A/N: Another chapter for y'all! I hope you're enjoying!

Chapter 11

Despite how hard the first few days with Victor semi-conscious had been, the following week with him fully conscious and lucid were even worse. He remained uneasy and distrustful of the doctors and staff or anyone that wasn't Yurio, Yakov or Yuri's family. Even with them he was subdued and a little jumpy. He never let go of the Maka-box and when he got overwhelmed, which was often, he would curl around it and disappear beneath the blankets. He had eventually been given the missing pieces his mind couldn't supply. Andre and a man called Reid had been captured but the third, Logan, was never found. They guessed he'd taken his money and run for the hills when Reid was captured. When he'd been kidnapped he'd apparently partially broken free of his restraints and a fight ensued which ended with Andre beating him unconscious with an empty beer bottle. He didn't remember it. The assault had resulted in two broken ribs and one cracked, a bruised spleen, bruised kidney, his appendix had ruptured but they removed it and cleaned everything up before it could cause more than a quick flare fever. He had an aggravated grade three concussion, severe skull fracturing along the temple and forehead which spider-webbed towards the crown of his skull. The orbital bone of his left eye was severely cracked but had completely fractured from the force of his vomiting. His cheek bone had shattered and collapsed and his lower jaw had been dislocated and he was missing two molars. Reid had sold out his partner and Andre and the police had arrived in time to pull Andre off him before he'd beaten him to death instead of just unconscious.

"That's why you can't feel your face. They've numbed all the nerves until it's healed more. Small mercy." His father in-law had explained as if it were nothing. Victor wasn't satisfied. He felt adrift. He demanded to see it in a mirror but the doctor's refused. He asked his family but they refused to let him see too. The staff psychologist had warned them his mental state was fragile and seeing the extent of damage to his face would be as traumatic mentally and emotionally as the kidnapping. They held firm preventing him from seeing. He felt helpless. He couldn't see himself, couldn't get out of bed he was so weak, couldn't see Yuri. They told him that Yuri was in a critical care room and he was recovering but he couldn't visit. Yuri was being kept sedated so he wouldn't even know he was there and his own condition was not strong enough to go visiting other patients. He kept asking and they kept saying Yuri was recovering well but he couldn't see him yet. Victor started to doubt them. He was beginning to think they were lying to him and that Yuri was actually dead. Desperate, alone and trapped he began to shut down. He curled in on his Maka-box with Yuri's shirt tied around it but the clothing had been off Yuri and held by himself so long it didn't smell like his husband anymore. He stopped eating and drinking. He got quieter and quieter until in just a short time he refused to speak entirely as he sank deeper into depression. They were forced to postpone a reconstructive surgery because instead of strengthening his condition was weakening quickly. They sent in the psychologist again but he refused to interact at all.

"You're going to have to let him see his husband. He can't continue like this. You're going to have to let him see Yuri, or this Makachan." The man glanced at his notes.

"Makachan is a dog. We can't bring a dog into the hospital."

"Victor has lost all control. He can't get out of bed on his own, can't go home, can't see this Makachan, can't see his husband, can't even see his own face. He exhibited more freedom while he was kidnapped than he has right now. You have to give him something." The blunt truth hit them like a cannonball to the gut but they couldn't refute it. They went back to Victor's room defeated and silent. He remained staring dead eyed at the wall as he hugged the Maka-box. He was looking terribly thin again. The doctors were discussing reinserting the feeding tube that evening if he didn't begin eating again. Yakov found himself in the corner of the room watching his young ex-pupil wasting away. They were losing him. Even if they kept him alive they were going to lose him and he was useless to stop it. When Victor met Yuri they'd taken two independent and thriving young men, tore them to pieces and put back a dysfunctional dependent relationship. One couldn't survive without the other anymore. If you destroyed one you destroyed them both now and for the second time Yakov found himself hating Yuri Katsuki. Yurio on the other hand is thinking.

"Victor. Victor!" The harsh whisper jolted him from sleep.

"Whaa...no no!"

