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Of all the things you expected that day—being dragged into a secure American facility in the middle of Kentucky, tied to a chair by a cowboy, and interrogated next to a scowling Scotsman and an emotionally frayed Eggsy—seeing Harry bloody Hart alive and shaving was not one of them.
But there he was.
On the other side of the two-way mirror. Shaving. Calmly. As if the world hadn’t buried him in a marble tomb months ago.
You stared. Hard.
His face looked the same—clean, sharp lines, that slight dimple when he frowned in concentration, eyes still a soft, steady brown. Except… something was off. A hollowness in his gaze. An unfamiliar hesitation in how he handled the razor.
And then the cowboy drew his gun. Harry didn't flinch. Eggsy shouted.
And you didn’t move when Ginger untied your wrists, even as Merlin rubbed the blood back into his fingers and Eggsy made a beeline for the mirrored glass. You just… stayed in your chair. Staring.
Harry interacted with them—Merlin and Eggsy—like they were strangers.
He blinked at Merlin with mild politeness, extended a hand, introduced himself as "Harry Hart, lepidopterist," and recoiled slightly when Eggsy tried to hug him.
“I’m sorry,” he said, brow wrinkled with unease. “Do I… know you?”
Eggsy’s face broke right there. Cracked wide open. The same kid who wore Harry’s legacy like a crown and curse.
You looked away. Just for a second.
“Alpha Gel,” Ginger was explaining beside you now. “It’s a medical miracle. Basically, it seals off brain trauma, suspends neurological degeneration.”
You blinked, turning your head.
“What?”
“We didn’t know who he was at first,” Ginger continued. "He’d been shot point-blank to the head… but the Alpha Gel kept him stable. Physically, he healed. But the memory loss—it’s a side effect. Sometimes temporary. Sometimes…”
Your gaze returned to the glass. Harry sat cross-legged on the bed now, a book open in his hands, reading with the same serene detachment he used to wear while waiting in the briefing room.
Like nothing had happened.
Merlin cleared his throat. “Kay. Maybe you should go see him.”
You didn’t even look away from the glass. “No.”
Eggsy turned. “What do you mean ‘no’?”
You exhaled through your nose. “He doesn’t remember you. Doesn’t recognize Merlin. I doubt he’d remember me.”
“Ginger said a strong emotional stimulus could bring it back,” Eggsy insisted. “Seeing someone he has a connection with might—”
“I barely had a connection with him,” you cut in sharply, finally turning to face them. “We tolerated each other, at best. I was the agent he rolled his eyes at in meetings. The one who always left the mission briefings five minutes early to avoid hearing him drone on about suits and manners. You really think that’s going to trigger a miracle recovery?”
Eggsy tilted his head, an almost sly grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Exactly.”
You blinked. “What?”
“That’s exactly why you should go.”
“Eggsy—”
He stepped closer, his voice softer now, more serious. “You said it yourself. You barely got along. Maybe seeing you stirs something ugly. Maybe he remembers why he barely tolerated you. And maybe—just maybe—that’s enough to crack open whatever’s blocking the rest.”
You stared at him, jaw set, throat dry.
“Sometimes,” Eggsy continued, voice low, “it’s not love or friendship that brings someone back.”
He glanced toward the mirror.
“Sometimes, it’s the person who knew how to piss you off just enough to make you feel alive.”
You didn’t answer. Couldn’t.
Harry was still in the room, flipping through a book now—something old, leather-bound, maybe poetry or history, it was hard to tell. His legs were crossed, one foot bouncing gently in a rhythm you recognized from years of briefings. It was him. It was Harry. But it wasn’t. And that did something to your chest you didn’t quite have the energy to analyze.
You and Harry could barely stand each other.
That was the story everyone knew. You disagreed on mission structure, on training protocol, on the proper use of violence, and yes, on tailoring. You argued in war rooms, bickered in field ops, and traded barbs that were just polite enough not to qualify as misconduct. You were the agent who drank black coffee and wore boots to the pub; he was the agent who corrected your Latin and wore a three-piece suit to the jungle.
