Go Confidently

“Confidence isn’t about certainty—it’s about walking out the door with fear still clawing at your ribs and daring not to show it.”

"How did you go?" Glenda's voice cut cleanly through the fog still clinging to me, pulling me back from the raw edge of adrenaline where I'd been teetering since the escape.

I was still breathing too fast, still feeling the ghost-pressure of that supply room door against my back, still hearing the phantom scrape of keys in locks. My hands trembled slightly as I set down the bags, the weight of them finally lifting from shoulders that had been carrying far more than medical supplies.

"I'm pretty sure I've got everything from your list," I answered quickly, the words escaping on a grin I couldn't quite restrain. Relief and leftover thrill tangled together in the expression, a faint echo of the danger I'd only just outrun. There was something almost giddy about standing here, alive, uncaptured, with bags full of exactly what Jamie needed.

Glenda crouched, lifting two of the bulging bags I had carried in. Her eyes narrowed, sharp and appraising, cutting past my smile to weigh the contents for herself. I watched her rifle through the first bag, her fingers moving with familiarity. Gratitude flickered there, but so did scepticism—how could I possibly have secured this much, and at what cost?

The answer, had she asked, would have involved police officers and locked doors and a Portal opened against a refrigeration unit whilst footsteps closed in. But she didn't ask, and I didn't offer. Some details could wait.

"Oh," I added quickly, half-apologetic, half-proud as I gestured toward the rest, "and then I just grabbed a heap of random stuff for good measure. I'm not really sure what any of it is."

The confession hovered in the air, a stark reflection of the chaos that had driven me, each item stuffed into the bags not with thought but with desperation. I'd grabbed anything that looked vaguely medical, anything that might prove useful in a world where the nearest hospital was an entire dimension away that nobody could access. Bandages, vials, sealed packages with labels I couldn't pronounce—all of it now sat at Glenda's feet like offerings at an altar.

"Well, that's not surprising," Jamie muttered, his voice tight with pain, yet edged with a trace of humour. The faint curve of it—sarcasm delivered through clenched teeth—was enough to twist my heart. Even suffering as he was, sweat still beading on his forehead and his body still locked in battle with the infection spreading beneath his skin, he still found a way to speak, to tease, to tether himself to me.

"Thank you, Luke," Glenda said, cutting across before I could respond, her tone warm yet brisk, redirecting all of us back to what mattered most. She drew out the morphine with practised ease, her movements calm, unhurried.

The sterile dance of needle, vial, syringe—all of it performed with the kind of confidence that radiated quiet assurance. She held the bottle up to the dim light filtering through the canvas, checked the dosage, drew the plunger back with steady fingers. No hesitation. No second-guessing. Just the accumulated muscle memory of countless injections given over decades of practice.

Watching her steadiness, I felt my own shoulders ease, if only slightly. For the first time since stepping through the Portal into that suffocating corridor, it seemed possible we might not lose him. Not today, at least. Not if Glenda had anything to say about it.

Glenda swabbed Jamie's skin, the sharp tang of antiseptic stinging the air. The needle followed, a quick jab that slipped beneath his skin before I could wince. I'd always hated needles—not the pain of them, really, but the wrongness of something piercing the barrier of skin, entering the body's private interior. But Jamie didn't flinch. Whether that was stoicism or exhaustion, I couldn't tell.

The morphine moved into him, unseen yet potent, the promise of relief carried in its silent flow. She followed at once with the sleeping medication—an intentional pairing, a calculated strike against the pain and gnawing anxiety that had clung to him like a second fever.

The change came quickly, almost unnervingly so.

The rigid tension that had knotted his muscles eased in waves, his jaw unclenching, the grimace softening into something closer to peace. His breathing steadied, the harsh hitch fading into something quieter, deeper. I watched the flutter of his eyelids—resistance, a stubborn fight against the drug's pull. Even now, even with his body screaming for rest, some part of Jamie refused to surrender.

But the battle was short-lived. His body yielded, surrendering at last to the depthless quiet of medicated sleep.

For a long moment, I just watched him breathe. The rise and fall of his chest, steady now instead of ragged. The way his face had smoothed, the pain-lines temporarily erased. He looked younger like this, vulnerable in a way he never allowed himself to appear when conscious. It reminded me of watching him sleep in our bed back in Hobart, in the early morning hours when I'd wake before him and simply lie there, memorising the planes of his face.

