Chapter Text
London, UK // Present
There’s forty thousand people in front of you, easily.
Their phones wave in the air, lit like stars while the bass thrums through the stage, through your boots, through the marrow of your legs, and up your spine until it feels like your teeth vibrate in time with the track.
You’re halfway through the bridge of your second number when they sing the line back at you; louder than the speakers, louder than the band, a wall of sound and it makes you grin into the microphone, lungs burning, sweat beading at the back of your neck. A little undone by it, the way you always are.
“London,” you shout back, breathless, and laughing. “You’re fucking loud tonight!”
The arena erupts again, the sound surging back toward you from every direction until you can barely hear yourself through the mic.
You move, can't stop moving- motion the only thing that makes sense up here, the only channel wide enough to hold all of it. You cross toward the barricade, fingers grazing the outstretched hands at the rail, security tensed in the pit below as you lean just far enough forward to make the front row tip onto their toes.
Your own face stares back from the screens overhead, twenty feet tall, eyes catching the light, every wrecked and salvaged piece of you rendered in high definition.
The song slams into its final chorus and you hit the high note clean, the kind of note that used to crack when you were sobbing alone in your shitty house you used to share with your ex husband John Price, crying into a phone mic at three in the morning. Now the whole world howls it back with you.
The last chord drops; the lights cut to black; the crowd roars.
You’re panting, smiling, hair plastered to your forehead as the stadium goes dark for the transition. The in ear monitor buzzes softly with your crew’s chatter, the stage tech already counting down to the start of Act Two.
You’re about to move toward the side stairs, toward the quick change area where a rack of costumes and a makeup artist are waiting, when the east side of the arena… flashes.
For a split second, your brain files it in the same folder as pyro. A bright bloom, a flare of light where there shouldn’t be one. Maybe someone misfired a special effect. Maybe you missed a cue in rehearsal. Maybe-
Then the shockwave hits.
Air punches the breath out of your chest as the world lurches sideways, stage tilting under you as your knees slam into the floor, palms scraping across the rough surface, microphone skittering away in a shriek of feedback.
Your ears ring so hard everything goes underwater the crowd’s scream distorting into a single, high, endless sound.
You blink.
Smoke curls up from the east gate and where there previously was a mass of people- banners, homemade signs, cheap knockoff merch- there’s… nothing there instead. Around it- people shoving, stumbling, bodies climbing over seats, over each other, trying to get away from-
From what?
Pyrotechnic malfunction? your mind offers, wildly. Some idiot set off something in the stands? A gas main? An amp blew?
You push up, trying to find your feet, and your hand slides in something wet and warm.
You look down.
It’s not sweat, not water from a spilled bottle; but red, thick and hot and already sticky across your skin, painting your fingers. For a second your brain blanks, refuses it, throat tightening as everything in you recoils in denial because surely this isn’t what you think it is…
Surely, this isn’t-
And then you see the person on the edge of the stage, slumped over the barrier, their hair matted, shirt soaked the same red as under your fingers, and your stomach climbs into your throat.
That’s blood.
That’s someone’s blood.
You’re covered in someone else’s blood; hot and wet and soaking through your bodysuit, sticking to your palms.
Your brain tries to catch up, tries to make sense of it, but there’s just red. So much red. Someone else’s blood on your hands, your arms, splattered across your chest.
Your mind runs at it and runs at it and can't get purchase, keeps presenting it as a technical problem, a wardrobe issue, something with a solution- and there's no solution, there's just red, and the smell- something scorched and sweet and wrong- curling up into your sinuses.
Your vision tunnels. The giant screens flicker; emergency lights beginning to strobe. Somewhere in your in-ear, someone yells your name, but it’s buried in static and the white roar of forty thousand people panicking at once.
“Move! Move! MOVE!”
The shout comes from behind you just as fingers clamp on your upper arm, already pulling, dragging you up and back-
“Wait- ” you gasp, instinctively pulling away, heart hammering. You twist, trying to plant your feet, to see the crowd, to see if anyone is-
You look up.
Eli.