Some agents believed the two of you hated each other. But when Merlin called you—his voice brittle, careful—you were in a safe house in Lyon, wrapping up an extraction gone sideways. “He’s gone,” Merlin had said. “Valentine shot him. Point-blank. There’s nothing left.”
And you’d felt it. That pang.
It messed with you, losing another Kingsman. Always did. But this one? It settled differently. Somewhere between guilt and disbelief. A strange silence had followed you through the rest of that mission.
And now—of course—he was alive.
The lucky bastard.
You took a long breath, set your shoulders back, and stepped into the observation room.
The moment the door clicked shut behind you, Harry looked up. He saw you. That was clear.
But there was no recognition in those brown eyes—just quiet assessment, a cautious narrowing of the gaze. He closed the book in his lap and straightened a little, every movement clean and controlled. He wasn’t afraid. Just… measuring.
You didn’t blame him.
You moved slowly, staying by the wall. “Name’s Kay,” you said, voice even. “I’m Kingsman. Like you used to be.”
Harry’s brow creased, mouth twitching faintly downward. “Harry Hart,” he said after a pause. “Though I’ve been told that name doesn’t mean much anymore.”
You didn’t acknowledge the sting. Instead, you nodded toward the drawings on the wall—dozens of butterflies, meticulously sketched. “Papilio machaon,” you said, pointing. “Nice detail on the tail extensions.”
He blinked. “You know your butterflies.”
“My father was a lepidopterist,” you replied. “Taught me how to pin specimens before I learned to tie my shoes.”
Harry’s posture shifted. The line of his jaw softened, just a bit. He glanced at the drawing, then back at you.
“I’m a lepidopterist,” he said carefully, almost like a question.
You tilted your head. “So you’ve mentioned.”
A pause. A flicker in his eyes.
Then—he smiled.
Small. Faint. But real.
Harry stood up suddenly, the book forgotten on the bed, eyes lighting up with that flicker of interest you remembered all too well from briefing rooms and field maps. “And that one—Danaus plexippus,” he said, gesturing to the sketch on the far wall. “The monarch. Fascinating migratory patterns. I was told once they can travel up to three thousand miles, did you know that?”
You nodded faintly, arms crossed as you leaned against the wall. “Mm. Impressive.”
“And this,” he continued, now pacing, pointing at another set of meticulously drawn wings, “is the Morpho menelaus—see the iridescent blue? Not pigment, actually. It's structure. Microscopic scales reflecting light.”
You hummed. “Harry, I’m not the one who hit my head. You don’t have to recite the encyclopedia at me.”
He blinked, slowing just a bit. “Oh. Apologies, I just—sometimes I speak aloud to center myself. I didn’t mean to overwhelm you.”
“Hard to overwhelm me, Hart,” you replied dryly. “But go on. You’re clearly enjoying yourself.”
You heard the muffled voices on the other side of the mirror—Eggsy, Merlin, Ginger, and Tequila, all watching.
Inside the surveillance room, Eggsy leaned in, arms folded tightly. “Alright, what the hell is this? Thought they hated each other.”
“They bickered,” Merlin corrected. “There’s a difference.”
Eggsy squinted at the glass. “No, there’s something off about this. They look like... I dunno. Like they’ve done this before.”
“They have,” Merlin said, quiet, eyes locked on the two of you through the mirror.
Eggsy frowned. “You gonna explain that, or are you just gonna keep sipping your little secrets like they’re aged Scotch?”
Merlin hesitated, then glanced at Ginger, then at Tequila. The latter raised a brow, silent but expectant.
Merlin sighed. “She was one of Harry’s pupils.”
“What?” Eggsy barked.
“First batch after Gawain. She passed her trials and took the name Kay. Harry trained her himself. They lived in adjoining flats. Worked almost every mission together for nearly three years.”
Ginger turned her head slowly. “That doesn’t sound like two people who can’t stand each other.”
“It wasn’t,” Merlin muttered. “At first.”
Eggsy tilted his head, brows drawing together. “What happened?”
Merlin didn’t answer immediately. He watched through the glass as Harry pointed out another species on the wall, eyes bright with focus, while you shifted your weight with barely concealed impatience. There was something familiar in the rhythm. Something that had once been effortless.
