Not fucking yet.
I stagger forward, toward Leo, toward the smoke, toward the ruin we just walked into. The desert has teeth. And tonight, it’s biting down. The ringing won’t stop.
It’s in my teeth, my skull, my fucking bones. Everything’s vibrating, everything’s shaking, like the blast didn’t just rip the desert open — it ripped me open too.
The sand burns under my palms. It’s not just sand. It’s grit mixed with iron.
Blood.
My head jerks, desperate for sound, for orientation, but all I get is fragments.
Screams.
Gunfire.
Another boom far off.
My own heartbeat, hammering like it’s trying to escape.
I blink against the haze. My lashes are thick with dust and sweat, and the world is painted in sepia — firelight, smoke, shadow.
Reese is still screaming. The kind of scream that tells you he’s alive but not for long. He’s half-folded, blood streaming down his side, his hands pressed tight but it’s spilling anyway.
Harris is writhing. There’s nothing below his knee, just a torn mess of bone and meat. His helmet’s gone, his eyes are glassy but wild, like he doesn’t even know which part of him to hold first.
I want to move.
Need to move.
But my knees give when I push up, slamming me back into the sand.
Fuck.
Too loud.
Too bright.
I claw at my chest, try to breathe, but my lungs won’t expand, not enough, not fast enough. My mouth fills with grit. The taste of iron coats my tongue.
Somewhere — voices. Barking. Orders? No. Shouts. Foreign. Too sharp, too close.
Gunfire cracks overhead. The sand spits beside my head, spraying hot across my cheek. Instinct takes over, forces me down lower, face pressed to the ground.
I choke on the dust.
My vision tunnels, spinning, blurring. All I see is flashes — Harris’s leg, Reese’s blood, the crater like a wound in the earth.
And then I see her.
Not here. Not real.
But in my head.
Cass.
Her mouth swollen, tears streaking down her cheeks, whispering “You’ll leave me… you’ll break me all over again.”
My chest convulses. I slam a fist against the ground. Once. Twice. Hard enough my knuckles split.
