Summary:
"Every time I close my eyes it's burning again."
Kyra and Tom spend a sleepless night worrying about Alex in the aftermath of the Consanto explosion.
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Notes:
Set during Season 3, Episode 3.
Title shamelessly stolen from a line in Taylor Swift's The Archer.
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It's amazing really. She's slept on that air mattress in Jay's apartment very comfortably for nearly a week now and yet somehow, tonight, she can't understand how she's been able to do it for so long – the floor is hard. The pillows lumpy. The mattress too soft. She pumps it up further. Now too firm.
She thinks she's finally got it right but now the blanket is too scratchy. She throws it off. Now she's cold. She groans and pulls it back over her, closing her eyes and breathing deeply, willing herself to sleep.
Burning, sparks, explosions. Flames lick the inside of her eyelids, threatening to engulf her, and she forces her eyes open again, if only for the chance to see anything but that ship on fire.
"Okay…" she mutters to herself.
She gets up and wanders to the kitchen. Taking her time, she fills a glass of water and drinks it slowly looking out at the twinkling lights of Valletta.
Twinkling – or burning? How can a city that only six hours earlier looked so welcoming and friendly now look like the apocalyptic depiction of a fiery, hellish underworld?
She shakes her head harshly to set the thought free, takes a deep breath and stretches slightly. A sharp stabbing pain reverberates through her side and she stifles a yelp.
Incongruously pleased to have something to do that isn't attempting to sleep, she pads to the bathroom, pulls off the shirt she's using as pyjamas, and peels back the bandage wrapped around her waist to inspect the day old wound. As expected, part of it has split open again – if she had to hazard a guess it happened when they ran from the explosion – and is oozing a diluted mix of red blood and cell juice.
"Shit."
She closes the lid of the toilet and sinks down on it, wad of toilet roll clasped against her side. He head falls back against the bare brick wall behind her and she closes her eyes – just for a moment – because really she is so, so tired and she needs to sleep, she knows she does.
The boat is burning again and flames overwhelm the sky. She can hear the crackle of the fire, the whistle of the blaze in the previously still night air, the creaking of the floating laboratory coming apart at its seams.
Her eyes pop open and she purses her lips.
"Okay, that is not going to work."
She gently peels the toilet paper from the cut, wincing slightly as the action leaves a few shreds of paper behind, sticking to the wet blood. At least it's mostly stopped oozing. She grabs the first aid kit then cleans and re-bandages it, trying not to think about Alex doing the same just over twenty-four hours earlier. God, she needs to sleep.
This time, Kyra grabs the blanket from the bed and heads straight to the sofa, her usual spot, and curls up on the squishy cushions, pulling the blanket over her as she lets her eyes drift shut. "Come on…"
Fire everywhere. And then she's watching as Alex's burning body falls into the polluted water below as if part of a slow motion action sequence that in any other situation would have made her scoff.
She forces her eyes open with a gasp and is suddenly irrationally cross with herself. She feels she's not been at her best tonight – terrified, reactive, angry – and while realistically she knows it's okay, that it's perfectly normal (expected?) to react like this, she also hates this emotional side of her that he brings out. How can one person make her so happy and so terrified in equal measure?
She thumps the side of the sofa angrily.
"Can't sleep either?" his voice comes from the other side of the room. It's not wrapped in slumber, but sharp and clear, and she guesses that Tom hasn't been able to sleep either.
"Every time I close my eyes it's burning again."
"Yeah. Me too."
Oddly this makes her feel better. Less alone.
"How's the cut?"
She sighs, but offers him a response because she knows he really does care. "Little bit of blood. Little bit of pain. I changed the bandage and it will be fine."
"Okay…" Tom sounds unconvinced.
"Do you think he is okay?" she whispers, low enough to think Tom might not have heard while secretly hoping that he has because she needs someone to tell her that Alex will be alright. In the cold light of day she'd never, ever have asked, never have expressed such an inexcusable sign of weakness, but it's dark, and she's exhausted and scared.
Tom doesn't respond for a while and she's starting to think he really hasn't heard her when the whisper comes back across the room. "Yes."
She can't help herself. "And you know this because?"
"Because he phoned us-"
"-so we know he's alive, big deal, doesn't mean he's okay."
"No, but he phoned us, so he's not only alive but he's worried about us. And if I know Alex, and I do, that means he will do everything in his power to get back to us. We just have to trust him."
She lets out some of the breath she's been holding in. "I don't want him to die alone. I don't want him to die at all."
Tom has nothing to say in response to that, but she doesn't expect him to.
They sit in a companionable silence for a while – neither able to sleep, sat on either side of the room seemingly waiting for dawn.
"So what now?"
She shrugs, and then realises he can't see her do so.
"We work out how to find him. I did everything I could last night but with the police arriving at the boat we may have access to more leads over the next few hours."
They sit in silence again for a while until- "Tom?"
"Yes?"
"You are not going to sleep, is that right?"
She hears him chuckle slightly. "No, I don't think I'm going to get any sleep tonight."
"Okay. So if I turn on the lights you will make coffee while I start to research?"
He's laughing now. "Yeah, yeah I will."
Another pause and she's surprised at how much effort the word takes to force out; "thanks."
"That's okay."