Chapter Twenty-Eight: The Killing Moon
In the early morning hours of the next day, a full harvest moon fading from the sky Dr. Matthew Campbell's beat-up pickup truck turns into the driveway of Hell House. The headlights extinguish before the driver's side door opens, the cab light flickering yellow, casting a glow on the gravel. The necromancer steps out of his truck and slams the door, the sound of it echoing down the still, quiet street, sending birds scattering, halting their plans to announce the dawn rising tremulous and bloody over the shadow-blackened trees.
He walks around the truck, efficient as he opens the passenger door, plucking out a canvas bag that he slings over his shoulder. He leans bodily into the truck to retrieve something else—something heavy, judging by his struggle. He straightens after a few moments with something in his arms, something big and bundled in blankets, carried bridal-style in his arms. He kicks the car door shut, walking slowly and awkwardly up to the house, up the steps. He hefts the object over one shoulder, his arm wrapped around it.
Shannon Duvall watches from her porch, a silent witness, as an arm lolls bonelessly down the man's back, having escaped the tight bundle of fabric. She watches the man open the screen door, struggle to unlock the heavy oaken inner door. He disappears inside the house, along with the person in his possession.
Heart sinking, bile rising in her stomach, she stands from her rocking chair, her timeless emerald eyes staring, transfixed, at Hell House. She slowly makes her way inside her home, to her granddaughter's room, intending to wake her, to tell her.
To tell her what, she isn't sure—that Jonah Aickman's love-quest looks to have ended as badly as it could have? That her gut feeling, all those many months ago, as she first watched Matthew Campbell show up on that damned, cursed property, was correct? That man—that demon—he was no good. Evil, down to his bones, carrying a body back inside of Hell House. Jonah Aickman's body, whole and unburned and with that poor medium's soul inside it somehow, at least unconscious and presumably dead, again, in that witch's arms.
Matt carries the empty vessel straight to their bed, grunting and sweating his way up the stairs with the dead weight in his arms. Stripping the body of clothes is a lesson in determination and persistence that drives Matthew more than a little insane, struggling with the limp, lolling limbs. As he goes, he checks in on the injuries, realizing the reincarnation's estimation of only a few hours of healing was an optimistic, incorrect guess. There are still livid bruises, broken bones—the head is still lolling wrong. He arranges the naked vessel in a natural position, props it and supports it with pillows in a manner ensuring everything is aligned correctly.
He sits on the bed next to it and sighs, rubbing his right hand, the sigil faded and worn after this same repeated motion for hours of driving, and makes a decision he does his best to convince himself is for the boy's own good.
He's not going to revert the override, just yet. He's going to keep Jonah like this, suspended and frozen, in his control, until the vessel is fully healed—until the broken bones are, at least. It's for the best, really. Jonah will be in less pain, then, will be able to move freely without upsetting the healing injuries. And if he wants a fight, then he will be capable enough to.
Yes, he is keeping Jonah's spirit and soul under metaphysical lock and key for the medium's own good—certainly not to prolong the inevitable, certainly not to avoid the conversation that has to happen once those blue eyes open.
He could almost be sleeping, Matthew thinks, as he studies the dead body in the bed, its slack face, all signs of life, all animation, entirely suspended for the moment.
Besides, it will give him time to think of what to say, to formulate an explanation and an apology that could even potentially come near to assuaging the absolute horror of what he's done. Matt reaches out and brushes stray hair from the vessel's face, taking his time to simply touch it, admire it, to run his hands along the body he manufactured for the love of his life, his most all-encompassing fixation and obsession.
The fruition of his life's work, ice-cold to the touch and broken in several places, its pulse having long ended. A form, a vessel, waiting to be warmed by Jonah Aickman, when Dr. Matthew Campbell sees fit.
It really is a miracle, how well the vessel turned out—it looks like the literal dead ringer of the teenager's body in life, before he died. Matthew can't help but be proud of it, as he lifts Jonah's dominant hand and studies its splinted finger. After a moment, he removes the splint on the finger, bending the joint this way and that, his hands careful and sure. It's stiff, creaking audibly, but no longer broken, the bones at the very least knit back together.
