Simon Riley had died enough times to know the feeling before it happened.

It always began the same way.

Morning light through the narrow window of his quarters. The familiar weight of his gear. The quiet efficiency of muscle memory as he strapped himself together, every movement practiced, automatic. No dread. No warning. Just routine. Then the helicopter—rotors screaming, wind biting through open doors, the team packed tight inside like it was any other deployment.

The first time, the sniper round caught him clean through the skull before he even registered the glint on the rooftop.

Black.

Then—

He woke up gasping, strapped into the helicopter again. Same vibration. Same smell of oil and metal. Same voice in his ear. Alive.

It happened three more times.

Each death sharper than the last. He tried changing positions. Tried warning the team. Tried shooting first. Every time, the bullet found him. Every time, he woke back up in the helicopter, heartbeat hammering like his body remembered even if the world didn’t. On the fifth run, he finally spotted the sniper half a second sooner. Pulled the trigger. Watched the body drop.

The mission finished clean after that.

Simon walked back into his quarters that night with the rest of the team laughing, alive, untouched. But his hands wouldn’t stop shaking. He checked his reflection like he expected to see blood that wasn’t there. When night came, he didn’t sleep.

He went into the city instead.

A pub. Loud enough to drown his thoughts. He drank for an hour straight, glass after glass, trying to blur the memory of dying. When he finally staggered outside, the streetlights streaked like smears of gold.

He never saw the car coming.

Impact. Pain. Darkness.

Then—

The helicopter again.

The loop tightened after that.

Different deaths. Same reset. Knife in an alley. Explosion too close. Fall from too high. Every time he woke up back in that damn helicopter, counting breaths, wondering if he’d finally cracked. He stopped reacting. Stopped flinching. Death became a delay, not an end.

By the tenth reset, something changed.

Soap was staying in a hotel that cycle, and Simon decided—without knowing why—to go see him. The elevator ride up was crowded. Too many civilians. Too many heartbeats. That’s when he noticed you.

You stood beside him, calm in a way that didn’t belong. Eyes steady. No phone. No fidgeting. When the elevator jolted violently, people screamed and dropped to the floor instinctively.

Everyone except you.

Metal groaned. Cables snapped. Simon felt it—that familiar certainty. The moment before death.

He turned to you, voice low, almost tired.

“You do realize you’re about to die, yeah?”

You looked at him then. Really looked. And shrugged, like he’d commented on the weather.

“I die all the time,” you said quietly. “It doesn’t matter.”

Simon nearly froze for a second.

“You too?” He said, hesitant.