The doctors patched Delphine up, cleaning away the blood from where her wounds had partially reopened during all the hype of the last few days, irrigated it, and wrapped her up in a pressure bandage. The bandage made breathing a little difficult, and the pressure on the site certainly wasn't going to ease any of the pain… But it was for the best.
Delphine might have been able to control the impulse to groan or yell, but she couldn't control the tears, so she let them fall silently, keeping her head down and out of Leekie's probable line of sight.
The whole process didn't take very long but when you're in agony a few seconds can feel like hours, so being there for minutes felt like years.
The two male doctors cleared out, wheeling away the little table with bloodied cloths, used utensils and empty wrappers. But the woman remained, Delphine looked at the needle in the nurse's hand wearily and with distrust.
"This will help with the infection," She said and winked.
Delphine caught on but kept her face neutral and let the woman inject the fluid into her, whispering a careful 'thank you' to her when she was close.
The woman pulled her face mask up though it wasn't for any medical purpose; it would prevent Leekie from lip reading, "Just behave and maybe I won't have to see you in here again," The nurse said gently then pulled the face mask off and also stripped off her gloves.
"Alright we're done here," She spoke at in a normal voice.
Delphine pulled her shirt back on slowly and gingerly, and then slipped her jacket on with ease, flicking her out from where it caught on her collar at the back.
"This way Doctor Cormier," The nurse said, gesturing with her head to the door.
Delphine stood up and made her way over to the door, in the time it had taken the doctors to sort her out she had been able to regain feeling in her limbs making walking an easier task- though her side still smarted with the recent poking, prodding, wiping, and bandaging of her injuries.
When she finally decided to look up to the observation room, Leekie was gone.
Delphine frowned; she had expected him to be watching her like a hawk.
"Doctor Cormier?" The nurse asked.
"Quoi? Oh…" Delphine followed the woman out of the examination room and down the hall.
"Your friend is okay."
"What?"
"Your clone friend, she's okay."
Delphine was curios but suspicious, "How do you know?"
"I saw her when she ran out of one of our demonstration rooms, she's emotional but she's alright."
Delphine nodded, "Merci… but why are you helping me?"
"I know how Aldous operates, I know his methods and I've seen the results, I can't do much without getting myself into your situation but I do what I can to help to ease the pain," The nurse opened a door to a small room, "Here, have a sleep for a while, I'll come and wake you in an hour."
Delphine stepped into the room, spotting the bed in the corner, "Thank you, really, thank you…" Delphine didn't know what to say to express her gratitude.
"Look it's not much, but it'll help, the sedatives should kick in soon, go on."
Delphine shuffled over to the bed and kicked off her shoes, sighing gently as she sunk into the mattress gratefully.
The nurse flicked off the light.
"Oh! If you see Cosima, can you tell her I'm sorry?" Delphine asked quickly before the nurse could leave.
She nodded and then closed the door, enveloping Delphine in darkness perfect for sleeping in.
The damaged immunologist knew all about the restorative powers of sleep and right now, she really needed a good twelve hour sleep, if not longer, to let her body continue to heal properly. But unfortunately she also knew that Leekie would not allow her the luxury of resting and restoring her health.
No he intended to inflict pain, he intend to subtly control her life in such a way that she would be sleep deprived and not function correctly. It helped him that she was injured, he knew exactly what she needed to heal and as such held that above her head, dangling it in front of her like a cat with a mouse toy only to pull it away at the last second. It was easy to torment her in her current state with so many vulnerabilities, both physical, mental, and emotional.
And Leekie was manipulative enough to know exactly how to hit all three vulnerabilities at once.
She used to hear the rumours about him that he was a dangerous psychopath, but she didn't believe them. No one had ever shown her any proof of the alleged crimes the man committed so as far as she was concerned the rumours were just that- rumours.
At first Delphine was able to follow his train of thought and she thought he was brilliant; his ideas were as Cosima put it, 'fringe', but she enjoyed thinking about the potential prospects for science if only society and the law would embrace them. But then again, humanity always did a fear of the unknown.
But as the years wore on, Delphine began to see where her colleagues were coming from but she was so far down the rabbit hole that she defended him. Now however, it was a whole different ball game altogether with either no rules or everyone was making up their own. Disarray was the result. Panic. Mayhem. Madness.
Now being a primary source of the evidence of the crimes of Aldous Leekie, she could not refute against the rumours now but it had taken her a long time to realise the truth.
Siding with Cosima and her sisters was the best decision Delphine had made in years. It was also the most irrational, impulsive and crazy, but love has a funny way of working that way.
Delphine only had a few brief moments to think these sorts of things through before she could really feel the sedative in her system settle in. There was a blissful dulling of her body's ailments and a mental fogginess that started to creep into her consciousness, telling her to let go for the time being and let her body work itself out.
Craving sleep, Delphine didn't fight it all, quite naturally welcoming its final return she shut her eyes without another thought. She didn't even have time to think to pull up the blanket before she fell under the effects of the drug and was out like a light.