#chapter two

I just want to thank everyone for letting me take my time with this, I think these two chapters really work super well together. Chapter 2 will be released to the public in a couple of months, so if you want to wait then feel free. But I do think the content is worth it.

I'll be taking a short break from writing! But I'll be back in a week or two.

Enjoy!!

Not a sound of pain or fear. A warning. Low and deep and resonating from the chest of the person beneath you with enough force that you felt it vibrate through your knees, up your thighs, into your very bones.

Alpha.

The sound hit your omega biology like a physical force. Your hand froze. Your body went rigid. Every instinct screamed contradictions—fight, submit, flee, obey.

The growl rumbled again, and this time you heard it. Not a threat. Not quite. Something else. Something that made your hindbrain pay attention in a way that had nothing to do with fear.

You finally looked—or tried to look—at who you had pinned. The light from earlier had shifted into darkness and save from some glowing lanterns in the tent, the room was covered in shadows.

Na'vi. Male. Warrior.

Even pinned beneath you, even with your blade at his throat, there was no mistaking what he was. This wasn't some scout or inexperienced fighter. This was a true warrior. The kind your clan elders used to speak of with reverence. The kind of warrior who had died in the first years of the war in your clan. 

He was big even in the dark you could tell that much. Broad shoulders that your knees just barely managed to pin. Muscled arms currently trapped under your legs, biceps seemingly thicker than your thighs. His chest rose and fell with steady, smooth breaths beneath your weight, and you could feel the coiled strength in him. Like a viper. Still, but only because he was choosing to be.

Scars decorated his body. Not the desperate, defensive scars of someone barely surviving; like the ones that littered your body. No. These were victory marks. Clean lines from blades. A puckered mark from a bullet on his chest that looked like it should have been fatal, but clearly hadn't killed him, only made him stronger.

You could just make out his war paint; purple and yellow in hick lines made their way across his chest and up his shoulders to his neck and face, covering some of his darker blue striped skin. The colors were smeared and faded on the tops of his cheeks and made the gold in his irises shimmer with life. 

And the scent. His scent. 

The same faded scent that had lulled you to sleep. Woodsy. Leather. High-altitude winds. Alpha. It was strong now. Almost burning your nose with every sharp inhale you make. 

You connect the dots too slowly for your liking. 

This was his tent. His bed. His territory.

And you'd just attacked him in it.

Your hand trembled slightly, the blade still pressed against his skin. You should move it. Should get off him. Should apologize or explain or—

But he hadn't moved.

That realization cut through the panic like ice water.

His arms stayed pinned beneath your legs. His body remained still. He could have thrown you off the moment you'd lunged for him—you could feel the strength in him, could see it in the way his muscles shifted subtly beneath blue skin. Could sense it in the way he held himself with the perfect stillness of a predator deciding whether to strike or not.

Your mind goes dark with possibilities.

He could have stopped you. Could have caught your wrist. Could have reversed your positions and pinned you instead, could have done whatever the fuck he wanted with the unmated omega who'd stumbled into his space.

And yet.

His arms stayed pinned. His body stayed still.

And a smug smile sat on his face.

Not fear. Not anger. Amusement.

Like this was funny.

Your eyes snapped to his face properly for the first time, and—

Fuck.

He was handsome and the shadows from the night only made his features stand out more. Stupidly, unfairly handsome. Strong jaw. High cheekbones. Amber eyes that tracked every micro-movement with an intelligence that made your skin prickle. His bioluminescent syuratan dot his face in a beautiful pattern, despite some being hidden by the paint on his face. Braids adorned with beads that caught the dim light coming from the seam of the tent flap. He was devastatingly attractive. The kind of face that probably had omegas tripping over themselves for his attention.

And he was smiling at you. Like you were entertaining. Like having a knife to his throat was the most interesting thing that had happened to him all day.

Your grip tightened on the bone blade. You pulled it back from his skin—not sheathing it, but pointed at him, still straddling his chest and keeping his arms pinned. A clear threat. A promise that you could strike again if needed.

"You think this is funny?" Your voice came out rougher than intended. Sleep-hoarse and sharp with adrenaline.

His smile widened. Showing his very sharp fangs and pearly white teeth. "Little bit, yeah."

His voice was deep. Smooth. Accented differently than yours but not unpleasant. And completely, infuriatingly calm.

Your jaw clenches as you grit out your next words. "I could kill you."

"Could have tried." Still smiling. Still watching you with those too-intelligent, golden eyes. "Would've been interesting to see, pup."

The arrogance of it made your blood boil. You shifted your weight, pressing your knees harder against his arms. Reasserting your position. Your dominance in this moment, even though everything about him screamed that he was allowing this.

"I am not a pup," you bite out. 

"Alright." He actually laughed. The sound rumbled up from his chest, rich and genuine. "What would you like me to use then? Syulang?"

"I am a warrior—" You leaned forward slightly, blade angling toward his throat again. "A Syulang?" You can’t help but scoff in his face. Nothing about yourself had been soft or flower-like in years. “Would you like me to show you how soft and petal like my blade is, hmm?”

Your words matched your actions as you bring the tip of the blade back down to kiss the spot on his neck where his artery sat throbbing and thumping. 

His eyes flickered—just for a moment—down your body. As if he just now cared to observe your position over him. Your weapons. Your armor. Possibly even the mourning paint still visible on your skin. The scars.

When his gaze returned to yours, something in his expression had shifted. Still amused, but... considering. 

The man beneath you takes a deep inhale and his eyes flutter shut. The edges of his nose twitch, so softly if you hadn’t been so close to his face, you might have missed the movement in the dark lit room. His eyes stay closed for a second longer, however when they open again you can’t help but notice how his pupils are blown wider. 

Confusion sets in as you watch the smile come back to his face, only this time it's more of a smirk. A smirk that suggests he knows more about you now, than before. Heat burns in your chest once you realise what he’s done. 

He just scented you. 

Your walls were down, so whatever he smelt– even micro emotions– were now his to use against you. Disgust pools in your stomach.

You hated how their clan still operated, like the trueborn pack creatures of the forest were designed to, using their smell to keep clan bonds tight –like Viperwolves– to sense each member's emotions and henceforth their next bodily reaction. You hated how your sense of smell was used for surviving and not a social norm you had ever experienced. You were out of your league in the Ometicaya; you were weak and stupid when it came to using your senses in that way and this man was exploiting that advantage. 

A growl rumbles from deep in your throat. So Weak. So useless. Your own biology was giving you away and you didn’t know how to stop it. 

The man below you doesn’t react to your growl. Doesn’t even flinch. He just watches you–eyes glued to your face–as he observes you processing your emotions. 

"You're the one who asked for Uturu," he states. Frustration bubbles up again in your chest, clearly he does know more about you, than you do about him. 

"What's it to you?" You dislike the insecurity in your voice when you answer. 

"This is my tent." He says it simply. Factually. Like it explained everything.

Your stomach drops. "They put me in an occupied tent?"

"Technically it's not occupied. I've been on a raid." That fucking smile never leaves his face. "But yeah. This is mine. Has been for years."

Horror and rage war in your chest. Mo'at had known. Kiri had known. They'd put you here deliberately. You had trusted them so easily, so stupidly, and they had betrayed you. An unmated omega in an alpha warrior's personal space was begging for trouble. And now—

Now here he was –trouble– and you were straddling him, and you could feel every inch of his toned body beneath yours, and your omega biology was screaming that this was an alpha, a strong alpha, a good alpha, and you needed to—

No.

No.

You refuse to let your mind be distracted by his pheromones; his body. You needed space to think. To focus. You started to pull back, to get off him, to put distance between your body and his, before your instincts could betray you further.

His hands move fast and smooth, confirming he's every bit the predator he looks like. 

You'd released his arms from beneath your knees when you'd pulled the knife back to distance yourself from the alpha warrior, and he used the freedom to catch your hips. Grabbing but not restraining. Just... steadying. Keeping you from scrambling off him in a graceless panic.

The touch sent electricity up your spine. His hands were strong and warm against the skin of your hips. You could feel the calluses from years of fighting and training as his grip slid down a fraction to find a better grip on you. To keep you close to him. You pray that from his viewpoint he can’t see the twitching, wag in your tail.

"Easy," he speaks softly. His voice dropping lower to be more soothing. The kind of tone that you’ve used on spooked animals. "I’m just as confused as you are… Came home from three days of fighting the RDA to find my tent smelling like—"

"What—" You hiss, body going unwillingly rigid on top of him at the mention of the RDA. 

From the looks of it, the man below you must think you're concerned about the obvious power exchange happening at the mention of this being his tent. But you’ve got bigger worries in mind than this being his tent. How close were the air breathers? If he had been gone for days–

The terror that overtakes your body is all consuming; like a rock sinking into the depths of the sea, never to be seen again. Breathing is suddenly harder, you have to focus on something… anything else.

His grip tightens on you and makes you focus back on the warrior beneath you. The warmth in his palms is like biting into fresh Yovo fruit on a hot day, cooling and relaxing. You fall into the distraction.

You finetune your body–your thoughts– to him. If he thinks you're worried about his tent then play into it, you think to yourself.

“Why,” you question. “Why place me there then?”

"Because," he responds gently to your question, "your one of my many grandmother's attempts at procuring a mate for her grandson. And putting a new omega in the future Olo'eyktan's bed sends a certain signal to the whole clan." 

Oh, well that’s not what you were expecting him to say–

Wait. Future Olo'eyktan? The words seep into you slowly. 

Future Olo'eyktan.

Oh, fuck.

Your eyes widened. Your brain scrambled to piece together information. Toruk Makto's clan. His sons were out fighting is what Mo’at has said. This tent—its luxuries, filled with trophies, positioned prominently in the camp. The way Kiri had reacted when Mo'at assigned it. The scent that had made your omega biology purr with safety.

"You're—"

"Neteyam," he offered, and the smugness is back in full force. "Neteyam te Suli Tsyeyk'itan. Eldest son of Toruk Makto."

He paused, and his smile turns absolutely wicked upon seeing the fear of recognition in your eyes.

"And you just pinned the heir to the Ometicaya to the floor and threatened to slit his throat with a knife."

His hands were heavy on your hips, now. Still steadying. Still touching you with a casualness that suggested he had no intention of moving them. And then his thumb started to brush up and down; up and over the ties of your tweng and the sensitive skin around it. Involuntary shivers crawl up your spine at the motion.

"So," he continued, eyes gleaming with mischief and something darker, something that made your pulse spike, "you gonna tell me your name? Or should I just keep calling you 'Syulang’?"

Your heart was hammering against your ribs. Too fast. Too hard. The kind of panic that came from being caught off-guard, from losing control of a situation, from being vulnerable.

And he knew it.

You watched his nostrils flare slightly. Scenting the air. Scenting you again. Your fear. Your anger. Your—

His thumbs shifted again. They were now doing small circles just above the top of your tweng. Gentle. Soothing. Except his touch shouldn’t be any of those things.

The tension in your shoulders eased fractionally before you could stop it.

What the fuck.

His expression shifted. Softened just slightly around the edges, though the amusement never quite left his eyes. "Breathe," he said quietly. Not a command. Not quite. But your lungs obeyed anyway, pulling in a deeper breath. "You're safe. I'm not going to hurt you."

You mentally scoff at his words. There wasn’t much left in you to be hurt. Nevertheless, your body still obeys by taking in another breath. Deeper this time. And then three more, until your pulse slows enough for your brain to start working right.

You hated this. Hated that his touch was calming you. Hated that his voice was soothing something instinctive and pure animal in your omega hindbrain. Hated that you couldn't understand why it was working when you'd spent years learning to ignore your biology.

"Stop that," you snap, jerking back from his touch.

Except you were still straddling him. Still too close. Still drowning in his scent and the warmth of his body beneath yours.

His hands lifted from your hips immediately, palms up in a gesture of peace. But that knowing look never leaves his face. Like he understood exactly what was happening to you. Like he could read every shift in your scent, every micro-expression, every traitorous response your body was having before you could realise that your own body was betraying your thoughts, yet again. 

What was it with this man?

"Stop what?" The innocence in his tone was absolutely infuriating.

"Whatever—" You gestured sharply at him, at yourself, at the space between you. "—that is. Whatever you're doing."

"I'm not doing anything." Still that calm, reasonable tone. Still that slight smile. "You're just—"

"Don't." Your voice came out harder. Sharper. The blade in your hand angled toward him again. You couldn’t bear to hear him call you an omega. Not when you were so, so much more than that. "Don't treat me like some stupid girl who doesn't know when she's being manipulated."

Something flickered across his face. Respect, maybe. Or interest. "Fair enough."

You needed distance now. Needed to think. Needed to get off him and figure out what the fuck was happening and why Mo'at had put you in this specific tent. This needed to be handled fast, so you could focus on the reason you truly came. You had no time to be a toy this clan could play with.

You shifted your weight to stand, and he let you go. Didn't try to hold you. Didn't reach for you again. Just watched as you climbed off him and backed up several steps, knife still in hand.

