Chapter Text
Sevika grabbed another sugar cookie from the packet — which was now torn to bits and spilling sugar all over the bar due to her enthusiasm to dig into the treats that she'd well and truly earned (stolen) — and slid it across the counter to Viktor who happily accepted it and took a nice big bite out of it despite already holding a half-eaten cookie in his other hand. Sevika laughed as he scoffed it but knew that she herself was no better as she stuffed another cookie in her mouth, barely chewing and nearly choking several times.
"These are very good!" Viktor exclaimed through a mouthful of cookie. He quickly caught the crumbs that tumbled from his mouth when he spoke and made sure to eat those too, not wanting to waste a single piece.
"Should rob Pilties more often!" Sevika grinned and Viktor was in a good enough a mood to not fight her on that for once. She would always argue that the dumbass was asking for it, strolling into the Undercity with a whole bag of treats that were just begging to be stolen. It would have been cruel not to! And it seemed Viktor enjoyed the treats enough not to scold her for it so win-win, she supposed.
He rolled his eyes at her, though with no real malice, and stuffed the remainder of his cookies into his mouth. He grabbed a few more from the packet but tucked them safely away in his pockets, probably saving them for his mother or the Doctor as he often did. He was much nicer than she was, Sevika had only shared with him because she needed someone to be happy about the food with (and maybe also because he shared everything with her and she felt obliged to do the same but that part was irrelevant).
She noted that his smile had suddenly dimmed a little and his chewing had slowed so she waited expectantly for him to say or do something that would explain why that was but instead, he gazed over at the door to the back — where Singed had gone about ten minutes ago now — as if he were considering something.
"What'cha thinking?" She decided to humour him, nudging him in the side with her elbow like the annoying big sister enemy she was. When he reached out vaguely in her direction, she assumed it was his way of asking for another cookie so she scoffed and tried to hand him another but strangely, his arm just went limp, dropping to his side.
She eyed him for a moment, watching the confusion settle on his face, and she was about to cut in and ask what was wrong when suddenly he went very stiff...
And tipped right back out of his stool...
And just fell...
Never had she been so thankful for her quick reflexes as she leapt from her own stool to grab him and cushion the impact as she lowered him to the floor much more gently, though she cringed when his bad leg thumped down against the plank beneath him.
Her brain was still catching up as she tried to piece together the situation. He'd been fine a moment ago?! And then he'd just tipped back. She scanned over him for some sort of sign as to what had happened and found his face scrunched tight in discomfort, his eyes half-lidded but only the whites visible as his eyes had rolled back. As she observed him and catalogued these things, she caught the exact moment he started to convulse.
She still had her arms held loosely around him as she'd managed to lower him to the floor, half on her lap, so when he began to shake violently, she panicked and gripped him tighter. "Shit! Shit! Don't do that! Fuck—"
She mentally cursed herself because yeah Sevika, obviously he was doing this on purpose and if she asked politely enough he might even stop! Fuck...
Whether or not he was listening was pretty irrelevant when he clearly had no control over the way his limbs flailed, smacking her in the stomach with little consideration.
"Fuck fuck fuck what are you doing?!" She exclaimed, so very out of her depth right now, even with her previously existing short temper and lack of smarts, it was just made worse by the sheer panic she was experiencing as the boy shook in her arms. All she could think to do was keep squeezing as tightly as she could to keep him in place and stop his limbs from jerking like a gross mockery of one of those silly windup robots he loved making.
What was she even supposed to do?! She wasn't equipped for this! She could do bickering and joking and fighting, not whatever the fuck this was! She didn't even know what was happening! Just that it was really fucking shit and looked unbelievably painful.
She felt like a kid. She felt like a stupid helpless kid, so very unequipped to deal with any of this.
And so she shouted for help, she shouted and hoped that those old fuckers in the basement could hear her over the sounds of their stupid stupid grown-up meeting they never let her in on.
She felt a spark of hope and also a whole lot of fucking impatience as the door downstairs creaked open and heavy, lazy footsteps trailed up the stairs, already sighing in annoyance from being interrupted. Sevika couldn't give less of a shit right now.
"What's going on?" Vander groaned, anticipating one of their usual petty disagreements but once he reached the top of the stairs and took in the scene before him he froze.
"Don't just stand there!" Sevika nearly screamed, "Get some fucking help!"
"Vander? What's going on?" Silco shouted from the bottom of the staircase.
Vander suddenly snapped into action, turning to Silco with clear desperation. "Get the Doctor, now." He ordered.
"What—"
"Now"
Silco scurried away and moments later there were more footsepts ascending the stairs, much quicker this time.
The Doctor appeared in the doorway and Sevika caught the quick look of horror on his face before he shoved it aside in favour of professionalism and rushed over to tackle the situation.
