Author's Note: Normally I write faster than this, but I've been busy with school and doctor's appointments galore. But here it is. Sorry for the delay.
Chapter 31: Farther Behind
Mike's heart stopped for a brief moment when he saw Micky's eyes roll up in the back of his head again. His whole body stiffened and contorted to form a ghastly position that looked as though his bones would snap any second.
"He's having another seizure," Ginny said, snapping into attention next to Micky. Rose's face went pale and Mike rushed over to try and help his friend.
"What do we do?" Mike asked.
"Wait it out and make sure he doesn't hurt himself," Ginny said.
"He's not breathing," Rose said. Mike looked at Micky's chest and realized it was just as still and stiff as the rest of his body. It all seemed like slow motion; he stared at Micky's chest for what seemed like minutes just waiting for it to move. When Micky's body did finally relax, Mike was sure the breathing would start again, but his chest remained still as the rest of his body relaxed back into the bed.
"Micky, start breathing," Mike pleaded in a panic.
"His airway might be blocked," Ginny said. "We need to get him on his side." Mike helped her roll Micky onto his side facing her. He watched as she opened his mouth and carefully put her fingers inside. Moments later, Micky sputtered and coughed. Vomit spilled out of his mouth and soaked the pillow next to him, but he gasped and started breathing again.
"Oh, thank God," Rose breathed.
"Micky, can you hear me?" Ginny asked carefully brushing his hair from his face. Micky nodded slightly; he was conscious again, but very weak.
"Just rest, Micky," Mike said as he moved to grab his own pillow. Ginny moved the soiled pillow from under Micky's head carefully as Mike replaced it with his own and Micky rolled back onto his back. Rose went to the bathroom to retrieve a small, damp cloth to clean his face. She was shaking a little when she handed the cloth to Ginny. Mike pulled her off to the side and held her close to him for a moment. He knew how terrified she felt.
"He can't keep this up," Rose said softly against his shoulder. "He can't keep doing this."
"I know, but you said there's nothing we can do about it," Mike said. "You said it yourself, with this ergot, we need to just let it run its course. There's no treatment we could offer."
"Robert could," Rose said. "Maybe. I don't know much about it."
"Robert's not going to help him," Mike said. "Robert did this to him."
"Robert doesn't want him to die!" Rose said pushing away from him angrily. "We tell Robert his plan is killing Micky and he could give Micky medication to save him."
"We aren't telling Robert anything," Ginny said walking over to them.
"He stopped breathing, Ginny," Rose said. "He wasn't breathing for a long time."
"He stopped breathing for less than 2 minutes," Ginny said.
"I don't care how long it was and how can you be so calm about this, anyway?!" Rose exclaimed.
"Because there's nothing we can do about it," Ginny answered shortly.
"We tell Robert!" Rose argued again.
"No," Ginny stated firmly. "Before he wouldn't have wanted Micky to die, but now I don't know if he cares. He thinks any one of us could open the box and he doesn't need all of us alive to do it. We show him we would do anything, including beg, to save Micky, he'll know that's our weakness and he'll use that against us. He'll start picking us off one by one."
"She has a point," Mike sighed grudgingly.
"Well, we have to do something!" Rose argued. "Can't you do something? You stopped that bullet from hurting him!"
"Don't you think I would have done something already if I could?!" Ginny answered angrily.
"Ok, that's enough," Mike said putting himself between the two of them. "This is not helping. None of this is helping. We're stuck in a bad position and we're turning on each other. We can't do that. We have to stick together; that's the only way we're gonna get out of this."
"Ginny, I'm sorry," Rose said softly after a moment, a tear sliding down her cheek. "I just couldn't handle seeing him like that."
"I know," Ginny said. "I shouldn't have snapped."
"Ok, we're ok now," Mike said before turning to look at Micky on the bed; he appeared to be sleeping again. "Is he actually gonna be ok after all that?"
"Yes," Ginny said. "He wasn't without oxygen long enough to do any real damage. He's sleeping now. We just need to make sure we keep an eye on him."
"And hope that shit wears off soon," Rose said walking back over to her brother's side. She sat on the end of the bed and turned to look at Ginny. "Thank you, Ginny."
"For what?" Ginny asked walking over to join her.
"I froze," Rose said. "You took action and I froze. You saved him."
"It's ok," Ginny said. "Happens to the best of us. We're all scared right now and we have no good options."
"No, we really don't," Rose agreed. "We have to put all our faith in Piper and the others. Still not sure how I feel about that."
"They'll get us out," Mike said though with each day his own conviction wavered more and more. "I faith in them."
Peter watched Piper tidy up in the kitchen. She looked like she was just trying to keep herself busy. She'd already cleaned Davy's blood up from the corner of the counter and floor and was now just wiping the counter. He walked over to her and put a hand on her shoulder.
"You ok?" Peter asked softly.
"Yes," Piper answered with a heavy sigh. "I just don't like any of this."
"I know, but Davy is gonna be ok," Peter said. "You said that yourself."
"Yes, he is," Piper said turning to him. "It's not just that though. It's just not fair that you both got dragged into this. Four months ago neither of you even so much as knew what an Assassin was and now you've been dragged into this war with us."
