I reach up—my fingers claw air. Nothing there. Just IV lines. Just ghosts.
I blink again—and the tent’s gone.
I’m back in the chapel. Glass crunches underfoot. Moonlight bleeding through holes in the roof. Her mouth under mine, soft and wild and ruined. “You’ll never fucking leave me again.” My voice echoes like a vow. Like a curse.
Her eyes flash—fear, fury, want. All of it tangled. Her lips tremble. “You’ll break me, Dax.”
And I already have.
And I still will.
I lurch, my body jerking against the restraints on the cot. A nurse shoves me down, murmurs something I don’t hear. The monitors spike but I don’t hear machines. I hear gunfire. Her scream. And my own voice, hoarse, desperate—“Butterfly!” I rip my throat raw on the word, but it drags me back—half.
Not enough.
The ceiling swims. Shapes blur. White coats move around me. Cassandra’s face flickers in and out between them, her eyes wet, her lips moving—Stay with me.
Stay.
I don’t know if she’s really there or if I’ve finally gone under.
All I know is if she lets go of my hand—I’m not coming back.
I can’t tell if my eyes are open. Light comes and goes, too bright, too dark. Shapes move, shadows bend.
The cot shifts under me, straps biting my wrists. Cold metal. Warm blood. I don’t know whose.
“Dax—”
Her voice.
My throat convulses, torn raw. “Butterfly.”
But when I turn my head, it’s not her. It’s smoke. Sand. A crater opening wide under my boots. Reese is gone. Harris is screaming. Torres is dragging me by the vest, snarling, “Stay with me, Doc.”
And over it all—her.
“Don’t you fucking leave me.”
Her face flickers in the haze—Cassandra with blood on her hands, mascara running, her eyes wide like she’s watching me die twice.
I jerk hard, muscles seizing, monitors screaming. Hands shove me back down, pressing, holding, restraining. My ribs shriek. My chest rattles.
I can’t breathe.
And then—her lips. Close. Wet. The chapel again. Her mouth crushed to mine like she’d rather burn with me than be left behind. My hands in her hair. Her legs locked around me.
“You’ll never leave me again.”
But then she’s gone.
Pulled back into smoke.
Her eyes hollow, her mouth whispering goodbye butterfly in a voice that doesn’t belong to her.
“No—” I thrash, my voice breaking. “No, stay?—”
The ceiling swims. The walls warp. Blood drips from the IV like it’s my own veins leaking.
