Chapter Text
Rorschach travels the jungle path at a good clip, the weakness in his body chased back by a flush of adrenaline. The handle of the fireaxe shifts and bounces where its slung over his shoulder, enough to probably bruise but he barely notices. His stomach is clenching in on itself, either from hunger or foreboding, he doesn't know. He's never been able to separate out the sensations, as he is usually underfed and always anticipating the worst.
Path veers to the left—halfway there. Scars of sunlight press through the foliage, over the palm with the wind-bent trunk and an epiphyte clambering over it. He's minutes away still. His footfalls crunch through crisp fallen leaves in a regular beat and his breath comes hard in his chest. He passes the gnarled tree with its loops of vine and fungus shelves, and then he is in the clearing.
No sign of Daniel. The trap is uncovered, wilted leaves scattered and—some of them glistening. Wet. Rorschach frowns and shrugs the axe from his shoulder, and creeps forward.
Their shovel lies discarded in the loam. The ground nearby is churned up. His foreboding mutates into true alarm as he kneels and touches the glistening wet and his fingers come away bloody. It's fresh, only just beginning to turn tacky and dull. No dead piglet here—perhaps slipped Daniel's grip in a botched slaughter. Daniel has probably spent all morning running after it.
Seems likely.
Or—the blood could be Daniel's. Not as reasonable a deduction, he knows this, but one he seizes upon. It bothers him enough that he raises his head and bellows Daniel's name to the indifferent screen of jungle. When his voice echoes back to him, it sounds on the verge of panic. He doesn't like it.
Behind him, the undergrowth rustles violently. Rorschach turns with relief to the source of the sound and takes two paces towards it before an inhuman scream freezes him in his tracks.
The vegetation thrashes and a beast hurtles out of it.
It's pure instinct and muscle memory that makes Rorschach throw himself aside in a Hail Mary of a maneuver. Clumsy, almost too slow; he feels the creature's hot breath on his face. He hits the ground with his shoulder and rolls to one knee, grabs the axe and brings it up in front of him in defense. Daniel's early worries about the island's fauna shoves to the forefront of his mind, marinated in the accumulated stress of the installation's strangeness and what they know of Veidt's experimentation—what monster has finally revealed itself?
Only a wild boar.
Heh. Only. Two hundred brutish kilos of angry mother pig.
Doesn't remind him of anyone in particular.
Her deep-set eyes glitter, and she moves to circle him, snorting, front hooves scuffing at the ground. Rorschach shifts his stance and she freezes, then opens her maw in a high-pitched, piercing cry. There is blood on her teeth.
(Those teeth could shear through human flesh like a butcher's cleaver.)
Rorschach is immediately, completely furious.
He channels it into readiness—it's not so different to facing down an opponent on the streets; low-rung criminals with delusions of grandeur hire muscle on the regular, always as wide as they are tall, necks as thick as their arms, twice Rorschach's weight but half as fast. They hurt when they catch him, but they're slow. He quickly learned to take them out of commission as efficiently as possible.
Difficult to break a pig's wrist, or nose. Would be breathtakingly foolish to try gouging her eyes. He does the next best thing and uses what he's got. He anticipates her next charge, sidesteps wide and uses his momentum to swing the axe as hard as he can. It embeds itself in her shoulder with a sick thud. She squeals and backs up, dragging the handle out of his hands.
She flings her head back but can't reach the axe, and her mouth works empty air, spittle flying. Soon she gives up and rears around, careening into a tree trunk as she crashes back into the jungle. That jolts the axe free. Lucky. Very useful tool. Rorschach retrieves it with caution. While he might have hurt her enough to drive her off, she may return. He has a pretty good idea why she was here in the first place.
He returns to the pit, and to the congealing blood. If he looks closely, he can detect a trail of spatter leading into the jungle, not far from where the boar appeared. He pushes aside the fiddleheads and waxy fatsia leaves, and there's Daniel.
The adrenaline drains from him all at once and his legs almost go out from under him. Daniel has managed to drag himself most of the way up the tangled buttress roots of a fig tree and wedge himself a half-dozen feet off the ground. Dark blood is smeared over the bark and leaves. For a moment Rorschach thinks he's too late, that this is how Nite Owl meets his end, and all he can think is that it's a better death than a heart attack on his couch.
But when Rorschach reaches up and grabs his ankle, Daniel stirs.
