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Ok, Dan, you are going to enter this room silently, check his pulse, and then leave. Sure, it'll have been a bit creepy, but no one will be any the wiser - and you'll be reassured.
That's what the vampire's telling himself, anyway, as he stands awkwardly in front of Kevin's closed door. A few minutes ago, he was pacing downstairs, after trying and failing to read a book in the calm living room.
But there lies the problem. The calm is unsettling, when you're used to four people running around with their stupid complaints and jokes that make him both sigh in despair and laugh to tears, it's really, really fecking weird to be alone in the quiet.
He could go fetch Daithi - Daithi's not resting tonight. Last Dan's heard of him, he finally stopped staring at a wall in a library to float back to the room Brian's in, where he's presumably ruminating and looking at another wall, silently threatening the cyborg to get some rest.
Brian should be sleeping. That's what Dan heard him swear to Daithi he was going to do. But, well, Daithi didn't sound like he believed him, and the vampire's inclined to agree. After any kind of failure, injuries or deviation from a plan that ends badly, he usually hides in his room, rerunning the scenario in his head over and over again, looking for the thing that went wrong and upgrading his mechanical parts, stuck in a never-ending loop of trying and failing to imagine every other possible scenario.
Seán is absolutely and definitively conked out, at the very least. Not that he didn't absolutely fight sleep like the devil, but there was no way a fight like that wouldn't tire him out for a full eight hours, even in abnormal circumstances.
And these are abnormal circumstances.
Dan comes back to himself when he hears a pained sigh from within Kevin's room. He can't help but hold a breath he doesn't need until he hears the human settle back into slumber. While he's standing in front of his door. Like a weirdo.
The vampire fiddles with his coat. Usually he would turn around. He would go back to the living room. But…
Kevin shouldn't be hurt in the first place, so they're not dealing with usual right now.
Dan enters Kevin's room.
He goes straight to where Kevin's bed is and kneels, putting his hand to the human's pulse as quickly as possible, even if he heard him breathing a few seconds ago. He just wants to make sure.
Of course, he's alive. Why wouldn't he be? But Dan still feels tension leave his body.
Exhaling, he raises with the intention of leaving, going back to his book. But as soon as he passes the threshold, the anxiety comes rushing back. As if the human was going to die as soon as he left, get a grip, Dan.
He turns around. There's a chair in Kevin's room, and he moves it closer to the bed. He sits and takes his book out.
At least this gamer chair Kevin insisted Dan buy is comfortable.
Daithi is stressed.
It wouldn't be noticeable to a stranger, but Brian's not a stranger, and he's been hanging around him for long enough to notice his tells - namely, staring blankly at a wall for hours to days on end without any sign of remembering he's corporal.
He'd be worried, if there was any part of him that wasn't wishing he could do the same - ignore the passage of time until they knew Kev would be absolutely and completely fine, when he could run a real diagnostic and know exactly what the after-effects would be and-
He's spiralling.
He's been spiralling since they split up, actually.
He was able to run a quick scan of Kevin's injuries, Daithi possessing his body - always a great experience for everyone involved - as Dan and Seán very nearly maimed every single person standing in that field. They're terrifying, working together like that.
The diagnosis he obtained was flimsy, at best, more so picking up the superficial injuries, the burns, the bum leg, some bruises, probably a concussion.
Stab wound.
There's not much he can do with that - sure, the massive bleeding stab wound is the most concerning thing about this, and he can fix it, superficially - analyze, grip, pull hiss, sorry, Kev, apply pressure, cauterize the wound - there, done.
But he can't help but feel this deeply rooted anxiety about what might be happening inside, potential side effects that Brian can't see without a good, calm environment and an awake, ghost-free patient.
He assumes the danger has passed when Dan and Seán swarm him like concerned parents, talking over each other until Daithi shuts them up, saying Brian couldn't possibly concentrate with them like this. Bit of a lie, since he's already done all he can, but he's grateful still.
An amazing day, overall.
