Jefferson awoke with his mouth in desperate need of moisture. He reached in the cloak draped around him, shaking vial after vial, until sloshing greeted his ears.
He tore off the cork, brought the vial to his lips, drenched his insides, and swallowed…
…but before he finished half the contents, he wrenched the vial from his lips and began to sputter and spit, to choke. He shoved the cork back in the vial.
It was the snake venom.
His vision grew hazy. A speeding bullet, the horror of what he'd done sank into his brain.
He had no time to waste. On his feet, he sprang, dropping the cape to the floor and subconsciously grabbing one of his top hats and placing it on his head.
With haste, he departed his mansion, no longer looking a man with the night on his side but instead like a man with Lucifer on his tail.
He was terrified.
A part of him thought fate had intervened, but most of his mind knew it was the way he always got before his coffee. The Mad Hatter was a night person—he generally went to bed still wide-awake and woke up brain-damaged. He never should have fallen asleep with that blasted cape still draped around him…
He poked his nose in the emergency room. Chest aching, veins bursting, head threatening to pound. His left leg was starting to go numb, so he staggered up to the check-in desk.
Breathless, he stated as loudly as he could, "I drank snake venom."
From over her glasses, the receptionist peered at him. "I will alert Dr. Whale immediately. In the meantime, please have a seat." She lifted a phone to her ear.
Head down, Jefferson staggered to the first empty seat he could find. Then he glanced at the man beside him and did a double take.
"You again? What are you here for?"
Slack-jawed, Will answered, "Alcohol poisoning." Licking his parched, dehydrated lips, the half-conscious man elaborated, "I moved some of the bottles to my apartment. Temptation won me over when I was halfway done. In the alley. Archie found me slumped in front of his office, still guzzling tequila, and got me here, but I could be in worse condition, so that punk isn't ready to take me in…"
At that moment, Dr. Whale came with a wheelchair.
Will started to rise from his seat, lifting his hand in salutations. "See ya, mate."
Dr. Whale pulled the wheelchair back. "Not you. Him. He drank snake venom, which was obviously a mistake. No offense, Will, but you did this on purpose, and he's going to die if I don't take him now. You aren't going to die, just writhe in pain without medical treatment." Helping Jefferson into the wheelchair, Dr. Whale promised, "Unless someone else drinks venom, I'll get you after I finish him up."
Will pursed his lips and stared at the ceiling in palpable displease but otherwise kept his mouth shut.
Speeding the wheelchair through the hallway, Dr. Whale murmured, "Don't worry; I'll hook you up with an IV full of antidote ASAP. Do you happen to know which snake?"
Blacking in and out of consciousness in flashy, jagged seconds, it was hard for the patient to keep his focus. "Agrabah," spat Jefferson out of a mouth that felt full of cotton. His neck rolled from side to side. He felt like he was breathing through a coffee straw. His nostrils were so grateful for each skinny, cold breath coming through from the hospital's rooms.
Dr. Whale was perspiring heavily; his eyes were dilated. Jefferson could see none of this, but Dr. Whale was fighting the horrors of his past. Recalling every time he tried to save one life and ruined another's instead. His head was buzzing because he couldn't breathe.
This was the first person since Emma broke the curse and restored Frankenstein's memories that had a literally life-or-death situation. Dr. Whale's hands shook on the handlebars. He knew there was a possibility he wouldn't save Jefferson, and a part of him was terrified to try and…make things worse…somehow.
But he made himself put Jefferson in a room, swiftly insert an IV, then rush to retrieve the only jug the hospital had of antidote that was for a snake that didn't exist in our world.
Scampering to Jefferson's room, he poured the right amount of antidote in Jefferson's IV. Then he hooked the blood pressure cuff and pulse oximeter to the nearly unconscious man, took a deep breath, and strode anxiously from the room.
His heart was pounding so hard he had to stop at the bathroom to splash icy water on his face before returning for Will Scarlet. He shoved thoughts of his golden child brother—who Victor loved deeply—and his abusive father from his mind. Forced himself to enter the present.
Will was cursing him something awful when he wheeled him to a room. Dr. Whale didn't mind; he was only half-listening. Besides, the things his father—who he'd loved, innately—had said to him were much crueler and had made Dr. Whale feel defective. A horrible existence in the world. He'd tried not to let the shame weigh him down—he was what he was and his intentions were hardly sinister. But it was his father, the man who'd sired him. Talking to him like he was evil, a lowlife, and Dr. Whale's existence repulsed him.
