MasukFORT’S POVThere was a time when I believed silence was safer.Words created expectations.Promises created weaknesses.Feelings created something people could use against you.So I became good at keeping things inside.I mastered the art of standing beside someone while never truly allowing them to reach me.Until Elon.He had a way of making every wall I built feel unnecessary.Not because he forced them down.Because he simply stayed long enough for me to realize I did not need them anymore.I watched him sleeping beside me, his expression finally peaceful after everything he had carried for so long.It was strange seeing him like this.Not fighting.Not questioning.Not trying to prove that he was more than what people had decided he was.Just Elon.And somehow, that version of him was the one I wanted to protect the most.I reached out, brushing a strand of hair away from his face.The action was something I would have once considered impossible for me.It was gentleness, affecti
ELON’S POVI used to think belonging was something people were either given or denied.Some people were born into families that loved them without question.Some people had homes they could always return to.Some people had someone waiting for them at the end of every difficult day.I had spent most of my life believing I was not one of those people.I had always been searching for something I could not name.A place.A person.A reason to stop feeling like I was standing outside my own life.But now, standing beside Fort, I realized something I had never allowed myself to consider.Maybe belonging was not about where you came from.Maybe it was about where you finally felt safe enough to stay.Fort was quiet beside me, staring out at the city lights, but I knew him well enough now to understand that his silence was never empty.He was thinking.Always thinking.“You’re doing it again,” I said.He glanced at me.“Doing what?”“Trying to carry everything alone.”A faint expression cros
ELON’S POVI used to think finding the truth would finally make me feel complete.For so long, I had searched for answers about myself, believing that once I understood every missing piece, every unanswered question would stop haunting me.But I had been wrong.The truth did not fix everything.It did not erase the fear.It did not remove the scars left behind by everything I had lost.What changed everything was not discovering where I came from.It was discovering who stayed.I looked at Fort.He was standing by the window, his expression calm as always, but I knew him well enough now to notice the small details.The way his shoulders remained tense even when he was trying to relax.The way his mind was still working even when there was nothing left to solve.The way he carried the weight of everything without ever admitting it was heavy.I smiled slightly.“What?” he asked without turning around.I raised an eyebrow.“You knew I was looking at you?”“I always know when you’re looki
ELON’S POVI used to think finding the truth would finally make me feel complete.For so long, I had searched for answers about myself, believing that once I understood every missing piece, every unanswered question would stop haunting me.But I had been wrong.The truth did not fix everything.It did not erase the fear.It did not remove the scars left behind by everything I had lost.What changed everything was not discovering where I came from.It was discovering who stayed.I looked at Fort.He was standing by the window, his expression calm as always, but I knew him well enough now to notice the small details.The way his shoulders remained tense even when he was trying to relax.The way his mind was still working even when there was nothing left to solve.The way he carried the weight of everything without ever admitting it was heavy.I smiled slightly.“What?” he asked without turning around.I raised an eyebrow.“You knew I was looking at you?”“I always know when you’re looki
ELON’S POVThe message was still on my phone, but the words no longer carried the same power they were supposed to have.For years, people had controlled my life through fear.They hid answers from me.They made decisions before I even knew there was a choice to make.They turned my existence into something they could measure, analyze, and manipulate.But they had made one mistake.They assumed that knowing my past meant owning my future.And they were wrong.I looked at Fort standing beside me, his expression guarded as he studied the message, already trying to determine who sent it and how much danger it represented.It should have frightened me.A threat against him should have made me panic.Instead, I felt something else.Clarity.Because the person they were threatening to take away was the same person who had spent every moment reminding me that I belonged to myself.They had underestimated what that meant.“Fort.”He looked at me immediately.“What?”I held his gaze.“I’m not
FORT’S POVI used to believe that the most dangerous moments were the ones where everything was loud.The sound of weapons.The sound of alarms.The sound of people making threats they were prepared to carry out.But I had learned something different tonight.Sometimes the most dangerous moments were the quiet ones.The moments when someone had finally found something worth protecting.Because once you cared about something, every decision became heavier.And Elon had become that for me.Not a responsibility.Not a mission.Not someone I was assigned to protect.Someone I chose.The thought was still unfamiliar.Not because I did not understand what I felt.Because I did.That was the problem.For someone like me, feelings had always been easier to control when they stayed unnamed.But Elon had never allowed things to remain simple.He challenged every belief I had built around myself.He made me question why I thought caring was dangerous.Why I believed distance was safer.Why I had
FORT’S POVThe warehouse had gone silent.Not peaceful.Not safe.The kind of silence that existed when everyone in the room was waiting for the next disaster to reveal itself.I had learned a long time ago that silence was rarely empty. In places like this, it usually meant someone was calculating
FORT’S POVThere was a difference between walking into danger and walking into a trap.Most people never learned the difference because, in the end, both usually looked the same.A dark road.An uncertain outcome.A decision made with incomplete information.But after years of dealing with people w
FORT'S POVThe moment never truly recovered after Mara's call.Not because Elon stopped trying.He did.Unfortunately.For the next twenty minutes, he launched what could only be described as a sustained campaign against my patience. He criticized Cassandra's timing, questioned Mara's commitment t
FORT'S POVThere were very few moments in my life when I genuinely wanted time to slow down.Do not stop.Not disappear.Simply slow down long enough for me to appreciate something before the world finds a way to ruin it.That afternoon became one of those moments.The city stretched endlessly beyo