Now here he is, working on upgrading his injury scanner, periodically checking in on Daithi who's still just standing there, ignoring life. He understands it's Daithi's way of dealing with the situation (because even if he sometimes acts like he doesn't care, he's a big old softie deep down). It still makes Brian a bit annoyed - he knows it's unfair to be jealous of a dead man, who is his best friend no less, but it is what it is.
As it stands, he looks at his tools through his loading interface, and decides that's enough for today. He pushes himself up with the intention of going to the living room, getting some water and quickly checking on Dan, and then going to bed. He won't be able to sleep, but at least Daithi won't be on his ass about not even trying to when he mentally checks back in.
But when he enters the living room, Dan's no longer sitting there with his book. Bewildered, Brian looks around for a second, thinking. He can't be sleeping, it's the middle of the night, and when Dan's not sleeping, he's not in his room. So where is he? Sure, the mansion has about a million rooms and sure, technically speaking, Dan could be in any of them, but he prefers to hang out downstairs when someone is sleeping, both to stay closer to those awake - when they're not making too much noise - and for fear of making noise himself and waking those who're sleeping- even if both Seán and Kevin are out cold. And the library… well, Brian doesn't think Daniel would be in the mood to be alone in the library while his friends are… like this.
Brian's gaze flickers to the stairs and he frowns. Dan's probably checking in on Kevin, but from the lack of a crease in his leather armchair, he's been gone for a long time and from the lack of books nearby, he's not planning on returning here anytime soon.
Well, no hurt in checking on them before returning to his own room.
He cracks open Kevin's door and immediately notices Dan in Kevin's gaming chair even if the vampire doesn't notice him, completely absorbed in his book. He looks more relaxed than he was earlier, that's for sure, and that's good. Brian withdraws from the door, intending to return to his room.
“You can stay if you want.” Daniel's voice interrupts him, and he spins around. Dan hasn't looked up from his book, but he still noticed him. Of course.
Brian crosses his arms and makes a show of looking around. “Kevin's making a real inefficient use of space in his room, keeping only one chair after you graciously gave him the biggest bedroom.” Dan looks vaguely embarrassed, as he does every time one of the lads mentions his favouritism toward Kevin, but to his credit he clearly recognizes it as the poorly disguised attempt to change the subject that it is.
“Hmm. So, are you coming in or not? There's room on the floor.”
Wide awake Brian says no. His tired mouth does not.
Instead, almost as if his tired body made the decision for him, he enters and drifts toward the bed, sitting on the floor next to it and resting his head on the mattress. He closes his eyes. Just for a second.
Daithi remembers he exists after what might or might not be actual hours.
When he blinks himself back into existence, the only tell that time has actually passed is that Brian's no longer next to him, muttering as he fixed things that don't need to be fixed in his programming. And the sun is starting to rise.
Shit. He doesn't usually lose that much time in one go. Clearly, the day's taken more of a toll on him than he realized.
Earlier, when they were all walking away from the field, Brian asked him if he was alright and he said yes. Then Daniel asked him if he was alright and he said yes. Then Seán asked him the same question again and he started to think that maybe the time he thought he was very conspicuously losing while they were worried about Kevin was not conspicuous at all and he was being obvious about being confused.
It's not his fault, really. He's worried, of course he's worried, he does not want to guide Kevin into the afterlife, thank you very much. And when he's worried he loses time, and when he loses time it's kind of like he appears at random moments after his body moved on autopilot without him in it, and so it is confusing.
He came to after Brian had fixed Kevin while he was just along for the ride in his body, just in time to stop Dan and Seán from overwhelming poor Brian to death by telling them to shut up - his favorite thing to do.
Then, they were in the manor, Daithi was in his own non-body again and Dan was stepping out of Kevin's room, telling them it was going to be fine and that they should just do their own stuff and let him rest. They all let out a sigh of relief.
And then Seán was passed out on the floor and Brian was asking for his help to carrying him to bed. Daithi's pretty sure, after the fact, that that possession was the one that sapped all of his remaining energy, and the reason that he lost as much consecutive time as he did after.
