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For the first time in three- no two- weeks Neil felt relaxed. He was disoriented and the fact that he let himself just lie there instead of frantically checking his surroundings was evidence enough to how out of it the boy was. His head seemed to rest on a persons shoulder but the touch didn’t carry the usual feeling of fear or irritation. He couldn’t tell why but somehow he knew he was safe with whoever was with him. His eyes were closed and his body was sitting on a soft surface.
Comfort. Warmth. Safety. Everything he didn’t have for most of his life -which he had found in his team. He couldn’t even begin to describe how grateful hee was for everything they’d given him- without ever expecting anything in return.
His body hurt and he was sure that his vacation in Evermore could’ve and would’ve ended much worse if his team hadn’t given him the strength to resist Riko’s „offer“.
Now that he was finally back, he was tired. Really tired. Sleep didn’t take as long as it normally did and everything went dark.
It was in the middle of the night when an exhausted David Wymack tried to get up to make a coffee in order to keep watch on the injured fox until morning. Abby made remarks about the coffee which she called ´disgusting brown soup´ but Wymack who had drunk the latter for the past twenty years was used to the bitter taste.
The boy on his couch was Neil Josten even tough he didn’t look like he was. Blue eyes, auburn locks. Wymack had almost mistaken him for some random homeless guy at the airport but ironically the ratty clothes and duffle bag had given him away. Well, along with the countless bandages of course. Wymack had only briefly checked on them to make sure they were clean after he carried the unconscious striker in his appartment and laid him down on the couch. The position must’ve put pressure on the injuries of his back and Neil had nearly cried out in pain. The unfamiliar blue eyes had looked pained yet cloudy. Sitting up seemed like the only position that allowed him to relax so Wymack sat next to him to keep his body upright. It had taken less than a minute before a heavy head lolled onto his shoulder and Neil’s eyes slipped close.
Now the striker had been asleep on his shoulder and unmoving for almost five hours and he felt his knees starting to hurt, his old bones not made for sitting in the same position for so long.
But five hours of sleep … For Neil Josten that seemed like five hours more than usually.
Carefully, he held the other’s head and his hands and got up. The skin was strangely cold to his touch and he helped the still sleeping kid to lay on his side, resting his head on a pillow on the couch. He tried to shake off that weird feeling creeping up his chest, holding tightly onto his heart. But to no avail.
Rushing into the kitchen, instead of coffee he got a glass of water and returned to the living room.
There it was. That taste in his mouth everytime he felt nervousness creeping up behind him and taking posession of his body, his heart now rapidly thumping against his chest.
His eyebrows furrowed, he ignored his aching hip and kneeled down next to the couch and checked Neil’s temperature. The skin felt cold to his touch but sweaty at the same time. Maybe he wasn’t sleeping at all…
Something was wrong.
“Hey kid, wake up now,“ he quietly said and took his face between his hands, boundaries momentarily forgotten in the face of fear.
No reaction. No noise. Silence.
Horribly wrong.
“Come on, don’t do this to us, Josten,“ he almost pleaded and slightly slapped the teen’s cheeck. Cursing under his breath, he tried to shake his shoulders gently.
Nothing.
He started searching. He wasn’t sure for what-ripped stitches, infections- but he would eventually find out. His instinct told him he had to search for broken stitches.
He truly should have called Abby. The reget of thinking he could handle this by himself came back ten times stronger when his hand came back bloody from Neil’s right shoulder, Wymack rolled his sudden patientover to get a better look.
Even though he wasn’t by any means an expert, he had had to stitch himself up when he was younger more than enough times.
His mind and body seemed now synced as he didn’t need to think much about what he needed to do next. It was something he was accustomed to, sadly, and espevially when it came to one of his foxes. Wymack was no resentful man but he promised that whatever demented bastard had done this would pay. He might not have been able to protect his foxes when they were younger but he sure as hell would protect them now.