The silence of the ICU was no longer peaceful. It was heavy, a suffocating weight that seemed to press against the very walls of the Peralta Hospital. Keifer had finally closed his eyes for the first time in days, his head resting near Jay's hip, his hand still entwined with hers.
For sixty minutes, there was a ceasefire between life and death. And then, the machines broke the truce.
Keifer's eyes snapped open not to a sound, but to a change in the air. The steady beep of the cardiac monitor had shifted into a frantic, uneven gallop. He looked up, his heart leaping into his throat.
Jay's face was no longer calm. Her chest was heaving, fighting against the ventilator, and the monitors were flashing a violent, rhythmic red.
"Jay?" Keifer's voice was a panicked rasp. "Jay! C IN! SOMEBODY!"
The door burst open. C in ran in, still in his surgical cap, followed by a swarm of nurses. He didn't even look at the charts; he looked at Jay's neck. The veins were distended, her pulse visible and chaotic.
"She's in ventricular tachycardia!" C in shouted, his face turning a ghostly shade of white. "The heart is giving out! Get the crash cart! Now!"
Keifer was pushed back by the sheer force of the medical team. He stood against the glass, watching as the woman who was his entire world began to slip through the fingers of science.
"Blood pressure is 40 over nothing!" a nurse screamed. "We're losing the rhythm!"
Outside, the Section E squad had pressed themselves against the glass. Felix had his hands over his mouth; Mica was on her knees, her forehead pressed against the cold floor. Keigan and Keiran were frozen, their eyes wide with a terror that no teenager should ever know.
"Clear!" C in roared, the paddles hitting Jay's chest.
Thump. The monitor flatlined. A long, agonizing, continuous tone that filled the room and spilled out into the hallway.
"Again! 360 joules! Clear!"
Thump. Nothing. Just the line. The flat, mocking green line.
C in stopped. He looked at the monitor, then at the clock, then at Keifer. His hands were shaking so hard he had to grip the edge of the bed to stay upright. Tears were streaming down his face, soaking into his mask.
"Keifer..." C in whispered, his voice breaking. "She's gone. Her heart... it just won't start again. There's nothing left to shock."
No," Keifer said, his voice eerily quiet. He walked past the nurses, past the equipment, and stood over Jay. He reached out and touched her cheek. It was still warm. "She's just tired. Jay? Weify, look at me."
"Keifer, stop," Jasper, Jay's father, sobbed from the doorway, held up by Kuya Angelo. "Let her go, son. Let her rest."
Keifer didn't listen. He climbed onto the bed, pulling Jay's limp, broken body into his arms, tubes and all. He tucked her head under his chin, rocking her back and forth.
"The twins, Jay," he whispered into her hair. "Alexander and Aurora. They're right there. They haven't even heard you say their names. You can't leave. You promised me a lifetime. We're only five years in. You owe me the rest."
The silence was the loudest thing I had ever heard.
It wasn't the peaceful silence of our bedroom at the Black Box after a long day. It was the heavy, hollow silence of a world that had just stopped spinning. I was still holding her. Her weight in my arms felt different—the gravity of her soul was gone, leaving only the beautiful, cold shell of the woman who had saved me from myself.
I pressed my face into the crook of her neck. I didn't care about the nurses standing awkwardly by the door. I didn't care about the medical equipment that had failed us. I just breathed in the fading scent of her—antiseptic and that faint, sweet vanilla shampoo she always used.
"Jay," I whispered into her skin. "Open your eyes. Just one more time. Tell me I'm being dramatic. Tell me to go back to work. Just... say something."
But there was no witty comeback. No eye roll. No sharp-tongued remark to put me in my place.
I felt a hand on my shoulder. It was heavy and trembling. I looked up through a blur of stinging heat to see C in. His surgical mask was hanging off one ear, his face ravaged by a grief that mirrored my own. He looked like he wanted to say something—some doctor's explanation—but he just choked on a sob and looked away.
She's cold, C in," I rasped, my voice sounding like it was being dragged over shards of glass. "Why is she so cold?"
He didn't answer. He couldn't.
The door creaked open further. I heard the staggered, uneven footsteps of my brothers. Keigan and Keiran stepped into the room, and for the first time in my life, I saw them look truly small.
Keigan let out a sound—a high, thin wail that cut through the room like a blade. He stumbled toward the bed and collapsed against the mattress, his hands clutching Jay's feet. "Mumma? No. No, not yet. We didn't finish the nursery. You didn't see the new plushies. Mumma, please!"
Keiran stood at the side of the bed, his face a mask of white marble. He didn't cry at first. He just stared at her hand—the hand that had held his when he failed his first exam, the hand that had ruffled his hair when he won his first game. He slowly reached out and touched her fingers, his lip trembling.
"You promised," he whispered, his voice cracking on the last word. "You promised you'd see us graduate."
Behind them, the Section E boys were a row of broken men. Felix was leaning against the wall, his head in his hands, his shoulders shaking with silent, violent sobs. Mica was being held up by Calix, her face buried in his chest to stifle her screams. Kit was standing by the window, staring at the grey Tagaytay sky, clutching a silk blanket so tight his knuckles were white.
They had lost their commander. Their friend. The only person who could handle the "Monster" and turn him into a man.
The nurses brought the bassinets closer. They didn't know what else to do.
I reached out, my arms shaking as I picked up Alexander and Aurora. They were so warm—horrifically warm compared to the woman lying in front of me. I sat on the edge of the bed, the weight of the twins in my arms, and looked at Jay.
Look at them, Jay," I choked out, a hot tear finally spilling over and landing on Alexander's forehead. "Look at your son. He has your stubborn chin. And Aurora... she has your peace. How am I supposed to tell them who you were? How am I supposed to be enough for them without you?"
Alexander let out a soft, tiny whimper, as if he felt the light leaving the room.
Jeena and Jasper walked to the other side of the bed. Jay's mother touched her daughter's hair, her voice a low, haunting moan of a name. "My baby. My beautiful, brave girl."
The room was full of people, but I had never felt more alone. I looked at the heart monitor—the screen was dark now. The "Starlight" wasn't just gone; it had been ripped out of the sky, leaving me in a darkness so absolute it felt like I was suffocating.
I've got them, Jay," I whispered, leaning down one last time to press my lips to her cold, unyielding forehead. "I'll be the father you wanted me to be. I'll build the empire for them. But God... I don't want an empire. I just want you."
I stood up, holding the heirs to my chest, and turned my back on the bed. Walking out of that room was the hardest thing I had ever done. Every step felt like I was leaving my heart behind, pinned to that hospital mattress.
I walked past Section E, past my sobbing brothers, and out into the hallway. The lights were too bright. The world was moving too fast. People were walking by, unaware that the center of my universe had just collapsed.
I looked down at the two tiny faces in my arms.
"It's just us now," I whispered to them, my voice lost in the vast, empty corridor. "Just us."