Page 123 of Zorro

His brows lifted, but his mouth twitched. “Gonna have to stop giving you shit now, huh?”

She tilted her head. “Nope. I need the training with you all.”

He grinned. “Damn. Zorro’s doomed.”

Buck muttered, “She’s already running the team.”

Gator folded his arms. “I’m okay with it.”

Professor gave a quiet nod, deadpan as ever. “Checks out.”

Laughter circled the room like a balm, low, tired, real.

Everly smiled through the tears that wouldn’t wait anymore. “God. You all are…”

“Loud?” Bree offered, grinning.

“Terrifying?” Helen added dryly.

Everly pointed at Bree, voice raspy but playful now. “You, Pretty in Pink with your brazen bravado…” She shook her head. “I want your glute regimen, because sister, that was one tight ass.”

The room roared.

Bree burst out laughing. “Well damn, Doc. Buy me a drink first.”

Blitz groaned, scrubbing a hand down his face. “Please, no. I can’t be here for this.”

D-Day clapped him on the back. “Oh, you’re here for it. You’re so here for it.”

Buck pointed. “Your woman just got medically confirmed as a WMD. That’s a Weapon of Maximum Donk.”

“Permission to throw myself into traffic,” Blitz muttered.

Gator grinned. “Negative, sailor. You die with honor or at least blushing.”

Izzy let out a snort. “Told you she was one of us.”

For the first time since the OR doors had closed behind her, Everly laughed too.

They were hers now. She felt it in her bones. The family she never had, and the man who would light up her life forever.

Hospital Copa D'Or, Copacabana, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – Twenty-four hours later

The world came back to Bear in fragments. Light. The sharp scent of antiseptic. The distant thrum of a heart monitor that wasn’t his. Pain twisted low in his side, warm and dull. He blinked, throat dry.

White walls. A cooling IV drip. The faint shimmer of sunlight through closed blinds.

Flint. Relief rushed through him. His partner lay at the foot of the bed, head resting on crossed paws. One eye cracked open at the shift in air. The nurses had clearly tried to protest his presence. Bear could tell by the blanket folded oddly at the corner of the mattress, like someone had attempted tidiness around a stubborn shadow. But Flint hadn't moved.

Bear's voice rasped, gravel-scraped. “Zorro?”

A chair creaked beside him. The sound was soft, but it carried authority.

“Of course you ask about someone else.”

He turned his head.

Claire Martinez sat by his bedside, her silver-blonde braid draped over one shoulder, expression calm but alert. She wore jeans and a soft blue top that looked like it belonged in a sunlit garden, not a trauma ward. But her presence fit. Strong, grounded, quietly luminous.

---