For the next time you're in need of Biggles prompts- Biggles is giving his standard "You're too good for this, reconsider your nefarious ways" speech to EvS but wholly unexpectedly/uncharacteristically EvS just starts crying in response (feverish delirium? drugged? exhausted? drunk?) and now a flummoxed Biggles has to contend with a sobbing nemesis and (horror) Emotions
(Slightly older prompt, I hope you're still around to see the fill, anon! ❤️)
The sound of footsteps, one dragging slightly, heralded an arrival at the cell, so Biggles hastily stopped trying to pry loose the slightly rusty lock. It was very dim, the only light coming from a dingy bulb in the hallway, but the lithe figure that appeared as a vague shadow in the lamplight was one he would have known anywhere.
"My men told me they had caught you." Von Stalhein sounded exhausted, and Biggles, having quietly dropped the pry-bar onto the heap of dirty sacking that was the cell's only furnishing, leaned against the bars to see him better. "And only you, which I suppose means your associates are still running around free. I expect they shall be down the chimney shortly."
"I can't say where they are or what they're doing," Biggles said mildly. There was a raspy undertone to von Stalhein's voice, and when his enemy moved a little, so that some of the lamplight fell across his face, Biggles was so startled at how bad he looked that an exclamation was surprised out of him. "Good God, man, are you taking proper care of yourself?"
Von Stalhein let out a sharp sound, more an exhalation than a laugh. He move into shadow again, but not before Biggles saw him all too clearly.
His face looked cadaverous, as if he'd lost weight he couldn't afford to lose, and he was shivering a little, though he struggled to keep it under control. Damp patches of sweat soaked through the crisp creases of the uniform he wore. All in all, it presented an appearance very different from his usual precision.
Biggles had experienced something similar too many times not to know exactly what he was looking at.
"It's a tropical fever, isn't it? Those are nothing to trifle with. You should be in bed."
"I do not need advice from you," von Stalhein said sharply. "Anyway, I'm sure you'd like that, wouldn't you? I take to my bed, and let you and your associates have the free run of the place."
"Well, that wouldn't be a problem if you had surrounded yourself with men worthy of your leadership," Biggles retorted. "I can trust my associates to attend to my affairs when I am not with them."
"As I know all too well," von Stalhein shot back, his hoarse voice snappish. "Anyway, it's not a matter of mere competence. A leader cannot collapse like a wilting petunia. What on earth would your men say if you retired to your sickbed in the middle of a mission?"
"I do not have to wonder, because it has happened. As for what they would say, they would say I had need of it, and take up the slack without complaint until I am back on my feet. I would consider myself a poor commander indeed if I forced one of my men to continue working when it was clear that he needed his bed as badly as you do."
At first, Biggles thought von Stalhein had reacted with a laugh. One hand covered his face; his shoulders shook. He leaned back against the wall, still covering his face with his hand, as if overcome with mirth. And then he slowly slid down the wall to sit on the floor, still with his face hidden, head bowed, and it gradually dawned on Biggles with a slowly growing horror that this was not laughter, it was the furthest thing from it.
It appeared that von Stalhein was trying to stop and could not. His shoulders hitched, and he shuddered in brief, violent paroxysms. Biggles did not feel at all comfortable standing over him, it felt somehow -- cruel, so he sat down on the filthy floor of the cell to bring himself closer, but this did not help either. If it had been Algy, or Ginger, or Bertie he would have known what to do. (Well, more or less. The last time he had had to deal with a weeping Algy was a number of years ago, and he recalled that he had patted Algy's shoulder with an awkward "there, there" and Algy threw a teapot at him.)
It seemed not only highly inappropriate to say "there, there" to a weeping von Stalhein, but it was likely to result in a much more violent reaction than a smashed teapot that no one had liked very much anyway. But he couldn't do nothing.
"Are you ... all right?" Biggles offered hesitantly.
This resulted in another choking paroxysm, although this one seemed to have hysterical laughter mixed in. It was not an improvement.
Possibly Biggles had learned nothing from the teapot incident, because his hand moved almost without his conscious volition, reached through the bars and placed itself on von Stalhein's trembling shoulder.
Biggles could feel the heat radiating through his uniform, and the bones beneath. How long had von Stalhein been ill, how hard had he pushed himself to keep moving, keep working, in a state Biggles himself had experienced often enough to know how it felt: the grinding exhaustion, the splitting headache? Even so, he expected von Stalhein to shrug him angrily away.
He was unprepared for the way von Stalhein leaned into the touch, sagging as if the last strings holding him up had been cut. Biggles tightened his grip, with his hand still working almost without his conscious control, as if it was indeed Algy he was comforting, or someone else dear to him.
They sat like that, Biggles with his arm stretched through the bars, von Stalhein leaning into the strength of Biggles's grip, until the sobs died and von Stalhein turned his face away and wiped his sleeve across his eyes.
"Well," he said, staring at the wall rather than looking at Biggles.
"Well, then," Biggles echoed, and von Stalhein gave a sudden quick laugh -- really a laugh this time, small and weak as it was, and glanced at Biggles quickly before looking away again. His eyes were reddened, his face wet in the lamplight, but there was a slight smile on the thin lips, visible only briefly. And Biggles still had his hand on von Stalhein's shoulder.
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