Skye

  The base didn’t announce itself.

  There was no dramatic reveal, no sign welcoming them in. Just a stretch of road that stopped being public without anyone bothering to say so. The hedges were cut too straight. The lampposts too evenly spaced. The tarmac smoother than it had any right to be.

  Skye felt it before she saw it—like stepping into a room where the air had rules.

  Dad slowed the car automatically. His shoulders shifted, posture tightening into something practiced and old. He didn’t speak. He didn’t need to.

  Alice leaned forward, eyes scanning. “This is where you work now?”

  “Part of it,” Dad said. Neutral. Careful.

  The gate came into view—tall, matte grey, flanked by fencing that didn’t try to hide how serious it was. Cameras tracked the car’s approach with quiet precision. No blinking red lights. No drama.

  Just attention.

  Skye’s stomach clenched.

  A guard stepped out of the booth as the car rolled to a stop. Male. Late thirties, maybe. Body armour under his jacket, radio clipped high on his shoulder. He didn’t wave. Didn’t smile.

  Dad rolled down the window.

  “Afternoon,” the guard said. His tone was professional, clipped—not unfriendly, not warm. His eyes flicked from Dad to Alice, then—

  He stopped.

  Not theatrically. Just a pause that shouldn’t have been there.

  His gaze returned to Skye.

  It wasn’t shock. Soldiers didn’t do shock like civilians. It was assessment. A recalibration.

  Dad didn’t rush to fill the silence.

  The guard cleared his throat. “Sergeant Harper.”

  “Yes,” Dad replied.

  “You’re not scheduled today.”

  “No.”

  A beat.

  “Appointment,” Dad added. “Medical. With Dr Carter.”

  The guard’s mouth twitched despite himself. “Christine?”

  Dad grimaced. “Yes.”

  “Right,” the guard said dryly. “More than an examination, then.”

  Alice gagged audibly. “I’ve just thrown up in my soul.”

  Dad didn’t look at her.

  The guard exhaled through his nose, then looked back at Skye. Longer this time. Searching for something he wasn’t going to find.

  “She hasn’t...” He stopped himself. Chose different words. “She hasn’t aged.”

  “No,” Dad said.

  Another pause. He leaned closer to the window, lowering his voice—not for secrecy, but habit. “I understand now why you came in.”

  Alice frowned. “You’re just... okay with this?”

  The guard glanced at her, then back to Dad. “You work here long enough,” he said, “you learn not to ask for explanations you’re not cleared to receive.”

  Skye felt a cold ripple move through her chest.

  Dad cut in smoothly. “He’s joking.”

  The guard met his eyes.

  “Sergeant,” he said carefully, “I’m telling you I understand.”

  A beat — then he let his tone lift, outwardly harmless, for anyone listening who wasn’t cleared to listen.

  “Relax,” he said, tapping the booth frame once. “I’m joking.”

  He keyed something into the console. The gate slid open without ceremony.

  “Drive slow,” the guard added. “And Sergeant?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good call.”

  Dad nodded once and pulled through.

  Inside, the base opened up in layers.

  Low buildings in dull, practical colours. Wide roads with painted lines that meant something specific Skye didn’t understand. Groups of personnel moved with purpose—not rushing, not wandering. No one loitered.

  Everything felt decided.

  As they passed the first cluster of buildings, two soldiers glanced up mid-conversation.

  One of them stopped talking halfway through a sentence. The other kept walking but turned his head a fraction too far, like his body had reacted before his discipline could catch up.

  Not everyone reacted the same. Some looked once and forced their eyes away, jaw tight. A few—older ones—watched Skye with something like resignation, as if they’d long ago accepted that the world didn’t behave.

  Skye’s skin prickled. She shrank instinctively, shoulders curling inward.

  Alice noticed immediately. Her hand slid into Skye’s, fingers firm. Grounding.

  Skye breathed again.

  Dad glanced back in the mirror. His jaw clenched.

  They parked near a squat medical block—windows narrow, reinforced. A red cross painted on the side, faded with age.

  As they got out, voices fell quiet nearby.

  A group of airmen faltered as if they’d hit an invisible line.