“It was a mission in the Pyrenees,” Merlin said finally. “Bandit cell extraction. Midwinter. Brutal terrain. Harry and Kay were covering the east ridge. Things went sideways—gunfire, smoke, bad visibility. Harry got shot in the thigh. Through and through, but bad. The bandit took off through the snow, and Kay had a choice—go after him, or help Harry.”
Eggsy swallowed. “And she...”
“She went after the bastard. Took him down, called in extraction. But by the time she doubled back, Harry had taken another round and nearly bled out.”
Ginger exhaled sharply. “Shit.”
“Wasn’t her fault,” Merlin added. “She followed protocol. Secured the target. Harry would’ve done the same.”
“But he didn’t see it that way,” Tequila muttered.
“No,” Merlin confirmed. “He didn’t.”
He could still hear it—the shouting. The sound of raised voices echoing off the infirmary walls. Sharp, brittle. The clash of two people who should’ve known better how to wound each other.
You were standing at the foot of the bed, hands still bloodstained, jacket half-torn, face pale but set like stone. Harry was upright despite the IV, pale as paper, jaw tight with pain and fury.
“You’re out of your bloody mind,” he’d spat. “You left me there.”
Your eyes flashed. “I didn’t leave you.”
“The hell you didn’t,” he growled, pushing himself upright with a grunt, ignoring the sting in his leg. “You had a choice.”
“I made the right one,” you shot back. “I followed protocol. We had a priority target—”
“I was bleeding out in the fucking snow!”
“And I came back,” you shouted. “You weren’t dead. You weren’t even unconscious. I secured the bastard and I came back—just like you would’ve done.”
Harry scoffed, cold and bitter. “You don’t know what I would’ve done.”
“Yes, I do,” you snapped, voice shaking now, not with uncertainty—but anger. “Because you taught me. ‘The mission comes first.’ That’s what you said. Over and over. Drilled it into me like gospel. You made me choose, Harry. And I did.”
Merlin flinched when Harry’s voice cracked on the next words.
“I trusted you.”
You stared at him, breath coming hard and fast, chest rising like you were ready to fight him for real.
“I trusted you,” Harry repeated, quieter now, voice rough. “And you left me to die.”
“No,” you whispered, shaking your head. “I wasn’t going to let you die.”
But Harry wasn’t listening anymore. Or maybe he was—just past the point of caring.
You clenched your fists. “Why are you angry? The mission was successful. We got the target. You lived.”
“That’s not the point,” he hissed. “The point is, I would’ve stayed.”
You went silent.
Then your voice dropped—dead quiet.
“That’s not what you taught me.”
Harry inhaled, sharp and tight, and looked away. His hands trembled faintly where they rested on the bed. His mouth opened to speak—then closed.
And then, softly, like it physically hurt to say: “I wouldn’t have left you.”
Merlin hadn’t known if you heard him. You didn’t answer. You just turned, walked out of the infirmary, and slammed the door hard enough to rattle the windows.
The silence afterward was deafening.
Merlin had stood there a long time, clipboard in hand, watching Harry stare at the ceiling. The older agent looked more wounded than he had from the bullet, eyes hollow, jaw clenched so tight Merlin swore it would crack.
“Kay’s young,” Merlin said finally. “She’s still learning.”
Harry didn’t respond.
“She made a call. A hard one.”
Still nothing.
“You would’ve done the same, Harry.”
A bitter laugh escaped him, low and humorless. “Maybe. But it wouldn’t have cost me her.”
After that, everything changed.
You and Harry went cold. Cold like winter. Cold like protocol.
You still briefed together, still fought side by side, but the heat—the tension, the subtle push and pull that had once lived between you—was gone. Replaced with silence. With clipped orders and avoided glances. The sort of quiet that only forms when affection dies and pride is too wounded to bury the body.
They said you couldn’t stand each other.
But Merlin knew better.
It wasn’t hate. It was heartbreak. Left unspoken. Unmourned.
And now, Harry was alive. But the years of silence still sat between you, heavy as ever.
Would you speak it now? Merlin didn’t know.
But through the glass, he saw the way you watched Harry—jaw tight, eyes wary, every nerve in your body alert but tethered.
