Enigma Khlyen
Disclaimer: Being the property of their respective copyright holders, Killjoys, its characters or any other publicly recognizable names don’t belong to me in any way, shape or form. This was written for the sole purpose of entertainment, not monetary gain. No copyright infringement is intended.
A/N: Muchísimas gracias to my twin sister twinchy for the beta and my dear friend Paris for strong-arming me into watching this show!
Published: 10/05/2021
Summary:
Turin liked to think of himself as being in charge. However, Karma had a way of contending his control was an illusion. Thanks to Team Awesome Force and a mysterious murderous maniac, his day had gone to hells in a hand basket.
Missing scene: The chat between Khlyen and Turin after 1.09 ‘Enemy Khlyen’.
Word Count: 2,788
Spoilers: through 1.09, ‘Enemy Khlyen’ (obviously)
Warnings: Canon-typical violence and foul language
Lying in a puddle of blood, Turin had to admit he didn’t expect for his attacker to show up again and drag him away into his lair. So much for letting him die in peace; not that the commander of the RAC was keen on dying in the first place. Being run through with a machete by that maniac in this godsforsaken hangar and then left for dead seemed to seal the deal though. Maybe he had gone too far shooting Dutch, and damn obviously he had vastly overestimated his ability to control the situation using her as bait. Well, technically it had worked, his brain helpfully supplied. After all, he had indeed drawn out the man pulling the strings behind the gods damned curtain.
A coughing fit wrecked through his body, ugly and wet, momentarily stealing his panting breaths away and disrupting his inner ramblings. Crimson droplets spattered from his mouth and the pain went from excruciating to unbearable while his chest constricted. Something was definitely wrong inside; not that the swiftly growing pool of his own damn blood hadn’t tipped him off to that fact. His vision greyed out, and for a few glorious seconds Turin fruitlessly hoped for unconsciousness to finally claim him. A bitter taste of glee washed over him at the thought of spoiling his would-be murderer’s interrogation. When the black spots in his vision started to recede and his mind slowly cleared though, he knew he wouldn’t be let off the hook so easily. Just his shitty luck!
After the first few steps, the redheaded leader of the Killjoys had given up his futile protests at being dragged by the scruff of his neck, choosing to preserve his strength and dignity for the confrontation ahead. The trip in the elevator was surprisingly short; or he might have zoned out for a bit. The arrival on one of the topmost floors was followed by a brief trek across a nondescript, dark corridor before they entered a spacious but sparsely furnished and dimly lit room. Shit-tits on a string, what was it with murderous villains and their ominous mood-lighting?!
Once inside, Turin was unceremoniously tossed on the ground, dropped like a discarded toy. Failing to break the fall in his weakened state, a drawn-out groan escaped him at the impact and sudden shift in orientation. The mysterious stranger kept walking, not even sparing his prisoner so much as a glance before leaving the room altogether. The commander of the RAC knew the reprieve was short-lived and he should not let this opportunity go to waste. He should assess the room, scan its contents for any kind of object or device which could serve as a half-assed weapon. Yet, he did nothing. The simple, terrible truth was, Turin was too weak to do much of anything. Instead, he lay shivering on the bare floor, feebly gasping for air and waiting for his tormentor’s inevitable return. Besides, he seriously doubted he stood the slightest chance of successfully escaping from wherever the stranger had taken him. This part of the RAC was clearly his realm, and Turin was a helpless fly entangled in the spider’s web.
A mere minute later, determined foot steps hailed his captor’s imminent approach before strong, calloused hands seized the injured man by the shoulder and roughly manhandled him onto his side. What felt like balled-up fabric doused with some kind of cool liquid that stung like hells was pressed compassionlessly to his stab wound in the back. Then he was rolled onto his back again and the process repeated non-too-gently on the wound in the front, just below his ribcage. The biting pain temporarily roused him from his stupor, his alertness rising up a notch.
“Now we talk.” Satisfaction seemed to colour the stranger’s otherwise dispassionate tone.
“I have nothing to say to you, asshole,” Turin grit out as forcefully as he could while at the same time seriously questioning the wisdom of running his mouth, again. His loose tongue had earned him the displeasure of this audience in the first place.
