trans_9 | It Must Have Been A Monday

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It Must Have Been A Monday

Elisa came awake all at once, woken by some internal alarm, shrill and indefatigable. She'd done this before— woken up in the hospital, drugged and groggy, but usually it happened slowly, like floating to the surface of some deep pool of water.

The blanket was too warm, but her midsection ached like—

...like a wolf had...

Elisa focused and found her gaze stuck on the meaty ceiling of the med bay, and the slow pulse of her plantsuit around the tender places and bruises. So, it wasn't a dream?

"Hello? Is anyone there?"

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"I'm here."

A large, clawed hand slides underneath hers and closes around it gently. At least that, and the voice, and the tall, dark figure crouching at her bedside, are familiar.

Goliath is back to looking as stoic as ever, but Elisa knows him well enough to hear the frustration at the edge of his voice. Not at her, but at her state. At the fact that it must have happened while - perhaps because - he wasn't there to protect her.

"It's all right, Elisa. You're safe now."

For now.

He doesn't want to think about it, but here . . . he can hardly stop himself.

"Hey," she murmurs, but somewhere it's in tense muscles to be annoyed at his presence. She can take care of herself, she doesn't always need— well, obviously, she does. That's even more frustrating, and it comes out in a clench-toothed sigh.

"No offense, big guy," Elisa groused, thinking with exasperation that the mean streets of the city with the highest per capita rate of violent crime was somehow safer than...wherever this was, "But I don't exactly feel a whole lotta 'safe' around here."

To the one person who'd do anything to keep her safe, that's just as distressing. As is the tenseness in her voice and her movements, which Goliath picks up on. He knows her too well not to.

His hand tightens gently around hers in response to his own anxiety. This is some kind of a terrible night to wake up to, considering the morning had ended so well.

"I should have warned you better than I did. This is my fault."

She could have lost her life, and all because he was too busy being relieved to see her to think of the immediate danger he wouldn't be able to protect her from.

"The doctors have engineered a cure for the virus, and I'm not going anywhere until you've healed fully. I won't let anything else happen to you."

He'll sleep in front of the door if he has to. Anything - just to keep her from tensing away from him like that, when he's missed her so much, for so long.

"Yeah...fine," Elisa sighs and squeezes back, patting his knuckles with her free hand, since he's seen fit to hold onto the one with the IV in the elbow. She's not mad at you, Goliath, she's mad at herself, at this whole situation, at the ship and the idea that she might have to face that it's all....gone.

No, screw that. Goliath was easy to get mad at— he was so damn frustrating sometimes, and it was a hell of a lot easier to stoke that fire than to put it out and stare at the ashes of her entire life. Of course, Bella's teeth had made sure Elisa was infected as well, and that made her even less capable than normal of controlling her temper.

"So just what have you been telling everyone about us while I've been out, huh?"

He sits back in surprise, as it occurs to him. It was easy to assume the doctors would have administered the cure while operating on her wounds, but in hindsight, he isn't a doctor. It's safe to assume that what he assumes about human medicine might not always be spot-on.

But he's here now, and he needs to be here. Even if she's not in her right mind. ESPECIALLY if she's not.

He didn't sit by her bedside this long, didn't wait for her this long just to turn away from her now.

"I told them you were my dearest friend, and that I missed you."

It's not his fault he wears his heart on his sleeve. Even if he doesn't actually wear sleeves.

"I said nothing to anyone that I had not already said to you."

Which is to say - there was no L-word.

Even this far apart, there are some things Goliath knows she wants unsaid. Even though everyone else can see it.

Maybe they did, or maybe they didn't— or it could be that it takes a while to come into effect. Elisa could as easily be frustrated with the slime, the nakedness, the near-death and his hovering, almost-worshipful attitude. As if he hadn't seen her for months.

It was all a huge reminder of the possibility that all this was real, and the entire world had been... Elisa wasn't coping particularly poorly, but she certainly wasn't doing well.

"Fine," she sighed and settled back to just...letting him hang on to her. For a moment she seemed ready to muster the anger again, but it came out in the fear of a child, "This...is it all for real?"

"I am afraid so."

Perhaps Goliath is just being paranoid. Perhaps he's unsettled because this isn't at all what he wanted for their reunion - no, that's a certainty.

Regardless, she is the one who has suffered today, and this conversation will get worse before it gets better.

"Elisa - no one knows more than I the pain of losing your world." He squeezes her hand, gently. "But this is not the end. Your presence here proves that I was right, that the Ohm would not have taken one of us and left the rest behind. Our friends - your family - they are still alive. And for them, we must not give up hope."

This is a battle and they have woken up to it. She's a fighter - she will fight, to protect her sleeping loved ones, with him.

Surely.

"Hey, alright if I come in?" Peter asked, as he rapped on the edge of the door. Though he wasn't wearing his mask, Elisa should've been able to pick up on the similarities between his voice and the Spider-Man she had talked to earlier.

"Sure, why not?" Complete stranger person. Where has she...heard that voice before? Elisa just frowns at him for a long, hard minute.

"Weren't you going around introducing yourself as a friendly neighborhood guy not too long ago?"

Ah, sarcasm, the most annoying of defense mechanisms.

Peter shrugged. "Yeah, well, wasn't sure what situation I was getting into, and being Spidey is more useful that being just plain Peter Parker. Still not sure about the situation, but the mask was kind of getting in the way, and apparently people I've never even met know who I am under it."

"Besides, you and the Gargoyles don't know me without the mask. Not that you now anyways," he muttered "but my point still stands."

"Look, uh..." What had he said his real name was? Peter? Peter Parker, that was right.

"Peter. I'm not going to argue with you," She smiled, though it was half-hearted, "Heck, I don't have a leg to stand on, in that case, right?"

"Sorry. Kind of naturally snarky. Comes from an entire years worth of making sarcastic comments in an effort to not freak out over whackjobs trying to kill me." He explained.

"Hey, what am I gonna do about it, right?"

Elisa gestured with annoyance at the bed. She was more or less completely helpless, just now.

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It Must Have Been A Monday

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