silenttrainbaby | arrival (closed to Curtis)

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arrival (closed to Curtis)

The pain wasn't bad, not really. As he'd trained, he'd been hurt a lot, muscles and joints bruised and bones nearly broken. He's used to pain. This - this pain he felt now - was nothing new, not really. It was just more final and Grey knew it. Since Gilliam was dead, this - death - was nearly a relief. He'd done what he could to help Curtis, to avenge Gilliam's death. Nothing more could be done. As he felt the knife press into his chest, he sank into oblivion.

Only to wake up with a start at the train seeming to have stopped. He was on the floor, of course. The pain woke up a second later and he hissed out between clenched teeth. He pulled and realized that the knife was still lodged through his right hand. That hand throbbed and his entire body felt as if he had been been through too much, worse than any training session. His left hand hung from his wrist uselessly. He forced his eyes open and stared at the ceiling of the steam car of the train.

Where was the old man in the suit?, he suddenly wondered, the one who had been fighting him? Grey's vigilance forced him to sitting, ready for more fighting despite the pain. He pushed the knife from his hand and held it, even if the pain seared through his palm, his left hand still hung loosely; the wrist was broken. It didn't mattier. Surely, if the train had stopped, he must be ready for anything. He pushed to his feet and forward in the train, it not yet occurring to him to go outside the car. After all, wasn't the world still frozen?

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Curtis let the quiet stretch on, keeping his eye on the door, the exits, a habit he'd probably never break.

When a nurse finally stepped out, frowning at a file in her hands, and called for a Mr. Grey, Curtis huffed out a breath, something almost akin to a laugh, and got to his feet.

"Come on," he said, hand on Grey's arm to help him up, "That's you."

Eyes opening, Grey pushed himself to his feet, hissing out another sound. The ache seemed to be settling into his bones. The coverings on his feet slid along the shiny tiles as he moved as directed.

At the sight of the nurse, he stiffened, just a little. A stranger.

As soon as they were through the door, the nurse started asking questions and offering sympathetic platitudes for Grey's current state. She looked at him expectantly, waiting for a reply, her eyes flickering nervously toward Curtis' looming presence.

"He doesn't talk," Curtis said flatly. Wouldn't, couldn't. He'd never known why, had never asked. Someone knew, Curtis was sure. Probably Gilliam. Probably Wilford, the bastard.

"Oh," she said, frowning as she jotted something down on her file. "Are you his...?"

"Friend," Curtis said, even though that wasn't entirely true. There wasn't really a word for what they'd all been to each other. "I'm his friend."

While Grey didn't duck behind Curtis, he stood close, even if he was swaying on his feet. His gaze might even have been a disconcerting, it was so steady and unblinking (the focus helped keep him from falling).

Someone tried to take his coat and he snatched at it, pulling away, the motion causing a jolt of pain to rock him.

They were lead behind a curtain, where a sterile hospital bed waited, machines and equipment Grey would've never encountered.

"Let them take it," Curtis said firmly, calmly, as he claimed a place against the wall, relatively out of the way. "I'll hold onto it, you'll get it back."

It was all he had. Gilliam had found it for him. Reflexively, he held it closer, but Curtis's orders, he was used to following.

He handed it over and his knife too, meeting Curtis's eyes.

"You'll get it back," he promised again, his tone softening almost imperceptibly.

It stank. Like the train. Like they all had. But he slid the knife into a pocket and held the coat against his chest anyway.

There was murmuring and talk and Grey was urged by sterile strangers toward the spindly white bed. Against the clean, he looked dirtier, scrawnier, darker. Someone pressed something to his chest and he winced, hissing, flinching, hands flexing. He looked to Curtis, trying to ground himself there.

He didn't say anything, but he gave a faint but reassuring nod, watching intently as the nurses checked the kid over, ready to intervene if he had to.

He needed x-rays, they said, even though you could take one fucking look at that wrist and see that it was broken.

Curtis gritted his teeth. They were in for a long night.

None of what they were saying made any sense; it all sounded like noise to Grey. One of the "nurses" wrinkled her nose at how he smelled, how dirty he was. She, on the other hand, was too clean, too vulnerable.

He was tugged gently to stand, for the "x-rays." Where were they taking him?! Panic showed on his face; he started to struggle.

"Grey," Curtis said, taking a step forward, trying to draw the younger man's attention back to him, "They're going to look at your arm. You're going to need to let them, or it's not going to heal right, you know that."

They'd seen what happened, in the tail, when injuries weren't treated properly. A break like that could cripple a person for life.

And one of them needed two good arms.

