1.1.1 Night, early on. (Patreon)

This is what things look like when I write my first drafts, petering out at the end because I had an online meeting at eight. Not spell or grammar checked.

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There's a sound in the dark that doesn't fit right, not an echo of the empty corridors of your dreams, but a stumble and a curse. Not at you. For once.

"Ortega?" You mumble the name, half awake and yet it comes easy to your lips. A special kind of curse you don't know whether you'd want broken or not. That's the kind of wishes that can backfire, that can leave you trapped in bed with broken legs and blacklisted painkillers to help you through the night.

"Yeah," comes the reply, and the shape in the dark straightens out all six feet and then bends low to rub ${his} foot. "Just forgot I moved the chairs out here to make room." Make room. For you. Are you to blame for ${his} nighttime bruises as well as ${his} daytime mistakes? Yes. Of course the answer will always be yes. The big question is whether you care.

"You could have lit a lamp," you grumble, and reach out to do just that. The stab of pain reminds you that you are more broken than the furniture, and your curses joins Ortega's in the dark. A familiar chorus.

"Close your eyes," ${he} warns, half a second before ${he} turns on the ceiling light, revealing much less of a mess than you expected from the sounds. No broken chair, just a toppled one. Would be that you were as lucky. "Sorry about that," ${he} straightens the chair. "I didn't want to wake you."

"Maybe I didn't mind being woken." You shift yourself into a more comfortable position, wondering whether you could take another painkiller. When would your liver start to protest? Farm-grown like the rest of you, it should hold up well enough. In the end it doesn't matter, the bottle is still out of reach in your inured state, on the sidetable resting against the wall.

"Nightmares?" Ortega comes into focus as your eyes adjust to the light.

*if ortega_name = "Julia"

  A worn t-shirt reaching barely mid-thigh and little else. It's shapeless from years of use, but the Charge symbol is still legible. Barely.

*else

  Boxers. Not much else. It takes you a moment to notice the little lightning bolts on the waistband.

"Wearing your merchandise?" You smirk instead of answering a question you both know the answer to.

"Would you prefer I was wearing yours?" The smile is wide but can't hide the wince as Ortega pulls over one of the chairs to sit down. Not right next to you, far enough for some manner of privacy. $!{he} shouldn't have turned on the lights if ${he} wanted that.

"I would prefer it if you were still in the hospital. You look like shit." For once, it's not an exaggeration. The lack of clothes reveals the bruises and cuts, the securely bandaged ankle and the way ${he} holds himself. Wrong. 

"And I would prefer the same for you, and yet here we are." Ortega leans forward, left foot doing it's familiar anxiety dance, heel not quite tapping the floor. "Two stubborn idiots who don't know what's best for us."

"Not going to argue that." You fall silent, but Ortega catches your eyes going to the bottle of pills.

"Need another one?"

"Yeah," you admit, pretending you don't would be stupid at this point. "At least if you want me to have any chance to go back to sleep."

"Would probably be best for both of us." Ortega heaves ${him}self out of the chair with grunted effort, limping over to the table. After a moment's thought he taps out two for you, handing them over. 

"You can stop staring, you know." It was impossible to miss the glance going to your tattoos, but you hid the look on your face as you swallow the pills with the help of the lukewarm water in the bottle next to your bed.

"Sorry." To ${his} credit, Ortega looks more ashamed than sheepish. "It's probably going to take a while." $!{he} lips back to the chair, but you don't miss the fact that ${he} gets a pill of ${his} own and dry-swallow it as ${his} back is turned.

"Don't worry," you lie. "I'll be back to wearing proper clothes as soon as I can crawl out to your closet and steal something."

"Hey," there's an amused protest as ${he} sinks back in the chair. "It's a lot easier to treat your injuries without you having to scramble in and out of a hoodie all the time."

"I don't need the IV for long." If it was up to you it would be out already, but you know you need to recover fast. Every bit helps.

"Probably not," ${he} acknowledges. "I still wish you would let Dr. Halabi come and fit you with a pair of therapeutic casts. They could shave a lot of days from your recovery."

"Still would mean that someone would see my legs."

"Someone who has already seen them." Ortega signs heavily, rubbing a bruise. "Seriously. I wore one when I broke my arm a few years back. The vibrations doesn't even tickle that much."

"When you say that, it means they tickle a lot. But fine, ask me again in the morning." You don't like being helpless either, and while the painkillers help with your legs, they also make your brain feel number than you'd like. You'd still pick up trouble in advance, but would you sense people who knew how to hide? People using numbers? The thought makes you nauseous.

