Chapter 185: Golden Omega….

I set the last button of my shirt into place and let out a slow breath I didn’t know I’d been holding. The fabric settles against my skin—clean, familiar, mine. No more hospital gown falling open at the back, no more IV tubes snaking into my arm, no more lying here staring at the glass wall, the city spread far below.

Two days of tests and whispers and needles sliding into the crook of my elbow. Two days of feeling like I was just borrowing this body, waiting for the real owner to come back and claim it.

Today, finally, I’m free.

I sit on the edge of the bed, my palms pressed flat against the soft mattress, and let my shoulders drop. The afternoon sunlight pours through the glass wall, casting long bands of gold across the polished floor, catching dust motes suspended in the still air.

Far below, the city moves on without me—cars reduced to slow-moving lines, people no more than fleeting shadows, the world indifferent to whatever is happening inside me, in the quiet spaces between one heartbeat and the next.

My body feels strange. Not wrong, exactly. Just… different. Lighter, maybe. Or hollow in places that used to be full. I search for the right word and come up empty. It’s been two days since I last felt solid ground beneath my feet, walked without a nurse hovering at my elbow, or breathed air that didn’t carry the sharp undertone of antiseptic and quiet concern.

Moon hasn’t come.

The thought arrives without invitation, settling in my chest like a stone dropped into still water. Not since that night—when he stood in the balcony doorway, his silhouette outlined against the city lights, watching Deniz and me kiss. His face was unreadable in the dim glow—not angry, not sad, just… absent. As if he’d already left.

He sends his secretary instead. Kaz arrives each morning with white roses—always white roses—and a note in neat, professional handwriting: Get well soon.

No signature. No teasing remark. No demand. Just four words that say nothing and everything.

And his silence unsettles me more than his presence ever did.

Is he alright? Should I check on him?

The thought rises before I can stop it, unbidden and unwanted. My hand stills on the sheets. I stare at the sunlight pooling on the floor, the way it gathers in the corners, dust motes drifting through it, anything but his name forming in my mind.

Maybe he’s fine. Maybe he just doesn’t want to see me. Maybe seeing me with Deniz—

I cut the thought off before it can finish. Moon has feelings for Zyren. I know this. He told me. He knelt in front of me in that penthouse, tears sliding down his face, and opened a box and asked me to be his. And I said no. I chose Deniz. I would choose Deniz again, a thousand times, without hesitation, without looking back.

But his silence doesn’t feel like acceptance. It feels like something else. Something I don’t have a name for, something that settles in the spaces between my ribs and makes it hard to breathe.

No. I’m not going to interfere. Neon, just stay away. Don’t get closer.

The more you let him in, the harder it will be to let him go. And it feels like I’m getting addicted to his presence.

I shake my head, pressing my palms against my eyes until faint sparks flicker behind my lids.

Stop. Just stop. Relax. Don’t think so much. You’re out. You’re fine. Let the rest come when it comes.

KNOCK….. KNOCK…..

The door opens. I drop my hands.

Dr. Leia steps in, her white coat crisp, her steps unhurried. Behind her, the nurse follows, a file clutched to her chest, her eyes respectfully downcast. Her face is softened with a practiced smile—the kind that tells you nothing and promises everything.

“Mr. Kael.”

Her voice is warm, professional, the voice of someone used to delivering diagnoses and the quiet, ordinary cruelties of medicine.

“How are you feeling now?”

I return the smile, though I’m not sure how convincing it is.

“Better. But my body feels… strange.”

Her eyebrows lift, just slightly—a flicker of professional interest beneath the pleasant mask.

“Any pain?”

“No.” I reach up, rubbing the back of my neck, where a low, persistent sensation has been sitting for days. Not quite pain, not quite pressure. Just… there. A faint hum beneath the skin.

“It’s just a weird sensation. Right here.”

She adjusts her glasses, the gold rims catching the afternoon light. Her gaze sharpens, turning more clinical, more focused.

“Behind the neck.”

She gives a small nod. “That’s where the pheromone glands are located.” A brief pause, then, more quietly, “That’s a good sign. It means the glands are still responsive.”

I sit forward, my hands gripping the edge of the mattress.

“So I might not lose my pheromones?”

She doesn’t answer immediately. The nurse hands her the file, and she opens it with the slow deliberation of someone handling something precious. Her eyes move across the pages, scanning lines of text I can’t read, numbers and abbreviations that tell a story I’m only beginning to understand.

“Let’s see what happens next,” she says slowly. “Sometimes the rut returns. The body finds its rhythm again, re-establishes its patterns.”

A pause. Her finger traces a line of text, and her voice shifts, becomes more careful. “Other times… it turns into heat.”

I blink. “What do you mean, heat?”

She looks up at me over her glasses, her expression carefully neutral. “In your early tests, I noticed something unusual. Your pheromones are still active. Weak, yes—barely detectable, in fact. But present.” She closes the file, her fingers resting on its cover.

“In rare cases, when an Alpha’s rut fails completely, the body compensates. It recalibrates—finds another way.”

Recalibrates.

The word settles heavily in my chest, foreign in a way I can’t quite place.

She meets my eyes, and something in her expression softens. “Some patients in your condition transition into a different dynamic entirely. A Golden Omega.”

Her voice is soft, careful, the way you speak when you’re handling something fragile, something that might break. “It’s very rare. I can’t guarantee it, one way or another.”

I stare at her.Golden Omega.

The term floats in my mind, unfamiliar and luminous, like something from a fairy tale—the kind I used to read in another life.

She tucks the file under her arm. “Please don’t stress yourself. Rest. Take your medication on time.”

A small smile, almost maternal. “We’ll talk more at your next appointment.”

I nod slowly, still staring at my lap, my hands folded there, fingers that feel suddenly cold.

“Take care of yourself, Mr. Kael.”

I look up. “Thank you.”

She nods and walks out, the nurse close behind her, and the door closes with a soft click that leaves me alone with the silence and the sunlight and the word I can’t stop turning over in my mind.

Golden Omega.

****

Bonus 🌸 Deniz —POV:

After completing the discharge requirements, Deniz walks down the hallway, his footsteps echoing against the polished floor, each one falling into a quiet rhythm that matches the relief in his chest.

Zyren is finally getting out today.

A soft smile spreads across Deniz’s lips, unbidden and warm. He remembers the look on Zyren’s face this morning when the doctor said the word discharge—his eyes lighting up, his posture straightening, already gathering his things before the sentence finished.

He was so fed up with this place. So tired of being a patient, of staying still, of being watched.

The smile lingers as Deniz reaches the door. His hand hovers over the handle.

I’ll ask him to come to my place tonight. He needs someone to take care of him, and I can’t trust the servants at the mansion to notice when he’s tired, when he’s pushing himself too hard, when he needs someone to just… be there.

His fingers close around the handle.

Then he hears the voice through the door.

“In rare cases, when an Alpha’s rut fails completely, the body compensates. It recalibrates—finds another way.”

Deniz stops. His hand freezes on the handle. The soft smile fades from his lips, replaced by something more guarded, more attentive.

Alpha’s rut… fails? What does that mean?

Zyren collapsed from weakness. From exhaustion. From pushing himself too far.

He doesn’t move. Can’t move. His feet are rooted to the floor, his chest heavy with a slow, dragging beat.

The doctor’s voice reaches him again, muffled through the door but clear enough.

“Some patients in your condition transition into a different dynamic entirely. A Golden Omega.”

Deniz’s eyes widen. His breath catches.

His hand drops from the handle. He stands in the hallway, alone, as the word Omega echoes in his mind, spreading outward in quiet waves he can’t stop.

Golden Omega.

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