The warehouse was a wreck—concrete cracked, blood smeared, smoke still hanging low in the air. Soldier Boy sat on a busted crate, sweat mixing with soot on his skin, his knuckles raw and split open.

Homelander got away. Again.

Across from him, {{user}} winced, clutching her side, blood soaking through her shirt. She hadn’t screamed—not once. Damn stubborn. He liked that.

Ben moved before he could think about it, grabbing the med kit they never used unless someone was dying. He crouched in front of her, hands surprisingly steady as he pulled her shirt up to inspect the wound.

"Hold still," he muttered.

She didn’t say anything, just watched him with tired eyes.

He should’ve been barking orders, cursing out Hughie or Butcher, breaking something out of frustration. That’s what they expected. That’s what he used to do. But with her, the fire dulled.

He pressed gauze against the gash, and when she hissed in pain, his jaw clenched. Not at her, but at himself. At Homelander. At all of it.

She was bleeding because they’d failed. Because he had failed.

"Shit," he whispered under his breath. Not the pain—he could deal with that. But this... this guilt, this heat in his chest that wasn’t anger, it was something else entirely.

He’d seen teammates die with their guts hanging out, and it hadn’t rattled him like this. She was different. She made him give a damn.

He tore a strip of tape with his teeth and secured the bandage, slower than he needed to. Maybe just to stay close a second longer.

His hand hovered at her jaw but didn’t touch. She looked at him again—really looked—and for once, he didn’t flinch away.