The Algorithm

Chapter sixteen - Bullets and Scars

Marinette sat on a hospital bed as Duusu cleaned up the cut on her upper arm, the sound of the heart rate monitor flatlining still echoed in her head like a constant and repetitive buzzing. She could still hear the doctors yelling and scrabbling to revive him and all Marinette could do was say that it was her fault. She had let him come without permission and now he was fighting for his life.

As Marinette listened with her ear against the door of Adrien's operating room, Plagg had found her and dragged her to Duusu to have her cut looked at, and up until that point, she hadn't noticed she was bleeding. Marinette flinched slightly at the stinging of a needle piercing her skin as Duusu threaded the wound shut.

"The cut isn't very deep." The doctor said while pushing her mix of blue and purple hair out of her face. "It won't leave a scar." To be honest Marinette didn't care about scars. Dozens of them lined her skin, showing the battles she had won, and some she had lost. Marinette saw it as a kind of diary that recorded her history. A thin white gash on her left forearm that was a few centimeters long had been earned when Marinette was hit by a piece of shrapnel while pulling a soldier out of wreckage. A blemish on her thigh was from when she was stabbed while undercover at a horse race. A scar at her waist was given to her when she had been shot by a rifle, and chances were she would have another scar to match if Adrien hadn't done what he did.

The only scars she hated were the ones that appeared during her time at the refuge. Jagged marks ran up from the base of her spine to the nape of her neck, giving her discolored gashes all over her back. The white scars gave the impression that an animal had clawed away at her flesh but in fact the short lines were given to her by scalpels and knives from having to rip her open over and over in hope that she would become the impossible, and she did. She got powers and the cutting stopped but her suffering didn't. The scars became a permanent reminder of what was done to her.

As Duusu tied off the stitches, three familiar faces appeared in the doorway. "How is Adrien? Marinette asked before they even got a chance to say hello.

"He flatlined but they got him back and he's stable." Plagg said. "They are hopeful that he will make a full recovery."

"Only hopeful?" The blue eyed girl asked.

"Be glad they are hopeful." Tikki stated bitterly. "What the hell was he even doing there? We never gave him authorization to leave." Marinette understood what Tikki was trying to accuse her of but she was not in the mood to deal with one of her lectures. She knew she messed up and didn't need to be reminded of that.

"Can I see him?" Marinette asked, completely ignoring Tikki's presence in the room.

"He's awake." Nooroo answered. "He's been asking about you. Once Duusu is done patching you up we can go see him." Luckily Duusu had already finished up with Marinette's arm and permitted her to leave. Marinette got off the bed and ran past her three superiors and through the hallways to Adrien's hospital room.

As soon as she set eyes on him, her heart sank. He was white as a sheet, sweating, had tubes sticking out of his appendages, and the heart monitor was only registering small, weak heartbeats. His shoulder was wrapped in bandages and his arm was propped up in a sling. "Adrien?" Marinette mumbled. Anemically, he opened his eyes which seemed to be a great effort on his part.

"Hey." He managed to whisper to her and a small smile tugged at his lips. Marinette's eyes stung with tears but she bit her lip, not wanting to cry in front of him.

"I told you not to die Adrien, I specifically told you not to die, and what did you go ahead and do?" She retorted sarcastically and slightly angry that he disobeyed her orders to stay in the car.