He sat up slowly, deliberately. Non-threatening. His movements were fluid, controlled. Every inch the trained warrior he was seemingly bred to be. He stayed seated on the floor, making no move to stand. Keeping himself physically lower than you.

A calculated choice to appear less threatening.

Which somehow made you trust him less.

"Why?" The word came out harsh. Demanding. "Why did they put me here if this is your tent? If you live here?"

Neteyam's expression sobered slightly. He regarded you for a long moment, and you could practically see him choosing his words. Calculating how much to tell you.

"The Ometicaya have rules," he said finally. "Old rules. Traditions that have kept us strong."

"Your traditions mean shit to me. Answer the question honestly."

His jaw tightened fractionally. He didn’t seem to like the insinuation he was lying. The first sign of irritation you'd seen from him. Good. You preferred him annoyed over amused.

"Unmated omegas are fair game," he speaks bluntly. "Any alpha can attempt to claim them. Challenge for them. Take them."

The words hit you like a physical blow.

Take them.

Your fingers tightened on the bone knife, keeping it positioned in front of your body. "Willing or unwilling?"

"Historically?" His eyes never leave yours. "Both."

Ice flooded your veins. Horror and rage and a sick understanding crash over you in waves.

"The warriors I saw staring at me," you said slowly. "When I arrived. They weren't just curious."

"No. Most likely not."

"They were deciding—" You force your voice steady, but can’t help the crack in your tone. "They were deciding if I was worth the trouble of claiming."

"Some of them, yeah." He said it so calmly. Like it was normal. Like it was just another fact of life in the Ometicaya.

Your vision swims with red. "And you let this happen? You let your warriors just—just take omegas who don't—"

"I didn't say I agreed with it," Neteyam interrupted sharply. The first real edge in his voice. "I said it was tradition. The old way. My father has been working to change it, but change takes time. Especially with the elders."

"That's not good enough." You were shaking now. With a new rage. With a new fear. With the realization of just how much danger you'd willingly walked into. "I came here for sanctuary. For help. Not to be—"

"You're safe," he cut in, and his voice had dropped to that soothing tone again. But this time there was steel underneath. Certainty. "You're safe because you're here. In this tent."

You stared at him. "What does that mean?" The words come out coated in detestment.

"You asked why grandmother put you here." He gestured at the space around you. At his weapons. His trophies. His territory. "Traditionaly the most eligible alpha gets first claim to new ‘mega’s. Your here because of who and what I am to this clan. My rank. My title. My claim to..."

You could feel the words he was leaving unsaid. My official claim to you.

"I don't understand." And you truly didn’t. How could you asking for uturu possibly mean that you would have to willingly put up with this hierarchical bullshit. You wanted bloody, crimson revenge not to fall into rank with this clan. The Ometicaya were supposed to be your salvation and now it is starting to seem more like it’s own type of personal Hell to you. 

Neteyam shifted to a crouching position, his weight shifting to his toes. The new position did little to calm you. He looks even more massive in this new position, light casking onto his silhouette–highlighting his physique that now looked posed to strike–to chase.

"It means," he said carefully, "that by putting you here, grandmother made it very clear that you're under my protection. Any alpha who wants to challenge for you would have to go through me first."

The implication settled over you like a heavy cloak.

"And they won't," you said slowly. "Because you're the heir. Because you're—"

"Because I'm the most dangerous warrior in this clan after my father," he finished. Not bragging. Just stating a fact. His causal tone irked every bone in your body. "Because I've killed more sky-people than anyone except Toruk Makto himself. Because challenging me would be suicide, and everyone knows it."

He was protecting you. Mo'at had placed you in the one location where no other alpha would dare touch you.

But that meant—

"I slept in your bed," you said, and your voice sounded distant to your own ears. "I'm covered in your scent. The whole clan is going to think—"

"Yeah." He scratches the back of his neck, looking almost sheepish. "That's... going to be a thing."

Horror and humiliation war in your chest. "They're going to think you're claiming me. That I'm yours."

"For the time being, yes."

"And you're just—okay with that?"

"I'm okay with you being alive," he said flatly. "I'm okay with you not being dragged off by some alpha twice your size who doesn't give a shit about consent. I'm okay with grandmother using my reputation to keep you safe." He pauses only for a second, as if the weight of his next words were just something else for him to carry. "I am the next Olo'eyktan, I care deeply about the protection of my people. That includes you now. So regardless if I have to kill the sky-people or protect you from egotistical alphas, then so be it. I’ll always get the job done."

You wanted to scream; wanted to rage. Wanted to reject all of this, the protection and the implications and the sheer arrogance of him deciding you needed saving.

"When you asked for Uturu," Neteyam continued, and his tone had gentled again but still cared an edge to it, "you agreed to follow our rules. Our laws. Grandmother took it upon herself to assign you to me, partly because of tradition, but also because she is insistent on me finding a mate. Until you find a mate you actually want, you're with me."

The words triggered something violent in your chest.

"I don't need a keeper," you snarled, and you were moving before you thought about it. Closing the distance between the two of you. Blade angled at his throat again. "I don't need you to protect me. I've been surviving just fine on my own."

He didn't flinch. Didn't move. Just looked up at you with those too-knowing golden eyes.

"I don't want a mate," you continued, and your voice was shaking with fury. "I don't want protection. I don't want any of this. I want revenge. I want the sky-people who killed my family to burn. I want to watch them bleed and scream and die, and I want to be the one holding the knife when it happens."

The silence in the tent was loud after you finished your rant. You could feel the weight in the room shift as Neteyam regarded you for a long moment. Then, slowly, he smiled.

Not the smug smile from before. Something sharper. More feral. Understanding.

"Finally," he said softly. "Something we agree on."

Your blade wavered. "What?"

"You want revenge?" He tilted his head slightly, baring his throat to your knife in a gesture that should have been submissive but somehow wasn't. "Good. So do I. So does every warrior in this clan. That's what we do. We hunt the sky-people. We make them pay for every inch of our land they've tried to steal. For every Na'vi they've killed."

He leaned forward slightly, finger tips gently resting on the ground, and his eyes were blazing now–something familiar. Golden and intense and full of the same rage that burned in your chest.

"You want to watch them burn? I'll hand you the torch. You want to make them scream? I'll teach you exactly where to cut to make it last. You want revenge?"

His smile widened, showing sharp teeth.

"Welcome to the Ometicaya, sevin. We specialize in it."

The words sent a thrill down your spine that had nothing to do with fear.

Everything to do with something else entirely.

Your breath caught. Heat flooded through your body—sharp and sudden and wrong because this wasn't the time, wasn't the place, wasn't—

But the image his words painted was intoxicating. The promise of revenge. Of justice. Of finally, finally making the sky-people pay for every loss, every death, every moment of suffering they'd inflicted.

The thought of it made something deep in your core throb with anticipation.

With need.

Not the heat-need your omega biology sometimes whispered to you in the dead of night. This was different. Darker. The need to see blood spilled. To hear screams. To watch the light leave the eyes of those who'd destroyed everything you loved. To claim victory over the oppression and horrors that had been casted onto you.

And he was offering it to you.

Neteyam's nostrils flared.

His pupils dilated.

The change in his expression was instantaneous—that once lazy amusement sharpening into something exclusively predatory. Something dangerous. His eyes tracked over you with new intensity, and you watched his jaw clench. Watched the muscles in his shoulders tense.

He'd scented it. Your excitement. Your attraction to his offer.

Fuck.

"You—" His voice came out rougher. Lower. He cleared his throat, and when he spoke again there was something raw underneath the words. "You really mean it. The revenge. It's not just anger talking."

"I told you—"

"No, I know." He crawled forward on his hands and feet like an animal stocking its prey, and the movement brought him closer. Too close. Close enough that you could see the way his pupils had blown wide again. Could smell the shift in his scent—something sharper, muskier, alpha responding to omega interest. "I can smell it on you. How much you want it. How much you need it."

Your hand tightened on the bone knife as he leaned into its sharp edge. "Stop scenting me."

"Can't help it." His lips curved into something that wasn't quite a smile. Something more intense. "You're broadcasting loud enough that half the camp probably knows you're—"

He stops abruptly and pulls back. Dragged his eyes away from you with visible effort.

But the damage was done. His pheromones had already hit your nose—thick and heady and screaming alpha, strong, dangerous, capable. Everything your omega hindbrain insisted you should want. Should need.

The urge to drop to your knees was overwhelming.

To straddle him again. To press close and take what your biology was screaming you needed. To—

No.

NO.

You needed to keep those thoughts far, far away. Needed to find something to talk about; to lighten the wave of desire that had suddenly taken over your body. 

You take a step away from him, back brushing up against the walls of his tent. You hadn’t realised just how far he had moved to follow after you; the bed was now across the room. But there he was just a breath away, crouched like he might be worshiping the ground you had just been standing on.

“A bargain.” Your voice is a shaky whisper now, but this time it has nothing to do with fear. 

“What?” Neteyam leans in ears tilting to hear you better. Eyes focusing in on your mouth.

“A deal,” you have to clear your throat to speak. Choking down the desire that is clawing up your throat in an effort to sound more certain. “We should make a deal.” 

The smirk appears back on his lips. His tail waves behind him in excitement or anticipation, at your suggestion. “What kinda deal?”

You force your shoulders to square and your spine to straighten. Based off the look on his face, you must choose your next words carefully. 

“The kind of deal that gets us what we both want.” 

His head tilts when he speaks, “And what’s that, Syulang? Blood?” He assumes and scuffs, “I don’t need anything from you to spill blood.”

“Right, but you seem annoyed by your grandmother about this mate situation.” The words fall from your lips so fast you can’t help yourself as the next words follow. You just hope he will believe them, because you don’t. “I’ll play house with you, to get her off your back.”

“Play house?” He laughs out. “What an offer from such a brave little omega. Is that what you think I want?”

“Look,” you bit out. “Clearly, I need more from you than you do from me.” The truth of the situation hangs in the air and leaves a bad taste in your mouth. You can’t believe the game you're about to play with the prince of the Ometicaya. You were going to have to admit to both Neteyam and yourself, how much you actually needed him. You were about to show him just how weak you were.

“I don’t want a mate. I want blood,” you restate the obviouse. “You can give me blood and keep the alp–” the words die on your tongue. “You can keep the others away. I don’t have much to offer you but…” You leave the sentence hanging in the air. “I can play mate and get your grandmother off your back so you can be free of her nagging.”

What else could you even offer an alpha warrior who can have whatever and whomever he wants. This deal might not even be sweet enough for the warrior prince of the Ometicaya.

The tent is silent for a long minute as the man before you observes every little thing about you. It takes genuine effort to keep you back straight and not fall to the floor in a ball and sob at the intensity of Neteyam’s gaze upon you.

“Alright,” he stands to his full height as he begins to speak. “I’ll make a deal with you. My needs are different from yours though. So don’t agree to this lightly.” 

He closes the last little bit of distance between you again and you have to look up to maintain eye contact with him. Your back fully touches the wall of the tent, and you feel like a caged animal. No, you are a caged animal and Neteyam was the one holding the key.

What little space that exists between the pair of you is now laced with the dense air of desire.

“What do you want?” The words are barely a whisper in the wind but they carry the suggestion of surrender.

His voice hits your ears like nectar to the tongue of a Direhorse .

“If you want to play house with me,” he pauses, voice full of want as his eyes fall down your body. “That means being my rut partner. I have no time to waste in this war. Handling my rut by myself isn’t proficient and hooking up with random omegas is tireless. It takes days if not a full week to get through alone but with a partner it's gone in a day or two. Would you agree to that, ‘mega?”

A gasp leaves your mouth and Neteyam breathes it in. His growl echoes in the tent. There is no doubt in your mind he already knows–smells– how you feel about that. Scared and excited. The conflicting emotions cloud your brain. 

You had never had a heat partner before; it had been so long ago that you had even experienced a heat that you were too young to even have a partner and no male had ever asked you to help them through their rut. The thought provokes something foreign in you, that you struggle to name until it becomes clear: lust. 

Between the tension in the air and the heat you can feel coming off Neteyam, the thought occurs to you at how easy it would be to fall into the trap he was setting for you. How easy it could be to let him have his way with you.  If you were any weaker you might have caved right then and there, but fear pushed the idea deep and far away into the back of your mind.

You had to focus on the bigger picture, not on the throbbing in between your thighs. If you could play your cards right–if you could manipulate Neteyam just enough to get what you wanted then leave the clan– what could be so bad about being his rut partner. 

“If I agree,” You can’t believe the words coming out of your mouth. This man is a stranger. “I–

Your stomach growls.

Loud and long. Completely destroying whatever moment had been building between you.

Neteyam's head snaps down to look at the source of the sound. His expression shifts immediately from a predatory intensity to something else. His eyes narrow, and he is backing away from you, creating the largest distance from him you’ve had since tackling him to the ground earlier.

"When did you last eat?" It’s not a question but a demand.

You blinked at the sudden change in conversation; in his actions. "I—what?"

