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Xavier remained silent and still as the thugs carried him bodily down the stone steps, cursing and swearing at his dead weight. At the bottom of the steps, they dumped him unceremoniously on the floor while one collected a set of metal keys off a hook on the wall. Xavier listened as they discussed which cell to throw him in.
“Just throw him in with the bitch, maybe they’ll kill each other,” a baritone voice finally ended the brief argument with a barked scoff. His cell had been chosen. A jingle of keys, the scraped opening of a heavily barred door, and Xavier was once more hoisted and then dumped. To his immense annoyance, his shoulder and most of his back landed in a puddle of some sort, but he remained immobile.
Xavier waited until there was the jingle of the keys going back on the hook, and the stomping of two sets of shoes back up the stone steps and away. Then he finally opened his azure blue eyes, his pupils immediately widening to account for the relative darkness. They’d left him in an honest-to-goodness dungeon and he had to admit he was a little impressed. It had been a very, very long time since he’d been thrown in a dungeon. There were thick metal bars on two sides, with the third and fourth sides being an obviously thick and forbidding stone. Someone had carved a rectangle out of the wall furthest from the door to allow a blush of fresh sea air to enter. The roof too was hewn stone. At some point, they’d splurged and installed a toilet where the one barred wall met rock. The final wall, without a window carved into it, was irregular, tapering down as it moved to meet with the stone floor, and providing a small amount of shadow to hide where his cellmate lay.
Moving his head only enough to spy her through the darkness, Xavier looked at his cellmate. Despite the shadow and relative darkness, he saw that she was curled up where the two stone walls met, on her side, with one knee pulled up against her chest, and the other somewhat splayed out. She was breathing as quietly as seemed possible, her eyes fixed on his prone form. She held her body taut, as though afraid any movement would send him rushing at her, obviously fighting against the chill of the empty stone all around them.
Knowing if he stayed lying in the puddle much longer, he too would start to shiver, Xavier carefully pushed himself up to a sitting position. She didn’t move. In fact, he was afraid she might be holding her breath. “My star, is that you?” he whispered, opening one gloved hand and blowing a small burst of lights from his hand towards where she lay. As the sparks neared, he watched her recoil in fear, a brief noise escaping her throat. Through the short flash of his lights showing off her face he knew he’d found his partner, but her reaction to his Evol made him snuff them out. Something was very wrong.
Moving slowly, showing his open hands in the sparse moonlight that spilled through the bars from the outside, Xavier pulled up onto one knee. “Starlight,” he tried once more, “It’s me.”
Her body had begun to shiver, her eyes were pools of darkness in the shadows, but she said nothing in response.
“I’m going to send a little light, alright? It won’t hurt you, I promise. Just enough for me to check you for injuries, alright?” There was no response, but he hadn’t really expected one either. Building the small ball of light in his hand he brushed it softly in her direction.
It was definitely his partner, his Starlight, laying in the darkness. The light started at her feet and made its way upwards. The leg she had left extended was potentially broken, her foot at a slightly off angle that made him wince. Her hunters uniform was dirtied and torn in places. And when the light reached her face, he got his first good look at her expression. Her pupils were two different sizes; a head injury. He cursed under his breath. For someone with her history – with their history – a head injury could be catastrophic. She likely didn’t know who he was, which would explain why she was so terrified to be locked in here with him.
He tried a different tack. “My name is Xavier. And I know you. We work together, in Linkon City. With the Hunter’s Association.” Telegraphing his movements, he inched closer to her. “We’re partners. At the Association.” Her shivering continued, but she wasn’t scrambling to get away from him either, which he took to be a good sign. “In fact, we even live in the same building. You live just below me.”
He was in touching distance now, his soft light floating between them as he held out a hand to her. “I can get us out of here,” he offered, “but I’m going to need your help.” He waited, almost breathless, as she examined his outstretched hand, looked up at him with those mismatched pupils and then back to the hand.