That felt like a lifetime ago. A different world—literally.

"He's going to be okay, isn't he?" The words slipped from me barely above a whisper. Vulnerability crept into my voice, unguarded, raw. I hardly recognised it as mine.

"I hope so." Glenda's reply was low, steady. Professional, yes, but with an edge of something more—concern that she couldn't entirely mask. Her tone carried no guarantees, only a thread of possibility, thin yet vital.

It hung in the air between us, fragile as spun glass, and I clung to it because there was nothing else to hold.

A surge rose in me then, part desperation, part resolve. I reached out and placed a hand firmly on her shoulder, needing to ground myself in something tangible. My grip carried more than thanks—it was a plea, a transfer of determination I wanted her to feel. She had given up everything to be here. Her practice, her patients, her husband Pierre who even now might be fleeing from the Fox Order's reach. All of it sacrificed on my promise of safety.

"I have to go," I said. The words were spoken with force, but in truth, they were aimed inward, meant to harden my own resolve as much as to inform her.

Glenda met my gaze and gave a slow, deliberate nod. Her eyes, rimmed with fatigue, spoke volumes. Already, the strain of this place, of being thrust into our fight, was carving its toll into her. It wasn't just physical tiredness—it was the weight of responsibility, of choices that could bend lives one way or another. Of being the only qualified medical professional in our settlement.

For a moment, the silence in the tent wrapped around us both—two people pushed past the edge of endurance, holding each other's determination like a shared burden. She had her role to play: healing Jamie, keeping him alive through the night. I had mine: everything else.

"I'm so sorry, Glenda." The words spilled out before I could contain them, a torrent of guilt that had been building ever since I pulled her across the threshold into Clivilius. I hadn't asked her permission in any real sense—not for the magnitude of what this meant. Her life on Earth, her career, her relationships—all torn away by my hand.

I had opened the Portal in her examination room and shown her a way out, but was it really an escape if she'd had no time to weigh the alternatives? If the choice had been flee now or face whatever consequences the Fox Order had in store? I'd presented it as salvation, but perhaps it had been a different kind of trap.

"You did the right thing, Luke," she replied with a steadiness that belied the exhaustion in her features. Her voice carried that calm authority of a woman who had seen life and death in field hospitals and humanitarian camps, who had refused to be cowed by either. She meant it—I could see that in her eyes. Whatever regrets she might harbour later, in this moment she believed I had made the only choice available.

"Now, go and do what you need to," she urged, her tone less a dismissal than a gift, granting me permission to step into what terrified me most.

I rose to my feet. My body felt heavy, as though every ounce of responsibility pressed into my bones, slowing my steps toward the tent's entrance. Inside, doubts circled, relentless and merciless.

Do I really have any idea what I'm doing?

The question wouldn't leave me. It echoed inside my skull, a cruel refrain that had been playing on repeat since the first moment I'd activated the Portal Key and realised the magnitude of what I'd inherited.

How many lives am I going to destroy in the process?

Joel was dead. Pierre was fleeing. Glenda was stranded. Jamie lay unconscious with an infection that could still kill him. And I—I was supposed to lead them. Build a settlement. Create a new society. All whilst barely keeping my own head above water.

"And go confidently."

Her words stopped me mid-step. Clear, ringing, and deliberate. A lifeline thrown across the churning water of my self-doubt.

I turned slightly, catching her eyes, and saw no mockery, no doubt—just unshaken belief in me. Confidence. She was giving me permission to wear it, demanding that I wear it, because she understood something I had been resisting.

She was right. Confidence wasn't some optional accessory I could put on or take off depending on my mood; it was survival. A shield, as essential as food or fire. If I faltered—if I let my fear dictate my actions—the collapse would ripple outward. Jamie. Paul. Even Glenda herself. All of them could pay the price for my hesitation.

People needed to believe in something. In someone. And whether I felt worthy of that role or not was irrelevant. The role existed, and I was the one standing in it. I could either fill it or leave it empty, and empty would get people killed.

I drew in a deep breath, lifted my head, and let her conviction fortify the weak scaffolding of my own resolve. The storm in my chest didn't vanish, but it stilled, just enough to move forward. Just enough to take the next step.