Close cropped dark hair. Jaw clenched. Security headset askew around his neck. Your head of security, usually so relaxed he’s borderline smug, looks like someone ripped the floor out from under him.
His eyes cut over you, fast, assessing- no obvious wounds, conscious, mobile- and then he hauls you harder.
“We’re off, now,” he barks, voice low and sharp, the tone he only uses when drunk fans rush the barricade. “Let’s go, let’s go.”
“What happened?” you demand, stumbling after him, body moving even if your brain is still ten seconds behind. “Eli- what- was that- ?”
A crack tears through the air and you flinch instinctively because you know that sound. Everyone does. It’s baked into millions of movies, of news clips, headlines, videos you’ve scrolled past online.
Gunshots.
One. Two. Then a controlled burst- short, deliberate, patterned- and there's nothing for your mind to do with it except what it already knows.
You flinch again, so hard you nearly throw yourself out of Eli’s grip. Below the stage, people scream, trying to get away from everywhere all at once now, not just the east side, spilling over seats, over each other, tripping, falling, being dragged down by strangers who are just as terrified.
“Down!”
Eli shoves your head down, palm heavy on the back of your neck, folding you at the waist as he angles himself between you and the arena, broad shoulders taking up more space than you remember.
Your view of the world compresses down into a narrow, tilted view of the stage floor and the edge of his boot as he drags you toward the wings, toward backstage, toward anywhere that isn’t open and exposed.
You taste dust and metal and the sour tang of smoke. The smell of burned something- plastic? fabric? flesh?- curls under your nose and makes your eyes sting.
You let him move you. You go where you're put.
And the scream, when it tears out of you, doesn't feel like yours.
5 years ago…
You’re staring at the papers in front of you, words swimming, willing them to rearrange themselves into something that makes sense.
But they don’t. They stay exactly the same.
Petition for Dissolution of Marriage.
Your name. His name. A case number that reduces seven years of your life together into administrative processing.
Your eyes drag up slowly to John Price, your husband, who’s watching you. Just… watching, face carefully blank, an expression he uses when he’s delivering bad news to families, to command, to anyone he needs to keep at arm’s length. You’ve seen him use it a hundred times.
You’ve never seen him use it on you.
“What’s this?” Your voice comes out smaller than you want it to, confused, like you’re asking him to explain a joke you don’t get.
Price shifts in his chair, won’t quite meet your eyes. “I think it’s pretty clear.”
“No.” You shake your head. “No, it’s not. John, what- what is this? Where’s this coming from?”
He sighs, and it’s the sigh he uses when he’s tired, when he’s been patient long enough. “We’re not happy. Either of us. Haven’t been for a while now.”
“I’m- ” You stop. Blink. “What?”
“You’re unhappy. I’m unhappy.” He says it factually, like it’s already been decided. “This isn’t working anymore.”
Your hands start shaking and you press them flat against the table to make them stop, but it doesn’t work. “I’m not- John, I’m not unhappy. I’ve been worried. You’ve been distant, you’ve been- I’ve been trying to figure out what’s wrong so we can fix it.”
“There’s nothing to fix.” His voice is so calm. Too calm. “It’s just… run its course.”
“Run its course?” You’re standing now. You don’t remember standing. “We’re not a fucking mission, John. We’re a marriage.”
“And it’s over.”
The words hit like a slap and you actually rock back on your heels.
“No.” Your voice cracks. “No, you don’t get to just- we don’t just end. Not like this. Not without even trying- ”
“I have tried.” Now there’s something in his voice. Frustration, maybe. Guilt. “This is what’s best. For both of us.”
“Best for- ” You can’t breathe right. Your chest is too tight. “How is this best? John, talk to me. Please. What did I do? Just tell me what I did wrong and I’ll- ”
“You didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Then why?” You can feel the tears hot on your face. “Why are you doing this? We can fix this. Whatever it is, we can- I love you. Don’t you- ” Your voice breaks completely. “Don’t you love me anymore?”
Something flickers across his face. For just a second, he looks like he’s in pain, but then it’s gone, locked down, and he’s Captain Price again. Unreachable.
