Sofia shut the door instantly after having opened it as she realized what Peter and Katherine were doing. She had understood now why the last person who had opened that room had yelled "Get a room".

  She walked back toward the hall of the manor, wondering just how long it would take to clean up and get rid of the overwhelming stench of alcohol. The festivities had stretched from midday to well past midnight, the traditional Midsommar celebrations gradually giving way to full-blown debauchery—at least for the younger crowd.

  No one could really claim surprise. The moment the organizers revealed just how much beer had been stocked, it was obvious where the night was headed. Not that anyone outside the most conservative bunch actually cared.

  As she made her way down the hallway, she passed a couple tangled together on a sofa—kissing, whispering, lost in their own world. She barely gave them a glance. Her and Przemek had volunteered as a "safety supervisor," a role that was half babysitter, half peacekeeper. Her job? Make sure no one drank themselves into a coma, defuse tensions before they turned into fights, help people out—whether that meant mediating arguments or stepping in when consent got blurry.

  And, of course, ignore the smell of weed.

  Marijuana was still very much taboo in Oksj?, but outside of the Home Guard, which had a strict zero-tolerance policy while on duty, no one really cared. People had been through a lot. If smoking helped them unwind or drown out the nightmares, as long as they weren’t doing it in public and stinking up the place, no one bothered to stop them.

  The need for escape—whether through alcohol, weed, or something else—had only grown since the start of the "therapy" circle. At first, there had been hesitation. Oksj? was small, and the idea of spilling your trauma in front of familiar faces didn’t sit well with everyone. But grief doesn’t spare anyone. Everyone had lost someone. Some had watched their loved ones die. Others had simply woken up one day to find them gone, vanished without a trace.

  With just two psychologists and one psychiatrist in the entire settlement, the mental health system had been overwhelmed from the start. Support groups had eventually taken shape, hesitantly at first, but now, they were one of the few things holding some people together.

  And yet, as she walked past the remnants of the night’s excess—spilled drinks, abandoned flower crowns, muffled laughter from a nearby room—she couldn’t help but wonder: Was any of it really enough?

  She saw how people coped. Alcohol. Some drank excessively, others traded food just to get more rations. Weed. Smoked in quiet corners, ignored as long as it didn’t cause trouble. Debauchery. A fleeting distraction from reality.

  Oksj?’s relative comfort was both a blessing and a curse. Life was stable enough for people to start looking inward. And for many, that meant confronting things they weren’t ready to face.

  She had tried to break through to Jonathan. She had heard the details through Amir, piecing together what had really happened in Norrk?ping. First came disgust. Then rage. But when they truly understood who they had been dealing with, compassion took its place. Even so, understanding didn’t mean forgiving. And it wasn’t enough to make it all go away.

  People had whispered about Sven. They noticed how he had withdrawn, first drowning himself in alcohol just like Amir and Jonathan, then eventually retreating even further. Unlike them, he didn’t crawl back out. He refused to take part in running the settlement, avoiding leadership altogether. Instead, he buried himself in working with the cattle.

  His isolation raised more questions than Amir or Jonathan’s struggles ever did. Jonathan was just a gun for hire—people expected him to carry baggage. But Sven? He was supposed to lead.

  And yet, he had walked away.

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  Jonathan left the settlement again, throwing himself back into work. Milan was dead, his own hands the cause. Amir was slipping away too, slowly but surely. The three of them—Jonathan, Amir, Sven—all buried themselves in work, but none of them were actually dealing with it.

  She had tried talking to Skadi. She knew something was wrong. She knew Asher and Karim back in Norrk?ping. She had worked for him before, as a third party with the group of mercenaries she ran with.

  So whatever Jonathan had gotten himself tangled up in—she knew exactly how bad it could be.

  And yet, Jonathan was even more reluctant to talk to her than anyone else in the settlement.

  As Sofia and Nikolaj checked on the guy slumped over the kitchen table, she couldn’t help but wonder why Nikolaj was wearing a Hawaiian shirt. Of all things.

