Chapter Twenty Five
Dax
Dark.
Not the kind that means sleep. Not the kind that gives rest. The kind that presses in, heavy, choking.
Beep.
Hiss.
Beep.
Hiss.
Machines breathing for me.
Machines telling the room I’m still here.
Am I?
My body feels far away.
Too heavy.
Like I’ve been buried under sand again, ribs split open, lungs full of grit.
I try to move—can’t.
Try to speak—nothing.
The world drags me back in pieces.
Fluorescent light burning through closed lids.
The sour bite of antiseptic clogging my nose.
Pain like fire stitched into my side, spreading with every shallow breath and her voice.
Not here.
Not real.
But it doesn’t fucking matter—she’s in my head, same as the bullets, same as the blast.
“You’ll never catch me, Dax. You never fucking do.”
My throat works. No sound comes out. Just a rasp, broken and useless.
I don’t know if it’s hours later, or minutes, but the weight shifts.
Footsteps.
Closer.
A hand touches mine.
Warm. Small. Real.
And fuck—I know it.
I’d know it blind.
“Dax.”
Her whisper cracks through the haze, through the pain, through every wall I ever built.
Butterfly.
I force my lids open, everything blurry, edges swimming. The light blinds. My head screams. My chest feels sewn together with barbed wire.
But I see her.
Cassandra.
Eyes red, cheeks raw, her hair pulled back like she fought with it for hours. She looks destroyed. Beautiful. Mine. Her fingers tremble where they hold me, but she doesn’t let go.
“You scared the shit out of me,” she whispers, voice shaking, breath hitching like she’s holding herself together by a thread.
I want to tell her I’m sorry.
That I’m fine.
That I’ll never leave her again.
But all that comes out is a broken rasp, cracked and useless—
“…Butterfly.”
Her eyes flood, tears spilling fast, faster, like she’s been holding them back all night and for the first time since the blast, I feel something other than pain.
I feel hers.
Bleeding all over me.
Her tears burn worse than shrapnel.
“Don’t—” Her voice breaks, sharp as broken glass. She squeezes my hand harder, like she can anchor me with just that grip. “Don’t you ever do that to me again. You hear me?”
I try to answer. My lips move. The sound that comes out isn’t a word. Just a ragged breath, rougher than gravel.
Her other hand presses to my chest, right over the bandages. Careful but firm. Like she’s reminding me my heart’s still in there. Like she’s daring it to stop.
“You think you’re the only one allowed to bleed?” Her whisper cuts deep. “You think you’re the only one who gets to drown?”
I close my eyes. Not because I want to, but because the weight of hers is too much. The fury. The grief. The love she won’t admit but can’t fucking hide.
Her thumb brushes over my knuckles, gentle when nothing else in this place is.
“You stupid bastard,” she chokes. “I was ready to let you go once. I can’t do it again. I won’t.”
My chest jerks. A cough tears through me, hot, wet. Pain flares like fire stitched into my ribs. She’s there instantly—tilting me, pressing gauze, whispering it’s okay, it’s okay even though it’s not.
When the spasm eases, I’m wrecked. My body’s a corpse barely strung together, but my voice finally cracks out one word.
“Why?”
She freezes. “Why what?”
“Why… stay?” My throat rasps, raw, every syllable clawing. “Why not… run?”
Her breath stutters. She leans down, so close I feel her tears hit my skin, hot and relentless. “Because even when you leave,” she whispers, voice shredded, “I still fucking love you.”
It guts me. More than the blast. More than the war because I don’t deserve it and I can’t live without it.
My fingers twitch around hers, the only strength I’ve got left. My lips crack, the word slipping out like confession, like surrender, like the only truth I’ll ever own.
“Butterfly…”
Her head bows, her hair brushing my face, her body trembling against mine as the machines keep screaming I’m alive and for the first time, I almost believe them.
The drugs hit slow. Heavy.
Not enough to silence the pain, just enough to turn it into something else.
Thick. Warped. Like the edges of me are blurring.
I blink—and the ceiling isn’t the ceiling anymore.
It’s sky. Black. Burning. The blast still in my bones.
I hear Harris screaming.
Reese coughing blood.
Torres dragging me through hell by the straps of my vest.
And over it—her voice.
“Breathe with me, Dax.”
My chest jerks. I try. I drag in smoke instead. Choke. Gag. My ribs splinter.
Her hands press down, sharp, frantic.
Not Cassandra’s hands. Not here. Not real.
But my mind doesn’t care.
She’s crouched over me in the crater, scrubs covered in dust, eyes wide, wet, breaking.
“Don’t you dare leave me. Not like this.”
I reach up—my fingers claw air. Nothing there. Just IV lines. Just ghosts.
I blink again—and the tent’s gone.
I’m back in the chapel. Glass crunches underfoot. Moonlight bleeding through holes in the roof. Her mouth under mine, soft and wild and ruined. “You’ll never fucking leave me again.” My voice echoes like a vow. Like a curse.
