#Data Recovery Professional

[onecutreviewsdotcom]

Stellar Data Recovery: Rescuing Your Data, One Byte at a Time

Let’s face it, losing data feels like a digital punch to the gut. Whether it’s that crucial work document, your entire vacation photo album, or the dissertation you swore you saved, the panic is real. Enter Stellar Data Recovery, a software that promises to swoop in and rescue your precious bits and bytes from the abyss. Does it deliver? Mostly. Is it perfect? Well, even knights have their rusty…

[digimobphonerepairs]

Essential Guide to Data Recovery Services in Adelaide

Lost access to your files after a device crash or accidental deletion? At Digimob Phone Repair, we provide trusted data recovery services in Adelaide designed to retrieve your valuable data quickly and securely. Whether it's a laptop that refuses to boot or a phone that took a swim, our skilled technicians use advanced tools to perform laptop data recovery and phone data recovery even in the most challenging cases. From water-damaged devices to corrupted drives, we’ve seen and recovered it all.

[itsappleexpert]

Recover Your Files: Fast, Secure Hard Drive Data Restoration Service

In today’s world, hard drives are an essential part of storing and managing data. Whether you're using a personal computer, laptop, or a business server, your hard drive holds all your important documents, photos, videos, and software. However, hard drive failures can occur at any time, causing a sudden loss of data that can be both inconvenient and distressing. When data loss happens, you need a solution that’s fast, reliable, and secure. That’s where professional hard drive data restoration services come in, offering peace of mind by recovering your files efficiently and safely.

Understanding the Causes of Hard Drive Data Loss

Before seeking a data restoration service, it’s important to understand what can cause a hard drive failure. Hard drives are intricate devices that use mechanical and electronic components to store and retrieve information. Various factors can lead to data loss, and they often fall into two categories: logical failure and physical damage.

Logical Failures: This type of failure happens when the data on the hard drive becomes corrupted, deleted, or inaccessible due to software issues, malware, accidental deletion, or file system corruption. Logical failures are typically less complicated to fix compared to physical failures, as they often involve the restoration of data from a functioning drive without significant hardware repair.

Physical Failures: These occur when the internal components of the hard drive, such as the motor, read/write heads, or platters, become damaged. Physical damage can occur due to drops, overheating, power surges, or age-related wear. Physical failures are more complicated and require specialized equipment to repair or replace damaged parts and retrieve data.

Why You Need a Fast, Secure Hard Drive Data Restoration Service

When you encounter a hard drive failure, the first priority is to recover your files quickly and securely. Here's why you should consider a professional data restoration service:

Speed of Service: When dealing with critical data loss, time is of the essence. Professional data restoration services are designed to recover your files quickly, often within hours or days, depending on the complexity of the issue. This efficiency helps minimize the downtime for your business or personal use, ensuring that you can return to your work without significant delays.

Expertise in Data Recovery: Hard drive recovery is a delicate process that requires knowledge of the drive's internal mechanisms and the latest data recovery technologies. Professionals have the tools and experience needed to handle both logical and physical failures effectively. They are trained to identify the root cause of the issue and use industry-standard techniques to restore your files without causing further damage to the hard drive.

Data Security: One of the most important aspects of a professional recovery service is data security. When you trust experts with your data, you can rest assured that your files will be handled with the utmost confidentiality. Reputable data restoration services implement strict security measures to protect your information during the recovery process, ensuring that no unauthorized parties have access to your sensitive data.

No Risk of Further Damage: Attempting to recover data yourself or using unverified software can result in irreversible damage to your drive and make data restoration much more difficult, if not impossible. A professional service ensures that no further harm is done during the recovery process. They have the equipment and knowledge to handle your hard drive carefully and efficiently.

Wide Range of Recovery Services: Whether you are dealing with a simple case of accidental file deletion or a more severe physical failure, professional recovery services offer a wide range of restoration techniques. From repairing logical issues like corrupted file systems to replacing broken mechanical components, experts can handle it all. They also provide various recovery solutions for different types of hard drives, including HDDs, SSDs, and RAID arrays.

The Hard Drive Data Recovery Process

The recovery process begins the moment you contact a professional service. Here’s what you can expect:

Initial Evaluation: The first step is an assessment of the hard drive to determine the cause of the failure. During this evaluation, the technicians will check the health of the drive and decide whether it’s a logical or physical failure.

Data Recovery Attempts: If the problem is logical, the technicians will use specialized software to recover deleted files or repair corrupted data. For physical failures, the hard drive is typically taken to a cleanroom environment, where the internal components are carefully examined and repaired or replaced as needed. The recovered data is then extracted from the drive.

Data Verification and Transfer: Once the data is recovered, the technicians will check for file integrity to ensure that the files are intact and usable. Once verified, the recovered data is transferred to a new storage device, such as an external hard drive or cloud storage.

Return of Data: The final step is the safe return of your recovered files. You can choose to have your data transferred to a new storage device or returned on a medium of your choice.

Why Choose a Professional Service Over DIY Solutions?

It’s tempting to try free software tools or DIY methods when dealing with a hard drive failure, but these solutions often fall short. Here’s why professional services are the best choice:

Higher Success Rates: Professional data recovery services have a much higher success rate compared to DIY methods. Their advanced technology and knowledge increase the likelihood of recovering your files without causing further damage.

Prevent Data Loss: By relying on professionals, you prevent making the situation worse. DIY attempts, like using unverified software or opening the hard drive yourself, can lead to permanent data loss.

Peace of Mind: Knowing that your data is in the hands of experts provides peace of mind. You can trust that the recovery process is being handled with care and that every effort is made to retrieve your files securely and efficiently.

When your hard drive fails, every minute counts. Professional hard drive data restoration services offer fast, secure solutions to recover your important files with minimal hassle. With expert knowledge, advanced tools, and a commitment to data security, these services can restore your files quickly and efficiently, so you can focus on what matters most. Whether you're dealing with a logical failure or a physical malfunction, don't take the risk of attempting recovery yourself. Trust the professionals to restore your data and get you back on track as soon as possible.

[bondrees]

Discover the Truth with Bond Rees Investigations - Your Trusted UK Detective Agency

Uncover the truth with Bond Rees Investigations, the UK’s leading private detective agency. Our expert team offers discreet and professional services, including private investigations, lie detector tests, tracing services, corporate investigations, and data recovery. With a 98.7% success rate, we ensure confidentiality and accuracy in every case. Trust Bond Rees to provide the answers you need.

[datamigration58]

Hard drive and server recovery Near Me in New Jersey

Total Data Migration is one of the leading computer and Data Recovery Services in New Jersey, We provide offer data recovery, restoration, migration, conversion, disposal services, and many more services. Contact us today for expert assistance. For more information, call us at +1 (800) 460-7599.

[datarecovery4]

Factors Affecting the Cost of Professional Data Recovery

When your device gets physically damaged, it can be stressful to think about losing important data. Luckily, professional data recovery services can often help retrieve your data. However, the cost of these services can vary widely.

[zinitech]

Zini Technologies' Superior Cloud Backup Service: Safeguarding Your Data with Excellence

In the age of technology and data-driven operations, ensuring the security and availability of your digital assets is paramount. Zini Technologies, a recognized leader in the realm of IT services, is proud to introduce its state-of-the-art cloud backup service. With our robust and reliable solutions, we offer you the peace of mind that your data is protected and accessible whenever and wherever you need it.

Cloud Computing for Secure Backup

In today's fast-paced world, the utilization of cloud computing has revolutionized how data is stored, managed, and safeguarded. Zini Technologies' cloud backup service takes full advantage of this technology, providing you with a scalable, cost-effective, and secure means of backing up your critical data. No longer do you have to rely solely on on-site servers or local backups.

Backup Made Easy with Remote Backup Service

Our remote backup service is designed with your convenience in mind. No matter where you are or what device you use, our service ensures that your data is securely and automatically backed up. Whether you work with Windows servers, Linux-based systems, or the latest macOS computers, we've got you covered. You can even restore your data to a different computer, making recovery hassle-free.

Reliable and Secure Data Protection

Your data's security is our top priority. Zini Technologies employs stringent security measures to ensure that your data is encrypted and protected from unauthorized access. With our cloud backup service, you can trust that your data is stored securely in our high-availability data centers.

Server and Computer Backup

Our cloud backup solution is not limited to just one type of device or server. We understand that businesses use a variety of platforms. That's why we offer server and computer backup services, allowing you to back up your entire infrastructure seamlessly.

Affordability and Peace of Mind

Zini Technologies' cloud backup service is not only robust and reliable but also highly cost-effective. With us, you can enjoy the assurance of your data's safety without breaking the bank. Our competitive pricing ensures that businesses of all sizes can afford the benefits of a secure backup service.

A Solution You Can Trust

Our cloud backup service is the result of years of experience and expertise in the field of data management. We understand that the data you store is not just numbers and files; it's the backbone of your business. With Zini Technologies, you have a trusted partner committed to safeguarding your data's integrity and availability.

In conclusion, data protection and backup are integral parts of any modern business. Zini Technologies' cloud backup service offers a comprehensive, reliable, and secure solution to ensure your data is always within reach. With our service, you can enjoy the peace of mind that comes with knowing your data is protected and ready for recovery when you need it. Don't leave your data's security to chance – trust Zini Technologies to provide the professional and dependable backup service your business deserves.

[bwacha2]

Stellar Data Recovery Professional 11.0.0.5 + Portable

Stellar Data Recovery Professional is a complete solution to recover lost data from your hard drives and removable drives. It is a complete solution for all your data loss problems. The powerful scanning engine of the software performs a thorough scan of the selected storage device, shows a preview of the files found during the scanning process and finally saves them to the specified destination.…

[clarityts]

If you always found it challenging to manage your business’s IT needs? Get in touch with Clarity Technology Solutions. We investigate to find out what your company requires to succeed. We assure you that you will benefit greatly if you partner with us. Since 2005, companies have been reaching out to us.