  One of them started to say something, then swallowed it. Another’s hand lifted toward his cap and dropped again, remembering himself.

  Skye wished she could disappear.

  She hated being seen.

  Dad’s boots hit the pavement. He straightened, shoulders squared, voice snapping into place.

  “At ease.”

  It wasn’t shouted. It didn’t need to be.

  They obeyed immediately.

  A senior officer approached—grey at the temples, expression locked down tight. His eyes flicked to Skye and stalled.

  He recovered fast.

  “Sergeant Harper,” he said evenly. “Why are you back on base?”

  Dad stepped aside slightly.

  “Sir,” he said, and moved just enough for Skye to be fully visible.

  The officer swallowed.

  “What do you need?” he asked.

  “Blood work,” Dad replied. “Medical oversight.”

  The officer held Skye’s gaze for a second longer than polite.

  Then nodded.

  “That won’t be necessary,” he said, cutting off whatever Dad was about to add. “You don’t explain this. You just deal with it.”

  He turned sharply. “No phones. No speculation. This is a blackout.”

  A few soldiers shifted uncomfortably.

  The officer’s voice hardened. “I mean it. Nothing seen or heard in this perimeter leaves it. Am I understood?”

  “Yes, sir,” came the immediate chorus.

  He softened just a fraction and crouched in front of Skye.

  “You like biscuits?” he asked, quietly.

  Skye blinked. Nodded.

  He handed her one from his pocket—wrapped, unbroken. Like an offering.

  She took it with both hands.

  “Thank you,” she whispered.

  The officer stood. “Get her inside.”

  They moved again.

  As they walked toward the medical wing, Skye felt eyes on her—not hungry, not hostile. Something worse.

  Measured.

  Alice squeezed her hand harder.

  Dad didn’t look back this time.

  They reached the door marked Medical — Restricted Access.

  Dad paused, hand hovering over the handle.

  “She’s a good doctor,” he said, finally. “And she’s a good friend.”

  Alice didn’t answer.

  Skye nodded anyway.

  The door opened.

  And whatever was waiting inside did not feel like rescue.

  It felt like the next rule.

  —————-

  Linda

  The hospital hit Linda like a memory with teeth.

  Automatic doors breathing open. A wash of heated air that smelled of bleach, hand gel, microwaved food, and the faint copper of something you couldn’t scrub out no matter how often you tried. Fluorescent light, too flat, too honest.

  Her body remembered the route before her mind caught up. Left past the volunteers’ desk. Right toward the corridor that led to staff-only doors. The floor had the same shine, the same careful cleanliness that used to make her feel competent.

  Now it just made her feel watched.

  Jolie stayed close without crowding her, coat zipped to the throat, eyes scanning the way Linda used to scan a ward: not for drama—just for what could go wrong.

  Linda pulled her sleeve down instinctively, covering the bandage. The gesture was automatic and stupid. You didn’t hide grief in a building that specialised in it.

  Ruth spotted her from across the nurses’ station and went still.

  It was subtle—Ruth was good at subtle—but Linda saw it anyway. The way Ruth’s shoulders tightened, the way her mouth parted like she’d taken an unexpected hit to the chest.

  “Linda,” Ruth said, stepping out from behind the desk. “Christ—are you... are you alright?”

  The question wasn’t professional. It was personal. It was someone trying not to step on a scar.

  Linda forced her face into something that could pass for functioning. “I’m coping,” she said. The lie came out too flat. “Trying to.”

  Ruth’s eyes flicked over her—too pale, too tight around the mouth, the way her hands kept clenching and unclenching like she was still holding a sheet.

  Ruth didn’t ask the next question—how—because there was no safe way to ask it.

  “Tea,” Ruth said instead, as if tea could be triage. “Come on. Staff lounge. Sit down.”

  Linda should’ve refused. The hospital didn’t like visitors where staff were meant to exhale.

  But Jolie’s hand touched the small of her back—light, guiding—and Linda’s knees suddenly felt less reliable than she wanted them to be.

  They followed Ruth through the coded door.

  The staff lounge was exactly as it had always been: a too-small room full of plastic chairs, a humming vending machine, notices pinned to a board—rotas, charity runs, infection control reminders, a faded poster about burnout with a smiling cartoon nurse that made Linda feel like screaming.

