Verdamona stirred slowly awake. She blinked, realizing she was lying on a makeshift bedroll in a small tent.
The air was warm and thick with the scent of smoke and simmering broth. For a long moment, she stared at the canvas above her, trying to recall how she had ended up here, and then memory returned in broken pieces. Her knees giving out, the ground rushing up and strong arms catching her before the dark took her.
When she turned her head, her gaze fell on Phaser. He sat near the entrance of the tent with a steaming bowl in his hands.
"Morning."
He pushed the bowl a little closer across the blanket.
"Eat this."
Verdamona propped herself up weakly and glanced down at her clothes. Her heavy coat was gone. Only the thin straps of her tank top clung to her shoulders, exposing the pale skin of her arms and collarbones. Her breath hitched in embarrassment. Her eyes darted back to him.
"Did you… undress me?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"The tent's already warm. You would have collapsed from heatstroke if I left that coat on you."
His tone carried no room for misunderstanding.
"Did you… do anything to me?"
Phaser narrowed his eyes at her, the slightest flare of irritation cutting through his expression. He didn't dignify the question with words. Instead, he held the bowl out again. She took it.
She lifted the spoon and drank, letting the hot stew coat her throat. It was rich and filling, though she barely registered the taste. Her gaze kept wandering back to him. Thin strands of emerald light shimmered into being, the strings twisting and looping around each other, forming delicate shapes that collapsed into sparks when he lost interest.
"Phaser, am I… doing the wrong thing?"
His eyes flicked up to her, the threads pausing mid-spiral.
"Why would you ask that?"
"I did help them. I didn't expect anything in return. But still, even just a thank you would've been nice."
Phaser sighed and leaned back slightly.
"You want a story, then? I'll give you one to elaborate the situation you're in. There was a man trapped in a cave with two strangers, both women. The only exit was blocked by rubble that would take hours to break through. It's too much for the weak and too slow for the desperate."
His fingers flexed and the emerald strings rose again.
"There was another path, a tunnel sloping down into the earth. It's a gentler passage, but it led straight to a beast. It's massive and slow but patient. Sooner or later, it would climb and it would kill whatever waited above. Hours. That was all they had."
Verdamona's spoon froze halfway to her lips.
"One woman was bleeding. She had already tried to escape through the rocks and torn herself open. Her blood was dripping into the dirt. She wouldn't last long. The other was poisoned. She was bitten when they tried to go down toward the beast. She was too weak to move or dig. The man was fine."
"He had two choices. He could work three times as hard. He could break through the stone by himself, lift until his hands tore and his breath came in gasps. He could dig and dig and dig, and maybe get them out. But by the time he reached the surface, he'd be too spent. His body would join theirs. Noble, yes. Heroic, true. But it's sacrifice that no one would remember."
"Or, he could throw them to the beast. The bleeding one first who is easy prey, with the smell of blood drawing it close. Then the poisoned one, who is too weak to resist. It would eat them, glut itself, and retreat deeper into its pit. He would be safe for a time. That choice would buy him hours long enough to break through, to escape and to live. He would walk away alone and alive. And the world would never know what he'd done, only that he survived."
Verdamona's hand trembled, the spoon clinking against the bowl.
"That's… monstrous. You make it sound like it's sensible."
"It is sensible. Survival doesn't bend to ideals. Survival doesn't care about your kindness, or how much you suffer for others. The world doesn't reward martyrs. The dead rot. The living carry on."
Her lips parted in protest.
"So you're saying the right thing is to let them die? To feed them to the beast?"
"I'm saying the effective thing. It's the path that ensures survival. It doesn't gamble lives for the sake of empty gratitude. Sacrifice them, and you have a future. Save them, and you all die together in the dark. Tell me, what value is there in that? Who benefits from three corpses instead of one survivor?"
Her chest tightened. She wanted to argue and to say that lives had worth beyond calculation, that sacrifice was not meaningless, but the way he looked at her stole the words from her lips.
She set the bowl aside, her hands shaking.
"I… I would choose to save them. Even if it meant I'd die."
"Then you would die and no one would remember your noble choice. No one would thank you. No one would even know you existed, except as a corpse left in the rubble. You'd waste yourself for people who could never repay you. And in the end, your sacrifice would feed nothing."
Verdamona's breath shook. She gripped the blanket around her shoulders, anger and grief warring in her chest.
"I'd rather die trying than live as the kind of person who throws people to monsters."
"Then that will be your epitaph. You would be a hero who died trying. I think your story would be a cautionary tale for those who chose differently."
Verdamona lowered her head, clutching the spoon so tightly her knuckles whitened. She hated him for saying it. She hated him more because part of her feared he was right.
"Sooner or later, you're going to have to make a choice that will eat at you no matter what you pick. Do you sacrifice yourself and keep going so others live or do you just stop, let them die and you continue saving others?"
She tried to sit up straighter but he shook his head, cutting her off before she could argue.
"Don't think I'm talking about glory here. Glory's cheap. I'm talking about reality. If it were me, I'd stand against that beast. I'd hold the damn thing off as long as I could, not because I'm some savior, but because it would give people I care about a chance to escape. Hours, minutes, whatever I could buy them. But strangers?"
He let out a sharp laugh.
"Strangers wouldn't get that from me. They don't matter the way my people do. The ones who carry your heart are the only ones who tilt the scales."
Verdamona's lips parted, but Phaser raised a hand to silence her.
"That's the truth nobody likes to admit. That's why villains always seem so damn selfish when you look at them from the outside. They burn the world for the ones they love. Because to them, the world without those people isn't worth a damn thing. It's just empty scenery. That's not madness. It's clarity. Strip everything else away and what's left? And on the other side, you've got the so-called heroes. You know what heroes really are? They're people willing to let themselves rot in suffering because they put strangers on the same level as the ones they love. And that suffering eats them alive. That's why heroes die faster than villains. They're always carrying too much weight that was never theirs to carry. They crush themselves under it."
Verdamona clenched her fists, but there was no anger in her, only confusion. He could see it, so he drove deeper, cutting past hesitation.
"If you want to be a hero, then listen carefully. You have to abandon everyone you care about. Every face, every bond, every single thing that makes your heart beat faster, you have to let it go. Because only then can you treat everyone the same. Only then can you save without regret. You won't ever have to choose between saving your friend or a stranger, because to you, they'll be equal. That's the cost of real heroism."
Her eyes widened at the cruelty of it, but Phaser didn't flinch. He leaned back and his expression softened, just enough to show he wasn't spitting poison, only truth.
"But here's the catch. If you do that, you're going to hollow yourself out. You'll never regret your choices, sure, but you'll also never feel joy when they smile at you and never feel warmth when they survive because of you. You'll save, and save, and save, but nothing will mean anything. That's the hero's curse. It's enduring without reward. It's living without living."
Phaser sighed and dragged a hand through his hair, shaking his head like he hated himself for saying all this to her.
"Sorry for dumping this on you the second you wake up but you needed to hear it. You don't get to keep dodging this choice forever. One day, it will come down on you and if you haven't decided, it'll crush you. You'll freeze and people will die for it. So decide now. Do you want to live as a hero, empty and unbreakable, or do you want to live as yourself as someone who saves who she can, who suffers when she can't, and who accepts that suffering as the price for caring?"
He reached into the small pack beside him, pulled out a piece of dried meat, and tossed it onto her lap.
"Eat. Don't think too hard on an empty stomach."
Verdamona stared at the food and Phaser leaned his head back against the tenr, closing his eyes.
"And don't look at me like I'm some prophet. I'm not. I'm just telling you the truth the way I see it. Maybe I'm wrong. So when we go back, think about it."