A/N: Here we go again! Another chapter for all y'all! Also I need your guys' help! I've got another story cooking and I need pet names for Phichit, something sweet and cute that COULD be used by just friends but is a bit more biased towards being from a significant other. To work! Get me those names!

Chapter 10

A blinding flash in his eyes, brief, momentary, torture. People talking all around him. Hands all over him. Touching, lifting, and moving him but it all felt far away. There's a dullness to light and sound for a time but a horrendous constant vibration wracks through his body, igniting every pain. Finally it stops with a rush of cold and white flurries then squares of light rushing past him from above. More people surround him bombarding each other with demands and questions and maybe some are for him as well. He can't tell. It's moving too fast. He doesn't understand what they want. It doesn't matter as he slips away.

He wakes again vomiting violently. Hands are all over him, turning him on his side so he doesn't choke. His head feels like it's going to crack in half and the pieces left will shatter again. Unknown voices talking to him, always talking to him but he can't understand. His mind can't track the words. His throat burns and his stomach feels twisted all about before it finally let's him rest. Someone wipes down his face with a cool damp cloth which would feel good but he's already insensible again.

Next time is different. He comes around slowly and is semi-coherent. He's intensely distressed. Something is missing, something so important he can't breathe without it. He doesn't realize he's crying or that he's talking. He's not self-aware enough to know.

"Yuuuri, I need Yuuuri." He moaned.

"Shh Shh, you can see Yuri later honey." A small delicate hand brushed away tears he didn't know rolled down his cheeks. He didn't even have the energy to open his eyes.

"Need to find Yuri...please...need Yuri." He struggled to sit up but Yuri's mother pushed him back down. It was nothing to hold him to the mattress. He continued to beg for Yuri and weep but he never responded to anyone around him. He seemed aware of them but not enough to actually interact. Yuri's mother tried to soothe him, petting his hair, promising he could see Yuri later when he was feeling better but nothing eased his agitation.

"Isn't there anything we can do for him Doctor? We can't just leave him like this?"

"I'm sorry ma'am but there's nothing we can do. He's been through a serious physical and emotional trauma. All this in the span of a week has left him mentally in a state of shock, combined with the side affects of his injuries and being heavily medicated it's stripped him of his coping mechanisms and his ability to regulate emotion. If he becomes severely upset we can intervene to encourage him to rest but for now he is quite mild and the best thing we can do for him is wait." His mother in-law huffed unhappily. She couldn't bear watching him suffer and being told to wait it out was not satisfactory. They settle back to wait. Victor remains unchanged, drifted sometimes and then rousing only to weep without knowing why and whimper for Yuri without his knowledge. At some point Yurio comes, bearing food, and Yurio stay for a bit, and then he leaves saying he's got an idea cryptically. He returns an hour or so later and Victor is awake in his usual state of upset.

"Hey Nikiforov." Nothing. "Nikiforov." He gets closer up and more in his face but he's still locked in his own isolation. "DUMBASS!" Yurio smacks him on the shoulder in a move that is far more calculated and careful than it looks.

"Yurio!" It works. Victor jolts and suddenly he's actually looking at Yurio. The Russian Fairy ignore's Other Yuri's mother.

"I bring you Makkachan." He holds the dog up too close to the man's face hoping he won't focus on it enough to see it's not really Maka but the tissue box holder replica. It's a strange design blending tissue box holder with stuffed animal with a zipper and padding that when sealed up also makes it a plushie. Victor blinks sluggishly and continues his hiccuping sobs then with trembling hands, the first deliberate action he's taken since he began fading in and out of consciousness, he takes Maka. He doesn't just take the tissue box, stuffed animal, pillow thing that is the likeness of Maka, he squeezes it to his chest, burying his face against it's neck. He doesn't realize it but there's a t-shirt of Yuri's tied like a bandanna around it's neck. His whole body seems to curl around it as he inhales deeply and suddenly he can name the sucking void in his chest. Maka. Yuri. Home. Something slipped inside of him. Not the disoriented uncontrolled emotions from before but intense focused sobbing of knowing what he needed right then, right there to just keep breathing. For five minutes Yurio panicked that he'd broken Nikiforov for good this time. Then the scent of Yuri, and himself, and even a bit of Maka and their kitchen absorbed into the cloth as they held it or it sat on the counter while they cooked, started to fill him. Like a balm on a burn it eases the hurt in his chest and then dissolves it entirely. It takes a moment for Yurio to realize that Victor hasn't faded out or fallen unconscious like usual but is taking deep slow breaths in complete restful, healing sleep.

Victor was coherent outright the next time he woke a day later. His family had been concerned about him sleeping so long but the doctors were please and insisted no one disturb him. He was getting food through a tube in his nose and they said the rest would make his recovery leap forward. It took him a long time to come around but he was lucid at last. He found himself alone in the hospital room, quiet for the first time he could remember, clearly or not, with only Yuri's father for company. He licked his lips surprised by their extreme dry and cracked condition so that it hurt to touch them and then struggled vainly to sit up.

