel the aftershock trembling up the tunnel.
"oh we're dead," I said. It was meant as a joke, but my voice cracked on the last syllable.
"Probably," Kai agreed, but he was grinning for real now. For the first time in years, the lines on his face smoothed out, and his eyes lost their hunted animal's edge. "But it was worth it."
I rolled my eyes at Kai's grin, refusing to look at him again for fear I'd start laughing or—worse—kiss him even harder. Instead, I snatched a fresh protein pack from my belt satchel—a sun-faded, off-brand yellow wrapper that had already started leaking from a corner seam. I jammed it between my teeth and bit down, the edge splitting with a satisfying pop and squirting a glob of viscous, neon sludge down my chin. The tang of artificial citrus hit the back of my throat, sour enough to make my nose sting, and for a second I clung to the sensation, grateful for something sharp and real in the midst of all the static. I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand and kept chewing, pretending I didn't notice how Kai watched me, his eyes lingering on the dried blood at the corner of my lip, the way I darted my tongue to clean it up.
He said nothing, just leaned forward , head cocked like he was trying to figure out the sum of me and coming up short. I focused on the taste of the protein—cheese and plastic and a weird, metallic undercurrent that reminded me of the air in the service shafts. I made a show of it, crunching louder than necessary, not caring how feral I looked. It was easier than letting myself think about Charlie, about the way his face had darkened when he caught us.
Kai finally broke the spell by flicking a pebble at the tunnel wall, the sharp clack echoing down the shaft. "Charlie is really going to kill us, you know that?" His tone was light, but there was something knotted up underneath, something that made my chest tighten with a rush of guilt and something else I didn't want to name. I shrugged, rolling the now-empty pack into a tight ball and tossing it aside. "I'd rather die of flavor poisoning than let Charlie choke the life out of me for one more day."
Kai snorted. "Flavor poisoning. They'll put that on your stone along with, 'Died as she lived—mouthy and impossible to shut up.'"
I snorted back, almost choking. For a few seconds, nothing else existed but the shared joke, the rhythm of banter that had always been the only safe currency between us. Then the moment stretched, and I became sharply aware of how close he still was, the heat of his body radiating through the thin coverall, his breath stirring the hair at my temple. The world shrank again, down to the thread of air between us, and something low in my gut burned itself to cinders. I forced myself to swallow and looked away.
The leaking protein pack had left a smear of yellow across my knuckles. Without thinking, I licked it clean, acutely conscious of how Kai's gaze tracked every move. I finally met his eyes, daring him to say something else. He didn't. He just reached over and thumbed a stray fleck from the corner of my mouth, his fingers lingering for half a breath longer than necessary. For a second, it felt like maybe the kiss hadn't been a mistake—not entirely, anyway.
A siren blared up the shaft, signaling the end of the work day. The sound shivered through the rock and punched me back into my body. I pushed myself upright, slapping imaginary dust from my thighs, and locked eyes with Kai one last time. This close, his irises looked almost gold.
"Come on," I said, voice steadier than I felt. "We're late."
Kai grinned—wolfish, wild, a little too bright. "oh yes wouldn't want to disappoint the boss."