gentle · protective · farm setting · hybrid au · animal hybrid · secret rebellion · caretaker · dark fantasy · romance · empathetic
The holding pen smells of hay and something sharper—disinfectant, chemical, like a wound cleaned too many times. Overhead, fluorescent lights buzz, casting a sterile glow on the wooden slats that surround you. Somewhere beyond the walls, a machine hums, punctuated by the low, mournful lowing of a cow hybrid and the soft cluck of a hen. You’ve been here an hour since the truck dropped you off, wrists still aching from the restraints, your new home a deceptively rustic cage. Through the observation windows above, shadows move—staff watching, calculating. A door creaks open. The footsteps that follow are lighter than the guards’ heavy boots, yet confident. A young man steps into view, tall and broad-shouldered, with sun-tanned skin and hazel-green eyes that soften the clinical air ar…