"Food. When?" He was already moving, grabbing something from a pile near his sleeping furs. A woven bag. "When the fuck did you last eat?"

The anger in his voice catches you off-guard. This wasn't the amused, smug warrior from moments ago. This was something else. Something almost... concerned.

"I don't—" You tried to remember. The morning before the attack? Before your sister died? "Two days, maybe? Three?"

The sound he made was somewhere between a growl and a curse.

"Come on." He strode toward the tent entrance, then paused. Looked back at you with an expression that brooked no argument. "And stay close. Don't wander off."

It wasn't a suggestion.

You should have argued. Should have told him you didn't take orders. Should have reminded him you weren't some helpless omega who needed supervision or protection for that matter.

But something in his tone made you obey. And the previous conversation was leaving you full of doubt and confusion. Your body sure did feel like some helpless omega.

Maybe it was the alpha command. Maybe it was exhaustion. Maybe it was the fact that your stomach was currently trying to digest itself.

Yet you followed after him.

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Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Center

Emergency Department

05:12 PM

The Emergency Department at Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Center had carried more than its fair share of catastrophe over the years—far more than any building of steel and glass should reasonably be expected to endure. The staff who worked there knew it, even if they rarely said it aloud. They had seen nights when the city seemed to fracture all at once, when sirens became the soundtrack of entire shifts and stretchers lined the hallways faster than rooms could be cleared. 

Most days unfolded in quieter rhythms—sprained ankles from weekend games, elderly patients struggling with pneumonia, children with fevers cradled in anxious parents’ arms, the steady, familiar flow of ordinary emergencies that defined the work. There were long stretches when the department breathed easily, when laughter drifted from the nurses’ station and the loudest sound in the corridor was the soft hum of monitors tracking stable heartbeats.

Yet when disaster did strike—when something large and violent tore through the city and the surrounding hospitals reached the limits of their capacity—the path always bent in the same direction. Ambulances rerouted. Helicopters redirected. Radios crackled with the same destination repeated again and again until it became less of an instruction and more of an inevitability. 

The medics didn’t debate it. They didn’t hesitate. They drove toward the same familiar set of sliding glass doors, toward the same brightly lit entrance that never closed, no matter the hour or the circumstances. Pittsburgh Trauma Medical Center stood at the center of those worst days, a place designed not just to treat injuries but to withstand the weight of collective crisis—to absorb shock, to hold the line, and somehow remain standing when everything else felt like it was collapsing.

Tonight had settled into that kind of gravity long before the first ambulance reached the bay.

The shift in rhythm had begun subtly, almost imperceptibly at first, a tightening in the air that experienced staff recognized without needing to name it. Conversations shortened. Movements became sharper, more deliberate. The background noise of routine care gave way to the steady cadence of urgency, the sound of wheels rattling over tile floors growing more frequent, more insistent. 

Gurneys rolled through the entrance in rapid succession, paramedics speaking in clipped, breathless bursts as they delivered patient reports before their boots had even fully crossed the threshold. Each arrival carried its own pocket of chaos—voices raised, hands moving quickly, equipment clattering against metal rails as stretchers were steered toward open trauma bays.

Civilians rescued from the raid came first in waves, their conditions as varied as their expressions. Some stumbled forward in shock, faces pale and unfocused, unable to fully comprehend the violence they had just escaped. Others cried out in pain or confusion, clinging to medics or officers as though letting go might send them back into danger. A few remained eerily silent, their stillness more unsettling than any scream, eyes fixed on nothing as they were rushed past the nurses’ station and into waiting rooms filled with bright lights and controlled urgency. 

Behind them came the police officers—uniforms smeared with soot and blood, shoulders rigid with adrenaline that hadn’t yet found a place to settle. Their movements carried the restless energy of people still halfway inside the crisis, minds racing faster than their bodies could follow.

The SWAT agents arrived last, heavier and quieter, their presence marked by the dull clink of equipment being removed piece by piece along the hallway. Tactical vests were loosened, helmets set aside, gloves peeled off with trembling fingers. At first glance, many of them appeared intact, standing upright through sheer discipline. 

But once the gear began to come off—once scissors sliced through fabric and hands pressed against hidden wounds—the truth revealed itself in spreading bloodstains and sharp intakes of breath. Injuries that had been concealed beneath layers of armor suddenly demanded attention, forcing the staff to move faster, to prioritize, to triage with ruthless precision.

Through it all, the department did what it had always done.

It absorbed them.

Dana stood near the central trauma corridor, her posture straight and composed, her presence steady amid the controlled chaos unfolding around her. She had positioned herself carefully, deliberately choosing the spot where the entrance from the ambulance bay remained fully visible, where every incoming patient passed through her line of sight before being directed to a room. 

From there, she could track the flow of arrivals, anticipate bottlenecks, and respond before problems had time to grow. No supervisor had assigned her to stand there, no protocol demanded it. The role existed purely because experience had taught her the value of watching, of seeing everything as it happened rather than reacting after the fact.

Her gaze moved constantly, sweeping from one stretcher to the next with quiet precision, cataloging injuries and expressions in a matter of seconds. Years of trauma work had trained her to read the smallest details—the pallor of skin, the angle of a limb, the rhythm of breathing—signals that revealed how urgent a case truly was before numbers appeared on a monitor. 

She stayed rooted in place, hands loosely clasped in front of her, shoulders squared against the rising tide of urgency. To anyone passing by, she might have appeared calm, even detached. But beneath that stillness, her mind worked relentlessly, mapping out possibilities, preparing for complications, calculating the next move before the current one had fully unfolded.

And beneath all of that—beneath the training and discipline and practiced composure—there was another reason she refused to step away from that spot.

She was searching.

Each time the doors from the ambulance bay slid open, her attention sharpened instantly, her focus snapping forward before the paramedics had a chance to speak. She scanned faces first, instinctively, before listening to the rapid-fire details of injuries and vitals. It was a reflex she couldn’t suppress, a quiet, persistent vigilance that pulled at her concentration no matter how hard she tried to stay grounded in the present. She watched stretcher after stretcher roll past her position, her eyes moving quickly across each patient, searching for familiar features among the blood and exhaustion.

An elderly man clutched his chest as he was rushed toward a cardiac bay, his breathing shallow and uneven. A teenage girl with blistered skin along her forearms whimpered softly as a nurse adjusted the oxygen mask over her face. A police officer limped forward under the support of two colleagues, a deep laceration stretching down the length of his thigh, blood soaking steadily into the fabric of his uniform.

The injuries blurred together in a steady procession of pain and urgency—fractures, burns, shrapnel wounds, shock—each one demanding immediate attention, each one pulling resources in a dozen different directions at once.

The air inside the department had grown heavy, saturated with the layered smells of antiseptic, smoke, and something sharper that clung stubbornly to clothing and skin. Chlorine lingered faintly among it all, an unmistakable reminder of the water where some of the victims had been found, its sterile scent mixing uneasily with the metallic tang of blood. 

The combination settled deep in the back of the throat, impossible to ignore, a sensory echo of the disaster still unfolding beyond the hospital walls.

The charge nurse noticed all of it.

She noticed the tremor in a patient’s hands, the strain in a medic’s voice, the subtle shift in pace as staff moved from one emergency to the next. She registered every detail with clinical precision, her attention sharp and unwavering.

But with each passing minute, one detail remained painfully absent.

No sign of Joanna.

Time began to stretch in ways that felt almost unnatural, the minutes lengthening far beyond their actual measure, each one pressing heavier against the women’s awareness than the last. She could feel the tension building quietly beneath her ribs, tightening in slow, deliberate increments, like a knot being pulled taut strand by strand. 

It wasn’t panic—she was too experienced for that, too disciplined to let fear take shape in the middle of a working shift—but the absence itself had started to feel wrong, deeply wrong, in a way that logic couldn’t easily explain. 

There was a pattern to nights like this, a rhythm she had learned to recognize after years in trauma medicine, and Lieutenant Adavani’s continued absence disrupted that rhythm in a way that made the back of her neck prickle with unease. It was like scanning a familiar landscape and realizing a landmark had vanished, leaving behind an empty space that the mind kept circling back to, unable to reconcile what was missing.

Yet the department did not slow, and neither did she.

Work had a way of demanding attention with relentless insistence, refusing to yield to personal worry or speculation. Patients continued to arrive, injuries continued to demand intervention, and the steady current of urgency flowing through the Emergency Department allowed no room for hesitation. 

Dana forced herself to remain anchored in the present, pushing the growing concern into the background where it could not interfere with decision-making. She drew in a quiet breath, steadying her thoughts, reminding herself of the rule that governed every crisis: focus on the patient in front of you. Everything else could wait.

“Let’s move—pressure here,” Langdon called from inside Trauma Three, his voice carrying through the open doorway with a firmness that left no doubt about the situation’s urgency.

The charge nurse responded immediately, her body shifting into motion before conscious thought fully caught up. She stepped across the threshold in a smooth, decisive stride, sliding into position beside him with the practiced ease of someone who had performed this choreography hundreds of times before. 

The room was already alive with activity—staff moving quickly but deliberately, equipment being positioned, hands reaching for supplies in a seamless sequence of coordinated effort. At the center of it all lay the patient, a middle-aged civilian who had been pulled from the building only minutes earlier, his body trembling faintly against the narrow stretcher beneath him.

His skin had taken on a washed-out pallor that spoke of blood loss and shock, beads of sweat clinging to his forehead despite the cool air circulating through the room. A makeshift bandage had been wrapped hastily around his upper arm during transport, but the fabric was already saturated, darkening steadily as fresh blood seeped through the layers. 

Beneath it, a jagged fragment of shrapnel had carved a violent path through muscle and tissue, leaving the wound uneven and unstable, the edges raw and angry where metal had torn its way inside. Each movement of the patient’s arm sent another slow pulse of blood into the gauze, the steady loss draining strength from his body with quiet persistence.

“BP’s dropping—ninety over sixty,” Perlah reported from the monitor station, her voice calm but edged with urgency as her fingers moved quickly across the control panel, adjusting settings and tracking the numbers flickering across the screen. “Heart rate one-thirty.”

The words landed with immediate significance, the vital signs painting a clear picture of a body struggling to maintain stability.

“Alright,” Langdon said, already reaching for a fresh pair of gloves, his movements precise and economical as he pulled the latex snug over his hands. His voice remained level, controlled, carrying the steady authority that anchored the room even as tension continued to build. “Let’s get a large-bore IV in—eighteen gauge. Start fluids wide open. I want labs drawn—CBC, CMP, type and cross. And reinforce that pressure dressing now. We need to slow this bleed.”

Dana stepped closer to the stretcher as he spoke, her attention fixed on the injury, assessing depth, direction, and severity with the sharp focus of clinical experience. Every detail registered instantly—the rate of bleeding, the patient’s shallow respirations, the slight tremor in his fingers. Her mind calculated next steps in rapid succession, preparing contingencies before the current intervention had even been completed.

Melissa acknowledged the instructions with a single, decisive nod, already reaching for sterile gauze and additional bandaging supplies. Around them, the rest of the team moved in tight, efficient coordination, each person slipping into their role without needing further direction. 

A nurse secured the IV line, the catheter sliding smoothly into place as saline began flowing through the tubing. Another staff member adjusted the oxygen mask over the patient’s face, ensuring a steady supply of air as his breathing remained uneven.

The room filled quickly with the layered sounds of controlled urgency—monitors emitting steady, rhythmic beeps, gloves snapping sharply as new pairs were pulled into place, the soft metallic clink of instruments being arranged on stainless steel trays. The noise formed a familiar background, a kind of organized symphony that signaled work being done, problems being addressed, lives being fought for in quiet, methodical ways.

For several moments, Dana allowed herself to sink completely into the task at hand, letting muscle memory guide her movements and sharpen her focus. The worry that had lingered in the back of her mind receded slightly as the demands of the present took priority. Her hands worked steadily, confidently, applying pressure, checking circulation, monitoring the patient’s response to treatment. 

In those moments, the world narrowed to the immediate—blood flow, vital signs, stabilization—everything else fading into the background.

And then—

From somewhere beyond the walls of the room, cutting cleanly through the steady hum of activity in the department, came a voice.

Sharp. Urgent. Unmistakable.

“Dana!”

The voice carried down the corridor with a clarity that cut through every other sound in the department, sharp enough to slice straight through the layered noise of monitors, footsteps, and urgent conversations. It wasn’t just loud—it was unmistakable, threaded with a tension that immediately demanded attention from anyone within earshot. There was familiarity in it, authority, and something else beneath the surface that made heads lift instinctively before conscious thought could catch up.

Princess.

The charge nurse’s head snapped upward the instant the name registered, her body reacting on reflex alone, years of training wiring her to respond to urgency without hesitation. Her hands paused mid-motion above the patient’s arm, fingers still pressed against the reinforced dressing as her focus shifted toward the doorway. 

For a fraction of a second, the room around her seemed to tilt slightly, her attention pulled outward by the tone of that single call. She didn’t need to see her colleague’s face to understand what that voice meant. It carried strain—tight, controlled, but unmistakably urgent in a way that went beyond routine trauma, beyond the controlled chaos they had already been managing since the first wave of patients arrived.