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  Maeve looked up from a table with a half-eaten sandwich.

  For a second her face did something unguarded—shock, then softness, then pain so quick she nearly missed it.

  “Linda,” Maeve said, standing. Her voice was careful, like approaching a patient who’d just been told the worst news. “Hey.”

  Linda’s throat closed. She nodded once, because words would leak too much.

  Ruth shoved the kettle on like it was a procedure and started rooting for mugs. “Sit,” she ordered again. “Both of you.”

  Maeve’s gaze flicked to Jolie, assessing. “And you are...?”

  “Jolie,” Jolie said, offering a small smile that didn’t pretend everything was fine. “I’m... with Alice.”

  Maeve blinked, then grinned—genuinely, briefly. The first real brightness Linda had seen in her since she walked in. “Oh.” She looked at Linda, almost asking permission to be happy about it.

  Linda managed something that might’ve been a smile if you didn’t look too closely. “Yes,” she said. “That.”

  Maeve huffed out a breath. “Bloody hell. Good for her.” Then, softer, to Linda, like she was tucking the happiness away so it didn’t offend the grief: “I’m glad she’s got you.”

  Jolie’s posture shifted. She could’ve stayed quiet, could’ve let Linda handle it.

  But Jolie had never been good at letting people bleed politely.

  “I’m a social worker,” she said, the words chosen like a shield. “Before anyone asks why your colleague has dragged one of us in here.”

  Maeve let out a small breath that was almost a laugh. “So that’s why Linda’s here.”

  Jolie’s smile tightened. “Something like that.”

  Ruth set two mugs down in front of them, tea too strong, milk already stirred in. Linda wrapped her hands around the heat without thinking.

  The warmth didn’t fix anything. It just reminded her her hands were still alive.

  Ruth watched her drink like she was monitoring obs. “What’s happened?” she asked quietly, not prying—worried.

  Linda kept her eyes on the mug. She could feel the story pressing at her ribs, demanding to be told and also to be protected.

  “We saw something,” Linda said finally. “Something that made me remember someone.”

  Ruth’s eyebrows lifted. “Someone?”

  Linda looked up.

  “Ms Marlowe,” she said.

  The name landed heavy in the little room. Maeve’s expression flickered—she remembered, too. Bay Twelve. The calm woman with eyes like knives wrapped in silk.

  Ruth’s mouth opened slightly. “Why do you—”

  Jolie stepped in before the question could sharpen. “She spoke to Alice,” Jolie said, deliberate and careful. “About Skye. About... grief. And what she said has... stuck.”

  Maeve’s gaze dropped to Linda’s sleeve. The bandage.

  Ruth read that glance and her face softened, like a door unlatching.

  “Oh,” Ruth whispered. “Right.”

  Linda hated the relief there—relief that this was about grief and not something stranger. Relief that it could be filed somewhere familiar.

  “She said something about Skye’s spirit,” Jolie added smoothly, as if this was a normal request and not a lie built from panic. “Linda just wants to... understand why.”

  Ruth hesitated.

  You could see the calculation: policy, privacy, job, consequences.

  Then you could see the human part override it.

  Ruth leaned in, voice dropping. “I can’t do this as a nurse,” she said. “If anyone found out—”

  “I know,” Linda murmured.

  Ruth nodded once, sharply, as if making the decision hurt and she wanted it over with. “I’ll find out where she is. If she’s still here. But you didn’t hear it from me.”

  Linda’s fingers tightened around the mug. “Thank you.”

  Ruth held her gaze. “You want to owe me one?” she said, voice thin with emotion she didn’t let spill. “Then you go out. You live. Skye would’ve wanted that.”

  The way Ruth said her name—clear, careful—made something in Linda’s chest twist.

  “I...” Linda started, and couldn’t finish.

  Ruth stood abruptly, as if staying any longer would make her cry. “Stay here. Drink the tea. Don’t move.”

  She left.

  Maeve sat back down slowly, as if the air had thickened. “Are you okay?” she asked Linda, quieter than before.

