CHAPTER 10 – Awakened Heat

February 2005 – Full MoonPOV: Dual (Ren + Kira)

Weeks passed, each one marked by a quiet rhythm neither of them understood.

Ren Bai, ever silent, ever sharp-edged, went about his days at Forks High like a ghost walking among the living. He exchanged few words, offered fewer glances, and kept himself neatly folded behind a wall of detachment. His Lamborghini became the subject of countless whispers, but his demeanor kept everyone at arm's length.

Except Kira Yue.

They hadn't spoken since that awkward moment in Biology, but their eyes had. Occasionally, they crossed paths in the halls — shoulders nearly brushing, silence stretching like invisible thread between them. She'd smile sometimes. He wouldn't. But he noticed. Every time.

Kira, unlike him, drifted through Forks with the ease of someone who didn't care about being understood. She was a spark against the fog. She joked in class, explored every trail in the woods, and chased every moment of solitude like it owed her answers. But when she passed Ren in the hallway, something inside her flickered. Like memory, or instinct. She didn't know which yet.

And then came the full moon.

—

Ren

He woke up drenched in sweat, shirt clinging to his back like glue. His room was cold — unnaturally so — and yet heat throbbed beneath his skin as if he were burning from within.

He sat up sharply, heart pounding.

The air around him felt heavy, metal particles in the room vibrating faintly, pulsing against his will. It hadn't been this volatile since the first time his powers awakened. He clenched his jaw and steadied his breathing.

Control. Control it.

His footsteps thudded heavier than usual down the stairs as he made his way to the garage. The Dodge Challenger frame waited for him like an old friend. He needed the calm that came from work — the repetition of torque, the click of bolts, the grind of thoughtless labor.

But nothing was normal.

The moment he picked up the wrench, it screamed in his grip — not audibly, but through vibration. He froze. His palm clenched involuntarily and CRACK — the thick steel tool bent in his hand.

"Shit," he whispered, staring at it.

His pulse quickened. Every bit of metal in the room responded — faintly, erratically. Tiny screws in drawers buzzed against the wood. The Lambo parked in the far corner clicked like a cooling engine, though it hadn't been driven that day.

The world felt... alive. Or maybe he did.

He stepped out of the garage to get air, the cold evening wind rushing his face. But even then, his senses were too sharp. The cry of a distant raven scraped against his eardrums. A squirrel darted across the treeline and he flinched violently, heart jumping.

Something was wrong.

Or maybe something was beginning.

—

Kira

Kira stared blankly at the ceiling of her attic room, her sheets a tangled mess around her legs. Sweat pooled at her collarbones despite the frigid air. She couldn't stop tossing, couldn't stop feeling everything.

Downstairs, her aunt was humming — nervous. Kira could feel the hum like a buzz in her teeth. The neighbor outside was pacing. His anxiety tasted like sour breath and concrete.

She pressed her hands against her eyes, frustrated. Her shadow twitched on the wall beside her — long and flickering, though there was no breeze, no movement. Just her.

It had been like this all day. People's emotions weren't just noticeable anymore. They clung. They leaked into her skin.

In town, she'd brushed past a stranger and nearly thrown up from the bitterness of his heartbreak. At the grocery store, she could smell the cashier's shame when he miscounted her change.

She was cracking open from the inside.

By nightfall, her body felt like it didn't fit right anymore — too hot, too tight. Her skin itched. Her vision sharpened and blurred in cycles.

And her legs needed to move.

She threw on her hoodie, barefoot, and slipped out the back door without a word. The cold ground soothed nothing. The forest welcomed her like it had been waiting.

—

Ren

He walked into the trees without realizing why.

His hoodie hung loose, the sweat soaking through it, but he didn't feel cold anymore. The deeper he walked, the more he felt something calling. Not in sound — in gravity.

He walked like a man pulled by fate.

And with every step, the metal around him stirred. A vein of iron deep beneath the soil throbbed in resonance. The zipper of his jacket tingled at his collar. His breath came faster.

The forest was alive.

And something was hunting him.

Or… calling to him.

—

Kira

She ran.

The cold wind slapped her cheeks, but her body was fire, legs like coiled springs. The trees blurred. Her feet didn't slip once.

Her mind was a drumbeat of instinct.

Run.

Run faster.

Every rustle in the trees pulled her head around. Every smell on the breeze told a story — moss, old leaves, a fox nearby.

But something else...

A scent. Wild, familiar.

She skidded to a stop, breathing hard. Her vision caught a flicker of white between the trunks far ahead.

Her breath hitched. Her pulse pounded.

What was that?

—

Their paths twisted unknowingly toward one another.

Ren stepped through a veil of trees, silver light coating his skin in ghostly sheen. Kira darted between shadows, eyes wide, heart cracking with every beat.

And then…

Silence.

They were only a few meters apart, separated by a shallow hill and a cluster of trees.

Kira crouched, peering through the underbrush. She saw a shape — tall, lean, male. Hair like ink pulled back into a knot. Bare hands twitching.

Ren paused. His ears rang with whispers. Not words — pulses. The trees felt like they were breathing. He turned slowly toward the presence he couldn't see.

A breeze passed between them.

Their eyes never met.

And then — agony.

—

Ren fell to his knees, clutching his stomach. Fire licked his bones, his spine bent backward in a sudden jolt. His vision burst with white light. Skin tore. Muscles shifted. Every part of him screamed as something ancient awakened beneath his skin.

Kira screamed too — high and broken. Her hands convulsed, fingers curling like claws. Her legs spasmed, bones snapping and reforming. Darkness spilled around her feet like ink.

Their clothes tore. Their bodies twisted.

A roar echoed through the forest, followed by another — two calls, one piercing, one thunderous.

—

When the moon reached its peak, they lay in separate clearings, bodies no longer human.

Ren — sleek, powerful, white fur laced with faint silver markings, tail lashing like a whip, heart calm and savage.

Kira — black as shadow, her body wreathed in mist, eyes glowing violet in the dark, low growls thrumming from her throat.

They didn't know what they were yet.

Only that they had changed.

And that they were not alone.