“I need you to sign the papers.”
“No.” You shake your head. “No, I’m not- John, please. Please. We can go to counseling, we can- I’ll do anything. Just don’t throw this away. Don’t throw us away.”
“I’ve already signed.” He taps the bottom of the page, and you see it. His signature. John Price. Black ink. Final.
You stare at it. At proof that he’s already made this decision. That he’s already left you, he’s just waiting for you to catch up.
“I’ve been asking everyone if something was wrong,” you whisper, sitting back down. Your throat feels raw. “Soap, Gaz, Laswell- I thought maybe it was a mission, something you couldn’t tell me about, I thought- ” You let out a sound that’s half-laugh, half-sob. “I thought if I just gave you space, if I just waited, you’d come back to me.”
Price’s jaw tightens and he looks away.
“But you’re not coming back.” The reality of it settles over you like ice water. “You’ve already decided. You’ve already… you’re already gone.”
“Sign the papers.” His voice is quiet now, almost gentle, and somehow that’s worse. “Please.”
You press your palms against your thighs again. The kitchen feels too bright, the morning sun pouring across the countertops. There’s a mug in the sink with a ring of old coffee at the bottom. His jacket on the back of a chair. Your life, scattered in the details of a home you thought you shared.
“What changed?” you ask. “Tell me that, at least. Because last year you came home from a tour and you grabbed me in the hallway and told me you missed your wife more than your bed.” Your voice cracks on wife. “So what changed?”
“Nothing changed,” he says. “That’s the problem.”
You stare at him.
“That doesn’t make sense,” you whisper.
He leans back slightly, eyes flicking away from you to the window, to the counter, anywhere but your face.
“We keep doing this,” he says. “You wait for me to come home. You try to… fit around the job. I try to leave it at the door. We pretend it works. It doesn’t. I’m tired.” A pause. “You’re tired.”
“You don’t get to tell me how I feel,” you snap, the first real spark of anger cutting through the fog. “Don’t put words in my mouth because you don’t want to say what’s actually going on.”
His gaze drops back to you, heavy and assessing, an officer sizing up a situation and it makes something in you bristle offended.
“I am saying what’s going on,” he says, and there’s a finality in his voice that makes your stomach flip. “I don’t want to be married anymore.”
For a heartbeat, everything goes silent.
There’s still a fridge humming. A car on the street outside. A distant dog barking. But they all sound miles away.
Your hand lifts off your lap without your permission and lands on the papers, fingertips skating over the printed lines. You can feel your pulse pounding under the thin skin of your wrist.
“What did I do?” You’re begging now and you hate it, hate the way your voice sounds, but you can’t stop in desperation, the pleading. “Just tell me. I can fix it. Whatever it is, I can- ”
The question sits between you, fragile and ugly. You hate that you asked it. You hate that you need the answer.
He flinches, just a little.
“You didn’t do anything.” And there’s something desperate in the way he says it. “This isn’t about you. It’s- ” He stops. Runs a hand over his face. “It’s me. I can’t… I can’t do this anymore.”
“Can’t do what? Be married? Be with me?” You’re shaking so hard your teeth are chattering. “John, we built a life together. Seven years. That means something. That has to mean something.”
“It does.” His voice is rough. “It means I’m asking you to let me go.”
The floor might as well have dropped out from under you.
“Let you go,” you repeat. Numb now. Beyond tears.
He nods.
“John,” you say again, softer now. “Please. Tell me what I did. I can fix it. If I’ve been… too much, not enough, if I’ve been handling the stress wrong, if you need space, we can figure that out. We can- ” Your breath hitches. “Don’t throw this away without even trying to fix it.”
He looks at you then. Really looks. For a moment you see something crack in his expression- guilt, pain, something deep and complicated that you reach for like a lifeline.
Then it’s gone.
He shakes his head once, slow.
“I have tried,” he says, voice low. “Longer than you know. This is me fixing it before it gets worse.”