[work-data]

Hdd Donor is a hard drive refurbishing company, which specializes in retailing hard drives, hard drive circuit boards, hard drive parts, data recovery tools, and other hard drive diagnostic equipment and accessories. We offer a large selection of rare, outdated, discontinued, and modern hard drives and PCBs. 

https://hdddonor.in/

[workoffice23]

Hard Drive Head Replacement Tool Set For Repair & Data Recovery

These days all leading professional data recovery companies know and successfully use data recovery products in their business. In depth knowledge of the products has become a requirement for every highly skilled data recovery specialist. We have dedicated our lives to gather precious knowledge and inventing unique methods for successful data recovery. Now we are ready to share the experience we’ve accumulated over the last few years in data recovery.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Epic Systems, a lethal health record monopolist

Epic Systems makes the dominant electronic health record (EHR) system in America; if you're a doctor, chances are you are required to use it, and for every hour a doctor spends with a patient, they have to spend two hours doing clinically useless bureaucratic data-entry on an Epic EHR.

How could a product so manifestly unfit for purpose be the absolute market leader? Simple: as Robert Kuttner describes in an excellent feature in The American Prospect, Epic may be a clinical disaster, but it's a profit-generating miracle:

https://prospect.org/health/2024-10-01-epic-dystopia/

At the core of Epic's value proposition is "upcoding," a form of billing fraud that is beloved of hospital administrators, including the "nonprofit" hospitals that generate vast fortunes that are somehow not characterized as profits. Here's a particularly egregious form of upcoding: back in 2020, the Poudre Valley Hospital in Ft Collins, CO locked all its doors except the ER entrance. Every patient entering the hospital, including those receiving absolutely routine care, was therefore processed as an "emergency."

In April 2020, Caitlin Wells Salerno – a pregnant biologist – drove to Poudre Valley with normal labor pains. She walked herself up to obstetrics, declining the offer of a wheelchair, stopping only to snap a cheeky selfie. Nevertheless, the hospital recorded her normal, uncomplicated birth as a Level 5 emergency – comparable to a major heart-attack – and whacked her with a $2755 bill for emergency care:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/10/27/crossing-a-line/#zero-fucks-given

Upcoding has its origins in the Reagan revolution, when the market-worshipping cultists he'd put in charge of health care created the "Prospective Payment System," which paid a lump sum for care. The idea was to incentivize hospitals to provide efficient care, since they could keep the difference between whatever they spent getting you better and the set PPS amount that Medicare would reimburse them. Hospitals responded by inventing upcoding: a patient with controlled, long-term coronary disease who showed up with a broken leg would get coded for the coronary condition and the cast, and the hospital would pocket both lump sums:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/13/a-punch-in-the-guts/#hayek-pilled

The reason hospital administrators love Epic, and pay gigantic sums for systemwide software licenses, is directly connected to the two hours that doctors spent filling in Epic forms for every hour they spend treating patients. Epic collects all that extra information in order to identify potential sources of plausible upcodes, which allows hospitals to bill patients, insurers, and Medicare through the nose for routine care. Epic can automatically recode "diabetes with no complications" from a Hierarchical Condition Category code 19 (worth $894.40) as "diabetes with kidney failure," code 18 and 136, which gooses the reimbursement to $1273.60.

Epic snitches on doctors to their bosses, giving them a dashboard to track doctors' compliance with upcoding suggestions. One of Kuttner's doctor sources says her supervisor contacts her with questions like, "That appointment was a 2. Don’t you think it might be a 3?"

Robert Kuttner is the perfect journalist to unravel the Epic scam. As a journalist who wrote for The New England Journal of Medicine, he's got an insider's knowledge of the health industry, and plenty of sources among health professionals. As he tells it, Epic is a cultlike, insular company that employs 12.500 people in its hometown of Verona, WI.

The EHR industry's origins start with a GW Bush-era law called the HITECH Act, which was later folded into Obama's Recovery Act in 2009. Obama provided $27b to hospitals that installed EHR systems. These systems had to more than track patient outcomes – they also provided the data for pay-for-performance incentives. EHRs were already trying to do something very complicated – track health outcomes – but now they were also meant to underpin a cockamamie "incentives" program that was supposed to provide a carrot to the health industry so it would stop killing people and ripping off Medicare. EHRs devolved into obscenely complex spaghetti systems that doctors and nurses loathed on sight.

But there was one group that loved EHRs: hospital administrators and the private companies offering Medicare Advantage plans (which also benefited from upcoding patients in order to soak Uncle Sucker):

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8649706/

The spread of EHRs neatly tracks with a spike in upcharging: "from 2014 through 2019, the number of hospital stays billed at the highest severity level increased almost 20 percent…the number of stays billed at each of the other severity levels decreased":

https://oig.hhs.gov/oei/reports/OEI-02-18-00380.pdf

The purpose of a system is what it does. Epic's industry-dominating EHR is great at price-gouging, but it sucks as a clinical tool – it takes 18 keystrokes just to enter a prescription:

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2729481

Doctors need to see patients, but their bosses demand that they satisfy Epic's endless red tape. Doctors now routinely stay late after work and show up hours early, just to do paperwork. It's not enough. According to another one of Kuttner's sources, doctors routinely copy-and-paste earlier entries into the current one, a practice that generates rampant errors. Some just make up random numbers to fulfill Epic's nonsensical requirements: the same source told Kuttner that when prompted to enter a pain score for his TB patients, he just enters "zero."

Don't worry, Epic has a solution: AI. They've rolled out an "ambient listening" tool that attempts to transcribe everything the doctor and patient say during an exam and then bash it into a visit report. Not only is this prone to the customary mistakes that make AI unsuited to high-stakes, error-sensitive applications, it also represents a profound misunderstanding of the purpose of clinical notes.

The very exercise of organizing your thoughts and reflections about an event – such as a medical exam – into a coherent report makes you apply rigor and perspective to events that otherwise arrive as a series of fleeting impressions and reactions. That's why blogging is such an effective practice:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/09/the-memex-method/

The answer to doctors not having time to reflect and organize good notes is to give them more time – not more AI. As another doctor told Kuttner: "Ambient listening is a solution to a self-created problem of requiring too much data entry by clinicians."

EHRs are one of those especially hellish public-private partnerships. Health care doctrine from Reagan to Obama insisted that the system just needed to be exposed to market forces and incentives. EHRs are designed to allow hospitals to win as many of these incentives as possible. Epic's clinical care modules do this by bombarding doctors with low-quality diagnostic suggestions with "little to do with a patient’s actual condition and risks," leading to "alert fatigue," so doctors miss the important alerts in the storm of nonsense elbow-jostling:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5058605/

Clinicians who actually want to improve the quality of care in their facilities end up recording data manually and keying it into spreadsheets, because they can't get Epic to give them the data they need. Meanwhile, an army of high-priced consultants stand ready to give clinicians advise on getting Epic to do what they need, but can't seem to deliver.

Ironically, one of the benefits that Epic touts is its interoperability: hospitals that buy Epic systems can interconnect those with other Epic systems, and there's a large ecosystem of aftermarket add-ons that work with Epic. But Epic is a product, not a protocol, so its much-touted interop exists entirely on its terms, and at its sufferance. If Epic chooses, a doctor using its products can send files to a doctor using a rival product. But Epic can also veto that activity – and its veto extends to deciding whether a hospital can export their patient records to a competing service and get off Epic altogether.

One major selling point for Epic is its capacity to export "anonymized" data for medical research. Very large patient data-sets like Epic's are reasonably believed to contain many potential medical insights, so medical researchers are very excited at the prospect of interrogating that data.

But Epic's approach – anonymizing files containing the most sensitive information imaginable, about millions of people, and then releasing them to third parties – is a nightmare. "De-identified" data-sets are notoriously vulnerable to "re-identification" and the threat of re-identification only increases every time there's another release or breach, which can used to reveal the identities of people in anonymized records. For example, if you have a database of all the prescribing at a given hospital – a numeric identifier representing the patient, and the time and date when they saw a doctor and got a scrip. At any time in the future, a big location-data breach – say, from Uber or a transit system – can show you which people went back and forth to the hospital at the times that line up with those doctor's appointments, unmasking the person who got abortion meds, cancer meds, psychiatric meds or other sensitive prescriptions.

The fact that anonymized data can – will! – be re-identified doesn't mean we have to give up on the prospect of gleaning insight from medical records. In the UK, the eminent doctor Ben Goldacre and colleagues built an incredible effective, privacy-preserving "trusted research environment" (TRE) to operate on millions of NHS records across a decentralized system of hospitals and trusts without ever moving the data off their own servers:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/08/the-fire-of-orodruin/#are-we-the-baddies

The TRE is an open source, transparent server that accepts complex research questions in the form of database queries. These queries are posted to a public server for peer-review and revision, and when they're ready, the TRE sends them to each of the databases where the records are held. Those databases transmit responses to the TRE, which then publishes them. This has been unimaginably successful: the prototype of the TRE launched during the lockdown generated sixty papers in Nature in a matter of months.

Monopolies are inefficient, and Epic's outmoded and dangerous approach to research, along with the roadblocks it puts in the way of clinical excellence, epitomizes the problems with monopoly. America's health care industry is a dumpster fire from top to bottom – from Medicare Advantage to hospital cartels – and allowing Epic to dominate the EHR market has somehow, incredibly, made that system even worse.

Naturally, Kuttner finishes out his article with some antitrust analysis, sketching out how the Sherman Act could be brought to bear on Epic. Something has to be done. Epic's software is one of the many reasons that MDs are leaving the medical profession in droves.

Epic epitomizes the long-standing class war between doctors who want to take care of their patients and hospital executives who want to make a buck off of those patients.

Tor Books as just published two new, free LITTLE BROTHER stories: VIGILANT, about creepy surveillance in distance education; and SPILL, about oil pipelines and indigenous landback.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/10/02/upcoded-to-death/#thanks-obama

Image: Flying Logos (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Over_$1,000,000_dollars_in_USD_$100_bill_stacks.png

CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en

[digimobphonerepairs]

Fast iPhone Screen Repairs & Secure Data Recovery at Digimob Phone Repair

Your iPhone is more than just a phone—it’s a lifeline to your personal and professional world. Whether it’s a cracked screen or a sudden data loss, these issues can be extremely frustrating. Fortunately, professional iPhone phone repairs, including iPhone screen repairs and data recovery services, are here to help restore your device to its original functionality. At Digimob Phone Repair, we specialize in fast, reliable, and affordable iPhone repairs to get you back on track in no time. This blog will guide you through our top services, including screen repairs, battery fixes, and data recovery solutions, ensuring your iPhone is always in optimal condition.

