"Have you seen this morning's paper?" asked Hargreeves nonchalantly.
"Not in the mood for it right now," grunted Kraken.
Hargreeves peered at him over the folds of the newspaper. Impatiently Kraken tapped his foot. Twenty hours had passed since Vanya had been taken to the hospital. In that time someone had had the bright idea to go and alert Hargreeves, who'd curtailed his trip and come back early. Kraken would track them down and kill them later.
"Three words make up its headline," Hargreeves continued, "The Jennifer Incident. They're calling it an incident .02, the literary word for catastrophe. Our reputation diminishes with every copy sold."
"Couldn't give a fuck right now," Kraken snarled.
"You," said Hargreeves through narrowed eyes, "are-"
"-grounded-" inserted Kraken.
"-for-"
"-one-"
"-year and are on-"
"-triple-" Kraken said, looking at his nails.
"-patrol, effective-" hissed Hargreeves.
"-immediately," finished Kraken, "Nice talk dickhead."
Turning on his heel he marched out of the room to the nearest window. Once there he climbed out of it and began his progress towards the hospital. He didn't bother to check in at reception; just simply found her room from the outside of the building. Then, as customary, he slipped in through the window.
With great efficiency he walked over to the door, closed, and jammed the lock. It was a nifty trick, one that he could undo in mere seconds if there was an emergency. He needn't have bothered though. He knew the night schedule of the orderlies and they wouldn't be bothering them for quite some time.
Finishing with the door he picked up a chair and dragged it over to her bed. From what the doctors had told him the night before she was stable; but she wouldn't be able to be out of the hospital for a long time. Just after that he had been dragged away by Spaceboy, who had insisted that Hargreeves wanted a chat. That chat had been prefaced by being locked in his room for several hours.
Now though, it was just him and her. It was barely even that though, seeing as she hadn't been conscious in hours. Still though, he knew somewhere that being close to her made a difference. Tiredly he leaned back in his chair. He'd been resolved for the long wait, knowing that even if he fell asleep in that damn plastic chair at least he'd be there.
Sometime later a slight pressure on his hand woke him up. His good eye flickered open to see Vanya staring at him. Kraken supposed that she was staring at him; most of her face was covered with bandages and IVs. Most of her arms were too for that matter, one of them in a cast the same way both of her legs were.
The only thing that remained untouched were her hands. Thankfully Jennifer hadn't managed to get to them, and they remained perfect. He flipped his own hand over so he could hold hers.
"I'm so fucking sorry," he muttered, "I… I can't believe…I never meant for you to get hurt. I love you too much…God…I just can't-"
Vanya's hand wriggled out of his so that she could put a finger over his lips. Her head shook slightly, as if to say that she didn't want to hear it. Kraken sighed.
"You're too damn good for me, that's what you are," he said.
Turning her hand over he kissed the inside of her palm and sighed again. Then he held her small, paler hand in his larger one carefully. Still careful he brought it up to touch his forehead, and squeezed it tenderly in a gesture of comfort. It was all he could really do, just like she'd done for him all those years ago.
From the look on her face she recognized the gesture as well. She squeezed back, but didn't attempt any sort of discourse. She just let the absolute quiet between them continue, much deeper than any words they'd have to share. This time though, they understood exactly what it meant between them.
Maybe in the years to come he would fuck things up so bad that the work of that summer would be destroyed. Maybe things would get bad. However, they would still have this. They would still have the silence that existed between them; that had been found when he had lost his eye and rediscovered during The Jennifer Incident.
