Hours stretched only as hospitals understand, measured in blood transfusions and surgical clamps instead of minutes. Titan remained unmoving except for his slow breathing.
When the surgeon emerged, mask hanging loose, eyes rimmed with fatigue, he said what they were bracing for: “He’s critical, but he’s still with us.”
It wasn’t a promise, but it was a foothold. Titan stood immediately, nails clicking, ears forward, sensing the tone if not the words.
“Can the dog see him?” Caleb asked, and after a bureaucratic hesitation, the surgeon nodded.
In recovery, Adrian lay swaddled in bandages, oxygen hissing, skin pale from his close dance with death. When his eyes fluttered open, they moved to the familiar shape at the bed’s foot.
“You stayed,” he rasped, and Titan pressed his muzzle into Adrian’s hand, watching over him, the silent guardian of a story that would be told for years to come.