Why Choose Professional iPhone Repair Services?

When your iPhone faces any type of damage, you want to ensure it’s repaired properly. While DIY fixes or third-party repair shops might seem like an affordable solution, they can often lead to more harm than good. Here’s why choosing Digimob Phone Repair for your iPhone phone repairs is the best option:

Expert Technicians: Our technicians are highly trained and experienced in all aspects of iPhone repairs, from screen fixes to data recovery.

Genuine Parts: We use only high-quality, genuine replacement parts to ensure your phone works like new.

Fast Turnaround: We understand that your time is valuable. That’s why we offer quick repair services, often completing repairs on the same day.

Warranty: Our repairs come with a warranty, giving you peace of mind that your device is protected.

iPhone Screen Repair: The Most Common Repair

One of the most common issues iPhone users face is a cracked or shattered screen. Whether it’s the result of a drop or pressure applied to your device, a broken screen can make your phone unusable.

Why iPhone Screen Repair is Essential

Your iPhone’s screen isn’t just for display—it’s the interface you use to navigate your device, make calls, send messages, and browse the web. A cracked or damaged screen can not only affect your ability to use your phone but can also pose a safety risk with sharp edges and potential further damage.

How We Fix Your iPhone Screen

At Digimob Phone Repair, we specialize in providing quick and effective iPhone screen repairs. Here’s how we handle the process:

Evaluation: Our technicians assess the extent of the damage to determine the best course of action.

Screen Replacement: We replace the cracked or broken screen with a brand-new one, ensuring that it works like new.

Quality Check: After replacing the screen, we conduct thorough testing to ensure the touch sensitivity, display clarity, and functionality are perfect.

If you’re facing any issues with your iPhone screen, don’t hesitate to reach out for professional iPhone repairs.

Read more: Fast iPhone Screen Repairs & Secure Data Recovery at Digimob Phone Repair

[hamilton-here]

𝒫𝓇𝑒𝓈𝓈𝓊𝓇𝑒 𝒫𝑜𝒾𝓃𝓉𝓈

Authors Note: Hi lovelies! Here’s another one-shot. Enjoy. I made changes to race dates to make it a bit different. Also after the performance by Ferrari at Imola…I need therapy. Lots of love xx

Summary: A slow-burn romance blossoms between Lewis Hamilton and new grounded physiotherapist during F1, where healing touches turn into something far more intimate.

Warnings: none

Taglist: @nebulastarr @hannibeeblog

MASTERLIST

࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊

2024 Barcelona – Day Eleven of Testing

The silence in the motorhome was deafening.

Not the kind laced with comfort or familiarity, the kind that wraps around two people like a warm blanket when words aren’t needed. No. This silence was different. It was sharp. Uneasy. The kind that settled between two people who didn’t quite know what to do with each other yet. It didn’t hum it throbbed. Uncomfortable and persistent, like static in the air that refused to clear.

You stood near the counter, clipboard clutched loosely in one hand, pretending to check his hydration schedule for what had to be the fourth time. You weren't fooling anyone not even yourself. You weren’t reading. The rows of data blurred into meaningless numbers, just a distraction from the heavy energy taking up space in the room.

Across from you, Lewis sat hunched over at the edge of the massage table, elbows resting on his knees, phone in hand. He scrolled lazily, without purpose, and didn’t look up once when you entered. No greeting. No eye contact. Just the blue-white glow of the screen reflected in his unreadable eyes.

You had gotten used to the silence over the past few weeks, or at least you told yourself you had. But today, it hit differently. Sharper. Heavier. It filled every corner of the motorhome, settling into your bones, and for the first time since you joined the team, it made your hands tremble.

The way he was sitting tense and folded into himself told you everything. Shoulders drawn up, jaw tight, neck stiff from more than just physical strain. He hadn’t relaxed once since stepping inside. Not even in his own space. That said something. That screamed something.

You cleared your throat quietly. “Okay. Ten minutes on the Normatecs, then we’ll work through active recovery for your hamstrings. That sound alright?”

Nothing. Not a word. Not even a nod.

You moved automatically, rolling out the compression sleeves, checking the connections, setting the timer. The machine hummed to life with a low, rhythmic buzz just one more noise filling the space he refused to break.

He didn’t help. He never did. Since the first day, he’d made it clear you were to do your job while he did his best to pretend you didn’t exist. He wasn’t cruel, not exactly. Just absent. Disconnected in a way that left you wondering whether your presence irritated him, or if he just truly didn’t care.

You crouched beside him, guiding the first sleeve gently over his leg, careful not to let your fingers linger longer than necessary. You were allowed to touch him hell, that was your job but every movement still felt like a negotiation. Like the wrong brush of skin would shatter whatever fragile boundary existed between professional and personal.

Still nothing.

“Hydration levels are low again,” you said, your voice quieter now. Less clinical. Less sure. “I left a new blend in your bottle. Less sodium, more potassium. Should help with the cramping you mentioned yesterday.”

That made him glance up.

Just a flicker.

His eyes deep, dark, and exhausted met yours for half a second. Flat. Impenetrable. Then they dropped again, back to the safety of his phone screen.

You looked away too, suddenly feeling exposed.

You had to remind yourself again that this wasn’t personal. That you were simply the replacement. The new name in the system. The girl brought in to fill the void left by someone else.

You weren’t Angela.

You hadn’t known what brand of tea calmed him before a race. You didn’t understand his routines down to the minute. You hadn’t sat beside him in private jets or walked beside him through years of highs and heartbreaks. You didn’t know him like she did.

You weren’t his best friend. You weren’t even welcome.

You were the stranger occupying a sacred space.

And the worst part? You got it.

You weren’t trying to replace her. You respected what she meant to him how could you not? Her absence was still carved into the walls of his life, her name lingering in the silence he so carefully maintained. You were just trying to do your job. To help him heal, recover, push forward.

But lately, it had started to wear on you. The quiet. The resistance. The constant ache of walking on eggshells around someone you were trying your best not to disappoint.

You sat across from him now, folding your hands in your lap as the Normatecs began their slow, pulsing work. The rhythmic tightening and release of the sleeves was the only consistent sound in the room, aside from the occasional chime of a text notification on his phone.

Three weeks.

That’s how long it had been.

Three weeks of showing up every morning with a quiet resolve, hoping for a nod, a word, something. Three weeks of swallowing your pride and doing your job with a kind of quiet grace that no one applauded. Three weeks of watching him build walls and wondering if you’d ever be allowed to climb over them.

You’d heard the whispers in the paddock.

“She’s temporary.”

“He’ll bring someone else in by mid-season.”

“He hasn’t said two words to her.”

You weren’t there for gossip. You weren’t there to be liked.

Still, some small part of you a part that refused to go numb ached to prove them wrong. Not for your ego. But because, beneath the silence and distance, you felt something in him. Something raw. Something bruised. Something still soft underneath the hardness of it all.

You didn’t want anything from him. Not glory. Not attention. Not even friendship, if he didn’t have it to give.

You just wanted to help him carry the weight. Even for a minute.

But you were starting to wonder if he’d ever let you.

"Angela was his person. Anyone else was always going to be second best."

"I give it a month before she hands in her notice."

You weren’t planning to walk away.

Not after everything it had taken to get here.

Too many years spent in lecture halls, your head down over textbooks filled with muscle diagrams and case studies. Too many late nights in university labs testing recovery theories on willing volunteers. Too many unpaid internships, too many times you’d had to fight for a seat at the table while people with half your qualifications were handed the room. But you earned this. You built your reputation working with Olympic athletes who pushed their bodies to the limit, MotoGP riders stitched together with pins and sheer will and Premier League players who treated pain like a background hum.

You were damn good at your job.

But this?

This was something else.

This wasn’t just about stretching out hamstrings and correcting muscular imbalances. This was about surviving the unrelenting emotional chill of one of the most intense men in motorsport. And somehow, today felt colder than ever.

Lewis sat across the room, the only sound in the motorhome the soft hiss of the air conditioning and the intermittent tap of his thumb against his phone screen. His expression was unreadable. But it always was. That was part of the game if it even was one. The unreadability. The distance. The quiet disdain that radiated off him like static.

He hadn’t looked at you once since you walked in.

You cleared your throat, keeping your voice professional, steady. “Anything feel tight?”

No response. Not even a blink.

You glanced down at your clipboard, scanning over yesterday’s notes just to fill the silence. “I noticed some stiffness in your right calf during cooldown. You were compensating on your push-off stride.”

Still nothing.

Your heart beat just a little faster, but you didn’t let it show. You shifted your weight, pen tapping softly against the clipboard.

“I can adjust the therapy plan if—”

The sound of his phone clacking against the bench made your sentence die in your throat.

Your eyes snapped up.

He was staring at you now finally but not with interest. Not with curiosity. With irritation. Cold and sharp, like he was already regretting the effort it took to acknowledge your existence.

“You don’t have to talk so much.”

You froze.

Not in fear.

In shock.

It was the first full sentence he’d spoken to you since the first day you met. And it was spoken like a command, not a comment. Flat. Dismissive. Almost bored.

Your lips parted slightly, the instinct to defend yourself flaring, but no words came out. You inhaled slowly through your nose, grounding yourself in professionalism, not emotion.

“I’m trying to help,” you said quietly. Controlled. Precise.

He looked at you again, slower this time, his eyes narrowing. His silence stretched long enough that you started to wonder if he was going to speak at all. And then, with a sigh that sounded far too tired for the hour of the day, he said, “I didn’t ask for help. I asked for silence.”

It wasn’t shouted. It wasn’t even particularly harsh.

But it sliced through the air like a scalpel.

You stood there, clipboard still in hand, spine straightening almost involuntarily. You weren’t one for confrontations not in your professional setting. But something about the way he said it, the complete and casual dismissal of you as a person, made the words rise in your throat before you could stop them.

