Page 99 of Duty Preserved

Once, he jerked so hard out of his sleep that it startled me awake. Another time, I found him sitting on the edge of the bed, elbows on his knees, both hands pressed against his face like he was trying to hold something inside his skull.

During the day, he ran the training and he was good at it. He had both the patience for it and the skill. The rangers responded to him dutifully. But I caught him in the gaps. Between drill sets, leaning against a truck by himself with his arms crossed and his eyes fixed on nothing. At meals, he was physically present, but mentally, he was somewhere else entirely.

Andrew was carrying more of it than he had before. Running drills on both groups when Donovan went quiet, stepping in with corrections before the pause got long enough for the rangers to notice. Andrew did it without being asked, and he did it without making a show of it.

Donovan’s easy laugh was gone. So was the dry humor, the quick grin he gave me when no one was watching—all of it pulled behind a door I couldn’t open.

I’d tried once. Two nights ago, lying beside him after another bad stretch of sleep, I’d asked him what was going on. He’d said he was fine. He said it quietly and without any edge. Then he pulled me closer and pressed his mouth against the top of my head. That was the end of the conversation.

I let it go. I don’t push him. I’d never pushed him. That wasn’t how we worked.

But I knew it was connected to the training. The nightmares started when the drills changed. When the obstacle course became contact drills and the focus shifted from fitness to fighting.

And there was more. After the elephant, when I’d frozen with the syringe in my hand and he’d walked me through it, he’d talked that night about the work. About what it cost. Underneath it all, I could tell he was suppressing a hurt that I couldn’t pinpoint. I’d let it pass because he wasn’t offering more, and I didn’t know how to ask.

Whatever I was watching now, it was that wound. Pressing harder.

On the training ground, Donovan called the rangers in. They gathered around him in a rough arc, rifles across their chests, breathing hard. He talked to them and they listened. His words didn’t carry to me, but every man there had his eyes fixed on Donovan and none of them looked away.

He dismissed them. The group broke apart, and the rangers moved toward the bunkhouse and the mess tent. Andrew fell into step beside Donovan and they walked together. As they spoke, Donovan shook his head repeatedly.

I pushed off the fender of the truck and went back to what was left of my work.

I was awake when it happened again.

No light in the cabin. I’d been asleep for maybe an hour before his breathing changed. Each breath got shorter and more forceful, his chest rising in quick, shallow hitches against my back.

Then his whole body locked. His arm was draped across my waist, and it went rigid. The tendons in his forearm pulled tight where it pressed against my stomach.

I lay still. Sometimes it passed. Sometimes the tension would rise and crest then break. He’d settle back down without ever surfacing.

This time, he said a name.

“Owen.”

It came out hoarse. Ripped from somewhere deep, and it was not a murmur. The anguish in the single word made my chest hurt.

“Owen. No.”

I put my hand on his arm. Gently. The muscle was stone beneath my fingers.

He came up fast. One sharp inhale and his body curled forward, hands gripping the sheet. His breathing was ragged.

I sat up beside him.

He dropped his head. His hands were still fisted in the sheet, and his shoulders rose and fell with each breath.

I waited.

“Who’s Owen?”

He didn’t answer.

“Donovan. Who’s Owen?”

He sat there for a long time. His breathing slowed, one breath at a time. The fists in the sheet loosened. His hands went flat on his thighs.

“Owen Parker.” His voice was low and rough. “He was a kid in my unit.”