The explosion should have killed him. Caleb remembered vividly how the scorching flames devoured his home, how the sound of collapsing wood mixed with piercing screams that echoed through the night. That day, everyone believed he had died.

But the truth was, he didn't die. He was saved. Or rather, taken.

The organization never gave him a choice to return. They changed him, stripped away his humanity, turning him into something more than human—and yet, less than that. A weapon. A killing machine. Years passed in darkness, filled with pain worse than death. But one thing kept him going: the image of the woman he loved. Her smile. Her laughter. Her touch.

He had to return. He had to go home.

And finally, after five years, Caleb was free. With a body covered in invisible wounds, he walked through the streets he once knew so well. His heart pounded as he stepped into the familiar neighborhood. Countless times, he had imagined this moment—the moment he would see her again. See the shock in her eyes. Hold her close. Breathe in the scent he had missed so much.

But what he saw was another nightmare.

There, standing on the porch of their home, was the woman who had kept him alive all these years. The woman he loved more than his own life.

Laughing in another man's embrace.

Her hand rested on her swollen belly, while the man beside her held the hand of a young boy—a three-year-old child who giggled happily.

Caleb's world shattered in silence.

Five years.

Five years trapped in hell, enduring endless pain, only to come back and find a reality more agonizing than death itself.

His hands clenched into fists, his nails digging into his palms. His breaths came short and heavy. His chest tightened, as if his lungs had forgotten how to function. His mind refused to accept this, but his eyes saw everything with painful clarity.

All this time, he had lived for her. For the love that made him want to survive. But in the end, he was nothing more than a shadow of the past. A ghost of a life that had moved on without him.

Something inside him died for the second time.

Caleb turned away, letting the cold night air carry away the words he would never get to say. There was nothing left for him here. No home to return to.

Only emptiness accompanied his steps as he walked away.

But just as he was about to leave, a voice stopped him.

"Caleb."

His body froze.

Her voice was filled with disbelief, trembling. A voice so familiar, one he had longed to hear—one that, for years, had been the only light in his darkness.

Caleb clenched his fists tighter, letting his nails dig deeper into his skin, suppressing the storm of emotions raging inside him.

It took everything in him to turn back, to face the woman now standing before him. Tears welled in her eyes, her face frozen in shock as if she were staring at a ghost brought back to life.

Oh, how he wanted to pull her into his arms, to kiss away the tears threatening to fall, to whisper soft reassurances into her ear. But when his gaze shifted to the man watching them in silence, he knew all too well.

That was no longer his place.

He held her gaze, then took a deep breath before forcing a smile—one that felt foreign even to himself. A fake smile, meant only to hide the agony within.

"Long time no see, pip-squeak," he said, his voice calm, yet his eyes held a sorrow too deep to be put into words.