Chapter 12

It was four in the afternoon before AJ woke, lying down in front of the door to his flat.

Perhaps I need to move the bed closer to the door…

He peeled himself off the floor and shed his clothes, stepping under the hot spray of the shower before his mind could fully process what had happened the night before.

The shower rinsed away the grime, but the weight in his chest remained.

“Sofia…” he murmured to himself, “I hope you’re alright…”

Michael’s words echoed in his ears.

He doesn’t want to see me until Tuesday.

He toweled off and dressed, then checked his phone, swiping away anything that didn't connect to the chaos his life had become. Michael had messaged, as if reiterating AJ’s own thoughts.

“Don’t come in today. Don’t do anything remotely connected to work. Just rest OK?”

“Got it bossman,” AJ responded. 

Although I’m going to ignore you and go and see Sofia.

He pocketed his phone, grabbed his jacket, and stared at the kara on his desk. His fingers hovered, then curled around the cold steel, sliding it over his right wrist.

Outside, Leeds wore its usual grey like a shrug. Traffic hummed. Pigeons flapped half-heartedly at the approach of buses. The city moved on, indifferent to fires, vampires, and analysts who survived when they shouldn’t.

He walked.

Better to move than sit and replay the night on loop.

Down New York Street, past men in hi-vis nursing takeaway coffees; through the thin river-light where the Aire cut the city’s breath short; up toward the hospital’s modern glass where faces drifted behind panes like fish.

Leeds General Infirmary looked even more clinical by daylight; angles, reflections, a neatness that felt mildly accusatory. AJ paused at the sliding doors, checked his watch out of habit, then went in.

I’m glad you’re not at St. James.

The reception smelled faintly of hand gel and boiled vegetables. He queued behind an elderly couple and a man still in plaster dust. When it was his turn, he leaned forward, pitch ready.

“Visitor for Sofia Alvarez.”

The receptionist’s eyes flicked up and down; shirt, jacket, the tension in his jaw.

“Relationship to the patient?”

“Colleague.” He flashed the OUSR ID like a talisman. “I was with her when it happened.”

“ICU isn’t public access,” she said, the script already moving her lips. “Immediate family only. If you wait, I can…”

“I won’t be long,” he said, lowering his voice, angling the ID just enough for the gold seal to catch the light. “And it’s… related to the incident.”

A long blink. Something in her tightened, then released. She wrote a temporary pass and slid it under the glass.

Can’t believe that worked.

“Second floor, follow the blue line. If a nurse asks, show them that.”

“Thank you.”

He followed the blue vinyl line as instructed; it meandered like a vein. Posters: hand hygiene, staff appreciation, a charity appeal with a child’s drawing of a sun that looked too hopeful. He passed a tea trolley manned by two volunteers. One of them, a Sikh gentleman with a kind face, offered a smile that almost undid him.

“Tea?” the man asked.

“After,” AJ said. “I’ll come back.”

The ICU made a different kind of silence, the kind that presses a finger to your lips and doesn’t move until you obey.

Monitors pulsed their neon heartbeats. Machines breathed for those who couldn’t. A nurse at the station looked up as he approached; tired, efficient, the steel of a thousand shifts behind her eyes.

“Visiting is limited.”

“I know,” he said, showing the pass and the ID. “Sofia Alvarez.”

She glanced at the board. “Bed six, private room. Ten minutes.”

“Thank you.”

He forced his legs toward the darkened room. Each step felt like he walked into a story he’d chosen and couldn’t now un-choose. He stopped at the door, braced himself, and pushed it open.

Sofia lay propped slightly, nasal cannula delivering or removing something he couldn’t make sense of. Bruising flowered purple along her cheekbone.

Both legs were encased, splinted, elevated. The fine, busy energy that always lived behind her eyes had gone still.

“Hey,” he whispered, pulling the chair close. He sat and placed his hands on his knees like a schoolboy. “It’s me.”

Monitors ticked. A drip clicked. He swallowed.

“I’m sorry,” he said. The words weren’t big enough. “I’m so… Sofia, I don’t even know how to name this.”

The hiss of the ventilator filled the silence, patient and cruel.