How marvelous, Matthew admires, still fiddling with the healing finger, and unexpected. A Golem that can heal itself.
For that was the truth—this form, Jonah Aickman's vessel, was not a poppet, was never a poppet, like the medium had initially assumed. A very well-educated guess, Matt has to admit, considering Jonah's limited knowledge of his own physical existence on this plane. Had he been informed of the entirety of the situation, Matt is sure the witch would have realized what he is, immediately.
No, a poppet would've been too weak. A humble fucking poppet would never have been able to contain the sheer immensity of Jonah Aickman's spirit and soul.
Matt had considered it, though, several years ago—he had even done a test run of one. But it had turned out wrong—it hadn't looked like Jonah, for one. Or at least, not enough. No…its skin had been too unnatural, unblemished and smooth, with strange pores, the texture of it like a grapefruit's skin. The face, too, had been wrong. It just didn't have Jonah's specific features, or at least not what Matt remembered Jonah looking like. No, the poppet's face had looked like a doll's—like a Barbie, generic and blank.
Matt had felt so fucking livid at himself, staring into the nondescript face of the imitation of his Messiah, Jonah, as Raum had so cruelly reminded him. How could he have ever thought a glorified voodoo doll could ever do Jonah Aickman, the Miraculous Medium, and Matt's own savior, both literally and figuratively, any justice at all?
And so the necromancer had scrapped the failed poppet and moved on. He speculated, and researched, and studied, for another many years, immersing himself in as many religions and practices as he possibly could. He tracked down ancient, blasphemous texts and poured over them, deconstructing every single rite and spell he discovered. He followed whispers of myths and folklore almost entirely lost to time, just to unravel their potential and tease out the truths they may contain. He practiced, and practiced, and practiced. Revelations, blasphemes, miracles, and plans came and went, washing over and into him as so many varied baptisms. And finally, finally, he reached the epitome of his final spell.
After spending his entire adult life in frenzied study and self-induced isolation, he had perfected his spell to resurrect Jonah, spirit and soul, into a golem, an artificial human body endowed with all the markers of life. Blood, healthy organs, a beating heart and a functioning brain, neurons and all, all perfect recreations of Jonah's previous body. This vessel was manifested into being using so many prayers and requests in the name of every god, deity, and entity Matthew could discover during his career. The vessel itself is powered by the dead boy's actual remains and residual metaphysical power, as well as Matthew Campbell's literal lifeforce and sheer fucking power of will.
Matthew genuinely doesn't know if the spell could be recreated—the whole rite was so specific to Matt's intentions, and so finely tailored to suit Jonah's needs. And it had worked, had worked so insanely beautifully, effectively resurrecting the long-dead witch into a vessel exactly like his body before death, and this time, it was indestructible, immortal as long as Matthew lived.
But then Jonah had gone and made his own vessel vulnerable by physically separating his soul and energy from it, so he could leave Hell House. That had never been in the plan—Matt had never intended for Jonah to be able to leave the premises. He had intended to live out the rest of his natural life within the walls of Hell House, with Jonah at his side, in peaceful, loving domesticity.
The occultist's thoughts are broken by a meow, as a cat hops up into the bed—a fluffy, reddish-orange furrball—walking over to nose and paw at Jonah's body.
"Just who the fuck are you?" Matt asks, but the cat does not reply.
Matthew waits a whole day before deciding that it's time. He spent all those hours right there, at Jonah's side. Watching him, waiting patiently as the vessel heals. He reads aloud to pass the time, one hand lethargically petting through Jonah's soft black hair.
The bruises have almost entirely disappeared from the vessel, are now yellowing shadows cast on pale skin—except for that one bruise on Jonah's side, though it has faded from black to a muted port-wine, and is growing smaller by the hour, suffusing at the edges.
