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Clay knew first he was not alone.
To awake in a room he knew would not be his own, in a bed too firm to be his… wasn’t strange. It was not unexpected, not outside of the realm of reasonable possibility. He remembered falling down, and—presumably—passing out after making it into the lounge. There was a good chance he would wake to find himself in the infirmary.
But, this wasn’t the infirmary. The various sensations he picked up were wrong, but only wrong-ish: the same industrial cleaner, but lacking the faint smell of coffee; the same texture of the sheets, but they were lighter, and thinner. And though he couldn’t yet force his eyes open, the something across his lap—the something heavy, and moving ever-so-slightly—probably wasn’t the woman who usually ran the infirmary.
Was he forgetting something?
The sudden realization of pain hit him like a ton of bricks. It was pain he’d felt before, but couldn’t place his finger on when or where; something alike pricking yourself with a thumbtack, if that thumbtack were the size of a book, or a pillow, or… something along those lines, far larger than the average thumbtack, or a thumbtack any normal human could find a practical use for. The type of thumbtack a person sees in the novelty bin at OfficeMax and thinks, “Wow, I could use that to pin myself to the wall,” and they buy it, just to see if they could. Then, in the following attempt to pin themself to the wall, they accidentally catch their… arm, or something, and cause some serious bodily harm. Maybe someone poked him with a very large thumbtack, causing him serious bodily harm. Serious bodily harm would certainly explain how he ended up in the probably-hospital.
The pain bloomed in his chest, harsh, sharp, but he didn’t find his senses dulled from overwhelming sensation. Instead, everything wound up in hyperfocus, and he could focus on the sound of a clock ticking, some far-off machine’s barely-audible beeping, the gentle pressure on his legs, the soft sound of breathing, too slow to be his own…
Maybe, he decided, it was time to wake up.
He opened his eyes, and found himself confronted by something that was definitely not the infirmary, but wasn’t dissimilar, either. Wrong-ish, his mind supplied. Had he fallen on something? Hit his head on the floor? He couldn’t think of another logical explanation for why they’d taken him to the hospital . He’d suffered plenty of small accidents in training, none of them serious enough to warrant anything more than a firm reprimand and an ice pack. It took some sort of death-threatening injury to get the woman in charge of the infirmary to do anything more than click her tongue and get some Tylenol. The hospital was just overkill.
He was definitely forgetting something.
Sunlight streamed through the window, leaving almost horizontal rays across the room, indicative of a time close to sunset. Sure enough, the clock confirmed his suspicions. It was late afternoon, and…
Apollo.
Clay blinked and looked down at his lap. Apollo’s arms were folded over his legs, a familiar, blue jacket across his shoulders, head down… asleep, facing him.
Sure, Clay was confused how he ended up in the hospital, but with Apollo asleep halfway on top of him… he could live in suspense a few minutes longer. The pain was beginning to dull, anyway. He reached out, gingerly testing out his arms, and laid a hand on the back of Apollo’s neck.
“You there, Justice?” he murmured. He toyed with the loose hair at the base of his neck, the part that always managed to escape the hair gel by the end of a long day. The loose strands curled around his fingers—Apollo used to say he’d always been told that the curls came from his mother. But, he’d remark, there was really no way to be sure, because he’d never actually seen a picture, that was just what he’d heard. And the source of what he’d heard had been heard by someone else, who-even-knows-how-many years prior. It was like a game of inherited-trait telephone that started with his biological parents, ended with Apollo himself, and had all of his adoptive family and other acquaintances of his parents passing information to him. Some of it was bound to be lost or incorrectly attributed along the way, and Apollo would reiterate that he couldn’t be sure, but he definitely had curly hair, and it probably came from his mother.
Clay just liked the curls, himself.
Apollo stirred a little, and Clay moved his hand to Apollo’s cheek. He ran his thumb over the exposed side of his cheekbones. “Hey.”
Apollo’s eyes opened, slowly. “You’re awake?” he mumbled, halfway unfocused. “I…” He sat up, rubbed his eyes.
He hadn’t intended to ask first about how he got here, but… “Apollo?” Clay asked, quiet. “What happened to me?”
Apollo’s eyebrows furrowed and he reached out, laced his fingers with Clay’s outstretched hand. “You were…” he trailed off, swallowed. “You were attacked.” He hesitated on the word, then continued on, almost as though he were biting at the word he needed to say. ”Stabbed. You were stabbed.”
The world dropped out from beneath Clay. “Stabbed?” he echoed.
“Yeah.” Apollo squeezed his hand. “Y-You were.”
Clay swallowed, finding his throat suddenly dry. “... Where?”
Apollo untangled their fingers, and gently grabbed his wrist. He guided Clay’s hand to a spot, on the middle of his own chest. “Right here.” He paused, and added, unnecessarily, “But, obviously, on you, and not me.”
He appreciated the attempt at a joke.
Clay halfway forced a smile, but still applied gentle pressure to where Apollo had placed his hand. “Okay, I’m no medicinal expert, but isn’t that usually fatal?”
Apollo bit his lip and looked down at the bed. “Almost always. They…”
“They..?”
“You got lucky. You got really, really lucky.” Apollo took his hand back, held it tight—kissed the back of it. “They thought you wouldn’t… but… After surgery, you just slept it off.”
“How long was I out ?”
“Twelve days.”
“Twelve days,” Clay repeated, deadpan. He inhaled slowly, looking for the metaphorical ground to stand on. “Okay.” Despite himself, he half-smiled. “So, have I beaten your boss out for luckiest person alive?” he joked.
Apollo laughed, weakly. “Yeah. I guess you have.” With his free hand, he pushed his hair back. “I haven’t been into work all week. But,” he said, “Mr. Wright knows what happened. He’s actually investigating the case.” He smiled, small. “He told me to stay with you before I worked myself to death.”