“A pity,” the other man replied unsympathetically. “Of course I could always chemically make you talk,” he conceded, “but where is the fun in that?!” The predatory half-smile left no doubt in the ginger’s pain-addled mind that the arrogant bastard had the means and intention to back up his words. “You should consider, I have you conveniently incapacitated, in pain but otherwise fully conscious. Your injury is not fatal, not immediately anyway. I can make this last for a very long time.”
Running the risk of revealing hard-earned strategic information warred with Turin’s instinct for self-preservation in this shitty, uneven power play. Still, if he kept thoroughly pissing off his assailant, the painstakingly slow process he had undertaken of gathering relevant information about the infiltration of the RAC would only be paralleled by his agonizing death. Who said there was a lesser of two evils, gods damn-it?
Reluctantly coming to an uneasy decision, the commander ground out, “You are the shithead secretly pulling the strings in my RAC.”
“Your RAC?” the black-clad man scoffed derisively but let the matter drop. Exuding an air of superiority and continuing in a slightly less confrontational tone of voice, he whispered conspiratorially, “Oh, I am so much more than that. My name is Khlyen Kin Rit of Land Kin Rit, member of one of the noble families on Qresh. I am the enemy but I am also your closest ally in the upcoming war. A war you are not yet even aware is on your door step.”
Turin’s foggy brain stuttered through processing Khlyen’s ominous words. Kin Rit, he had heard the name before, with ties to the uninhabitable moon Arkyn, but that part of history was centuries ago if memory served. The geezer should be long dead and buried not leisurely kneeling over him. Yet, the most disturbing piece of news was undoubtedly the last part. A looming war; it wasn’t a surprise exactly but having his suspicions confirmed was another story entirely. This fustercluck of a situation was getting better by the minute.
Evidently oblivious to his captive still being hung up on the last bits of information, the grey-haired man purposefully kept talking, leaving Turin’s sluggish mind desperately trying to keep up with the discussion.
Just barely managing to not completely lose track of what was being said, the commander of the RAC was already drifting for some time, the conversation coalescing through a thick haze, his brain always a step behind. Lately however, the words had stopped making sense altogether. Although the uncontrollable shivering from shock and blood loss had lessened considerably, his failing body had gone oddly numb, seemingly melting into the cold floor, his eyes lethargically fluttering shut.
“Not so fast. We’re not done yet!” His tormentor’s raised voice was followed by a sharp prick in his neck. The stimulant raged through Turin’s body, setting every fibre on fire and leaving nothing but scorched nerve endings in its wake. Then a vicious rubbing pain assaulted his sternum and the long-haired leader of the Killjoys resurfaced with a strangled gasp.
“Don’t you dare!” Khlyen hissed in warning, demanding attention as soon as the recently-revived man’s eyes focused once again.
~~~~~
The discussion carried on for a little while longer, edging more and more towards a monologue as Turin’s alertness slowly began to ebb with the ticks of passing minutes.
“What does all of this shit have to do with Dutch?” the redhead interjected cautiously before the mysterious figure could continue his tirade. “How is she involved in this gods-damned scheme? And why are you protecting her?”
For a second, displeased annoyance passed over Kin Rit’s face at the impertinence of being rudely interrupted. Ultimately, he thought better of it and elected to indulge his prisoner. “Yalena, or Dutch as she calls herself nowadays, and I go way back. I raised her, trained her, guided her. She is my weapon for the coming war and everyone in our way will face the consequences. I do not tolerate stupidity or incompetence that may potentially doom the whole Quad and all of humanity. Raising your hand against her was a mistake you will not make twice. Up until now I have allowed you to stay in charge of the RAC because you have proven useful and adequately capable of handling Yala.”
A mirthless, almost hysterical grunt erupted from Turin’s chest that was supposed to be a snort but leaned heavily towards a pitiful wheeze instead. Damn, he was at his last rope.
“Listen carefully, I am done playing games.” The deceitfully calm syllables melted into a warning that screamed danger and Turin swatted feebly at the fist in his collar. “I can do so much worse than this if you refuse to cooperate,” Khlyen threatened menacingly.
