* * *

What’s taking so long? Sarah checked her watch again.

Wait a minute. Robyn had gone out with her friends, and Jeremy wouldn’t be awake yet this early on a weekend—anything before noon was too early for him. Her parents had just left for the grocery store. So what—or who—was she waiting for?

Someone screamed in the distance and she whirled around, searching. Sarah checked the TV to see if it was somehow on without any picture. A flicker of light appeared in the would-be reflection.

Sarah sucked in a breath.

The air burned her throat and lungs.

Her legs gave out, and she fell to the floor, wheezing and coughing.

The house was gone, hidden in a thick cloud of dust and smoke. An enormous wall had replaced her kitchen, a trail of blood leading towards where her room had been. Before she passed out, she saw patterns—letters?—come alive in the scorched, darkened wall.

* * *

Sarah held in a cough as she choked on nothing. She reached for her water without looking away from the screen, which was suddenly very blurry. No, not the screen… definitely her eyesight.

She closed her eyes, pinching the bridge of her nose. It hadn’t been that long since she’d started reading, she couldn’t be tired already.

Despite a nice start, her Saturday had quickly gotten sidetracked. Pegasus, Scorpion, and Mermaid had been urgently called away because of a suspected sighting of New Nation members at a robbery in progress that the local police had been called to. Of course, that happened about an hour before the start of Pegasus’ scheduled down time.

It was supposed to be a quick assignment, but she wasn’t too thrilled with the timing.

Now here she was, battling a growing sense of unease while going over reports in a flowery summer dress. One of Robyn’s. Sarah no longer had anything that frivolous—or pretty. She didn’t think she looked like herself, but that was half the point.

Cold fingertips clutched the skirt of her dress. She couldn’t possibly be nervous about going outside, could she?

It had been almost two hours since she’d last heard anything about Pegasus. Not for the first time, she caught herself reaching for the com. There was no reason to call anyone. He was fine, she reminded herself, shivering at the odd sense of déjà vu.

She’d thought that once before about her sister. Look how that turned out.

The alarm sent her to her feet with a start. It took her a moment to realize it wasn’t that horrifying sound that signaled impending death, but the shorter bursts stating that wounded were coming in.

Sarah rushed to medical, barely stopping herself from bursting through the open doors.

Pegasus was lying on a stretcher as nurses cut his shirt out of the way.

A sickening feeling churned in the depths of stomach, mixing with the cold. Sarah approached slowly, afraid of what she would find.

And then it was as if the air wasn’t so hard to breathe after all. He was conscious, if a little dazed. He was holding something to his temple with his right hand while another nurse cleaned up his left arm.

“What happened?” Sarah asked.

There was a moderate amount of blood around his temple, both dried and fresh, and his left arm had several small bleeding wounds.

Pegasus waved off her concern with his free hand, which apparently hurt. That got him a scowl from the nurse.

Sarah came closer, careful to stay out of the way. “I told you not to get shot.”

“You didn’t say anything about shrapnel.”

Sarah couldn’t even take the joke as a sign that he was fine; he’d probably be making jokes on his deathbed.

“It’s not as bad as it looks,” he said, but the trail of dried blood she could now see down his cheek was difficult to ignore.

One of the nurses asked Sarah to wait outside and she retreated—albeit reluctantly—back to the hallway. Scorpion was there, nursing a sore spot on her arm. The yellowing bruise looked a few days old.

“What happened out there?” Sarah asked.

Scorpion took in Sarah’s attire with a long look. “Something went boom.”

“New Nation?”

“Not that we can tell. All’s pretty quiet on our front. You can still head out if you want.”

She shook her head. “I’d rather wait to make sure Pegasus is okay.”

“Suit yourself.”

Muttering something about debriefing, Scorpion walked away.

Sarah hung around for a couple of minutes while they prepped Pegasus. Once they’d taken him into the O.R. to remove the shrapnel still lodged in his arm, she left to go finish her reports.

She could come pick him up later. It wasn’t as if he’d be going anywhere any time soon.

* * *

Pegasus thought it would be very helpful if the floor and walls stopped moving. He stumbled along the corridor, finding it extremely difficult to walk and fold his jacket at the same time. A strange sort of stop and go motion reminded him of old-fashioned clay animations. He took a couple more exaggerated steps and laughed at his halting movements.

“Should they have let you wander off unsupervised?”

He turned around very slowly so he wouldn’t lose his balance, taking the time to school his expression before he had to face Scorpion. “Don’t I look okay?”

“You always do. That’s the problem,” Scorpion said. “Phoenix was worried.”

He scoffed at the change in her tone. “You don’t think she should be?”

“She’s not Robyn.”

“I know that very well.” His feelings were obviously capable of making that distinction as well.

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

“Then you should be careful with your heart.”

