Gee

The next time he wakes Valentine still doesn't remember what happened. He most likely never will according to the doctor, who says he's got a concussion and his brain is good and scrambled. He's also cracked some ribs, broke his collarbone, torn ligaments in his shoulder, and scraped skin off half his face and palms. He gets a lecture about how important the program is and how his horsing around is a waste of good resources and the future of humanity depends on him not being a complete dumbass, or something to that effect. He is on some very strong pain medication and it makes everything a little wobbly.

The next few days are all a bit of a haze and he can't get any straight answers on what happened to Roberto, only that he's 'no longer with the program'. Valentine doesn't know who the doctor thinks they're fooling, everyone knows that's what they say when someone's dead.

The medical wing is pretty empty thanks to a sharp decline in newcomers to the facility. Rumor has it that someone who actually has both influence and scruples finally noticed that the governments of the world were forcing children into the program. They got the ball rolling on an investigation which led to leaks which led to a general outcry. Terrorist groups everywhere had gleefully proclaimed this proved their point that humanity wasn't worth saving.

It's nice having a double room all to himself until they cut off his pain meds and he becomes all too aware of the itch of healing skin on his face and hands. Thanks to the accelerated healing that all DEXO subjects enjoy Valentine will be out of the med wing and back in class soon but in the meantime he is in desperate need of a distraction before he scratches his face off.

He grossly overestimates his ability to do anything more strenuous than sitting up in bed. He's got a sling for his arm and his ribs are taped but each step he takes is fresh agony as healing bones are jostled. He barely makes it out past the door to his room before he has to lean against the wall for support. He's breathing hard, which only further aggravates his injuries.

"Everyone's saying you killed Roberto and like, cut him up into tiny pieces and fed him to the crows," a voice says from behind him. Valentine startles with surprise, which in turn tweaks his ribs and collarbone and really fucking hurts. Once his vision clears and the pain recedes enough to the point where he's not in complete agony he very slowly, very carefully turns his head.

"Hi!" chirps a boy that's a good foot taller than Valentine and looks oddly cheery given he's just accused him of being a murderer. He gives a little wave as he smiles. "I'm Gee." He waits expectantly for Valentine to respond in kind.

"Like the crows would eat him," Valentine says absently, still not sure what to think about the whole murder thing. This kid is weird. He won't stop smiling and he is way too friendly. He also looks like he could bench press Valentine which is…concerning given that it's taking all his strength to keep from sliding down the wall onto the floor. Being in pain is exhausting.

"Yeah he was a dick, wasn't he," Gee agrees happily. "Need a hand?"

"I didn't kill him," Valentine says, exasperated and not sure what the point of this whole interaction is supposed to be. Seriously what is this guy's deal and what would it take for him to go bother someone else. Valentine's legs finally give out and he starts to slide down the wall. Goddamn it.

The kid—Gee—reaches out to help support him but he yanks his hands back at the last second, realizing that there's not really a good way of doing so that won't aggravate Valentine's injuries. So he just stands there, hands held out uselessly while Valentine continues his slow descent to the floor. He lands in a bit of a tangle. Everything hurts.

"Sorry!" Gee apologizes, face twisted with concern. "Wasn't sure where to grab you."

"It's cool," Valentine says, starting the slow and painful process of sorting out his limbs. He somehow manages to turn so his back's up against the wall and his legs are more or less sprawled out in front of him. How the hell is he going to get back inside his room before the nurse comes to check on him?

Gee sits down right next to him. Like, right next to him. He is uncomfortably close. Valentine can practically feel the heat radiating off his skin. "So how did you do it?" Gee asks.

"Huh?"

"You know, Roberto?"

Valentine shoots him a death glare but Gee just laughs and laughs. "Kidding! Kidding!"

They sit in awkward silence and Valentine wonders how long it'll take before this weirdo gets bored and wanders off. He tries to sneak a look at him without turning his head and their eyes meet. Gah.

Gee laughs and slides over the scant few inches between them, companionably bumping their shoulders together. "I'm just here to get my hand looked at." He holds up a hand that's in a brace. "Broke it a few days ago and they want to see how it's coming along."

Valentine turns to look at him and Gee's sobered up now, a serious look on his face. "No one's going to miss Roberto, really. What happened to you sucked. Just wanted to let you know."

Valentine's not sure what to say to that so he just nods his thanks. It's hard to not be suspicious, no one's ever nice to him. On a good day they're indifferent. The throbbing in his shoulder isn't getting any worse but it's getting harder to ignore, to say nothing of the ache of his ribs. His fingers twitch as he tries to resist scratching everything that itches. He closes his eyes and leans his head back against the wall. He sighs.

"They teach you meditation yet?" Gee asks. Valentine guesses it was too much to hope for just one quiet minute to sort himself out.