“Well,” you said, tone clipped, tight but not disrespectful, “if you want to avoid tearing your muscles or aggravating your already overworked hip flexors before the weekend, you’ll need more than silence.”

That got his attention.

He blinked, then tilted his head just slightly, as if genuinely surprised you’d spoken back. Like he’d expected you to nod, apologise, and go mute. His lips didn’t move, but the silence shifted. It felt heavier. Denser. As if something in the room had changed.

You didn’t flinch.

You met his gaze, held it, even when his expression darkened by a fraction. You didn’t back down. You’d worked too hard, sacrificed too much, to let one man no matter how many trophies he had make you feel small.

He didn’t reply. Instead, he leaned back against the bench, arms folding across his chest with slow, practiced ease. Like he was done with the conversation. Like you were a fly buzzing in his ear, not worth the swat.

Fine.

You returned to your notes without another word, pretending to study the page even as a lump formed slowly at the base of your throat.

You wouldn’t cry. Not here. Not for him.

You’d learned a long time ago that in high-performance sport, the ice wasn’t always in the therapy rooms. Sometimes, it wore racing suits and sat across from you like you were the one out of place.

The rest of the session was mechanical. You asked questions basic ones, required for your notes. He ignored most of them. Gave one-word answers when silence no longer sufficed. When you gently adjusted the Normatec sleeves on his calves, he shifted away like your touch was something unwelcome, a necessary evil he had to endure.

You thought maybe the first week had been the worst, when he’d barely acknowledged you, when his eyes would scan the room and deliberately skip over where you stood.

But this was worse.

Now he saw you and still treated you like nothing.

The session ended with no goodbye. No eye contact. Just the quiet sound of a zipper as he pulled his hoodie over his head, grabbed his phone, and walked out like you hadn’t just been in the same room for forty-five minutes.

The door clicked shut behind him.

You stayed where you were for a moment, standing in the middle of the room, arms limp at your sides. Then, slowly, you knelt down, packed away the Normatecs, disinfected the table he’d barely touched, and made quick, efficient notes in his recovery log.

He was gone five minutes before the debrief even ended. You didn’t need to ask why. You’d stopped asking questions you knew he wouldn’t answer.

The ache in your chest was familiar now. Low-grade and dull, like an old bruise still tender if pressed too hard.

But you didn’t press it.

You stood, squared your shoulders, and rolled your tension out of your neck like you’d instructed a thousand others to do.

You weren’t here to make friends. You weren’t here to be liked.

You were here to do your job. And whether Lewis Hamilton wanted to acknowledge it or not, you were damn good at it.

“Hey.”

The voice startled you from your concentration, slicing cleanly through the silence. You looked up from your tablet, where notes about hydration levels and muscle fatigue blinked softly on the screen. Marc, one of the performance engineers, was leaning through the side door of the motorhome, his expression somewhere between teasing and concerned.

“He, uh…didn’t throw anything at you today, right?” he asked, one brow raised.

You gave a quiet laugh, though it didn’t quite reach your eyes. “No flying water bottles. Just the usual soul-crushing silence.”

Marc stepped in fully, the door swinging shut behind him with a soft click. He tossed you a protein bar, and you caught it out of reflex. “You holding up?”

You nodded; the smile you gave him automatic but grateful. “Trying,” you admitted.

He studied you for a moment, then sat down on the edge of the massage table, the one Lewis hadn’t touched today. Or yesterday. Or, if you were being honest, much at all this week.

You’d gotten used to this people stopping by to check on you when they thought no one else was watching. Little signs of solidarity. A spare espresso left on your station with no name attached. A folded towel you hadn’t placed there. A toolbox casually moved closer to block Lewis’s line of sight whenever his glares got particularly cutting.

Even Toto had surprised you once during a track walk. He’d murmured a soft “Hang in there” as he passed by, the weight of his hand on your shoulder more grounding than you expected. It wasn’t pity not exactly. It was more like shared understanding. Everyone here had felt the sting of Lewis’s coldness at one point or another. The difference was that you were now expected to survive it day after day, from a front-row seat.

Marc unwrapped his protein bar, chewing thoughtfully as he leaned forward. “You coming to the team dinner tonight?”

You shook your head. “Still have to finish reports. Adjust the physio plan for Saturday.”

He gave you a pointed look. “You know he’s probably not reading those, right?”

“Doesn’t matter,” you said, voice quiet but firm. “They’re still my responsibility.”

Marc exhaled slowly through his nose, then nodded like that answer was better than anything he could’ve come up with. “If you change your mind, we’ll save you a seat.”

You offered him a small smile, then returned to your notes. He left without another word, the silence resettling around you like a heavy curtain.

Hours passed. The paddock emptied in waves, the once-busy energy fading until all that was left was the occasional creak of a door, the buzz of a security golf cart outside. You stayed. Of course you did.

You sat cross-legged on the floor, a resistance band looped around your feet as you stretched absently, reviewing your schedule on your tablet. The only light came from the hallway, casting a soft golden glow across the otherwise darkened room. There was a stillness now that felt sacred this was the time you usually got the most done, when you didn’t have to brace yourself for the way Lewis would walk past you like you didn’t exist.

Until the door opened.

You startled. Just slightly. Enough that your body tensed before you even looked up.

Lewis.

He stepped inside slowly, hoodie up, hands buried deep in his pockets. His eyes landed on you immediately. You couldn’t read the expression in them only that he hadn’t expected you to be here. Then again, you hadn’t expected him either.

“I thought you left,” you said, voice cautious but neutral.

His gaze moved over you quickly - your posture, the tablet on your lap, the stack of charts on the bench. Then back to your face.

“Could say the same to you,” he replied, flatly.

You started to rise, more out of instinct than necessity, but he waved a hand. Not rude. Just dismissive. Like he couldn’t be bothered with the formalities.

“You don’t have to. I’m just grabbing something.”

He disappeared into the side room. You heard a few soft zippers, the rustle of gear bags. Silence again. Then, unexpectedly, his voice drifted back.

“You shouldn’t work so late.”

You froze.

It wasn’t just the words. It was how he said them.

Not sharp. Not cold. Just quiet. Measured. Almost human.

You blinked, unsure how to respond. “Neither should you,” you said finally, your voice steady but soft.

He emerged a moment later with a folded hoodie and a half-eaten protein bar in hand. He paused in the doorway, eyes on you again.

“You do all this for every athlete you work with?” he asked suddenly.

You tilted your head, unsure if this was sarcasm or something else. “All what?”

He gestured vaguely to the clipboard, the notes, the tracking charts on the wall, the pre-race hydration metrics outlined in neat, colour-coded blocks.

“This level of detail.”

You hesitated, then shrugged. “You’re not just any athlete.”

That made him blink. And for a second just a second something flickered behind his eyes. Not softness, exactly. But a shift. A flicker of recognition.

You stood then, brushing off your track pants, already moving to pack up. “Anyway. I’ll be out of your space in a minute.”

He didn’t move. Just stood there, watching you. Not with the disinterest you were used to. This was different. His gaze wasn’t ice. It was flint. Something waiting to be struck.

“You’re not trying to replace her.”

The words came low. Blunt.

You looked up, startled. “Angela?”

He nodded once.

“I’m not,” you said honestly. “I couldn’t. I wouldn’t try to. I’m just trying to do the job I was hired to do.”

There was a long pause. A breath caught somewhere between you.

“I didn’t want anyone new,” he murmured. It wasn’t defensive. It wasn’t even angry. It was tired. Honest.

“I know,” you replied gently.

Your words seemed to land. His jaw flexed once, like he was working through the effort of keeping the rest inside. He looked down at the floor. Then back at you.

“You don’t have to stay,” he said again, but softer this time. Almost like he was giving you a way out.

“If this isn’t worth it.”

You stared at him. Really stared.

“I don’t quit,” you said quietly.

For a beat, nothing. Then barely his lips twitched. Not a smile. But a suggestion of one. A ghost of something real.

He nodded, once. Then turned and left without another word, the door clicking shut behind him.

You stood alone in the dim light, pulse thudding in your ears, the silence he left behind now somehow louder than it had been before.

And for the first time in weeks, it didn’t feel so empty.

It felt like the beginning of something shifting.

Maybe not warmth.

But something.

Something real. ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊

2024 Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix, Saturday

Rain slicked the paddock, soaking into every crevice of the asphalt and turning the air into a clinging, grey fog. It wasn’t heavy rain more of a misty drizzle that fell steadily, like the world itself was holding its breath. The sky hung low, dull and oppressive, as if weighed down by tension. You tugged the hood of your team-issued rain jacket tighter around your face, fingers curled into the sleeves as you kept your eyes down and feet quick. The occasional spray from a passing cart splattered against your ankles, and you grimaced, but didn’t stop.

Qualifying had ended just fifteen minutes ago.

P8.

Not terrible. But not what anyone wanted. Not what he wanted.

The Mercedes garage had been a storm of movement by engineers huddled in muttering groups, mechanics shaking their heads as they toweled off tools, data feeds blinking with too many red sectors. You hadn’t spoken to Lewis afterward. You hadn’t needed to. The way he stalked out of the car, jaw clenched so tight you were certain it would crack, had been loud enough.

Still, you moved through the paddock as you always did quiet, efficient, invisible when needed, but never far. You knew where he’d be: in debrief. And you knew where you needed to be after that.

Inside the Mercedes motorhome, the air was warmer, drier, but no less tense. The murmur of voices in the meeting room filtered faintly through the wall, but you stayed where you always did just outside the door. Clipboard in hand. Post-qualifying protocol ready. Notes committed to memory. You weren’t officially inside those briefings yet. You hadn’t earned that access. But you were close enough to be called on at a moment’s notice. Close enough to hear when the tone of the voices shifted. Close enough to feel the emotional fallout before it even hit.

He hadn’t spoken to you since that night.

The one in the motorhome. The strange, silent exchange lit only by hallway light and unfinished sentences. He hadn’t acknowledged it, hadn’t brought it up but you noticed the difference. Subtle, almost imperceptible. His silences had softened. He no longer recoiled from touch. When you adjusted the tightness of the wraps around his wrist, he didn’t pull back. When you altered his hydration balance by a percentage point, he drank it anyway. He didn’t say thank you.