"Hey easy dumbass!" The room was dark except for moonlight filtering through the partly open blinds.

"Y-Yurio." He went to rub the sleep from his eyes but the blond stopped him. In these half awake moments and still unable to feel his face he would forget how badly the action could hurt him. It was also the only chance they could catch him actually talking; before the heartsick ache would set in and he'd drown in it they could get a few phrases from him.

"Listen up. You do it right and you can see Yuri. You can only watch at night when the staff thinks you're asleep. Don't tell anyone and you have to eat and talk again. Are you listening to me? What did I just say?"

"Don't tell, watch at night when they think I'm asleep, be obedient little boy. How can I see Yuri?" He sat up further, trembling from the effort, his body screaming for food but he had no appetite. The staff had tried to put a feeding tube in him again that night but he'd resisted until they gave up afraid to do more harm but vowed it wasn't over. He wouldn't give up though. They were still lying to him, telling him Yuri was alive but he wasn't. Yuri must have died and they were lying so he would cooperate and heal but he wasn't buying their lies anymore. He would not eat or accept a feeding tube. He would let himself waste away until he could meet with his Yuri once again. He figured it wouldn't take long. But Yurio was telling him he could see his husband. He could see him now. Was he wrong? Was there still hope? The screen of a cellphone flashed blindingly and he grunted as pain spiked across his eyes. He had the use of both now, as the swelling reduced, but they were immensely light sensitive and the left was incredibly blurry and almost useless. The doctors didn't say if it was permanent or not.

"Yuri." he doesn't realize he's murmured his name as the video feed flickers to life. He's in a room exactly like his own but the lights are on so the machines can be monitored. He's unconscious with the help of heavy drugs. He wears an oxygen mask and has tubes and wires sticking out of him but mostly he's coiled in bandages. They're everywhere, his face, arms, chest, anything with skin has bandages and what doesn't has stitches. He hardly looks human. He clutches the phone tighter, pulls the Maka-box to his chest and settles back onto the bed settling in to watch his husband. He can't look away. Now he believes them. Now he's convinced Yuri isn't dead and everything they told him is true. It's fuzzy, he was less lucid then but he remembers discussing Yuri's injuries. Left arm broken in two spots with fracturing to the elbow. Two cracked ribs and two broken. His right hip had been dislocated and there was stress fracturing through that side of the pelvis from repeated blows. The right knee was dislocated and the kneecap was shattered. Aggravated concussion from multiple concussive events. That one had taken him a while to understand that he'd accumulated concussions and each one was worse than the last. Externally he had twenty-five stitches for the deep cuts, mostly to his face and hands, but the doctors said internally from all the muscles and tendons torn so badly or even snapped having to be stitched together he had over two hundred stitches in him. He was glad Yuri was kept sedated. Gradually his breaths matched Yuri's and he melted into the bed. He wouldn't remember falling asleep or Yurio lightly taking the phone and shutting it off on the nightstand. He wouldn't feel him pull the blankets up to his shoulders or repositioning the Maka-box so it stayed safely tucked in his elbow. If anyone else had been there Yurio wouldn't have done it but they were alone and his Grandpa told him sometimes you just have to show kindness, even to annoying people.

Morning brought sweeping dramatic change. Victor's light-hearted childish nature was back so fast they could almost here the snap as it popped back into place. Victor had conscripted someone, whom they hadn't found yet, to get him a straw and little balls of paper and spent the day zinging Yurio in the back of the neck with spit balls when he wasn't looking. The family had a sense of whiplash, confused by the sudden improvement and no clue as to the cause. There was still a shadow that flickered at moments behind his eyes and he was wary around the doctors and strangers and no one could get near the Maka-box still but otherwise it was as if everything was fixed. Now there biggest struggle was keeping the Russian fed. The switch was flipped and the man was hungry! He eats two eggs, three sausages and a little mixed fruitcup with juice box for breakfast then he demands he's still hungry and gets a jello cup and then a chocolate pudding cup. An hour later he's hungry again and wants coffee but the doctors tell him no and give him a pitcher of water and a sliced apple. He eats the apple, leaves the water and half an hour later they come back from a consult with the doctors and he's got a large peppermint mocha and a fresh donut and no one is admitting how he got them but the doctors fail to confiscate the forbidden snacks. The doctors actually had to ban him from eating for a few hours afraid he'd make himself sick but they did declare his condition had improved enough they scheduled the next reconstructive surgery for the next day. He had done little more than nodded at the decision. He couldn't bring himself to get emotionally connected with his half destroyed face. He knew the clinical terms for all the damage they'd told him but he didn't really know what was wrong with it. He hadn't seen it, couldn't feel it. It left him disassociated with the severe injuries.