"No." He's learned a number of what he'd been told are essential skills. Things like how to identify and subdue a number of supernatural creatures, making and modifying charms and talismans and protective amulets, how to find missing people or missing things. Meditation has come up in his classes but only as a brief mention in a very long list of things he'll be expected to know.

"Ah, well, they taught us and it's supposed to be good for all sorts of things?"

"Uh huh."

"I just…it might help. You take deep breaths and like, clear your mind."

Valentine reluctantly opens his eyes and looks back over at Gee who is just making this…face. Like all he wants is to do is one nice thing for Valentine. Valentine doesn't trust it. Can't trust it, not in this place. No one here is nice without an ulterior motive. "Ribs are broke. Breathing sucks."

Gee's face falls and Valentine feels the briefest stab of guilt. Seriously though who asked this guy to care. What is his deal.

Gee sits with him in an almost companionable silence until the nurse comes back. She predictably gives Valentine a hard time but then Gee turns on the charm and distracts her. He gets her laughing and smiling and even blushing a little all while she's helping Valentine up and back into his room, back into bed. She tells Gee they need to go take a look at his hand and he says sure but when they're done can he come sit with Valentine a bit. She gives him an odd look.

"If it was me sitting all alone with no pain meds, I'd want some company," Gee says, not even looking over at Valentine. He's just continuing to dial up the charm, softening his gaze, gentling his smile.

Ah, there it is, Valentine thinks. He's just being nice to me to try and score some points with the nurse.

As a strategy it's not half bad. The nurse looks utterly charmed. She agrees to let Gee come back and sit with Valentine after he gets his hand looked at. Valentine just huffs and shakes his head. He knew there had to be some sort of angle.

So he's very surprised when not even fifteen minutes later the door to his room swings open and Gee comes barreling through. "Catch!"

Valentine's too slow to react and something hits him in the chest. "The fuck!" He rubs absently to soothe the pain as he looks down to see what hit him. It's a chocolate bar. And not the cheap kind either, it's the super expensive stuff that is almost impossible to get these days. He looks back up at Gee in astonishment.

"I know where the nurses hide the good stuff," Gee shrugs and tries to play it off like it's no big deal. "No pain meds and meditation's no good so I thought maybe, you know. Chocolate."

"They are going to murder you when they find out it's missing," Valentine warns him even as he's carefully removing the paper sleeve. He gently snaps the bar and the foil covering it in half. He can't remember the last time he ate anything that was even remotely sweet. He holds one of the halves out to Gee. "Might as well get something out of it."

He's managed to surprise the other boy. "You don't—Really?"

Not only did Gee actually come back but he brought chocolate. Of course Valentine's going to share. He scoots over a bit so Gee can sit down next to him if he wants. It will be a bit of a squeeze but he doesn't think Gee's got a real good grasp on personal space anyway. Sure enough, the other boy takes his share of the chocolate and sits down next to him. Valentine very carefully breaks a square off his half and tucks it under his tongue to let it melt. It's very dark and very rich.

Gee on the other hand takes a huge bite out of his and chews it. He gets through his half of the bar in relatively short order then notices that Valentine's barely touched his. "You don't like it?"

Valentine laughs and shakes his head. "It's good." He kind of wants to wrap the rest of his half back up and hide it somewhere for later, really make it last. Is that weird? Will Gee think it's weird? He doesn't like caring what other people think. "Thanks," he says, face growing warm with embarrassment. No one's ever given him a gift before and he's not quite sure what to do. He wraps the chocolate back up and very carefully not looking at Gee he slides it under the pillow for safekeeping.

Gee, in a rare moment of tactfulness, says nothing but the corners of his mouth twitch up in a there and gone again smile. "I've got some reading I need to get done," he says. "Thought I might do it here, if that's okay with you?"

Valentine nods, unsure where this is all going. Gee reaches into the bag he's got slung over one shoulder and fishes out his tablet. "Thought you might like to read along," he says. "We're working through some epic poems now and they're actually pretty cool stories. Like, there's the things we're supposed to be learning about but there's also sword fights and stuff."

"That does sound cool," Valentine says. He doesn't like modern accounts of supernatural incidents as they tend to be incredibly dry. He's enjoyed the historical stuff a great deal though despite his teachers' fondness for pointing out all the inaccuracies and gaps in logic and imprecise nature of the flowery language that's used.

Gee grins then holds out the tablet so they can both see.

Valentine wakes just as the night nurse comes in to check on him. He doesn't remember falling asleep. He remembers the beginning of the story he started with Gee but that's pretty much it. It's disappointing, realizing that he's missed a rare opportunity to spend some time with someone who not only tolerates him but seems against all odds to actually enjoy his company.

The nurse pokes and prods and questions him and says he should be back to his regular schedule in the next day or two given how he's healing. Valentine wonders if he'll see Gee around or not. He wonders if he wants to. He wonders if Gee wants to.

