20,000 leagues under the osea

They watched her wake up from their chair, one foot kicked up onto their knee. They’d seen worse, but not by far. Wires snaked up out of the hole in her chest, hooking her up to monitors on the other side of the bed. Her shell had almost been caved in around where the bottom of her ribs would have sat in a human body, filled in cracks spreading around her waist, disappearing under the blanket that lay over her legs and stomach. She’d been lucky to have her team take her in so fast. 

Why Certo cared enough to spend their down time next to her bedside they weren’t entirely sure. Friendship, or something close enough to it, as much as they had tried not to let it creep up on them. They had even considered taking their helmet off, but they weren’t confident enough they’d be able to fry the cameras without also frying the equipment holding her together. It was a waste of time; they knew she would be back on her feet by the morning, but they sat there anyway.

And when she actually started to shift, the hands folded over her stomach curling on the thin infirmary blanket, they spoke up. “Hey.”

She cracked an eye at them, lips already turning up in a smile. “Hi.” She always synched her lips to her words, something they found strange and useless. Probably one of the reasons why she was allowed to talk to the press. 

“Heard you got fucked up.” 

She shrugged one shoulder. “Oh, I’m alright.”

They clicked their tongue in dissent, something they had picked up from an old teammate. “You almost rejected your shell.” 

Her smile went strained. But it stayed. “Only a little.”

“Be more careful.” One of these times she wasn’t going to come back at all. At least in Intel she wouldn’t burn right away, but the idea still bothered them. 

She shoved herself higher up on her pillows, careful not to disturb her innards where they spilled out. “You aren’t my superior, you can’t tell me what to do.”

Technically true. Not that she would follow their orders anyway. Nobody could break her self sacrificial habits. They clicked their tongue again.

“It was me or my teammate,” she tried, with a certain pleading tone they had heard before. The smile had disappeared. “And I wasn’t going to let them get hurt when I could take the hit instead. Please don’t be mad.”

She had said something similar the last time this had happened. And the time before. This little pattern pissed Certo off royally, but they knew better than to try to adjust the cycle. Why was she willing to die for these people? Why did they care so much that she felt that way?

Instead of asking they swept a hand to the things they had set on the tray by her bed. Keeping the tablet from being fried had been a pain in the ass, but hopefully wrapping it in the sweater had helped some. “I brought you some stuff.” Waiting for repairs when you didn’t ever really sleep was boring, and she was more prone to fidgeting than most. 

“Thank you,” she murmured. Her eyes roved over them, and they watched her back through the dark glass of their visor. The monitors behind her already showed improvement, stabilization.

Certo just nodded, pushing themself from their seat, satisfied. 

She piped up when they had reached the door. “Hey.”

They turned their head back, one hand on the handle.

“Will you—do you have time to keep me company?”

They had an hour or so more downtime. Dive prep could wait a while. “Fine.” They took the chair next to her bed again. 

“Did you watch the latest episode of HoloLove?”

They shook their head.

She brightened. “I’ll tell you about it.”