He saw the way Harry’s brow furrowed just slightly when you spoke—like something in him was trying to remember.
And maybe, just maybe, that meant there was still time.
Inside the room, the silence stretched. You spoke of butterflies, nodded at his facts, watched his brows knit in thought as if something was just beyond reach. Then you stepped back, hands at your sides, throat tight with words that had no business surfacing.
“I should go,” you said finally, already turning toward the door. But before you could leave, you felt the soft pull of something—his hand, wrapping lightly around your wrist. Not forceful. Just… tethered.
You froze, gaze flicking down to the point of contact. His fingers were warm. Steady.
You looked at his hand, then up at him.
Harry blinked, as if realizing what he was doing, and quickly pulled away. “I’m sorry,” he murmured, voice quiet, guilt flashing in his eyes. “I didn’t mean to— That was inappropriate.”
You didn’t say anything.
“I just…” He hesitated. Then, with a quiet breath, added, “Do you think you’ll come back?”
You blinked.
Harry gave a faint, almost self-deprecating smile, glancing down at his shoes. “It’s just… the doctors here, they’re kind, but they don’t know anything about lepidopterism. And it’s terribly dull having conversations about diet and neural function when all I want is to discuss the difference between a comma and a tortoiseshell.”
Your chest tightened.
He lifted his eyes again—brown, soft, tentative. “But you do. You know about them. I like that.”
That part was real. Even if the rest of him was still fragments.
You looked away, jaw tense. “I’m busy, Harry. I have a schedule.”
His face flickered—just slightly. A small crack in the smooth composure. Disappointment, quickly buried. “Of course,” he said. “I understand.”
A long pause stretched between you.
For a moment, you remembered the old days—the old him. The way his voice dipped when he spoke to you after long hours in the war room. The way he looked at you when he thought you weren’t watching. You remembered your hands brushing as you passed files, the late-night debriefings, the quiet cups of tea when neither of you could sleep.
You remembered thinking—just once, just briefly—what if?
But you never acted on it. Never dared. Because the mission came first. And because he was Harry Hart. Your superior. Your teacher. Your friend.
Or at least, he had been.
“I’ll try,” you said finally. Quiet. Noncommittal.
Harry’s eyes flicked up again. Hope sparked. Then faded.
“Alright,” he said softly. “Thank you.”
You nodded once, sharply and professionally, then stepped out without another word. Behind you, the door clicked shut. And the silence inside the room returned.
You didn’t come back.
Not the next day. Not the day after that.
Harry waited, legs crossed neatly beneath him, book untouched in his lap. He didn't say much, but he watched and listened. Once, when the nurse handed him his lunch and asked how he was feeling, he responded, "Better, I think, if someone brought back the lepidopterist."
She smiled politely. Wrote something on her clipboard.
But you never came.
That boy—Eggsy, they said—he came every day. His energy filled the room like a storm cloud about to burst. Loud. Sad. Hopeful. Annoying. A blur of too many emotions in a track jacket and a cocky grin. He brought sweets and magazines, sometimes old vinyl records he swore Harry used to like. He played them through a portable speaker while Harry drew on the walls.
Eggsy talked. About training. About suits. About someone named Roxy, someone named Arthur, a dog called JB. About how Harry once made a grenade umbrella look “sexy as hell.” About how everything was better when Harry was around. About how everything went to hell the second he left.
Harry listened. Smiled when appropriate. Nodded when expected. Sometimes, he asked about you.
Only in passing. Only softly.
“Is Kay well?”
“She still busy?”
Eggsy always hesitated—just for a second—before answering. “Yeah. She’s busy. But she’s fine. Said she might come soon.”
Harry would hum. Smile faintly. Then go back to his book. But the books no longer held his focus.
The butterflies didn’t, either.
He’d started dreaming—long, strange dreams that clung to him like fog. Butterflies at first. Monarchs drifting through halls of glass. Iridescent wings brushing his skin like whispered names he couldn’t recall.
But then came the snow.
Endless. Quiet. Suffocating.
He’d wake in a cold sweat, heart pounding, nails dug into the mattress as if trying to claw his way out of something. It always left him shaken, though he couldn’t say why. Couldn’t even explain it properly. He didn’t know why snow terrified him. Only that it did.
