He recognized the smell first. It was sharp and cold, the distinctive hardness of hospitals that he'd never really forgotten. Then came the quiet beeping, the gentle brush of cool air moving systematically over his body, the rustle of starched sheets….
John cracked his eyes open, squinted blurrily through his lashes. The room was dimly lit, the windows darkened and the overhead lights at fifteen percent capacity. There was the dark silhouette of a figure slouched in the bedside chair, and John felt his heart leap clumsily in his chest. "Dor...?" he croaked, throat cracking painfully.
The figure jerked upright with a startled grunt, head swiveling towards John in alarm. "Kennex!"
John faltered, his vision clearing. "Oh," he said wearily.
"Hey, why the long face?" Paul settled back into the chair with a halfhearted smirk, crossing and uncrossing his legs uncomfortably before settling on a nonchalant sprawl. "You've had the whole precinct in a tizzy, man."
John felt his chest tighten dizzyingly. "Don't…"
"What?"
"Don't call me 'man,' Paul. You don't like me enough for that." He closed his eyes, wanting to sink back into the pillows and disappear. If he concentrated, he could shut out the beeping of the machines, the stomach-turning smell of chemicals and-
"Everyone likes you," Paul said offhandedly, and John heard a dull clunk by his head. He opened his eyes warily and glimpsed the vase of brightly colored flowers on the bedside table. "It's from the precinct. Told them flowers weren't really your scene, but..." He scratched at the back of his neck sheepishly. "Well, figured it was the thought that counted, you know?"
John looked at him, reallylooked at him for the first time. Paul's eyes slanted away, and John's jaw tightened. "What?"
Paul shifted uncomfortably in his seat, and John's heart fluttered in rising panic. He struggled to sit up, and Paul leaned forward automatically. "Hold up there, Kennex, don't-"
John's hand shot out, grabbing at the front of Paul's shirt. "Tell me," he rasped, voice cracking audibly. "And I swear to God, if you-"
"John," Paul said, somehow managing not to sound like an asshole for once, and it was that sudden change that made John falter and fall back, his fingers slipping numbly from Paul's shirt.
"Is it Dorian?" he realized suddenly, glancing around the room wildly. "Where is he? Is he-"
"Kennex, listen to me, damn it," Paul snapped, a trace of his usual bitchiness returning instantly. John blinked, a spark of annoyance lowering his stress levels slightly. "Your synthetic's fine," Paul continued, looking more exasperated than John thought he had any right to be. Then, he realized what the other man had said.
Fine. Fine? The hell did that even mean, fine?
John wasn't sure what expression he was wearing now, but judging by Paul's satisfied smirk, it probably wasn't his most stoic.
"That's a good look on you," the other detective remarked. "I should scare the hell out of you more often."
John couldn't even bothered to be pissed off. "So where is he?" he demanded, scanning the room as if he'd somehow missed Dorian standing in the corner. "Is he all right? How-"
"Easy there. Your bot's with Rudy. Running final diagnostics or what have you. In fact, he should be cleared for duty even before youare." Paul reached out, tapped the empty space under the sheets where John's prosthetic should be. "You busted yourself up real good down in that cesspit, cowboy."
"He's okay," John said numbly. He raised a shaky hand, brushed it roughly over his eyes. "He's okay," he repeated, almost disbelieving.
Paul looked at him with a tinge of apprehension, patting his left foot gingerly. "Yeah. You, um. The captain said to pass on that you two did good on your case. With those dealers," he said, looking as if someone had force-fed him a gallon of blended lemons. "Your synthetic, ahh, Dorian, that is...well, I gotta say, he's not that bad a partner." Paul looked almost pained at his own words for a moment, then had to add, "You never could settle for the norm, could you?"
John eyed him with vague amusement, his mood lifting slightly by Richard Paul, of all people. "I'll take it as a compliment."
"Yeah, well." Paul shifted again in his seat, suddenly looking immensely awkward. "I'm going to let you rest now, all right? I was….well, since I don't think the plan's going to work-" The trilling of a comm cut him off, and his face collapsed in relief. "Thank God," he mumbled, reaching in his pocket, and John watched bemusedly as he fished out his comm and tapped the screen once with his thumb.
"John?" came the voice, slightly crackly at the edges, but still undeniably there. John felt his heart attempt to evacuate his ribcage.
"Dorian?" he said dumbly.
Paul stood and shuffled his feet, then placed the unit on the bed next to John's hand, stepping back and crossing his arms self-consciously. "Gonna leave you two alone," he mumbled. "Rudy said he'd, ah, put him on once diagnostics are over."
John nodded, not sure if he could bring himself to sleep, and after another lingering moment, Paul nodded back jerkily and left. As soon as the door clicked close behind him, Dorian's voice returned in a mock whisper, "Is he gone?"
John let out a numb laugh, more air than sound. "Yeah. Yeah, he's gone." He closed his eyes, trying to imagine Dorian sitting next to him instead of his tinny voice coming from the slim comm unit. "You okay?"
"I'm fine." The end of his sentence dropped a full octave before swerving back to normal levels, and Dorian made an annoyed sound. "Mostly. I should be asking about you, John. You can't be fixed as easily as me."
"I'm…" His throat tightened before he could continue, and he swallowed past the growing lump. "I'm gonna be okay. I just-" He couldn't keep going, and he exhaled shakily. "Damn it, Dorian, I thought I lost you down there. I thought-" Thought I got my partner killed again.
"I know,"Dorian said quietly, and John could almost pretend he was in the room. "I'm sorry you had to see that."
"You ass. Telling me to leave you behind like that."
"It's what you would have done."
"Well, for future reference, don't ever do what I would do."
"I'll keep that in mind." Dorian was silent for a long moment, and John was determined to not be the first to speak. Dorian hadn't brought up what he'd said before breaking down, the three little words that John couldn't decide if he wanted to forget he'd ever heard or...or?
"Rudy says I'll be ready to go tomorrow. I'll come see you,"Dorian said, and John forced himself to put the other matter out of his mind. People said all sorts of things under high stress, after all, and Dorian's systems had been pumped full with lead and sewer water. He probably didn't even remember, and if John had overreacted a bit himself...well, he'd never liked the dark much. It messed him up in ways he didn't like to think about, made him say and think crazy things like wishing his partner was human so he wouldn't think twice about kis-
"John?"
"That'd be nice," John said weakly, struggling to pull himself back together, then huffed in distracted amusement.
"What?"
"I was just thinking...I'm gonna have to get Paul a damn fruit basket for this, aren't I?" He couldn't even lift his arm to wipe at his eyes, and maybe it was a good thing that Dorian wasn't there to see him, after all. "I mean, I guess even he can be halfway decent sometimes."
"Well."He could sense Dorian's good humor even through the phone line. "I suppose so."
A few seconds of silence. John opened his eyes and stared up at the white ceiling, waiting. "John, you still there?"
"I am."
"I heard you. At the end."
His heart was pounding again, flustered and panicking in his chest. "Yeah?"
"Yeah." He could hear Dorian's quiet exhales, something the android did even though he didn't strictly need to breathe. "John, I-"
"The nurse is coming in," John lied loudly and badly, and he hoped Dorian wasn't good enough to pick out his vitals across the damn phone line. "I'll see you tomorrow."
"Wait, John-"
John hung up, and he stared at the ceiling until the nurse really did come in, twenty-five minutes later. "Goddamn it," he said aloud then, ignoring her quizzical glance.