Page 84 of Marked by the Demigod

They're inside a small infirmary style room, the walls a stark white, so white she squeezes her eyes shut. He staggers, setting her down on a cot, then stumbling over to a cheap folding chair, drawing in ragged breath after ragged breath.

Underneath the lights, he looks small, haggard.

"Where are we?" She croaks out, struggling against the weight in her chest to sit up.

He gives her a blank look, one that speaks way more volumes than any of his usual suaveness does. "The Organization's office."

She blinks, then rests back heavily on the bed. "Wait, Katya's?"

He nods, the skin on his face gray.

Her brain clicks together. "Shouldn't you be the one in the cot, not me?" She gestures vaguely at the blood soaking through his suit.

Again, the blank look. "I'll be fine." His face twists with discomfort, as if her bringing it up starts the pain, and he picks at the shirt stuck to his chest with the air of someone distracted.

The door swings open, and Katya strides in with a doctor in tow. She gives Iakov a critical glare - as if the blood sticking to him is an annoyance then scowls at Aimes. "You in pain?" She barks out, and she may actually have up to three hairs out of place, she's that frantic.

Aimes nods, and almost before she completes that action the doctor is unfurling an IV drip. "But --" she starts, but Katya gives her such a glare that she shuts her mouth.

Iakov sits back, face pale, watching as the doctor deftly hooks a needle in her arm, injecting something quick and cold.

The room's silent, but not the silence of the hole she was stuck in for the last few days, and it’s odd against her ears. "What happened? She asks, staring at the IV in her arm as a warm rush spreads from the line.

Both Iakov and Katya open their mouths, glance at each other, then close them at once.

Another fission of frustration moves through her, and the pain seems far away, moving further. "Shouldn't you help him?"

Iakov's face tightens, and he shakes his head, quick. "They're not going to drug me," he snaps, as if drugging him is the worst that can happen, with all the blood on his front.

The moment he shook his head, the pain echoes through Aimes's sinuses. "I mean, blood transfers are a thing, you are bleeding...a lot."

"I can't die from bleeding out, Aimes, that's not how people like me die," he says, harsh, but the lines around his eyes soften. "I just need time and good food."

She leans her head back, exhausted, and rests her eyes for just a moment as the warmth from the drugs floats above her. "Stitches, though. You could get stitches." Her voice sounds slurred, even to her.

Katya coughs, and it's her 'I'm agreeing with you but can't say that' cough, and Aimes smiles with her eyes closed.

Cool fingers fix a pulse reader onto one of her hands, and take her blood pressure, and she lays there, letting them. A small part of her, the part that's not in pain and a lot pissed off, thinks about refusing, about shaking them off and leaving, but she doesn't move.

After an indeterminate amount of time, the door opens and closes again, footsteps walking out. Aimes knows, somehow deep inside her, that it's just her and Iakov in the room. She blinks up at him, and he looks like absolute shit.

They lock eyes, and the silence stretches on.

"What happened?" She whispers, her mouth feeling more like cotton than anything else.

He sighs and cradles his head in his hands. He doesn't answer for a very long time, in which Aimes struggles to keep her eyes open. "I tried your idea." He rasps out. "To take one down."

Her eyes flicker down to the bloody mess of his chest. "Which one?"

"Vanya," he says, as if it’s obvious, and, seeing her face, he capitulates. "He's the shorter one."

Aimes closes her eyes again and tries to remember if one was actually shorter than the other. "Right."

"He tried to rip out my heart," Iakov mumbles, and he just looks so exhausted. "I think...he thought if I didn't have that inside, I couldn't live. Even with you still alive."

She pops her eyes open. "Wait, you don't have a heart right now?" And it's tragic, but it's also way way too funny under the haze of the drugs.

He closes his eyes, but the corner of his lips twitch up. "We got it back."

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