“Don’t worry, no one could ever do as good a job at breaking it as you did. Or was that the lesson I should’ve learned?”

She reeled in her anger with obvious strain. “I should know better than waste my time talking to you when you’re like this.”

Whether she meant to or not, she touched a nerve. He felt the words form, leaving an almost bitter taste in his mouth. “I guess some things are more trouble than they’re worth.”

Scorpion stopped cold, unsheathed anger now clear in her expression. “You don’t get to say that to me.”

He held his ground, trying for cold as he matched her glare. “Why not, Belle? You said it to me first.”

She had bridged the distance between them before he could react and grabbed him by the shoulders. The pain oozed past the haze created by the fading anesthetic—maybe that was the intention.

For a moment, he thought she was going to hit him, but she shook him instead, as if trying to wake him from a stupor.

“You really, really need to get some sleep. Now.” She shoved him back and for the lack of a better option, he let her.

Unsure how easy it would be to get up if he wound up on the floor, he was glad the wall was there to catch him.

Watching Scorpion walk away, he cursed himself for still being so angry, so easily hurt by her words. He didn’t understand what he’d ever done to make her hate him.

When he was sure he had regained his balance, he resumed the trek to his room. Maybe he should have stayed in the infirmary a while longer like the doctor ordered, but now it was easier to keep going than head back.

Besides, he’d made a bet with Doc Green that he could make it to his room before giving up—or collapsing.

* * *

Sarah stood further down the hall, glued in place. She didn’t think Pegasus had seen her. Scorpion hadn’t, distracted as she was with almost throttling him.

When he started moving again, Sarah approached him with hesitant steps. “Do you want help?”

He shook his head. “She’s right. I need some sleep.”

Sarah didn’t say anything about it, not wanting to ask about the argument.

“How is it they let you leave the infirmary?”

An unrepentant smile came suddenly to life as he turned to her. “Lack of options.”

“Well, sleep sounds like a good one.”

He placed a hand on her shoulder, but put no weight on her. “C’mon, I’ll let you tuck me in.”

“How long until the meds wear off?”

“How should I know? Wait, Doc Brown said minutes, hours. One or two maybe. And he said something about my liver.”

“What happened to your liver?”

“Toxic gas made a mess of it a while back.” He struggled with that. “Or was that my kidneys? I’m not sure right now, ask me when I’m awake.”

His movements were so slow when typing in the code to his door that she was caught off guard when he pulled her into the room the next moment, not even a hint of disorientation left.

He smiled. “You look really beautiful.”

“And they say you’re mean when you’re dosed.”

He shook his head, then raised a finger to touch the bandage on the side of his head as if he’d upset it. Scorpion probably hadn’t helped matters. “I’m sorry I spoiled our outing.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” she said, resisting the urge to check if he was bleeding. Then she narrowed her gaze playfully. “Unless… Did you try to get blown up on purpose just to get out of it?”

He laughed, swaying a little.

Sarah took a step closer, preparing to catch him if necessary. “Do you want me to stay with you until you’re feeling better, or are you going to go to sleep?”

He smiled at her with nothing but mischief. “Yes.”

Sarah barely had time to register his answer before he pulled her closer and kissed her. She responded automatically, as if it were the most natural thing in the world for her to kiss him back. Maybe she could blame her response on a few seconds of system malfunction, but finally she pulled away.

She stared at him, unsure of whether he was conscious enough of what he was doing to give her an explanation.

“What was that?” She was surprised she’d managed to pull away. She was even more surprised that her voice was steady.

“I’ve wanted to do that ever since you came back.”

He sounded sincere, but she kept some distance between them, perfectly aware that he was not functioning properly at the moment.

“Then why didn’t you?”

“It never felt like the right time.”

He appeared to be awake enough, but she’d seen him overworked and sleep-deprived enough times to know he could be a second from being unconscious and still look lucid.

The mask of normalcy he’d been struggling to maintain finally slipped away, and he pressed a hand against his forehead, eyes closing. “This wasn’t it, was it?”

“This wasn’t what?”

Clear blue eyes met hers. “The right time…”

Sarah exhaled a deep breath, tried for a smile. “What did the doc give you?”

He started to shrug, but the movement never completed, pain flashing across his face.

Sarah moved him towards the light. “Let me check your bandage.”

“It’s fine,” he protested, nevertheless allowing her to do as she pleased.

The only blood there was from earlier. She made sure the bandage was firmly in place before releasing him again. His eyes were half-closed, though he was somehow still upright.

She gestured towards the bed. “You should get some sleep.”

“Then you’ll forget this happened,” he protested, but he didn’t pursue her when she moved further away.

“That’s not how it works.” How scrambled was his brain right now? “Don’t worry, I won’t forget.” This would take a while to forget, if ever.

