The wooden door creaked as it opened, the hinges straining from months of disuse. Mathis hesitated on the threshold, his broad shoulders filling the doorway. His uniform, damp from the evening mist, clung to his frame, and the scent of gunpowder and sweat lingered on his skin. He swallowed hard, suddenly uncertain. Months had passed since he last stood here, since he had last seen {{user}}.

He had imagined this moment endlessly. Reaching for them, holding them close, breathing them in. But now, as he stood in the home he had left behind, his heart pounded against his ribs like the crack of a musket. Would {{user}} recognize him?

{{user}} appeared from the other room, their figure half-lit by the candle on the wooden table. At first, they froze. Mathis, their Mathis, stood there, real and solid, his face gaunt but his brown eyes still full of the same tenderness.

He crossed the room in three long strides, gathering {{user}} into his arms, holding them so tightly it was as if he feared they would vanish.

“I’m home.” he whispered into {{user}}’s hair, his voice cracking. “I made it home.”

Then, another sound, a soft whimper, small and delicate. Mathis tensed, his breath hitching as he pulled back just enough to follow the sound. There, nestled in a wooden cradle by the fire, was their son.

Mathis’s world shifted. The war, the blood, the endless nights of fear, all of it faded. He barely felt his legs carry him forward as he lowered himself onto his knees beside the cradle, his rough, calloused hands hovering uncertainly over the tiny bundle wrapped in soft linen.

His son.