He realizes, when he gets shot as he is dragging the stasis suited form out to where the Skyranger waits, that he never planned to tell the others about the sweater. That he doesn't plan to.
He ropes up into the ship clutching the suit, settles it into a free chair and then pats at his side - his hands come back red and wet.
no dying! yells the sweater; he feels pressure increase from where it hugs his form under his shirt.
"You don't get to decide that," he says, and leans his head back, exhaling hard between his teeth.
Kelly rises into the ship, panting, and the floor closes beneath her just barely before the Skyranger takes off, zipping between the skyscrapers and away from the city center.
She yanks the first aid kit from the wall and thrusts it at him; together they pull out a bandage, him holding it as she rolls his shirt up and then exclaims: "You're wearing the sweater?!"
"Good luck charm," he says, gritting his teeth as she smears antibiotic cream on the wound and then presses the bandage against it.
"You're insane," she says. A glance at the slumped suited form next to him. "Insane."
yes! he is a silly man! he should not do half the things he does!
"I know, right?" She's furiously shoving the haphazardly rummaged through first aid kit back together, her elbow still touching the sweater. "Smashing the glass of that tank, what the hell was he—"
She stops short, stares at him. "That wasn't you," she says.
Shit.
"Uh…"
"Who the hell was that."
"Remember how the Templars took my sweater for studying earlier this year," he says. "Well, uh, apparently it's psionic—"
"Are you serious."
"— and it can, uh, talk. To people."
She tosses the first aid kit into an empty chair and drops into the one on the other side of Central, throwing her hands up. "I will deal with your psychic sweater after we figure out exactly who or what we just broke into a gene clinic for."
"Another sweater," says Central.
"Oh it better not be," she says.
When they reach the Avenger, the sweater is momentarily forgotten in the rush to get the suited figure into Tygan's care. Central paces next to the operating table, leaning in as the doctor removes the suit helmet.
It is them.
I told you! I told you we'd find them! I'm gonna reverse haunt peter!
Tygan and Shen are discussing the risk of removing this chip that apparently is stuck in the Commander's head, and he knows he should be more afraid, he knows he is extremely afraid, but he still says "No plan B here, people. Do it."
They flat line.
Central feels his heart drop to his feet, feels it sink lower than that.
No. No. No no no.
Before the terror can set in, they revive, and he lets out a breath he didn't know he was holding.
He helps get them out of the rest of the suit, gently as possible; they're wearing a hospital gown beneath it, perfectly preserved. It's only as he's carrying them to the Commander's Quarters that Shen says, "Wait, you're bleeding!"
"I'm fine," he says, and gingerly kicks the door open. He sets them down in the bed, and then turns to Shen, who's standing in the doorway. ROV-R comes over to him, nosing as much as a robot with a nose can at where his wound is, and then makes a sequence of beeps at Shen.
"Fine my ass," she says, grabbing him by the hand and pulling him back out of the room. She marches him down to the makeshift medical wing, hooks him up to one of the rudimentary IVs, makes him take off his shirt and the sweater, leaving him sitting in the cold as she gets Tygan.
He holds the sweater in his lap, fingers rubbing the sleeves between them.
"I'm fine," he says again to the empty room.
you are bleeding still, says the sweater. that's not fine!
"We need to have a talk," says Kelly as she appears in the med wing doorway. "How long have you known?"
"Known what?"
"The sweater can fucking talk."
"I only just learned it when the Templars—"
"Ding ding ding," Kelly interrupts him.
"What?"
"That's my bullshit detector," she says, just as Shen and Tygan come up behind her.
"What bullshit are you detecting?" Shen asks. "Did he do something again? I mean, besides smash the tank."
"I was in a hurry!" he says, a weak defense. Tygan is quiet, wordlessly motioning for him to lie down. He does, grumbling still.
"Apparently," Kelly says, and she comes over to him now, snatching the sweater up, "this thing is the one who's psionic." She waves it around. "And apparently it can—"
She drops it like it's on fire.
Central laughs. "It said hey, right?"
"Please stop talking," says Tygan. "I'm about to start stitching this up, and I want to be sure my work is straight."
