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It was early in the morning. After a long night of hunting, and fighting with some criminals, Armaros and Michael were resting together.
When Armaros woke up, it was still early in the morning, and, seeing that Michael was still deeply asleep, and knowing that he was still hurt from the previous night, he decided it would be a good idea to prepare him a breakfast so he could eat in bed once he’d wake up.
So, with that in mind, he carefully slid away from Michael’s grasp, making sure to not wake him up, before going to the kitchen.
Once there, he opened the fridge to see if he could get some eggs and bacon, or maybe at least something to make pancakes.
Sadly, the fridge was mostly empty.
He sighed to himself, remembering that they hadn’t gone grocery shopping in quite a long time and had been avoiding it as much as possible because they were getting tight on money this month.
Thankfully, with their previous night of work, they’d finally managed to get some good amount of money.
So, without thinking much about it, and thinking that it would be easier, Armaros decided he would go grocery shopping himself, at least to get a little amount of food for them all, as they still had to feed Eden, of course, and Alex, who, despite wanting to have her own place to not bother them as much, was still recovering from everything that had happened to her, and Light who was watching over her.
So, after writing a quiet note and putting it next to Michael on the bed, he put on his shoes and took some bags, before going out, making sure to not make too much sounds to not wake up anyone.
As he walked toward the supermarket, hoping it would be near enough to the opening hour as it was still quite early, he noticed a white van driving passed him slowly before parking a little farther down the path in front of him.
He didn’t think much about it, it wasn’t unusual for people to be out at this hour, and maybe it was a delivery for one of the shops he was passing by, despite them still being closed.
As he approached it, he heard the driver’s door open and close, but once again didn’t think anything of it, just hoping he wouldn’t have to talk to whoever it was, as he wasn’t really good with small talk, even less with stranger, despite them trying to talk to him quite a lot since he became a full angel again, his charm of angel still not fully under his control.
Thankfully for him, the driver didn’t acknowledge his presence at all, going to the trunk and opening its doors as Armaros passed next to it.
However, as soon as he passed by them, he heard quick footsteps approaching him from behind.
He didn’t have time to turn around before he was pulled back by his scarred wing, a hand shoving something over his mouth and nose, a strange ether-like odor filling them as he tried to breathe through it.
His wing was let go off but only for the arm that was pulling on it to wrap around his neck tightly, making it harder to breath, and pulling him backwards and to the side.
Armaros couldn’t understand what was happening, all he knew was that someone was trying to take him somewhere.
He tried to fight them off, flinging his wings backward to try and destabilize the aggressor, as his hands tried to pull the arm and hand away from him.
Still, whoever it was had a strong grasp on him.
It didn’t take too long before the angel started feeling lightheaded, growing weaker by the second, until he eventually passed out entirely, falling limp onto whoever was aggressing him.
He barely registered feeling being pushed into something cold roughly.
When he started to recover his senses slightly, but not enough to move or do anything, he realized distantly that he was completely blindfolded. He could barely feel the cloth that was still pressed onto his mouth, the odor from before still there despite being weaker, but still keeping him weak and lightheaded.
He barely registered that something was being put on his body, something cold that made his skin crawl, and something being inserted painfully in his sensitive area on his wings, where his veins were.
He tried to ask what was going on, but all he managed was to groan slightly at the pain that suddenly coursed through his whole body, making him shake slightly.
It was like a wave of electricity was coursing through his entire being, and like something was draining him of all his energy.
He felt himself drifting away under the pain, although he thought he heard someone exclaiming something. It sounded like someone was overjoyed, something about something finally working, about a breakthrough, but he couldn’t hear much of it under the pain and the lightheadedness.
He wasn’t too sure what had happened after that, he vaguely remembered how he kept drifting away and then coming back to more pain and exhaustion.
He wasn’t sure how long it had lasted, or what was being done to him.
But, eventually, he felt the electricity stopping suddenly, the devices on his body and whatever they’d inserted into his wings’ veins being removed.
As he could feel the thing on his eyes and the one on his mouth being removed as well, exhaustion finally won and let him slip into the darkness of unconsciousness.
Armaros woke up to a steady beeping next to him, he could feel a blanket over his cold body.
He tried to open his eyes, making a small sound of discomfort as the light of the room blinded him suddenly.
Once he was able to look around, he was scared at first, finding himself in a fully white room, machines around him, and something inserted in his arm.
Thankfully, he quickly relaxed as he saw Michael next to him, calling out to him worriedly.
Now he could recognize the place. He was in the hospital. It had been a while since he last ended up here.
He didn’t miss it.
“Armaros? Can you hear me?” Michael’s urging voice calling out to him, making him come back to his senses.
He nodded, feeling very weak and exhausted.
“Thank god, you’re finally awake.” Michael’s eyes shone with tears of relief.