Delirious with pain, blood loss and an incessantly spreading lethargy, the smaller man’s attention waned and his eyelids were on the verge of sliding closed without blinking open again. Apparently realizing the futility of continuing the conversation and every bit a member of the noble families, the grey-haired man roughly grabbed Turin’s chin and mercilessly shoved his head to the side, exposing the injured man’s vulnerable neck. A needle was brutally stabbed into its unprotected side and the ginger’s heart raced with plain terror, ragged breaths rattling in his lungs as the drug began taking effect.
“You can rest now. We are done here.” Khlyen’s expression did nothing to assuage the dread of Turin’s final moments. Barely holding onto the last vestiges of awareness, foot steps announced the arrival of another person in the room. Drifting away, the Killjoys’ leader hardly made out the command, words cold and detached, “Najik, take care of him. And clean up this mess!” Then his consciousness diluted into nothingness.
~~~~~
Turin was floating on a wave of oblivion for an indistinct amount of time. Awareness crawling back to him in infinitesimally small increments. Unconnected notions filtered through his mind, never quite forming a complete thought. He lingered in this cocoon of warmth and contentment. The bizarre bubble never actually popped, rather the coalescing walls became more translucent as time passed. With supreme effort, he struggled his eye lids open to half-slits, nothing immediately registering to his unseeing eyes. The uneven pressure eventually clued him in on the fact that he was lying on his side but the reason why this was important eluded him.
From one moment to the next, the air seemed to shift around him and shadows began dancing in his peripheral vision. It took him an embarrassingly long time to realize someone must have entered the room and started bustling about. There was a second of hesitation in the commotion, then the flurry of activity resumed. Sudden warmth spread through his tired body. Eyes gradually closing once more, his tenuous grip on consciousness washed away.
~~~~~
When the commander of the RAC inched towards wakefulness again, the quality of the air was fundamentally different, yet strangely familiar. Trying to open his eyes took several unsuccessful attempts, and even then, he needed unreasonably long to identify the visual of his surroundings: his own quarters.
He was once again lying on his side, a cushion propped at his back to keep him from rolling over. Straining to move, his leaden limbs were entirely loath to cooperate. When he finally managed to will his defiant body into obedience, a dull pain bloomed in his chest and back, bringing the stabbing and subsequent shit-fest of a tête-à-tête fresh into his mind. A trembling hand wandered searchingly underneath the top of the lose scrubs to the patch of gauze just below his ribcage. How he was still alive after this gruesome experience was utterly beyond him.
Taking stock, his mouth was parched and his tongue tasted like some undisclosed sand creature from the badlands had frigging died on it. To his surprise and disbelief, a pitcher with water and a clear cup resided on his bedside table. Truth be told, Turin longed for a far stiffer drink than water but seriously doubted the alcohol would mix well with the drugs that probably still coursed through his system. Furthermore, the water was within arm’s reach, whereas the good stuff was in the cabinet above the sink; go figure. So water it was for the moment.
Although feeling like gulping down the whole pitcher in one go, he chose the sensible option of taking small sips and savouring the sensation. His belly grumbled its disapproval at the lukewarm liquid, though he wasn’t quite certain whether it protested the water itself or complained about being ignored for too long. Not in any condition to leave the bed just yet, he dismissed his stomach for now. Eating would have to wait a little while longer still.
Done quenching the most immediate thirst, the slender man gingerly shifted to his other side and snuggled deeper into the mattress as sleep claimed him anew.
~~~~~
The next time Turin woke, he was much more alert, and despite the still lingering discomfort, his traumatized body felt like he had fully settled into it again. With disgust he noticed an ugly, sticky stain on his pillow. He angled his head away from it with a groan.
Steadfastly ignoring the increasing pain at moving himself upright, he pushed forward undeterred. Upon reaching a sitting position, beads of sweat covered his brow, shoulder-length hair sticking to his forehead, and he had to breathe through a bout of nausea and vertigo. Once he had given himself a minute to catch his breath, the redheaded man struggled to his unsteady feet by the skin of his teeth. His one hand had a death grip on the bed frame while his other hand sought purchase against the wall. Legs like jelly and traitorously threatening to fold underneath him, the commander of the RAC began his way towards the bathroom with small, shuffling steps, never letting go of the wall or any other surface which promised even the meagrest of support.