He knelt down at Sevika's side and was quick to try and pull Viktor away from her but she held on even tighter, using her superior strength over the frail man.
"Let go." Singed ordered, maintaining a cool head but obviously already losing patience with her.
"No!" Sevika argued, "He's going to hurt himself! He's— He'll hit something!"
"Sevika," Vander said warningly.
"Trying to hold him still isn't going to work. If anything, it'll just hurt him." Singed explained, again trying to pull Viktor away from her.
This time she was less resistant. She let her grip ease at the idea of hurting him because of course she would, of course she'd hurt him because that's all she knew how to fucking do. She let Singed pull him away and immediately she regretted it as the convulsions became more aggressive.
Singed quickly removed his coat and crumpled it up, laying it on the floor and then he rested Viktor's head on top of it as a way of cushioning the blows as his head bashed against the floor.
"Can't you do something?!" Sevika exclaimed desperately, unable to lift her gaze from where it was glued to the boy on the floor to even look at Singed as she spoke, "You're a doctor, aren't you?!"
Singed ignored her and instead brushed her away. "Give him some space." He told her, and okay, maybe she was a little too close, her knee brushing against his shaking leg, but she couldn't bring herself to move, to leave him, in case he needed her. She protected him, that was the deal, that was their unspoken truce. But right now, she was doing fuck all as he writhed in what was undoubtedly pain.
His back was arched up just off the floor in an unnatural way she knew hurt his crooked spine, his bad leg was bent strangely and probably bruised from how it had hit the floor, and he was making this horrible choking noise as the muscles in his throat visibly spasmed. In the end, Vander had to physically pull her back as she was too frozen in horror to move herself.
Silco smartly chose to keep a safe distance, watching from across the room with some papers from the Doctor gripped in his hand.
Sensing her fear, Singed tossed her a stopwatch — already started — to give her something to focus on, and an instruction to make herself feel helpful. "Keep an eye on that, we want to time this."
"What the fuck is wrong with him?!" She barely managed to force out, in a way that came across much harsher than intended but she was beyond caring about manners right now.
"He's having a seizure." Singed clarified, finally giving her a straight answer, "Right now, all we can do is wait for it to finish."
Sevika's eyes flickered between the stopwatch and Viktor and the stopwatch and Viktor as the hands ticked forward and he continued to seize violently. "When will it finish."
"Soon, probably," Singed replied. Sevika did not like that 'probably'. "Five minutes is when we start to worry."
Too bad, Sevika was already worried, worried out of her fucking mind, and honestly she was a little pissed nobody else was, even if logically she knew it would be much better to keep a level head.
The choking noise Viktor was making was only getting worse until he was outright gagging and had to be rolled on his side so he wouldn't choke (even more than he already was) when he vomited up half-eaten cookie, accompanied by little noises of pain that sounded like a wounded animal.
Singed kept his hand on the boy's back to stop him from rolling on his back, giving him gentle but firm pats every now and again to make sure all the vomit was out of his throat. Sevika didn't miss the slight red tinge to the saliva that dripped down his chin.
"He's bleeding." She stated, looking to Singed for a reaction so she could grasp how bad that was because she knew it certainly wasn't good.
Singed didn't seem too surprised, thankfully, but he hadn't seemed very surprised about any of this. "He's bit his tongue." He explained.
"Why is this happening?" She asked. Sevika had seen someone have a seizure only once and that was when a man had touched a loose wire in the factory and had been electrocuted. It had sent him convulsing on the floor until someone with a vague knowledge of first aid had rushed over to help. But nothing had caused this, Viktor had been fine. They'd just been laughing and eating cookies like normal and then he went weird and fell!
"I'm still not a hundred percent sure. I still have to run some more tests but I believe the most likely cause is epilepsy."
"This has happened before?" Sevika asked, feeling a wave of nausea hit her at the idea even if she wasn't sure why she cared so damn much.
"A few times." Singed replied calmly, "None as bad as this, though."
Great. Very reassuring.
It seemed like the spasms in his throat had finally stopped as Viktor had thankfully stopped making those horrible choking sounds and no more vomit was coming up. Sevika tried to see that as a good sign and stole a glance down at the stopwatch. "It's been three minutes, is that still..."
"That's fine." Singed reassured her though she felt it was anything but fine. It was shit and it wasn't fair, Viktor hadn't done anything stupid like touching loose wires, but still, this had happened and that wasn't fair.
He didn't look right. Something about the way he'd disappeared, becoming just an onlooker himself as his body seized (that was if he was even aware of what was happening to begin with) made it difficult for Sevika to make the connection that this was still the boy she'd been laughing and eating cookies with just minutes ago. He looked so much smaller and frailer than she remembered, as if any one of the harsh jerks his body made could break him. She hated it. She didn't want to see him like this. She wanted him to be strong again like when he found a way to climb up the rocks to the river even when his leg hurt or when he denied her offers to carry him, saying he could find a way to do it on his own. She hated how tired and defeated he looked laying there on the floor.