"Jesus, get out of here," he groans, struggling out of his slump. His voice turns urgent. "There's a, a bitch of a pig—"
"Gone," Rorschach tells him. He climbs up as far as he can using Daniel's leg as a handhold. His pants are soaked and sticky, and Rorschach knows that this much blood is never good news. Didn't sever an artery or Daniel would be so much carrion by now, but still not good. "Chased her off. Hrrn. Don't know how I'm going to get you down."
"S'okay, I got it," Daniel says, and shifts under Rorschach's hand. He slithers from his perch, clutching at the tree's twining roots, only to fall and land unceremoniously at Rorschach's feet.
"Oh god, oh Jesus Christ, you could have caught me," he moans into the leaf litter. "Think I'm gonna puke."
Rorschach ignores his bleating and rolls him over to inspect the damage. His khakis are ripped up and he's tied a tourniquet around his thigh with a salvaged strip of the fabric. Smart. The remains of his pants leg are ragged and dangling with threads that are plastered to his skin, stiff where his blood has begun to dry. He lets out a high-pitched yelp when Rorschach peels it back to take a better look.
Not pretty.
Daniel takes a few deep breaths and visibly marshals himself. "I'm going to die, aren't I," he says evenly. He's staring up at the jungle canopy, his brows knitting together.
"Got you pretty good."
Daniel doesn't need to know there's a hefty chunk of flesh missing. Barely nicked something major judging by the amount of blood and how it's bubbling up. No need to panic him; the tourniquet is doing a reasonable job for the time being. He can find out the gory details on his own time.
"Nothing critical," he lies. "Quit catastrophizing."
"Didn't think it'd be like this. Always thought I'd get shot, you know?"
Rorschach hauls him onto his feet. It's going to be a long, rough trek back to the beach and he is not looking forward to Daniel's complaining, or worse, his heartfelt deathbed confessions. "Fat chance," he grumbles. "Foolish old coot."
"Hey, man, you're no spring chicken yourself," Daniel retorts. He's sweating more than normal and despite his tan he's sickly pale in a way that makes Rorschach think of spoiled milk—though, evidently, it's done nothing to dampen his petulance.
"Hehn." Rorschach braces an arm around his waist. "Still better shape than you right now."
"Not a high bar." Daniel leans heavily against Rorschach's side and swears softly under his breath. His mouth contorts, and, horribly, Rorschach realizes that he's crying a little.
He sets his jaw and ignores the uncomfortable lurch in his chest. "Walk it off," he says, yanking him along by his belt loops.
-
While he tries to be a cheerful guy, Dan knows he is given to bouts of pessimism. Stressful situations can get on top of him sometimes, especially when they're the kind he can't resolve by either smiling affably or putting someone in an armlock. He might barely survive a bleed-out, but infection or gangrene will probably get him after a slow, agonizing deterioration, so he feels entitled to be a bit of a downer for a moment.
He sniffs and rubs his nose with the back of his wrist, and his chest hitches hard enough that Rorschach probably felt it—he's definitely picked up on the odd mournful sigh, judging by the way his demeanor is steadily icing up. Well, fuck him. Dan's going to die in this idyllic hellhole and there's nothing either of them can do about it.
He choked badly with the pig—fight or flight failed to kick in until the creature had its teeth in his leg, and by then he was already considering the probability of his survival if it got him on the ground (not good); whether there was anything he could hit it with (the shovel); and where the hell Rorschach was (better late than never, he supposes).
The trail back to the beach is longer than it's ever been. Each pace hurts more than the last, and the viscous sensation of blood oozing down his leg makes him feel nauseous. He keeps trying to get Rorschach to stop marching him long enough to hurl into the bushes, but when he does manage to drag them both to a standstill, all that happens is he braces his hands on his knees and gulps helplessly, to Rorschach's palpable contempt.
Finally the jungle breaks away and they're back at camp. Rorschach dumps him next to the firepit and disappears off somewhere. Great. Dan attempts to expire before he gets back out of sheer spite.
No such luck, and he spares a moment to feel like a jerk when it turns out Rorschach had gone to fetch him some water, but it doesn't last. He swallows it down too fast. It sloshes in his empty stomach and then cramps him up. He rolls onto his good side and groans while Rorschach sits with his back to him and stokes the fire.
"I'm not cold," Dan says, shivering.