“How is walking away fixing anything?” you demand. “How is handing me a stack of papers fixing the fact that my husband comes back from missions and won’t let me in? How is this- ” You jab a finger at the document. “- better than a therapist? Or time? Or actually talking to me?”
“Because I don’t want to talk about it,” he snaps, the first crack in his composure. “I don’t want to pick apart every decision I’ve made, every op, every night I didn’t call. I don’t want to sit in a room with some stranger while we pretend this is salvageable when it’s not.”
Your eyes burn.
“So that’s just… it?” you say. “You’ve decided it’s over, so it is.”
“I’ve decided it’s over,” he agrees quietly. “I think that’s the kindest thing I can do for both of us.”
A bitter laugh catches in your chest but it doesn’t make it out. If you start laughing, you’re not sure you’ll stop.
“You don’t get to call this kind.” You spit. “You’re ripping my life in half at the kitchen table and you think that’s mercy?”
He doesn’t answer.
The clock on the wall ticks. The sunlight moves another inch across the table, catching on the gold of his ring. Your ring feels suddenly heavy on your hand, a band of metal that’s more shackle than promise.
You curl your fingers into a fist to hide the tremble.
“What if I don’t sign?” you ask, because you have to cling to something, some measure of control. “What then?”
His gaze drops briefly to the papers, to the neatly filled out lines, the places where he’s already written his signature. Where the solicitor’s name sits. Where the process has clearly already started without you.
“Then it’ll take longer,” he says. “And it’ll be uglier. Lawyers. Courts. All of it. I don’t want that for you.”
He keeps saying it like he’s doing you a favor.
You swallow hard, taste metal on your tongue.
Images flicker in your mind: him coming through the door with that tired, lopsided smile. The way he kissed your forehead when he thought you were asleep. The time he brought you a mug of tea and sat with you on the floor when you cried over some stupid movie, his big hand moving slow and clumsy on your back because he didn’t know what else to do but refused to leave.
You built a life on those moments. On the belief that underneath the uniforms and silence and scars, you were wanted.
You look down at the papers again. At the blank line next to your name. All you have to do is sign and seven years of love and trust and building a home together just… ends. Dissolves. Like it never mattered at all.
Your hand is shaking so badly you can barely hold the pen.
“I love you,” you whisper. One last time. One last desperate attempt. “I love you, John. Doesn’t that matter? Don’t you love me anymore?”
He doesn’t answer.
The silence stretches, taut and strangling. Somewhere outside a car door slams, the dog keeps barking, the world keeps going like it doesn’t know everything inside you is collapsing inward.
You let out a shuddering breath.
“Okay,” you say, even though nothing is okay. “Okay. You want it to be over. You’ve already signed. You’ve already talked to a solicitor without me. You’ve decided this is the best thing for both of us.” Your voice steadies as you go, anger cooling into something colder. “Just… don’t stand there and pretend it’s because you’re doing me some kindness.”
You sign your name.
The pen feels like it weighs a thousand pounds. Your signature looks wrong. Shaky and small and wrong. But it’s there.
“There,” you say, voice barely above a whisper. “Congratulations.”
John’s breath leaves him in a slow, heavy exhale. His shoulders drop a fraction, like something just unclenched inside him. The sight of it makes bile rise in your throat.
Price reaches across the table and takes the papers. Doesn’t look at you when he does it.
“I’ll have my lawyer file these tomorrow,” he says quietly. “Thank you.”
You laugh, broken. “Don’t thank me,” you say. “You asked me to help you burn our life down and I handed you the matches. That’s not something you thank someone for.”
You just sit there. Empty. Hollowed out.
He walks to the door. Stops with his hand on the frame. For a second you think he’s going to turn around. Going to say something. Going to tell you this was all a mistake.
He doesn’t turn around.
The door opens. Closes.
The house is suddenly too quiet. The only evidence he was ever here is the faint smell of his cologne, the ghost of his coffee in the sink, and your name, still wet in ink on a document that says your marriage is over.
You sit there at the kitchen table, hands folded tightly in your lap so you don’t fall apart, and try to understand what you did wrong.