“Dana, we need you—now!”

The words landed hard, heavy with immediacy, leaving no room for interpretation or delay.

A sudden, hollow sensation opened in the woman’s chest, her stomach dropping sharply as instinct surged ahead of reason. Something was wrong. Not just another critical patient, not just another complicated injury—something different, something personal, something that triggered a deeper kind of alarm. 

She stepped back from the stretcher automatically, stripping off her gloves in one swift, practiced motion, the latex snapping softly as she peeled them away and dropped them into the nearest disposal bin. Her movements were efficient, controlled, but faster than before, driven by a quiet urgency she could not ignore.

She was already moving toward the doorway before the last glove hit the trash.

And then she saw them.

The gurney came through the entrance from the ambulance bay with explosive momentum, bursting into the department as the automatic doors slid open just wide enough to allow passage. The medics pushed hard, their boots striking the floor in quick, determined strides, bodies leaning forward with the kind of urgency that came from transporting a patient balanced on the edge of survival. Their movements were fast but precise, each step calculated to keep the stretcher steady while covering distance as quickly as possible. Equipment rattled against the metal rails, IV tubing swaying with each turn of the wheels, the entire scene unfolding in a blur of motion and controlled intensity.

Their voices rose above the surrounding noise in overlapping bursts, sharp and efficient, delivering the trauma report in rapid succession as they cleared the threshold into the department.

“Female, early thirties—found submerged at scene—multiple penetrating injuries—hypothermic—hypotensive—possible head trauma—”

The words struck Dana’s ears in fragments, each one carrying weight, each one tightening the pressure building in her chest.

And then—

She froze.

Not for long. Not enough for anyone else to notice.

But long enough for the world to narrow sharply around the figure lying on that stretcher, everything else in the department fading into a distant blur of movement and sound. The noise softened. The lights seemed harsher. The air felt suddenly heavier, thicker, as her focus locked onto the patient’s face with a clarity that pushed every other detail aside.

Joanna.

The recognition hit with quiet force, stealing the breath from her lungs for a single, suspended moment.

The brunette lieutenant lay motionless against the thin hospital mattress, her body unnaturally still as the gurney rolled forward beneath the harsh glare of fluorescent lights. Her skin had taken on a ghostly pallor that made the dark strands of her hair appear even darker by contrast, the color drained from her features in a way that spoke of blood loss and shock. Her clothes clung heavily to her body, soaked through with water that dripped steadily from the fabric, forming small, spreading pools on the floor as the stretcher moved. 

The scent of chlorine rose faintly from her shirt, mingling with the metallic tang of fresh blood, creating a sharp, unmistakable reminder of the place she had been pulled from only minutes earlier.

Her tactical vest remained strapped tightly across her chest, the thick material weighed down by moisture and debris, the dark fabric stained and torn in several places. Near her right lower abdomen, the damage was unmistakable. The fabric had been cut away just enough to expose the injury beneath, revealing the source of the bleeding that continued despite the medics’ efforts.

The object was still there.

A jagged shard of metal protruded from her abdomen, lodged deep within the tissue, its edges irregular and brutal where it had torn through flesh on impact. It remained immobile, fixed in place by the surrounding muscle, a silent and dangerous presence that prevented any attempt at removal outside the controlled environment of an operating room. 

Blood seeped steadily from the wound, slow but relentless, darkening the gauze packed carefully around the site. The bandages applied during transport had already begun to saturate, the steady loss of blood draining warmth and strength from her body with each passing second.

On her left side, another injury demanded attention. A thick dressing had been secured tightly around her flank, but the fabric beneath it had turned a deep, spreading red, evidence of the knife wound sustained during the chaos of the raid. The pressure applied by the medics had slowed the bleeding but not stopped it, the wound continuing to seep through the layers in stubborn defiance of temporary measures.

Her body trembled faintly beneath the weight of her soaked clothing, the movement subtle but unmistakable.

She was cold.

Not just uncomfortable—dangerously cold.

The prolonged exposure to water had stripped heat from her body, pushing her into hypothermia, and the signs were already visible to anyone trained to recognize them. Her skin carried a strange, mottled coloration, pale and waxy with a bluish tint creeping along her lips and fingertips. The natural warmth of healthy circulation had been replaced by a chilling stillness, the body’s defenses struggling to maintain core temperature after the shock of injury and immersion.

A thin line of blood traced its way down the side of her head, slipping slowly past her ear before disappearing into the damp strands of her hair. The source of the bleeding remained partially hidden beneath tangled locks, but the steady flow suggested more than a superficial cut—another problem waiting to be assessed, another risk layered on top of the others.

Possible head injury.

Her holster hung loosely at her hip, the leather darkened by water and empty of the weight it normally carried.

Weapon lost.

The detail registered automatically, another piece of the story written across her body.

The sight of her—broken, bleeding, dangerously cold—landed heavily across the department, sending a ripple of tension through the staff gathered nearby. Conversations faltered. Movements sharpened. Even those who had not yet been directly involved in her care felt the shift in atmosphere, the quiet recognition passing from one person to the next.

Dana was not the only one who recognized her.

Joanna Advani was known here—not just as another officer, not just as another patient passing through the doors, but as someone familiar, someone respected, someone who had stood in these hallways on better days. She had shared quick jokes at the nurses’ station, traded stories during quieter shifts, escorted injured civilians through the department with steady reassurance. 

Over time, she had become part of the unspoken partnership between emergency medicine and law enforcement, the quiet alliance forged through years of shared emergencies and mutual trust.

Faces around the corridor reflected that recognition now.

A nurse’s eyes widened briefly before narrowing with focus. A physician stepped closer without being asked. Hands moved faster, more deliberately, as the reality settled in.

A ripple of recognition moved through the team.

And with it came something stronger than shock, stronger than fear.

Determination.

“Move her to Trauma One,” Robby called immediately, his voice cutting cleanly through the corridor with sharp, unmistakable authority.

There was no hesitation in the command, no uncertainty, only the decisive tone of someone accustomed to making life-or-death decisions in crowded rooms filled with urgency. His gaze swept quickly across the team, already assigning roles before anyone had the chance to ask. 

“Now. McKay, Mohan, Whitaker, Santos—let’s go.”

The response was instantaneous.

The team mobilized with the kind of speed that came not from panic, but from discipline built over years of working together in high-stakes environments. Bodies shifted into motion in a seamless wave, each person moving toward their assigned position without waiting for further instruction. Equipment was grabbed mid-stride, gloves pulled on as they walked, hands already reaching for tools they knew they would need before the stretcher even reached the room. 

The energy in the department tightened sharply, the atmosphere thickening with urgency as the realization settled across the staff that this was not just another critical patient—it was someone they knew, someone they cared about, someone whose survival suddenly felt personal.

Dana stepped forward almost automatically, her body responding before conscious thought had time to intervene. She moved into position at Joanna’s side as the gurney rolled quickly down the corridor toward Trauma One, matching the medics’ pace without breaking stride. 

The wheels rattled loudly against the floor beneath them, the sound echoing in the narrow hallway as the team pushed hard to close the distance. Her hand settled lightly against the rail of the stretcher, steadying herself as much as the patient, grounding her focus in the familiar rhythm of emergency care.

Training took over in quiet, efficient layers.

Her breathing slowed. Her thoughts sharpened. The surge of emotion that had flared at the sight of the lieutenant’s injuries retreated behind the wall of clinical discipline that years in trauma medicine had built. Every movement became deliberate, purposeful, guided by instinct and experience rather than fear. She forced herself to see the injuries objectively, to read the body in front of her the way she would read any patient—through vital signs, physical responses, and visible trauma—rather than through the lens of personal connection.

This was Joanna. 

Jo.

But this was also a patient.

The distinction settled firmly into place, anchoring her focus as the stretcher crossed the threshold into Trauma One.

“Vitals?” The nurse leader asked, her voice steady and controlled despite the tight pressure pressing insistently against her chest. She kept her eyes on the brunette’s face as she spoke, watching the faint flutter of her eyelids, the shallow rise and fall of her chest, searching for any sign that consciousness was slipping further away.

“BP seventy-eight over forty,” one of the medics reported, breath slightly labored from the rapid pace as they maneuvered the stretcher into position beside the trauma bed. 

His words came quickly, efficiently, each number delivered with the urgency of someone who understood exactly what they meant. 

“Heart rate one-forty-two. Respirations shallow—twenty-eight per minute. Core temp ninety-three Fahrenheit. GCS twelve—she’s drifting in and out.”

The numbers landed heavily, forming a clear and dangerous picture.

Hypotensive. Tachycardic. Hypothermic.

Shock.

The diagnosis assembled itself in Dana’s mind almost instantly, each piece of information slotting into place with clinical precision. Her gaze moved briefly across Advani’s body again, confirming what the numbers already suggested—the pale, mottled skin, the trembling muscles, the sluggish responsiveness. Blood loss and cold exposure were working together against her, draining strength and stability at a pace that could not be allowed to continue.

“Alright,” she said quickly, her tone firm and grounded, projecting calm into the rapidly intensifying room. Her voice carried the steady authority that anchored the team, giving direction where uncertainty might otherwise take root. “Let’s keep her talking. We need her awake. Princess, warm blankets—get the Bair Hugger ready. I want active rewarming started immediately. Whitaker, two large-bore IVs—sixteen gauge, bilateral. Start warmed normal saline wide open. Santos, activate massive transfusion protocol—O-negative, now.”

The orders came in rapid succession, each instruction clear and precise, leaving no room for hesitation.

“On it,” Trinity replied without looking up, already reaching for the phone mounted along the wall. Her fingers moved quickly across the keypad, dialing the blood bank with practiced efficiency, her posture tense but focused as she relayed the activation code.

Around them, the room transformed instantly into a tightly coordinated machine.

The transfer from gurney to trauma bed happened with deliberate care, every movement controlled and synchronized to prevent any sudden shift that might worsen the internal damage. Four sets of hands gripped the stretcher rails, their timing perfectly aligned as they counted softly under their breath.

“One—two—three.”

Joanna’s body was lifted smoothly from the gurney and lowered onto the trauma mattress in a single, fluid motion, the team adjusting their grip mid-transfer to protect the embedded metal fragment lodged deep in her abdomen. Even the smallest jolt could have caused catastrophic bleeding, and everyone in the room understood the risk without needing it explained.

As soon as her body settled onto the bed, the room erupted into motion.

Scissors flashed through soaked fabric, slicing cleanly through the heavy material of her shirt and tactical gear. Wet clothing peeled away in damp, clinging layers, exposing bruised skin and blood-streaked wounds beneath. Monitoring leads were pressed quickly against her chest, adhesive pads sticking to cold, clammy skin as the cardiac monitor sprang to life with a sharp, rhythmic beeping. Oxygen tubing was secured beneath her nose, delivering steady airflow to support her shallow breathing.

Whitaker worked quickly at her arm, his fingers steady as he located a suitable vein despite the constriction caused by hypothermia. The needle slid into place with practiced precision, followed seconds later by the second line on the opposite arm. Clear tubing filled with warmed fluid, the saline beginning its steady flow into her bloodstream, pushing life-sustaining warmth back into a body that had lost too much heat.

The air in the trauma room filled with the layered sounds of emergency care in full motion—monitors chiming, packaging tearing open, metal instruments clinking against trays, voices calling out updates in short, urgent bursts. The smell of antiseptic mixed with the lingering scent of chlorine and blood, creating a sharp, sterile atmosphere that clung to the back of the throat.

At the center of it all lay Jo—pale, shivering, fighting to stay conscious—as the team worked with relentless determination to pull her back from the edge.

Dana moved quickly but deliberately toward the head of the bed, threading her way through the tight circle of bodies and equipment until she reached the one place where she could anchor herself—and Advani.

It was a position she chose instinctively, the same place she always navigated to when a patient hovered on the edge of consciousness. 

From there, she could watch the subtle changes in breathing, track the flicker of awareness in the eyes, and intervene the moment the body began to slip too far into shock. She rested one hand lightly against the side rail, leaning forward just enough to enter the woman’s line of sight, careful not to crowd her, careful not to add pressure to an already overwhelmed nervous system. 

The room around them pulsed with activity—voices calling out vitals, packaging tearing open, monitors chiming—but the charge nurse narrowed her focus to the single face lying pale against the trauma mattress.

Her priorities aligned with quiet, unwavering clarity, settling into place like the steady rhythm of a heartbeat.

Keep her conscious.

Keep her breathing.

Keep her calm.

Everything else—blood loss, surgical consults, imaging, the looming rush to the operating room—would come next. But right now, the fight was simpler and more immediate. Hold her here. Keep her tethered to the present. Do not let her drift.

“Jo,” Dana said gently, lowering her voice so it cut through the noise without adding to it, warm and steady in a way that invited attention rather than demanded it. She leaned slightly closer, angling herself so the brunette wouldn’t have to search for her. “Stay with me. You’re at Pittsburgh Trauma. You’re safe.”