But he didn’t resist anymore.

It was something.

The door to the meeting room swung open twenty minutes later.

He walked out first fast, purposeful, shoulders squared. His race suit hung open around his waist, the fireproofs beneath it clinging to his damp skin. His face was a careful mask, lips pressed in a firm line, eyes like stone. You didn’t speak. You didn’t need to. You simply fell into step beside him, matching his stride, clipboard held to your chest.

He didn’t tell you to come with him.

But he didn’t tell you to leave, either.

He led you to the private treatment room near the back of the motorhome, the one reserved for cooldowns, muscle work, or the kind of days where nothing else helped. You closed the door gently behind you as he dropped down onto the padded bench, exhaling hard through his nose.

He didn’t speak, so you did.

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” you said softly, knowing how little comfort that kind of truth offered on days like this.

He laughed, short and sharp, but there was no humour in it. “Tell that to the car.”

You didn’t reply. Instead, you let the silence stretch for a few seconds enough to let him breathe, to let the frustration settle without feeding it.

“Take your shirt off,” you said finally, voice calm, clinical.

His head turned, just slightly. Eyes flicked to you. It wasn’t defiant more surprised. As if for the first time, he actually heard you. Not the instruction. The voice beneath it.

But he didn’t argue. He pulled the damp black shirt over his head in one swift motion and tossed it onto the chair beside him. You moved to your station, pulling a small bottle of oil and a warm compress from the drawer, laying out towels with quiet efficiency.

You didn’t let your eyes linger. Not on the ink that curved over the strong line of his shoulders. Not on the flex of muscle across his back or the faint trail of moisture that ran along the side of his neck. You’d worked with world-class athletes for years. You’d seen better physiques. Probably. Maybe.

But it had never felt like this before.

You pressed your thumb into his left shoulder blade, slowly working the knot you already knew would be there. He tensed at first habitual but gradually relaxed into the pressure.

“Tight,” you murmured under your breath. “You’re overcompensating on the left side again.”

“Didn’t feel it on the sim.”

“It’s not the sim,” you replied, matter of fact.

His lips quirked faintly not quite a smile, more like reluctant agreement.

You worked in silence. Long, slow strokes. Careful attention. He wasn’t the kind of man who responded to chatter in moments like this. You could feel his breathing begin to slow as your thumb moved in deliberate circles beneath his shoulder blade, coaxing the strain away.

After a while, he exhaled low, unguarded.

“That bad?” you asked quietly.

“I’ve had worse.”

“You shouldn’t have to.”

The words slipped out before you could stop them. Too honest. Too exposed.

And yet…he didn’t pull away.

He stilled. Then, slowly, his voice found you again. “You take this job very seriously.”

You paused, letting your hands still against his skin. “I take you seriously.”

There was a silence then. A heavier one. Not uncomfortable just charged. His head turned slightly, and you felt his gaze settle on you over his shoulder.

“Why?” he asked. Soft. Sincere. Not a challenge. Just a question from a man who’d stopped expecting genuine answers.

You stepped back, wiping your hands on a towel, heart thudding once in your chest like a warning. You didn’t dodge the question.

“Because you don’t need someone to worship you, Lewis. You need someone to take care of you. And I’m good at that. Whether or not you ever thank me for it.”

His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. His jaw twitched unreadable expression flickering across his face like static. Something passed between you in that second. An understanding, maybe. Or the beginning of one.

The silence stretched again.

Then his radio pinged from the corner of the room. A notification. Reality calling him back.

And just like that, the walls came up again.

He moved quickly, standing and reaching for his shirt. You saw the armour slip back into place: the focus, the distance, the self-protection he wore like second skin.

“Race is tomorrow,” he said, voice low, already slipping back into routine.

You nodded. “You’ll need the TENS on your calf tonight. Ten minutes. I’ll set it up in your suite.”

He paused, then nodded. Just once. Small. But real.

And as he left the room, you didn’t follow right away. You stood still for a moment, hands still damp, heart still racing.

Something was shifting.

And this time, it felt like he’d noticed it too. ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊

2024 Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix — Saturday Night

The storm rolled in harder.

By the time you stepped out of the hospitality suite, the mist from earlier had turned into a proper downpour. Cold sheets of rain danced across the emptying paddock, bouncing off slick asphalt, bouncing off puddles that had swelled in uneven places. Lightning flashed somewhere beyond the hills, illuminating the track for a heartbeat before the world slipped back into wet, colourless grey.

You pulled your rain jacket tighter and tucked your clipboard under your arm, head down, boots splashing as you made your way back toward the team’s garage annex. The air felt heavier now—not just with weather, but with something more personal, more charged.

You hadn’t been able to shake the moment from earlier. The way Lewis had looked at you, voice stripped bare when he asked why you cared. The way he’d listened really listened when you told him the truth.

You were halfway across the compound when your earpiece crackled.

Static, then your name. Then, “Lewis had a fall. It’s minor. Nothing broken. But…he slipped on the paddock stairs. We need you.”

You didn’t ask questions. Just turned on your heel and started moving faster.

The compound near the entrance was quieter now, most media cleared out, crews huddled indoors. A few security guards stood at the perimeter; shoulders hunched against the storm. You moved past them quickly, ducking into the treatment wing Mercedes shared with a few other teams for emergencies.

Inside, the air smelled of antiseptic and rain-soaked fabric. Dim lights flickered overhead. And there he was.

Lewis sat on the edge of the physio bench, one elbow on his thigh, head tilted forward, rain still dripping from the ends of his braids. His fireproofs clung to his legs, soaked and rumpled. One leg was slightly bent at the knee just enough for you to notice the stiffness in how he held it.

His expression was neutral. Blank, almost. But you saw it the tension in his jaw, the clench of his hands.

Not pain.

Pride.

Someone had seen him fall. That was worse.

You didn’t ask if he was okay. He would’ve lied. Instead, you moved forward and crouched in front of him, rainwater still beading on your sleeves.

“Let me see,” you said, your voice calm, careful.

He didn’t respond. But he didn’t pull away either.

Gently, you rolled up the bottom of his compression leggings, slow enough not to jostle the muscle. The lighting wasn’t great, but you could already see it a faint swell above the knee, the beginnings of a bruise blooming violet and red along the outside of the joint. Not terrible. But enough.

You palpated the area with trained fingers, watching his face more than his leg. He flinched only once.

“No major swelling. No tear,” you murmured. “But it’s a strain. Keep pushing and it’ll get worse.”

He exhaled through his nose, silent again.

“I can tape it,” you offered, reaching for your kit behind you.

He hesitated. You could feel it a flicker of resistance, not to you, but to the idea of needing help. Of being seen needing help.

“Lewis.” You met his eyes this time, tone soft but insistent. “If you limp during the cooldown lap tomorrow, every camera on the track will catch it. Every headline will be about that, not your race. Let me help.”

A pause. The kind that hung in the air like a balancing scale.

Then, finally he nodded. Just once. But it was enough.

You set to work quickly, hands skilled and precise. The room fell into silence, filled only with the sound of rain thudding against the windows and the soft rip of kinesiology tape. Your fingers moved over the muscle with practiced ease, wrapping the joint just snug enough to offer support without restricting motion.

The air between you felt different now.

Not charged with discomfort or avoidance.

Open.

Tentative, real.

He wasn’t resisting. He wasn’t pulling away. And for someone like him, who held his world so close to his chest, that was massive.

When you finished, you smoothed the last strip into place and sat back on your heels.

“All done,” you said gently, wiping your hands on a towel. “Try standing.”

He did, slowly testing the leg, shifting his weight. His face stayed composed, but you could tell he was impressed. Or maybe relieved.

Then he looked at you. Really looked at you. For a long moment, he just stood there, eyes searching yours as if trying to find the edges of whatever it was, he’d started to feel earlier.

“You’re not what I expected,” he said at last, voice low.

You blinked, caught off guard by the sudden shift from silence to honesty.

“In a good way?” you asked, not teasing more cautious.

He gave a half smile, the kind that didn’t quite reach his eyes but felt more real than anything you’d seen from him in days.

“I don’t know yet,” he said softly.

You returned the smile, just faintly. “Fair enough.”

There was a pause. He turned as if to grab his hoodie from the bench, but then he stopped. The weight of something unsaid pulled him back.

“I’m signing with Ferrari next year,” he said, suddenly, like he needed to get it out before the moment passed.

You froze.

Not just at what he said but at the way he said it. Quiet. Intimate. Like a confession. You hadn’t heard it from the media. No one had. And he was telling you.

Your voice caught in your throat.

“Will you be with me at Ferrari?” he asked, eyes never leaving yours.

You stared at him, blinking once. Twice.

“You haven’t told anyone else,” you whispered, more to yourself than him.

“No.” He said it like a promise. “Not yet.”

You swallowed. Your hands felt strangely cold. “Am I…am I even allowed to be?”

He hesitated then stepped closer. Not much. Just an inch. But it felt like a mile.

“I want you there.”

Your chest tightened. You didn’t know what to say at first. The weight of that sentence landed somewhere deeper than you were prepared for. You’d spent so long trying to do this job perfectly, quietly, without asking for anything back. And now he was offering something you hadn’t dared hope for.

He wanted you.

Not just for a treatment. Not just for race prep. He wanted you.

You nodded slowly. The words stuck behind your teeth, thick with emotion. “Okay,” you said finally, voice barely above a whisper. “Then I’ll be there.”

His eyes softened. Just slightly. But enough.

And outside, the storm kept raging. But in here in this tiny room filled with rain light and tape and unsaid things a different kind of thunder passed between you.

One that felt like the beginning of something. ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊

2024 Last race of the season Miami Grand Prix – Sunday Night. Mercedes Motorhome – Final Debrief

The clinking of champagne flutes echoed in the corridor, muffled behind closed doors. Monaco glittered outside yachts bobbing gently in the harbour, floodlights painting gold across wet pavement. But inside the Mercedes motorhome, everything felt like it was standing still.

