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It is still early when Pac abandons sleep. Thoughts of the day - hysterical laughter, green, ice, Mike, Mike, Mike - stir constantly within him. The hospital was the best place for Mike, with the cold that never leaves and the brain damage or manipulation or something, but Pac hates it. Mike is back in body but not spirit, and Pac needs him. He needs him so badly.
It has been over twenty days since Mike vanished. Since the day they met, so many years ago and with Mike barely coming up to their guardians' ribs, they have never before been apart so long.
They were forced apart for longer than they have ever been apart before, and something has hurt Mike terribly.
And Pac has left him alone in a building which, probably as a result of however the Federation broke his best friend, terrifies him.
Pac cannot live with himself if he leaves that be. He grabs all of the bedding from the warehouse, then drops it and goes to Chume Lab instead. Mike's blankets and pillows are stolen from his bed, a few changes of clothes with them, and shoved into Pac's backpack.
Then he warps to the Favela, to a place which started as their home, and runs for the Order.
Mike is still asleep when he gets there, and Pac is glad for it. His friend shivers even with Fit's coat and the hospital sheets, however.
Pac knows how uncomfortable hospital sheets are. He rips them away in half of a fury, and starts packing the quilted green of Mike's preference around him.
"Mike," he whispers. "Mike, Mike, Mike."
Still he does not wake, and still he looks almost in pain. Pac places a hand on his cheek, and finds it still like ice.
How can anyone be so cold?
Pac hesitates a moment, but Mike is his best friend. Something terrible might have happened to him, but Cell did not break them back then, and Pac refuses to let the Federation do it now.
He kicks off his boots and abandons the bag and ignores all the rules, and crawls into bed beside Mike. A hospital bed is too small for them both to sensibly fit, but Pac makes it work. He drags Mike to his chest and curls around him, desperately wishing warmth into his bones, and for whatever has happened to his mind to heal.
"What did they do to you, Mike?" He whispers to his friend. And then. "We'll work it out. Me and you, me and you, forever."
Mike is not awake to repeat it back.
Pac clings tighter to his friend, as though he could fix this with just a hug, and begs the universe that this time - for the first time - he will be enough to save someone he loves.