A/N: Let's be honest, we all know what it's about. Predictability thy name is Gavii. Wait, who is Gavii, you ask? I hear you; it is a new name posting here. This is my first story exercise posted after an incredibly long hiatus away from the fanfiction space of the internet. For the long version I have posted some notes up on my profile page. For the short version –I was LilPippin; I've rebranded. I have three surviving stories from many years ago, and hopefully this one will be the start of more. Thank you for clicking in and taking a gamble on a new name.
Virgil
Once when they were children, his brother stopped talking to him for an entire month because he had taken apart his underwater drone as part of a school project. Virgil had, of course, put it back together within three days, but to Gordon that wasn't the point. The point was it was his.
Virgil still didn't understand why Gordon had needed an underwater drone in the middle of Kansas in the first place. With adult eyes, though, sure it had been stupid for him to take without asking, and a bit of an accidental power play with him being 4 years older. Virgil cringes at the stuff past-Virgil got up to. The case of the kidnapped drone being one that came up more frequently than he'd like to admit.
If he'd learned anything it was less about the way drones work and more about the tenacity of his second youngest brother. For someone so easy going, he had been so determined to stay angry at his brother just on principle. The reality was they were both miserable the whole month.
Virgil needed to borrow some of that tenacity to help him get through this assignment.
Right. Paper.
The to-go cup of coffee that was keeping him running has long since gotten cold. Virgil sighs, glances past his laptop at the sleeping (he is sleeping, right?) form cocooned in hospital white sheets, and types a few last words before typing ctrl +s and closing the screen. The tension in his neck and shoulders aches as he stretches. Like Gordon, Virgil has always been more of a do-er – his hands were made for taking apart and putting back together. Worker's hands.
Gordon's hands are broken in three places.
He would hate this paper too if he were awake and in Virgil's shoes. Then again, Virgil would be back at the university, taking the actual course instead of writing papers to satisfy the requirements if Gordon were awake and if WASP hadn't thrown their best aquanaut recruit into an untested hydrofoil. What Virgil would give to get his hands on those specs.
Virgil knows their father is pulling all his strings for more information, and if he doesn't find it, John will (he tries not to think about what that means). Until they know more, Virgil knows where he is needed most. And, by god, it is not writing a damn paper. He pulls out the chair closest to his brother's side and sits, resting his head at the bed space by Gordon's legs. There is a pillow there from earlier that day? Night?
From earlier.
He can still gently cradle Gordon's broken hand in his own, and so he does, being careful of the wires and the injuries.
Virgil can't help but stare. Somewhere beneath all those tubes and wires is a spark of life. Calcifer, the fallen star nearly smothered, but alive. "A heart's a heavy burden," he says, remembering the quote from the movie.
Breaths fall evenly, methodically. Machine breaths. Through its hiss and the steady beat of the heart monitor (good, steady is good), he hears the lulling ebb and flow of waves and bird calls from the "Beach Sounds" stream that they started playing on a loop. Gordon's chest rises and falls with the sound, and Virgil's brain tells him it is because the machine and the fake waves move at the same slow beat.
But he feels in his heart, as vividly as the touch of Gordon's fingers in his palm, that the world has a pulse of its own and Gordon's determined spark flutters still somewhere amidst the vibration. It comforts him to know that if Gordon's consciousness is anywhere, it's in tandem with the sea he loves so dearly.
He feels his own breathing fuse into the rhythm, his heart beats with Gordon's.