Feelin’ fine

The pain hits like a lightbulb exploding, and he can’t tell at first if the way his face hit the floor emptied out his sinuses, or if blood is bursting from his nose. He can’t think hard on it, can’t think at all, his body moves on its own- his legs lifting, lurching, launching his weight around in a whirlwind kick to his assailant’s jaw before their dive lands on him.

It’s enough force to knock them away, and his inertia keeps going until he’s spinning up from his shoulder and back into a crouch.

They eye each other, just for a split second, before the next beat of the song brings them crashing, snarling, ripping into each other.

His claws rake through the fabric of their clothes, their boots stomp into his feet, and with the same intensity, they crack their skulls into each other.

“Knock it off,” Doc passes by, unconcerned yet exasperated. “You’re getting blood everywhere.”

Deimos’ ears still ring with the head butt, his focus off now that Doc’s gone and broken his concentration. It gives Hank the opportunity to grab him by the face, their other arm reaching down to slide around his thigh, heaving him up and then chucking him into the couch like a hunk of firewood.

Deimos doesn’t get a breath in before they’re elbow dropping into him, shifting their arm just seconds before landing so the boney joint makes a cracking sound against the supports of the cushion instead of the center of Deimos’ throat.

“Heathens,” Doc still isn’t intervening, just walking by again with a package under his arm. “Breaking my stuff…”

“This ain’t even your house,” Deimos quips from beneath Hank’s body, slowly being suffocated as they let down more and more weight.

Doc doesn’t pause as he heads back upstairs, not seeing the stink eye he’s getting.

He looks back up to Hank.

“Think he actually cares?”

“No.”

So Deimos smashes his forehead into the space that used to be Hank’s nose, using the split second Hank reels back to slide against the silky liner of his jacket, shedding it like losing his tail to a predator, scrambling on all fours across the floor only to have his ankle grabbed-

Hank’s not the one reeling him in, Sanford’s dragging him around, a circle gaining speed, until he’s off the ground and lobbed back to the couch, crashing hard into Hank’s back, forcing all the air out of both of their lungs when the couch cracks again.

Hank’s trying to pull themself out from under Deimos when Sanford starts storming over, rattling the floorboards under his weight, coming in like a bulldozer.

The couch slams against the wall with his tackle, pinning Deimos by the throat and trapping Hank’s legs with his weight, knees digging in as he lifts Deimos again, and-

Tucks him up under his arm, like a sack of flour.

Hank manages to flip to their side and wheeze a little, Sanford eying them until they pat the couch a few times- tapping out. That has Sanford offering his free hand, helping Hank back onto their feet.

“Can’t believe you didn’t invite me, that hurts.”

“It’s ‘cause it only lasts two seconds when you pull this shit-“ Deimos squirms in Sanford’s hold, writhing himself out of his own shirt to escape the grasp, dropping back onto his feet. Sanford drapes the garment over his head. “You’re gonna break poor Hank’s back, look at ‘em.”

Hank’s straightening themself back up, tucking their shirt back into their sweatpants and giving Deimos a look of death as they start to pass him by. Probably. Hard to say, really, they sort of just always look like that.

“… See?”

“… Of course, what was I thinking? Can’t go rough housing with the elderly-“

The couch doesn’t survive Sanford’s body at terminal velocity, giving up the ghost when Hank shoulders him straight through it, collapsing it in the middle and dropping into the new void. Deimos is quick to slam his shin into the back of Hank’s knee as they’re reeling up a punch, dropping them to land on top of Sanford. When they’re down, he drops himself into the pile of bodies now filling the hollow space of the busted couch.

“… You’re dripping on me.” Hank mutters it, muffled into Sanford’s chest, and Deimos swipes his hand under his nose.

Oh, yeah.

”Deimos?”

Hm.

“Deimos? I can’t seem to find Deimos.”

The feet beneath the cot shuffle a little further into the shadows, near silent, but now fully hidden.

“I was going to give him some tablet time…”

… Nothing? Really?

“If he snuck out, they’re going to call security down. They’ll probably tell me to revoke snack closet privileges.”

There’s his little monster, springing off the back wall, claws outstretched. The kid fully wraps around his legs, mouth wide, they make eye contact as Deimos goes for the kill-

Just a light tap of his teeth against Doc’s ankle before he gets his mouth twisted in an evil grin.

He’s such an animal.

But, kids really are just animals.

“You brushed your teeth?”

“Nope!”

