Yet somehow it sounded stronger than anything she had said before.
"No matter what happens..."
A tear slipped silently down her cheek.
"I will bring you back."
The machines continued their steady rhythm.
Unchanging.
Unfeeling.
But Elena's eyes never left Anders.
As though sheer determination alone could force him to wake up.
Because she had already lost too much in her life.
And this—
This was the one loss she refused to accept.
The room fell silent after the doctor left.
Only the rhythmic beeping of the monitors remained.
Steady.
Unchanging.
Cruelly indifferent.
Elena sat beside Anders' bed without moving.
One hand wrapped tightly around his.
As though letting go would somehow make everything worse.
Kaya stood quietly near the window.
Watching her.
After two years, this scene had become painfully familiar.
The doctors changed.
The treatments changed.
The prognosis changed.
But Elena never did.