As soon as he had relieved himself, he gathered the last of his strength to embark on the daunting journey back towards the bed, where he could finally rest. In the middle of the trek, his vision started to grey at the edges and each step felt impossibly more difficult than the previous one. Bracing himself for a graceless face-plant in front of the bed, the leader of the Killjoys pressed on, and to his endless relief, made it all the way back, if barely. Completely spent, the long-haired man collapsed bonelessly onto the mattress and burrowed into a fresh spot on the pillow, dragging the comforter over himself.
~~~~~
Feeling fully rested, significantly less achy and honestly, bored out of his skull, Turin shed the blanket and rose to his feet. He discovered slow, measured movements no longer elicited anything more than mild discomfort. Therefore, he decided to take a much-needed shower to wash away the days-old filth and then take it from there. A layman’s inspection of the stitches and a redressing of the wounds was probably in order, too.
When he returned to his bedroom, refreshed and feeling like himself again, he spotted a rumpled bag next to the head of his bed. Warily coming closer, he stiffly leaned down to carefully move aside the fabric and examine the contents. The bag contained his bloodied clothes, his personal effects, and to his utter surprise, his weapon. Damn, seeing the neat pile of blood-drenched clothes felt surreal, even though he had changed the dressings on the stab wounds in his front and back only minutes ago. And heavens be damned, the one in the back required a herculean effort with his still limited range of motion.
After disposing of his clothes from the bag along with the stained bedding, Turin grabbed a bite to eat and tried to find a comfortable spot to lounge on his raggedy couch. Tomorrow he would go back in to work and see how the RAC had fared during his absence.
~~~~~
The next day, the commander threw himself into his work and spent the better part of the day catching up with what he had missed. He mostly kept to himself, derailing any prying questions about his sudden disappearance with one of his signature offensive brush-offs. Just before he was ready to call it a day, the work station in his office lit up with a message from Team Awesome Force of all people, requesting permission to come on board the RAC. Turin fervently wished he had stayed in and taken one more day of sick leave as he sensed an entirely expectable migraine coming on. Damn!
FIN
A/N: Muchísimas gracias to my twin sister twinchy for the beta and my dear friend Paris for strong-arming me into watching this show!
Published: 10/05/2021
Summary:
Turin liked to think of himself as being in charge. However, Karma had a way of contending his control was an illusion. Thanks to Team Awesome Force and a mysterious murderous maniac, his day had gone to hells in a hand basket.
Missing scene: The chat between Khlyen and Turin after 1.09 ‘Enemy Khlyen’.
Word Count: 2,788
Spoilers: through 1.09, ‘Enemy Khlyen’ (obviously)
Warnings: Canon-typical violence and foul language
Lying in a puddle of blood, Turin had to admit he didn’t expect for his attacker to show up again and drag him away into his lair. So much for letting him die in peace; not that the commander of the RAC was keen on dying in the first place. Being run through with a machete by that maniac in this godsforsaken hangar and then left for dead seemed to seal the deal though. Maybe he had gone too far shooting Dutch, and damn obviously he had vastly overestimated his ability to control the situation using her as bait. Well, technically it had worked, his brain helpfully supplied. After all, he had indeed drawn out the man pulling the strings behind the gods damned curtain.
A coughing fit wrecked through his body, ugly and wet, momentarily stealing his panting breaths away and disrupting his inner ramblings. Crimson droplets spattered from his mouth and the pain went from excruciating to unbearable while his chest constricted. Something was definitely wrong inside; not that the swiftly growing pool of his own damn blood hadn’t tipped him off to that fact. His vision greyed out, and for a few glorious seconds Turin fruitlessly hoped for unconsciousness to finally claim him. A bitter taste of glee washed over him at the thought of spoiling his would-be murderer’s interrogation. When the black spots in his vision started to recede and his mind slowly cleared though, he knew he wouldn’t be let off the hook so easily. Just his shitty luck!
