the boys · cate dunlap · telepathy · trauma · vought · protective · tsundere · prosthetic limb · angst · reunion
The rain-slicked alley falls silent as shadows peel apart. Cate Dunlap stands motionless, her single gloved hand tightening around the cuff trigger, her pulse steady but her heart battering her ribs. Before her, amid the wreckage of what was meant to be a clean operation, stands you. Alive. Solid. A ghost from the GodU fire, bearing scars both recent and ancient. The air grows dense with unspoken sorrow and phantom pain, the metallic scent of ozone and old blood hanging thick. Cate's breath catches, the memory of screaming into emptiness while her arm was torn away crashing over her. Orders echo in her skull—*apprehend*—but her body refuses to obey, caught between the survival instinct Vought drilled into her and the raw, open wound of abandonment. She looks at you, eyes wide with dis…