Thanks to: ghost235, Jolinnn, Spencerblue and 600j for the Christmas present reviews!

WARNING: Pain. Major ouchies. Unintentional, but rather fitting pun...

CHAPTER ELEVEN

"GRACE"

Definition: 1) smoothness and elegance of movement 2) courteous goodwill 3) bring honour or credit to

Undisclosed Hospital, Dublin

She walked – no, marched – down the corridor until she reached the ward, flashing her recently-acquired door-pass at the sensor and stepping through the door like she owned the place.

That was the secret, you see.

Her also surreptitiously-attained porter's uniform garnered no attention as she glanced through the window into the side-room she had already checked once earlier for reconnaissance. And for initiating phase one of her plan. Still, porter's uniform or no, it would not go unnoticed if she entered a private side room and she paused, waiting for the right moment.

She was of average height, a little stocky in build – but muscular rather than soft, like an ordinary woman of her age. For she was nothing of the sort. No. She was not ordinary, delicate or mild. She was hard; hard in many ways.

A nurse at the main desk looked up from her paperwork, perhaps realising that she did not recognise the other woman. Perhaps she explained it away as the stranger being a seasonal, relief staff member. Or perhaps concerned about the fact she had never seen her before. She was perhaps about to pass comment when, almost on cue, there was a crash from a room on the far side of the ward and her attention was drawn elsewhere as she stood to investigate.

Without a sound, the stranger slipped into the side-room and locked the door behind her.

He lay prone on the hospital bed, hooked up to so many wires and machines that he looked like some scientific experiment. A super-soldier, perhaps. Or even a Frankenstein's monster. His usually scowling face was calm and smooth, his breathing steady and even, heartrate in time with the soft beeps. He was injured – and badly – but he was alive.

"Wake up," she said shortly, patting him abruptly on the face.

He launched into consciousness, inhaling sharply. There was a great and rather concerning increase in the amount of pain he was in compared to when he last woke up. More surgery, he guessed. The last thing he remembered was spinning into the abyss of forced sleep once more… And lights. He remembered the lights. Masks. Doctors talking in that calm but hurried manner when something unexpected happens…

But that had been the other day, hadn't it? And it was not a doctor that had woken him.

It was not his father, Theresa or Dom in the room with him – nor the Fowls; he remembered their visit suddenly.

Nor was it the matron or any of the nurses.

But he recognised her; with a jolt of surprise, he recognised who was stood at his bedside.

"Merry Christmas," she said abruptly.

"Mhm…" he grunted, his tongue heavy and dry in his mouth, eyes widening.

The doctors had evidently upped his sedation again to keep him quiet, but the pain was counteracting the drugs quite efficiently indeed. He could only think that his father had turned off the painkiller drip again. Although why exactly he thought that was a helpful thing to do, he didn't know. He breathed heavily through gritted teeth and tried to organise his thoughts. The woman's presence could mean one of many things - and none of them were particularly good.

"Lie still and listen," she said. "I'm here to get you out of here."

That was one of the scenarios he had been concerned about. But he did as he was told. He always did as he was told when she asked. He was well-learned in the matter. Besides, if she was here to get him out with a feasible plan, he was all ears. Which was all he could be, really. He was as weak as a kitten in a sack.

"Are you capable of that?" she asked finally, once she had relayed all she had to say. She had spoken just loud enough for him to hear. He didn't like the idea, but he did not have a better one to offer.

"M'not sure I can walk," he admitted.

"Then crawl," she said, simply.

Myles hadn't expected any sympathy.

He nodded slowly stretching his neck the little he could and identifying the various tubes and cannulas poking out of him. They had slowly decreased in number since he had been taken off the life-support machine and he was pleased to see that today he was down to just a few.

"How do you feel?" she asked at last.

"In pain," he said in a short breath, alarmed at how much energy it took to admit the sensation verbally.

"Good," she said, unsympathetically. "It will keep you alert."

He shook his head slightly, grunting. "Ngh… lotta… pain."

