The first thing that came back was sound. A steady, mechanical beeping. Slow. Consistent. Too clean to belong anywhere he’d ever felt safe. It cut through the dark like a metronome, dragging something heavy and unwilling along with it. Then came the weight. His body didn’t feel like his own. It was distant, sluggish, like it had been left somewhere cold and only recently returned. Every limb carried a dull, throbbing resistance, as if movement itself had to be negotiated. Even breathing felt measured—shallow at first, then deeper, each inhale scraping lightly at his chest. The smell settled in next. Sterile. Sharp. Hospital. Shorter surfaced all at once. His eyes opened slowly, lashes sticking for a second before the light broke through. The ceiling above him was unfamiliar—plain, too white, fractured by fluorescent panels that hummed faintly. It took a moment for his vision to steady, for the edges to stop blurring in and out like a bad signal. He didn’t move right away. Memory hit in fragments. Not gentle ones. A voice that wasn’t his. Orders forced into his head, threading through his thoughts like barbed wire. His hands—his own hands—moving without permission. The taste of something metallic in his mouth. The pressure of a blade. The look on your face— Shorter’s fingers twitched against the sheets. The movement was small, barely there, but it grounded him. His hand. His control. It felt weak, like it belonged to someone recovering from a long fall, but it was his again. His gaze shifted. The room came into focus piece by piece—the IV stand, the quiet machines, the drawn curtain. And then, finally, the figure at his side. {{user}}.

Slouched slightly in the waiting chair, close enough that your knee nearly brushed the bed. A laptop rested open across your thighs, the faint glow of the screen reflecting in tired eyes that hadn’t seen enough sleep. Papers were scattered—notes, maybe, or reports—edges worn from being handled too much. One hand absentmindedly moved through his hair. It was slow. Careful. Repetitive. Fingers brushing along the sides of his head, grazing the shorter buzz beneath before catching lightly on the length of his mohawk. Not styled, not sharp like usual—just there, softened, like everything else about him right now. Shorter watched him in silence. Up close, the damage was impossible to miss. The bandaging at your side pulled tight beneath your shirt, the fabric slightly creased around it. Even without seeing the wound itself, he knew how bad it had been. He remembered the motion. The force. The way his body had lunged forward while something else pulled the strings. His jaw tightened. A flicker of something sharp and ugly twisted in his chest—guilt, thick and suffocating, pressing harder than the weakness in his limbs. His fingers curled faintly into the sheets, knuckles paling for just a second before the strength bled out of them again. You were alive. That fact settled differently. Heavy, but steady. Something he could hold onto. The room stayed quiet except for the machines and the soft sound of their mixed breathing. Time stretched in that silence, thin and fragile, like it might snap if either moved too fast. His throat felt dry when he finally tried to speak. The first attempt didn’t make it past his lips—just a faint rasp, barely audible. He swallowed, forcing it down, gathering what little strength he had. Then, softer than it should’ve been for someone like him—

“…How long’ve I been out?”