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THE MEDICINAL BAY IS QUIET. Save for the occasional drone from an unconscious patient or the murmurs from other aides. It's night after all. And so, the faction of winter brine and industrialization, Blackrock, now lies beneath the cascading starlight. Unlike many who’ve retired home after the relentless day, you’re still here
You think you’re going to be here the whole night at this rate as you sort through medical file after medical file. Every now and then you feel heavy-eyed, like your head is about to drop onto the desk. However, the ding from your laptop or the warning of it about to power-off is what begrudgingly keeps you conscious.
While you read through one more report, you’re not expecting the door to your office to harshly slam open. The sound echoes throughout the empty halls, causing you to hear the faint complaints of your co-workers. That noise is not your primary concern, however.
What is your top priority is the demon before you: Subspace. He just stands at your doorway. Somehow, you can discern the smile beneath his respirator while he casually leans against the frame. That pink smoke of his seeps through the ventilators, spilling into the otherwise well-conditioned state of your office.
If it weren’t for his battered and bloodied state, you’d assume that he’d be here to bother you about participating in another one of his experiments. Something about needing a medical professional if anything goes awry, but you’re certain that only applies to himself- a body constantly in decomposition will do that, not whatever is subject to his experiments.
Yet, there’s a continuing dripping against the floor. When your eyes follow where the noise may come from, you see it’s his blood. And before you can further take in his being, you hear his voice sharply cut through your ears.
“Hello, nurse!”
Then, he promptly collapses onto the floor.
The thump of his dropping body immediately shoots you out of your seat. It’s the medical training battered into your skill. Truthfully, you would’ve let him lay there bleeding out. Of course, you are compelled to help him either way because he pays you- You think, anyway.
You kneel at his side and murmur your curses at him, rolling his body to the side to further assess whatever even happened to him. It wouldn’t be a bad guess to think that he was assigned to another one of those matches the higher-ups have him doing, for whatever reason they may be doing so. You can’t help but wonder why they send him to those things in the first place- So scrawny, he sure is, the only thing he’s got going from him is that persistent rot of his that he uses against others.
Nevertheless, is his reputation that infamous? So much so that nobody thought to comment on the Head of Robotics dragging himself throughout the building and no one being polite enough to ask if he needed help?
You don’t think he’s that awful, at least to you. Venom still drips from his every word whenever he regards you, mocking laughter or dismissive comments. It’s not a lot, truthfully. Though, you can say you have it better than your co-workers.
Still, it’s basic courtesy to try and help someone who’s unusually closer to drawing their last breath. Even if that someone is a prick.
You let out a sigh and yell out for one of your colleagues to help you pick him up. This might just be another hour of unpaid overtime on your hands. Praise Blackrock for their thorough care and understanding of its workers. You should really start asking for a raise or something better at this point.
---
After apologizing to your co-workers for the inconvenience, Subspace is settled onto the examination table. He looks, well, more than rough now. However, that might be partially because you accidentally knocked him into the doorframe while carrying him. To which he somehow didn’t wake up from, but he doesn’t need to know that happened in the first place.
It’s only when you turn away from him, going to put your gloves on, does he rumble awake. You hear him shuffle around the table before he hisses.
“Careful,” you warn, “Try not to move too much, otherwise you’ll open that wound more.”
Somehow, someway, he finds it in himself to be upbeat.
“Ah, of course, nurse!”
With a sharp exhale from your nose, you go to open one of the medicine cabinets. Taking your necessary supplies then going back to his side. Subspace seems strangely content considering the numerous wounds from explosions, cuts, burns, you could go on about what's on his body- which is even more concerning, whether it be because of how much harm he’s gone through or for a reason you don’t wanna linger on.
You pinch the bridge of your nose, mentally cataloging what you’ll have to do to tend to each injury before you can use your gear to top it off.
“Your shirt,” you abruptly instructed.
You say it because you sort of need it off without anything hindering your process. However, he acts as if this was the most trifling bit of information he’s received. He squints at you with eyebrows creased, but that changes at the mirth in his gaze.
