#jactana

"Cross!" Luis dropped to his knees, hands fluttering for just a moment. He took Mariano's pulse after another moment of hesitation. Weak, stumbling along like its owner had been.

They'd had an electrocution refresher not fifteen minutes before.

Before he could call for anyone, Jactana was up and running over. The Sergeant was followed by, well, the rest of her squad that was there. Archer, Fletcher, Sirius, Castor, even Miguel and Solomon. The last two were reassuring at least, as the doctor and medic who saw Mariano the most.

"Luis, what happened?" Solomon's voice was even, but Luis had known him long enough to catch the accusation that went unspoken. "Were you both in the training room?"

Mariano's eyes fluttered as Solomon's fingers pressed to the other side of his throat. "Luis...I feel weird." He slurred, and Luis knew Solomon felt the same lack of real rhythm in Mariano's veins.

"We were doing an electricity refresher, yes." Luis said.

Jactana sucked in a breath through her teeth, whatever she was going to say cut off by Solomon directing Sirius to get the defibrillator from the wall and telling Fletcher to call for an ambulance. Luis was almost grateful. He wasn't grateful for Mariano's instinctive response to collapsing, though--Archer's hands flew to Mariano's shoulders as he tried to sit up.

"Whoa, whoa, no, firecracker, you need to stay down." Archer's voice just barely trembled. He caught Mariano's hands next, as they drifted up. "Eyes on us, okay? We have you."

Sirius sprinted back, the canvas bag clutched in his hands as he dropped to the floor at Solomon's side. Miguel knelt between Archer and Solomon, accepting the emergency shears that Solomon handed him from the kit. Without more than a glance between them, he began cutting through Mariano's high-collared long sleeve shirt. His binder was cut through next, and then Jactana was barking at the others.

"Jackets off--don't just stand there and stare." She said, already pulling her own off. Her long, pointed ears were tilted back, tension clear in their posture. "Let's keep the paparazzi off him, yeah?"

Jolted into action, Castor, Sirius, and Fletcher shrugged out of their outermost shirts and jackets.

A quick curtain was created. Luis helped to sit Mariano up, as Miguel pressed the sticky pads to his back and chest. The whip scars were stark and clear against Mariano's skin, the burns made his arms ripple and smooth over in turn, vicious knife gashes had long since turned tough and deep. Not all of them were old. Luis knew everyone could see them. He hoped against hope that Jactana couldn't tell what they were as they eased Mariano back down.

Solomon frowned at the screen on the defibrillator. "Alright, hands off. I need to try to get him back on rhythm with a shock. This won't feel good, Mariano, but bear with it."

Luis watched as Archer took his hands away from Mariano, and then followed suit. He couldn't watch his youngest mage as electricity ripped through him and forced a strangled noise out. He looked over in time to see Mariano go slack though, his expression smoothing out eerily.

The little wobbles on the screen smoothed out into a line, and Luis felt Solomon tense even across from him. After too long for Luis' liking, it started spiking again. It was still uneven, still unsteady, but not as badly as before.

Mariano groaned, blinking hard and trying to reach for his own chest. Solomon's frown deepened as the machine began to charge. "We'll have to do it again."

"No, no, Marito--leave the pads alone." Luis said, resting a hand on his forehead. Archer took Mariano's hands again before Luis could think to do it.

"Almost there, firecracker." Archer's voice had lost some of its steadiness. His grip stayed firm. "Keep fighting for us."

Solomon spoke up again. "Hands off of him." His finger went to the button as Archer gently set Mariano's hands back down on the floor and Luis let go of him again.

Another shock pulled Mariano's spine into a painful looking arch, and the stillness that followed made Luis' stomach roll all over again. "Come on, Marito, come back to us." He whispered.

Mariano squeezed his eyes shut with a gasp and a groan, and then Archer's hands were holding his again. "Luis, A...Archer, I...what...? Wha's...wh'appened?" Dark eyes wandered from face to face, clearly not making any connections to the situation and what he was feeling.

When Luis looked to Solomon. The relief on his face made something in Luis' chest settle. "Your heart was having trouble, so I shocked you to get it back on rhythm." Solomon explained. "An ambulance is almost here."

Luis glanced to Jactana, hoping to share the good news. The glare she pierced him with felt like he should've been the one laid out on the mess hall floor. As Mariano mumbled out another question and Archer took off his jacket to cover him with, Luis couldn't bring himself to disagree.

"Can someone ride with him?" The question was out of Luis' mouth before he could even think to keep it to himself. "I have...I should fill out the paperwork.

The answers and objections all faded together as Luis stood, moving through the crowd and past the hurrying EMTs. He couldn't be there. Not this time, not again. It was selfish, and awful, but...he just couldn't. He would try to visit later, would try to dodge Jactana at the very least.

Luis ran away, it was all he could do. He couldn't visit that evening. He couldn't talk to his wife about what happened.

He fell asleep with the memory of Solomon and Jactana's heavy gazes on him and Mariano's choked noises winding into his dreams.

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