Tomas reached the hospital running.
He carried Laura pressed tightly against his chest, her head limp on his shoulder, her blood soaking through his shirt — warm, sticky, terrifyingly real.
He burst through the emergency entrance. Nurses shouted orders, a gurney appeared out of nowhere, and in seconds she was pulled from his arms and rushed down the corridor.
The doors to the operating room slammed shut.
Tomas stood alone, her blood on his hands, on his clothes, streaked across his face.
He stared at his palms, the red spreading into the lines of his skin, and felt something inside him slowly tear apart.
---
Hours later, a doctor stepped out.
Young. Familiar.
Michael — once a fellow student, someone he had shared anatomy lectures and sleepless study nights with.
Michael took one look at him — the soaked shirt stiff with blood, the hollow, sleepless eyes.
"How is she?" Tomas asked. His voice sounded foreign, scraped raw.
"Stable," Michael said. "We had to induce a coma. Severe head trauma. When she wakes… her recovery will depend on her strength — and her will."
"Thank you," Tomas whispered, though the word tasted empty.
Michael studied him for a moment.
"You look… familiar," he said slowly. Then, noticing the blood and exhaustion: "Go clean up. Rest. We'll move her to a room soon."
Tomas nodded without seeing him.
He walked to his car and sat in the driver's seat, staring past the rain-blurred windshield. The world outside looked distant, unreal. All he saw was the memory of her lying in that widening pool of blood.
Eventually, he drove home.
The apartment was dark, cold — the way it had felt before she had entered his life.
He stripped in the bathroom, his clothes hitting the floor with a wet, sickening thud.
Under the shower, the water turned red, then pink, then clear.
When the shaking in his hands finally slowed, he changed and went to Laura's room.
It still smelled like her — soft, warm, alive.
He gathered some clean clothes and towels and headed back to the hospital.
And stopped halfway.
Lukas and Kristina. They needed to know.
At Obsidian, the moment Lukas and Kristina saw him — pale, hollow-eyed — their smiles disappeared.
"What happened, Tomas?" Lukas asked, voice trembling.
He told them the basics: an accident, a head injury, the hospital.
Nothing about Valentin. Nothing about the warehouse. Nothing about blood and guns and threats.
"I'm going back to her," he finished quietly.
They watched him leave, realizing he had only given them a fraction of the truth.
Tomas returned to the hospital and went straight to Laura's room.
Tomas pulled the chair closer to Laura's bed and sat.
The machine beside her breathed for her—steady, indifferent. Each rise and fall of her chest felt borrowed, temporary, as if something might come to reclaim it at any moment. Tubes traced pale lines across her skin, disappearing beneath the blanket like veins stolen and replaced with plastic.
Her face was too still.
He reached out, then hesitated, his hand hovering inches above hers. The memory of her blood on his skin flared again—warm, slippery, alive. Slowly, carefully, he let his fingers close around her hand.
It was colder than he expected.
"Hey," he whispered, barely louder than the machines. "I'm here."
The words felt useless. She didn't stir. Her eyelashes rested against bruised skin, her lip swollen, split just enough to remind him of how violently the world had taken her from him.
He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, his forehead nearly touching the edge of the bed.
This is my fault.
The thought arrived fully formed, heavy, undeniable.
He replayed every decision—the warehouse, the hesitation, the moment he'd looked away for half a second too long. All the calculations he had made, all the risks he had told himself were controlled.
And now she lay here, broken and silent.
"I should've protected you," he murmured. "That was my job."
His grip tightened unconsciously around her hand, as if holding on could anchor her to the world. His chest ached with the effort of breathing normally, of not letting the sound in his throat escape.
Memories crept in uninvited.
Her laugh in the mornings. The way she leaned into him without thinking. The quiet certainty with which she had trusted him—never asking how dangerous his life really was.
Trust he had not earned.
A pulse of anger flared, sharp and blinding. Not just at Valentin. At himself. At the part of him that had believed he could keep his worlds separate. That she could exist near him and remain untouched.
Days passed.
Tomas never left her side.
He didn't sleep.
Barely ate.
His skin grew ashen, his eyes sunken — a ghost standing guard over her bed.
When Lukas and Kristina visited, they froze at the sight of him.
"Tomas," Kristina whispered, "how are you even standing?"