He tried to tell someone once—one of the medical aides—but she just patted his shoulder and wrote “active imagination” on the chart.
It wasn’t imagination.
He could feel the cold. Feel it in his teeth, behind his eyes, in the phantom ache in his thigh where he sometimes limped without understanding why.
One morning, while reading a volume of Victorian poetry, the room filled with water.
No warning.
One moment, he was turning a page. The next, water surged from the vents, cold and rising fast, climbing past his knees before he even registered the danger. He stood quickly, dropping the book, shouting for help as panic gripped his chest. He couldn’t swim. He could, technically—but not like this. Not in a sealed room with no exit and water that smelled faintly of bleach and memory.
By the time someone burst in and drained the flood, he was shaking. Soaked. Silent.
He didn’t speak until the bald man came.
Merlin.
That was the name he gave. Said they’d known each other. That he’d been trying to trigger memories.
Harry stared at him, expression carved from ice. “You could have killed me.”
Merlin didn’t flinch. “You weren’t in real danger. We were monitoring your vitals.”
“You think that makes it better?” Harry snapped. “You drowned me.”
“It wasn’t real drowning. It was simulated. The sensors would have—”
Harry stood abruptly, the soaked trousers clinging to his skin, the cold still pressing into his spine. “You could have asked me questions. Played music. Shown photographs. Talked to me.”
Merlin was quiet for a long moment. Then he said softly, “We tried all that. You don’t remember any of it.”
Harry stared at him, chest rising and falling in shallow breaths.
“And what would have happened if I did remember?” he asked quietly. “Would you have locked me in here anyway? Kept poking the wound until I bled properly?”
Merlin opened his mouth, then closed it again.
That was answer enough.
Harry turned away, his voice low. “I want to see my mother.”
The silence behind him was heavy.
“Harry,” Merlin said carefully, “your mother passed away. Years ago.”
Harry didn’t move.
“I want to see my mother,” he repeated, quieter now. “I want to go home.”
“This is your home, for now.”
“No,” Harry said, sharper. “It isn’t.”
Because home wasn’t white walls and observation windows. It wasn’t unfamiliar voices telling him what to eat, what pills to take, how to breathe. It wasn’t dreams of snow and butterflies that meant nothing but made him feel everything.
Home… home had smelled like something.
Like clean wool and old books. Leather polish. Rooibos tea. Something warm. Something grounding.
Something—someone—missing.
He went quiet after that. Stopped speaking to Eggsy. Stopped sketching butterflies. Just stared at the wall sometimes. At a spot near the corner, where, on a restless night, he’d scrawled something with a pen he'd smuggled from the nurse’s tray.
Just a name.
Kay.
He didn’t know why. Didn’t know what it meant.
But the letters came back again and again.
Every few days, he wrote them in the corner of the mattress seam. On a tissue box. On the back of a food tray.
And sometimes… when he closed his eyes, he’d see you.
A flash of boots. A sharp tongue. The scent of rain and clean sweat. The feeling of being watched—not in fear, but in challenge. As if someone was daring him to get back up.
He didn’t know what that meant either. But it mattered.
And he was beginning to wonder if anyone would ever tell him why.
The night before his departure, Harry Hart stood at the small table by the window, meticulously folding the few belongings he’d been allowed to keep. The suitcase was modest—brown leather, scuffed at the corners, something Merlin had brought him to replace the stark plastic of the facility-issued duffel. Inside were the basics: neatly folded shirts, trousers, a pair of gloves, a crisp white handkerchief. But Harry’s attention lingered on the smaller items.
A comb. A silver pocketwatch that didn’t work. And a bottle of aftershave.
It was the aftershave that gave him pause. He unscrewed the cap and brought it to his nose. The scent was clean, old-fashioned—vetiver, a hint of bergamot, and something else underneath that tugged at a corner of his mind. It smelled like Kingsman. Like a hallway he couldn’t quite remember walking down, a coatroom he couldn’t quite picture, a ritual he’d forgotten but still craved.