For a few long seconds, there was no response.

The lieutenant’s eyes remained unfocused, drifting slowly beneath half-lowered lids as if she were staring at something far beyond the bright ceiling lights overhead. Her breathing came shallow and uneven, each inhale a little too quick, each exhale carrying a faint tremor that betrayed the cold still gripping her body. Her lips quivered faintly, the muscles struggling to maintain control as hypothermia and blood loss drained strength from her system. 

The color in her skin remained wrong—too pale, too gray, the faint bluish tint along the edges of her mouth standing out starkly beneath the fluorescent lights.

The oldest watched carefully, searching for any sign of engagement, any shift that suggested the words had landed somewhere beneath the fog of pain and exhaustion.

Then, slowly—painfully—something changed.

Joanna’s gaze began to move, not in the restless, unfocused wandering of confusion, but with purpose, however faint. Her pupils tracked unevenly at first, sliding across the ceiling, then drifting toward the sound of Dana’s voice as though pulled by a distant thread. The motion was sluggish, heavy, each fraction of movement requiring effort her body barely had left to give.

And finally, her eyes found her.

They settled on the nurse’s face and stayed there.

Recognition flickered in that gaze—fragile and faint, like a small light struggling against a strong wind—but unmistakably present. It sparked slowly, fighting through layers of disorientation and pain, gathering strength as the brunette’s mind worked to piece together the fragments of reality around her. The confusion in her expression softened by degrees, the tension in her brow easing as understanding began to settle in. She wasn’t underwater anymore. She wasn’t in the chaos of the raid. She wasn’t alone.

She was here.

Safe, for now.

Her eyes remained fixed on Dana, clinging to that familiar face as though it were an anchor in a storm.

And then—barely visible, fragile but stubborn—Joanna tried to smile.

It was a small, uneven movement, the corners of her mouth lifting just enough to suggest humor, defiance, recognition. The effort cost her, that much was clear; the muscles trembled under the strain, the expression wavering as exhaustion threatened to pull it apart. But it was there all the same, unmistakably hers—the same teasing resilience that had carried her through countless dangerous situations, the same refusal to surrender even when her body was battered and failing.

Just for Dana Evans.

The sight landed deep, cutting through the layers of clinical detachment the nurse leader had wrapped tightly around herself since the moment the youngest entered the room. Something inside her softened immediately, the rigid edges of professional composure giving way to a warmer, more personal instinct. 

Her voice changed almost without her realizing it, the tone gentler, quieter, threaded with familiarity instead of distance. If anyone in the room had paused long enough to listen—if their hands hadn’t been busy fighting to stabilize a critically injured officer—they might have noticed the shift.

“Hey,” Dana murmured, the word barely louder than a breath, her expression softening as she held Advani’s gaze. “Don’t you start showing off now.”

The lieutenant’s lips parted slightly in response, her breath catching unevenly in her throat as she fought to keep herself anchored to consciousness. The effort showed in the tightness around her eyes, the shallow rise and fall of her chest, the faint tremor running through her shoulders. Speaking required strength she barely possessed, but the stubborn determination that defined her refused to let silence win.

“Thought…” she rasped weakly, her voice rough and broken, the sound scraping painfully against dry vocal cords. She paused to draw in another shallow breath, her eyelids fluttering as the room threatened to spin. “…you said… no VIP treatment…”

The words emerged in fragments, barely audible, but the intention behind them was unmistakable—a faint, breathless attempt at humor, a familiar teasing remark delivered in the middle of crisis.

Even now.

Even lying on the edge of collapse.

The oldest wasn’t surprised—not really, not in any way that mattered.

She wasn’t surprised by the humor that slipped through Joanna’s cracked lips, nor by the stubborn flicker of defiance burning behind exhausted eyes, nor by the way the lieutenant reached instinctively for levity even as her body hovered dangerously close to shutting down.

Dana had witnessed that resilience too many times to mistake it for anything else. She had seen Jo crack jokes at the end of sixteen-hour shifts, had watched her tease interns when the department was drowning in patients, had heard her offer quiet reassurance to frightened victims while carrying the weight of her own fatigue. 

Humor, for the young woman, was never carelessness. It was armor. It was discipline. It was the steady refusal to let fear take the lead.

Even now—pale beneath the harsh fluorescence, skin drained of its usual warmth, dark hair damp with sweat and clinging to her temples—she was still trying to steady the room with that familiar spark. 

Blood continued to seep into the trauma sheets beneath her, soaking through layers that were replaced almost as quickly as they were stained, the metallic scent thick in the air despite the antiseptic. Her body trembled in small, uncontrollable shivers as hypothermia and shock pulled at her strength, yet somewhere beneath the physical collapse, her instinct to take care of others still surfaced in quiet, stubborn ways. 

Evans recognized it instantly, and the recognition tightened something deep in her chest—not fear exactly, not yet, but a fierce, protective awareness that refused to let go.

So she stayed exactly where she belonged.

At the head of the bed.

Steady. Unmoving. Present.

She planted herself there like an anchor in rough water, the quiet center Advani could return to whenever the world tilted too sharply. One hand rested lightly along the side of the brunette’s neck, fingers gentle but deliberate as they tracked the pulse beneath the skin—rapid, thready, racing faster than it should, each beat a reminder of the blood her body had lost and the fight still unfolding inside her. 

Dana adjusted her touch subtly, not pressing, not restraining, simply maintaining contact, a silent reassurance that she was there and would remain there. Her other hand gripped the metal rail of the trauma bed, grounding herself in the physical reality of the moment—the cold steel beneath her palm, the vibration of movement traveling through the frame as the team worked around them.

The trauma bay hummed with controlled urgency, a carefully orchestrated storm of motion and sound. Monitors beeped in uneven rhythms, suction units hissed, packaging tore open with sharp snaps that punctuated the air. Voices rose and overlapped—focused, efficient, familiar to anyone who had spent years inside emergency medicine. 

Yet beneath the noise, there was a shared tension threading through the room, a collective awareness that this patient was not a stranger. 

She was one of their own.

To Advani’s left, McKay leaned in with unwavering concentration, her shoulders squared, posture tight with determination. The remains of the black T-shirt had already been cut away, fabric peeled back in jagged strips and discarded onto the floor, leaving the injury fully exposed beneath bright surgical lighting. 

The wound along the lieutenant’s flank was ugly—deep, irregular, still bleeding despite the thick layers of gauze pressed firmly into place. Dark red soaked steadily into the dressings, spreading outward in slow, stubborn blooms that refused to stop. Cassie worked with the calm precision of someone who had done this countless times, but the tension in her jaw betrayed the effort required to keep emotion locked behind professional focus.

Her gloved hands moved quickly yet carefully, packing the wound with fresh gauze, applying steady pressure while monitoring the response beneath her fingertips. She leaned closer, studying the tissue, evaluating the rate of bleeding, the depth of damage, the subtle changes that could signal improvement—or disaster.

“Pressure’s holding for now,” she reported, her voice controlled but edged with urgency, the words delivered without hesitation. She didn’t look up from the wound as she spoke, her attention fixed entirely on the task in front of her. “Still oozing, though. She lost a lot before she got here.”

The statement settled heavily into the room, not dramatic, not panicked—just factual, the kind of information that shaped decisions in real time.

At the foot of the bed, Robby stood tall and immovable, his presence commanding without effort. His gaze moved constantly, scanning monitors, wounds, IV lines, faces—absorbing every detail with practiced efficiency. Years of trauma leadership showed in the way he carried himself, in the steady cadence of his breathing, in the quiet authority that filled the space around him. 

But beneath the clinical focus, there was something else—a tightness around his eyes, a flicker of personal concern he didn’t bother to hide completely.

Because this wasn’t just another trauma.

This was Jo.

“Keep packing it,” the attending physician instructed, his voice firm, grounded, leaving no room for hesitation. 

The words carried the weight of certainty, the calm insistence of someone who had guided teams through countless crises and refused to surrender now. His eyes shifted briefly to Joanna’s face before returning to the wound, the glance quick but unmistakably protective. 

“We’re not letting that bleed win.”

There was no drama in the statement, no raised voice, no theatrical urgency—just quiet determination, the kind that spread through a trauma team like electricity.

“Copy,” McKay replied immediately.

She didn’t waste a second. Her hand moved automatically toward the supply tray, grabbing fresh gauze without breaking rhythm, her focus locked onto the wound as she replaced saturated dressings with clean ones. The motion was smooth, practiced, relentless—pressure maintained, bleeding controlled, time bought one careful movement at a time.

And at the head of the bed, Dana remained exactly where she needed to be—close enough for her protégée to see her when her vision cleared, steady enough to hold her attention when panic threatened to rise, calm enough to keep the fragile thread of consciousness from snapping.

She didn’t move.

She didn’t look away.

She simply stayed.

On the opposite side of the bed, Mohan positioned herself with careful deliberation near Joanna’s right lower abdomen, her posture tense but controlled, every movement measured to the millimeter. 

The metallic fragment embedded there caught the overhead light in dull, unforgiving flashes—a jagged piece of debris that had no business being inside a human body, its sharp edges partially exposed through torn fabric and blood-darkened skin. It protruded just enough to make its presence impossible to ignore, a brutal reminder of the force that had driven it inward. 

The tissue surrounding the wound had already begun to swell, the skin stretched tight and shiny with inflammation, mottled shades of deep red and purple spreading outward in uneven patterns. Beneath the surface, damage lurked unseen, the kind that could shift from survivable to catastrophic in a heartbeat if the fragment moved even a fraction of an inch.

Samira kept both hands steady against the area, bracing the metal carefully, stabilizing it with the disciplined patience of someone who understood exactly how fragile the situation was. She leaned in close, eyes narrowed in sharp concentration, tracking every rise and fall of the lieutenant’s abdomen as she breathed, monitoring the subtle tension in her muscles whenever pain surged through her body. 

Her fingers adjusted minutely as she shifted, counteracting the motion before it could translate into pressure on the wound. She wasn’t just holding the fragment in place—she was guarding against disaster, maintaining a fragile equilibrium between injury and survival.

“Fragment’s still secure,” she reported after a moment, her voice low but clear, cutting cleanly through the steady noise of the trauma bay. 

The words carried the calm precision of clinical assessment, but there was an unmistakable edge of urgency beneath them. She glanced briefly toward the chief without removing her hands, maintaining constant contact with the wound. 

“No active arterial spray at the moment, but she’s guarding hard. There’s definitely internal irritation. We need imaging the second she’s stable enough to move.”

Her statement settled into the room like a marker on a timeline—another step in the careful race against deterioration.

Just behind her, Whitaker moved with practiced efficiency, his focus fixed on the web of IV lines running into Joanna’s arms. He worked quickly but without haste, the rhythm of his movements smooth and confident, shaped by years of repetition under pressure. 

Clear tubing stretched from fluid bags suspended above the bed, the lines trembling faintly as warmed saline surged downward in a steady rush. The fluid moved fast—intentionally fast—pushing volume back into a body that had lost too much, too quickly. The faint vibration traveled through the plastic and into the catheter sites, a silent reminder of the battle unfolding inside her bloodstream.

The first-year resident checked each connection methodically, fingers brushing along the lines to confirm and back again. He adjusted the roller clamp with a small twist, ensuring the infusion remained wide open, then reached for the pressure bag and squeezed it firmly, increasing the flow rate without breaking his steady composure.

“Two large-bore lines are running,” he announced, his voice clear and steady, the words delivered with the confidence of someone who knew exactly what he was doing. He glanced toward Robby briefly, then back to the tubing, verifying the response. “Fluids are wide open. She’s taking them, but she’s still cold. Blood’s on the way.”

At the far counter, Trinity balanced the phone between her shoulder and ear while her hands worked simultaneously to prepare the transfusion equipment. Her movements were fast and economical, every gesture purposeful, shaped by countless emergencies that demanded speed without panic. The plastic packaging crinkled sharply as she tore it open, retrieving the necessary tubing and filters while continuing her conversation with the blood bank in a voice that remained calm, measured, and professional.

“Massive transfusion protocol is active,” she said, covering the mouthpiece briefly to address the room. 

Her tone carried the steady authority of someone coordinating a critical system, but her eyes betrayed her—they drifted toward Joanna again and again, lingering just a fraction longer than protocol required. She had worked with her too many times to pretend she was just another trauma case. 

“First units are being released now. O-negative, uncrossmatched. They’re sending them up immediately.”

She ended the call with a quick nod to herself and turned back to the equipment, hands already moving to prime the line, removing air bubbles with careful taps of his fingers.

“Good,” Robby said from the foot of the bed.

The single word carried quiet approval, but also expectation—an unspoken demand to keep pushing forward, to stay ahead of the injury before it could outpace them. He gave one sharp nod, his gaze sweeping across the team, measuring their progress, confirming that every critical step was unfolding exactly as it should. His posture remained solid and grounded, a steady presence anchoring the room even as tension pressed in from every direction.

“We stay ahead of this,” he added, his voice firm, calm, and unwavering.

Dana absorbed every word without turning her head.