The nurse, the one who'd led them back, looked between the two of them with big, sympathetic eyes and said softly, "You can go back with him, if it'll be better for him. We'll put you in a lead apron, you'll be fine."

Grey kept looking at Curtis, barely blinking. His heart was beating hard and fast, tension radiating off him.

They needed to do this to heal him? If Curtis was going with him, then Grey would go.

He let himself be led, turning to make sure Curtis followed.

The room was cavernous, daunting even for Curtis, gray walls and an ominous machine filling up the center.

"We're just going to take a picture. Okay, hon?" the nurse said, as if she were talking to a young child, "You won't feel a thing."

She handed Curtis the apron, and setting Grey's jacket down nearby, he slipped the apron awkwardly over his head, fumbling one-armed with the strap.

If Grey kept his eyes on Curtis, he was all right; he could control his breathing and his pulse. The machine hummed in a different way from the Train.

They guided his broken wrist toward it and he gritted his teeth, a low, inarticulate hum escaping.

From the far corner, Curtis kept a watchful eye, trying not to let his own anxiousness show. After over two weeks trapped in this place, he'd been reminded why people hated hospitals. Why he'd hated hospitals, a lifetime ago.

"Last one," the technician chirped, changing out the film and then ducking behind the shield as the machine clicked and hummed.

"Alright," she said, moving to help Grey to his feet. "You can go back to the room. We'll have the doctor look at these."

Yanking off the lead apron, Curtis tossed it aside and retrieved Grey's coat.

Nodding for Grey to follow, he made his way back to the little room they'd been in, tugging the curtain shut around them. For now, they were alone, surrounded by the sound of nurses and patients bustled around, the curtains fluttered as they hurried past.

"This is gonna take a while," he explained. Doctors always did.

Fatigue, that pounding headache, the pain, it all made Grey feel dull, while the fear and strangeness of the place made his skin feel too thin. He nodded, though, standing in the middle of the room. Each movement of the curtain was felt in his nerves.

"Sit down before you keel over," he said, laying Grey's coat over the back of an empty chair.

"If I leave you here for a minute, you're gonna be okay, right? I'll be right down the hall. You don't need to do anything but just sit here while I'm gone."

Sit. Grey looked around, then sat on the padded, pristine bed in his grungy track pants. He nodded. He'd sit.

Rummaging in his pocket, Curtis pulled out a handful of crumpled bills and change, fumbling to keep from dropping them as he hurried to the vending machines he'd seen on the way to the X-Ray room.

It was a struggle, juggling it all one-handed, but he ended up with two bottles of water, a couple of protein bars and packs of crackers, and on a whim, a bag of knock-off, Darrow M&Ms, clinched between his teeth.

Slipping back through the curtain, he dumped everything down on the bed.

Cracking open a bottle of water with his teeth, he held it out near Grey's lips, offering him a sip.

Eyes still locked on Curtis's face (a habit since he was a child; reading expressions for how to react), Grey tilted his chin up, taking a sip.

It was cold - so cold! - and crisp and fresh and he nearly choked on it before drinking again, swallowing as much as he could.

"Careful," Curtis murmured, letting Grey drink his fill and then setting the bottle aside.

Tearing open one of the protein bars with his teeth, he handed it over, saying, "You should eat something."

It was the chewy kind, hopefully not too hard or too rich. After a lifetime of the train's gelatinous protein blocks, Curtis had already learned the hard way that their stomachs were a little finicky.

Grey wouldn't know the words, but his extreme dehydration made the cold of the water chill him; goosebumps covered him and he shivered. Holding the bar, then, in his cut hand, he watched Curtis's faced as he smelled it. It didn't smell like anything he knew. His expression grew quizzical as he took a small bite.

Tearing open his own, Curtis took a bigger bite of his protein bar, trying to show the kid that it wouldn't hurt him.

Sitting down on the bed next to Grey, Curtis ate his food in silence, watching out of the corner of his eye as Grey experienced food as he'd known it seventeen years ago. Prepacked snacks and junk food and everything easily accessible, though not always cheap.

He'd bought a box of Cheerios, the other day. He hadn't really known what to do about how standing in the cereal aisle at the grocery store had made him feel.

When Curtis took a bite, Grey took a bite. Even the texture on his tongue was different, the sweetness, strange, making his mouth water. He chewed just as slowly, then he swallowed and he took another bite. He wasn't sure he liked this, but fuel, he knew, was fuel.

Finish off the bar, Curtis tossed the wrapper into a nearby trashcan and then offered Grey some more water.

Just then, the curtain swept back and an ER nurse swept in to stitch up Grey's hand and check it over for any damage to the tendons. Shifting off of the bed, Curtis took his place in the chair, out of the way.

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