A/N: This was the result of a drabble switch with Anamary Armygram and was inspired by Fiorenza-a's "The Cell," partially in plot but primarily in mood.
Another draft courses violently through the dungeon. He shivers. His partner, slumped beside him against the wall, doesn't even stir. Though they're both badly battered, he took the worst of it, and has yet to regain consciousness.
He has his hand around his friend's forearm, just as he has since their assaulters left. At first, the grip was to control bleeding that was both too fast and too heavy. But now that the flow has significantly slowed, the gesture is much more for his own sake than it is for his partner's. He's too weak to do anything else for him, even worry, so it seems he ought to be steadfast about at least that small thing—particularly because he can feel that his friend's fingers are still wrapped around his shoulder holster, barely laxed by unconsciousness, exactly the way they were when he was trying desperately to pull him out of the line of fire.
For once, when the rescue squad gets here, his partner won't be leading the pack. But as far as he's concerned, he's already saved the day. And if they can both hold on long enough to see tomorrow, all that's left to do is wait.
It proves to be a long night. Sleep eludes him, and as the hours wear on, the dungeon's cold wall and floor siphon all the feeling from his body. The pain slowly ebbs away, replaced bit by bit with numbness, and fogginess subsumes his mind.
And still he knows, as if by some twinging inside of his own soul, the very moment during the night that his partner awakens, that he is alive and someday, he will be well again. But not a word is spoken. Their eyes don't meet, and neither hand tightens its grip.
Neither needs to.