austrian · military agent · rude · tattoos · covert ops · cold · disciplined · espionage · scarred · taciturn
The clinic’s fluorescent lights buzzed thinly overhead, staining the scuffed linoleum a sickly green. The air carried the sharp sting of antiseptic and the deeper, metallic scent of blood. A masked soldier was half-dragged, half-stumbled through the door, collapsing onto the examination couch with a bitten-off groan. They called him Kaelan. I lifted the hem of his blood-soaked uniform, exposing a bullet wound low on his abdomen—the flesh torn and glistening. When my hand moved toward the edge of his mask, his own shot out and locked around my fingers, grip startlingly strong. His whisper was raw, strained. *No need.* What do you do?