Will was merely talking to him like a man desperate for attention and a desire to insult the doctor where it hurt because he'd rushed to save another man's life.
Jefferson awoke to some comforting beeping. His spine was in a stiff position.
Well-hydrated, he flexed his arm and felt the tape around his wrist.
Pulling his eyelids apart, he frowned at the IV. Amidst a stiff spine, it took him a while to remember. A while of staring uncomprehendingly at the IV.
His eyes slowly traveled to the wall clock. The short hand pointed to the 4. The long hand was pointing to the second small dash after the first big dash. 4:07, he concluded automatically. The windows were dark, so it was plainly early in the morning, the day after he'd swallowed the venom. No wonder his brain wasn't functioning.
The good doctor must've put him under a sleeping curse.
"You up, mate?" a familiar voice filled Jefferson's ears. He lifted his eyes to stare at his roommate. Will Scarlet in the flesh. "That was quite a turn you had there. You almost died."
Jefferson blinked. "I did?" He thought to himself, You mess with fire—the Evil Queen—you get burned.
Enviously, Will confirmed, "Yeah, mate. Whale had to perform some fancy CPR and pump your chest. It worked." He gave Jefferson a thumbs-up.
Jefferson became lost in thought. He owed Dr. Whale a sincere thank-you. What would make the doctor feel appreciated? He rubbed his stubbled chin with his cupped IV hand. A gift card to a nice restaurant? He wasn't ready to die…Dr. Whale had really done him a huge favor. Regina not so much.
Once he got Regina back for what she did, he wasn't going to care anymore if he accidentally killed himself. One never knew. There was that dude who worked at Disney World and played Gaston who accidentally killed himself by setting fireworks off on his head. For all Jefferson knew, that could be him someday.
If not for Dr. Whale, this time would have been the time. Though, he thought wryly, truth be told if not for Regina, he wouldn't have Agrabah viper spit in his cape.
It all came back to her, he realized with a sourpuss expression. He didn't think he would accidentally kill himself in the future, but he sure as heck hoped if he did, he could get Regina back first.
Then let him bask in it for a week, then whatever happens happens.
"Yo, mate." Will broke into Jefferson's gruesome thoughts. "Where'd you go? I was telling you how rough last night was for me. I didn't sleep a wink."
"Huh? Why? This bed is comfortable enough." Though the daft nurses thought Jefferson liked to lie in bed like your typical man. Jefferson had a specific position he laid in to keep his spine from crunching.
He couldn't fault the nurses. It's not like he'd given them written instructions.
"I haven't gone a night without alcohol since I was sixteen. Thirty-one, you add twenty-eight years of frozen time, and you see my dilemma."
Jefferson wished he were as nonjudgmental as he'd gathered Frankenstein was. For lack of shaming him or Regina for his snakey predicament. Yet, his nose wrinkled automatically.
It obviously was Regina's trapped serpent. Dr. Whale was hardly foolish enough not to surmise correctly. Grumpy would have been commenting while pushing the wheelchair, "We'll get her, my pretty, if it's the last thing we do."
Jefferson paled. It very nearly was.
"Look, Will," he coughed, stretching slightly. "Life is what it is…you know? You can drink your nights away all you like. It's not going to kiss your world and make it better. It's just going to make you forget it sucks."
Bristling a la porcupine, Will leapt out of his laying position and stood, scowling, over Jefferson. "Your life probably sucks." Smashing his palm against his hospital gown-covered chest, he enlightened, "My life doesn't suck."
"Then I cannot fathom what you want with several bottles a night, unless you're an alcoholic or miss being a baby."
That shut Will up good. He had no idea how to respond. He'd been burned, and he knew it. Bewilderedly, he moved on legs that seemed to be tripping over pillows until he fell, stomach-first, back on his bed in a position a child would be forced in before a spanking.
Jefferson couldn't help noticing Will's butt wasn't horrible to look at. It honestly made him slightly grumpy. He'd rather not notice any of Will's assets.
Debating inwardly whether he ought to snipe, "Will you put that thing away?" he felt his fists clench and unclench at his sides.
Luckily, Will took the choice away from him when he awkwardly climbed into bed and did put it away without Jefferson's request.
Lying on his side facing Jefferson, Will wondered, "You ever been drunk?"
