𝐙𝐄𝐑𝐎 - 𝟎𝟎𝟏 𝐅𝐀𝐍𝐅𝐈𝐂 ✔️

030

You wake drenched in sweat. 001's not beside you. Your limbs are tangled in the sheets. Frantically, you struggle to unwind yourself from its grasp.

Your thoughts feel hazy and it takes a bit of breathing before you can stand. After a moment, you determine that you're not in a dream. The world before you felt too real. The words in your head were too loud. 

001. Find 001. Where's 001?

The room—though your own—could never have looked more foreign. You can't see the curve of the bed in the dark. Where it started, where it ended, who knew? You stub your toe in the process of reaching the door. Surprisingly, it's unlocked.

A low groan sounds from the other side. The voice sounded all too familiar for comfort. You open the door, gasping at the sight before you. Your lover was on the ground, bloodied and barely breathing.

The hallway is so dark, that you can barely make out his silhouette. You kneel before him, cupping his face in your hands, but he doesn't move. His eyelids don't flutter. The world around you fades away.

"Wake up," you nudge, trying to hide the desperation in your voice.

Papa wouldn't kill 001. It was too out of character. The man often lied, but you knew he did love his "children" in some sick, twisted way. He cared for 001 too much to go as far as killing him. You repeat those thoughts to yourself in your head, but your blood runs cold as you take in his injuries.

"Hey, please," you whisper, running your fingers through his hair. The golden locks were rustled and matted with blood. You tug his hand, lift his face, but his body falls limp again. You could feel your emotions threatening to break through the only gate of sanity you had left.

You cup a hand over your mouth, inhaling then exhaling slowly, "No..."

They knocked him unconcious—or rather, tased him until he'd fallen to so. Red liquid dripped from his face. You couldn't tell where his bloodied nose ended and his bashed lip began.

His uniform was uptorn and disheveled. The buttons across his chest rose and fell with each shaky but subtle breath. Bruises cuffed his wrists. You could tell by the faint abrasions that he'd put up a fight against the chair he'd most likely been cuffed to.

If you had your powers, you'd heal him. You'd erase each and every injury. You'd make him free of pain. The only thing worse than feeling trapped was feeling helpless.

You didn't have your powers. So what? You'd spent enough time sulking in the loss. The pain only went away when you forgot about it. The emptiness was only filled when you couldn't tell it was there. But now, 001 was the one in pain. 001 was the one who needed you. Powers or no powers.

Getting him from the hallway to your room is quite the struggle. First, you try getting him to stand. That wouldn't work. Two bashed heads wouldn't do you any good. You sit in exhaustion for a second, wishing he would magically wake up, but he doesn't. Your only option left was to drag him, though... it looked like he already had been.

It pains you to put him through this again. Both emotionally and physically, but the long and exhausting task pays off. Your chest is heaving, but 001 was at the foot of your bed now. You can't help but check every so often to make sure he's still breathing.

"This is gonna be impossible," you mumble, glancing at the man on your floor and then at your empty bed.

001 was long and lanky, not to mention heavy. Dragging him the fair distance from the door to your bed had exerted most of your energy. You collapse to the ground in defeat. There was no way you were lifting this man from the floor.

Instead, you bring the bed to him. You throw the pillows to the ground and yank the sheet from your bed. Carefully, you lift 001's head and slip the pillow under his neck. He winces in his sleep but doesn't wake.

You unbutton the shirt from his chest, allowing him to relax in the night. He shivers at the cold air and you quickly wrap him in the white blanket. White. Why did everything have to be white?

You use his unbuttoned shirt to wipe away the blood on his face. Several trips to the bathroom sink are made to try and wash away the cuts on his skin. You wash the blood from his hair. The stains on his body came off much easier than the stains in his shirt. You doubted those would ever come out, but the now wet material made for a good icepack. You dab at his remaining bruises and lay the cloth over his head.

There were no meds in your room. Everything was kept in the infirmary, but it would be closed by now. The painkillers, antiseptics, and ointments you needed would all be locked away.

You groan in frustration. There wasn't much else you could do. You scan his exposed skin for any other injuries. Thankfully, there was nothing more than the occasional scuff or scrape. The more severe injuries had already been tended to.

Out of paranoia, you scan his body multiple times for broken bones. His ribs seemed to be intact, arms were fine, but how could you know for sure? He could have had a concussion for all you knew.

The most you could do now was wait. The suspense was killing you. An hour passes and he still doesn't wake. You sit beside him, stroking his face, willing him to groan or to shuffle in his sleep. You want him to smile at you with those gleaming eyes and tell you a joke. You wanted to hear one of his sarcastic remarks. He lies still. Utterly and perfectly still.

You check his breathing one more time. It was faint, but it was present. You don't remember a time in your life when you'd been this anxious. It was almost amusing as it was dangerous. To finally have something you were terrified of losing.

Sure, there were times where you didn't get along and you felt like the world was ending.  In the end, it didn't matter. You would always find each other again. You would always resolve it at the end. It would always be better because you loved each other.

Love blinded everything else in its path. When you looked at 001, you didn't see his flaws or his trauma. You just saw him and the little boy you'd always known. You see the man you'd grown to love. You see the one person you didn't want to lose. The one person you couldn't because you'd lose it if you did.

001 was the only one who truly understood you. He was the only one who cared for you. He was the only one who stood by your side till the end. Of course, it was easy to ignore his flaws and his trauma. The world had done to him exactly what it had done to you. The boy was broken like glass, the pieces of him shattered. The burden of putting him back together again weighed on your shoulders.

And he laid there, perfectly still, never knowing the effect he had on your mind. The control he had over your emotions. The power he had over your heart. How could he?

A tear rolls down your cheek, then another. A dreadful minute passes, then another. Another tear falls, but 001's still still. You beg him to wake, beginning to doubt if he ever will.

The night drags on, but you keep your mind alert. It takes a half-hour of debating with yourself before you force yourself to bed. You slide into the covers next to him and keep close. You cuddle into his chest, preserving the body heat between you as you roll the covers up to your ears.

"001," you mumble against his skin, "promise me something."

No answer.

"You have to promise me that no matter what we'll always be together. I can't lose you." You cuddle in closer, letting the slow beat of his heart lull you to sleep. You feel protected in his absent embrace. As long as you were with him, you'd be alright.

But 001 doesn't respond. Not with a murmur or a breath or even a flutter of his eyelids. The only thing that answers is the dark. It taunts you like a thief. It mocks you like a game. You wrap your arms around 001 tighter, bracing yourself for the nightmares that were sure to come.