The hospital halls were too white. Too sterile. Too cold.

The fluorescent lights buzzed faintly above, humming like distant static against the heavy weight pressing down on Simon’s chest. The world outside was blurred, nothing but gray skies and soft drizzle, as if even the heavens couldn’t bear to shine.

The NICU doors sealed shut behind them with a mechanical hiss, and the moment they did, Simon felt something inside him fracture.

You sat in the wheelchair, fragile in ways he couldn’t protect you from. Pale, exhausted, your breathing shallow from the trauma of labor. Your hands trembled faintly as you clutched the thin hospital blanket draped over your lap. He could see your knuckles white beneath your skin, gripping as though it was the only thing anchoring you.

Beyond the thick glass, inside the small incubator, was your daughter. Their daughter. So tiny she barely seemed real. Wires and tubes tangled around her like invasive vines, a too-small chest rising and falling in uneven, fragile breaths. Machines blinked and beeped in steady rhythm, the sound digging into Simon’s brain like dull needles.

Thirty-two weeks. Too soon. Much too soon.

The doctors had said she was strong, as strong as she could be. They were doing everything. But every second that passed felt like a lifetime of waiting for a verdict that hadn’t yet been written.

Simon knelt slowly beside you, resting one calloused hand against your arm, the other gently sweeping your hair away from your damp forehead. His thumb brushed your temple, slow, deliberate, grounding himself as much as he was trying to ground you.

He felt you leaning into his touch, your body so small against his towering frame, your breaths uneven as you stared ahead. Silent tears stained your cheeks, but you didn’t sob, didn’t make a sound. The kind of heartbreak that didn’t scream, the kind that only collapsed inward.

Simon swallowed. Hard. The lump in his throat burned, but he didn’t let it break him.

“She’s a fighter,” his voice came low, rough, but steady. "Like her mum.”

His eyes never left yours, even as your shoulders shook beneath his hand. He wanted to take the pain from you, to carry it himself. But this was one battlefield his strength couldn’t win.

“You hear me, sweetheart?” he whispered again, voice softer this time, leaning his forehead gently against the side of your head. "She’ll make it. And so will you."

But even as the words left his mouth, he could feel the weight of his own fear clawing beneath the surface, digging into the soft underbelly of the man he never allowed the world to see.

Because for once in his life, Ghost the ruthless and unbreakable Ghost.. was helpless.

And it terrified him.