They didn't go far.
Just an old safehouse west of the harbor—abandoned, forgotten, not even on Lucien's grid anymore.
Sky didn't speak as Day stitched the gash on his arm.Day didn't speak as Sky washed the blood from his jaw.
It was the quiet that said everything.
Not cold.
Just fragile.
As if the wrong word might crack it all open again.
Sky sat on the edge of the old couch, arms around his knees.Day leaned against the windowsill, the cigarette between his fingers unlit.
The silence throbbed.
Then—
"You weren't supposed to follow me," Day said, finally.
Sky looked up. "I know."
"You weren't supposed to walk into gunfire for me."
"I know."
Day turned toward him. Slowly. Like it hurt to look.Like it hurt more not to.
"Do you have any idea what it did to me," he said, low, rough, "when I saw you walk through that warehouse door?"
Sky's voice was soft. "You mean besides saving your life?"
Day laughed once. Bitter. "Don't do that."
"What?"
"Make it sound easy. Like this is normal. Like it doesn't kill me every second I imagine you getting pulled into this—my world."
Sky stood. Crossed to him.
He looked up at Day, right into those dark, haunted eyes.
"You don't get to protect me from myself, Day," he whispered. "You don't get to decide how much I'm allowed to care."
Day's breath hitched. His hand dropped the cigarette.
Sky took it.
Held it.
Then, very softly:
"I would rather die beside you than live in a world where I never tried."
Day didn't speak. Couldn't.
So Sky pressed forward, forehead resting against his chest.
"I love you," Sky said.
Simple. Fierce. Certain.
"I love you and I'm not scared of what that means anymore."
Day's hands curled around him like he was breaking.
Like he was healing.
He pressed his lips into Sky's hair, whispering words like a prayer:
"I don't know how to keep you. I don't know how to let you go."
Sky tilted his head up. "Then don't."
And Day kissed him.
Slow.Shaking.Desperate.
Not because he was falling.
But because—this time—he'd decided to land.