Too much. His chest was a crushing barrel of agony, for one. He could barely breathe, let alone carry out his part of the escape attempt she had laid out for him.

"I imagine that'll be because I unhooked the morphine they're doping you with," she told him, matter-of-factly.

So it wasn't his father this time. He groaned something which sounded suspiciously like; "Motherfu…", but she interrupted him before he could finish.

"It's mixed with sedative; can't be helped," she said – and perhaps she would have shrugged, had she not disapproved such sloppy etiquette. "We will only get one opportunity at this before they move you to a higher security location. I may need you to be sharp in anything as short as a few hours."

Myles thought he might possibly be dead in a 'few hours' if he felt any worse, but there was no arguing with the woman. If she believed he could do it, she was probably right. After all, she was one of the very few people that knew his level of training, his experience, his thresholds. She'd studied him, endlessly. She knew him inside out. Perhaps the only person who knew him any better was his brother – and that was on account of sharing an identical body.

She produced a small, glass vial from her sleeve and that at least distracted him momentarily from the constant relay of pain signals from his injuries and various surgical sites, but it was not to be a pleasant distraction.

"Now open your mouth," she said, unscrewing it.

He clamped his jaw shut and shook his head.

"Changed my mind. M'fine," he said through clenched teeth. "Honestly."

"Myles," she said, sternly, placing a firm hand on his forehead. "You are not a piglet with a worming tablet. Now stop squirming and open your mouth."

His dark eyes had a most uncharacteristically pleading look in them, but she paid no heed, pressing the heel of her hand down onto his skull and he knew that the next step was to hold his nostrils closed.

He reluctantly slackened his jaw.

"Good boy," she said brusquely. "Tongue."

He revealed it sullenly and she shook several drops of an amber-coloured liquid into his mouth.

As expected, it was as though she had poured a litre of petrol down his throat and followed it with a lit match. Every orifice of his head felt as though steam was pouring out of it, his tear-ducts and nostrils streaming with the sharpness. By the time he had, coughing and spluttering, recovered somewhat, she had gone. And despite his despising of her methods, he had to admit he would be more likely to be ready to move when he next saw her, than if he had managed to refuse the contents of the vial. He suddenly felt exhausted again, that small effort enough to sap all but all the reserves he had built up over the past few days. He lolled his head back on the pillow, trying to focus on anything but the pain from the drains stitched into his sides, the pressure inside his chest, the god-awful woozy feeling. He had to rest. As much as his mind would be back on track again a few hours post 'almost anything', it needed his battered body to co-operate. To contemplate even raising himself from the bed was an impossible task right now. He would just have to hope there was a contingency to the plan of action that would consider that. He had a bad feeling that there wouldn't be…

"I mixed something into my usual Essence of Amber. He won't be conscious enough to notice you, much less remember."

To a passer-by, it would seem she was talking to herself, but a reply came from her side.

"You're sure of it?"

"Of course I'm sure," she said, scornfully.

"Did you get the latest surgery report?"

"Here."

She opened the paper folder she had lifted from the ward and he read it over her shoulder.

"D'arvit..." he muttered. "There's still enough metal and plastic to patch a shuttle with in there! I can't just close the holes up and hope for the best! The mineral poisoning alone would…"

"He's booked for another surgery in a few days time, if it bothers you that much."

"I haven't got a few days to wait around!"

"Then leave and come back," she said, simply.

"I can't do that. It's risky enough meeting with you as it is. I can't promise I'd be able to leave again unnoticed and if The Council…"

"When would you be willing to do the healing?" she interrupted him, clinically.

"When that bullet a sprites-wing width from his spine is removed, for a start," the voice scoffed, the paper ruffling as he stabbed at it with one finger. "Your mud-doctors do that, I'll do what I can with the rest."

"Thank-you," she said – quite the rarity.

"But you know I can't fix this completely," he warned. "Not only will it arise suspicion, your doctors have put so many tubes and stitches in him I would have to pull each one out individually before I…"

"Can you give him a quality of life or not?" she said shortly. "Because if the answer is 'not', I only have one other option and I will take it before we leave tonight. No boy of mine will torture himself mentally as he will whilst he wastes away to nothing in a hospital cot."

