“Speak for yourself,” Luca mutters. “I’m ninety-eight percent sure my spleen detached yesterday.”
Jace doesn’t glance up from his screen. “You don’t need a spleen to run recon.”
“Then you can do recon next time.”
“No.”
Tex grunts, either in agreement or because he’s stretching a sore shoulder. Could go either way.
I shift slightly under the blanket, eyes drifting across the room. It’s absurd how natural this has become, waking up with them here. Living in each other’s spaces. Learning to breathe the same rhythm.
There’s something unspoken hanging in the air today, though. A stillness beneath the teasing. They’re all thinking it.
The mission is coming.
Lucian hasn’t said when yet, but we know it’s close. The fact that today’s been cleared of all training means we’re being prepped. A short breath before the plunge.
I sit up slowly and stretch, wincing. “How are you guys not dead?”
Tex shrugs. “Been through worse.”
Jace murmurs, “You get used to it.”
Luca groans. “I refuse to believe that.”
Noah finally looks up at me, his expression a little softer now. “But you haven’t tapped out. That’s the part that matters.”
Their words hit me like a delayed shockwave. They’re not just being kind. They’re acknowledging me. As part of this. One of them. I press myback against the headboard and let the quiet settle. It’s peace. Or at least, the closest thing we’re allowed.
“I need air,” I mutter, pushing off the bed.
No one stops me.
But Noah looks up from his tablet and sets it down, already reaching for his hoodie. “I’ll come.”
I nod once. That’s all it takes.
We don’t say anything as we head out of the dorm and down the quiet eastern path that snakes along the back edge of campus. The late-morning sun filters through the thinning trees, casting long patches of light and shadow over the gravel.
The silence is comfortable. Familiar.
It’s not until we’ve walked a full five minutes without either of us speaking that I finally break it.
“Do you ever get used to this?” I ask.
Noah glances sideways at me, his hands in his hoodie pockets. “Used to what? The bruises? The danger? The pressure to be perfect at eighteen?”
I huff a laugh. “All of it.”
He thinks about it. “No,” he says. “But you get better at hiding the parts that hurt.”
I stop walking. “That’s not exactly comforting.”
He shrugs. “You didn’t ask for comforting. You asked for truth.”
Fair. He always gives me the truth, even if I don’t want to hear it.
We keep walking, slower now.