“I didn’t expect you to be so forward now of all times,” he teases.
You lightly poke his less damaged shoulder, “Don’t be ridiculous. This is just so I can help you, Subspace.”
“Sure, sure, say what you have to,” he coos.
You swear that if he wasn’t so beat up, you’d have punched him. Then again, you’re certain that’d be the final nail to his coffin and you’d be charged for his expiration. Thankfully, he still knows how to comply and stay relatively silent while doing so, for he slips the fabric off of his torso. Now allowing you to treat him without too much issue.
Cautiously, you do what you can to treat him. Gently cleaning his wounds, swabbing them with cotton, wrapping them in bandages, so on and so on. You’d expect him to leave you alone, knowing that you’re working and all, but this is Subspace.
“So, nurse,” he hums, “How’s your night been, eh? Not too much trouble?”
You sigh. Annoyed.
“What?”
“It was manageable,” You tell him, “Until you were trouble.”
“What even happened to you?”
He mocks his hurt, bringing a hand over his chest,“Oh, c’mon, I thought you liked my ‘trouble’!”
Then, he sways his head from side to side as he speaks, “It’s nothing much, nurse. Just a couple of explosions, cuts, the usual from those little field experiments.”
You pause to perplexingly look at him, then just roll your eyes. “You’re ridiculous.”
“Oh, don’t be like that!” He whines, you can sense the frown underneath his respirator, “I thought you liked me.”
Again, you pause. Does he know what he’s saying? Does he know how trivializing it is? Instinctively, you recoil backwards at the weight of his words. However, he leans forward to maintain- if not, close -the distance between the two of you.
“At least answer me!”
A shaky sigh leaves you and you opt to ignore him. You take a large roll of bandage a sigh, going over to wrap it around the cuts on his arms.
“Lift your arms up-“
“Nurse.”
He sing-songs it, but ever so slightly, does his tone deviate from its usual joviality.
Still, you don’t say anything. and you cast your gaze to the diagrams hung against the walls, of the body, of the heart- Speaking of, you can feel it hammering against your ribcage. It feels like it’s about to burst out and you partially wonder if he can hear it so close.
Yet, the most frightening part about its rampant rate is that you can’t discern if it’s out of nervousness of agitating a colleague, or the possibility that you’re flustered by the proximity and his persistence.
Though just as easily as he begins all of this, he easily pretends like he hasn’t been interrogating you. He leans backwards, hands clasped against the edge of the examination table. You feel relieved that he’s laid off of you. Yet, some ludicrous, aching part of you wants him to continue the unrelenting inquisitions.
Subspace shrugs and he smiles despite everything. Beneath the respirator of his mask, you can discern that serpentine smile of his. The sentiment sends shivers throughout your spine, and yet, it is pleasant.
“Whatever!” He hums, “Keep to yourself!”
You click your tongue at him. Then, a miraculous quiet befalls the two of you, only the low sound of breathing along with the clatter of equipment within the sterile walls. You clean and tend to his battered state. And you don’t know why, but you care for him so kindly and gently.
You shouldn’t. You really shouldn’t.
Only a glimpse of him could inform fools that he was no saint, for the poison that plagues acts as a warning to his nature. He’s not someone who can be trusted with the tenderness that is a heart. Maybe, he’ll hold it within the palms of his hands and say that he’ll cherish it. But, he’d squeeze and squeeze it within the palm of his hands. And when it is gone with nothing but a gross “pop,” he’ll watch the viscera spill from his gnarled fingertips.
You suppose you are worse than a fool. You are ignorance itself. Whatever bliss you can believe someone like him can offer you, you are willingly to blindly stumble through thorns to have him share a smile with you.
Thus, it spills from your lips, something sentimental.
You murmur, “You should watch yourself more, Subspace.”
“Hm?” He tilts his head to the side, “Since when does it matter to you?”
“It always has.”
You’ve given him your heart. Maybe, he’s even had it before you offered it to him.
Only the Gods will know what he’d do with such a delicate thing.