"I'm sorry," Ortega admits, with that pained look on ${his} face that means it's a real one. Not just to make peace. 

*if not(tinfoil)

  *goto ofhgtalk

  [variables depending on how the crash happened, and the other circumstances. this one doesn't know about Ortega's suspicions about HG, so it's HG talk time]

*label ofhgtalk

"This is mostly my fault." 

"Mostly?" You give ${him} an incredulous look. 

"Look. This is on you too, if you had talked..."

"Me? You know full well that I don't talk even with a gun to my head because my secrets can and will kill me. This is all on you."

"I know now." Ortega squirms. "And I mean I thought I knew. I thought I was helping you keep your secrets. I was such an idiot."

"Not going to argue that," you mutter tiredly.

"You don't understand." Ortega's foot has started it's dance once more. "I thought I knew who you were. Not from the start, you made sure of that. Mysterious. Masked. Can't believe you pulled that off for as long as you did."

"Eating with the mask half-on did suck," you admit. "If you leave it under your nose, you can't taste anything and it gets sticky. If you pull it up over, it scrunches up around the eyes so it gets really hard to see."

"See, that's why I never wore a mask," Ortega says, but the smile is shallow. Looks like you didn't manage to deter ${him} from baring ${his} heart. "But when I saw your face, I couldn't help but start digging."

"Why?" This smells like a confession, but a confession about what?

"You look like Hollow Ground." $!{he}'s leaning forward, eyes on you as if ${he} still quite can't believe the resemblance is incidental. "Or, to be precise, you look like ${hghis} ${sibling}."

"What?" You're glad for the drugs, because you don't think you're good at faking confusion. Not after you've seen Hollow Ground yourself.

"Yeah, I had—" am empathetic gesture "—files on them since after Hood's death. Father, dead. Oldest brother,a boost, dead. A third one, dead during boosting I think. Hollow Ground, and finally ${hghis} little baby ${sibling}. You. Or so I thought."

"You thought I was—" you break off before you can say human, even if ${he} knows the truth, that would still sting too deep.

"It all made sense." A helpless sigh. "Why you didn't want to show your face. Why you were on the run. How you got that kind of training at that age," ${he} catches your grimace,"Oh yeah, Chen talked to me about that. Though you were some kind of military super soldier. Guess he was closer to the truth than I was."

"He most often is." You wonder if Chen has told Ortega now. About the pictures. About what he knew. Suspected. Somehow you doubt so, not with Ortega joking about this. "Still, why didn't you tell me?"

"I figured you were only staying because you didn't think anybody had figured it out. I was worried you'd cut and run if I brought it up. Especially with the face you made every time I tried to bring up Hollow Ground."

"I can't believe this." You sink back in bed, trying to digest what ${he} has told you. Keeping your secret for all those years, and it was the wrong secret. Hilarious. Tragic. 

"Me neither," Ortega admits. "I thought I was so clever, having everything figured out. Everything except—"

"Except the truth," you interrupt, feeling anger take you. Could you have told ${him}? Could you have trusted ${him} all those years ago? Would you have dared?

"Yeah." $!{he} lets out another sigh. "Would you have run? I've asked myself that again and again."

*fake_choice

  #"I wish I could say no." Could I have trusted ${him}?

    "I wish I could say no," you admit. Could you have trusted Ortega to keep your secrets? Back then? You know the answer is no, but part of you wish it could have been yes. Maybe things would have turned out differently. To have an ally. A friend in your corner. Someone who knew.

        "I'm glad I didn't take the chance then." The smile is soft, but sad.

  #"Probably." Ortega paying attention would be dangerous.

    "Probably," you admit. "Even if you were wrong, it meant you noticed too much. Paid attention to me. What I did. Who I was. I don't think I could have risked staying." You always relied on not being noticed. Ortega being immune was annoying.

        "I'm glad I didn't then," the smile is soft.

  #"Of course." I wouldn't have taken a risk like that.

    "Of course," you say with emphasis. "Even if you were wrong, it meant you noticed too much. Paid attention to me. What I did. Who I was. You wouldn't have settled for a no, and would probably have found out what I really was." And that you could not risk.

        "I'm glad I didn't then," the smile is soft.

"Sap," you say with an annoyed frown. 

(needed to stop writing here, was running out of steam anyway)