He pokes and prods at the body, moving it this way and that, relieved to find that all the broken bones have healed, even the ribs, the vertebrae, the neck—he turns Jonah's head from side to side and finds no resistance, or stiffness, the movement of it organic and healthy, the skin cold and unfeeling under his scarred palms.
Everything seems to be almost entirely healed. In terms of nerve damage goes, though, well…that will only be a question in Matt's mind until he eventually surrends the override and turns the reincarnation back on.
Before he does so, he carries the vessel to the bathroom and runs a bath hotter than a normal body could handle, in the hopes of warming the flesh enough to not feel too unnatural when Jonah regains function. Matthew washes Jonah's body patiently, reverently, a soapy washcloth in hand as he scrubs any and all traces of the possession and exorcism from the flesh. The necromancer can't help but smile, humming softly to himself as he gently manipulates and positions the body to better bath it. Eventually finished, he holds one of Jonah's limp, lukewarm hands in his, running his thumb along every fine-boned little knuckle.
"My love for you is endless and unconditional, Jonah." Matthew whispers, pressing his lips to the back of Jonah's hand, voice muffled in the vessel's skin. "I'm so sorry, but it will be alright. I hope you can still bring yourself to love me, after this is all said and done."
The vessel does not respond.
Jonah watches from the ether, hovering between planes of existence, as Matthew washes his body, his vessel. The necromancer handles the empty thing that looks like him with love, and care, and devotion, whispering prayers to himself like they'll actually do something.
The spirit feels as if he is made only of feelings and thoughts as he floats in this liminal space, organic and timeless—a babe, secure and organic, suspended body-warm and blameless in amniotic fluid. These feelings take the form of colors surrounding the soul, and Jonah considers each hue with a detached feeling of loss and confusion. Anger and indignance in the form of livid, pulsing red—betrayal and disgust, a roiling pus-yellow—disbelief, bright orange with shock. Love like a forest, the richest of greens, shot through with rivers of white devotion. Loss, a blue the same soft hue of his eyes.
When Jonah had haunted Hell House, the colors that had surrounded the spirit then had been easier to deal with—guilt, fear, and determination in varying shades of red, black, and brown, like fresh blood spilled in the mud. But these feelings, as he watches Matthew handle his golem…Jonah doesn't know how to fix these, how to reconcile them.
He'd had seventy years to deal with the essence of his first life. He's unsure how long it will take him to handle this bright new kaleidoscope of awareness, as unwillingly trapped in this present as he is, the soul-bound golem to the second man he's ever loved—the first one he's ever loved to this degree.
As Matthew gathers the limp corpse up in his arms, pulling its dead weight sloppily from the tub, Jonah turns away. Looking at the empty vessel the necromancer has made for him makes him feel a strange sort of displacement, of uncanniness—is that thing even him? Was it ever even his in the first place? That body had felt like his only hours before, even as broken and tired as it was.
Now? That body resembles a doll, like a store mannequin, more than it ever has—a pale facade of humanity.
Matt dries the body thoroughly before carrying it back to their bed, this time arranging him in a position more similar to the one Jonah usually sleeps in—on his side, knees to chest, one arm extended, familiar and comforting.
He uses a Sharpie again to draw both sigils on his palms. He meditates first, clearing his mind of his basest intention—to restore Jonah's brain and motor functions, as well as his entire mind and free will. He takes deep breaths and wills his heartbeat to calm to a normal cadence. He prays to every one and thing that could be listening. Please, please let this work, I beg.
The witch presses his left palm, the one with their sigil, to the vessel's hip, gripping bones and skin in hand. He presses his right palm, control, to the vessel's forehead. Through his palms he pours all of his will, his intent, his power, visualizing it in his mind as waves of energy entering the golem, running through the body as electrical currents. He is patient, as the minutes tick by. The manual override at the Burnham house, the first time he has ever had to perform an override, had taken several minutes, after all.