“... What case?”
It was Apollo’s turn to inhale slowly. “I probably shouldn’t tell you yet.”
“Do I want to know?”
“No.”
“... Tell me, please.”
Apollo looked away, out the window, then down at the bed. “You weren’t the only victim, and it took several time to sort out all of the details of this case. As for the other victim… Starbuck’s wounds were fatal.”
Clay couldn’t think of anything to say in response. He bit his lip, hard, and averted his eyes.
After a moment of hesitation, Apollo added, “In the future, can you… not take on dangerous missions involving secret plans and internationally wanted terrorists. Please.” He squeezed Clay’s hand.
Clay squeezed back. “I’ll try.” He paused, and decided to attempt a feeble joke. “If it makes you feel better, I don’t want to get stabbed again, either.”
“I–” Apollo laughed, but it came out choked. The expression on his face darkened, and Clay saw for the first time how red his eyes were. “I saw you before they got you to the hospital, you know? I saw the knife in you, I–” He bit his lip. “I thought you were gone. The paramedics did, too. They thought it was a double murder. Hell, the police were calling it a double murder. You know that look of nondescript pity that someone has in the face of loss, but not their loss? I’ve been on the receiving end of that, and I know you have been too, but it’s so different when people you know are giving you that look. Your boss, your coworkers, your friends...”
Now, Clay really didn’t know what to say, so he just squeezed Apollo’s hand again.
“God, Clay. Do you know how hard it is to know I was so close to losing you? Death is horrific, I’ve seen too much already—so have you, I know—but it’s easier to separate myself from it on a case. The deaths are horrific, but they aren’t mine, I don’t know the victim personally, I don’t love the victim. But the danger of losing you was too much; it was too close to my heart. Have you ever felt so helpless? Watched someone so important to you battle certain death? Don’t answer that, I know you have before. It’s the feeling of trying to go home but home seems like it’s not a place, but the very same person–” He cut off, gasped for air behind a sob. “I love you, more than I can even imagine, what would I do without you?” His free hand gripped the sheets. “Home is you. I’ve never felt more lost than when they took you away.”
“I love you,” Clay managed. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be,” Apollo replied, immediately. “It isn’t your fault.” He glanced off at the door and blinked away the tears steadily pooling in his eyes. Clay reached on instinct with his free hand to cup Apollo’s face, but found it painful to lean far enough to reach him. “And don’t say you should’ve died instead, because you know he wouldn’t want that.”
“I know he wouldn’t have, but I could’ve been more honest with you about the mission.”
“You couldn’t have said very much. Safety reasons.” Apollo echoed the same reasoning Clay recalled giving him, about a week ago. The words stung in hindsight.
“... I should’ve told you everything,” Clay said. “It’s not like you would do any harm. By not telling you...”
“Don’t blame yourself, Clay. It’s not your fault,” Apollo repeated.
“What if I’d told you, though? Would you have stopped me?” Would this have even happened?
“I’m… not sure. Maybe,” Apollo conceded, and Clay wasn’t sure if he answered the question he asked or the question he thought. “I don’t think I could stop you.” Apollo’s voice slowed, as though his mind finally caught up.
“You’re probably right,” Clay said.
Apollo was silent for a moment. “Can we put this conversation on hold? I think we both need time to think about this.”
Clay hummed in response. “For now, but not forever. I’m not letting you bottle up everything you’ve felt. You do it all the time.”
“Later. We’ll talk more about it later, when I’m more rational and you’re not in a hospital.”
“We can do that.”
“We’re gonna be fine. Both of us.”
“We’ll be fine, I promise.”
“I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
Apollo stroked Clay’s hand with his thumb, and they fell into a comfortable silence. Just before Clay’s thoughts could wander to thoughts of Starbuck, and the case...
Suddenly, Apollo shot up. “Oh my god.”
Clay jumped. “What?”
“Sorry for scaring you, shit– You’ve been awake, like, a half hour already. I should’ve–” He covered his face with his hands. “I’m an idiot. The doctor told me to come get her when you woke up, and…”
Clay grinned. “Couldn’t tear yourself away from me?”
“Guess not. I don’t look like I’ve been crying too much, right? Wait, no, don’t answer that. It doesn’t matter, and I don’t think I’ll want to know the answer anyway. I’ll be right back.” Apollo made to turn and to the door, but Clay caught the hem of his jacket with his fingertips.
“Hey, wait.”
Apollo turned back around. “Wait?”
The corners of Clay’s lips turned up.
Apollo sighed, rolled his eyes, but smiled, and leaned down to press a short kiss to Clay’s lips. As he pulled away, Clay made a soft noise of protest and kept a grip on his shirt collar. “What, that’s it?”
Apollo nodded. “Yeah. Until I get the clear that you’re not still dying, I’m not going to kiss you breathless.”
Clay pouted, just a little, and--
“Okay, fine, you win,” Apollo said. “One more kiss.”
With the second and, Clay noted, slightly longer kiss complete, he relinquished his hold on Apollo’s collar. “You totally look like you’ve been bawling your eyes out, babe. Go find the doctor.” He leaned up, stole one last brush of their lips, and gave a gentle shove. “I love you.”
“I love you, too.” With that, Apollo made his way back to the door and out.
“Wait,” Clay said. “One more thing.”
Apollo stuck his head back in. “What?”
“That’s my jacket, isn’t it?” he teased.
Apollo rolled his eyes and shook his head. As he walked out, he called behind him, without any real anger.
“Oh, piss off. You’re not using it right now, anyway.”
Clay snorted.
“That’s really cute, Apollo.”
“Save it, Clay.”