  Linda stared at the tea. “No.”

  Maeve’s laugh was wet and humourless. “Fair.”

  Jolie watched Linda’s hands like she was trying to work out what kind of breaking was happening today. “When Alice told me what that woman said,” Jolie murmured, “I thought it was grief making patterns out of noise.”

  Linda swallowed.

  “So did I,” she said.

  “And now?”

  Linda’s throat burned. “Now I don’t know.”

  Time dragged. The hum of the vending machine, the distant beep of monitors bleeding through the walls, someone laughing in a corridor like life was still allowed.

  Then the door opened again.

  Ruth stood there with her face rearranged into something careful. “Come on.”

  They followed her through corridors that felt narrower than they had a minute ago. Linda caught herself walking the way she used to—purposeful, contained—as if putting her body back into the shape of competence might stop her from falling apart.

  They reached a bay tucked away from the main noise. Curtains drawn. A low murmur of oxygen flow. The air inside smelled sweeter somehow—medical plastic, clean sheets, and the particular scent of someone who had been ill long enough for illness to become part of the room.

  Margaret lay propped up on pillows.

  The oxygen mask sat over her nose and mouth, tubing looping like a tether. Her skin was paler than Linda remembered. Thinner. The tidy hair was still pinned back, but the effort behind it was visible now—as if she’d arranged herself for visitors because being seen undone was the last indignity she refused.

  Her eyes found Linda instantly.

  They sharpened.

  Then softened.

  Margaret’s hand lifted slightly, beckoning, and Linda stepped forward without thinking.

  Margaret reached for her fingers—light, careful—and her thumb brushed the edge of Linda’s bandage through her sleeve.

  Margaret’s eyes narrowed with understanding that felt like being x-rayed.

  “Oh,” she whispered, voice rough under the mask. “Love.”

  Linda’s breath collapsed.

  She nodded, once, helpless.

  Margaret’s hand tightened faintly, then she lifted her other hand and tugged the mask down just enough to speak.

  “I told you,” she rasped, and a faint, humourless smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. “I knew it would come back.”

  Linda stared at her. The nurse in her saw the hollowing at the throat, the slight tremor in Margaret’s breathing, the fatigue that clung to her like damp.

  The mother in her didn’t care about any of it.

  Margaret studied Linda’s face, then Jolie’s, and something shifted—like a thread being pulled, gently, to see what it was attached to.

  “She came back,” Margaret said, not asking.

  Linda’s body jolted. The room tilted.

  Jolie swore softly under her breath.

  Linda’s voice came out broken. “She—last night. She thought she’d just—been knocked out. She—she—” Her mouth trembled. “She panicked when she found out.”

  Margaret nodded slowly. “Of course she did,” she said, as if that was the only sane reaction. “From her perspective... it’s a hole in the world.”

  Jolie leaned forward, all restraint thinning. “Why did you tell Alice?” she asked. Not accusing—desperate. “Why warn her like that?”

  Margaret’s gaze drifted for a second, like she was watching something play out on the inside of her eyelids. “Because she was breaking in the shape of someone who thinks they’ve killed a sister,” she said quietly. “And because I knew she’d need... softness. Not later. Then.”

  Linda’s nails dug into her own palm. “How?” she demanded, voice rising despite herself. “How did you know? Why this? Why us?”

  Margaret’s eyes flicked, quick, to Ruth lingering near the curtain—listening, worried, pretending she wasn’t.

  Margaret’s voice stayed calm. “You want answers that would tear you open,” she said. “And you’re already open.”

  “Don’t,” Linda choked. Rage flashed, sudden and hot. “Don’t speak to me like I’m—like I’m a patient.”

  Margaret didn’t flinch.

  Jolie slid a hand onto Linda’s forearm, grounding. “Linda,” she murmured.

  Linda’s eyes burned. “She came back in the same clothes,” she said, words spilling now, unstoppable. “Same age. Same—everything. Is it temporary? Is it some—some mistake? Is she going to—” Her voice snapped. “Is she going to die again?”

  Margaret’s gaze held hers, steady as a hand on a shoulder.

  “I can tell you this,” Margaret said, voice soft and steady, “she isn’t going back to how it was.”

