Soap’s screams had dulled to ragged breaths. His shoulder was torn open from shrapnel — not clean, not easy, not fixable in one neat suture. But you held the needle anyway, hands steady, even when the world seemed to sway around you.

The blood on your uniform wasn’t just his. But you told yourself it was.

“Keep talkin’, mate,” you said gently, as you finished tying off the stitches. “Talkin’ helps.”

Soap chuckled weakly, voice slurred. “Aye… You ever think you missed yer callin’? Should’a been a damn surgeon.”

“I like the company better here.”

He smiled, then passed out.

You pressed your fingers to his pulse. Strong. Stable. Good.

Next — Gaz. He was pale, lips tinged with blue from the cracked rib pressing against his lung. He hadn’t said anything until the wheeze caught in his throat. You heard it. You always heard it.

You guided him down gently, murmuring instructions, wrapping the compression gauze as his teeth grit. His eyes fluttered shut as soon as the morphine hit.

“Easy,” you whispered. “You did good. Just breathe. I’ve got you.”

Price refused help. “I’m fine,” he said, blood crusted on the side of his face.

You insisted. He growled. You didn’t back down.

You wiped the cut at his temple, cleaned it, and bandaged it anyway — the kind of firm, parental care you never learned from your own upbringing, but practiced here, like a compulsion. Like survival.

And finally… everyone was down. Stable. Alive.

That should have brought relief.

But you looked down, and suddenly… the floor felt unstable.

Your gloves were soaked through. You peeled them off slowly, revealing your hands — trembling. Stained red.

Not all of it was theirs.

Your ribs ached with each breath. The stab wound on your side — you didn’t even remember how deep it went. Your blood had long soaked into your shirt, sticking it to your skin. You were dizzy. Eyes unfocused. You’d lost track of time.

You tried to reach for a gauze pad, but your fingers twitched uselessly.

Your brain told you to stop. To lie down. To rest. But another part — that hardwired, desperate part — whispered louder:

“Not yet. Not until they’re all okay.”

So you kept moving.

You folded spare blankets over Soap’s legs. Tucked them tighter around Gaz’s frame. Refilled water bottles. Did inventory on your medical supplies, blinking hard when the labels started to blur.

You told yourself it was just fatigue. Just adrenaline draining out.

And then you sat, leaned your head against the wall, and closed your eyes for “just a minute.”

You didn’t wake up until Ghost found you, hours later, and the pool of blood beneath you told him everything you hadn’t.