Her eyes flickered back to the stopwatch. Nearly four minutes. That was still 'fine', as the Doctor had put it, but it wouldn't be long until it wasn't fine. Sure, three minutes didn't sound like a lot, but soon it would be four and when it was four that would mean they only had a minute left and then they'd have seconds instead of minutes: fifty-nine seconds, fifty-eight, and that was dangerous.
And now she was thinking about it, the stopwatch wasn't totally accurate, Singed had only turned it once he'd come upstairs and realised what was happening. There had still been that period of time between the start of the seizure and when the stopwatch had started. Five minutes could have already passed.
"I think it's been five minutes by now," Sevika told the Doctor anxiously. Her lip would be a bloody mess by the end of this if she didn't stop chewing it. "What do we do now?"
"There isn't anything we can do at the moment. If it doesn't stop in the next few minutes then... I'll figure something out." Singed decided, fumbling through his many coat pockets and cataloguing everything he had on him. Sevika could see the anxiety seeping into him too.
"Anything we can do, Doctor?" Vander spoke up. Sevika had entirely forgotten about him. "Me and Silco could see what we have in the back or even run down the market?"
"We're fine for now." Singed replied, "But I'll keep that in mind."
Sevika watched as the stopwatch officially hit five minutes. "What if... it doesn't stop."
"It will," Singed said, less of a reassurance and more of a fact which turned out to be more reassuring actually. "It has to, eventually. Five minutes is just a guess anyway, it's not exactly a fixed number, so to say."
"What's so special about five minutes?" Silco asked, finally speaking up from across the room, having been more preoccupied with whatever designs and ideas Singed had given him than any of this. Sevika wished she could punch him, or even better, shoot him in the face again.
"Well, typically—" The Doctor began before suddenly cutting himself off.
Sevika had to admit she had jumped a little when Viktor stopped shaking which was a bit strange considering it really should have been the opposite. She barely remembered to press the stopwatch and shoved down her nausea at the sight of the approaching number six.
"Viktor," Singed prompted quietly though received no response. The seizure seemed to have stopped, thank goodness, but his eyes were still half-lidded and vacant.
The Doctor adjusted his position a little, making sure he was on his side after he'd rolled over a little and he gently brushed the boy's hair out of his face. "Can you get me a cold cloth, please?"
Singed hadn't asked anyone in particular but it was Vander who stood up and disappeared into the back, emerging what could only have been a few seconds later with the cloth, handing it over to Singed and returning to where he'd sat himself down on the bench by the door.
Folding the cloth up, Singed used it to delicately wipe away the remaining vomit and blood from Viktor's face before turning it over to the clean side and holding it against his forehead. Slowly, the boy's eyes drifted over to look up at him.
"It's alright," Singed said softly and Sevika would never have guessed she'd ever actually refer to anything Singed did as comforting but here she was. "How are you feeling?"
Viktor's voice came out scratchy and hoarse and only after a long period of hesitation. "Sore... tired..."
Sevika had listened to him rattle of answers to the sums she gave him in seconds so the fact that it had taken him so long for such a simple answer was concerning.
"I can imagine." Singed replied, "If you're tired you can rest, if you'd like?"
Viktor didn't even nod, he just closed his eyes and presumably went to sleep. Sevika half worried that he might not open them again but Singed seemed about as unbothered as usual now.
"You can bring him through to the back, set him up on the sofa?" Vander suggested, already on his feet.
"Yes, that would be ideal," Singed replied, very gently hooking his arms under Viktor and picking him up. It scared Sevika to see how limp he'd gone. "I wouldn't want to carry him back to the lab in case he started seizing again. I fear I'd drop him."
And suddenly there was the very real worry that it would happen again.
Singed had already told her that it had happened before. Could he have two in a row? That would probably be really bad, right?
Sevika watched Singed as he walked away with Viktor, leaving her behind on the floor, and couldn't help but feel abandoned. "What about me? What should I do?"
Singed gave her a brief glance over his shoulder. "Return home I suppose." He shrugged without much thought.
As he disappeared down the stairs, Sevika's gaze settled on the stopwatch, still clutched tightly in her hands. She only hesitated for a moment before chucking it at the wall, cogs and springs and whatnot spraying out across the room. She refused to give it a second glance and hauled herself to her feet.
She did not in fact return home like Singed had told her to. She settled down at the bar in her usual seat and fell asleep staring blankly at the empty space beside her.
The packet of sugar cookies sat empty, leaking sugar out onto the bar.