“Why not?”

“Poison attack.”

Doc rubs at the bridge of his nose, and gives Deimos a look.

The kid stares up, withered.

“… Vvvvenom attack.”

“Better. Go brush.” He scoots the kid with a foot, until Deimos detaches to get up to his feet and dash off to the washroom.

He should probably supervise.

Last time he let him go by himself, Deimos had started messing around in the eye rinse station.

Kudos to the designer, they created something with such an understandable design that a feral child could operate it first try. Then use it to trick scientists into demonstrating how the thing worked, smacking the button to start the flush when they leaned down to show him how one should put their face.

Utter nightmare.

“You have not had the time to brush-“ Deimos had come back to the room, toothbrush in hand-

Blood dribbling from his mouth.

“Bit m’cheek,” He hooks his own lip like a fish, trying to show where he’d hurt himself. He looks- Not panicked, but worried, as Doc drops to his knees to inspect the damage. “Does it count?”

Doc almost doesn’t hear the question through the fact that Deimos is talking around his own fingers. He tilts the kid’s head to see better, and- Yikes. He hasn’t chewed himself that hard since he’d first arrived. “Count for what, Deimos?”

“Bites? There’s blood.”

… His kid doesn’t live a normal life.

He inhales, exhales, then coaxes Deimos into just a little bit of eye contact. “What would a muzzle do if you bit the inside of your mouth?”

“… Nothin’?”

“Right. Let me find some cotton.”

The labs are filled with every type of swab and medium one could hope to find, this area used to be a place for chemical research. Then they got that new wing, and this place has been overrun by the more esoteric projects that no one wants to properly classify.

Or document.

Or acknowledge.

Not for lack of interest, but more-so the want for an amount of secrecy. Some things that happen here are completely inane and downright stupid, some things are above Doc’s own pay-grade.

Some things are packing cotton balls in a par-boiled clone’s mouth and emphasizing that he must not, under any circumstances, swallow the cotton balls.

Doc can tell he is really fighting the urge.

Admirable.

“If you swallow them, I’ll have to have Skinner pump your stomach again.”

“Noooooo…”

He’d swallowed several coins.

And a small desk toy.

And only got caught because he’d been eating erasers.

He is curious about something, though.

“… Does it hurt?”

Deimos looks puzzled by the question, finger in his mouth to press at the cotton like he’s keeping it in place. His brows are all pinched, slightly raised, like Doc’s an idiot.

He nods.

“… I’ve just noticed you don’t really tell me when something hurts.”

“M’I s’posed to?”

“I’d like to know. People usually say ‘Ow’ when they get hurt.”

“Ow.”

“Good enough.”

The kid beams with bloody teeth, and allows himself to be ushered back to his room.

Doc does fulfill the semi-promise of letting Deimos have the tablet for a while, watching him go through puzzles until the kid starts leaning more and more against the wall, until his eyes droop.

He has Deimos spit the cotton out before he konks out, the bleeding stopped for the moment.

Doc lingers for a while. He should be taking the chance to pop back to his apartment, perhaps get a few hours of proper rest on a flat surface, but the prospect of leaving the kid alone down here continues to be a daunting one.

Deimos gets into trouble, yes.

He’s not exactly concerned about that, because he gets in trouble for show. He has to have an audience to make it entertaining, and there are only a few scant researches that will make nighttime trips to this level, if they do show up.

And he isn’t afraid of Deimos being caught in an emergency, per say.

Deimos can quite obviously take care of himself if someone were to break in to the labs again, he has the upper-hand in the dark and the ability to hold his own if he gets a weapon.

He’s more worried about…

Well, he isn’t quite sure.

The sight of the kid with a bloody mouth, that he may hurt himself and have no one there to fuss over him, that he won’t take care of himself because he lacks the necessary reactions to reduce his own pain.

That he may get scared, waking up alone.

Or that he may wander off looking for Doc.

That he’ll have a bad dream.

He looks over the kid, in his too-big cot, swaddled in enough blankets to swim in.

He has the thought again, the thought that he should be in a house, that he shouldn’t subsist off what equates to mediocre hospital food, that there should be clothes that fit him and shoes he could wear.

It would be a mistake to have more kids for him to be around, this world is not made for children.

He doesn’t go back to his apartment. He finds a vending machine to get a bag of chips, and takes up on the uncomfortable couch in a nearby break room, writing out his notes until he can’t keep his eyes open anymore.

He’ll go home tomorrow.