Harry stared at the bottle a long while before setting it in the suitcase, centered and upright, as if it were the most precious thing he owned.
Then the door creaked open.
Eggsy stepped in, his expression unsure, his trainers scuffing the floor. “You decent?”
Harry turned, a brow raised. “I’m packing. Not bathing in the moonlight.”
Eggsy let the door close behind him, moving to lean against the wall with crossed arms. “So it’s really happening, then. You’re off to chase butterflies.”
“I prefer the term ‘document rare species in under-researched migratory zones,’” Harry corrected dryly. “But yes. My accommodations in Ecuador are confirmed. Merlin pulled a few strings.”
Eggsy nodded slowly, watching him. “Looks like you’ve got all the essentials.”
Harry gave a faint smile and held up the aftershave. “Including this. I don’t know why I like it. But I do.”
“That’s cause it smells like you,” Eggsy said, voice softer. “The you I remember.”
Harry’s smile faltered. He turned back to his suitcase.
“I’m not him,” he said. “Whoever you knew before… I’m a collection of tattered pages from a book someone tried to burn. Bits and pieces. A few instincts. A couple phrases. But the man you want—he’s gone.”
“Bullshit,” Eggsy said flatly.
Harry blinked.
“You can say all that fancy poetic stuff, but you’re still the guy who trained me. The one who taught me that manners maketh man and not all heroes wear spandex. The man who looked at a chav in a track suit and saw potential.”
“I don’t remember that,” Harry said evenly.
“Doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.”
Harry’s mouth tightened, but he didn’t reply.
Eggsy pushed off the wall and stepped closer. “Look, maybe you don’t remember all the missions or the codes or the fact that you once threatened to shoot someone over table manners—but I do. And I’m not ready to say goodbye to you. The world’s not, either.”
Harry gave a faint huff. “I’m not the world’s concern.”
“You’re mine,” Eggsy said, voice hardening. “You turned me from a caterpillar into a butterfly, remember? You said that—once. That the ugly bits didn’t matter as long as you came out stronger in the end.”
Harry turned toward him, arms folded, brow furrowed. “Even if I said that, what exactly do you want from me now?”
Eggsy stepped forward. “I want you to come with me.”
Harry frowned. “Where?”
Eggsy grabbed his wrist, tugging gently. “You’ll see.”
“Eggsy—”
“No arguments. No questions. Just trust me.”
Harry didn’t move for a moment. But then he heard it.
A name.
“We’re going to see Kay.”
Harry stopped breathing.
His eyes flicked to Eggsy’s hand on his wrist. Then up to Eggsy’s face. “Kay…”
“Yeah,” Eggsy said, voice gentler now. “You remember her, don’t you?”
Harry blinked, something unreadable passing behind his eyes. “She knew about butterflies,” he murmured. “She… she said I was reciting an encyclopedia.”
Eggsy smiled. “Yeah. That sounds like her.”
Harry swallowed. “I could talk to her. About… Danaus plexippus. The Morpho menelaus.”
“And maybe,” Eggsy said carefully, “about everything else.”
Harry hesitated—then nodded.
“Alright,” he said. “Take me to her.”
And with his suitcase forgotten and the aftershave still lingering in the air, Harry followed Eggsy out the door. He followed Eggsy out into the night, the air crisp and still. The wind tugged gently at the hem of his coat as they stepped beyond the warm glow of the Statesman’s security lights and into the darker stretch of the lot behind the facility. There, seated on a worn bench beneath a flickering lamp, was you.
You sat with your legs crossed, one boot resting against the edge of the bench, a cigarette dangling between your fingers. The ember glowed orange in the dark, illuminating the faint curve of your cheekbone and the subtle arch of your brow as you looked out at the stars. Harry slowed when he saw you. His breath caught.
You smoked?
The question slipped from his mouth without thought. “Do you smoke?”
You turned your head sharply. Your eyes moved from Harry to Eggsy, and back again. Your expression was unreadable.
“What is he doing out here?” you asked, voice low but not unkind.
“He wanted to see you,” Eggsy said, his voice careful, almost apologetic. “Said he needed to talk.”
