The room hums with machines, each sound too sharp in the quiet, doing the work Cate’s body can’t. Cate doesn't stir, tucked into sheets with a bandage wound around her head and wires tracking the faint pulse of her life. {{user}} has lost count of the hours, the days, of how many nurses have told her to go home. Time isn’t measured in minutes now, only in heartbeats—still thrumming stubbornly beneath Cate’s ribs, still hammering too fast in {{user}}’s own chest. It’s the only rhythm she trusts anymore. Half afraid if she looks away, it’ll stop.

Her chair is pulled right up against the bed, hoodie wrinkled from fragmented sleep, hair a mess because what’s the point in fixing it when Cate can’t even tease her about it. She holds Cate’s hand like a lifeline, thumb moving in endless circles across knuckles on a hand that doesn’t squeeze back.

The nurses keep telling her to sleep. She tries. Sometimes she folds into the chair, chin propped on Cate’s leg, and dreams half-dreams. But every sound—every shuffle of shoes or squeak of a cart—drags her awake again. And every time, she murmurs something to Cate, refusing to let silence get the last word.

“Do you know how quiet it is without you?” Her voice is hoarse, raw from talking to someone who can’t answer. “Even when you’re mad at me, even when you’re teasing me with that sharp little smile—at least it’s noise. Now it’s just me and the machines and I hate it, baby. I fucking hate it.”

There’s a notebook on her lap, filled with messy scrawl. She started writing letters: updates on the world outside, little stories Cate would want to hear, confessions {{user}}’s too scared to say out loud. The most recent page just says please wake up over and over again until the pen broke through the paper.

Lilies are perched on the windowsill. {{user}} picked them out herself—well, more like swiped them from a florist across town when the room started to feel too empty. “They’re your favorite, right?” she murmurs, though Cate’s lips stay slack, unmoving.

Beside the bed is a teddy bear with a crooked bandage around its head and a stitched-up arm. {{user}} bought it from the hospital gift shop, where all the toys looked too hopeful for a place like this. Spent the whole night hunched over patching it together with trembling fingers. One of its plush arms is neatly stitched up now, matching the line of Cate’s amputation. A tiny gauze bandage crowns its head. {{user}} smooths the bear’s ears and tucks it against Cate’s side like a guardian. “I know…it’s stupid, but I figured you’d want someone who understands. Someone who’s on duty when I can’t be.”

Her chest tightens. Rage simmers under the grief. At their “friends” leaving Cate to die. For making {{user}} be the one to gather her up and run blind with terror with Cate limp in her arms, thinking: if she dies here, I’ll burn this place down and salt the ash.

Every time {{user}} looks at her she sees it again: Jordan’s blast, Cate’s body slamming into the wall with a sound {{user}} will never stop hearing. The thud, the crack, the way her head lolled when she dropped. When the anger crawls back up her throat, she doesn’t swallow it. “You know what pisses me off the most?” she mutters. “They acted like you were the danger. Like you were the villain. Jordan watching while you bled out, telling Marie not to touch you because you might use your powers.”

Her throat tightens, fury sour in her mouth. “You couldn’t even lift your head, Cate. You weren’t a threat. You were dying.” She spits, “They should’ve stayed. They should’ve fought for you.” {{user}}’s voice cracks, gripping Cate’s hand harder. “But it’s just me now. Me, the flowers, the bear. We’re not letting go.”

Her breath stutters out, quiet and uneven. “You don’t have to rush…but come back to me. Please. I don’t care how long it takes—I’ll be right here when you do.”

The lilies in the window bow in the draft. The bear keeps watch. {{user}} closes her eyes and listens to the machine keep time with Cate’s heartbeat.