"Piper, we aren't here against our will," Peter said. "Sure we got dragged in at first, but Mike and Micky gave us a choice to walk away and we didn't. We stayed. After they got kidnapped, we could have walked away, but we didn't. Davy and I are all in on this with you guys. We are staying and that is our choice. You don't have to feel bad about it."
"Peter, I just…" she was about to respond, but they were interrupted by Daryl.
"Davy's waking up," Daryl said poking his head around the corner. Peter knew Davy was going to be ok, but hearing Davy was waking up so quickly after his injury still felt like a huge weight being lifted off Peter.
"I'll be there in a second," Piper said before turning back to Peter.
"He seems like a great guy," Peter said absentmindedly.
"Daryl?" Piper said a little surprised. "Yes, he is…"
"We should check on Davy," Peter said and walked toward Davy's room before Piper could really go any further. He hadn't even known why he'd said that. He felt a certain amount of jealousy for Daryl seeing how he was with Piper and he wasn't sure he really had a right to be. He and Piper hadn't talked about what their relationship was, after all. They'd really only shared the one kiss. The one, passionate kiss. He had no idea what Piper and Daryl shared.
"What…what happened?" Davy asked when Peter walked in the room. He had just opened his eyes and was about to sit up. Willow pushed Davy back down onto the bed to really keep him from sitting up and Piper walked in behind Peter. Daryl was already in the room checking Davy's pulse via his wrist.
"You pushed yourself too hard, Davy," Peter said. "You got dehydrated and passed out and hit your head on the counter giving yourself a concussion."
"Oh," Davy said reaching up to touch the bandage on his head as if double checking.
"How does your head feel?" Piper asked.
"It feels ok, I guess," Davy said. "It doesn't hurt."
"We've given you some medication to help with the pain, so don't worry about that so much," Daryl said moving to hold three fingers up in front of Davy's face. "How many fingers am I holding up?"
"Three?" Davy said after a moment's hesitation.
"Good," Daryl said. "His pulse is still steady as well."
"I'm gonna be ok, right?" Davy asked.
"You're gonna be fine," Piper said. "Just don't push yourself like that anymore. You cannot train all day like that."
"You guys do," Davy muttered.
"We've also been doing it since we were teenagers," Daryl argued. "We trained our bodies to handle it and we started out slow. Which is what you need to do."
"So, what, you went to regular school during the day?" Davy quipped.
"Yes, we did," Piper said. "When we came home, we learned our history and spent about 2 hours a day training until we built up enough stamina to do more. It wasn't until we were at least 16 that we could go all day. Even then we rarely ever did."
"Your history?" Peter asked curious. He knew they had to have had their own history and that they knew secrets the history books he'd read could never have even imagined. He was curious as he'd always found history interesting.
"We studied philosophy and well known Assassins and Templars mostly," Willow said.
"Did you guys have textbooks for all that?" Peter asked.
"Not in the conventional sense," Piper said. "Mostly we had a mentor who acted as a teacher. Taught us the meaning of the Creed."
"Creed?" Davy asked.
"It's complicated," Piper said. "And now's not the time to get into it. You need to get your rest. You'll be in that bed awhile and the more rest you get, the quicker you will recover."
"Ok," Davy said. For a moment, Peter thought he might have argued with her, but had apparently decided they knew what was best. They had been doing this much longer than Davy and Peter.
"We'll leave you alone to rest now," Piper said motioning for the others to leave with her. Davy just smiled and closed his eyes as Peter reluctantly left. Davy wouldn't readily admit it, but he looked weak. Peter was just glad he wasn't also feeling pain.
"We'll keep an eye on him throughout the day and night over the next few weeks," Daryl said. But the worst is over."
"We should keep following those leads," Piper said looking at Peter.
"Shouldn't we stay here though?" Peter asked.
"Daryl and Willow can handle him," Piper said. "He's out of the woods now. We need to focus on finding Micky and the others."
"Ok," Peter said. When they'd returned from the little bit of recon they had done, they'd had to rush to take care of Davy. The only information they had so far was what that professor had told them and that most of the numbers Willow's father had were dead ends, food places or cab rentals. One was for a pawn shop that Piper had wanted to check out and the other an old bookstore. Peter wasn't sure what they had to do with Micky or his father, but Piper had said Robert would not be transporting 4 prisoners in a cab; the food was for William during his stay. The bookstore and pawn shop were out of place and could be nothing, but Piper wanted to make sure. Piper had said she'd wanted to shower and change before going to investigate, but they'd ended up rushing to take care of Davy.
"So do you want to go now?" Peter asked. It was just beginning to get dark out and he wasn't sure how long they'd be open.
"Give me about five minutes to jump in the shower," Piper sighed noticing she had a bit of a blood on her clothes. "You can catch them up on what we know while waiting." Peter nodded and sat on a barstool at the counter. His mind raced as he thought of Davy, Micky and Mike while briefly telling Daryl and Willow what they'd discovered, which hadn't been much. His heart sank a little with the realization they were actually farther away from finding his friends; Davy was sidelined and they had no clues to go on. They didn't even know if Robert was holding Mike and the others in Arizona. Fear flashed over him as he thought that his friends might well be on the other side of the country for all he knew. Or worse, in another country all together. If these Templars were as well-connected and rich as Piper had been telling them, it would have been all too easy to get a private plane where you could load four innocent victims and take them wherever in the world you wanted.