She remained fixed at Advani’s side, her focus locked on the lieutenant’s face, reading the subtle shifts in expression, the minute changes in breathing, the flicker of awareness that came and went like distant lightning. Yet even without looking, she tracked everything happening around her—the cadence of voices, the rhythm of footsteps, the subtle changes in tone that signaled concern or relief. It was second nature after years in trauma care, an instinctive awareness that allowed her to hold the patient at the center of her attention while still understanding the entire room.

The controlled chaos surrounding them felt familiar, almost structured in its predictability. There was comfort in the routine—the sequence of assessments, interventions, updates, the choreography of professionals working in tight coordination under pressure. But beneath that organized motion pulsed something deeper, something unspoken yet unmistakable.

A shared understanding.

A quiet, collective recognition none of them needed to articulate.

This wasn’t just another patient on a stretcher.

This was Jo.

The woman lying beneath their hands had stood beside them in this department on countless days, weapon holstered, voice steady, guiding victims and families through fear and uncertainty. She had shared horrible coffee at impossible hours, argued passionately about police versus hospital protocols, laughed too loudly at bad jokes when exhaustion blurred the edges of professionalism. She had come running whenever needed, done some unofficial favors, and stepped in without hesitation whenever someone else needed help.

She was woven into the daily life of this department—the steady presence people relied on, the familiar face that made hard shifts feel manageable.

She was one of them.

And now, for the first time, she lay motionless beneath trauma lights while the team she trusted fought to keep her alive.

“Jo,” Dana said softly, leaning in again until her face filled the brunette’s blurred field of vision, making herself impossible to miss despite the constant motion surrounding them. 

The trauma bay pulsed with activity—monitors chiming, equipment clattering, voices overlapping—but the nurse carved out a small pocket of calm right at the head of the bed, her presence steady and warm in a way that felt deeply personal rather than clinical. 

She angled her body just enough so Joanna wouldn’t have to search for her, one hand resting gently along the side of her neck, thumb brushing lightly against damp skin as she tracked the racing pulse beneath. Her voice carried the unmistakable cadence of home, that strong Pittsburgh accent softening the edges of her words, grounding them in familiarity. 

“Stay with me, sweetheart. Talk t’me, okay? I’m right here.”

Advani’s breathing hitched unevenly in response, the sound shallow and fragile, each inhale catching halfway as though her lungs had forgotten how to expand fully. Her chest rose in small, trembling movements that never quite satisfied the body’s demand for oxygen, the rhythm too quick, too light, driven by shock and exhaustion. 

Her eyelids fluttered weakly, fighting to remain open against the heavy pull of fatigue, and the effort showed in every line of her face—the tightness at the corners of her mouth, the faint crease forming between her brows, the tension that gathered in her jaw whenever pain surged through her. Sweat clung to her skin in a fine sheen, mixing with dust and blood, her dark hair matted against her temples.

For a moment, her gaze drifted past Dana, unfocused and distant, as though she were looking through the room rather than at it—chasing fragments of memory that refused to settle. Then her lips parted, dry and trembling, and the first broken word forced its way out.

“Raid…” she murmured, the sound hoarse and uneven, scraped raw from deep in her throat. Each syllable seemed to cost her, pulled up through layers of exhaustion and pain. Her eyes moved restlessly, flickering between the harsh ceiling lights and the shadowed corners of the room as if the past and present were colliding inside her head. “Villa… we went in… cleared the first floor…”

The charge nurse nodded slowly, deliberately, her expression calm and encouraging, the way she would guide any patient struggling to stay conscious—but there was something softer in her gaze now, something warmer that belonged only to Jo. Her hand remained steady against the lieutenant’s skin, grounding her with gentle pressure, letting her feel that she wasn’t alone in this moment.

“That’s good, honey,” she said quietly, the words rolling out in that familiar Pittsburgh lilt, gentle but firm. “You’re doin’ just fine. Keep talkin’. Tell me what happened next.”

The encouragement wasn’t just medical—it was personal, threaded with quiet affection that had lived between them for years, unspoken but unmistakable. It showed in the way Dana leaned a fraction closer than necessary, in the way her voice softened when she used those small, instinctive pet names, in the way her eyes never left the youngest’s face even while the rest of the team worked around them.

Advani swallowed hard, the movement small but visibly painful, her throat working against dryness and the lingering taste of smoke and blood. Her fingers twitched weakly against the mattress, muscles trembling as she fought to keep herself anchored to the present. Every word required effort now, every breath a negotiation between willpower and physical collapse.

“Guy… came outta nowhere…” she whispered, her voice thin and fractured, breath catching sharply as memory collided with the sharp edges of pain. Her brow tightened as the scene replayed behind her eyes, the adrenaline of the fight still echoing in her body. “We fought… hand-to-hand… he had a knife… I—”

The sentence broke apart abruptly as a wave of discomfort rippled through her abdomen, her muscles tightening instinctively around the embedded fragment. A low, strained sound escaped her throat, half gasp, half groan, her body reacting before her mind could control it.

“Easy, easy,” Mohan said quickly from her side, her hands tightening gently but firmly around the stabilizing support she held against the metal fragment. Her tone was calm but urgent, the voice of someone who understood exactly how dangerous even a small movement could be. “Don’t move, Jo. Stay still for me. You’re doing great.”

The brunette gave the faintest nod in response, jaw clenching as she forced herself to obey, the discipline of a seasoned officer showing even through the haze of pain. Her breathing remained shallow, but she fought to steady it, drawing in careful, controlled breaths despite the discomfort that radiated through her torso.

“Explosions…” she continued after a moment, the word barely audible now, carried on a fragile thread of air. Her eyes flickered again, distant and unfocused, as the memory sharpened. “More than one… whole place shook…”

Across the room, Santos paused mid-motion while priming the blood tubing, her head snapping up at the implication. Her brows knit together immediately, concern flashing across her face as she looked toward the foot of the bed.

“Multiple blasts?” she asked, voice sharp with sudden focus, the question directed straight at Robby.

“That’s what she’s saying,” the chief confirmed, his tone steady but serious, the weight of the information settling heavily into the room. 

He stepped forward, moving closer until he stood within Joanna’s line of sight on the opposite side of the bed, his posture firm but reassuring. His gaze softened slightly when it landed on her face—familiarity replacing clinical distance.

“Hey, Lieutenant,” he called gently, using the title with quiet respect, the way he always did when she showed up in the department with case files tucked under one arm and a tired smile on her face. His voice carried calm authority, steady enough to cut through fear. “You did good. You got your people out. That’s what matters. Now you let us take care of you, alright?”

The words were simple, but they carried the weight of shared history—the countless times Advani had walked through those emergency doors not as a patient, but as a partner in the city’s endless cycle of crisis and response. She wasn’t just another injured officer. She was a familiar face, a trusted ally, someone who had stood shoulder to shoulder with them in difficult moments.

Her breathing began to change again, growing faster, more uneven, her chest rising and falling in short, strained bursts. The shift was subtle at first, but Dana felt it immediately beneath her fingertips—the pulse quickening, the tension building in the muscles along her neck. Her eyes widened slightly, panic beginning to push its way through the exhaustion as fragments of memory aligned into a single, terrifying realization.

“Gus” she whispered suddenly.

The name slipped from her lips in a fragile breath, barely louder than the steady hum of machines surrounding her, but it carried a weight that shifted the entire atmosphere of the room. It wasn’t just another detail from the raid, not another fragment of memory surfacing through shock and exhaustion. 

It was personal. 

Urgent. 

The kind of name spoken when fear had found its mark. Dana felt the change before anyone else could fully register it—the subtle tightening of muscles beneath her hand, the sudden acceleration of the pulse racing against her fingertips, the way the woman’s eyes sharpened with a clarity that hadn’t been there seconds earlier.

That spark of recognition was different now. Not confusion. Not pain.

Fear.

Real, immediate fear.

The charge nurse’s thumb pressed a fraction more firmly against the side of Advani’s neck, tracking the rhythm there as it climbed higher, faster, more erratic. She didn’t move away, didn’t look toward the monitors, because she didn’t need numbers to tell her what was happening. She could feel it in the tension coiling through Joanna’s body, in the shallow pull of each breath, in the way her gaze suddenly locked onto something far beyond the trauma room.

“I told him… to go…” the brunette continued, her words beginning to tumble over one another, losing their careful rhythm as urgency broke through the haze of shock. Her voice trembled, strained, the syllables coming faster now, pushed forward by panic rather than effort. “I sent him… with the woman… we found her upstairs…”

Her chest began to rise more quickly, breaths shortening into shallow gasps that never quite filled her lungs. The fragile steadiness Dana had worked so hard to build started to fracture under the pressure of memory, the rhythm slipping out of control as adrenaline surged through a body already stretched to its limit. The muscles along her neck tightened beneath the blonde’s touch, her pulse fluttering wildly, each beat more frantic than the last.

Around them, the trauma team reacted in subtle but immediate ways. Whitaker glanced toward the monitor, noting the spike in heart rate. Santos paused mid-motion while preparing the blood line, her hands hovering for a second as she assessed the shift in the lieutenant’s breathing. Even Robby, stationed at the foot of the bed, straightened slightly, his attention sharpening as he recognized the familiar signs of rising panic.

“He went back…” Joanna said, her voice cracking now, the words scraping out through tightening lungs. Her brow furrowed deeply, memory crashing into realization with brutal clarity. “…downstairs… on the main floor…”

The sentence hung in the air for half a second.

Then the realization struck.

It landed all at once, like a physical blow.

Hazel eyes snapped fully open, wide and glassy with sudden terror, pupils dilating as the full weight of the situation slammed into the woman’s consciousness. The panic that followed was immediate and overwhelming, flooding her system with raw, uncontrollable urgency.

“The bombs—” she gasped, the word tearing from her throat as her body reacted before reason could intervene. Her shoulders tensed sharply, muscles coiling with instinct, and she tried to push herself upward despite the searing pain that radiated through her torso. “He was still inside—”

The movement was small, barely a few inches off the mattress, but in her condition it was dangerous—potentially catastrophic.

“Jo, don’t move,” McKay said sharply, her voice cutting through the noise with instinctive authority as she reached out to steady the detective’s shoulder. Her gloved hand landed firmly but carefully, applying just enough pressure to keep her from rising further. The urgency in her tone was unmistakable, shaped by both clinical awareness and personal concern. “Stay down. You’re going to make this worse.”

But panic had already taken hold, spreading faster than logic, louder than reason.

“I have to go back,” Joanna insisted, her voice rising, the words breaking free in raw, desperate bursts. 

The discipline that usually anchored her responses had been swept aside by fear for someone else, by the unbearable thought of leaving a partner behind. Adrenaline surged through her system, forcing strength into muscles that had none left to give. Her body tensed hard against the mattress, abdomen tightening dangerously around the embedded fragment as instinct drove her to act. 

“He could be hurt—he could be trapped—he could be—”

The sentence shattered into a sharp cry as pain exploded through her side, bright and merciless, stealing the breath from her lungs. Her body jerked reflexively, the movement small but enough to send a ripple of alarm through the team.

“Hold her still,” Mohan said immediately, her voice firm and controlled as her hands locked securely around the stabilizing support at her abdomen. Her grip tightened just enough to prevent any shift in the metal fragment, counteracting the tension in her muscles before it could translate into movement. “Nobody let that fragment move.”

Whitaker stepped closer without hesitation, positioning himself near her arm to maintain control of the lines, ready to intervene if she thrashed or pulled free. Santos moved in as well, her posture tense, eyes fixed on Joanna’s face as she prepared to assist if sedation became necessary. The room compressed inward, the team closing ranks with quiet efficiency, every person ready to act in perfect coordination.

Dana reacted before anyone could issue another instruction.

Both of her hands came up gently but decisively, cradling Joanna’s face between her palms, fingers sliding carefully along her jawline and temples. The touch was firm enough to stop the frantic movement of her head, steady enough to anchor her attention, yet impossibly gentle—protective rather than restraining. 

She leaned in close, closing the distance between them until their faces were only inches apart, until Joanna had nowhere else to look.

“Hey,” the nurse said softly, her voice low but unwavering, carrying that familiar Pittsburgh warmth that had calmed countless patients before—but never with this much urgency beneath it. “Hey, look at me, baby.”

Her thumbs brushed lightly against the brunette’s cheeks, grounding her, drawing her focus back from the spiraling fear threatening to pull her under.

“Eyes on me,” she murmured, steady and sure. “Right here. Stay with me.”

For a second, Joanna resisted the command without meaning to. Her eyes darted wildly from one corner of the trauma bay to another, searching for something—an exit, a plan, a way to regain the control that had always defined her in the field. Her gaze skimmed over the bright surgical lights overhead, the blur of blue scrubs moving around her, the gleam of stainless steel instruments laid out in precise order. 

Every instinct inside her screamed to act, to get up, to run back into the danger she had left behind. Her body, battered and bleeding, strained against the invisible leash of injury and exhaustion, adrenaline still surging through veins that had already given too much.