Her eyes flash—fear, fury, want. All of it tangled. Her lips tremble. “You’ll break me, Dax.”
And I already have.
And I still will.
I lurch, my body jerking against the restraints on the cot. A nurse shoves me down, murmurs something I don’t hear. The monitors spike but I don’t hear machines. I hear gunfire. Her scream. And my own voice, hoarse, desperate—“Butterfly!” I rip my throat raw on the word, but it drags me back—half.
Not enough.
The ceiling swims. Shapes blur. White coats move around me. Cassandra’s face flickers in and out between them, her eyes wet, her lips moving—Stay with me.
Stay.
I don’t know if she’s really there or if I’ve finally gone under.
All I know is if she lets go of my hand—I’m not coming back.
I can’t tell if my eyes are open. Light comes and goes, too bright, too dark. Shapes move, shadows bend.
The cot shifts under me, straps biting my wrists. Cold metal. Warm blood. I don’t know whose.
“Dax—”
Her voice.
My throat convulses, torn raw. “Butterfly.”
But when I turn my head, it’s not her. It’s smoke. Sand. A crater opening wide under my boots. Reese is gone. Harris is screaming. Torres is dragging me by the vest, snarling, “Stay with me, Doc.”
And over it all—her.
“Don’t you fucking leave me.”
Her face flickers in the haze—Cassandra with blood on her hands, mascara running, her eyes wide like she’s watching me die twice.
I jerk hard, muscles seizing, monitors screaming. Hands shove me back down, pressing, holding, restraining. My ribs shriek. My chest rattles.
I can’t breathe.
And then—her lips. Close. Wet. The chapel again. Her mouth crushed to mine like she’d rather burn with me than be left behind. My hands in her hair. Her legs locked around me.
“You’ll never leave me again.”
But then she’s gone.
Pulled back into smoke.
Her eyes hollow, her mouth whispering goodbye butterfly in a voice that doesn’t belong to her.
“No—” I thrash, my voice breaking. “No, stay—”
The ceiling swims. The walls warp. Blood drips from the IV like it’s my own veins leaking.
Her voice again—closer now, fractured. “Dax, breathe. Please, just breathe.”
I drag air in, choking on it. Salt burns my eyes. My chest stutters.
She’s here.
She’s not.
Her face leans over me, tears falling hot on my skin. I swear I feel them.
“Don’t you dare leave me.”
I try to lift my hand. My fingers twitch against the restraint, desperate to touch her, to anchor her real. But all I feel is leather, straps biting deep, holding me down like the desert itself.
And all I can think—If she lets go now, I won’t find my way back. So I hold her name on my tongue, raw and ragged, until my lips split.
“Butterfly.”
Again.
“Butterfly.”
Like a prayer.
Like the only fucking thing keeping me alive.
The ceiling is melting. Dripping into my eyes. Into my mouth. Bitter. Metallic. I taste iron. I taste her. Her thighs around me, her lips swollen, her tears on my tongue but when I reach for her, my hand comes back red.
I blink—and it’s Mason’s blood again.
All over me.
All over her.
She’s there with gauze and trembling hands, pressing down, sobbing, “You’re losing him, Dax, you’re losing him—”
My heart slams so hard I feel the monitors screaming, but I don’t hear them. I hear her. Always her.
“Promise me you’ll come back.”
“I can’t promise you that.”
I choke on it, the memory, the lie. My chest rattles like broken glass.
“Dax—”
Her voice again.
Soft. Fragile. Terrifying.
I turn my head—she’s kneeling on the chapel floor, shards of stained glass glittering in her hair. Moonlight paints her like a saint, but her eyes… Christ, her eyes are hell.
“You left me,” she whispers. Her mouth trembles, her throat works, and it guts me worse than any bullet. “You always leave me.”
I lunge forward—can’t, my wrists yank tight against the restraints. My throat tears raw. “No—no, Butterfly, I didn’t—I—”
But she’s gone again.
Smoke swallows her.
Sand fills her mouth.
And then it’s Torres’ voice, sharp, guttural: “Stay with me, Doc!” His hand crushing my vest, his face smeared with blood.
I blink—and it’s Cassandra again. Her hands on me, nails biting my skin, whispering, “Stay with me, please, just stay with me.”
I don’t know which is real.
I don’t care.
I grab at the air, at her ghost, at the straps that pin me to the bed. My body thrashes. My ribs scream. My lungs seize.
And I feel it—the chapel wall against her back. Her cunt squeezing me so tight I couldn’t breathe. Her voice breaking on mine: “I’ll never breathe without you.”
The machines howl. My body jerks, convulses.
And still—
still—
I whisper her name.
“Butterfly.”
Like I can drag her through the smoke.
Like I can tether myself to her hands.
Like if I say it enough, the desert won’t swallow me whole.
“Butterfly.”
Blood fills my mouth.
Tears I don’t remember fall hot on my face and the darkness curls closer, whispering I won’t wake but I fight.