After a while he declared he was tired and ready to spend some quiet time alone. The family had panicked that something was wrong hearing the request but after ten minutes of convincing they finally believed him and let him alone. He hadn't lied. He was feeling stifled being surrounded by people fluffing pillows, asking him if he had enough water, was he still hungry(he was) was he feeling any pain? The questions never seemed to end and it was constant noise filling his head and he needed it to all just stop. He breathed a sigh of relief, alone for the first time and took a few minutes to revel in the quiet. Once he felt he'd absorbed as much of the silence as he could take he pulled out the cell phone and powered it up.

He was looking forward to catching up on some of his social media. He didn't start with the most recent posts however. Instead he scrolled, and scrolled and scrolled, until he found the last post he remembered and worked his way back up from there. It didn't take him long to scroll through the outcry of his fans during the week Yuri was missing and neither of them were seen publicly or posting. They had simply dropped away and it was noticed. He felt his throat clog a little seeing the #SaveYuri campaign he and Yurio had launched. The media had exploded finally getting the devastating answer to what happened to the pair the last week and the fight to find his husband. Their efforts broke the media sites several times. Then they were gone again, but this time they had answers. There was a video of the last minute of his own kidnapping that had made it to the sites. He watched it six times and he still couldn't wrap his mind around it. In the end he failed to resolve his feelings on it and was forced to move to other posts. He tucked the phone away when a nurse came for his check up and to bring lunch(his fourth) and then he was idly eating and scrolling again. He choked up seeing the fans responses as the reports of their being rescued were announce and then nothing. His family, his friends, no one would comment on their conditions and the world went wild.

#Where are the Nikiforovs?

#Still Missing?

#The Legend is Dead?

#Their Rescue a Lie?

#Save our Legends!

Victor felt overwhelmed. He let the phone drop to the mattress and just laid back and stared at the ceiling for a long while. He felt disjointed and out of body, no, not out of body, like he had his body, and also his body a foot and a half to the left at the same time. He was unusually quiet when the family returned for dinner and that worried them. He did his best to reassure him and that he was just thinking, processing everything that had happened. He wasn't sure if they bought it but it was the truth. Around nine that night they forbid him from any food and remind him no water even after midnight because he has his surgery in the morning. It wasn't long after an incredibly large dinner that he demanded solitude again. He did nothing for the some time after they left. The ceiling has sixty eight tiles and an average of five hundred and nine freckles on each. Finally he figured out what he wanted to do. He pulled Maka-box into a familiar hug and took a semi-posed selfie. It took three tries to get one that wasn't blurred and seeing his face with a quarter of it hidden under bandages was strange, but he posted the picture.

The Legends live! It's a long road to recovery and we're held together by glue but on the mend and eager to go home. #Hanging in there #Victurri Lives #you know who you are bring more donuts and coffee

He knows there's going to be a firestorm from the media, probably already started even, when he checks it again but for now he's satisfied. For some reason the post makes him feel like reality has clicked back into place. He's not stuck in limbo anymore and time is moving forward again. He settles to a more comfortable position and flips to the video feed of Yuri. It's been too long since he could check it last and he's feeling homesick. His love is still asleep and healing at a good pace but he's so broken and battered he knows it will be a long time before he sees his old Piglet again. He vows to himself to do everything he has to to heal quickly and get released so he can sit by Yuri's side and hold his hand again.