The fact that Brian's gone pleasantly surprises him, even if he doesn't really trust that the cyborg did what would be best for himself and gone to sleep. At least he's in his room, resting. Technically, Daithi could go back in his own world, recharge some more and then maybe come to even before Seán and Kevin woke up.
But no, since he's such a good friend, he's actually going to check on them.
He starts by checking on Seán, who's still curled in a ball on his bed and snoring so loudly that Daithi's surprised he hasn't woken himself up. At least he's actually getting some sleep now instead of worrying himself sick like he did while he was awake, as if it would actually help Kev get better faster to have an extra pair of eyes on him.
Then, he checks Brian's room quietly, just in case he actually fell asleep , but he isn't there. Probably in the living room, chatting with Dan instead of getting rest. Daithi's going to kill him. Or he's going to kill Dan (again) for being a bad influence. Whichever happens first.
With a heavy sigh, he turns around. Just one final check on Kevin before going downstairs and chastising Brian and Dan. Brilliant.
But, when he phases through Kevin's room, he's greeted not just with an unconscious human but also both Brian immobile on the floor and Dan shushing him from Kevin's stupid spinning gaming chair.
Daithi mouths what the hell? to the vampire, to which Dan just responds with a shrug. “They're resting, aren't they?” he whispers, before motioning for him to come further into the room. So Daithi does, coming to float between Dan and Kevin's desk, where he takes a second to check what the human actually does with that desk (burned paper, check, is that sheet music? alright, didn't know Kev was actually committing to learn that and is that paint? as in Kevin willingly picking up a paintbrush to make art? that's insane. good for him) before sitting(?) on it.
Dan returns to his book. Kevin's chest keeps moving up and down. Brian lets out a breath.
Things are calm. Losing time here seems less worrisome than where he was earlier. Maybe he'll stay here for a little while.
Seán wakes up with a start in the middle of the day, drenched in sweat and swearing profusely.
He could have sworn that two seconds ago Dan was dying - or was it Brian? No, no, that was a dream. Right? Nothing happened and in two seconds Daithi and Brian are going to start arguing in the kitchen, even if they know Dan's probably sleeping.
But then why is he asleep at noon, if - Kevin!
Everything comes rushing back at once. They were getting rid of a bunch of hunter material stacked in a seemingly empty warehouse until they got jumped, and then Kevin was on the floor bleeding and he just saw red, jumping fangs first onto his attackers with Dan close by his side, covering his tracks.
A bloodbath, if he remembers correctly, and he might not, it's a bit fuzzy. He's rarely been this angry, or this tired.
He does remember hovering over Kevin, like a mother hen, to use Daithi's words from when he was telling them off so that Brian could focus. He could already sense the bone-deep exhaustion starting to creep up on him as they walked back to the house in silence, four of them with two in the same body. It was always a bit weird when Daithi needed to possess one of them.
Then Kevin was in his room, Dan was telling them it would be fine and relief crashed into him so hard he thought he was going to pass out. Daniel told him to go to sleep and he said no, he was going to stay awake at least until Brian could do an actual scan, and then he doesn't remember anything else.
Did he seriously collapse from exhaustion ten minutes after getting back? Talk about an adrenaline crash.
“Holy - they let me sleep - should've woken me up, bunch of-” Seán grumbles through the whole process of getting out of his insanely thorn human clothes from yesterday (thank god he slept in wolf form, this shirt is disgusting) and getting in something decent, fast enough that he leaves a heap of clothes on his floor, and then he's out the door, power-walking toward Kevin's room.
He stops dead in his tracks when he smells the combination of odours coming from the room. It's almost like the living room? But the living room only smells like that when they're all in there, and this is Kevin's room, so what the hell.
He opens the door and yep - they're all in there.
Seán just takes a moment to take in the scene ; Kevin's still asleep in his bed (he better be recuperating, fecker), but now Brian's on the floor next to him, angled so his head is on the soft side of the mattress, which is probably the work of Daithi, who's staring into the void from where he's sitting on the desk, flanked by Daniel, who's asleep in Kevin's awesome gaming chair.
