A/N: You'll get this chapter pretty soon since I'll be quite busy next week and it'll probably be weekend again before I'm able to update. About this chapter, there were some parts that kept bugging me and I'm still not completely satisfied with all of them. Anyway, I hope you enjoy! Lots of hurt/comfort here!
I know you get me
So I let my walls come down, down
Newt and Frypan eased Thomas carefully to a sitting position on the bed in the spare room upstairs. Thomas wailed slightly as he tried to stay up, his face looked ashen and he was holding his stomach with his other hand. Newt kept his arm around Thomas, helping him sit straight, touching his hand to Thomas's forehead. It was covered in sweat.
"Here," the Med-jack, Jeff, said and handed him a bowl. Newt accepted it, but suddenly it was snatched from his hands by Thomas as the boy pushed him off of him. A flash of confusion and hurt flashed in Newt's face until Thomas buried his head to the bowl, throwing up violently.
Thomas spat to the bowl and swept his hand over his mouth before putting the bowl to the floor and laying slowly down to the bed, clearly in a lot of pain.
"What's wrong with him?" a small, slightly trembling voice slipped past Newt's lips, worry etched on his face.
As Newt was about to step closer again, Jeff stopped him by stepping between him and the bed, placing his Med-jack's bag to the bedside table. Newt frowned but stayed back as Jeff got to his work, starting to run some basic tests on Thomas.
Newt gnawed his fingernails in an anxious manner as he stared impatiently at Jeff who carefully touched his hands all over Thomas's head, examining it for injuries and ignoring the boy's mild protestations while he listened to Thomas's breathing and checked his eyes with a small flashlight. Finally Jeff straightened up and turned to Newt and Frypan.
"It's just a mild concussion, I suppose. Luckily it's nothing too severe. I still need to take a look at his other injuries, though." The Med-jack glanced warily at the dark-haired boy's scruffy appearance. "The shank got beaten up pretty badly. I could use some help-"
"I'll stay," Newt answered immediately, startling the others a bit by his sudden declaration.
Jeff nodded slowly and turned to his bag, starting to fiddle with some of his equipment. Frypan raised his eyebrows a bit but nodded as well, clapping Newt to the back. "See that our Greenie gets up and runnin' about again," he said with a small smile on his lips, glancing at the restlessly stirring Thomas who was mumbling incoherently to himself on the bed.
Newt looked as Frypan backed away, closing the door behind him. Then he shook his head and finally stepped next to the bed again, settling his anxious eyes on Thomas. The boy on the bed looked very ill.
"Okay, we gotta get his clothes off. They are more or less bloody and we need to clean his wounds and check that he hasn't any broken bones," Jeff explained, all professional. Newt swallowed hard and felt blood rushing under the skin of his cheeks but nodded curtly. They had to make sure Tommy was gonna be okay.
Jeff helped Thomas to rise to a sitting position again as Newt started to ease the shirt off of the boy. He slid his hands lightly over the other boy's stomach, raising the shirt with the movement. As it revealed the bare skin underneath, Newt felt the breath hitch in his chest as his eyes settled on the sight before him and his hands froze against Thomas's chest.
The beautiful, slightly tanned, smooth skin was covered by angry bruises all over Thomas's abdomen. Jeff moved his head to take a look as well and grimaced. Thomas had his eyes closed tightly shut and he leaned heavily against Jeff who was holding him in place, not saying a word. Newt swallowed again and finally snapped out of the mixture of feelings rushing through his body. In his mind he swore he would make Ben pay for what he had done.
"Hey, Tommy, would you raise your hands a bit, yeah- just like that," Newt murmured to the boy softly, removing the shirt off of him slowly, finally sweeping it over his head and letting it fall to the floor.
They checked the boy's back but there seemed to be no other injuries besides more bruising. As they were about to start stripping off Thomas's trousers, the boy suddenly growled and the two boys stopped, glancing at him in worry.
"Tommy, what is it?" Newt asked urgently, looking all over Thomas's face as the boy opened his eyes but avoided their gaze.
"I'm- I'm fine guys, just let me sleep. I feel stupid enough as it is," the boy murmured, a flash of red appearing on his cheeks. Jeff snickered, amused.
"Sorry mate, in case you haven't noticed, your leg is bleeding and we really should get that cleaned up," Jeff grinned at the boy and he settled Thomas on his back, asking for Newt to get the disinfectants ready as he quickly stripped Thomas off of his trousers, letting the boy only keep his underwear. Newt felt a flash of jealousy flare through his insides at Jeff's actions. What bloody right has he to boss me around and – and take Tommy's pants off? Suddenly aware of his thoughts again, Newt shivered and snatched the bottle of disinfectant and some cotton pads.
"If I wasn't about to black out at any second, I'd.." Thomas mumbled under his breath, throwing his arm over his eyes, mortified.
Newt stepped back beside the bed, desperately trying to keep his eyes from travelling all around the exposed skin before him. As his eyes caught the long slash along Thomas's thigh, his confusing mind was filled with the mix of worry and anger again. Jeff tried to take the disinfectant from his hands but he held them back.