  Linda’s breath caught. Hope and fear collided so violently she nearly gagged.

  “You can’t know that,” Linda whispered.

  Margaret’s eyes flicked with something like sorrow. “I wouldn’t say it if I didn’t.”

  Linda shook her head, frantic. “She wants to go back to school,” she blurted. “She wants normal. The world won’t accept her. They’ll ask questions we can’t answer. They’ll—” Her voice dropped into something raw. “They’ll take her.”

  Margaret’s fingers tightened around Linda’s, surprisingly strong for someone so thin. “Then you hold her tighter,” she said.

  “That’s not enough,” Linda snapped, tears breaking free. “You don’t understand what they do to things they don’t understand. They’ll examine her. They’ll dissect her. They’ll—”

  “Linda,” Jolie warned gently.

  Linda couldn’t stop. “He saw her,” she said, voice shaking. “The man who killed her. He knows she’s alive. He’ll come for her and I—” Her breath hitched hard. “I don’t know how to stop him.”

  Margaret went still. Not surprised. Just... accepting, like she’d already placed that piece on the board.

  “That,” Margaret said quietly, “is a legitimate fear.”

  Linda made a broken sound.

  Margaret’s voice softened further. “They probably will try,” she admitted. “People do terrible things when the world refuses to behave.” She paused, then added, careful: “But there are people who would die to keep someone like Skye safe.”

  Linda’s eyes narrowed through tears. “People?”

  Margaret’s gaze slid away for half a heartbeat—toward the window, toward somewhere not in the room.

  Then back.

  “And I know you would too,” Margaret said, and the way she said it made it less like comfort and more like recognition.

  Linda’s shoulders shook. She was crying now, openly, like her body had finally given up trying to keep the grief dignified.

  Margaret lifted her hand—slow, tired—and cupped the back of Linda’s fingers.

  “You’ve only just got her back,” she murmured. “You’re not meant to have all the answers right away. Just... be there. Love her. Stay.” Her eyes shone. “If the world finds out... then the world will have to accept her.”

  Linda laughed, a harsh sound full of disbelief. “And if it doesn’t?”

  Margaret’s expression didn’t change. “Then you fight,” she said simply. “Not with panic. With people. With plans. With—help.”

  Linda’s breath shook. “I don’t know who to trust.”

  Margaret’s eyes softened again, almost kind. “Start with who has already stayed.”

  Jolie’s hand tightened on Linda’s arm as if agreeing without saying it.

  Margaret drew the oxygen mask back up with a small wince. The movement cost her. Linda saw it—how effortful everything was now.

  Ruth cleared her throat gently from the curtain. “Visiting hours,” she said, voice apologetic. “I’m sorry.”

  Margaret’s eyes stayed on Linda. “Go,” she rasped behind the mask. “Do what you need to do.”

  Linda’s fingers clung to hers for a second longer than appropriate. Then she let go, because she had learned the hard way what it cost to refuse endings.

  “Thank you,” Linda whispered.

  Margaret’s eyes crinkled faintly. Go.

  Outside the bay, Ruth stopped them with a hand lifted—not blocking, just asking for a second.

  She looked at Linda like she was about to say something professional and chose something else instead.

  “You know,” Ruth said quietly, “you were always better when you were doing the thing you were built for.”

  Linda frowned. “What thing?”

  Ruth’s mouth trembled. “Saving people,” she said, as if it was obvious. “It’s in your blood, Linda. You don’t have to be a ghost.”

  Linda stared at her, breath caught. The word ghost hit too close.

  Jolie’s gaze met Linda’s, steady and unromantic. We move. We don’t fold.

  Linda swallowed. “I’ll think about it,” she said, because it was the only truth she could manage.

  Ruth nodded once, satisfied with the small survival of it. “Good.”

  They walked out through the corridor again, past doors that opened and shut, past nurses moving like the world still made sense.

  Linda’s mind was still full of questions Margaret had refused to answer—how, why, what it meant—and yet something else sat beneath the questions now, heavier, more useful.

  Skye would not die again.

  Jamie knew.

  And there were people—somewhere—who had already been watching, already been ready.