"I'm fine," he said, though nothing about him seemed alive.
"Go eat," Lukas urged. "We'll stay with her."
Tomas nodded and finally stepped outside, his legs trembling under his weight.
He bought two sandwiches, sat in his car, and forced himself to eat.
Halfway through the second bite, exhaustion hit him like a brick wall.
He fell asleep with his forehead resting against the steering wheel.
He woke hours later to multiple missed calls from Miklas.
His stomach dropped.
He sprinted toward the hospital entrance.
Michael met him halfway down the hall.
"Is she okay?" Tomas demanded.
Miklas exhaled slowly. "She woke up."
Tomas felt the floor tilt beneath him.
"But Tomas…" Michael lowered his voice. "She has amnesia. We don't know how severe or if it's temporary."
Everything inside Tomas went silent.
She doesn't remember me.
And then, like a bitter whisper:
Maybe that's the mercy she never got.
No past.
No pain.
No Valentin.
No danger.
No me.
Maybe she could finally live without suffering.
He swallowed hard.
"I need a favor," he said quietly. "Don't tell her about me. I'll pay for everything she needs. If she asks who's covering the bills — just say it's handled."
"Tomas…" Michael hesitated. "She might recover her memory faster if you stayed close."
"She'll be happier without it," Tomas said, his voice empty but final.
Michael nodded reluctantly.
The corridor felt too bright.
Tomas stood alone, staring at the pale wall across from Laura's room, listening to the distant rhythm of hospital life continuing as if nothing had ended.
"She might recover her memory faster if you stayed close."
Michael's words echoed again, unwanted.
Tomas closed his eyes.
If he stayed, everything would come back.
The warehouse.
The gunfire.
The blood.
Valentin's voice, calm and cruel.
And him.
He saw it clearly now—not as fear, but as certainty. Every step he took toward her dragged darkness behind it.
He pressed his thumb into the edge of his palm until pain cut through the fog.
If she remembered him, she would ask questions. Why was she there? Who hurt her? Why had someone tried to kill her?
And the answers would lead straight back to into danger.
He imagined her looking at him with the trust she used to give so easily. Imagined telling her half-truths, then lies, then watching fear slowly replace warmth in her eyes as the truth bled through anyway.
No.
Better to let her wake into a smaller, quieter world. One without guns, blood, or shadows waiting in doorways. One without him.
The thought hollowed him out.
"I love you," he whispered to no one. The words felt like betrayal.
Love wasn't holding on.
Love was leaving before he ruined what little she had left.
He straightened, forcing his face into something neutral, something that could pass as indifference if anyone looked too closely. The decision settled inside him—not gentle, not noble, but absolute.
She would forget him.
He would carry everything instead.
The memories. The guilt. The consequences.
All of it.
He opened his eyes and turned toward her room, knowing it would be the last time he allowed himself to look at her as his.
Tomas stepped toward her room and looked through the narrow gap in the door.
Laura sat upright, pale but awake, slowly eating a peeled apple.
Lukas and Kristina sat beside her, talking softly.
They saw Tomas and waved.
Laura lifted her gaze.
For a moment, her eyes flickered — something like recognition?
A spark?
A shadow of something lost?
But it faded.
She tilted her head politely, as if greeting a stranger.
Tomas' fist clenched so tightly his nails broke the skin.
"Sorry," he murmured. "Wrong room."
And he turned away.
Lukas and Kristina met him in the cafeteria, confusion and worry etched into their faces.
"Why did you pretend not to know her?" Lukas asked.
Tomas sat across from them, eyes cold, hollow — but something darker simmering beneath.
"Do me a favor," he said quietly. "Don't tell her about me. Tell her she doesn't have family… but that you two are like family to her. Tell her she works at the bar. Tell her she lives simply."
Kristina slammed her hand on the table.
"You think her life will be better without you?"
"Yes," Tomas said without blinking.
"And listen carefully," he added. "Someone will come. He'll call himself Valentin. Her uncle. Don't believe him. Don't let him near her. Ever."
He stood up and gave them a small, almost formal nod.
"Thank you. Take care of her."
He turned and walked away — shoulders rigid, fists clenched, eyes hollow.
Kristina made a move to go after him, but Lukas gently caught her arm.
"Let him go," he said softly.
"He's already gone."