After the first few steps, the redheaded leader of the Killjoys had given up his futile protests at being dragged by the scruff of his neck, choosing to preserve his strength and dignity for the confrontation ahead. The trip in the elevator was surprisingly short; or he might have zoned out for a bit. The arrival on one of the topmost floors was followed by a brief trek across a nondescript, dark corridor before they entered a spacious but sparsely furnished and dimly lit room. Shit-tits on a string, what was it with murderous villains and their ominous mood-lighting?!
Once inside, Turin was unceremoniously tossed on the ground, dropped like a discarded toy. Failing to break the fall in his weakened state, a drawn-out groan escaped him at the impact and sudden shift in orientation. The mysterious stranger kept walking, not even sparing his prisoner so much as a glance before leaving the room altogether. The commander of the RAC knew the reprieve was short-lived and he should not let this opportunity go to waste. He should assess the room, scan its contents for any kind of object or device which could serve as a half-assed weapon. Yet, he did nothing. The simple, terrible truth was, Turin was too weak to do much of anything. Instead, he lay shivering on the bare floor, feebly gasping for air and waiting for his tormentor’s inevitable return. Besides, he seriously doubted he stood the slightest chance of successfully escaping from wherever the stranger had taken him. This part of the RAC was clearly his realm, and Turin was a helpless fly entangled in the spider’s web.
A mere minute later, determined foot steps hailed his captor’s imminent approach before strong, calloused hands seized the injured man by the shoulder and roughly manhandled him onto his side. What felt like balled-up fabric doused with some kind of cool liquid that stung like hells was pressed compassionlessly to his stab wound in the back. Then he was rolled onto his back again and the process repeated non-too-gently on the wound in the front, just below his ribcage. The biting pain temporarily roused him from his stupor, his alertness rising up a notch.
“Now we talk.” Satisfaction seemed to colour the stranger’s otherwise dispassionate tone.
“I have nothing to say to you, asshole,” Turin grit out as forcefully as he could while at the same time seriously questioning the wisdom of running his mouth, again. His loose tongue had earned him the displeasure of this audience in the first place.
“A pity,” the other man replied unsympathetically. “Of course I could always chemically make you talk,” he conceded, “but where is the fun in that?!” The predatory half-smile left no doubt in the ginger’s pain-addled mind that the arrogant bastard had the means and intention to back up his words. “You should consider, I have you conveniently incapacitated, in pain but otherwise fully conscious. Your injury is not fatal, not immediately anyway. I can make this last for a very long time.”
Running the risk of revealing hard-earned strategic information warred with Turin’s instinct for self-preservation in this shitty, uneven power play. Still, if he kept thoroughly pissing off his assailant, the painstakingly slow process he had undertaken of gathering relevant information about the infiltration of the RAC would only be paralleled by his agonizing death. Who said there was a lesser of two evils, gods damn-it?
Reluctantly coming to an uneasy decision, the commander ground out, “You are the shithead secretly pulling the strings in my RAC.”
“Your RAC?” the black-clad man scoffed derisively but let the matter drop. Exuding an air of superiority and continuing in a slightly less confrontational tone of voice, he whispered conspiratorially, “Oh, I am so much more than that. My name is Khlyen Kin Rit of Land Kin Rit, member of one of the noble families on Qresh. I am the enemy but I am also your closest ally in the upcoming war. A war you are not yet even aware is on your door step.”
Turin’s foggy brain stuttered through processing Khlyen’s ominous words. Kin Rit, he had heard the name before, with ties to the uninhabitable moon Arkyn, but that part of history was centuries ago if memory served. The geezer should be long dead and buried not leisurely kneeling over him. Yet, the most disturbing piece of news was undoubtedly the last part. A looming war; it wasn’t a surprise exactly but having his suspicions confirmed was another story entirely. This fustercluck of a situation was getting better by the minute.
Evidently oblivious to his captive still being hung up on the last bits of information, the grey-haired man purposefully kept talking, leaving Turin’s sluggish mind desperately trying to keep up with the discussion.
Just barely managing to not completely lose track of what was being said, the commander of the RAC was already drifting for some time, the conversation coalescing through a thick haze, his brain always a step behind. Lately however, the words had stopped making sense altogether. Although the uncontrollable shivering from shock and blood loss had lessened considerably, his failing body had gone oddly numb, seemingly melting into the cold floor, his eyes lethargically fluttering shut.