He hums. This is a good idea for everyone's sanity, he thinks. This way, no one has to worry about Kev, or worry about others being worried about Kev. Fullproof!
Although it does suck that no one woke him up so he could participate, he chooses to forgive them as he shifts back into wolf form to climb at the end of the bed, rolling back into a cozy circle. They probably just wanted him to keep resting.
And hey, he can keep resting here, now that he knows everyone is safe…
They all wake up in a weird chain reaction at about the same time, a few hours later.
Brian slowly finds himself yawning awake, eyes blinking a few times as he processes his surrounding - oh shit. He fell asleep in Kevin's room?
He turns his head to check and sees that Dan is still in the chair, but this time he's quietly snoring, so he feels slightly less bad about passing out here. The floor might honestly be more comfortable than that forsaken chair, at least for sleeping.
Definitely more awake than he was a second ago, he clasps at a blanket on the bed, and tugs.
Seán immediately howls in pain and falls of the bed from where Brian just tugged on his tail, knocking Dan's chair and startling him awake as the chair spins once and knocks into the desk where Daithi is, passing through his hand.
And then Daithi comes back to himself just in time to start laughing profusely in Seán's face, who growls at him before laying down on the floor, as if injured, and shifting back. “Ouch, Brian. And Daithi, you piece of shit, stop laughing!”
While Daithi wipes invisible tear down his transparent face, Dan blinks a few times, groaning as his back cracks. He pats the desk next to his head and checks the floor before turning to the lads. “Where is my book?”
Brian and Seán shrug simultaneously, and Daithi shakes his head. “None of us were awake, we didn't take your book.”
“It is so boring, Dan. You're lucky I didn't set it on fire.”
They all simultaneously turn toward the bed, where Kevin is most definitely awake and laughing in their faces. In two seconds stat everybody is around him asking about how he feels, until he waves them all back. “You have a near-death experience once, and now everybody needs to be reassured you're alive! Honestly!”
Dan grabs his book back and puts it out of the human's reach, adding in a annoyed tone (that everyone knows is false), “Of course the first thing you do once awake is try to set my stuff on fire.”
“I didn't, and technically that's not the first thing I did when waking up.”
“No, clearly the first thing you did was steal it.”
Kevin puts his head back on the wall behind him, eyes sparkling with amusement. “Yeah. And I'm sensing a lot of animosity against me for simply keeping your book in safe hands.”
Daithi raises an eyebrow at him. “Safe hands.”
Kevin shrugs. “Dangerous hands, then.”
Brian snorts.
Dan rolls his eyes but the smile on his face betrays him. “Sure, Kevin. You're so gracious.”
“I am, thank you.” Kevin matches his energy better than he has since he got injured, which is an excellent sign.
Brian clears his throat nonetheless. “Now that you're awake, I should scan you, just to make sure it's healing ok - that good with you?”
Kevin shrugs. “Fire away.” he thinks for a second. “Actually, I should say take a stab at it. Eh?”
Dan and Seán send him twin dark looks, but Brian actually barks out a laugh, which surprises everybody and especially Kevin, before his lips curve in a self-satisfied smirk.
A few minutes later, while Brian looks over the results of his scan, Kevin taps at the side of his mattress restlessly. “So what's the verdict, boss?”
Dan says, “Well, you don't smell like blood anymore,” which earns it a bit of a weird look by Daithi and Seán. Kevin just laughs. “That's good.”
Brian finally looks up, smiling. “You're gonna be fine, dipshit.”
Seán whoops in joy, Daithi closes his eyes in relief and Dan smiles so wide his fangs are visible.
Kevin laughs at them again, hiding his own relief. “Obviously.”
There's a second of silence before Kevin's voice, dripping with irony, resonates in the air again. “Thank god none of you panicked, huh?”
Four other voices resonate at once. “Shut up, Kevin.”