A piece of fic inspired by a lovely piece of artwork created by vegetacide.
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She cornered him.
In every way possible.
She knew him so well, she had every base covered.
She knew what he would say and made sure she had the answers before he could ask.
Later Scott described to him how she burst into his office with medical data she had pilfered from Grandma and downright demanded Virgil be pulled off rota. Scott said he hadn't even had a chance to open his mouth.
Apparently, Scott had already identified the issue and had been about to approach Virgil, but Kay was faster, more determined and ready to kick his ass if he didn't comply.
Scott would take on Kayo at her worst if necessary.
It wasn't necessary.
Next, she targeted Gordon. His fish brother was rather peeved she had attempted to threaten him. As if he'd get a scratch on Two. Hell, if that happened, he'd be far more terrified of Virgil than Kayo. That was a longstanding agreement - Two came before Gordon's life.
Of course, when Virgil heard about that he made a point of finding his brother and clapping him up the head as he outlined exactly what degree of bullshit that statement was.
Which was probably exactly what Gordon had planned, because, distraction.
Virgil liked to hope that the discussion was not related to why there was currently a six-inch scratch across Two's nose. How it got there, he didn't know, but what he did know was that Gordon would have a good reason.
Maybe.
He would think about killing him later.
But anyway, back to Kay, the love of his life, his tactical genius, the woman who knew him better than he did himself.
He supposed he only had himself to blame. After all, he did lift in his sleep, in the middle of a nightmare, and he could empathise with Kay waking up buried in feathers.
She had freaked.
Well, only as Kay would freak, which was cool, calm and deadly.
And full of worry.
She woke him, concerned he had hurt himself as their bedroom wasn't quite wide enough to support his span and the ends of pinions had hit the walls with matching thuds. He remembered looking up at her blearily as she switched on her bedside lamp, reaching beyond his massive wing.
He had attempted to fold them as soon as his brain came online, but she had reached out and gently caught his forewing.
"Virgil, what's wrong?"
He blinked, still not fully awake. The echo of his nightmare, one of falling through a burning building, falling...falling...
"Virgil?"
Huh? Oh. "What?" He was so polite. Shit.
His head hurt.
Her fingers combed through several of his feathers and he leant into the gentle gesture.
"What happened?"
He blinked and frowned in her direction. "What?"
Her hand gently lifted one of his feathers and he flinched. Ow.
Of course, that just set her off and she sat up in bed. He tried to fold his wings again, but her fingers still held the left one. Not hard, but determined and as his brain finally clicked, he knew he was in the shit.
"Your feathers are a mess!"
Yes, they were. They were well overdue a preen and a clean. Lifting during a rescue today, he had whacked his right wing on the support pylon of the bridge. There was probably a bruise, but he hadn't had time to really look.
Time.
It was the key to everything.
He just hadn't had enough.
And now he was really in the shit because Kay would just see it as not looking after himself. Which it wasn't! He was planning on it in the morning...
"Virgil!"
Huh?
Her fingers brushed at his feathers in her lap. Black flickered in the lamplight as she smoothed them down ever so gently.
Oh, that was nice. His eyes drifted closed at her gentle ministrations.
"What happened?" Her voice was as soft as her touch and it lulled him. "Why haven't you taken care of yourself?"
"I have." Her fingers were absolute magic.
"You have bent feathers, Virgil."
Even that warning tone in her voice wasn't enough to draw him from the lull of her touch. "Mmm. 'S nothing. Hit bridge."
"You hit a bridge?"
"Mmm-hmm."
Her fingers twitched just a little before smoothing in a soft sweep across his flight feathers.
"Mmm, nice." He shifted closer and snuck an arm around her pulling her to his side. "Love you."
Her voice was ever so faint. "Love you, too."
Later hindsight could see through the fog of his half-asleep brain to the danger in her words, but right then, all he wanted was for her to keep doing what she was doing.
And she did.
He fell asleep wrapped around her, her fingers preening his feathers ever so gently. Perhaps it was selfish of him, but his brain wasn't functioning on any intelligent level.
He was simply focussed on her.
Of course, the next morning the fallout was of epic proportions.
Scott's office and cornering Gordon all occurred before he had even woken up. She left him in their bed, wings sprawled inelegantly across the room.