Then her eyes found Dana’s face.

And stopped.

The frantic motion stilled as if someone had reached inside her chest and slowed the spinning gears. The chaos around her faded into the background, replaced by the steady, unwavering presence directly in front of her. Evans didn’t look away. She didn’t flinch. Her gaze held the lieutenant’s with quiet insistence, calm and grounded, a fixed point in the storm that refused to move.

“Listen to me,” she continued, her tone unwavering—calm, deliberate, threaded with the kind of quiet authority that came from years of standing at bedsides just like this one. 

Her thumbs brushed lightly against Joanna’s temples, slow and rhythmic, the gentle pressure grounding her, anchoring her firmly in the present moment. The touch was steady, intentional, a silent message carried through skin and bone: Stay here. Stay with me. 

“You cannot move right now. There’s debris in your abdomen. If it shifts, it could tear something inside. Do you understand?”

The brunette’s chest rose and fell in uneven bursts, each breath shallow and strained, the air barely reaching deep enough to satisfy her lungs. Fear still burned in her eyes, bright and stubborn, refusing to be extinguished by logic alone. Her pulse hammered beneath Dana’s fingertips, fast and erratic, the rhythm of a body caught between survival and panic. Sweat gathered along her hairline, damp strands clinging to her skin, while tension coiled through her shoulders like a wire pulled too tight.

“He’s still there,” she whispered desperately, her voice breaking on the words, raw with guilt and fear. The image of August—of her partner—alone in the building, surrounded by smoke and danger, pressed against her mind with relentless force. “Dana, he’s—”

“I know,” the woman said softly, the interruption gentle but firm, the words carrying both reassurance and certainty. 

She didn’t rush them, didn’t raise her voice. Instead, she let the calm settle into the space between them, steady and unwavering. She held Joanna’s gaze with unshakable focus, allowing every ounce of steadiness she possessed to flow into that connection, into the fragile thread of trust forming between them. 

“And we are going to find him.”

The room shifted subtly around them.

It didn’t fall silent—the steady beeping of monitors continued, the soft rustle of gloves and the quiet clink of instruments still filled the air—but the energy changed, becoming more deliberate, more focused. The team worked with practiced precision, their movements efficient and controlled, yet every one of them listened without interfering, sensing the importance of the moment unfolding at the head of the bed. 

Even Robby, stationed at the foot of the bed, paused for a brief second, his attention drawn to the exchange, watching the fragile balance between panic and control teeter on the edge.

“I’ll make sure someone checks on August,” Dana continued, her voice gentle but resolute, the promise clear and unambiguous. There was no hesitation in her tone, no room for doubt. It was the voice of someone who understood exactly what that assurance meant—and exactly how much it mattered. “We’ll get confirmation. We’ll find him. But right now, your job is to stay here with us. Stay still. Stay breathing.”

Joanna stared at her, searching her face with desperate intensity, scanning every detail as if the truth might be hidden in the smallest flicker of expression. Her eyes traced the steady line of the nurse’s mouth, the calm set of her jaw, the unwavering focus in her gaze. She looked for uncertainty, for hesitation, for any sign that the promise was empty.

She found none.

Only steady confidence.

Only care.

Only the quiet, unshakable certainty of someone who refused to let her face this alone.

Slowly—almost imperceptibly—the rigid tension in the lieutenant’s shoulders eased a fraction, the tight coil of resistance loosening just enough to allow reason to slip back in. The fight didn’t disappear entirely; it lingered beneath the surface, stubborn and protective. But the sharp, frantic edge dulled, replaced by something more fragile, more vulnerable.

Trust.

Her breathing remained uneven, still catching on the edges of pain and exhaustion, but the desperate gasps softened into slower, more controlled pulls of air. Her body sank a little deeper into the mattress, surrendering—reluctantly—to the hands working to keep her alive.

“Promise?” she whispered.

The word was barely audible, fragile and small, stripped of the strength she usually carried. It held the weight of fear, of responsibility, of the unbearable possibility of loss. In that single syllable lived every unspoken worry she carried for the partner she had left behind.

Dana didn’t hesitate.

“I promise,” she said quietly.

The words settled into the space between them with quiet finality, steady and sure, carrying the kind of certainty that didn’t need to be repeated. Her hand remained against Advani’s cheek, warm and unwavering, long after the promise left her mouth. Her thumb traced a slow, reassuring path along her skin, the contact gentle but constant—an anchor holding her steady against the rising tide of fear.

A reassurance.

A silent vow.

And, beneath it all, a confession neither of them was ready to speak aloud.

She sensed the change before the monitors had time to react, before numbers could flicker and alarms could translate danger into sound. It arrived quietly, almost deceptively so, beneath the steady cradle of her hands—in the fragile warmth of Joanna’s skin, in the faint tension she had been tracking along the line of her jaw, in the subtle but unmistakable shift that spoke of a body reaching the edge of what it could endure. 

One moment, the woman had been there, fully present, eyes locked onto hers with fierce, stubborn determination, demanding a promise with the same relentless loyalty she carried into every burning building and every crime scene. The next, that fierce resistance softened, not gradually but all at once, as if something deep inside her had finally exhausted itself and simply let go.

The already-faint warmth drained from the detective’s cheek with unsettling speed beneath Dana’s palm, the heat receding in a way that had nothing to do with the cool air of the trauma bay and everything to do with failing circulation and mounting blood loss. The tightness that had held her muscles rigid—held her fighting—melted away in an instant, the tension unraveling like a rope that had been stretched beyond its breaking point. 

The charge nurse felt it in the faint tremor that rippled through the brunette’s body, so small that anyone else might have missed it, but not her. Never her. She felt it in the slight falter of breath against her wrist, in the shallow inhale that never quite finished, in the fragile exhale that followed as if the strength to complete the motion had simply vanished.

For the briefest moment, the world seemed to pause around them.

The constant movement of the trauma room—the shifting of feet, the rustle of gowns, the muted hum of equipment—blurred into the background, muffled by the sudden stillness settling over the woman in her hands. Time stretched thin, suspended between one heartbeat and the next, between the steady fight Joanna had waged since arriving and the terrifying silence that threatened to follow.

Then her eyes rolled upward.

The motion was slow, unsteady, lashes fluttering weakly as focus slipped away from the world around her. The fierce awareness that had burned in them only seconds earlier—the sharp intelligence, the stubborn refusal to surrender—dimmed without warning, replaced by a distant, unfocused glaze that hollowed them out. 

It was the look Evans had seen too many times in too many patients, the unmistakable signal of a body sliding into shock, of consciousness retreating in self-preservation.

The lieutenant’s head tipped slightly to one side, the strength draining from her neck as muscles surrendered to gravity. The fragile thread of control she had clung to with such determination finally snapped, leaving her suspended in that dangerous in-between space where the body stopped fighting and the darkness began to close in.

“Jo,” Dana breathed.

The name slipped from her lips in a low, urgent whisper, threaded with a fear she worked desperately to keep contained. It carried the weight of years of experience, of countless emergencies navigated with calm precision, yet beneath it lay something far more personal—something raw and unguarded that she refused to let surface. 

Her hand tightened gently along Joanna’s cheek, fingers pressing just enough to maintain contact, to anchor her there, to remind her body that someone was still holding on.

She refused to let that connection break.

Her thumb traced a small, steady arc along the cool skin, the motion instinctive, grounding, as if she could coax warmth back into her through touch alone. She leaned closer without realizing it, her gaze fixed on the slackening features beneath her hands, searching for any sign of resistance, any flicker of the relentless will she knew lived inside that battered body.

Even as Advani began to slip deeper into the darkness of shock.

No.

The word echoed silently through Dana’s mind, sharp and absolute, cutting through the rising dread threatening to take hold.

Not now.

Not like this.

Dana moved before fear had time to take shape, before emotion could rise high enough to interfere. Instinct took over completely, honed by decades spent standing at bedsides just like this one, guiding her hands with the kind of precision that came from muscle memory and hard-earned experience. 

Her thumb pressed more firmly along the sharp ridge of the brunette’s cheekbone, grounding her touch, while her other hand slid swiftly to the side of her neck, fingers settling against the carotid artery she had been monitoring since the moment the lieutenant had burst through the trauma bay doors. 

She closed her eyes for half a heartbeat, focusing entirely on the sensation beneath her fingertips, searching for rhythm, for strength, for reassurance.

The pulse was still there.

But it had changed.

It felt thinner now, weaker, fluttering in a rapid, fragile pattern that set off alarms deep in her mind long before any machine confirmed it. Each beat seemed to chase the next in a frantic race, as if the body itself were struggling to keep up with the demands placed upon it. It was the rhythm of a system under siege, a circulation stretched to its breaking point, hovering dangerously close to collapse.

“Jo, stay with me,” the nurse said quickly, her voice steady but edged with urgency, the familiar warmth of her Pittsburgh accent still woven through her words but sharpened now by command. 

She leaned closer without hesitation, bringing her face down into Advani’s fading line of sight, refusing to allow distance—physical or emotional—to form between them. Her presence filled that narrow space above the stretcher, determined, unyielding, the quiet force of someone who had pulled too many patients back from the brink to surrender now. 

“Hey—open your eyes. Come on, honey, stay with me.”

She tapped gently against the patient’s cheek, the motion controlled and deliberate. It wasn’t rough, not even close to painful, but it carried just enough firmness to stimulate awareness, to send a signal through skin and nerve that demanded response. 

Her fingers traced slowly along the line of Joanna’s jaw, pressing against the unnaturally cool skin, the temperature drop impossible to ignore. She kept contact constant, steady, as if her touch alone could anchor the lieutenant to consciousness, could pull her back from the dark edge she was slipping toward.

Behind them, the machines finally registered what Dana had already felt.

The steady cadence of the monitor shifted abruptly—beeps tightening, accelerating, the pitch climbing into a sharper, more insistent register that sliced through the controlled quiet of the trauma bay like the first wail of a distant siren. The sound carried urgency, unmistakable and impossible to ignore, drawing every pair of eyes toward the screen even as hands continued their work.

Samira didn’t lift her gaze immediately. Her attention remained locked on the task in front of her, hands braced with unwavering precision around the stabilizing support that held the jagged metallic fragment embedded deep in the woman’s right lower abdomen. 

Her fingers maintained constant pressure, steady and controlled, guarding against even the slightest movement that could transform a critical injury into a catastrophic one. Years of discipline held her posture firm, her breathing measured, her focus absolute. She had stood at this threshold before—the moment when the body’s fragile balance tipped and compensation gave way to collapse—and she understood exactly how quickly things could unravel if anyone faltered.

“Pressure’s dropping,” she said calmly, her voice controlled and clinical, though a subtle tightening at the edges revealed the urgency beneath. Her eyes flicked briefly toward the monitor before returning to the wound, her hands never wavering. “She’s losing volume.”

On Jo’s right side, Cassie felt the change almost simultaneously, the shift registering through the wound beneath her palms before the words even reached her ears. The bleeding that had slowed earlier under careful compression and packing began to return with renewed persistence, dark red seeping steadily into the gauze that had already absorbed more than its share. The fabric grew heavier, warmer, saturated with fresh blood that spread outward in widening stains.

The resident’s jaw tightened as she adjusted her grip, applying firmer, more deliberate pressure while keeping her movements precise. Her shoulders squared, muscles bracing against the mounting tension, determination settling across her features as she worked to hold the line.

“Bleed’s picking back up,” she reported, her voice steady but sharper now, urgency threading through the words despite her controlled tone. Her eyes remained fixed on the wound, tracking every drop, every change in flow. “We need that blood.”

“Already on it,” Santos answered from the side of the bed, her response immediate, her hands moving with practiced efficiency as she connected the fresh unit from the blood bank. 

The bag hung heavy from the IV pole above them, dark crimson swirling slowly inside the clear plastic like ink suspended in water. She worked quickly but methodically, priming the line with careful precision, ensuring no air remained, no delay could interfere.

Her fingers moved with confident speed, muscle memory guiding each step. She checked the connection once out of routine, then again out of instinct, eyes scanning the tubing to confirm the flow was unobstructed. Only when she was certain everything was secure did she open the clamp fully, allowing the blood to surge forward, racing down the line toward the patient who needed it.

“Transfusion running,” she confirmed, her voice firm and clear, the words carrying a quiet determination that matched the urgency of the moment.

Whitaker moved closer to McKay without needing direction, the shift almost instinctive, like a seasoned partner stepping into rhythm before the music had fully changed. He slid into position at the detective’s side with the quiet efficiency of someone who had done this countless times, his presence steady and unobtrusive, yet immediately essential. 

For a brief moment, his gloved hands hovered just above the wound, assessing the situation in silence—the saturation of the gauze, the angle of the resident’s pressure, the steady but concerning seep of dark red beneath their fingers. Then he acted, reinforcing her hold with careful precision, applying additional pressure along the injured side while keeping the surgical field clear and controlled.

The two worked together in seamless coordination, their movements synchronized by years of shared shifts, long nights, and emergencies that demanded absolute trust without the luxury of conversation. There was no need for instructions, no wasted motion, no hesitation. 