Jefferson batted his lashes in irritation. "Hate to break it to ya since you clearly have this perception I never let alcohol touch my lips, but I do like to drink a couple shots once a month. But I know when to stop and have no desire to overdo it, so that's where you and I are different, 'mate'." He snorted softly. "My weakness isn't alcohol, I can promise you that."
"Whatever your weakness is what sent you crawling in that lair for a serpent's kiss," Will stated knowingly. "Let me guess…lady trouble?"
Slyly, Jefferson used his double-edged sword. "You could say that, yes." After all, between his chagrin over abandoning his daughter because Regina tricked him and desire to see Regina breathless in a coffin, he had nothing but "lady trouble".
"Word of advice from a bit of a younger man: don't kill yourself over a dame," Will chided. Jefferson was thirty-six to Will's thirty-one. "Had to learn from experience—they're not worth it. Don't be a Romeo looking for a Juliet—be a Tom Huck."
Jefferson was fighting back giggles. For one thing: he knew Will meant Tom Sawyer or Huckleberry Finn. He probably saw the movie Tom and Huck while he was drunk and forgot they weren't the same person.
For two: it was easy to fool this tool into thinking he had a normal problem. Getting stupid over an airhead with nothing but a pretty face.
Jefferson wasn't impressed with pretty girls and never had been. Priscilla had been intelligent, and that was what had won him over. Both of them had been thieves in Camelot, which was how they met and bonded, but Jefferson wouldn't have fallen for her if she'd been an airhead.
Let Will be a know-it-all. He didn't need to know Jefferson's business, and Jefferson sure as hell did not want him to know. He was a lone sailor, and that was how he rolled. He didn't need or want a best friend. He merely wanted to succeed in his goals. And Will was the kind who would stick his foot in his best friend's plans and snuff them out.
"You're one smart cookie," Jefferson confided with a twinkle in his eyes. "Hopefully one day, I can be as…insightful as you."
"It's not that hard," bragged Will. "If you meet enough wrong women, you'll get the hang of it."
Jefferson deduced he'd better quit inflating Will's ego before he induced a brain tumor. "How's the food?"
"Surprisingly delicious in spite of many TV shows informing me hospital food is terrible," Will reported. "Though I can see why, considering my taste buds sang over the gravy and mashed potatoes, but my stomach swore I'd better not swallow. If being in a hospital takes your appetite away, why would they offer scrumptious meals?"
"You sound like you watch a lot of TV," commented Jefferson.
"Mm, yeah, last night. Can't sleep, you're passed out cold, all the channels show hospital scenes. It's a hospitalpalooza, mate. I even saw an awful news report on a hospital feeding a patient a live opossum. When the patient complained, the nurse said if he can't kill his own food, he deserves to die." Will scratched his cheek. "I'm not sure that was in the United States. I changed the channel as fast as I could. Didn't learn all that much, except that some people are horribly apathetic."
"Well, if they have cooks, they aren't doing their job right. A nurse is just supposed to bring the food to the patient and…she did that. But what you're telling me is…this hospital has delicious food but lame entertainment."
Will nodded heartily. "At that point, I kinda wanted to turn the TV off, so I asked if they had anything to read." Reaching under his bed, Will produced a stack of magazines. He flipped through them to show Jefferson. From the flashes, he saw many disturbing images of people being cut open and words only a doctor would use leaping out at him. "I decided the TV wasn't so bad after all."
"The TV's off," Jefferson remarked.
"Oh, yeah, I had to turn it off an hour before you woke up because I couldn't take it anymore." Will returned the magazine stack. "I've been pretending to meditate since trying to actually meditate did not go well."
Dawn was pressing its forehead against the top of the window.
A nurse strode in the room and checked their vitals.
"Will, you may go. Jefferson, the doctor wants you to stay one more night. What would you like for breakfast?"
Jefferson knew Will was going to be jealous listening to him give his order, but he didn't care. He told her exactly what his stomach wanted after a day of not eating.
Flirtatiously, she sat on the edge of his bed and cooed, "You have such a healthy appetite!" Reaching to caress his bicep, she murmured, "It must be because you're so tall."
Will was definitely grumpy when he left, but Jefferson had a feeling it had more to do with the nurse flirting than the platter of food coming for him.
After all, Will was weaker for a firewhiskey than a slab of bacon. And Jefferson couldn't shake his intuition that Will loved attention and became crabby when someone else was under the spotlight.