"I can bloody well clean one simple wound, you bloody shank," Newt growled, irritated. Jeff held his hands up, shrugged and stepped away.
Newt sat beside Thomas on the bed. He opened the bottle and moistened the cotton with the liquid and started to pat it gently against the wound on Thomas's leg. As the bitter liquid touched the skin, there was a sharp hiss of pain at the other end of the bed as Thomas jumped slightly. Newt glanced at him quickly but continued cleaning the wound and Thomas let him.
Jeff came over and silently handed him a small tube of some kind of healing salve and a large bandage to put over the wound. Newt spread some salve around the cleaned wound and placed the bandage over it.
Without permission Newt moved ahead, shuffling closer to Thomas's upper body, starting to treat the few smaller cuts on his arms and chest with the same care. He was so focused on his work he was barely aware of the world around him. There was just he and Thomas in the room for all he knew. He didn't notice the Med-jack's widened eyes as the boy kept staring at the two of them.
Thomas had lowered his arm from his face at some point and let Newt get it cleaned up as well. Newt didn't notice the wondering, warm way Thomas's eyes were resting on him as he worked on his wounds dutifully. Eventually, Newt raised his head to look at Thomas's face and was taken aback by the expression he found there. Thomas's hazel brown eyes were heavy with fatigue and pain but there was a whole variety of emotions to be found there. Newt took a shuddering intake of breath and shuffled even closer, cupping Thomas's jaw carefully with his hand.
Newt tore his eyes away from those burning, beautiful eyes and settled on patting the small cuts along Thomas's jaw and cheeks. Thomas kept his eyes on him the whole time, only slightly grimacing anymore as the disinfectant bit his sensitive skin.
The cotton pad was soon covered in blood and Newt turned his gaze away from Thomas's face, just about to snatch a clean disinfectant pad from the table when he felt the tiniest brush of fingers on his injured cheek. He turned his head back quickly, staring at Thomas who was looking at his bruised skin with a troubled wrinkle between his eyebrows.
"You should get this cleaned up as well," Thomas murmured softly, sweeping his fingers gently over his cheek again.
Newt's heart pounded hard in his chest and his skin tingled under Thomas's touch. Suppressing the urge to close his eyes and sigh in pleasure, Newt smiled softly instead.
"It's nothing, Tommy. Just a scratch. I'm okay," he said, taking Thomas's hand in his own and lowering it slowly back to the boy's lap.
"I'm alright as well, Newt. You don't have to worry about me," Thomas argued quietly, sweeping his thumb over Newt's fingers.
Newt swallowed hard and his eyes locked with Thomas's, holding his gaze for long minutes. During that look, something shifted between the two of them. Newt could feel it in the way a shiver ran down his spine and he watched as Thomas's gaze lowered slowly to his lips.
Suddenly someone cleared their throat behind them. Newt whirled his head around, blinking as he realized Jeff was still standing there. He pulled his hand away and sat up straight again as he felt a blush settling over his face. Still, he couldn't bring himself to feel ashamed. He had simply been taking care of Tommy.
Jeff stepped closer and Newt noticed he was holding a cup full of water and some pill.
"Here, Thomas, take this. I guess your stomach has settled enough already so you can at least try to ingest something to relieve your pain," he gave the glass and the medicine to Thomas who was propped up slightly with Newt's help. The dark-haired boy swallowed the medicine gratefully and settled back to the bed, sighing.
"You may get some sleep now. Because of your concussion, though, you must be watched over for at least a day from now and you can't be allowed to sleep more than a few hours straight. Someone has to wake you up regularly to see how you're doing and note if there's any change in your demeanor," Jeff paused for a bit, looking at Newt pointedly. "I'm gonna go check on how Clint and others are doing with Ben. I guess you can keep an eye on Thomas for the night, then?" Jeff raised his eyebrows slightly in question even though a smile tried to tug at his lips.
"Sure," Newt assured, trying to sound nonchalant but failing miserably.
Jeff nodded to him, turning around to leave. "Just let me know immediately if there's any kind of change on his condition." He closed the door behind him.
Newt blinked after him a couple of times, his brain trying to catch up with the situation at hand. He turned his gaze back to Thomas and noted the boy had silently fallen asleep. His chest was rising and falling regularly as he breathed slowly in and out. All the lines of pain had cleared out of his face and there was only the look of peace and vulnerability that made something twist painfully somewhere near Newt's heart.
Slowly Newt rose from the bed, trying not to wake the other boy up. There was no reason to worry, though, since the boy seemed to be fast asleep.
Newt covered Thomas's treated body with a soft blanket and tucked the boy in, unable to stop himself from sweeping his lips lightly over Thomas's forehead before settling to sit on a chair beside the bed. He kept his eyes on the sleeping, extraordinary boy, emotions and thoughts swirling through his confused mind. Still, at the same time, Newt felt a peculiar peace settle over him, in a way he hadn't felt for a very long time.