“No. Katya... emergency reserve. Sewn into the... lining of the bag.”
He fumbles with the duffel, the sound of tearing fabric loud in the quiet cab. A moment later, I hear a sharp intake of breath.
“Got it. I’ve got it.” A syringe appears in the narrow cone of my vision. “How do I?—?”
“Intramuscular. Thigh. Do not... overthink. Push it in.”
I feel the needle enter my leg. It is a blunt, distant pressure. The medication is a high-yield assault on the infection, but it will take time. I do not know if I have the time.
“The border,” I manage.
“Ten kilometers,” Nikolai says, his voice hardening as he secures the new bandage. He is wiping the blood from his hands onto his trousers, his movements efficient. “I’m getting us there. I’m bringing you home.”
He slams the door and returns to the driver’s side. The truck moves again, but the pace is different now—slower, more careful. He is conserving the vehicle. He is conserving me.
I watch the city recede in the side mirror. Moscow is a silhouette of smoke and fire, an empire consuming its own history. We are leaving the ruins behind.
“We did it,” Nikolai whispers.
“Not... yet.” I close my eyes. The darkness is still there, but it feels less like an ending and more like a rest. “We are not clear... until the map ends.”
“The map ended at the warehouse, Alexei. We’re writing the rest ourselves.”
The logic is sound. I do not have the capacity to verify the geopolitical fallout, but the logic is sound.
“You drove through the roadblock,” I murmur. “You could have... surrendered. They would have taken you back to Viktor.”
“I wasn’t going to let them take you,” he says. He doesn't look at me; his eyes are fixed on the horizon. “I decided a long time ago. I’d rather be dead with you than a prince without you.”
I did teach him that. In the gray room, through the mapping and the hunger. I taught him that survival is the only metric.
I didn’t realize he would apply the metric to my life instead of his own.
A regional marker appears in the headlights. The border of the Oblast. A simple piece of road signage.
But it is the furthest I have ever been from a master.
Nikolai pulls the truck onto the shoulder. The engine idles, a low industrial purr.
“Why... stop?”
“Because I need to know you’re still in there.”
He reaches across the console. His fingers find my throat, pressing against the carotid. It is the same motion I used on him a thousand times. I feel the coolness of his skin and the weight of his attention.
“Pulse is weak,” he notes. His voice is clinical, controlled—the voice of a man who has learned to build a wall around his panic. “But it’s there. You’re still with me.”
“Still here,” I confirm.
He doesn’t pull his hand away. His fingers linger on my pulse, confirming with every beat that the machine is still running.
“We should... keep moving.”
“In a minute.” His other hand finds mine. Our fingers interlace, his grip tight and warm. “In a minute, I’ll drive. Right now, I just need to feel the heartbeat.”
I understand. I spent hours watching him sleep in that warehouse, counting his breaths just to prove to myself that I hadn't killed him.
The infection is still there. The pneumonia is a heavy, wet weight in my chest. The mathematics of my survival are still skewed toward the negative.
