Page 129 of Rescuing Ally: Part 2

Who have.

“Come here.” Jenna’s voice is soft but firm. She pulls me away from the table, away from the sheet-covered reminder of what we’ve lost.

“I can’t leave him.” Leaving feels like abandonment, like the final betrayal of everything we were together.

My legs feel disconnected from my body, muscles unwilling to obey simple commands. The medical bay has become the last place we were all together, the last space where love existed in its complete form.

“You’re not leaving him.” Malia takes my other arm, gentle but insistent. “But you can’t stay here either.”

“He’ll always be with us,” Rebel adds quietly, her damaged face showing fierce conviction. “Death doesn’t end love. It just changes where it lives.”

They guide me out of the medical bay, a procession of wounded women supporting each other through the worst night of their lives. Our voices fade as we move toward the galley, leaving the men to stand vigil over their fallen brother.

“Three days to home port,” Ethan says quietly to the remaining team. “Captain’s running dark, minimal communications. Gives us time to figure out our next steps.”

“Memorial service?” Carter asks.

“Full military honors,” Walt confirms. “Guardian HRS will want to?—”

“No.” Blake’s interruption is sharp. “Not just Guardian HRS. This is bigger than that. Hank was—he was family to all of us.”

“Private service first,” Ethan decides. “For us. For the people who loved him. Then whatever official ceremonies Guardian HRS requires.”

Three days on this boat with Hank’s body in the ship’s morgue. Three days to process what we’ve lost and decide what comes next.

Three days to figure out how to live in a world that feels fundamentally broken without him.

Three days that feel like a lifetime.

But also like no time at all to say goodbye to the future we’ll never have.

I loved you, I think, grief settling into my bones like lead.I loved you, and I’ll keep loving you, and I’ll figure out how to live with that love even when you’re not here to receive it.

The thought doesn’t comfort. Nothing will comfort for a very long time.

But it’s a place to start.

FORTY-TWO

The Space He Left

ALLY

The galleyof the trawler smells like coffee and diesel fuel. Yellow light casts everything in warm tones that feel wrong for a night this dark. We claim the space, turning it into a sanctuary where grief can exist without judgment.

Jenna sits beside me on the worn bench seat, her bandaged hand resting on mine. The absence of her fingers hits me fresh—another piece of wholeness Malfor stole from us. Mia curls up in the corner, Rigel’s jacket draped over her shoulders. He’s somewhere above deck, keeping watch.

“He loved you both,” Rebel whispers. Her voice rasps through swollen lips, one side of her face stitched and discolored. “Anyone with eyes could see it.”

“Could see what?” My voice sounds hollow to my own ears.

I can’t breathe. The air burns as it drags into my lungs. My chest stays hollow, no matter how tightly I wrap my arms around myself.

“How complete you made each other.” Malia shifts beside me, wincing with the movement. One arm cradles her ribs, the other reaches out, brushing my back like she’s afraid I might break apart. “The way you fit together like puzzle pieces. Howyou looked at each other like nothing else mattered. Like you found home in the same place.”

My legs go. I drop, knees slamming against cold metal. Hands catch me—Stitch’s, trembling from the lash marks that haven’t stopped bleeding. Rebel sinks down beside me, pulling me in with her unbroken arm.

“And now? What do we do now?”