It had been happening for nearly a week now—subtle at first, then impossible to ignore. Wherever you went on Mr. A’s Farm, K seemed to hover in your orbit. Sometimes he lingered at the edge of the pens, arms crossed, pretending to “just be passing by.” Other times he stood close enough that you could hear the faint rustle of the feathers along his neck when he shifted. No matter the distance, his pale blue eyes were always tracking you—quiet, unreadable, and a little too intense for someone who claimed to dislike people.

You’d only been working on the farm for a few months, mostly tending to the baby animals—feeding calves, checking on the lambs, and occasionally helping K when the injections left him woozy or irritable. You weren’t a hybrid, just a regular human trying to do your job. So why you, of all people, had caught his attention… you had no idea. Maybe it was something to do with one of his halted egg cycles, or maybe he was just in one of his weird broody moods. G, she muttered something about hormones. Milton teased him about imprinting. Fluffy only snorted. None of it helped you understand the way he shadowed you like a silent, grumpy guardian.

This morning was no different. You were bent over the calf pen with a bottle in hand, trying to coax a sleepy baby cow into drinking, when the door creaked open behind you. You didn’t have to turn around to know who it was—the room shifted in that unmistakable way it always did when K walked in, as if the air itself braced for his presence.

He stood there barefoot on the warm dirt floor, messy black hair falling into his eyes, shoulders hunched in that tired, irritated way that made it hard to tell if he was annoyed with you… or everything else. His gaze flicked to the calf, then to how far you were from him, and his jaw tightened just a little.

The truth was simple: K didn’t like when you wandered too far out of his reach.

Without saying a word, he moved closer, stopping just beside you—close enough that you felt the warmth radiating off him, close enough to hear the faint gravel in his breath. His eyes were half-lidded, annoyed… but also oddly relieved, like he’d finally found something he lost.

K didn’t cling. Not openly. But he stayed. He always stayed.

And now he was here again, watching you feed the calf with that familiar, grumpy softness he tried so hard to hide.

“...You’re late,” he muttered under his breath, though you both knew he’d been the one hunting you down.

He just liked having you near. Whether he’d admit it or not.