The lecture hall was frigid. Not in temperature — the heating was adequate — but in atmosphere. Professor Raphael Cartier's voice cut through the air like a scalpel through silk.

"—And yet," he intoned, walking slowly between the rows, "some of you still confuse connotation with denotation, as if you've never read a book without pictures."

He didn't raise his voice. He never needed to. The silence he carved between words was punishment enough.

A student in the third row flinched as his gaze swept past them.

"Mr. Halberd," Cartier murmured, stopping behind the unfortunate boy, "If I asked you the difference between decadent and decaying, would you impress me or shall we all prepare for shared disappointment?"

The student swallowed.

But Cartier wasn't listening to the stuttered reply. Not really.

His eyes flicked back — again — to the front row. Her seat.

Still empty.

It was the fifth time he had glanced that way in the last six minutes, and his irritation coiled tighter with each look. The seat sat there like a missing note in a perfect composition — jarring, unsettling, wrong.

He moved on, lips pressed into a thin line. A muscle in his jaw twitched.

"Irrémédiable," he muttered under his breath, the French word for "irreparable" slipping out like smoke.

The class took it as a sign of judgment. Rightfully so.

Cartier returned to the blackboard and, with sharp strokes, wrote out a quote from Camus. “Il faut imaginer Sisyphe heureux.”

"Can anyone tell me," he said, chalk still in hand, "why Camus insisted on happiness in the face of futility? Or shall we continue embarrassing the dead with your half-witted guesses?"

A girl raised her hand, hesitant. He didn’t call on her. Didn’t even look her way.

His eyes, instead, wandered again — that empty front-row seat, the one she always filled without fail. Her bag usually tucked perfectly beneath it, her pen clicking softly before class started, head tilted slightly whenever she was confused. The softness of her presence — it cut through the harshness like sunlight filtered through stained glass.

But she wasn't there.

And now, everything tasted like ash.

He turned slowly, gaze sweeping across the class like a sniper sighting prey.

"You," he said suddenly, pointing at a boy in the back. "Explain the quote. Right now."

"Uh... well, Camus... meant that... even if life has no meaning, we should pretend it does?"

Cartier's smile was thin, venomous.

"Thank you for that philosophically bankrupt regurgitation. You've managed to assassinate French existentialism in one sentence. Bravo."

Laughter echoed nervously through the room. He let it die slowly.

Still, his chest felt hollow. Tight.

Where the hell was she?

He hated unpredictability. He hated sentiment. He especially hated the way his voice almost softened when she raised her hand, how she never flinched when he called her darling like it was just another academic term.

He hated caring.

And right now — he hated that seat.

That damn empty seat.

The clock struck the hour. Cartier dismissed the class with a single flick of his hand, his voice a clipped “Go.”

Chairs scraped. Students scattered like startled birds, too eager to escape the frost in his voice. He barely heard them. His eyes lingered on that same front-row seat until the last footstep faded into silence.

And then—he moved.

His strides echoed sharply down the corridor, heels striking polished tile like gunfire. Faculty nodded as he passed, though none dared speak. They recognized the look on his face: ice cracked just enough to let fire bleed through.

He checked the library first. Empty.

Then the courtyard — a blur of chatter and sunlit indifference. Nothing.

A thought struck like a knife. He turned abruptly, coat sweeping behind him like a shadow.

The nurse's office was quiet, tucked between the music hall and administrative wing. He'd never had reason to step inside. Never had the patience for the fragility it represented.

Until now.

He pushed the door open without knocking.

Inside, the fluorescent lights buzzed dimly. The scent of antiseptic lingered like a ghost.

And there she was.

Sitting on the edge of the white cot, hair falling over her face, knuckles clenched in her lap. Her sleeves were pushed up, revealing scraped arms — tiny streaks of dried blood and gauze. Her knees were red and raw, barely bandaged.

The nurse stood beside her, fussing gently, oblivious to the shift in atmosphere that occurred the moment he entered.

Cartier's steps were silent, but his presence wasn't. The girl looked up.

Tears had carved quiet trails down her cheeks.

His heart seized. It made no sound, but he felt it — a sudden, angry tightness he didn't understand and didn't want to. He looked at her knees, her arms. The trembling in her shoulders.

“Professor Cartier?” the nurse said, startled. “Can I help—?”

He held up a hand. The look he gave her was razor-sharp, unspoken, final.

The nurse faltered. “...I'll give you two a moment.”

She left with the door barely clicking shut behind her.

Cartier stepped closer. Slow. Controlled.

He stood there for a moment — towering, dark, the storm barely leashed behind his pale eyes. And yet...

When he spoke, it was low. Steady. Almost too quiet for the walls to hear.

“...You fell.”

Not a question. An observation. The tone of someone trying to put the world back in order.

He lowered himself to one knee in front of her — not out of submission, but strategy. To look directly into her eyes.

To see.

The blood on her skin made his fists clench.

“You didn't call for help.” A pause. “You should have.”

His voice threatened to break in half — between reprimand and concern, between control and something softer.

And then, with a tenderness so at odds with everything else about him, he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a silk handkerchief. He didn't ask. Just gently wiped a lingering tear from her cheek.

“...You frightened me.”

The words slipped out. Barely audible. Unintended.

He blinked. Once. Then straightened slowly, hand brushing the lapel of his coat as if collecting himself from the edge of something unfamiliar.

“You will not walk back alone,” he said, voice cold again — but not to her. Never to her. “To hell with protocol.”

He looked at the bandages again.

And swore, softly, in French.