"Tch Tch, lie still I will sit the bed up for you." He sank back finding himself too weary to argue. He found himself propped to an almost comfortable angle and then a fortress of pillows constructed around him with unexpected skill and he realized he wasn't almost comfortable anymore. The throbbing ache in his chest eases, his lower back relaxed and the thumping in his head subsided. He did not he oddly couldn't feel any of his face. It could have not existed for all he was aware of it. He glanced at the Makkachin replica tucked under his elbow feeling a sense of relief he couldn't explain. A doctor stepped in and Victor unconsciously shifted away from him seeming to tense.

"Ah it is good to see you awake today. You look a lot clearer now. How do you feel?" The man was too loud, his chipper tone harsh and abrasive. The room was too cold, too bright and it all seemed to be looming over him. He wanted to nestle into the pillows with the blankets over his head and disappear again where it was safe, dark and quiet, until his mind could catch up with itself but this man was expecting him to answer.

"Foggy." It was too succinct. It didn't compare to the truth. The man leaned in and Victor squeezed the Makkachin toy tight to his side protectively and tried to push away from the man again.

"It's okay my boy, no one will take it." Yuri's father consoled pressing a hand to his shoulder. The doctor flashed a penlight in both his eyes and he jerked away pain piercing his head and groaned.

"I know I'm sorry. Nobody with concussion likes that part. I'm done, I promise." The doctor tried to coax him out from between the pillows but it was dark and soft and safe in there. He didn't want to leave and let him finish his exam.

"C'mon Victor, it'll be okay. It's just a little more." The man his hand through his hair with such a strong paternal nature to it that it catches Victor off guard and compels him to submit. Here was Yuri's father spending his time to keep a vigil over him, treating him like his own son when he could be with his actual son. Where was Yuri? He isn't just an in-law to them. They've more than accepted him. They've absorbed him into the family as devoted as if he were born into it. He surfaces and does what the doctor demands. He follows his finger. Yes he knows his name. Yes he knows he's in a hospital though not which one and he vaguely remembers why. Yes he remembers the week before he was kidnapped, though he'd rather forget. No he doesn't know what day it is but he knows the month and the year. It seems like the questions will never end but they finally do and he's left exhausted.

"Alright, well everything is looking good so far. I'm going to send up some light soup. See if you can get him to eat it all. As soon as he's keeping down food we can get rid of the feeding tube. I'm sure he'll be more comfortable without it." Victor hadn't even been aware of the tube jammed down his nose but now that he was it itched horrifically. His father in law caught his hand and put it back to the bed each time he try to fumble with it.

"Let it alone." He admonished softly. Victor sank back into the pillows beginning to notice the many discomforts of his body again. His ribs hurt with every breath making it hitch in his chest but his stomach and even parts of his hips hurt. His head throbbed in time with his heartbeat and anything in between ached just by existing. His face was still gone. He couldn't understand why he didn't have a face. He could feel the inside of his nostrils and the tube forced down them, but not his face. Surely it was still there?

"I think it's best to wait a few more days before the next surgery. I'd like to see him with a little more strength recovered before we put him through another." Surgery? Another surgery? He didn't remember a first surgery. What are they surgery-ing? He stops paying attention. He's feeling tired and stretched. He wants to just wander back into sleep and he's about to do so when his father in-law brushes his shoulder lightly.

"Victor, wake up, we've got some soup for you. You need to eat." He blinks confused. He didn't remember actually falling asleep or the doctor leaving and he certainly didn't notice a nurse bring a tray of food with some soup and saltines. He wasn't sure how he felt about the food as he stared down at it. He wanted it and he didn't. He wasn't sure he could bear food in his stomach even as it began sending signals of hunger to him. "Why not try nibbling the cracker first and see how it settles." His father in-law suggested sensing his hesitation and opened the wrapper for him and handed him the first. Not wanting to disappoint he snapped off the corner and chewed it slowly. He was surprised to find himself indifferent to the food which made it oddly easy to eat.

"How are we doing in here? Is he getting the food down okay?" Victor startled glancing at the nurse momentarily then his gaze skittered away submissively as he pulled Maka-box closer to him and shifted away from the nurse. His father in-law noticed the movement.

"Aye we're doing well. All the crackers and about half the bowl down now. Although it doesn't really seem to be interesting him even though it's settling well."

"Well it's probably not the most appetizing soup but it should be gentle on his stomach. We can get something more appealing for him tomorrow if he's still eating well." They talked over him like he wasn't there but Victor didn't care as long as no one was getting in his space.

"Are you sure he is okay? He's so subdued. It's not like him."

"Well this is the first he's been awake and coherent in quite a while and as I understand it his injuries were caused by a brutal attack. He's probably a bit shell-shocked. Give him some more time to process and cope. If he doesn't come around after a while we can assign someone to talk to him." Victor curled around his Maka-box trying to tune them out. He didn't want to do this anymore. Didn't want to be their subject in a petri dish, didn't want to hurt and didn't want this lonely empty feeling inside to continue to suck him inside out like a blackhole trying to crush him. There was only one thing he wanted and it seemed to be the one thing he couldn't get but he couldn't remember why. His memory was full of holes and blurs. His father in-law was speaking to him again but he'd missed what was being said. The man seemed to notice his increasing anxiety and tiredness. He pulled the covers up to his shoulders and lowered the bed again but not completely then sat but close enough so he could soothingly pet his hair still. The action worked wonders to ease his frayed nerves but he still had a question burning his brain.

"Where is Yuri?"