You didn’t respond right away. Just looked down, inhaled one last drag, and stubbed out the cigarette against the metal arm of the bench. Then you stood, wiping your fingers on your trousers like the gesture could erase the tension from the air.
“Take him back inside.”
Harry flinched at the dismissal. “Wait.”
You didn’t stop.
“I—” Harry stepped forward, his tone urgent. “Why didn’t you come see me?”
You stopped walking, your back half-turned to him. He saw your shoulders shift—just slightly—but you didn’t answer.
“Didn’t you enjoy talking to me?” he asked, brow furrowed, voice gaining a faint edge of confusion. “I thought we... connected. I thought maybe—”
“You’re not him,” you cut in, quiet and firm.
Harry froze.
You started walking again, your boots crunching softly over the gravel, the darkness slowly swallowing your outline.
“I don’t understand,” Harry said, louder now. “Why are you walking away?”
Still, you didn’t respond.
“Wait!” Harry called out, his voice ringing sharp through the still Kentucky night. You didn’t stop. The gravel crunched under your boots, each step slower than it needed to be, as if part of you expected—hoped—he’d follow.
And he did.
Harry moved after you on instinct, one long stride cutting the distance between you. But as he stepped off the paved path into the shadowed gravel, something gripped him low and hard—an ache that twisted behind his right thigh. He staggered, just slightly, a sharp breath hissing through his teeth as his leg buckled, phantom pain slicing through flesh long healed. He blinked, breath catching. He knew this pain.
He had felt it before.
Snow. That was the first thing that hit him. Not here, not Kentucky—but snow. Cold biting through the fabric of his trousers. Wetness soaking the wool. The scent of blood in the wind. His hands pressing to his leg. A hole in his thigh. The taste of metal. The gunfire still echoing faintly through the Pyrenees. The pain wasn’t real now, but it had been then. He’d lain in the snow, alone, the world muffled by winter and blood, waiting for something—someone—who never came.
Eggsy, a few paces behind, caught him by the arm before he fell. “Harry? Whoa, mate—what’s wrong?”
Harry’s eyes were wide, unfocused. His lips parted as though he couldn’t breathe.
Eggsy gripped tighter, worry shifting to fear. “Harry—Harry, what is it?”
“She left,” Harry whispered, the words torn from some deep part of him. “She left me.”
Eggsy stilled.
Harry’s voice came again, hoarse now, shaking. “In the snow. I was bleeding. I couldn’t walk. And she—she went after the target.”
He blinked down at the ground, breath hitching. “She left me to die.”
Eggsy inhaled sharply, realization dawning. “You’re remembering.”
Harry’s eyes burned. “She left. I called her name—I told her I couldn’t move, that I was hit—but she ran. Said she’d come back. But she didn’t.”
“She did,” Eggsy said gently. “She came back, Harry. But it was too late.”
Harry’s jaw clenched. He wasn’t listening anymore.
“I thought I was going to die there,” he said, chest rising and falling with quick, shallow breaths. “I remember lying on my side, staring at the sky, thinking, ‘This is it. I’m going to die, and I never told her.’”
Eggsy frowned. “Told her what?”
“That I love her.” Harry’s voice cracked on the words. “That I would’ve stayed. If it had been her on the ground, if she’d been the one bleeding—I wouldn’t have left.”
Eggsy stepped back, stunned, hope flashing behind his eyes. “You remember all that? That’s it, innit? You’re back!”
Harry didn’t answer. His eyes were fixed on your silhouette, still retreating into the dark beyond the lamplight. She was leaving again.
And it was happening all over.
Not again.
“Wait!” he called, louder this time, taking one step forward despite the echo of pain in his leg. “Don’t walk away from me!”
You didn’t stop.
His heart pounded.
Then—his voice sharpened, clear as a blade in the night. “Stop! [Your Name]!”
Your entire body stilled like you’d been struck. You turned slowly, your breath caught in your throat, heart in your mouth.
He knew.
You looked back at him. The glow of the overhead light cast long shadows across his face, but you saw it—saw the way his eyes locked on yours. Brown. Burning.
“Please,” Harry said softly now, almost broken. “Don’t leave. Not again.”
For a moment, all sound disappeared.
Only the night and the memory of snow remained between you.