Cassian disappeared for six hours after the opera house.

Nobody stopped him.

Mostly because nobody knew how.

Kane tracked three separate burner phones before giving up and stress-eating protein bars in the kitchen like emotional collapse required extra calories.

Dominic suggested “therapeutic property destruction.”

Sofia threatened to sedate everybody again.

Evie listened to all of it from the couch without hearing much.

Rain rolled steadily against the safehouse windows while midnight deepened around the city.

Cassian still hadn’t come back.

By one in the morning, even Dominic stopped making jokes.

That scared her more than the silence.

Evie finally found him downstairs near the old training room beneath the basement level.

The lights were off except for one dim emergency lamp near the far wall.

Concrete floors.

Mirrors cracked from old fights.

Dust hanging motionless in cold air.

Cassian sat on the floor beside the far corner bench with his back against the wall and his tactical half-mask discarded beside him.

Evie stopped in the doorway quietly.

That alone felt wrong.

Cassian never removed the mask unless he was alone.

Even around the team, it usually stayed close enough to reach immediately.

Now it sat forgotten on the concrete beside him.

He looked up when she entered.

The expression on his face made her chest tighten instantly.

Not anger.

Not grief.

Disorientation.

Like the conversation with Elias cracked something open and now he couldn’t force the pieces back into place correctly.

Evie crossed the room slowly.

Cassian didn’t speak.

Didn’t move either.

The emergency light cast pale gold across his face, softening old scars and exhaustion into something painfully human.

“You vanished,” she said quietly.

Cassian looked toward the cracked mirrors across the room.

“I needed quiet.”

Evie stopped a few feet away.

The training room smelled faintly like dust, sweat, and rain carried downstairs from the upper halls.

“You wanna tell me what’s happening in your head right now?”

Cassian laughed once beneath his breath.

No humor in it.

“That’s the problem.”

Evie waited.

Cassian rubbed one hand hard across his face before leaning his head back against the wall again.

“For fifteen years,” he said quietly, “I knew exactly what I was.”

The words echoed softly through the empty room.

“A weapon. A problem. Something useful in ugly situations.”

Evie stayed still beside him.

Cassian stared toward the floor.

“Every terrible thing I did made sense if I believed I deserved it.”

The confession settled heavily between them.

Not dramatic.

Just honest enough to hurt.

Evie lowered herself slowly onto the floor across from him.

Close enough now to see the exhaustion hollowing shadows beneath his eyes.

“You think Elias took that away from you.”

Cassian shook his head once.

“No.” His voice roughened slightly. “I think he built it there on purpose.”

Silence followed.

Rain tapped softly somewhere deep above them in the safehouse pipes.

Cassian looked toward the mask lying beside him on the concrete floor.

“You know the first thing they taught us in training?”

Evie stayed quiet.

“Control the face.” A faint breath escaped him. “People trust expressions before actions.”

He picked up the mask loosely in one hand.

“Eventually it became easier keeping part of myself covered all the time.” His eyes lowered briefly toward the black material resting against his palm. “Then after Elena…”

The sentence faded unfinished.

Evie understood anyway.

Cassian stared at the mask another second before setting it back down beside him.

“I don’t know how to be anything else now.”

The vulnerability in that admission hit harder than every gunfight before it.

Not polished.

Not controlled.

Just a man exhausted from surviving inside armor too long.

Evie moved closer slowly across the concrete floor.

Cassian watched her approach carefully.

No retreat this time.

Still tense though.

Like he expected closeness to become dangerous eventually.

“You know what I think?” she asked softly.

Cassian looked at her.

“I think you spent so long turning yourself into something untouchable that now you panic every time somebody sees you clearly.”

His jaw tightened slightly.

Not disagreement.

Recognition.

Evie reached toward him carefully.

Slow enough to stop.

Cassian didn’t.

Her fingers brushed lightly against the scar near his cheekbone beneath the emergency light.

Warm skin.

Tired eyes.

No mask left between them now.

Cassian’s breathing shifted immediately beneath the contact.

Evie noticed his hands first.

Shaking again.

Not violent tremors.

Smaller.

Like his body no longer knew what to do without control holding every piece in place.

“Hey,” she whispered.

Cassian looked away instantly.

The room suddenly felt too small for him.

His breathing shortened.

Uneven now.

Evie recognized it immediately.

Not fear exactly.

A panic attack wrapped inside years of restraint.

Cassian pushed upright too quickly from the floor and crossed toward the mirrors like movement might outrun whatever was happening inside his chest.

It didn’t.

His hand braced hard against the sink beneath the cracked glass.

Breathing worse now.

Evie stood immediately.

“Cassian.”

“I’m fine.”

The answer came automatically.

Meaningless.

He dragged one hand through his hair roughly and stared at his own reflection like he barely recognized it anymore.

Weapon.

Monster.

Operative.

Survivor.

Every identity colliding at once.

Evie crossed the room carefully behind him.

No sudden movement.

Cassian’s shoulders tightened hard beneath the black shirt when she stopped close enough to touch him.

“I don’t know what’s left if this isn’t who I am anymore,” he admitted quietly.

The words sounded pulled out of somewhere deep and bleeding.

Evie looked at his reflection in the broken mirror.

Then at him.

“There,” she said softly.

Cassian frowned slightly.

“What.”

Evie reached up slowly and turned his face toward her.

Not romance.

Not seduction.

Just grounding him back into the room.

Back into himself.

“There you are.”

The sentence broke through something.

Cassian’s breathing caught sharply before turning uneven again.

Evie kept one hand against his face while the other settled lightly against his chest.

“Look at me.”

He did.

Barely holding himself together now.

Not from violence.

From being seen too clearly by someone who stayed anyway.

Evie’s thumb brushed slowly beneath his eye.

“You’re not Elias.” Her voice stayed calm and steady. “You’re not the things they trained into you.”

Cassian swallowed hard once.

“You don’t know what I’ve done.”

Evie nodded gently.

“I know.” She held his gaze. “And I also know you crossed a compound to save me, lowered a gun tonight when you could’ve killed him, and spent months pretending sticky notes weren’t emotional attachment.”

Something fragile crossed his face then.

Not weakness.

Relief.

The terrifying kind that arrives when someone stops fighting to remain unreachable.

Cassian’s eyes closed briefly beneath her hand.

Then he leaned forward slowly until his forehead rested against hers.

Not collapsing this time.

Choosing.

The emergency light hummed softly above them while rain moved through the safehouse pipes somewhere overhead.

Evie stayed there holding his face between both hands while his breathing finally steadied little by little.

No mask.

No gloves.

No distance left to hide behind.

Just Cassian.