You stood next to Lewis, just outside the debrief room, watching him quietly as the team finished their final post-race rundown. He hadn’t said much since crossing the line today - P5 after a long, bruising race. Not the send-off he’d wanted. But still, there was a calm in him. A quiet acceptance.

He glanced over at you now, his lips twitching into something soft. “Feels weird,” he said.

You nodded. “End of an era.”

“Twelve years,” he murmured, running a hand over his jaw. “Twelve years in silver and black.”

You looked at the logo on his race suit black now, but the silver star still prominent on his chest.

“Still suits you,” you said gently.

He smiled, but it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Not for much longer.”

And as if on cue, the buzz started.

Your phone lit up in your pocket. Then his. Then Toto’s voice called from inside the room—“It’s out.”

The press embargo had lifted. The announcement was live.

Lewis Hamilton to join Scuderia Ferrari in 2025.

Through the glass wall, you could already see the team scrolling through their phones, a few shoulders stiffening, some murmuring in surprise even though most of them had known. Still, seeing it official made it real.

Lewis exhaled. Not nervous. Just…letting go.

You stepped a little closer. Close enough that he could feel your presence behind him, even if you didn’t touch.

“They’re going to spin it,” he said, quietly. “They always do.”

“Let them,” you said. “You know why you’re doing this. And you’re not doing it alone.”

He turned to you then, fully, eyes meeting yours with something that felt like gratitude and something else something heavier.

“No,” he said. “I’m not.”

The motorhome around you was moving now people preparing for the inevitable media storm, public statements, clipped interviews. But for a second, in the eye of it all, it was just the two of you.

“You ready to wear red?” he asked.

You gave a small smile, heartbeat steady. “Only if you are.” ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊

2025 Preseason – Maranello, Italy

Three weeks until the first race

The first thing you noticed about Maranello was the quiet.

Not silence, exactly there were always distant echoes of movement, clipped Italian voices passing through corridors, the whir of machines in wind tunnels deeper within the complex. But compared to Brackley, this place felt almost reverent. The air was still, like it was listening. Watching. Remembering.

There was history in the walls here. Decades of it. You felt it in the smooth tiles under your boots, in the red banners lining the hallways, in the framed photos of champions and legends — Lauda, Schumacher, Ascari all staring out with the kind of intensity that made you unconsciously square your shoulders as you passed. You weren’t just working for a team anymore. You were stepping into a legacy.

You checked your new badge again, still not quite used to the prancing horse printed in gold beside your name.

Ferrari – Physiotherapist.

It still felt like something out of someone else’s story. But the weight of the lanyard was real around your neck, and so were your footsteps as you turned the corner into the gym.

Lewis was already there.

He stood alone in the centre of the room, red Ferrari training gear clinging to his frame, his back glistening faintly with sweat under the overhead lights. His braids were tied back tight, focused entirely on the punching bag in front of him. Left. Right. Right again. Controlled, powerful strikes. Not angry precise. Calculated. A rhythm more than a release.

He didn’t turn when you stepped in, but his voice met you anyway.

“About time.”

You let out a small, amused breath. “They made me sign five NDAs just to walk past reception.”

That got the barest twitch of his mouth not quite a smile, but not nothing. “Welcome to Ferrari.”

You moved a little closer, your eyes scanning the unfamiliar space. Everything gleamed. The weights, the equipment, even the water bottles looked engineered to impress.

“I still feel like I’ve broken into a museum,” you murmured.

He stepped back from the bag and reached for a towel. “It’s sacred ground.”

“And you’re the new priest?” you asked, eyebrows raised.

He threw a look over his shoulder, equal parts dry and self-aware. “I’m the experiment.”

You set your bag down near the bench, catching the shift in his posture not defensive, just watchful. There was no mistaking the difference in him since last season. He still moved like a fighter, still carried himself like someone who had nothing to prove and everything to protect. But there was a stillness in him now. A quietness that hadn’t been there before.

“So then,” you said, tone light but firm, “let’s make sure you don’t combust under the microscope.”

This time, when he sat, he didn’t hesitate as you stepped in front of him, hands already moving through your practiced checks. His eyes found yours not guarded, but deliberate. As if he wanted you to see the weight he was carrying. Not just from the physical training, but from everything else. The pressure. The shift. The risk.

“You stayed,” he said simply, voice low.

You blinked. “You asked me to.”

“That doesn’t mean much in this business.”

You guided his arm through the first shoulder stretch, fingers brushing the inside of his wrist, where his pulse beat steady and strong. “I’m not in this for the business.”

His gaze didn’t waver. “Neither am I. Not anymore.”

There was something in his voice not bitterness. More like exhaustion. The kind that sinks into your bones after years of chasing ghosts through podiums, through airports, through interview rooms where every word gets picked apart by strangers who think they know you.

“You still love it, though,” you asked, quiet. “Don’t you?”

He hesitated, lips parting just slightly. Then he exhaled through his nose, slow.

“I don’t know. I’m trying to remember.”

Your hands stilled on his forearm, eyes meeting his. There wasn’t anything performative in the moment no drama, no weighty declarations. Just honesty. Rare and raw.

Outside the gym window, you could see the edge of the track. Empty now, slick from a light drizzle, but waiting. In just under three weeks, it would roar to life again new season, new car, new team colours. And Lewis would be at the centre of it all. The man in red.

You reached into your kit and pulled out a new mobility band, looping it over your wrist as you refocused.

“We’ll start light today. Test your range of motion, no overload.”

He nodded once. “Lead the way.”

And for the first time since you’d met him all those months ago, back when he barely looked you in the eye unless it was necessary - he followed without hesitation. Without resistance.

He trusted you now.

And as you moved through the stretches, his breath syncing with yours, you felt it. The calm before the storm. The last few quiet moments before everything began again.

Only this time, you were starting together.

A week later

Training in Maranello had settled into its own steady rhythm, a pulse that beat differently from anything you’d known before.

Mornings were for the gym the smell of leather mats, the clinking of weights, the sharp sound of gloves hitting punching bags. Lewis moved through it all with a deliberate intensity, every motion precise and measured, like a man conducting a private ritual. You learned quickly that he didn’t want to be hovered over. Space was his currency. Too close, and he’d shrink inside himself; too far, and he might drift away. The balance was delicate.

Afternoons were spent in the simulator room. The hum of the machines, the glow of screens filled the space. You often sat quietly nearby, not interrupting, letting him immerse himself in every turn, every braking point, every split second that might mean the difference between victory and defeat. When he spoke, it was sparse, clipped a nod, a brief answer. But sometimes, just sometimes, he would glance your way, and you’d catch a fleeting flicker of something like camaraderie.

Evenings belonged to the review sessions. Lights dimmed, the team gathered around monitors replaying laps and telemetry. You watched how Lewis absorbed it all, the tight line of his jaw, the narrowed eyes a fighter learning his battlefield. Your job felt secondary to the mechanics and engineers, but it was no less vital. You knew that without his body, none of the data mattered.

Over the days, you became attuned to the small, unspoken things that grounded him.

The way he liked his towels folded - folded just so, edges crisp and corners sharp. You found yourself arriving before he did, smoothing and folding in silence, a quiet offering to the ritual of his preparation.

The post-ride drink a coconut water blend laced with just the right balance of electrolytes and minerals. It was subtle, but you learned it didn’t upset his stomach the way some recovery drinks did. He never asked for it, but it was always waiting for him, chilled and ready.

You discovered that the TENS unit helped him sleep better when you ran it on his lower back instead of his shoulders, even though he never mentioned it aloud. You just knew the way he shifted, the almost imperceptible sigh as the muscles loosened under the gentle pulses.

He never thanked you. There was no need. His world was built on results, on strength, on silent determination. But you saw it anyway in the smallest cracks of his armour. The way his eyes softened when you handed him the coconut water without a word. The almost imperceptible relaxation in his posture when you massaged the tight knot beneath his shoulder blade. The briefest exhale of relief after a long day.

It wasn’t much, but it was enough.

His guard fell, inch by inch, day by day. Quiet acceptance. Unspoken trust. The kind of trust that isn’t declared but felt, deep beneath the surface.

Then came the night that changed everything again.

It started like any other evening the team wrapping up in the conference room, Lewis retreating to his suite to prepare for tomorrow’s early start. You lingered nearby, tidying the physio room, when a message buzzed on your phone. Lewis needed you.

The details were vague just that he wanted you to come up. Now.

When you entered the room, you found him seated on the edge of the bed, the harsh white overhead light softened by the low glow of the bedside lamp. His eyes, usually so guarded, were wide and raw tired but resolute.

He didn’t say anything at first, just looked at you, really looked, and for a moment, the world outside ceased to exist.

No more pretence. No more walls.

Just the two of you, suspended in the quiet aftermath of a long day, on the cusp of something neither of you could yet name.

That night, something shifted subtle, fragile, but undeniable.

And you knew that whatever came next, you wouldn’t be standing on opposite sides of the glass anymore. ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊

Maranello – Friday Night

It was nearly ten in the evening when you finally finished logging Lewis’s data. The spacious physiotherapy facility was nearly empty, the hum of machines long gone, and the lights dimmed low enough to feel like the day was finally winding down. Your shoulders ached from the constant motion, from holding muscles in place and coaxing bodies back from the edge of exhaustion. You were folding up your clipboard and stacking your tools, the quiet settling in like a gentle shroud.

Just as you were about to grab your bag, a soft, hesitant tapping broke through the stillness tap tap, sharp against the glass of the physio room’s window. You turned and found him there. Lewis. Not the blazing star on the track, not the man chased by lenses and headlines. Just Lewis, wrapped in a loose grey hoodie and worn-in joggers, the edges of his face softened by the dim light. His usual fierce intensity was replaced by something quieter, more vulnerable.

“I owe you dinner.”

You blinked, caught off guard by the suddenness, by the low, almost shy tone. “Sorry?”

“That night in Imola last year ,” he said, stepping in just enough to lean against the doorframe. “You stayed late. Taped me up. No complaints.”

You shrugged, brushing a strand of hair behind your ear. “I was doing my job.”

“But I didn’t say it then. I should have.”

You studied him carefully. The protective wall of armour of steel he’d worn for so long was still there, but thinner now. More fragile. More...transparent, like glass instead of iron.