He eventually woke, his face planted into her pillow. Rolling onto his side, he inadvertently caught his bedside lamp and smashed it against the wall. Its remains fell to the floor with a clatter.
A dopey blink and he realised his wings were out and filling the room. An incoherent grunt, he folded them and let them go.
It took him a whole couple of minutes to work out what the hell had happened. It wasn't the first time he had lifted in his sleep, but...
Kay had been with him.
She wasn't here now.
That wasn't anything unusual, she always rose before he did, often before the sun. But he had an uneasy feeling, as if there was something he should be remembering and he wasn't.
Eventually he crawled out of bed, showered, and went in hunt for his morning coffee.
She cornered him over pancakes.
"Good morning, Virgil." She had his coffee already made and steaming on the counter in front of him. It was terribly distracting and it took him half a cup to realise they were alone in the kitchen. The pool was empty and the house was almost completely silent.
"Where is everyone?"
"Not here." She dropped a plate in front of him. It contained a couple of pancakes with maple syrup, strawberries and cream.
He would never admit to how easily she played him, but she did. Distracted first by coffee and then by food, he settled into his seat and did not see any of it coming.
"We're going to Canada."
The pancakes were soft and melted in his mouth-
What? "Why? Do we have a situation?" He shifted his weight and was already half out his chair before her hand brought the movement to a sudden halt.
"You are on mandatory leave."
He sat down hard. "What?" Again. "Why?"
"Because you need the time off." She picked a strawberry off his plate and dipped it in some of the syrup. He couldn't help but watch her bite into it.
Probably another aspect of her plan.
Kay really did think of everything.
"We are going to Canada. I've booked a chateau on a lake. We are going today."
His brain finally caught up. "Do I get any say in this?"
She leant in close and brushed her lips against his cheek. "No, you don't."
And with that, before he could protest or question or even outright refuse, she stalked out of the room, her ponytail swinging with her hips like the goddamned carrot it always was.
So, without his permission or even consent, he found himself bags packed and loaded into Two as he sat in a back seat as a passenger.
It was either a little unnerving or a little reassuring - he hadn't decided yet - to see Gordon flying Two while Virgil was perfectly healthy.
His younger brother was somewhat paranoid and kept looking over his shoulder the entire way. Gordon sat in his co-pilot seat because Kay had planted herself, in uniform, in Virgil's pilot seat before either of them could protest.
Even Virgil wasn't game to argue the point.
Consequently, Virgil sat in the backseat.
It was distinctly odd.
Several hours later he found himself the passenger in a deep grey-blue Audi, the love of his life negotiating some backroad in Canada.
With nothing to do but stare at her profile over his sunglasses.
She had hardly said a thing the entire trip, and slow his tired brain might be, he was still alert enough to hear the warning bells drowning out his heartbeat.
She was angry.
He could tell that much.
But he wasn't entirely sure what type of angry or why.
Sure, she was obviously pissed at the condition of his feathers and really, she probably had a right to be. He had wanted to take care of them before bed, he would have been so much more comfortable. But both rescues that day had been hell. First the bridge where they had lost two people, despite saving sixty-seven others.
Scott's vocabulary had been blistering and Virgil couldn't help but agree.
Then there was the building fire, almost immediately after. He had miscalculated the support for the floor he had been traversing and the weight of the exosuit had taken it out and him with it.
Two stories of fracturing wood only to land on and break someone's king-size bed on the third.
Scott's vocabulary hadn't been great after that either.
Grandma had been briefed and Virgil had been dragged off post-mission before he'd even managed post-flight.
Grandma's vocabulary, while less for mature audiences, was no less concerned than her eldest grandson's.
But he was fine and all he wanted was bed. Okay, so he didn't mention the collision with the bridge pylon, but he was okay. It was only a bruise.
Kayo hissed between her teeth and overtook a lumbering truck that had slowed in her path.
The car's engine roared under her determination.
That was the point he remembered mentioning the pylon to Kay.
Oh, shit.
The Canadian countryside flew past in its verdant green of summer. He hitched in a breath. "Love, I'm okay."
The car accelerated abruptly, the white lines blurring. But Kay didn't answer. She didn't even look at him.
Oh, hell.
He was in it up to his eyeballs.
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