"I didn't request?—"
"You will." She paused at the door, hand on the frame, looking back with something that might've been understanding. "Oh, and Zia? That fox-tail watermark in the emergency mix? Gorgeous. I've had it locked into the livestream archive so it can't be scrubbed. It's yours now. Permanently."
She left me sitting there, contract signed, head spinning, trying to understand what had just happened. Trying to reconcile the industry I knew, the one that had tried to make me sign away my boundaries at nineteen, with this strange alternate version where my work mattered more than my designation.
Three Alphas who wouldn't come near me.
A Beta who'd written protection into law, who'd deleted wellness provisions like they were offensive viruses.
A contract that treated me like my work mattered more than my designation, more than my biology, more than whatever convenient box they could've shoved me into.
And somewhere in the walls, the ghost of citrus and ozone that I couldn't smell but they apparently could, strong enough tomake them run, strong enough to require distance protocols and careful choreography.
I pulled out my phone and texted Callie.
Took a tour gig. It's weird.
Her response was immediate, the typing bubbles appearing before I'd even set the phone down.
Weird how? Creepy weird or sexy weird?
Respectful weird.
The typing bubbles lasted longer this time, like she was trying to process the concept.
... That's the weirdest weird. U okay??
I thought about Alfie's wild grin when he'd backed Rowan's shutdown of Gareth, the pure delight in his voice when he'd shouted "Copy that!" like watching someone delete a wellness provision was the best entertainment he'd had all week. About Euan's hands, careful and precise, never reaching toward me even when I'd been elbow-deep in his equipment. About Kit making himself smaller in the doorway, a full-grown Alpha trying to take up less space. About Cal's perfect tea and respectful distance, the way he'd stayed close enough to help but far enough to let me breathe.
I don't know,I thought to myself but just sent Callie a thumbs up.
The lights came back on properly, flooding the room with harsh fluorescent reality. No more emergency lighting, no more romantic shadows, just the brutal honesty of overhead fixtures that turned everything slightly green. Somewhere in the venue, Riot Theory was running soundcheck with the rig I'd fixed,sound bleeding through the walls. Alfie's voice carried through the concrete and drywall, warm and Northern and achingly careful: "Testing, one-two, can everyone hear me alright? Consent to proceed?"
Even his mic check asked permission.
I grabbed my go-bag and headed for the exit, past the green room's clinical neutrality, past the stage where three Alphas were probably still maintaining their careful distance. Tomorrow I'd be on a tour bus with them, living in close quarters, pretending biology didn't matter while they pretended they couldn't smell me.
It should've felt safe. It should've felt perfect.
So why did it feel like rejection?
The Seattle rain had stopped, leaving the streets shining like oil slicks under the streetlights. I counted breaths against my footsteps, the rhythm automatic now. Four in, six out. The suppressants rattled in my bag, a pharmaceutical reminder that I was playing with fire, touring with Alphas, pretending biology didn't matter when clearly it mattered enough that they'd written it into legal doctrine.
My phone buzzed. Rowan had sent the full contract PDF, every clause highlighted and notated in different colors, yellow for standard terms, green for protection clauses, red for absolute boundaries. At the bottom, she'd added a note.
This is just version one. We'll build better as we go.
Build. Not take. Not claim. Not fix. Build.
Like I was part of the construction instead of just the material being shaped.
I walked back to my warehouse loft, triple-locked the doors, deadbolt, chain, smart lock, and started packing for a tour that already felt like stepping off a cliff into something I couldn't name. My go-bag sat open on the bed, waiting to be filled with the usual necessities. Suppressants, scent neutralizers, backupcables, the small collection of things that made me feel human instead of just functional.
That night, I uploaded the emergency mix to my secure server, fox-tail watermark intact. The spectrogram showed my signature hidden in the high frequencies, invisible to casual listening but there if you knew how to look. If nothing else came from this, at least I'd have proof that I'd been there. That I'd fixed their disaster. That I'd existed in the same space as them, even if they couldn't bear to be near me.
Even if "couldn't bear" somehow meant "written protection into contract law."
Four in. Six out.