“Are you actually going to feed me or is this your version of small talk?” you teased, a half-smile tugging at your lips.

That coaxed a real smile from him a rare, easy curve of his mouth that lit up the space between you. “I found a place down the road. No cameras. No chaos.”

You hesitated, weighing the sudden invitation against the exhaustion pooling in your limbs. But only for a second. “Let me grab my jacket.”

Outside, the night air was cool and still, the streets around the Ferrari headquarters quiet under the amber streetlights. The walk to the restaurant was short, the sounds of the town muted except for distant laughter and the soft rustle of leaves in the gentle breeze.

The restaurant was small and intimate, with wooden tables polished smooth and walls lined with faded photographs and old racing memorabilia. The low lighting cast warm shadows, and the rich smells of basil, garlic, and slow-cooked tomato sauce wrapped around you like a comforting blanket.

Lewis didn’t put on a show. He didn’t act like Lewis Hamilton, global icon. He simply pulled out your chair with a quiet dignity, sat with a relaxed posture that surprised you, and asked what you liked without pretence or celebrity.

You ordered pasta, something simple but full of flavour, and a glass of red wine that stained the rim of your glass a deep garnet. He laughed once, low and genuine, when your fork clinked awkwardly against the wine glass as you tried to pour a delicate sip with too much enthusiasm.

Halfway through the meal, as the conversation meandered from mundane topics favourite movies, childhood memories to more personal territory, you looked at him. Really looked. The glare of competition and the weight of expectations had faded from his eyes. What remained was something rare and unguarded.

“You’re different here,” you said softly, voice barely above the hum of conversation around you.

He tilted his head, a small smile playing on his lips. “Good different?”

“Honest.”

Lewis rested his forearms on the table, his fingers idly brushing the curve of his glass as if anchoring himself to the moment. “It’s easier when I’m not being chased.”

“You’re still being watched,” you reminded him gently.

He gave a small shrug, almost imperceptible. “Not by you.”

You didn’t answer right away. Instead, you let the silence stretch between you a quiet understanding that needed no words.

“You want someone to see you,” you said after a moment, “not just watch you.”

His jaw tensed, the muscles tightening like a breath held too long. But he didn’t deny it. Instead, he looked at you really looked like he was trying to figure out how he hadn’t noticed you sooner. Like you were the missing piece in a puzzle he thought he had solved long ago.

And maybe, just maybe, he was. ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊

Late Winter, Barcelona Test Week

The Ferrari motorhome buzzed quietly with the calm energy of a team preparing for battle. Warm light spilled from overhead panels, soft conversations murmured around the hospitality area, and the occasional clink of cutlery echoed faintly through the air. Outside, the cool Catalan breeze whispered against the glass walls, but inside, the atmosphere was insulated — a cocoon of focus and quiet determination.

You were tucked away in the corner of the physio room, methodically organising a fresh batch of resistance bands. The subtle scent of leather and antiseptic mingled in the air, familiar and oddly comforting. Your hands worked with practiced ease, but your attention was partially drawn to Lewis, sprawled on the treatment table like it was a throne rather than a place of rehab.

He looked subdued today not withdrawn or tense, just internal, like the world was weighing heavily behind those calm eyes. He scrolled through telemetry data on his iPad, his fingers flicking through stats and lap times, but you could tell his mind was elsewhere.

“Shoulders tight again?” you asked softly, without looking up.

“Mmh,” he hummed in response, a low sound of distraction. “Didn’t sleep.”

You glanced over your shoulder, curiosity mingling with concern. “The new mattress not working?”

He shrugged, eyes flickering to the ceiling as if searching for answers there. “My brain’s loud.”

Crossing the room with your clipboard in hand, you stopped beside him. The warmth of the motorhome wrapped around you both, the faint hum of the air conditioning mingling with distant voices. “Want me to run the TENS unit?” you offered gently.

There was a long pause. No answer came at first, just the soft flicker of the screen and his shallow breaths. Then, quietly, almost like a request you hadn’t expected, he said, “Only if you’ll stay while it runs.”

Your heart caught. Lewis never asked for anything like that. Usually, he tolerated you, allowed your presence as a necessary part of his routine. But this was different. This was an invitation.

You set the clipboard down carefully, your fingers brushing the surface as you leaned in. “Of course.”

You attached the electrodes to his upper back with practiced precision. As soon as the current hummed to life, Lewis exhaled not a dramatic release, but a subtle loosening of tension that you hadn’t realised was coiled so tightly beneath his skin. Your fingers adjusted the settings, the touch gentle and sure, moving over his skin without the flinch or pull of resistance you’d seen in the early weeks. This was progress.

“Tell me what your brain’s saying,” you murmured, voice low enough that it felt like a secret meant only for him.

He tilted his head toward you, eyes half-lidded, soft and searching. “You really want to know?”

“I wouldn’t ask otherwise.”

There was silence, but it wasn’t shutting you out. It was a pause, a moment spent gathering the right words from a place that rarely opened so fully.

“I’m starting over,” he said finally, voice quiet but steady. “Again. Thirty-nine years old, in red. Everyone expects me to prove I didn’t make a mistake.”

You could feel the weight in his words not just the physical strain, but the mental and emotional pressure that came with changing teams, starting fresh under the unforgiving gaze of the racing world.

“I know I can still do this,” he added, voice tightening just slightly. “But I don’t know if they’ll let me.”

You looked at him, steady and certain. “You’re not here to ask permission.” Your tone was soft, but there was steel beneath it. “You’re here to win. They’ll catch up or they’ll fall behind.”

His gaze met yours again not fragile anymore, but tender. Vulnerable, but grounded.

“You always say the right thing,” he said, lips twitching into something like a smile.

“I say what I mean,” you replied, matching his quiet sincerity.

Lewis’s smile grew a little, the first true curve of warmth you’d seen in days. You didn’t say it aloud, but it was clear: since the move to Ferrari, it wasn’t just his muscles that had softened under your care. It was the walls he’d built around himself.

And maybe, just maybe, he was starting to see you not as a replacement, but as someone who genuinely cared.

The next afternoon, the physio room was quiet except for the soft hum of equipment and distant footsteps outside. You were focused on your clipboard, ticking off items from your checklist when Lewis appeared in the doorway.

He held out a coffee cup to you your name scrawled messily on the side. Almond milk, one sugar, and a light dusting of cinnamon crowned the foam exactly as you liked it.

You blinked, caught off guard. This was the first time he’d ever brought you anything like this.

He just shook his head, a small shrug that said, no need to make a fuss, without saying a word.

You tried to keep your expression neutral, tried not to smile. But the warmth in your chest betrayed you, and the corners of your mouth lifted before you could stop them.

Over the next few days, this simple gesture became a quiet ritual. Lewis began showing up without being asked, sometimes with your favourite coffee or a carefully brewed tea in hand. He seemed to know exactly when you needed a pick-me-up before exhaustion could settle in or frustration rise.

You started finding small notes tucked between your equipment or slipped inside your notebook. Some were sweet and sincere, little messages of gratitude written in his usual messy, hurried handwriting - “Thanks for having my back” or “Can’t do this without you.” Others were playful, teasing words that made you laugh softly, the kind of laughter that lingered long after he’d left the room - “Try not to burn down the physio room today, yeah?”

Bit by bit, Lewis peeled back the layers he usually kept so well hidden. You saw flashes of the man behind the driver the quiet humour, the subtle kindness, the moments of doubt and vulnerability he rarely let anyone witness.

And in the spaces between those gestures and glances, something began to grow.

It was slow and subtle, almost imperceptible at first, like the first hint of spring stirring beneath winter’s grip.

Something unspoken, fragile a connection weaving itself quietly between two people learning to trust. ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊ ⊹ ˑ ִ ֶ 𓂃࣪𓏲ᥫ᭡ ₊

Barcelona – Final Day of Testing

The paddock outside was a chaotic symphony of noise engineers darting between trailers with purposeful urgency, mechanics shouting instructions over the relentless hum of engines winding down, camera crews scrambling to catch their last moments of the week. The air buzzed with adrenaline and exhaustion, punctuated by the sharp scent of burnt rubber and fuel.

But the moment you stepped into Lewis’s private motorhome, the world outside seemed to dissolve completely. The warm, muted light inside wrapped around you like a soft blanket, contrasting the frenetic energy just beyond the door. The faint scent of eucalyptus from the diffuser mingled with the lingering musk of sweat and leather, grounding the space in an intimate, familiar cocoon.

You pressed your hands gently along his back, feeling the taut muscles beneath your fingertips tense and then slowly begin to loosen under your touch. The warmth radiating from his skin was steady, steady enough to calm the knot of adrenaline still pulsing through your own veins.

There was an unspoken understanding in the air between you no need for words. He wasn’t Lewis Hamilton here, the untouchable, celebrated champion. He was simply Lewis, the man who had, bit by bit, allowed you into his carefully guarded world, even if only a little.

When you finished, you took a step back, wiping your hands on the towel. You glanced up at him, silently waiting for a response. But instead of breaking the quiet with words, he rose slowly, moving toward you with a deliberate calmness that made your heart beat a little faster.

The space between you shrank in an instant, the distance closing until you could feel the warmth of his breath brush against your skin. You looked up at him, your breath catching somewhere between surprise and anticipation. His eyes locked onto yours dark, unreadable pools that seemed to hold a thousand unspoken emotions.

Almost instinctively, his hand rose, fingers trembling just slightly as they tucked a stray strand of hair behind your ear. His touch was feather-light, the soft brush of his skin against your cheek sending a quiet thrill through you.

You stood frozen, heart racing, as his fingers lingered warm and gentle softer than anything you’d expected from the fiercely driven man you knew. Time seemed to slow, compressing the world around you into a small, fragile bubble where nothing else existed but the two of you.

His eyes searched yours, as if trying to decipher every hidden feeling you hadn’t dared voice. His breath was steady but measured, betraying a subtle tension beneath the surface like he was waging an internal battle, the same storm you both seemed to be navigating in your own ways.

The distant drone of engines and chatter outside faded into white noise, replaced by the soft rhythm of your pulse pounding in your ears.