“Not so fast. We’re not done yet!” His tormentor’s raised voice was followed by a sharp prick in his neck. The stimulant raged through Turin’s body, setting every fibre on fire and leaving nothing but scorched nerve endings in its wake. Then a vicious rubbing pain assaulted his sternum and the long-haired leader of the Killjoys resurfaced with a strangled gasp.
“Don’t you dare!” Khlyen hissed in warning, demanding attention as soon as the recently-revived man’s eyes focused once again.
~~~~~
The discussion carried on for a little while longer, edging more and more towards a monologue as Turin’s alertness slowly began to ebb with the ticks of passing minutes.
“What does all of this shit have to do with Dutch?” the redhead interjected cautiously before the mysterious figure could continue his tirade. “How is she involved in this gods-damned scheme? And why are you protecting her?”
For a second, displeased annoyance passed over Kin Rit’s face at the impertinence of being rudely interrupted. Ultimately, he thought better of it and elected to indulge his prisoner. “Yalena, or Dutch as she calls herself nowadays, and I go way back. I raised her, trained her, guided her. She is my weapon for the coming war and everyone in our way will face the consequences. I do not tolerate stupidity or incompetence that may potentially doom the whole Quad and all of humanity. Raising your hand against her was a mistake you will not make twice. Up until now I have allowed you to stay in charge of the RAC because you have proven useful and adequately capable of handling Yala.”
A mirthless, almost hysterical grunt erupted from Turin’s chest that was supposed to be a snort but leaned heavily towards a pitiful wheeze instead. Damn, he was at his last rope.
“Listen carefully, I am done playing games.” The deceitfully calm syllables melted into a warning that screamed danger and Turin swatted feebly at the fist in his collar. “I can do so much worse than this if you refuse to cooperate,” Khlyen threatened menacingly.
Delirious with pain, blood loss and an incessantly spreading lethargy, the smaller man’s attention waned and his eyelids were on the verge of sliding closed without blinking open again. Apparently realizing the futility of continuing the conversation and every bit a member of the noble families, the grey-haired man roughly grabbed Turin’s chin and mercilessly shoved his head to the side, exposing the injured man’s vulnerable neck. A needle was brutally stabbed into its unprotected side and the ginger’s heart raced with plain terror, ragged breaths rattling in his lungs as the drug began taking effect.
“You can rest now. We are done here.” Khlyen’s expression did nothing to assuage the dread of Turin’s final moments. Barely holding onto the last vestiges of awareness, foot steps announced the arrival of another person in the room. Drifting away, the Killjoys’ leader hardly made out the command, words cold and detached, “Najik, take care of him. And clean up this mess!” Then his consciousness diluted into nothingness.
~~~~~
Turin was floating on a wave of oblivion for an indistinct amount of time. Awareness crawling back to him in infinitesimally small increments. Unconnected notions filtered through his mind, never quite forming a complete thought. He lingered in this cocoon of warmth and contentment. The bizarre bubble never actually popped, rather the coalescing walls became more translucent as time passed. With supreme effort, he struggled his eye lids open to half-slits, nothing immediately registering to his unseeing eyes. The uneven pressure eventually clued him in on the fact that he was lying on his side but the reason why this was important eluded him.
From one moment to the next, the air seemed to shift around him and shadows began dancing in his peripheral vision. It took him an embarrassingly long time to realize someone must have entered the room and started bustling about. There was a second of hesitation in the commotion, then the flurry of activity resumed. Sudden warmth spread through his tired body. Eyes gradually closing once more, his tenuous grip on consciousness washed away.
~~~~~
When the commander of the RAC inched towards wakefulness again, the quality of the air was fundamentally different, yet strangely familiar. Trying to open his eyes took several unsuccessful attempts, and even then, he needed unreasonably long to identify the visual of his surroundings: his own quarters.