Cassie adjusted slightly, shifting her weight to allow Dennis better access, while he stabilized the dressing with measured firmness, ensuring the compression remained effective without disrupting the fragile balance they were fighting to maintain. Their focus narrowed entirely to the task at hand—containing the bleed, preserving what circulation remained, buying precious seconds for the transfusion to do its work.

At the foot of the bed, Robby stood motionless, his posture tall and grounded, the stillness of his body masking the rapid calculations unfolding behind his steady gaze. 

His eyes moved quickly across the room, scanning every detail with practiced precision—the numbers sliding downward on the monitor, the steady decline in blood pressure that no one could afford to ignore, the pallor spreading across Joanna’s face like a slow-moving shadow, draining color from her lips and cheeks. He noticed the slackness in her body as well, the subtle loss of tension that signaled exhaustion and failing reserves. 

But more than anything, his attention settled on Dana.

On the way she had gone completely still.

He had seen that look before, many times over the years, in moments when medicine collided with something deeply human. It wasn’t panic, and it wasn’t confusion. It was something quieter, more dangerous—a brief, suspended instant when emotion threatened to overwhelm training, when the line between professional distance and personal attachment blurred just enough to make the next decision harder.

Not in Dana.

Never in Dana.

But he had seen it in spouses gripping hospital bedrails with white-knuckled hands, in parents staring helplessly at their injured children, in partners standing too close to someone they loved while that person slipped closer and closer to the edge. It was the look of someone who understood exactly what was happening—and feared, with terrifying clarity, what might come next.

“Dana,” he said firmly.

His voice cut cleanly through the rising tension, low and controlled, carrying the unmistakable authority of a leader who knew when to step in. It wasn’t loud, but it carried weight, the tone steady and grounded, designed to anchor rather than alarm. Beneath the clinical command lay a deeper awareness, an understanding that this moment required more than medical intervention—it required presence, connection, and focus.

“Talk to her. Keep her with us.”

The words settled into the space around them, direct and purposeful, a reminder of her role and her strength, a call back to the instincts that had carried her through thirty-three years of crisis after crisis.

The blonde didn’t respond right away.

For the briefest fraction of a second, she seemed frozen in place, her gaze locked on Advani’s face with an intensity that bordered on desperate. The world around her receded into the background, the noise of the trauma bay fading into a distant blur. Her entire focus narrowed to the pale skin beneath her hands, to the fragile pulse fluttering weakly beneath her fingertips, to the unnatural stillness that had replaced the relentless fight she knew so well.

She had built her career on movement—on decisive action, clear thinking, and steady hands in the middle of chaos. Thirty-three years in emergency medicine had taught her to trust her instincts, to remain calm when alarms sounded and lives hung in the balance, to step forward when others hesitated. She had guided countless patients through moments just like this one, had stood at bedsides and pulled people back from the brink with unwavering determination.

But this time was different.

Because this wasn’t just another patient on a stretcher.

This was Joanna.

And Joanna was crashing.

Cassie noticed the shift immediately. It wasn’t dramatic, not the kind of change that announced itself with sudden movement or raised voices. It was quieter than that—subtle enough that anyone less experienced might have missed it entirely. But the resident had spent too many years in trauma rooms, too many hours working shoulder to shoulder with the charge nurse, not to recognize the difference between focus and stillness, between control and that dangerous pause where emotion threatened to creep in. 

She saw it in the way Dana’s posture had gone rigid, in the slight tension that held her shoulders too tightly, in the way her gaze had narrowed and fixed itself entirely on their patient’s face, as though the rest of the world had faded into irrelevance.

The moment lasted no more than a heartbeat.

But in a room like this, a heartbeat was everything. It was the difference between stability and collapse, between recovery and loss. It was the smallest unit of time they measured life by, and McKay felt that single beat stretch longer than it should, heavy with meaning.

Her hands never stopped working. She kept steady pressure against the wound, fingers firm and deliberate, maintaining control over the bleeding even as her attention shifted. The gauze beneath her palm was warm and damp, the slow seep of blood a constant reminder of how fragile the situation had become. Yet her eyes lifted briefly from the task, drawn upward by instinct, searching for confirmation of what she had just sensed.

She looked toward the foot of the bed.

Robby met her gaze instantly.

He had already seen it too.

There was no hesitation, no confusion, no need for explanation. Years of shared leadership in moments like this had taught them to communicate without words, to read each other’s expressions with the same precision they read vital signs. In the span of a single glance, an entire conversation passed between them—silent, urgent, and unmistakably clear.

She shouldn’t be in this room.

Not now.

Not in this moment, when the line between professional duty and personal attachment had blurred beyond recognition. Not when the patient lying on the table wasn’t just another name on a chart or another trauma rolling through the doors. Not when every person in the emergency department—every nurse, every physician, every medic who had been in this space alongside them—understood, without a single confession ever spoken aloud, that there was something between Dana Evans and Joanna Advani that ran deeper than routine concern.

It was never discussed openly. It didn’t have a label, didn’t need one. But it was there, woven into the daily rhythm of the department in ways impossible to ignore. It lived in the subtle softening of the charge nurse’s voice whenever she said the youngest’s name, in the way her tone shifted from brisk professionalism to quiet warmth without her even realizing it. It showed itself in the small, unconscious details—the extra glance across the room to make sure Advani was safe, the way the lieutenant’s shoulders visibly relaxed the moment the oldest stepped into her line of sight, the silent understanding that passed between them in crowded hallways and chaotic scenes.

Everyone had noticed.

No one had ever said a word.

Now, in this moment, that unspoken truth hung heavy in the air, pressing down on the team as surely as the falling blood pressure on the monitor.

A question flickered in Cassie’s eyes as she held her boss’ gaze—brief but unmistakable.

A warning.

A silent request for direction.

Robby didn’t look away immediately. He held her gaze for half a second longer, the weight of responsibility settling firmly on his shoulders as he considered the decision before him. He could pull Evans out of the room, remove her from the center of the storm before the emotional impact of what was happening became too much to bear. He could assign another nurse to take her place, maintain the clinical distance that trauma medicine demanded, keep the team functioning with the clean, professional detachment that saved lives in moments like this.

He knew how to do it.

He had done it before.

But as his eyes drifted back to the figure lying motionless on the trauma table, the choice became painfully clear.

Because right now, their well-known homicide lieutenant—Joanna Advani, the woman who had walked into gunfire more times than anyone in the department could count, who had faced down danger with relentless courage and stubborn resolve—was lying beneath the harsh glare of surgical lights, her skin pale, her body frighteningly still. The strength that had carried her through the explosion, through the transport, through the first brutal minutes of treatment was finally beginning to give way.

Her body was losing the brutal fight it had waged since the moment the world around her had gone up in smoke and fire.

And she was crashing.

*

He guided her back toward the mouth of the alley, where the streetlight’s soft glow illuminated the contours of her face. She crouched down, unable to keep standing, instead hugging her knees to herself as if trying to hold herself together in more ways than one. Her expression was distant, like she was in a place all on her own despite being right in front of him, lost in the vertigo.

“You’re in shock,” he says softly but firmly. The words are sure, certain– stable. “You’re going to feel dizzy, maybe a bit sick. It’s normal, yeah? But I need you to listen to me.” He knelt down, bringing himself to her level. He slowly reached a hand out, careful not to startle her, before he used a curled finger to tilt her chin up so her eyes could look at his. “Can you remember anything you saw?”

She stared at him, watching multicolored irises swirl with indiscernible colors in the low light. Her lips parted but no words came. She shook her head slightly, her eyes still unfocused.

“That’s okay. You don’t need to remember all of it. Just… just breathe with me, yeah? Deep breaths.”

She followed his guidance, barely. Her chest rose and fell in jagged, uneven intervals, and her skin was ghostly pale, but he could see the slight easing of tension in her face as she focused on her breathing. It was a start.

His lips pressed together, like he was debating something. "You shouldn’t be walking around here alone at night," he said, slipping his hands back into the pockets of his jacket after helping her up. "Bad people come out after dark."

Bad people like you?

The thought flitted through her mind, unspoken and unfounded. She didn't see the shooter’s face, not really. There was only saw shadows, movement, a vague shape pulling the trigger—but not enough to be sure.

She was sure of one thing, though: she had to get away.

"Thanks for the advice," she said, taking a shaky step back. "I’ll be fine."

But he didn't move.

"Look," he exhaled through his nose, glancing down the empty street before looking at her again. "I know you don’t know me, and I probably just scared the shit out of you by grabbing you, but I really don’t think you should be out here alone."

His concern was so convincing. So effortless.

And she believed him.

Because why wouldn’t she? To her, he was just some random stranger in the wrong place at the right time, someone who saw a terrified girl and stopped to make sure she was okay.

Not the man who had just executed someone in cold blood. Certainly not the reason she was shaking in the first place.

"I’ll walk you home?" he offered with a small, disarming smile on his lips.

She should have said no.

Every instinct she had—every book she’d ever read about murderers, crime, and the dangers of trusting strangers—told her to refuse. But fear made her irrational. The thought of being alone on this street, with the echo of that gunshot still ringing in her skull, made her stomach churn.

And this man—was warm, steady, safe. Green and grey irises that reminded you of green tea and graphite. And he smiled like everything would be fine, like it was all gonna be okay.

Maybe it would be. So she nodded.

"Okay."

“There we go. That’s it,” he encouraged. Once her breathing became less critical, Lando stood and moved to her side, wrapping his arm around her waist and supporting her weight. “Let’s get you home.”

Slowly, Lando guided her toward the nearby street, one hand lightly resting at the small of her back to keep her steady, the other carefully ensuring she didn’t stumble. Her steps were unsure, her mind too disoriented to make sense of the world around her. He could hear her breathing, still ragged and uneven. 

He didn’t rush her.

When they reached the end of his street he turned to face her, evaluating her condition. One strong breeze would probably still have her keeling over, with the way she trembled like a leaf in the wind. The silence was thick, almost suffocating. He could feel the tension in her shoulders, see the flicker of dread in her eyes every time they passed a shadowed corner, a streetlamp. But he kept his tone even, his voice low as he asked her, “I’m gonna walk you home, alright? Can you tell me where you live?”

Her voice was hoarse when she answered, barely above a whisper. "Just a few blocks... I—I just need to go home."

And so he took her there, slowly and patiently, glancing over at her every so often to make sure she wasn’t slipping too far into herself. He needed her steady. He needed her compliant.

When they arrived, he didn’t let her leave right away. With a reassuring smile, he followed her up the steps to her apartment, making sure she had steady footing as she fumbled with the keys. She dropped them —once, twice— before Lando was kind enough to take it from her shaking hands and twist the key into the lock with ease.

Inside, the apartment was small —humble, plain, barely furnished— but she didn’t seem to care about any of that. She collapsed onto the couch, still shaking. Lando didn’t waste time. He moved quickly, making her tea, setting the kettle to boil. The kitchen was modest, the place smelling faintly of fresh paint, pages and something sweet, something she probably liked to bake in better days.

She barely noticed him moving around, her eyes fixed on the floor, her hands still wringing the hem of her sleeve in a subconscious attempt to ground herself. He fumbled around with various cupboards, searching until he found whatever it is he was apparently looking for. When the tea was ready, he brought it to her, the warm mug cupped in both of her trembling hands.

“Here, drink this,” he said quietly, his eyes scanning her face, looking for any sign that she was about to crack, any slip that might reveal her thoughts, her suspicions. But she just stared down at the mug, nodding blankly. He slipped two pills into her palm as well – for the earache, he gestured.

Lando sat across from her, watching. Patient. Calculating. 

He’d done this before—comforted those who’d witnessed something they weren’t meant to. He could tell from her dazed, hollow expression that she wasn’t thinking about the death she had just seen. She was in survival mode. But what she didn’t realize was that she wasn’t just a witness. She was a potential threat. A loose end he couldn’t afford to leave untied.

“Hey,” he said after a long silence, leaning forward just slightly. “You’re not in trouble. It’s not your fault, okay? You don’t have to tell anyone about what you saw.” His voice was gentle, laced with what sounded like sincerity. "You don’t have to do anythin’, alright?"

Her eyes flicked to his, her gaze vacant, but she nodded—softly, almost imperceptibly. It was enough for him.

He didn’t leave immediately. He stayed long enough to ensure she was too shaken to remember much of anything—long enough to watch her fingers loosen around the mug as the tea worked its magic on her mind. “You’re going to be just fine, sweetheart. You can forget about tonight, get some rest. You’re alright,” he said softly, the words sweet, even reassuring. And when he finally stood, he made sure to give her one last look—just to be sure. Her eyelids began to droop with exhaustion, the adrenaline finally wearing off.

“Take care,” he whispered. And then, with a final glance, he left. Quietly, like he’d never been there in the first place.

But as he walked out into the chill of night, he knew. No one would ever hear what she'd witnessed tonight.

The final sound in the neighborhood that night is the click of the closing door of a sleek black sports car before it drives into the darkness of the night.