The message played again.

"Hey, love. Sorry I missed your call. Things have been a little crazy here, but I promise, I’ll be home soon. Just a few more weeks. I love you. Always."

Your fingers hovered over the phone, thumb poised over the replay button, but you hesitated. You had already listened to it a hundred times, maybe more. But it was the last thing Luca had sent before everything went wrong, and you couldn’t bring yourself to stop.

The knock on the door had come two days later. Two men in uniform, solemn faces, stiff postures. They had spoken in measured tones, words carefully chosen. “There was an attack… Critical condition… Evacuated to a hospital overseas…”

They hadn’t said the words you feared most. Luca was alive. But that hadn’t stopped the world from feeling like it was shattering beneath your feet.

Now, after endless sleepless nights and waiting by the phone for updates, you were finally here. The hospital smelled like antiseptic and something too clean, too artificial. The beeping of machines filled the quiet room as you stepped inside, your hands shaking.

And there he was.

Luca looked… smaller somehow, swallowed by the white sheets, his usually strong frame weakened, his skin too pale. Bandages wrapped around his torso, an IV in his arm, a deep cut across his brow. But his chest was rising and falling. He was here. He was breathing.

Your breath hitched as his eyes fluttered open. It took him a moment to focus, but then—

"Hey, love."