He was once again lying on his side, a cushion propped at his back to keep him from rolling over. Straining to move, his leaden limbs were entirely loath to cooperate. When he finally managed to will his defiant body into obedience, a dull pain bloomed in his chest and back, bringing the stabbing and subsequent shit-fest of a tête-à-tête fresh into his mind. A trembling hand wandered searchingly underneath the top of the lose scrubs to the patch of gauze just below his ribcage. How he was still alive after this gruesome experience was utterly beyond him.
Taking stock, his mouth was parched and his tongue tasted like some undisclosed sand creature from the badlands had frigging died on it. To his surprise and disbelief, a pitcher with water and a clear cup resided on his bedside table. Truth be told, Turin longed for a far stiffer drink than water but seriously doubted the alcohol would mix well with the drugs that probably still coursed through his system. Furthermore, the water was within arm’s reach, whereas the good stuff was in the cabinet above the sink; go figure. So water it was for the moment.
Although feeling like gulping down the whole pitcher in one go, he chose the sensible option of taking small sips and savouring the sensation. His belly grumbled its disapproval at the lukewarm liquid, though he wasn’t quite certain whether it protested the water itself or complained about being ignored for too long. Not in any condition to leave the bed just yet, he dismissed his stomach for now. Eating would have to wait a little while longer still.
Done quenching the most immediate thirst, the slender man gingerly shifted to his other side and snuggled deeper into the mattress as sleep claimed him anew.
~~~~~
The next time Turin woke, he was much more alert, and despite the still lingering discomfort, his traumatized body felt like he had fully settled into it again. With disgust he noticed an ugly, sticky stain on his pillow. He angled his head away from it with a groan.
Steadfastly ignoring the increasing pain at moving himself upright, he pushed forward undeterred. Upon reaching a sitting position, beads of sweat covered his brow, shoulder-length hair sticking to his forehead, and he had to breathe through a bout of nausea and vertigo. Once he had given himself a minute to catch his breath, the redheaded man struggled to his unsteady feet by the skin of his teeth. His one hand had a death grip on the bed frame while his other hand sought purchase against the wall. Legs like jelly and traitorously threatening to fold underneath him, the commander of the RAC began his way towards the bathroom with small, shuffling steps, never letting go of the wall or any other surface which promised even the meagrest of support.
As soon as he had relieved himself, he gathered the last of his strength to embark on the daunting journey back towards the bed, where he could finally rest. In the middle of the trek, his vision started to grey at the edges and each step felt impossibly more difficult than the previous one. Bracing himself for a graceless face-plant in front of the bed, the leader of the Killjoys pressed on, and to his endless relief, made it all the way back, if barely. Completely spent, the long-haired man collapsed bonelessly onto the mattress and burrowed into a fresh spot on the pillow, dragging the comforter over himself.
~~~~~
Feeling fully rested, significantly less achy and honestly, bored out of his skull, Turin shed the blanket and rose to his feet. He discovered slow, measured movements no longer elicited anything more than mild discomfort. Therefore, he decided to take a much-needed shower to wash away the days-old filth and then take it from there. A layman’s inspection of the stitches and a redressing of the wounds was probably in order, too.
When he returned to his bedroom, refreshed and feeling like himself again, he spotted a rumpled bag next to the head of his bed. Warily coming closer, he stiffly leaned down to carefully move aside the fabric and examine the contents. The bag contained his bloodied clothes, his personal effects, and to his utter surprise, his weapon. Damn, seeing the neat pile of blood-drenched clothes felt surreal, even though he had changed the dressings on the stab wounds in his front and back only minutes ago. And heavens be damned, the one in the back required a herculean effort with his still limited range of motion.
After disposing of his clothes from the bag along with the stained bedding, Turin grabbed a bite to eat and tried to find a comfortable spot to lounge on his raggedy couch. Tomorrow he would go back in to work and see how the RAC had fared during his absence.
~~~~~
The next day, the commander threw himself into his work and spent the better part of the day catching up with what he had missed. He mostly kept to himself, derailing any prying questions about his sudden disappearance with one of his signature offensive brush-offs. Just before he was ready to call it a day, the work station in his office lit up with a message from Team Awesome Force of all people, requesting permission to come on board the RAC. Turin fervently wished he had stayed in and taken one more day of sick leave as he sensed an entirely expectable migraine coming on. Damn!
FIN