𝐖𝐄 𝐀𝐑𝐄 𝐅𝐀𝐌𝐈𝐋𝐘, 𝖺 𝗀𝗅𝖺𝖽𝖾𝗋𝗌 𝖺𝗅𝖻𝗎𝗆

the nursery that was never soft💐

Bea's dream — past and present blending like smoke.

The walls were white. Not the warm, kind of white but cold. Clinical. Silent. It smelled like disinfectant and metal. The lights above buzzed, too bright, too still.

Bea was six.

Her legs dangled off the edge of a hard metal cot, toes not even brushing the ground. In her arms: Primrose. Only a month old. Wrapped in a stiff blue blanket that smelled nothing like home... because there was no home. Not anymore.

"Shhh... shhh... don't cry," Bea whispered, voice trembling. "They'll come back if you cry."

Her hands were too small to hold a baby properly. But she did it anyway — arms wrapped around Prim like she was glass. Like she was all Bea had. Because she was.

She hadn't seen her parents in three days.

Food came through a slot in the wall. Water, sometimes. But no one spoke to her. No one told her what was happening. Just that "You're responsible now."

Six years old. And responsible.

Prim cried again, little sobs, little fists flailing. Bea gently rocked her. A motion she learned from watching a nurse once. From guessing.

"It's okay, Prim. I got you. I'm your big sister."

Her voice broke. "I won't let them take you. I won't let them. I promise, I promise—"

A door opened. Footsteps. White shoes.

Bea scrambled back, clutching Prim tighter. Her back hit the corner wall of the sterile room. She stared up, heart hammering.

"Don't take her!" she screamed. "Please! I'll be good, just — please — she's all I have—!"

The dream blurred.

The walls shifted — WCKD labs bleeding into jungle ruins, and back again. Her arms were empty now. She looked down and Prim wasn't there.

"Prim?! PRIM!"

She ran through corridors. Endless metal corridors.

A child's voice echoed back: "Bea?"

She turned. And there she was, a little girl with soft brown curls and amber eyes that matched Bea's. Wearing a too-big hospital gown. Holding a small toy lamb.

"Don't forget me."

Bea sobbed. "Never. Never. I could never."

Prim smiled.

And then the room filled with smoke, the hallway twisted, and the memory burned away.

🌙 Iron Lion — Present

Bea jerked awake in the dark. Breath shallow. Hand clutching her chest.

She was in her bed. Safe. Nico asleep in the chair nearby, slumped over, chin to his chest — a book open in his lap. He had stayed again. Like always.

Bea reached for her inhaler and took a breath. Then another.

The echo of the dream still clung to her ribs. But so did the memory of a promise she made a lifetime ago, when she was only six years old.

"I got you. I won't let them take you."

Even now, in the war and fire and heartbreak — she was still trying to keep that promise.