  Jolie steered her toward the exit without needing to say it.

  “The police,” Jolie said.

  Linda nodded, the motion stiff as if her neck had forgotten how to move.

  Outside, the night air hit her face like cold water. The hospital lights glowed behind them—sterile certainty.

  Linda didn’t feel certain.

  But for the first since Skye came home, she felt something besides fear.

  A plan beginning to form.

  And somewhere, behind a closed curtain in a quiet bay, Margaret Marlowe lay very still with an oxygen mask over her face—eyes open, staring at nothing, as if listening for footsteps that hadn’t arrived yet.

  ———

  Skye

  The room smelled wrong.

  Not hospital-clean—controlled.

  Skye noticed it the way she noticed things she wasn’t meant to: the lack of flowers, the metal bin with a yellow lid, the laminated charts screwed into the wall instead of pinned. Even the chairs were different. Bolted down.

  Dad shut the door behind them and the sound landed heavy, like punctuation.

  Christine Carter didn’t rush.

  That was the first thing Skye noticed.

  She stood from her desk slowly, hands visible, posture loose in a way that didn’t mean relaxed so much as deliberate. She wore fatigues instead of scrubs—medical insignia stitched cleanly into the sleeve—but her eyes were sharp and focused in a way Skye recognised immediately.

  Doctor eyes.

  Christine looked at Dad first.

  Then Alice.

  Then Skye.

  She didn’t gasp. She didn’t freeze. She didn’t smile.

  She inhaled once through her nose, like someone resetting their balance.

  “Hello,” she said, voice even. “You must be Skye.”

  Skye blinked.

  Not Luke. Not who is this. Just... Skye.

  “Yes,” she said carefully. “I think.”

  Christine nodded, accepting the uncertainty like it was data, not confusion.

  “I’m Christine,” she said. “I look after your dad when he breaks himself.”

  Dad snorted. “Once.”

  “Twice,” Christine corrected. “And a concussion you never reported.”

  “That was nothing.”

  “That was a helmet-splitting impact.”

  Alice let out a breath that might have been a laugh. “I like her.”

  Christine flicked her a look. “You should. I kept him functional when you couldn’t.”

  That landed.

  Not cruel. Not teasing.

  True.

  Skye watched Dad as Christine spoke to him—really watched him—and something slid into place quietly.

  This was how he looked when he didn’t have to pretend he knew what to do.

  He stood closer to Christine than to anyone else in the room. Not touching. Just... aligned. Like she was part of his system now.

  Skye’s chest tightened.

  Christine turned her attention back to Skye. “I’m going to ask you a few questions,” she said. “You don’t have to answer anything you don’t want to. If you don’t understand, you say so. If you need a break, you say so. Okay?”

  Skye nodded.

  Alice leaned in. “She faints at blood.”

  “I do not,” Skye snapped.

  Christine didn’t react. She simply made a note.

  “Have you ever fainted at blood?” she asked.

  Skye hesitated. The room felt smaller.

  “Yes,” she muttered. “But only when it surprises me.”

  “That counts,” Christine said.

  Alice folded her arms. “You’ve had jabs before.”

  Skye’s head snapped round. “That’s different.”

  “How?”

  “They were expected,” Skye said, voice rising despite herself. “And Mum was there. And I wasn’t—” She stopped.

  Dead.

  She swallowed hard.

  Christine watched without interrupting.

  Alice softened instantly. “Hey. I’m not saying you’re lying. I’m saying you’re braver than you think.”

  Skye glared at her. “Stop deciding things about me.”

  Alice raised her hands. “Fair.”

  Christine nodded once, approving. “Good boundary,” she said, then glanced at the clock on the wall.

  Skye followed her gaze.

  The second hand ticked loud in the silence.

  Christine moved. “We’ve got about twelve minutes before the next courier run,” she said calmly. “If we miss it, your samples sit overnight. That’s not dangerous, but it delays answers.”

  Dad stiffened. “Do we need—”

  “I’m not running anything exotic,” Christine said. “Full blood count. Inflammatory markers. Baseline metabolic panel. Chain of custody logged under restricted. Nothing leaves this building without my sign-off.”

