Work Text:
The morning breeze felt warm, refreshing. He breathed it in, closed his eyes, held it. For those seconds, he could imagine what it was like outside, beyond the open window; green earth, white clouds, the lighthouse in the distance... The rhythmic beeping of the life support machines always prevented his thoughts from traveling too far away from that small hospital room, though. Nothing in his life had ever made him long to escape as much.
“It's a nice day, isn't it?” He began quietly, voice weak, gaining strength as he continued. The nurse tending to the room's other occupant turned around, surprised to hear the sound of his voice. Around the nurses, he never had to worry about speaking because they only understood a little English.
Making minimal eye contact with her had her right back to what she'd been doing.
“I brought a few books today. I hope you don't mind if I read.” He glanced at the cover of the one he had resting in his lap; a medicinal herbs field guide. A light laugh escaped him uncontrollably and he rubbed the back of his neck. “Ah, well... It probably wouldn't be the most interesting thing to you, but I'll try reading some of it out loud. Otherwise, I don't think I have a lot of things I want to talk about.”
That was a lie.
John couldn't hear him and the nurses couldn't understand him, so there was no point in holding back his voice. It was just, there were some thoughts that would be too difficult to speak out loud. There were things he hadn't said yet and a lot of things that he wanted to say – to tell him – but if he spoke any of that now, while John couldn't hear it, it would be a waste. And he wasn't the begging type.
“You see, I've been doing a lot of reading in my spare time, and I've got a lot of spare time around here. Whenever possible, this is where I'm at, keeping an eye on you. They probably could've found you a better bodyguard, but I guess they figured they wouldn't find anyone else who'd be willing to sit around, waiting for you indefinitely. Do you have any idea how long it's been now, John?”
He wasn't expecting any responses. That had been another part of why he'd refused to speak for a long while. Talking to him while he was like that would've just given him the false hope that John would be able to hear him somehow. Whether or not he believed that John could, Adam knew that he wouldn't be able to separate himself from that fragile and ignorant hope.
“I've heard that talking might help to hasten your recovery.” Releasing a deep sigh, he sat back in his chair and threaded his fingers together over the book's cover. His gaze idly went to the clock on the wall across the room, watched its second hand move. “It's been three years, though. If the research had been out there back then, I might've been convinced to break the silence. It's still not certain, of course. There's no way for me to know whether or not you can hear what I'm saying. In all this time, I haven't seen you react to a single thing; not a flinch, not a spasm – nothing. Why don't you ever cut me any slack?”
Ever since they met, he'd been chasing after him. Even when he finally had him right there in front of him, he was still so far away. Lying there like that, his consciousness trapped somewhere else, there was no way for him to reach him.
John didn't move.
“You're a real thorn in my paw, you know that? I don't like being here. I'd rather be out there.”
That was another lie.
“One way or another... even when you're in a coma, you find a way to get in my way.”
There wasn't anything holding him back. He could leave any time he wanted.
There probably wasn't any point in talking out loud, so there definitely wasn't a point in throwing lies around. Even knowing that John couldn't hear him, it was just too difficult. He wasn't blind. He wasn't a kid anymore. Before all of it, before John ended up in that bed, Adam was sure that even John had figured it out; the reason he couldn't leave his side. There was something tying them together, but it wasn't some magical force. It wasn't anything special.
He sat up a little and looked at his bandaged face. “I don't know if you were just joking with me that one time, but I should've taken you up on that offer anyway – gone with you on vacation.” If John were awake, he wondered if he would even remember when he made that offer. It was coincidence that Snake had found his frequency that time. Adam had been in the middle of something and he could tell that John had probably been too, but the prospect had been too interesting. The young idiot he'd been, he'd told him that he would think about it, and there he was now, years later, regretting it whether it had been a joke or not.
The nurse, having finished what she came for, gave him a sympathetic look before leaving the room. Without the sounds of her busy hands, it really was too quiet.
“It looks like we've passed by each other again...”
John looked so calm. It was a cliché thought he'd had a thousand times, but it never became less disconcerting. John had no idea that anything was wrong. If he could open his eyes, Adam wondered if he would regret the three years he'd already missed. He wondered if he would regret being spared. But John couldn't have made any decisions for himself, so they'd decided for him. They decided that they couldn't let him go.
That one lying on the other side of the room who had taken the brunt of the explosion for him had done exactly what Adam would have done if he'd been there, he was sure.
Knowing that that was the unequivocal truth made him clench his teeth and made the backs of his eyes sting.
“I'm going to stay here,” he said. “Right here, John. Until you wake up, I'm not going to go anywhere. That was the promise I made to Zero, but I'm sure you know... I'm only doing this for you. Hurry up, will you?”
How pathetic, he thought.
“What kind of 'legendary hero' lies around like this? If I wanted to, I could kill you with my own hands right here, right now. I'd be saving a whole lot of people a whole lot of trouble by doing so.”
Still lying. Even hypothetically, it was a threat he'd never fulfill.
He knew that now. He'd acknowledged it.
Figuring that he wasn't going to get any reading done, at least for the moment, he placed the book in his lap on top of the two others on the small table next to John's bed. There were flowers there too, but he wasn't the one who put them there. He had a suspicion of who might've left them, but they hadn't run into each other. “Just like these flowers, John, there's no reason for me to be talking to you right now. You can't see these flowers, and, as far as I know, you can't hear my voice. I've acquired a broad knowledge now. I've learned all kinds of things in the words of many languages... I know all about the way the human mind works. It's a delicate and mysterious thing. Truly, if you wish to understand another person and get inside their head, you have to understand yourself first.”
Raising a hand, he reached out, but his fingers hesitated before reaching him. He hesitated for a moment longer before deciding to remove his glove, then placed his palm gently over the one that was resting, completely still, at John's side.
He was warm.
Sadly, Adam shook his head. “The truth is, talking to someone in a coma benefits the speaker more than the patient. I had thought that it would be better if I said nothing because I didn't want to hold onto a foolish hope, and I think I was afraid that you really might hear me, but now... I don't care about that now.” Lightly, he squeezed the hand he held, but he couldn't bring himself to look at his closed eyes again. “I want to get out of here, John. As long as you're here... I never leave.”
He was stuck. That invisible thread that tied them together strangled him whenever he tried to free himself from it. Wherever John was, he was dragging him along behind him.
It was no mystery. He knew plainly what name to give the thread that tied them.
“I wonder...” Apprehensively, he brought his eyes up to John's face, but his gaze quickly strayed to the open window. “What do you believe in? God exists if only in people's minds because they need something to propel them from day to day. No one wants to think that they're living a shitty life for nothing, right? I think you're smarter than that, so what is it? Will we disappear from here completely? Are men like us forced to walk the Earth forever?”
That didn't sound so bad.
A torture to anyone else, such a punishment would be fine with him.
Suddenly, it wasn't that difficult to look upon his face and smile.
“I know what I think,” he said, memorizing the warmth he held in his palm. “Even if you go on ahead of me, even if you go far, far into the distance, I'll never lose sight of your back. I'll keep following you.”
He put his glove back on and picked up the book he'd placed on the table and turned to the page he had marked. “I hope you're interested in hearing about the African peach flower.”