“What happened to me?” Armaros weakly asked, finding that even talking was exhausting right now.
“You were kidnapped by a group of mad scientists.” Michael explained as he held onto the angel’s hand tightly.
“Mad… scientists?” He asked confused.
“Yeah… They tried to experiment on you… They wanted to make you become some kind of unlimited battery or something.” The human frowned. “From what they said it worked, but they were crazy. They kept talking about how much of an incredible breakthrough it would be for science, for the world.”
“Oh…” Armaros only replied. Now he understood why he thought he’d heard someone being overjoyed about something, about a breakthrough.
“Do you remember what they did to you?” Michael asked hesitantly.
“I don’t know… There was something on my body… They injected something in my wings too… I could feel electricity coursing through my whole body… It hurt… It was exhausting… And it hurt so much…” The angel explained, shuddering at the recent memory.
“We did have to remove electrodes or something that looked like it from your body, and the needles in your wings…” Michael thought back. “But by the time we were done you were out cold… You really scared us, you know?”
“I’m sorry…” Armaros sighed tiredly. “How did you find me?”
“The ghosts woke me up when it happened.” Michael started to explain. “They said you’d been kidnapped and that I had to hurry to save you, that you were in danger. They warned me that there were more than one person and that I would need help, so I called the Inspector, and I warned Alex and Light before going, and asked them to take care of Eden while we’re gone.” He sighed. “It’s such luck that I can see ghosts…”
“I thought you hated it…” Armaros pointed out weakly.
“I do… But sometimes I’m thankful for it… I wouldn’t have been able to save you all those times without them.” He teased lightly, although very sad. “And same goes with you, I suppose.”
“They can be very useful sometimes… When it’s the nice ones…” Armaros noted although he was starting to feel too exhausted from being awake and starting to doze off.
“I’m sorry. You must be exhausted. You should rest. I’ll be next to you.” Michael instructed as he noticed the angel already drifting away. “I’ll stay by your side until you feel better.”
Armaros nodded as he closed his eyes, he could feel Michael’s hand squeezing his a little tighter as he fell asleep.
It took a very long time for the angel to get better. He was exhausted all the time, and couldn’t stay awake very long at first, making him have trouble keeping track of what day it was.
Eventually he felt better enough to start to try to walk again. It was a little hard at first, as his blood pressure would suddenly drop when he’d stand up, but slowly he managed to walk more.
During this time, he was visited often by Michael’s family. Sometimes, even Alex and Light would come back, bringing Eden with them, to let the boys see their daughter, despite them worrying about her seeing her father in the hospital, but she never seemed to notice anything as she was taken there. Michael praised Alex for managing to go out of the house and come all this way like that, as she was still struggling to find the courage to go out, despite being protected by her guardian angel now. And Armaros expressed his gratitude for them bringing their daughter to them, so that they could see her despite the circumstances.
It took a few weeks, the time for Armaros to recover enough of his drained energy to be able to walk on his own again, and for his blood pressure to return to normal when he would get up, but he was finally discharged from the hospital.
Michael had to help him walk still, to their house, as he was still weak, and easily exhausted.
He’d been instructed to take it easy and to rest as much as possible until his energy fully came back to him.
The moment they arrived home, they were greeted by the whole family. Armaros was settled into bed to rest, as they would watch over him. They’d also reassured him that they’d already gone and did the grocery shopping for them, scolding both boys for not telling anyone about their money situation and for waiting so long with so little to eat.
Both Michael and Armaros had to agree to tell them from now on if they found themselves in a tight situation like that again, before they were left alone to rest.
That night, Michael and Armaros kept their daughter close as they slept, happy to be back home.
The next morning, it was with great surprise that Michael woke up to the smell of pancakes from the kitchen.
While they were sleeping, Alex and Light had decided to make them pancakes so they could wake up to a nice breakfast.
Alex explained that she hoped they would be good, as she hadn’t really cooked any before, but had found a recipe online to help her.
Both boys were thankful for the surprise attention, even more as Alex and Light had also prepared the food for Eden to eat with her dads.
While they were eating, Alex expressed to them her intention of finding a job again, as she’d had to quit her old job because of what had happened to her, but as now she was more aware of their hard situation with the money, and she wanted to help out as much as she could to not be a burden on them, Light agreeing with the idea and promising to help her, she would even try to get the same job as her to stay by her side and help her better while also helping the family.
The boys were reluctant at the idea, but agreed to it regardless, knowing that it was an important step for Alex to make after everything that had happened, and that it would help her greatly to be able to go back to a more normal life, despite how anxious she was about it.
After that day, Armaros was made to rest as much as possible, only leaving his bed to eat and to play a little with Eden, before going back to rest in it.
It took quite a long time before he had fully recovered his energy.
He was grateful for all the support and help he had during that time from their families, and for how much they cared about him despite everything.