“Thank you” His voice was a low whisper, heavy with meaning, thick with vulnerability that made your chest tighten in a way you hadn’t expected.

His gaze softened further, shedding the public persona like a worn coat. This was the part of him few ever glimpsed—the Lewis behind the driver’s helmet the man who had slowly quietly let you in.

He took a hesitant step closer, the warmth of his body nearly merging with yours. You could feel the magnetic pull, but this time, the air between you wasn’t charged with tension or uncertainty. It was calm, peaceful, and filled with something unspoken but deeply understood a quiet connection forged through trust.

“I’m not always this...asshole of a person,” he admitted, voice rough with self-awareness. “I’m sorry I pushed you away when you were just trying to do your job.”

He paused, searching your face as if weighing how much of himself he could afford to reveal. “I don’t know how to do this.”

You shook your head gently, stepping just enough closer to close the gap between uncertainty and possibility.

“You don’t have to know,” you said softly, your hand rising to rest over his chest, feeling the steady beat of his heart beneath your palm. “I’m here. As your physiotherapist. And, if you want, something more.”

For a moment, his eyes flickered with an emotion you couldn’t quite name a complex mix of gratitude, longing, and something like fear.

Then, without hesitation, he closed the space between you.

His lips met yours in a tentative kiss, soft and questioning at first, as if he was testing the reality of the moment, unsure if it was something he deserved or even wanted to believe in.

But when you leaned in, matching his pace, the kiss deepened an intimate exchange that left you breathless. His hands found your waist, pulling you closer, the heat of his body seeping into yours, grounding you in the here and now.

His lips were tender, deliberate, as though every brush and press was trying to say what words could not. You felt it in the gentle tracing of his fingers along your back, in the way his entire being seemed to magnetically draw yours nearer.

When you finally pulled away, breath shallow and heart pounding, a quiet smile curved his lips—soft, genuine, far from the bravado he wore like a second skin.

His eyes, usually guarded and inscrutable, held something raw and real something he’d been hiding for too long.

“Does that feel real enough?” he teased, voice low but laced with warmth, the familiar glint of humour returning to his gaze.

You smiled back, fingertips still brushing lightly over the collar of his shirt, anchoring yourself in this moment of fragile clarity.

“More real than anything,” you whispered.

And in that quiet, shared space inside his motorhome, surrounded by the fading sounds of a racing world, you both knew this was only the beginning -

Of something neither of you could yet name, but both were ready to face.

Because you weren’t just his physiotherapist anymore.

And he wasn’t just the superstar you worked for.

You were something new. Something uncertain, but fiercely alive.

And somehow, in that moment, it already felt like home.

[coolpointsetta]

iwaizumi hajime (47) athletic trainer who publishes award winning research, becoming a pioneer in his field. he goes to conferences and presents said research for thousands of people. there are techniques named after him, he gets to write a textbook. his work is included in dozens of textbooks. he is invited for guest lectures at colleges and universities in nearly every country; including, but not limited to, his alma mater in california.

the topic of said research? knee recovery in athletes and recognizing the signs of the particular injuries before they start, stopping the injuries before they even happen. the goal of said research? to maximize an athlete’s performance and lengthen their career and limit muscle fatigue and surgeries even after they retire.

he is asked many questions about his research, but the one posed most often is why. why would he chose this topic.

“it is simple,” he always says. “i want to help others. this felt like the best way to do it.”

others, he says; he means it of course. he wants to help others and he has, he has helped thousands of athletes across the world. but to those who know him, they know it all ties back to one person.

in all of his published works, oikawa’s data is present. his x-rays and scans and initial prognosis, his routines and procedures and how the exercises made him feel. all of it compared to iwaizumi’s newly developed research and routines. oikawa’s name is omitted for privacy, but everyone knows it.

obviously, iwaizumi needed to gather data from hundreds of participants, but the same images and scans and quotes are all pulled from the same person.

iwaizumi loves his husband to the point of rewriting the story that oikawa would never make it as a professional athlete. watching tooru never give in to the critics was the whole he reason he chose this field in the first place, after all. hajime healed his injury with his own two hands and stood beside him every step of the way. iwaizumi loves him to the point of creation.

because all of it, after all this time, was for oikawa.

[cheri-cheri]

One-shot: Folded Away

Genre: Angst with no comfort... This is a story where you are not MC (ಡ‸ಡ)

Synopsis: In a relentless cycle of control and erasure, the mind of a Fleet officer fractures when a seemingly innocuous paper crane finds its way back to her.

You live the same day over and over.

Wake up. Train. Patrol the Deepspace Tunnel. Write reports. Rest. Rinse and repeat.

The days bleed into each other. You can hardly remember what life was like before the Fleet, nor why you chose to be here in the first place.

Patrols are dangerous, but even the worst injuries are treated with clinical efficiency, repairing you swiftly for your next mission.

Your reports are cold and factual. Even the most harrowing and fear-inducing experiences are distilled into objective data for the Fleet's research. The Toring Chip ensures that.

The chip is mandatory. Embedded in every Farspace Fleet officer, it mutes what the higher-ups call imperfections: fear, regret, longing, joy. You were told that it makes you more efficient, more obedient, more useful.

Adjutant Liam approaches you after a debrief.

“You dropped this,” he says, his voice monotone as always as he holds out a small item. "From your pocket."

You squint.

The item is made out of paper, folded from a page of a lined notebook. It looks like some kind of creature with its wings outstretched, head bowed. A crane, perhaps?

"It's not mine."

Your voice comes out flatter than intended, filtered through the chip’s constant calibration. Still, something about the delicate paper crane snags at your attention. Liam’s hand lingers in the air between you, patient.

He studies you with quiet curiosity as you reach out for it. Then, without a word, he places the paper crane gently on your palm and walks away.

You stand there in the hallway, the fragile little thing resting in your hand. It doesn't belong to you. You're certain about that.

And yet, something about it feels familiar.

Uncomfortably familiar.

You turn it over and over in your hands. The shape, the folds, the weight...

Somewhere in the quiet recesses of your mind, images stir from a fog. For a moment, you can’t tell if these images belong to your memories or to one of your many dreams.

In the hazy images, you were resting in the infirmary ward, wounds fresh after the crash on Cloudrealm IV. Colonel Caleb had come to visit. He hadn’t said much. He never did. His hands were always gloved, his uniform always immaculate, his mind always distant.

But before he left, he placed a paper crane on the bedside table.

“I was told that paper cranes symbolize healing. I trust that my adjutant will have a swift and steady recovery.”

You had treasured it. In those long, dreary days in the infirmary where your thoughts were dulled by a blend of pain and medication, it was the only thing that felt real.

You had turned it over and over in your hands, memorising its shape, its folds, its weight.

And you had somehow forgotten about it.

Or rather, the chip had made you forget.

And now, the crane and the unwanted memories it carried on its wings had found their way back to you.

You had always been closest to Colonel Caleb... or so you assumed. While he was always cordial and professional, there were fleeting moments between missions where he’d glance at you with something that looked like he saw you as more than a mere weapon. A year of proving your competence and loyalty to the Fleet made you an indispensable companion to Colonel Caleb and Adjutant Liam.

Your breath would catch during those moments. Somewhere, buried under layers of code and calibration, something still fluttered in your chest. A tether to your humanity or what remained of it.

But the chip didn’t tolerate humanity. It didn’t tolerate imperfection. It didn’t tolerate weakness.

One afternoon after you recovered, you made your way to Colonel Caleb’s office with the paper crane in hand, wanting to express your gratitude in person. The afternoon you saw him in the corridor with her was the afternoon the chip finished its work. She had muttered something under her breath, lips curved in what you registered as a playful pout.

And Caleb... he smiled.

It wasn't the same polite, measured upturn of lips that he would give you whenever you submitted a meticulously written report or when you presented a combat strategy that he agreed with.

That smile was different. Unrestrained. Warm. It softened his face, made him look unfamiliar. It was unguarded, light, and free.

For a moment, you felt as though your surroundings were dissolving around you. Sound and sight were gone. Only the distance between you and him remained. And the quiet yet cacophonous truth that it was a smile that would never be meant for you.

The hollow tug in your chest evolved into a sharp splintering from deep within. Something human was trying to claw its way to the surface.

And the Toring Chip responded instantly.

It pulsed to life, sending a surge of invisible static fizzling behind your eyes. Too many signals. Too much noise. Your heart rate was spiking.

Emotional variance beyond the acceptable range.

Emotion was instability.

Emotion was deviation.

Emotion was imperfection.

The chip did what it was designed to do.

The erasure was swift. Brutal in its precision.

One moment you were frozen, chest tight, breath shallow, fingers clenched around the paper crane as if it could anchor you to something real. You could still feel the ache. You could still feel.

And then you felt nothing.

Your grip loosened. The tremor in your hand stilled. The weight behind your ribs lifted, not with peace, but with absence. Your thoughts cleared.

The paper crane remained in your hand, but it was just that now: paper. Folded, meaningless, and useless.

You looked down at it, unblinking.

There were so many things to take care of. What were you doing standing here holding onto this random piece of paper?

Your hastily stuffed it into your pocket and spun on your heel.

You had countless tasks to complete. A schedule to follow. Reports to file.

You jolt back to the present, breath caught in your throat. The corridor. The smile. The ache.

The Toring Chip was still imperfect.

Whatever code was meant to suppress memories clearly malfunctioned. You make a mental note to speak with the higher-ups to get the chip fixed as soon as possible. This level of cognitive disruption could pose critical risk if it were to happen during a mission.

Your gaze drops to the paper crane in your hand.

What a useless, fragile thing.

Without thinking, your fingers tighten, crumpling the paper into an unrecognisable ball.

You cross the hall, dropping it into a bin. It lands with a hollow rustle, louder than it had any right to be.

You linger for a few seconds, staring into the bin.

And you try to ignore the sense that a part of you had been discarded along with it.

❀ ( ´ ꒳ ` )/ Thanks for reading! The way Liam shielded Caleb from his own son in [World Underneath - Sketches] hurt my soul in an unspeakable way and so I had to write this to cope LOL

❀ Masterlist