"Not trying to keep you warm," Rorschach responds, which is both cryptic and suspicious. The combination is not a tiny bit concerning.
"What then," Dan says, as a fresh wave of sweat breaks down his back. He feels sick with pain; it rises and recedes, but like the sea, is inescapable. He can feel his heartbeat in his leg. He's not worked up the courage to look at it yet.
Rorschach gives a one-shouldered shrug and thrusts something into the fire. He builds the wood up over it, really piles it on until it's roaring hot and Dan is lightheaded and soaked in sweat, just absolutely dripping with it. Sand clings to every bare bit of skin and grinds against him mercilessly.
It's hot enough to be a funeral pyre, he thinks feverishly. Rorschach is going to burn his body and all he will be in the end is greasy ashes and teeth and the odd titanium pin.
Or he's going to cook it, is his follow-up thought, and almost paralyzes himself with the force of his ugly laughter. Cook it and eat it. Survival of the fittest, winner takes all. So long, long pig.
Rorschach glances over his shoulder at him. A flicker of concern disrupts his sour expression.
"Nothing," Dan manages to splutter between excruciating gasps of laughter. His fingers curl into the sand. "I'm fine."
"If you say so."
Dusk is beginning to tear at the sky. It won't be long before full dark drops over them like a shroud. Dan makes a valiant effort to get his hysterics under control, then, with great disregard to his pain threshold and his own personal dignity, heaves himself into a sitting position. He's going to have to take a look at this before he can sleep, or he knows what kind of nightmares he'll have. If he can even sleep at all.
"Oh, Jesus," he says, and sucks his teeth as he eases the stiffened fabric away. The gouge in his thigh is at least six inches long and—Christ, god, there's a great big oozing indent, that fucker ate a bit of him. There's some irony there, he's sure.
The wound wells steadily with fresh blood; thick and dark. It keeps coming, soaking the leg of his khakis. It would make him queasy to look at it too closely if he weren't already on the verge of throwing up.
He touches it instead, which is how he discovers that the tourniquet cutting into his leg has numbed things somewhat. A spear of pain drives into his thigh, up his spine and into the back of his teeth. It hurts so much he can't even make a noise, and finally his stomach gives up the goods. He lurches onto his side and spews a few pathetic mouthfuls of bile into the sand. God, if he weren't in so much agony he'd be agonizingly hungry.
"Better?" Rorschach asks. The air above the campfire shimmers. He's thrown some green wood on it. To keep the mosquitos away, and the flies and their diseases and their maggots.
"Not even slightly," Dan says, choking up. He tries to spit but it just dribbles into his beard. He comes to the conclusion that exsanguination is going to get him before infection ever will. His toes feel numb, his chest is tight. "Hey, I don't think this is gonna stop bleeding anytime soon."
"Agreed," Rorschach says, and slides a strip of metal from the fire. It's glowing hot.
"Uh, okay, look," Dan says. His sweat turns into the coldest of chills, head to toe. "No. I am not okay with where you're going with this." But it's as if Rorschach doesn't hear his complaints. He shoves the strip back into the fire, kicking up a ribbon of burning motes. Dan recognizes it as part of Archie's interior paneling, probably one of the jigsaw of pieces he needed around the coffee machine.
"Lied earlier," Rorschach says. He stands up; his hands work at his belt buckle. "It's bad. Going to bleed out if it's not fixed. Have to cauterize it."
"I don't—don't want—" Dan says, meaning either of those things. It's probably too much to ask for a third option. A screaming but swift death at the hand of a bio-engineered horror squid suddenly seems alright. Just haul him up and throw him in the monster basement.
Rorschach pulls his belt from its loops with a sound like a whipcrack, doubles it up and hands it over. "Shut up," he says, "and bite down."
Dan eyes the belt in his hands warily and tries to form a new plan. One that's clever and effective and that will impress Rorschach enough that he'll consider it. He regrets surreptitiously drinking the lone vodka miniature the second week in. In the end, Rorschach evidently gets tired of watching a parade of trepidation march across his face. He sighs and snatches the belt back.
He gets to a knee and cups Dan's face with one hand. Dan must be delirious to the point of hallucinating, because there's no way that he'd voluntarily—
Ever the romantic, Rorschach shoves his thumb into the corner of Dan's mouth and levers his teeth apart, mashing his lips in the process.
