LOG: [Forge, Marius] Sunday afternoon

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Shortly after Jennie has her first visitor, Marius gets his.




Too shallow, like trying to pull in air from a punctured paper bag. Marius remained calm and forced his breathing slow and steady. Two breaths, three, and then it passed. Just shallowness, and not a full-blown attack. Not yet.

He opened his eyes, breathed out, and turned again to the same magazine page he'd had open for the last hour.

The hiss of the recovery room's automatic door sounded somewhat like a labored breath, the muted hiss-click followed by the gentle wheeze as the door swept shut. The shifting, uneven footsteps that stopped at the end of Marius' recovery bed were definitely more distinctive, though.

Forge stood with his hands at his sides, just silently looking at Marius with an expression that on someone else could have been curiosity, or anger, or concern. On Forge, however, it was absolutely cold and clinical. The same look he'd give a machine that wasn't behaving how it ought.

Marius' orange eyes held on the other boy's brown for only an instant, then flickered away. This wasn't right, somehow. Something should have been different after all those weeks away. A new haircut, or a shirt he'd never seen before, or -- something. But no, everything about the other boy was the same. Just the same. Everything that could be seen, at least.

The silence stretched. Marius folded the magazine closed in his lap. The glossy cover was slick under his hands, or what he could feel of it still. His gaze focused on a quarter-sized spot on the back of his right hand, the only part of his skin that hadn't puckered around the growing masses of keloid tissue as Marius' body slowly released a power that had never been his in the first place.

"So," Marius said at last, "here we are again."

Forge said nothing, just looking at Marius with that same detached expression. Silently, he walked over to one of the medical diagnostic machines, placing a hand on it and frowning slightly as he adjusted one of the readout dials. Quietly, he stepped away and slowly paced around the foot of the bed, over to where an empty chair sat by the wall.

Instead of taking a seat, Forge just kept pacing, the irregular shuffle and click of sneaker and metal foot on the tile almost making a perfect syncopation with Marius' occasional labored breaths. As he walked, Forge's gaze took in Marius' condition. Scarlike tissue pushing its way to the surface of his skin as his body began to revert back to a 'default' state. Skin would go first, then the lungs would follow. By the sound of things, the process had already begun.

With an almost casual gesture, Forge unclipped a small plastic device from his belt, tossing it lightly against Marius' chest, then turning to walk towards the door.

Marius blinked dimly at the device of opaque plastic that bounced off his breastbone and fell to the rumpled sheets, uncomprehending.

"What is this?" he asked hoarsely to his friend's retreating back.

Forge stopped, head bowed for a moment, before speaking. "Your lungs are reverting to their old state of wanting to breathe sulfur gas. I made some modifications to the respirator. It shouldn't be as invasive as the original, but it'll keep you alive."

He didn't look at Marius, but he didn't step closer to the door either. His hand stretched halfway to the door panel, then he stopped. "Tell me you didn't know what you were doing," Forge said quietly, his voice barely carrying to Marius' ears.

"Not a sodding clue." Marius' eyes lifted from the redesigned respirator, orange irises stark against dark, creased skin. "For all the good that does."

Finally, Forge turned slightly, glancing over his shoulder into Marius' eyes. "I believe you," he replied to Marius, then opened the door and walked out into the hallway.

"For all the good that does," he said as he let the door close.