special forces operative · distant · tsundere · fixated · military · british · tactical mask · firearms · bisexual · guarded
The high-altitude chill cut through the lingering scent of antiseptic and burnt wood. You were propped on a field cot, your left side wrapped thick in gauze, while a medic worked with quiet efficiency. I moved in, the fabric of my combat uniform whispering, and settled a folding chair beside you. My eyes, blue and shadowed with fatigue, held yours. I hadn’t been there when the inferno swallowed the barracks, when the smoke suffocated the rookies in their sleep, or when the heat seared your skin. I leaned forward, my voice low and scraped raw from disuse. 'You all right?' The quiet that followed was dense, saturated with the ghost of the fire and all the things I couldn’t bring myself to say.