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“Pain is information.”

My hand stopped. I looked up at him. “Did someone teach you that?”

“Yes.”

“Military?”

“Yes.”

“Useful.”

“It is.”

“Also depressing.”

One ear flattened, then recovered. “You find many things depressing.”

“Mostly things you say.”

I expected him to grunt, or ignore me, or set his face the way he did when a conversation ended.

Instead he turned his head toward the window and kept it there.

I closed my mouth and went back to work.

The low hum of the machinery below us filled the room, a steady vibration through the floor. I finished cleaning the edge of the wound and reached for another seal. Veyr’s eyes tracked my hands. “You did this on Earth.”

“Lab work, not wound care.”

“You are comfortable with it.”

“My job involved blood.”

“That is not the same.”

“No.”

I pressed the seal into place.

“My mother was terrible with blood.”

The words came out before I could stop them. Veyr’s gaze lifted from my hands to my face. I kept working, my fingers steady only from years of practice. “She could sit through any horror film, gore everywhere, and just eat her popcorn. But real blood?” I shook my head, the memory sharp as a blade. “I sliced my thumb open on a can lid once. She went pale, swayed on her feet, had to sit down and put her head between her knees.”

Veyr’s expression didn’t so much soften as still, the harsh angles of his face holding something quieter.

“You miss her.”

The words were quiet, almost lost in the hum.

“Yes.”

No point lying. I’d trained myself not to think about Earth in detail—details were anchors, and anchors were dangerous. They dragged up voices, faces, the mundane rhythm of a life I’d assumed was permanent.

Veyr said nothing else. For once, the silence didn’t feel like a wall.

I looked back down at the bandage. “She would be losing her mind if she knew where I was.”

Veyr said nothing.