#hawkhood

…

It’s hard to focus on things when there’s a knife between your ribs so Kate doesn't know where they are, not exactly. Red Hood has one of her arms slung over his shoulders and has half-carried her for several blocks, smacking Kate’s hands away from the knife every time she reaches for it. He’s inordinately worried that she’s going to accidentally pull it out, and she’d finally had to yell at him to stop because that’s what she was afraid of—that the knife was going to fall out.

So he’d had to. Kind of. Re-stab her, just to make sure that she didn’t start bleeding out in the middle of downtown Gotham.

Not that it would be that noticeable.

“Doing okay,  Hawkeye?”

“I have been looking for one of your safehouses for weeks and now I’m just getting walked right into one,” she mutters. “And all I had to do was get mortally wounded.”

“Don’t be dramatic,” says the man who is wearing a red goddamn skullcap mask and at least six guns. “And you did find one. The place above the bakery on 9th. It’s not anymore, but you did find one.”

“Unbelievable,” Kate mutters as he gently leans her against a wall and goes through a thumbprint scan and puts in three passcodes.

“If you’re bringing me here to kill me, I’ll haunt you,” she warns as he escorts her inside the sparse loft.

“If I wanted to kill you I would have just pulled the knife out,” he points out. “Give me some credit here, Kate.”

She freezes, pulls back from him. “Excuse me?”

“That’s you, right? Kate Bishop? I’m just letting you know that I know so that you don’t feel like you need to keep the mask on. You’re uncomfortable enough already, and you don’t seem to like it much.”

“Sonofabitch.” Kate rips off the domino mask and flings it down on the nearest table with too much drama, because she winds up doubled over, clutching her side.

“Take it easy,” Red Hood warns. “We’re in the home stretch, now. Let’s get you over to the couch.”

For the guy who’s in charge of midlevel crime in Gotham, he really is kind of nice.

“How’d you—how’d you find out?” Kate gasps as he helps ease her down.

“I have access to a lot of resources most people don’t,” he informs her. “Kind of like what I’m going to use to make sure you don’t bleed out.”

He disappears for a minute and comes back with a very medical looking vial and a few individually wrapped needle looking things.

He sits in front of her on the coffee table, holding the vial out for her to look at. “This is a military grade liquid suture. I’m going to inject it into you and it’s going to sanitize and seal your wound.”

“That sounds pretty cool. Gotham tech is awesome.”

“But since you were….” Red Hood trails off.

Kate looks at the hilt of the knife protruding from her side. “Impaled. You can just say it.”

“Since you were impaled, since the blade went...through you, I’m going to have to do this once for the front and once for the back. And I’m going to need your help with the back.”

“Fucking how, dude?”

“You’re going to have to pull the knife out, but only part of the way.”

Kate’s head buzzes. “What?”

“When I tell you to, you’re going to pull the blade out about halfway so that I can get the syringe in there.”

“How the fucking much is halfway? That’s not a measurement!” She wishes she could hyperventilate because now seems like a great time to do so but, you know. Knife in lung.

Red Hood seems to get what she’s saying, though, leaning back to look at her, measuring her side with the span of his hands. “Four inches,” he says with a small, firm nod. “The hilt is right up against you, so when you see four inches of blade, that will be enough.”

After some debate, it’s decided that it will be easier to do with Kate on her side, so Red Hood can roll her onto her back and take over knife watching duties.

He jabs a needle into the vial as Kate asks, “So, are you keeping the mask on during this?”

“It’s probably more sanitary.”

“You have a creepy red skull face. That’s not the last thing I want to see before I die.”

“You’re not going to die.”

“Says you.”

“Yes, says me!” Red Hood huffs at her, helps her lay on her side. “You have any guesses?”

“About how I’m going to die?”

“About who I am.”

“A few,” Kate admits.

“Okay, this might hurt, I’m trying to get the needle between the blade and your skin to cut down on how much blood you lose.” Red Hood jabs the syringe into her back. “So who do you think I am? This is going to burn, by the way.”

She thinks he’s kidding until he depresses the plunger, injecting her with the wound sealant he just used on himself and--

“Fuck!” Kate writhes, as if she can scramble away from the pain. “Fuck shit!”

“Hold still!” His hand clamps around her ribs. “You’re going to drive the knife further in, hold still!”

It burns. It burns like alcohol on an open wound, only this wound is deep-

She can’t breathe, and it’s terrifying, like her lungs have seized up--

The pain recedes until it’s just a dull throb.

“I changed my mind,” she pants as Red Hood eases her onto her back. “I hate your Gotham tech.”

“I’ll pass that along,” he says, already prepping another syringe. “You never said who you think I am.”

“They’re both dumb.”

“C’mon. Share.” He flicks his fingers against the syringe. “You get a prize if you get it right.”

“Is the prize a hired hit of my choosing?” She tears her eyes away from the syringe and tries to find someplace to put her hands. “Bruce Wayne or Lex Luthor. They’re both wrong. The Bruce Wayne thing actually lines up pretty well but he’s a lot broader than you are and the Lex Luthor guess is just because I can’t imagine you have a lot of hair under a helmet like that.”

Red Hood is staring at her. Or, well, probably. Hard to tell with the mask. “What?” she says.

“You’re surprisingly close with the Bruce Wayne guess,” is all he says. “Are you ready?”

“Uh, yeah, I guess? And how is Bruce Wayne close? You a billionaire playboy?”

“No—hold on.” He presses the knife to the side so there’s a small gap between the blade and part of the wound, so he can slide the syringe in like he did for the back. “Bruce Wayne was my mentor,” Red Hood says, and then pulls the knife out from between Kate’s ribs and injects her with more wound sealant before she can react.

It hurts worse than the once on her back did.

When Kate is able to think about something besides how every breath burns and how her torso feels like she’s been run over and how...how nice it is to not have a knife sticking out of her. And when she realizes that, she also realizes that she’s been squeezing the hell out of Red Hood’s hand.

“Sorry.” She makes a halfhearted attempt to let go of his hand and sit up, which fails pretty spectacularly.

“Don’t worry. And look how little you bled! That’s amazing. These towels will definitely be reusable.”

Part of Kate wants to tell him that’s gross but part of Kate also realizes that he’s correct, she’s bled...almost less than a normal night.

“I’d say you should go take a shower, get cleaned up, but you need to keep the wounds dry for twelve hours to make sure the liquid sutures take. I’ll go get you some clothes, to change into.”

“You’re not going to tell me?” Kate curbs her disappointment.

He hunches his shoulders, looking like he’s debating it with himself. “What the hell, why not?”

He presses something at the back of his helmet that emits a soft hissss and the whole thing pops out just enough to make it easy to take off.

They stare at one another.