But the time drags on. Too long, a glance at the bedside clock revealing it's been over ten minutes. Matt presses harder, focusses harder, grits his teeth and groans, pouring everything he has into the spell. But the vessel remains cold and unresponsive, not even a flicker of life.
Utter fear rises, raw and searing, in Matthew's chest, and the occultist finally brakes content, removing his hands, fumbling with the pocket watch resting, benign-looking and weighty, on the vessel's sternum.
He clicks the watch open, his mind a roaring, screaming blank.
It looks like a normal watch, feels like a normal watch. It is not warm, cold and still in Matt's hand, no pulse or thrum of energy apparent. It no longer shines from within with the familiar, effervescent aquamarine of Jonah's soul and spirit.
He's gone.
Jonah can hear Matthew Campbell's frantic cries of horror and fear echoing through space and time, as he drifts further and further from Hell House itself. He's glad he left before witnessing the necromancer's failed attempts to resuscitate his golem—Jonah doesn't think he can stand to watch Matthew's grief, considering how deeply he still aches for his "master".
The application of that title alone makes Jonah reel with horror. He hadn't asked for this existence, and he hadn't asked for Matthew's return. He hadn't even been aware of his absence, after the fire. Limbo had been an unknowing space for Jonah, unassuming and calm. At the time, he had figured the expanse of nothing would be as close as he ever could've gotten to Heaven, considering that if he'd moved on, he most certainly would have found himself damned to Hell.
No, Jonah does not want to witness his keeper's grief. He has his own thoughts and feelings—this vivid sea of colors around him—to deal with. Reconciling them will take time, and solitude, as well as the decision Jonah has to make. One only he can make, without any consideration at all for any other potentially affected parties.
And so the spirit drifts further and further from the house, until the necromancer's cries of anguish are entirely lost within the soft sounds of the night, the whispering of the woods, and the comforting, familiar babbling of the creek.
Jonah returns from his sabbatical after his decision has been almost entirely made. It had been the most difficult stretch of time during his entire existence, a veritable battle of pros, cons, and imagined compromises. It seems the time he had spent away had been difficult for Matthew as well—he finds the broken man at the vessel's side, locked within some kind of vigil. He's kneeling beside the bed, his head bent and his hands clasped in prayer, muttering quietly into the otherwise silent room. Dozens and dozens of lit candles cast the otherwise darkened room in a wavering orange glow, and offerings surround the empty golem like floodbanks—fruit, bread, alcohol, and objects too, such as books, art supplies, cigarettes and weed, clothing and cushions—all things Jonah had interacted with and enjoyed during his brief second-life.
Rusty lay curled up at the vessel's side, his chin resting on its chest, his tail flicking back and forth in agitation. The pocket watch still rests, cold and heavy, on the vessel's bare skin.
The spirit approaches the devotee, hovering mere inches from Matthew's dull, unwashed curls, and yet the man doesn't stir, his prayers unending. Jonah has to strain to listen, as quiet and worn as the man's voice has become.
"Please, Jonah, please hear me, please come back to me—I repent entirely, I beg forgiveness, I offer anything, everything, to you—please take or leave whatever you need, I ask—I beg you—please reach out to me, please don't leave me like this, with no closure, nor understanding—"
"I hear you." Jonah replies, his voice a faint tremor breaking through the layers of existence surrounding them.
Matthew's head snaps up so quickly, he wavers from the headrush. His wild, red-rimmed eyes study the clearly-immoble vessel before darting around the room. Hands still clasped in prayer, he staggers to his feet, as frantic as a man possessed.
"Jonah? Jonah—my God—where are you? Are you here?"
He can hear Jonah's sigh, like a sound carried on a breeze, and he thinks he can feel something, a presence, in the room. Matt's mind and thought processes are ablaze from the possibility, a roaring wall of hope so intense, he feels he may be sick from the force of it.
He feels pain suddenly, vividly, starting in the middle of his forehead and spreading, like a rail spike driving home to nestle in his gray matter. The initial agony morphs to become a feeling of warmth, a viscous, familiar substance that fills the inside of his skull full to bursting. He can't see for a moment, it's so bright, and searing, a violently vibrant neon blue rearranging his insides in seconds.