  Before she could ask, Ming walked in. Her **M4—complete with an ACOG scope—**hung loosely from its sling as she strode to the fridge, yanked the door open, and grabbed two large bottles of water. The rifle had cost her a pinky in the firefight where she’d taken it, but she never talked about it.

  She shot Nikolaj a long, dirty look before slamming the fridge shut and walking straight back out into the hallway.

  Sofia barely had time to say hi before Ming was gone.

  Nikolaj, still in his flip-flops, hurried after her.

  She threw the bottle to Jonathan sitting on the wall platform. He instantly put the bottle against his neck in a bid to cool off. With the temperature rising to 25C he handled the weather worse than Ming.

  Both had made a fortune just by keeping watch during the party. In eight hours, they were each replacing four people, two at a time. The payment? Actual cigarettes, chocolates, extra "black stock" ammunition, a few mangas and books. Hell, even Jonathan had managed to secure some coffee, which he planned to gift to Skadi the next morning in an attempt to forgive himself for missing the party.

  The mood had been a little sour, but not as sour as Ming and Nikolaj.

  He glanced at Ming as she leaned her M4 against the wall. On the small camping chair, she barely had her head above the height of the wall. He had overheard the heated argument they’d had before she joined him earlier that night. He could still see the tense look on her face from when she came back from the mansion for water.

  He hesitated for a moment, unsure if he should ask her what was bothering her. Instead, he shifted his chair closer and quietly shook the meadow flowers into the bottle. It was a simple infusion Skadi had taught him, and it worked wonders. Their little secret.

  “Thanks.” Ming’s voice was quiet, almost strained. She was on edge, as if she were on the verge of a breakdown. She took long, slow sips of the meadow-infused water, her eyes distant, like she was trying to ground herself in the calm it brought.

  The sound of footsteps on the stairs made her jump. They both turned around to see who it was. To their surprise—and Ming’s disappointment—it was Mads. He was on patrol, checking the wall perimeter to make sure no one was missing or sleeping.

  Ming’s face betrayed her. Jonathan could see the disappointment in her expression; she had been expecting someone else.

  “Cigarette?” she asked firmly, her voice rough. She wasn’t a regular smoker, but Jonathan could tell she needed one desperately right now. Without waiting for an answer, she simply sat back against the wall, as per their instructions if they wanted to smoke at night.

  Jonathan handed her a cigarette along with a lighter. As she lit it, the flash of the flame briefly revealed the dried tears on her cheeks. For a few seconds, she paused, eyes lingering on the glowing tip, as if the simple act of smoking could quiet the storm inside her.

  They were both in for a long night.

  "Tell him you think you're pregnant." Jonathan said. Ming shot him a look. It had been an hour since her first cigarette, and she was now on her fourth.

  "Wouldn't be right." She answered, voice tight. "It's not him, it's me. He's just living his life, and he's doing it better than most."

  Jonathan shot her a quick glance before looking away, the tension settling in.

  "I'm sorry, I didn’t mean to talk about you... just everyone in general." She quickly added, catching the look on his face.

  "Yeah, well, no one’s as lucky as him, I suppose." Jonathan replied, his voice bitter despite himself. Though Mads was his friend, there was always this nagging sense of jealousy that he couldn't shake—the stability of his upbringing, his current situation, his mental well-being.

  "You don’t know. You never know what people are going through, so there’s no need to say things like that." Ming’s tone shifted, more serious now.

  They sat in loud silence, both weighed down by unspoken things.

  "Fuck it, I’ll tell him I’m late tomorrow morning." Ming finally broke the silence, snickering despite herself. The tension seemed to dissipate, at least for a moment, as she let out a small, bitter laugh.

  Jonathan crushed his cigarette as Ming sat in front of him, watching the village as her mind was elsewhere.

  "Well you know, all of this makes us stronger." Jonathan said trying to raise her spirt.

  "I never asked to be stronger." Ming answered.