“I will.” He climbed into bed with very slow motions. “I always do.”

She couldn’t help a sudden twitch of jealousy. Was that why Scorpion was upset with him?

“So you make it a habit of going around kissing random girls when you’re like this?”

Hopefully he was out of it enough that he wouldn’t notice the trembling in her voice.

He shook his head, burying it deeper into his pillow. “Just the one I can’t stop thinking about.”

She froze at that, standing perfectly still until his breathing relaxed and she was sure he was asleep. Then she all but darted out of his room.

She took a moment to catch her breath right outside the closed door, trying to contain the silly smile that had blossomed spontaneously from his words. She gave the end of the corridor a surreptitious glance, wondering what anyone looking at the cameras might think.

His words kept coming back to her, inciting the smile back to its place.

Work. She could focus on work.

After a few more tries, she finally succeeded on wiping away her silly grin.

At least she didn’t have to worry about him anymore. Pegasus was fine, unbalanced as he may be at the moment.

Right. Work.

Sarah headed back up to Comm, where she struggled to finish reviewing the reports on New Nation activity she’d been looking at earlier.

“Are you going undercover or something?” Mermaid asked.

Sarah looked up at her, surprised. Contrary to Pegasus and Scorpion, Mermaid looked like she’d been lazing around all day.

Mermaid gestured to Sarah’s dress, laughing.

She’d forgotten about the dress. “I was going out.”

Unicorn pulled her chair next to Sarah’s. “Pegasus put a damper on her plans by getting injured.”

“So thoughtless of him,” Mermaid mocked.

“I forgot to go change,” Sarah said self-consciously.

Mermaid waved it off. “No one’s going to care. You’re on down time, right?”

“Theoretically.”

A tablet was all but smacked onto the table in front of them, getting even Cypher’s attention a few feet away. Scorpion was standing there, fuming.

Mermaid and Unicorn looked up at her with equally confused expressions, and Sarah tried very hard to pretend she wasn’t there.

“Do I have to guess?” Mermaid asked when Scorpion said nothing.

“What does dosed, drunk, and sleep-deprived have in common?”

“Ds?” Cypher asked, snorting out a laugh.

Scorpion glared at him and he went back to whatever it was he’d been doing.

Unicorn tapped her chin lightly. “Is Pegasus not himself again?”

Scorpion’s expression signaled murder. “He’s himself alright, that’s the problem.”

“They gave him something so they could remove the shrapnel from his arm,” Mermaid explained. Then she laughed. “I suspect Doc Green gave him something long-lasting so he’d get some obligatory rest.”

“Is he aware of what he’s saying?” Sarah asked, trying to sound unaffected.

“Oh, he can function fine, he’s just mean about it.”

Sarah stared at Scorpion’s retreating figure until she disappeared into the elevator before turning her confused gaze towards the other two.

“A while back, Scorpion and Pegasus had a thing,” Mermaid whispered as if that were an explanation in and of itself.

Sarah couldn’t disguise her shock.

“A thing?” Unicorn smoothed the curls atop her head as she leaned in closer. “If you’re gonna gossip, at least do it right. People were even expecting them to leave this place together, and then there was a hostage thing.”

Mermaid shook her head. “No, it was that raid at the New Nation propaganda machine.”

“Where there were hostages.”

“Oh, right. Sorry, go on.”

“Well, he deviated from the mission. It wound up saving Scorpion’s life, but we lost an important lead. It created all kinds of headache because they were together at the time. Zeus had to smooth it all over, but nobody was angrier than Scorpion. I think that was sort of the beginning of the end for them.”

“She broke his heart,” Mermaid said with a knowing look towards Unicorn. “Then stomped on it.”

Unicorn nodded. “He was in a foul mood for weeks, reckless and crazy.”

“Well, and then Robyn died.”

They each gave Sarah a sympathetic look, apologizing for the pain carried by those words.

“And that sort of blended his bad days all together into a few months.”

Sarah frowned. She didn’t remember him being in any particular bad mood when they met. But then she hadn’t been completely herself either.

“It took him a while to recover after that. Sometimes I’m still not sure he has.”

“Well, with Robyn gone,” Mermaid said. “I don’t think he really had anyone he was that close to.”

Sarah felt a sudden pang of guilt about the times she didn’t reply to his messages. They had probably been as much for his benefit as they’d been for hers. At the time, she’d thought he’d been only checking up on her.

“Did he say something to you?” Unicorn placed a hand on Sarah’s arm, sounding as if she already knew the answer to that. “Don’t mind it too much.”

Mermaid nodded. “Yeah, he’s always that way when there’s something wrong with him. He’s harmless enough as long as you don’t pay attention to whatever it is.”

“It’s fine,” Sarah lied. “I think he was just having some fun at my expense.”