"He's here." Is Matthew's first coherent thought, and the words swell huge, fit to bursting with intense, wild elation.
"Yes, I am—"
And their mind is absolutely flooded with emotions the cancer-survivor would never have been able to express in words alone. Love, so strong it's like a scream, reverberates through the skull, practically melting away all other mental facilities. It's accompanied by the same elation as before, as well as an emotion Jonah can only determine to be something akin to religious fanaticism—a feeling of devotion and faith so intense, Matthew's insides have been ground-up raw with it.
The disembodied spirit's presence in Dr. Matthew Campbell's head is like a balm to those wounds, the object of his devotion and faith proving true, returning like the long-promised savior. And it's so obvious and clear now, to the both of them, how their current situation even came to be.
It still feels the same as it did before, all those years ago. Two souls, overlapping and intertwining together in waves of emotions and thoughts in one skull. At times, it's hard to tell who's who, they come together so well, meshing and morphing to the other so naturally, so complimentary. Their voices, and intentions, one in the same:
I regret leaving, now—
But if you hadn't, it wouldn't have come to this—
Necessity.
I know, now, that it was—
Still sorry, though, so sorry—
I know.
Can't you stay like this, forever? Matthew asks, his voice finally breaking free to ring singularly as his own.
You know I can't, Matthew, it's like I explained the first time—you'll never be yourself again, and I will never get to be myself again—
But how can you be yourself after what I have done? Is that why you left?
Yes, Jonah replies, I had to decide—and you're right, I can't be, while you are in full control, while this power imbalance exists between us—
I didn't know it would be like this—
But you did know you would be in control, when you wrote the spell. Why would you go through with it anyway, knowing my agency as an entity would never be free—
I am devoted to you wholly. I thought it wouldn't matter. I incorrectly assumed that my actions would only ever be in your best interests, not mine, and that was a stupid and blind thought to have—
Yes and no, Matthew—your devotion and subservience to me is apparent, down to the way your neurons fire—but those who serve a God still manage to serve themselves in the process. And I don't want to be your God. I want you to be my equal. We may not be able to stay like this, intertwined, forever, but we can stay tethered together.
How?
The sigil that writes the rules of my existence? It must be rewritten. If the current one gives you control, we must endow me with a power strong enough to equal out and balance the equation.
When you put two heads together, Matt laughs, and Jonah's laugh is a dozen brass bells, tolling Mass, ringing through his skull.
Operating as a possessed unit requires some complex coordination. For the two living dead boys, it's as easy and as natural as breathing, as familiar as a pair of glasses. Matthew walks them down the stairs and to the study, Jonah gathers up paper and pen in their hands, and Matthew sits at the desk. Jonah fishes a cigarette forth from the pack in the body's front shirt pocket, and Matthew moves in tandem to light it—Jonah operates with the body's left hand, and Matthew operates with his right.
Matthew draws the base sigil, the one that establishes their intertwined existence as master and golem, in the upper-right corner. Underneath it, he draws the sigil for control that he uses to override his golem's—Jonah's—vessel, his guilt bombarding Jonah as he does so. Jonah returns the feeling with his own feelings—understanding, but also hurt, and horror. Matt grimaces, his right hand pausing in its motions, as the left raises up, the mouth taking a deep, contemplating drag of the cigarette, filling the body's lungs with smoke, and its nervous system with nicotine.
Why did you create the control sigil in the first place?
I had already realized that the best possible kind of vessel I could achieve for you would be as a golem. They are the most life-like, and accurate, and sturdy, for sure—but they inherently exist in subservience to their creator, their master. They usually possess no free will, or agency, at all, and must be operated constantly by their creator. By creating the sigil for control, and writing it into the spell, and my intentions, when I needed to, it created space for me to not be in control.
