#insaneduo

He takes a step back and lets Cellbit step forward, taking up the view of the window. Cellbit starts to speak in Portuguese to Forever as Forever continues to wail, shrinking away from Cellbit and shaking something fierce. Cellbit asks Bad to remove the glass pane and Bad does so in a heartbeat.

"Olha para mim," Cellbit says with a voice that's firm and raw but not unkind. He takes a deep breath, feline tail swishing about his ankles, and holds a bar of the cell for support as he leans in closer. "Olha para mim, Forever. Abre os olhos. Por favor."

A few seconds pass. Forever's sobs wither out into wheezing breaths, and his trembling hands slide down his face. Bloodshot eyes peer up at Cellbit. Terrified. Confused.

And Cellbit begins to talk. Phil barely understands a word of it, but Cellbit is calm and clear in his speech. He holds up the syringe for Forever to see, pointing to its contents, and he talks Forever down when he starts begging again. Bad, meanwhile, kneels down behind Forever. He doesn't say anything, but he places a feather-light hand on Forever's back through the bars, oh so gentle and wary of his claws.

And Phil? Phil stands off to the side. He gives the two of them plenty of room, refusing to crowd Forever and send him into another fit of panic; but his shield is still strapped to his arm, and his axe still hangs in his hand at his side.

He won't hurt Forever. God, no, he won't hurt Forever, but Phil---Phil needs something to hold onto right now.

At last, Cellbit reaches through the large gap in the bars, holding out the syringe in an open hand. Forever sits and stares at it, throat bobbing in half-aborted sounds of doubt. He doesn't move to take it.

Phil shifts his wings. They'll hold him down and administer the antidote themselves if they have to, but no one here wants to force it on him. He's been through enough.

Thankfully, Forever finally uncurls himself from his corner just long enough to take the syringe. His fingers tremble around it so badly that Phil is afraid he'll drop it and the tube will shatter on the floor, spilling the precious medication, but he doesn't. He takes syringe and jabs it through the pearl-white fabric of his sleeve and into the meat of his arm and sinks the plunger.

Silence.

And then Forever howls. The sound rips out of him, head tipped back and tears spilling over his cheeks and jaw open wide, wide like someone reached down into his esophagus and tore his insides up and out through his mouth.

Cellbit squeezes his eyes shut and ducks away, ears pinned back. Bad knocks his forehead against the cold metal bars and makes a quiet, pained noise. Phil closes his eyes and puts a hand over his mouth and curls his wings around himself and leans on his axe because oh god, he feels like he's going to be sick.

The cry tapers off. Phil hears Cellbit hurry away and start talking to Pac on the other side of the room. Bad mutters something about the inventory scanners. Phil opens his eyes and sees Forever slumped in the corner of his cell, eyes glassy and chest rattling with every inhale. His hand lay at his side, the syringe held limply between his twitching fingers.

Phil approaches the cell and braces a hand on one of the bars. "Forever," he says. Forever doesn't so much as twitch. "Forever, can you hear me?"

Forever's gaze drags itself from the middle distance over to Phil. He blinks. His eyes flutter shut, and he sags back against the bars completely, a heap of limbs.

Phil stands there. Rubs a hand over his mouth. In the distance, there is the sound of soft, gentle Portuguese undercut by anxious mutterings. The click-clack of an inventory scanner being disarmed echoes off the walls. There's an outcry, raw and guttural. Forever's cell is dismantled with a thunk of a universal block breaker. Weeping reaches Phil's ears, muffled by an embrace, soothed by hushed reassurances.

And Forever lies sprawled out on the floor, eyes closed. Unmoving. Phil, for that matter, can't bring himself to move either. He stands, and he stares, and he breathes, and he watches Forever breathing.

"Is he okay?"

Phil jolts. He looks away from Forever to look up at Cellbit. The man's eyes are red, his mouth drawn tight.

Phil shrugs. It's barely more than a shift of his shoulders; it's all he can manage. "I don't know. I think he passed out."

Cellbit nods. "Okay. Okay." He exhales and drags his hands down his face with a shudder. "Jesus Christ, man..."