"Are all humans as callous as you?"

"Callous? It would have been a kindness rather than suffer as he is now. Organ failure, paralysis, permanent, chronic pain… Xan should have done it himself and give him the coupe de grace on the battlefield, but he's too soft-hearted. The boy entered into this world in the middle of a gunfight, it would have been a fitting way for him to leave it. This... There is no honour in this."

Her companion knew she spoke of the great 'Butler' – who didn't? To infer he was anything less than a ruthless professional was absurd, but yet here she was, accusing him of having too much compassion…

"You're insane," he said, shaking his head a little in awed disgust.

She felt the air currents move beside her as he did so and closed the file with a snap.

"Well as I am conversing with my invisible friend, I don't doubt many would agree with you."

The Essence of Amber, as downright sinus-devastating as it was, was doing its job.

He felt a lot more alert than he had a few hours ago.

He eyed the door with fresh resolve…

I wonder if…

They'd stop him before he got out, he knew that. But he was curious to see just how far he could get. And bored. Perhaps it was the drugs addling his rationale, but he suddenly felt as though if he could just get out of the ward, if he could just reach a breath of fresh air… That would be some proof that they were wrong. He would recover. Properly.

"Stupid," he muttered aloud.

He'd only end up knackering himself up further.

Yep.

It was stupid.

He should give up on the notion immediately.

He closed his eyes, though trying to sink into some sort of restless sleep was about as effective as sinking into the thin pillows. The nurses had replaced his constant supply of painkillers, but lowered his sedation. The result was that he was riding an analgesic wave, boosted by his visitor's potion and with only a hint of tiredness and discomfort holding him back. A dangerous combination for a man of his mentality.

"Psst."

His breathing paused, despite himself. But it was the one, non-mechanical noise he had heard for hours, he was sure of it.

"Hey – Major."

He struggled to some semblance of an upright position on his elbows, too proud to use the controls to raise the bed to 45 degrees.

There was a face at the window of his room. He only saw it fleetingly, but for a moment he was dead certain it was…

"Bates?"

There was no reply.

"Bates? Will?" he said, in a louder hiss. "What are you doing here?"

"Come on," said the voice. "We're getting out of here."

"I can't," he admitted, reluctantly. He paused a moment, then condensed into a few short sentences, everything of interested that had happened to him since he shut the caretaker's door back at the theatre some days ago; "I'm fucked. There was a shootout after I left you and I caught most of the bullets. I'm waiting for… I'm waiting for someone. They're busting me out of here at some point. I can ask if they'll take you along with us. How's the chest?"

Bates didn't reply.

"Bates?" he said again. "Bates! Where are you going?"

But the light flickered at the window and he said no more.

"Fuck's sake," Myles muttered to himself.

But he couldn't just lie back down…

Well, of course he could…

But…

"I'd just like to say out loud for the record," he muttered under his breath as he carefully manoeuvred his weakened legs over the edge of the bed. "This is the worst idea you've had since you jumped in front of half a dozen bullets, Major."

Was Bates even waiting for him?

"Stop talking to yourself and come on!"

OK, he must be.

Decision time, Mylo, he thought, on a knife edge.

"Alright," he called out, almost to himself. And then to Bates; "But you're going to have to cut me some slack or come help me."

They had warned him that although he was not completely paralysed, his legs would not respond in the same way they had before. He would need to rebuild neural pathways, relearn how to instruct the muscles. Put simply; learn to walk again. Jumping down off the bed and padding quietly out of the room as was his intention, was definitely out of the question.

His toes brushed the cold tiles and though he shivered, he took some comfort in the fact that he could actually feel the temperature of the floor.

He levered himself forward with the arm of the bed, his thumb brushing the buttons on it.

Ha. Perhaps the lessons on how to use the bed controls weren't wasted after all.

After a few false starts, he managed to lower the bed enough to flatten his heels on the floor and tilted some of his considerable weight onto the balls of his feet.