By giving my otherwise absolute control parameters and conditions, I ensured that outside of those parameters, the golem would be able to operate on its own—with its own free will—independent of myself. The control sigil also ensured I could take control of the vessel if it was compromised, or stopped working properly, as it did after Raum's possession. I thought of it—think, of it—
Matt's mental wince of self-disgust rings through their head
—as a manual override, of sorts.
Jonah's answering emotion of understanding is laced with a sense of bitterness.
I understand why you built in this…failsafe, of sorts. I am grateful that you at least considered my free will when writing the rules of my existence. However, I still can't understand why you didn't just tell me about it, in the first place—
I was afraid you wouldn't want it anymore. That you would decide the existence I made for you wasn't enough—
But it isn't, Matthew. Is a life with you a form of Heaven? Yes, my love, it is. But a life in which I am unknowingly under your control, at your mercy, all the time? It's like a farce—a lie of omission.
It was, a lie. And I regret not telling you so desperately—I am so horribly sorry, Jonah—
I know, Jonah sighs, as Matthew's repentance and guilt rages through their mind like a tornado, and I forgive your oversight almost entirely.
Almost? Utter despair, and desperation.
Matthew, I have to ask…how many times have you done this—this manual override, as you called it—to me, and I didn't know?
Matt's regret and self disgust is sticky, clinging like cobwebs, and just as pathetic and weak.
Too many times, my dear. My darling…I never should have manipulated you. I'm so very, very sorry.
I forgive it, but I will never forget it. Did you know, Matthew, that it hurt, everywhere, physically, mentally, when you 'overrode' me? Put me to sleep, sedated me against my will, as the doctors in the hospital had? Put me down, like a dog. At no point between your initial performance of your spell, my resurrection, and now, have you ever asked my consent.
This brings Matthew's mental facilities at an utter halt, a static of white noise, entirely unable to process what to do, how to process that admission.
It…it hurt?
Yes, it hurt terribly. And I was aware the whole time as well, trapped inside that paralyzed vessel, screaming to be given my free will, my control, back. It wasn't until we got back to the house that I could wrench my soul free of that unresponsive body, that vessel that was never mine to begin with.
Tears roll down the body's face, waver and fall free of the jaw to blur the blue-inked lines of the paper.
I even thought it was my fault, for a while, that I deserved it. That it was for the best, as I had believed the hospital was for the best, for a time. I didn't want to go back into the vessel, so I left, and I existed by myself, with my own thoughts, and I finally realized that I deserve to be my own person, make my own decisions, just as every sentient creature does.
God, Jonah—
And so I decided that I would only go back into that vessel if you fixed the imbalance, if you created an equalizer for the control you decided to exert over me. And I do want to go back inside, Matthew—I want to exist with you, in this life you've manufactured, in this Heaven you've created. I still love you, I never stopped loving you. My trust in you, however, feels shaken.
It takes Matthew many long moments to regain coherency, and Jonah waits patiently in the bombardment of the other witch's thoughts and emotions, considering each of them, empathizing as much as he can.
I understand…I love you too, and I will do my best to restore your trust. We thought before, of power, to counteract control. The two are mutually inclusive, in the end. How I thought control could exist without power, I don't know—and I don't have power, I never have, that's always been you—
I know. Jonah states, as he takes the pen in the body's left hand, beginning to draw while Matthew watches through their eyes. And you've always had the control. We just have to restore this equilibrium, rewrite your equation with a new sigil.
Jonah can't help but feel pride, as Matthew's feeling of awe washes through them, as they watch the new sigil for power take shape. It's perfect immediately, and beautiful, far more streamlined than Matthew's sigil for control, which looks needlessly complex. No, power takes shape in just a few lines, with another full circle at the top, mirroring the one in their binding sigil, as effective as it is rare.
Creating the new sigil was the easy part, Jonah realizes, as he considers what they should do now. How do they enact this revision to Matthew's resurrection spell, rewrite the parameters of their shared existence?