"Hold on, hold on," Central says, patting at his pockets. He finds the flask, drains it, puts it away again. "Ok, go ahead."
Shen is holding the sweater now. "I wouldn't believe it if it wasn't talking to me right now," she says.
"What's it saying?" Kelly asks.
"Mostly hello," she says. "Wants to know what Tygan is doing."
"I," Tygan says with the calm of a saint, "am closing the wound Central sustained during Gatecrasher."
"It says it didn't know humans could be stitched up like fabric," Shen relays. "This is really weird."
"Central claims he had no idea it could talk," Kelly says. "I think—"
"— that is incorrect, yes."
Jeriah has entered the medical wing.
Kelly wheels around to look at them. "Did you know?" she asks, flabbergasted.
"Yes," they say. "I could sense it, so it made sense to ask early on."
"Why the hell didn't he tell anyone else?"
Jeriah crosses the room to stand near the foot of the bed Central is in, looking calmly back at Kelly. "Would you have believed him? Initially, I mean?"
Kelly hesitates. "No," she says finally.
"It does make sense," Shen says. "Can I run a few tests on you? Later, once the Commander wakes up and we're sure they're not, um..."
"Damaged?" offers Jeriah.
"Ew, no, that sounds like they're a object or something," says Kelly.
"Sweater says being an object isn't inherently bad," Shen says. ROV-R beeps affirmatively. "I think it might be a bit biased though."
Central wants to say "it doesn't like being studied" and "I need it to not have nightmares", but as he takes a breath to speak, Tygan shushes him again, so he doesn't say anything.
Tygan finishes finally, and he's told to stay put and remain in the medical wing, but once everyone leaves he slips the sweater back on and quietly makes his way back to the Commander's Quarters. He drags the desk chair next to the bedside and sits. And he waits.
He must have nodded off, because he wakes to the sweater giving the mental image of a child bouncing up and down and yelling: they're waking up!
The Commander blinks, once, twice. They sit up, their shoulders trembling from the effort— Central shoots out a hand to stop them, eases them back down.
"Easy," he says. "Glad to see you're finally coming out of it. Can't envy the headache you must have, though."
The Commander glances around, eyes resting on the memorabilia case, on the photo of the support staff as they were, and then settling back on Central.
Central finds he's swallowing back tears. "Not sure how much you remember," he says, "but things have been hard without you. Lost a lot of good men looking for you."
He wants to say 'including myself' but that seems too depressing for the situation. The sweater pouts at him for thinking this.
hope is good.
"Never gave up hope you were out there," he says, "but I'll be honest, there were… considerable number of nights where I got close."
He shakes himself, turns toward the computer that hums away on the desk across the room. "When you're ready, Shen's got our archives pulled up on your machine."
He begins to stand up, but the Commander's hand reaches out and grips at his, pulls him back down.
They're crying.
oh no. they're not supposed to cry. you're not supposed to cry. this is a happy time. you're happy aren't you?
Central swallows again, blinks away the water in his eyes. "I am unbelievably happy," he says. "It's good to have you back, Commander."
The Commander coughs.
There's water by the bedside; Central grabs it and offers it to them. They struggle to hold it up, nearly dropping - must be the atrophy, he thinks bitterly - and he leans in a hand to help, holding it steady as they take a long drink.
They weakly motion for him to put the water away. Once that's done they cough again.
Then: "How long did you say? 20 years?" Their voice is disbelieving.
"20 years," he says because there's no sugar coating it.
"You look older," they say, glancing at him up and down. "That's the sweater I made you, though."
"Funny story, about the sweater," he says, and explains it to them. Before he reaches the bit about it talking, though, they reach out and hold a handful of sleeve in their small hands.
"Hello," they say.
hello! it's been a long time!
He gets the sense that the sweater is akin to a wiggling puppy, wagging tail and all. The Commander must get it too, because they laugh.
Central remembers then that they have animist beliefs too, and that furthermore, they're a psion. Of course they'd know.
The Commander's hand lets go of the sweater and drifts back into his. They're smiling at him.
The tears come finally, and he is reduced to sobbing all at once, shoulders shaking and breath hot between the choked cries.
He is holding them, and they are holding him, and the sweater is holding him too, and he is not alone.