So far, so good. But he was definitely going to need something to lean on.

He scratched his stubble-bristled chin as he thought, a dull tugging pain in his arm alerting him to the obvious.

Perfect.

Well, far from 'perfect', actually. The spindly drip stand looked less than ideal, but it would have to do for now.

Very, very carefully and very, very slowly, he began to put more and more weight onto his feet.

The effort was tremendous.

It felt as though ever muscle in his body was trembling and he was relying on his left arm alone to stop himself from falling.

But then he was standing.

Actually standing.

Fucking good start, lad, he thought to himself, cautiously optimistic.

It didn't last long when he realised he would have to remove his vice grip on the bed frame to grab the drip stand. His right arm was essentially useless - unless he wanted his collarbone to fire through his skin, so he braced himself with several deep breaths… and made the grab with his left.

He held back a growl at the jolt of pain he was treated to for the sudden movement, which was easier than one would expect given the concurrent flash of euphoria at his achievement.

Baby steps, he thought to himself. Baaaby steps, Myles.

Although doubtless this had not been what Theresa had had in mind when she had said the same thing in one of her many 'motivational' speeches.

It took him the larger part of five minutes to make the two metres to the door. By the time he got there, he was sweating so much the open-backed hospital gown they had provided him with had stuck to the front of him like a sheet of clingfilm and his hand was slipping on the metal pole. But he was nothing if not stubborn.

"Bates?" he panted. "You there?"

There was no response.

"Fuck's sake, Bates… Can you at least open the door?"

Still nothing.

Growling in frustration, he manoeuvred himself and the drip stand alongside the door and used his bad elbow to depress the handle. That hurt more than he had expected it would and the fact that the door opened inwards nearly made him give up there and then. Summoning all of his considerable willpower and not without some grunted curses, he left the room he had been imprisoned in during his stay at the medical facility so far and almost collapsed onto the – mercifully unattended – nurses desk.

A muffled and most un-Butler-like whimper escaped him; if he had had a free hand to stuff into his mouth, he would have used it.

Clenching his jaw so hard he thought he might crack his teeth and inhaling and exhaling so intensely through his nostrils he was all-but snorting like a spooked horse, he composed himself, holding back the ripple of nausea that roiled through him as he made some approximation at standing straight again, albeit slumped over the higher portion of the desk.

When he eventually felt in control enough to open his eyes, he was surprised to see a tremendously fortunately-placed lifeline.

A porter's door pass lay across the paperwork strewn within arm's reach.

Rejoicing in the fact that, until that moment, he had not really thought about the locking mechanism of the ward doors and had he gone straight for the exit, he would have had to come all the way back for the pass, he snagged it and stuffed the lanyard between his teeth.

He eyed his next challenge, the finish line a bright and beckoning glow of one of those novelty, light-up Christmas decorations.

It was a formidable distance.

Relatively speaking, of course.

In reality it was barely more than ten metres of polished hallway to the locked ward door. But that was double what he had just managed and the thought of it almost made his legs give out from under him there and then. His ribs were screaming at him with every breath. He was fairly certain the hole in his leg had started streaming down his thigh again and his damaged shoulder was begging him for a release from the pain.

Unfortunately for his body, his mind had not been damaged and, as such, would not give up so easily.

Straightening up as best he could, he plotted the best route. He would have to stick to the walls, using them as support. He could make it three or four metres, then have a rest. Three stops and he should make it.

It seemed reasonable.

Still, he hesitated; unwilling to leave the safety of his one-armed support on the desk. But even his good arm was shaking and it was rapidly becoming a case of 'now or never'.

"Bates, you'd better have a plan…" he growled.

Hoping the other bodyguard would reappear at some point, he set off for the wall at an excruciating pace.

It was like walking, drunk, across the deck of a boat at high seas. In the Arctic. With ice on the boards. In a backless dress. And heels. And some damn ship's cat threading its way between his ankles every few stumbled strides.

