You were never part of Simon Riley’s world. Not really. You were the quiet place he returned to—the one thing untouched by war, untouched by violence, untouched by everything he kept locked behind the mask.

Home wasn’t a place. It was you.

The street was quiet in that hollow, late-night way that usually meant nothing at all.

Tonight, it felt wrong.

Simon noticed it before he reached the house. Something subtle at first, a tension settling low in his chest that had nothing to do with habit and everything to do with instinct. Not a sound. Not movement. Just the absence of something that should have been there.

The porch light was still on. You never left it on this late.

He slowed as he approached, gaze fixed on the front door before the damage fully registered. When it did, it landed all at once.

Splintered wood. The lock broken inward. The door hanging wrong on its hinges, forced open in a hurry.

For a moment, he didn’t move. Didn’t think.

Just stood there, staring at it like if he waited long enough, something would shift… like this could still be nothing. Like you might step around the corner, telling him it wasn’t what it looked like.

But the silence stretched. And you didn’t come. So he stepped inside.

The air felt different immediately. It pressed in around him, heavy, unfamiliar.

He didn’t call your name. He couldn’t. Because some part of him already knew what the silence would give back.

The living room was the first thing he saw. A lamp knocked over near the couch, the bulb shattered against the floor. The coffee table pushed sideways. A picture frame face-down near the rug, glass fractured beneath it.

He recognized it, but didn’t pick it up. He moved past it instead, slower, like the space itself had become fragile.

The kitchen was worse.

The vase you kept near the window was shattered, ceramic scattered across the floor, water soaked into tile beneath crushed petals. A chair overturned, the leg broken.

Then he saw it. Blood. Splattered across the white tile.

Not a lot. Not enough to be fatal… But it was there. Another spray across the cabinet. Thin lines trailing down, already drying.

His breathing faltered slightly.

He stepped further in, slower now, each movement heavier, forcing himself to look. The floor, the angles, the disturbed space between objects.

He could see it. The struggle. The movement. How it must have unfolded fast, chaotic, wrong. You had been here. You had fought. Of course you had.

The thought didn’t comfort him. It didn’t make him proud. It made his chest ache in a way he didn’t know how to hold.

You, scared but stubborn, refusing to go quietly. Trying to hold your ground in a place that was never meant to be dangerous. Calling for help that never came.

His jaw tightened, but it didn’t stop the shift inside him. Something heavier than fear settling in his chest.

He turned away from the kitchen, moving through the rest of the house without thinking. Every space answered the same.

Empty.

The bedroom felt the worst.

Everything was untouched. The bed still made, your side slightly indented like you had only just left it. Your shoes by the door, like you were still here. Like you would come back.

He stood in the doorway too long, staring at ordinary things that suddenly felt unbearable.

Because they were yours. And you weren’t here to claim them.

His throat tightened, something unfamiliar catching there. He swallowed against it, but it didn’t move.

He turned back toward the living room slower now, like the weight in his chest had become permanent.

The picture frame was still there.

This time, he crouched and picked it up carefully. The crack split straight through your face. He stared at it for a long time.

Not thinking of tactics. Not thinking of enemies. Just the silence and the space beside him where you should have been.

He didn’t move. Didn’t speak. Didn’t call your name. Because he knew now, if he did, there would be no answer.

And he wasn’t sure he could survive hearing it.