He eats his dinner and catches up on his own reading which is incredibly dull. The unit they're currently on is funeral rites throughout history and across the world and despite his usually excellent memory he's having a hard time keeping it all straight. He's not sure if that's to do with the concussion or his lack of interest.

Gee returns the next day much to Valentine's surprise. He bursts through the door, tablet in hand. He waves it at Valentine as he makes his way across the room, says he needs to finish his reading. Confused but pleased, Valentine draws his legs up and crosses them, making room for Gee to sit on the bed if he wants. He does.

"You fell asleep pretty fast there last time!" Gee gives Valentine a warm smile. He's always smiling.

"Yeah," Valentine agrees sheepishly, looking down at the bedspread. He picks at a loose thread.

"I think you missed most of it, want me to catch you up?"

Embarrassed but grateful, Valentine nods his head.

Gee summarizes the story so far, frequently interjecting with his own thoughts and opinions. When it gets to the sword fights he swings his arms around, pantomiming his favorite bits which is pretty much all of them.

There's a lightness in Valentine's chest and a smile he can't quite keep off his face. He should be cautious, wary of the other shoe that surely must be due to drop but all he can think of is how do I get more of this. He hasn't realized until just this moment how lonely he's been.

The nurse has to tell them to keep it down several times although her heart's not really in it. The medical wing is still pretty empty so it's not like they're actually bothering anyone. She does finally get stricter about it once curfew is near. Somehow Gee wheedles his way into spending the night. He drags the empty second bed over so that it's right next to Valentine's and they can keep talking even though they've received dire warnings to keep it down if he doesn't want to get kicked out.

Eventually they exhaust all their thoughts on Gee's reading assignment. The sword fights had been awesome, and there was battle magic and demons and a surprise twist ending. Valentine had thought for sure it would end with the main character nobly sacrificing himself for the greater good. Instead it had ended with him throwing down his sword and giving a speech where he pretty much told everyone that he deeply regretted dedicating his life to serving a bunch of ungrateful fucks and they could go kick rocks. Valentine didn't think stories were allowed to end like that.

"Thanks," he says. The word falls incredibly short of what he feels right now, still coming down off the euphoria of sharing something fun with someone who by all appearances really enjoys spending time with him, but it's all he's got.

Gee laughs but doesn't say anything else for a long time. Then he says quietly, "I hate this place."

Valentine doesn't know what to say. He hates it too? Does anyone like it here?

"There were so many of us to start with. And people just keep disappearing and we all pretend like they've gone somewhere else but everyone knows that they're dead. And it's like, everyone's just given up, going with the program because what else are they going to do?"

It's nothing Valentine hasn't thought to himself in the dark a thousand times over on the nights he can't sleep. But it's the first time he's heard anyone else say it.

"And look at you, you shouldn't even exist."

And there it is, the other shoe dropped. Valentine's stomach twists, going sour. "Fuck you," he grinds out, face growing hot as tears start to gather. And fuck me for thinking I'd made a friend, he thinks bitterly. He's got to get out of here. He fights his way free of the blankets and sheets and just as he's about to swing his legs out of the bed and run for the door Gee grabs his wrist.

"No, wait!"

Valentine tugs but Gee's grip is firm.

"You don't understand! Everyone here talks and they said— the doctors say that you should be dead but you're not and they don't understand why and maybe it's just because you're stubborn and they're scared, so scared of how smart you are. How you pick up all the spiritualist stuff like it's nothing. Better than the rest of us by a lot."

Valentine stops struggling and just looks across the beds at Gee's too earnest face.

"And everyone else hates you and treats you like shit and it doesn't even phase you, Roberto had like fifty pounds on you easy and you didn't give him a fucking inch."

"I don't remember what happened," Valentine says woodenly. He doesn't need Gee to tell him what he already knows, that everyone hates him. And Gee doesn't know what he's talking about, he's not smart or brave, all he's learned how to do is run when someone is after him.

"You tricked him into chasing you across the roof. He slipped and fell, broke his neck."

So Roberto is dead. He'd guessed as much. It still doesn't stop the rising horror and creeping dread he feels at being responsible for someone else's death, no matter how indirectly.

"And you," Gee shakes his head ruefully, "only you, got pulled down when you tried to save him. For such a smart guy you're kind of an idiot."

Valentine bristles instinctively at the insult but his brain's still churning over all this new information. And the one thing he keeps coming back to is why is Gee here. What does he have to gain by telling Valentine all of this? Why is he still holding on to his wrist? Valentine tugs and this time Gee lets him go.

"Why," Valentine asks at last. "Why me, why are you telling me all of this?"

"Everyone else has just given up, they just go along with whatever they're told and they'll all be good little soldiers by the time they get their placement. They're excited. They wanna be special." Gee scoffs in disgust, a dark look crossing over his face.

"But you, you're just trying to survive. So am I. And I could really use a friend."