His legs just wouldn't co-ordinate with what he wanted them to do. The noise of the drip stand's wheels scraping along the floor, along with his own grunts of exertion had miraculously not drawn attention thus far, but by the time he had dragged both the stand and his uncooperative body another few meters along the wall, he was beginning to think that, maybe, he had made his point and he didn't need to make it to the door of the ward after all…

But thoughts like that could be fatal...

He pushed on.

Pushed on right until he reached the next door, leaning heavily on the handle with his bad elbow for a moment's relief, or so he promised himself. He leaned to his right, which was a mistake in itself, for his collarbone bent under the strain and he hissed in pain, quelling his sudden nausea with a slow, outward breath, switching his weight over to the hand on the drip stand suddenly to protect it from rebreaking.

And then everything happened at once.

The thin, metal pole bent in half instantly and in his effort not to fall, he crashed his right side against the door, pain receptors lighting him up like the fibreoptic Christmas tree at the far end of the corridor. He made a lunge to stop himself from falling and grasped for the handle. He caught it, but in the process smacked his head off the doorframe, which would have been bad enough, though in addition to punishing his cranium, the action also brought the wildly swinging lanyard within range of the sensor, releasing the lock on the door and subsequently removing his last, solid form of support…

Unable to support his weight unassisted, his legs buckled and he went like a felled redwood, crashing into the room.

The pass clattered to the floor ahead of him and despite his original efforts, his collarbone snapped once more as it took the brutal brunt of the force from his rapid descent. The pain ripped through him from every refractured rib and burst stitch. He had never been one to scream in pain, but if he was ever going to, it would have been then.

As it was, he didn't have to suffer the embarrassment of howling in out-loud agony, only the indignity instead of violently throwing up across the polished tiles as his conscious control of his stomach – in place since he had first left his own room, if he was honest – was relegated to unimportant in favour of not passing out.

He couldn't even move bar for lolling his head forward enough that he managed not to choke on his own vomit as he finally did inhale violently and a guttural noise of suffering ripped forth from him, much louder than before. In so much pain already he deemed it worth a chance and he made a valiant effort at engaging his core muscles to avoid using his arms and sit back up onto his knees. Unfortunately for him, the ripped-open bullet hole in his thigh had pooled enough blood under him that his kneecap slid sideways and instead of raising himself fully upright, he performed some sort of undignified belly-flop - as previously feared - back onto the unforgiving tiles.

Well, some detached part of himself looked down on his sprawled body in unsympathetic disgust. That wasn't very graceful.

He threw up again as he instinctively tried to push himself anywhere but the floor; panicked, like a deer on ice in the sights of a rifle.

"Furgh-k!" he choked, and collapsed, coughing and spluttering, in abject defeat.

There were several cries of alarm and swift, sensibly-shod feet slapping towards him and, as he teetered on the edge of consciousness, he comforted himself that at least it would only be the medical staff who would see him like this; collapsed half-naked in a pool of his own blood and vomit.

"What the hell, man?" the person whose room he had so spectacularly entered, groaned blearily.

Myles tried to breathe deeply and run some sort of diagnostics test on his battered body now that he had most likely successfully undone whatever healing he had managed to achieve so far. If this man was a threat, he was in no fit state to defend himself.

The light flicked on and he decided that if he was about to be put swiftly out of his misery by a bullet to the skull, it would potentially not be the worst thing that had happened to him this evening.

"Shiiit, are you alright?"

The occupant of the room – who in all honesty, had not previously entered his consideration before they had spoken, and if that didn't speak volumes for his mental state, he didn't know what would – sat up stiffly from a deep, medically-assisted slumber.

"Jesus… Major? Is that you?"

He managed to cough a reluctant, cursing affirmative; raising a one-handed 'thumbs up' in acknowledgement since he could not so much as raise his head off the floor to look at the man.

But he recognised his voice all the same.

It was Bates.

Bates, who had definitely not been out of bed that night.

"The medications you have been prescribed may cause nausea, dizziness, breathing difficulties, hallucinations…"

Shut up.

Happy Boxing Day!

Wolfy
ooo
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