Finally, she was reaching for him. Her hand hesitant, open, close, open again and reaching. He waited, letting her touch him first, letting her settle her tiny, gun-callused hand in his. Trusting herself to him. Only then, with his inhuman speed, did he gather her fully into his arms. She barely had time to squeak in protest before she was resting in his lap, his back to the stone wall, holding her tight just in case she truly objected to the sudden manhandling. Her breathing came in gasps, her hands clawed into the tough fabric of his uniform, but at least she was up off the cold floor. He made gentle hushing noises as he held her, praying this position didn’t aggravate her broken leg further.
“Starlight, do you remember your Evol? Can you resonate with me? With just a bit of your power, I will get us out of here and take us both home, yeah?” He whispered the words into her nest of hair. He held his breath while she seemed to consider his words. Finally, her dominant hand released his lapel and splayed itself across his heart. He offered a brief thanks to any gods that might be listening as the glow between them began to grow and he felt her power push and extend his own. His Evol fought against the dampener around his neck, but with her, he could ignore it. Pressing her impossibly closer to his chest, encouraging her to put her arms around his neck, he pushed up again onto one knee. Summoning his light blade into his non-dominant hand, he cut a hole through the stone of their cell and sped away. Fast as light, he brought them to the motorboat he’d anchored not far from the island where she had been held.
Setting her with infinite gentleness into the passenger seat he pulled up the anchor, revved the boat to life and took off, back towards the mainland. Grabbing the radio, he flipped it on. “Xavier to Hunter’s Association, come in. Simone, are you there?”
There was a brief crackle. “Hunter’s Association copy. Xavier, what is your status?”
“I found her, we’re on the boat headed for you. She’s injured. Broken leg, and head injury. Probably memory loss.”
“Copy that, I will have an ambulance waiting for your arrival.”
Setting the radio down, Xavier looked over at his partner. She shivered against the cold air buffeting the boat as he sped towards safety. Ripping off his jacket, he reached over to tuck it around her smaller form before pushing the boat even harder.
She was asleep under his jacket when he pulled the motor boat up to the dock. An ambulance and a team from the Hunter’s Association waited impatiently, Simone jumping immediately aboard to secure the boat while he gathered his partner and took her to the waiting stretcher. She woke as he laid her down on the stretcher, the paramedics bustling to secure her, but she fought for a moment, grabbing Xavier’s arm, her eyes panicked.
He took her hand, ignoring the annoyed bustle of the medics. “I’m coming with you, don’t worry. Rest, I won’t leave.” This seemed to pacify her, and Xavier stepped back to allow the paramedics more room. When they rolled her to the ambulance and vanished her inside, he followed, casting Simone a glance as the ambulance doors closed behind them. He’d report in once he knew she was safe.
Later, once they’d set and bandaged her leg. Later, after they’d sedated her and scanned her brain to try and identify the injury. Later, as she lay, tiny, in a white hospital bed, monitored, and finally not shivering, he let himself breathe. He’d found her, and brought her back. Who he brought back, how much she remembered, or would remember, he didn’t know. But she’d reached for him. She’d accepted his help, and reached for him. Sitting at her bedside, forehead pressed against balled fists, he listened to her breathe.
“Xavier,” the soft exhale of his name brought his head back up, azure eyes trained on her face. “Thank you. For rescuing me.”
Xavier smiled softly, taking her hand in his. “No matter where you are, I will find you. Always.”
She smiled softly, dreamily on her pain medications, and then touched his face with her unhindered hand. “When it’s done, and I’m home, let’s get hot pot.”
The sentence actually managed to stun him for a long moment. What he had mistakenly seen as a ‘dreamy’ expression, was actually one of deadly satisfaction. She knew what he intended to do. And he had her explicit approval. Provided he came home safe and took her for dinner. He didn’t know how much of her memory had returned to her, but enough to know who he was. And what he was capable of in the face of her current injuries. He pressed her hand into his cheek and gave her palm a quick kiss.
“Of course, Starlight. I won’t be gone long.”
Stepping out into the hall he met the gold-green eyes of her cardiac surgeon standing there, her chart in his hand. Dr. Li met his cold expression with one of his own and wordless understanding passed between them. The doctor nodded, he would keep her safe. Xavier nodded in return, those that hurt her would meet their end. He walked away, a cold, dark satisfaction curling in his gut, but at the same time, a tense anticipation for that owed hot pot.