"Ohw-ow," Dan says, even though it's really not that painful at all, comparatively speaking, but was a mistake because it's given Rorschach enough leeway to jam the belt leather in there. It's salty and pungent, and Dan bites down to stifle his indignation and his disappointment rather than spit it out and have things devolve into a scuffle. He's not exactly on fighting form.
"This will hurt," Rorschach says solemnly.
"Ih aedy huhs," Dan informs him.
"Then no big deal."
Rorschach retrieves the metal strip then arranges himself behind Dan in the sand. Deliberately vanishing into his blind spot was always a portent that something unsavory was about to transpire; Dan makes a questioning sound around the belt leather. Rorschach takes a breath, one that sounds like he's about to tell him to shut up again, but instead he says nothing. He pulls Dan's shoulders back and straightens out his arms, then pins them under his knees.
"Ready?"
Dan will never be ready, especially with Rorschach pressed tight against his back. He sucks on the belt and shrugs half-heartedly.
Rorschach wraps one arm around his neck like he's preparing to choke him out, spreads his hand flat against Dan's shoulder then leans over and briefly touches the red-hot metal to his wound.
Dan has a moment to think: huh, that's not so bad, then his entire body convulses as that searing heat transmutes into an onslaught of pain. His spine curves and his teeth sink into the belt, muffling the low, animal groan that rips from his throat.
"Shh," Rorschach says into his ear—more a frustrated hiss than an expression of comfort—and touches him with the metal again. Dan digs his heels into the sand and twists against him, though Rorschach is as rigid and uncompromising as he's ever been. All he can do is writhe in the prison of his grip. Rorschach's hand makes a fist in Dan's shirt. "Once more. Keep still, Daniel."
Dan shudders under his grip. The anticipation of the burn is almost worse than the burn itself. The metal comes down once more as promised. Almost worse—but nowhere near, in reality.
His mouth goes slack and the belt slides down his chest, falling into the sand.
"Motherfucker," he says hoarsely. "You motherfucker, oh fuck."
"You shut up," Rorschach spits, and cuffs the side of his head. Dan just goes on to curse the illimitable stars, the empty wilderness, the endless barrier of the ocean and every inauspicious turn that brought him to this place and to this moment, with varying degrees of coherence but with, in his opinion, admirably consistent viciousness.
Rorschach tosses the metal aside and bundles Dan over onto his side so he can extricate himself. The stench of burning flesh seeps into Dan's consciousness. His stomach recognizes the smell of cooking meat, clenches hard and then rumbles, loud and long and hungry.
Rorschach pauses halfway through getting to his feet.
"Sorry," Dan says faintly. He presses a hand over his stomach as though he can muffle its horrific noises. "That was kind of fucked up."
-
The bleeding has stopped but the skin on Daniel's leg has blistered dramatically. Rorschach drags him from the fireside, where he has inconveniently passed out, and into the shelter of the Archimedes. The pillows they stole from the installation are moist and probably beginning to molder—and Rorschach fears that spiders may have used them for a nest and they will soon burst with countless scurrying young—but they're still more comfortable than the steel hull of the ship, so Rorschach tucks both of them beneath Daniel and his leg.
He jogs to the sea and wets a scrap of Daniel's khakis in the night-time surf. Salt water is good for wounds. Even as he thinks it, he feels a hopelessness wash over him. He has cauterized his own wounds in the past, once or twice, when circumstances and a lack of medical supplies demanded it. He'd used the element from his hotplate.
They had become infected every time, despite his best efforts. And there is no best effort here. There's pig saliva in him, ash and sand and insects seeking something soft and wet to burrow into. He'll soon develop an infection, the poison will spread into his bloodstream and then he'll go into toxic shock. His chance of survival is low, unless—
The shadow of the installation looms large in Rorschach's consciousness. He could go alone, brave its creeping horrors and salvage what drugs he can and leave Daniel at risk of dying while he's gone, desperately alone. Or he could drag Daniel there with him, weak, feverish, and vulnerable to whatever is haunting the sterile corridors, but—
—but it's grounding, the two of them together. Even if it takes them both, in the end. Better it takes them both.
He plasters the saltwater fabric over Daniel's leg. He stirs and moans incoherently, but remains unconscious. He is as hot as a furnace, sweating through his clothes. It's borderline unbearable, but Rorschach tucks himself at his back anyway and waits for the dawn.