  That mattered.

  Skye didn’t know why, but it did.

  Christine reached the door and cracked it open.

  Two soldiers were definitely not loitering.

  One was pretending to check a noticeboard that had no notices. The other was tying a boot that was already tied.

  Christine didn’t raise her voice.

  “Clear the corridor,” she said.

  One of them hesitated.

  Christine’s eyes hardened—not angry, just absolute. “That’s not a suggestion.”

  They moved immediately.

  When the door shut again, Christine pulled the blind down over the small window with a sharp tug.

  “There,” she said. “Now we’re just people.”

  Skye didn’t feel like a person.

  She felt like a thing everyone was pretending wasn’t impossible.

  Christine rolled a tray over. Needles. Vials. Labels already printed.

  Skye’s stomach flipped.

  “I don’t like needles,” she said quickly.

  Alice tilted her head. “You let the nurse at school do your flu jab without even swearing.”

  “That was a small needle,” Skye said. “And she was nice.”

  Christine picked up the smallest gauge. “This is smaller.”

  Skye stared at it.

  “No it’s not.”

  Christine didn’t argue. “You can look away,” she said. “You can talk. You can hold someone’s hand.”

  Skye hesitated, then grabbed Alice’s sleeve with both hands.

  “If you faint,” Alice said gently, “I’ll tell Mum you were very dramatic.”

  Skye huffed despite herself. “You’re horrible.”

  “I know.”

  Christine cleaned Skye’s arm. The cold made her flinch.

  “This is going to pinch,” Christine said. “Then it’s done.”

  Skye nodded rigidly.

  The needle slid in.

  She felt the pressure first. Then the warmth. Then the red bloom in the tube.

  Her vision tunneled.

  “Don’t look,” Alice said quickly.

  “I am not—” Skye’s knees buckled.

  Christine was already there, one arm firm around Skye’s shoulders, guiding her down into the chair she’d positioned exactly where it needed to be.

  “Breathe,” Christine said. “In through your nose. Out through your mouth.”

  Skye did.

  The room steadied.

  Christine finished, taped the cotton down, and disposed of everything with brisk efficiency.

  “Done,” she said. “You did fine.”

  Skye’s face burned. “I hate that.”

  “That’s allowed,” Christine said.

  Dad hadn’t spoken the entire time.

  Now he did.

  “Christine,” he said quietly. “I don’t know what to do.”

  That was new.

  Christine looked at him—not as a doctor, not as an officer—but as someone who’d held his life together when it fell apart.

  “You’re doing it,” she said. “You brought her somewhere controlled. You didn’t panic. You asked for help.”

  He shook his head. “She died.”

  The word hung there, heavy and obscene.

  Christine didn’t flinch. “Yes.”

  Skye’s breath caught.

  Christine met her eyes. “And you’re here now.”

  Skye didn’t know how both things could be true.

  Christine’s phone vibrated on the desk.

  She glanced at the screen, then turned it face-down.

  “That’s the third call,” she said calmly. “Which means someone is already asking questions.”

  Dad’s jaw tightened. “Can you—”

  “I can slow it,” Christine said. “Not stop it. Nothing like this stays contained forever.”

  Skye felt cold.

  Christine crouched in front of her again. “Listen to me, Skye. No one here is going to hurt you. Not today. Not on my watch.”

  Skye searched her face for lies.

  Didn’t find any.

  “But,” Christine continued, standing, “this means we move carefully. Together.”

  Outside the door, boots shifted. A muffled voice cut off mid-sentence.

  The base was holding its breath.

  Christine handed Dad a clipboard. “Sign here. Then take your daughters home.”

  Dad nodded, pen shaking just slightly.

  As they turned toward the door, Skye looked back at the chair. The tray. The blind.

  This wasn’t rescue.

  It was containment.

  But it wasn’t cruelty either.

  As the door opened, she caught sight of soldiers pretending not to watch.

  She squeezed Alice’s hand.

  And for the first time since she’d woken up by the road, Skye understood something with awful clarity:

  Being alive again didn’t mean being safe.

  It meant being noticed.

  And whatever rule came next, it wouldn’t be one she got to ignore.