They both have the same thought, at the same time, though their reactions to it differ. Matthew's response is a strange, sick sense of glee, some form of excited giddiness. Jonah's is of initial disgust, and trepidation, morphing into resigned dismissiveness.
It makes sense—
I know. Jonah interrupts Matthew's attempt to persuade him. Like your self-illustration when you performed your override, though permanent. It has to be permanent, to ensure the equilibrium never slips.
Matthew, sensing Jonah's hesitation and uneasiness, mistakes the reason behind it.
It won't hurt that bad, Jonah, and at least for you, it'll heal quick—
I'm not worried about the pain, dimwit. I'm just not looking forward to performing this rite—fucking black magic—
I can—
No, Matthew. Jonah interrupts again, firmly, a small thrill in the back of their skull as Matt's will immediately steps down to make room for his creation's will, I'm going to do it. I have a lot more expertise, after all—it's my speciality.
Parting hurts just as badly as it did before, as well. Matthew screams as it happens, and the sound of it, and the feeling of Matthew's soul clinging desperately to his, makes Jonah's whole soul shudder in answering pain. Ripping free of each other is just that—a rendering, tearing sensation, like pulling stitches free of woven flesh. It's over in seconds, the severance of their souls, thoughts, and emotions, but it feels like an eternity of agony.
Matthew, now alone again in his body, staggers before his knees give out, dropping heavily to the floor with a drawn-out wail of pain. He holds his face in his hands, sobbing uncontrollably, immediately ravaged by the loss of Jonah's possession. Next to him, on the bed, the vessel draws a sudden, hitching breath, gasping out in pain as its heart begins to beat once again, a muscle sore with disuse. Matt struggles, trying to rise to his feet, ultimately half-crouched by the bed as he watches Jonah's soul repossess his vessel.
"Jonah?" He murmurs, a shaking, scarred hand coming up to touch the body's pale face, migrating to tuck black hair behind a rounded ear.
The vessel's eyes open, the white-glazed cast of death in them slowly washing away in a flood of cornflower blue. Jonah groans, and coughs, struggling, and Matt is quick to help the conduit sit up, finally regaining some semblance of self-control as he sits on the bed next to his creation, rubbing and beating Jonah's back gently, helping to shake lose metaphorical cobwebs as the vessel begins to operate again for the first time in a week.
"How does it feel, darling?" Matthew asks after Jonah's breathing sounds somewhat normal, taking one of the still-chilled hands in his, rubbing the fingers between his two palms to try and warm them faster.
"Not great," Jonah croaks, turning his head this way and that, his neck releasing a worrying cacophony of pops and cracks. He begins to stretch, and Matt helps him, twisting and gently tugging on limbs and joints, trying to release the stiffness of injury, healing, and disuse.
"I feel like the living dead. Like a reanimated corpse." Jonah admits. "I feel cold, and so terribly sore—"
"It's the result of several factors—the injuries you sustained when fighting Roam, their subsequent healing, and your absence from the body for so long—"
"I understand, I just don't like it."
Matt smiles softly at Jonah and leans forward, pressing a lingering kiss to his love's forehead, breathing him in. Color immediately rises to Jonah's cheeks, and his eyes widen, the bedding rustling as he shifts awkwardly away from Matthew's touch. Matt seems oblivious though, his smile growing brighter with each passing moment.
"I'm sorry, dear one. In hindsight, I should've had you wait. I could've drawn you a hot bath first, warmed the vessel up a bit before reentry. But you're looking so much better already—your color is returning, and you're starting to smell like you again."
Jonah doesn't know what to say in response, but it doesn't seem to matter, as Matthew is already pulling away, looking blissfully content.
"Would you like to bathe, before we get this show on the road?"
"Yes, actually, that would be nice—"
"Together or separate?"
"Separate." Jonah responds almost immediately, the memory of Matthew washing his lifeless vessel flashing before his eyes. Matthew's smile falls just slightly, but understanding lives in his eyes, his gaze as familiar as holding a loved one's hand.