The steady beep of Natalia’s alarm cut through her dreams. Her hand moved automatically, silencing it before she was fully awake. Six AM. Ti to train.
She rolled onto her back, staring at the ceiling as she cycled through her morning ritual—five deep breaths, ntal review of yesterday’s techniques, visualization of today’s goals. Structure was comfort. Structure was power.
Natalia sat up, stretching her arms above her head, feeling the pleasant pull of muscles that had worked hard yesterday. Her routine was sacred: up at six, stretching by six-fifteen, breakfast by six-thirty, training by seven. It left no room for laziness or excuses, qualities that separated true Hunters from pretenders.
Like her stepbrother.
Even thinking the word ’brother’ in relation to that creature made her lip curl. Through the wall, she’d grown accustod to hearing his disgusting snores—the symphony of a lazy parasite who rarely erged before noon.
But this morning, sothing was different.
The house wasn’t silent.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
Rhythmic, heavy sounds from outside. Like sothing large repeatedly hitting the ground.
Natalia frowned, pushing her covers aside and moving to her window. She pulled the curtain back just enough to peer out into the backyard patio, expecting to see a maintenance bot.
Instead, she saw Satori.
He was attempting... exercise? His massive body moved in what she guessed were supposed to be burpees, though they looked more like a beached whale trying to flop back to sea. His face was already red, sweat pouring down his flushed cheeks. His oversized gray shirt clung to his body, darkened with sweat in expanding circles.
Natalia watched, fascinated and repulsed. He finished a set and dropped to a plank position. His arms trembled violently, his back sagged, and his breath ca in gasps that fogged in the morning air. Every few seconds, his form would collapse entirely before he pushed himself back up with a grunt she could hear even through the glass.
It was pitiful. Pathetic. The worst form she’d ever seen.
But he kept going.
When his arms gave out, he rolled over to crunches. When his core failed, he moved to lunges. Each exercise was uglier than the last—clumsy, uncoordinated, the desperate movents of a body that had known nothing but neglect for years.
Natalia realized she’d been standing at her window for nearly ten minutes, transfixed by this grotesque display. She stepped back, letting the curtain fall.
What was he playing at? Was this all part of so elaborate trick to impress her father? So last-ditch effort to avoid being cut off financially when they turned eighteen in a few months?
It didn’t matter. A few days of exercise wouldn’t undo years of sloth. He’d give up soon enough. People like him always did.
Natalia turned to her closet, selecting her training clothes. Black compression leggings, sports bra, moisture-wicking top. Every item chosen for function over form, though she knew she looked good in them anyway. Her natural gifts, combined with years of discipline, had sculpted her body into a weapon.
Unlike so people.
As she finished braiding her purple hair, she heard the back door open and close. Heavy footsteps shuffled across the kitchen floor, slow and dragging.
Natalia stepped into the hallway just as Satori erged from the kitchen.
The sight of him up close was almost shocking. His shirt clung to his enormous fra, mapping every roll and bulge. Grass stains marked his knees and elbows. His red hair was plastered to his forehead, and his glasses had slid halfway down his nose. His breath ca in ragged gasps.
He was disgusting. A sweaty, filthy ss.
Natalia opened her mouth, the familiar insult forming automatically. "Lazy—"
But the word died on her lips as his eyes t hers.
Sothing was different there. The soft, pleading desperation that had always made her skin crawl was gone. In its place was sothing hard. Focused. His gaze held hers steadily, without flinching or looking away as he used to.
He said nothing. Just brushed past her, leaving a trail of earthy sweat-scent and heavy breathing as he headed for the bathroom.
Natalia stood frozen, the unspoken insult hanging in the air between them. For the first ti since their parents’ marriage, ’lazy’ wasn’t true. And they both knew it.
The bathroom door closed. The shower turned on.
Natalia found herself standing in the hallway, uncomfortably aware of the silence filling their condo—a silence that felt louder than any argunt they’d ever had.
By the third morning, Natalia told herself she wasn’t watching for him. She just happened to be stretching near her window when Satori lumbered into the backyard.
It was the sa pathetic display—burpees that barely qualified as such, push-ups where his chest never quite touched the ground, squats that weren’t deep enough. But there were small improvents. He held his planks five seconds longer. His form, while still terrible, had marginally improved.
On the fourth morning, he added weights—just small dumbbells, but he struggled with them as if they were anvils.
On the fifth morning, he ran. Or tried to. Around and around their modest backyard, his heavy body moving with all the grace of a tranquilized bear. But he ran.
On the sixth morning, Natalia found herself ntally correcting his form. Straighten your back. Lower your hips. Control the descent.
It was annoying. His inefficiency was physically painful to watch. He was working twice as hard for half the results because his form was so atrocious.
Not that she cared.
By the tenth morning, other changes were impossible to ignore. The kitchen, once her battleground in an endless territorial war, remained spotless regardless of when she entered it. The piles of delivery food containers had vanished, replaced by al prep containers filled with simple proteins and vegetables.
Their paths rarely crossed. When they did, their interactions followed a new, unspoken protocol: silent acknowledgnt, then avoidance. No insults. No sneers. No comntary.
It was... peaceful. Unsettlingly so.
"What’s going on with your stepbrother?"
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