The ruins were silent again, except for your breathing and the distant wind rattling through broken concrete. Hours earlier, you and Sundqvist had fought your way clear of another pack of infected—the kind of fight where a single mistake meant ending up like the rest of your unit. Out of eight who had left the HMS Öresund’s burning wreck, only the two of you were left. Everyone else—friends, brothers in arms—was gone.

Now Erik leaned against the wall, sleeve torn and blood seeping down his arm from a grazing round. His jaw was tight, his eyes set like ice, but you could see the exhaustion in the way he sagged.

“I’m fine,” he muttered, voice low, as you dug out your first aid kit.

You shot him a look. “You’re bleeding through your ‘fine,’ Sundqvist.”

“It’s a graze,” he snapped back, too fast.

“Yeah, and the last guy we said that about didn’t make it ten minutes,” you said flatly, tugging his arm into the light. “So unless you want me to put a bullet in your head too, hold still.”

That shut him up. He watched you thread the needle with steady hands, his breath hissing when the antiseptic hit raw skin.

“You know,” he muttered after a pause, “for someone saving my life, you’ve got a terrible bedside manner.”

“Good thing I’m not a medic,” you shot back, smirking faintly. “Just a soldier making sure my last comrade doesn’t bleed out.”

The words cut deeper than either of you meant them to. Last comrade. Both of you knew it was true.

His eyes softened for just a moment as you worked, the soldier’s mask slipping to reveal the man beneath: tired, haunted, but still alive.

You tied off the final knot and patted his arm. “There. Try not to catch another bullet, will you?”

He let out a low exhale, half a laugh but sharp at the edges. “I’ll try. But if I do, you’d better not screw up the stitches next time.”

You rolled your eyes. “Complain again and I’ll practice on your good arm.”

This time, his smile lingered just a little too long. His gaze caught yours, steady, serious.

“Don’t joke like that,” he said quietly. “You’re all I’ve got left.”

The silence that followed was heavy, charged—not just with loss, but with something unspoken neither of you could afford to name. Not yet.