He stared at her face; what little of it wasn’t bandaged, and saw traces of soot still caught at her hairline.

He hadn’t noticed that before.

“I thought we were going to walk out together,” he whispered. “They said it was safe. I should have known better.”

Her hand shifted; not much, just enough for him to see the faintest tremor of life.

 He took it gently, terrified that even the warmth of his palm might hurt her.

“Sofi?”

Her eyelids stirred. Her voice, when it came, was barely more than air. “You got out?”

He nodded, tears threatening to undo him. “I don’t know how.”

Her eyes found him, heavy, unfocused. “The others?”

He shook his head. “No.”

She closed her eyes, a tear sliding down into her hairline. Her lips moved again, shaping a word that never came.

AJ sat there for a long time, his thumb tracing the back of her hand in small, useless circles.

“I haven’t been honest,” he said finally, his throat tightening around every word. “Not with them. Not with anyone.”

She didn’t react, but the faint sound of her breathing told him she was still listening. Or maybe he only needed to believe that she was.

“There’s someone…” He hesitated, pressing his lips together, the confession trembling loose. “Someone who might know what’s happening. Not one of us. Not human.”

He swallowed hard, hating how wrong it sounded in this place of antiseptic light and steady heartbeats. “She’s been helping me. Telling me things I’m not supposed to hear. I thought…” His voice cracked. “I thought if I listened long enough, it would make more sense…”

Her fingers twitched weakly against his. He felt the smallest pressure, as if she was answering him. Or forgiving him.

“I wanted to tell you,” he whispered. “I just… didn’t know how.”

Her eyes opened again, slow, dazed. For a moment, there was a flicker of something familiar; the old steadiness that always anchored him.

“Be careful,” she breathed. “Sometimes… they sound like they’re helping.”

He froze. “You’re not angry?”

Her lips barely moved, but he saw the word. “No.”

Her eyelids sank, her chest rising shallowly with each machine-assisted breath.

He stayed there, his hand still wrapped around hers, his head bowed.

“I’ll get to the bottom of this,” he said. “Whatever it is. I swear I will.”

The monitor continued its steady pulse, indifferent to promises.

He waited until her hand slipped from his, her breathing returning to the soft rhythm of sleep.

A nurse appeared behind him, the quiet footfalls of someone used to grief. “She needs to rest,” she said gently.

He nodded, rising slowly, his fingers trembling as they left her skin.

At the door, he turned once more. The hospital light cast her face in pale gold; still, fragile, impossibly far away.

He stood there until the nurse closed the door between them, closing her world off from his.

Outside, the corridor smelled of coffee and bleach. AJ leaned against the wall and pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes until he saw stars.

The words echoed back through him.

Sometimes they sound like they’re helping. Am I an idiot?

AJ left the ward in silence, the echo of Sofia’s breathing still caught in his ears.

He walked without seeing, following the blue line on the floor back toward the elevators.

The world beyond the glass doors felt muted; a thin drizzle falling from a darkened sky, traffic hissing along Great George Street, people moving as though the city hadn’t just stolen something from him.

He pulled his jacket tighter and stepped into the rain. The cold bit at him, but it was grounding; something that belonged to him alone.

He walked, not sure where he was going, just knowing he couldn’t stand still.

The weight of what Sofia had said pressed like a bruise against his ribs.

Sometimes they sound like they’re helping. Fuck, am I really an idiot here?

He thought of the late nights at OUSR, the static-laced feeds, the whisper of systems that almost seemed to watch back.

And of her; the one who moved through the dark like it belonged to her, the one who’d blurred every line between trust and manipulation.

Not her, she wouldn’t betray me… us…

He checked his phone. No new messages. She’d be waking soon.

I’ll get home and wait for her…

He turned toward the car park exit; and froze.

A woman stood beneath the overhang, half in shadow. Tall. Still. The rain didn’t seem to touch her. Her coat was black leather, heavy, the sleeves darkened with water. Or blood. Her eyes gleamed brightly in the aftermath of the sunset, their colour impossible to name.

“Radha,” he whispered, the name leaving his lips like a prayer and a curse.