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[ingeniar]

telepathy | letters | action

content warning: some threads may be nsfw and contain references to drinking, violence, character death

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cw: ref to incidental suicide, light restraint, more gore, an increasingly bad time had by all

[rehandle]

[ It's bad. It's worse than he thought. A snatched glimpse of that makeshift workbench, the garbled nothing traced out in bloody smears over paper. Stephen's blood runs colder than the pools of Tony's own scattered about in receptacles at their feet, a sharp throb of fear making patterns of his pulse. And then his patient's protests redouble in earnest, an attempt at motion that his body's barely equipped to action, but it's enough for Stephen to feel the lukewarm spill of something splattering against his ankle, to watch as Tony's ineffectual deterrent drags his blood across his torso.

No more of this. Every motion threatens to stretch the insertion points of those tubes, make free flowing open wounds he isn't equipped to stymie all at once. The hand free of cloth stretches to snag around one wrist, dragging it over to the other so he can hold them together, counting on the strength of his aching hand to be at least equal to that of a man with too much of his blood everywhere but in his body.

He tugs, commands attention, holding Tony's hands close to his body so there's nowhere he can go. What comes next is not his finest moment, horror congealing into desperate fury that he turns on a man who does not have the control over himself to have earned it. ]

Stop. Are you listening to me? Stop it. You are killing yourself. If you keep this up, you will die.

[ Or perhaps there will come something worse. It hasn't escaped his attention, can't escape his attention now he's so close, that his skin in places is lacking the pallor it ought to have. Exhibiting quite the opposite. ]

[ingeniar]

What if I'm dying already? Huh? It was like this before, when it -- [ Tony bites the words off, stares up into Stephen's eyes with feverish desperation, his own smudged with purple, bloodshot. Trying to get him to see. ]

The palladium poisoning. It was like this. Something inside me, broken. Leaking some kind of.. of nasty shit into my blood. Something I have to fix.

[ He tries struggling again, pathetically; it hurts, the tubes pulling, Stephen's grip on his bruised skin. His head is throbbing and his heart feels like it's going a mile a minute, but he's so much better than he was, why can't Stephen see that? ]

I just need to get it out, I need to get it out of me. You're supposed to be my -- my friend. You should be helping me, damn it, I can feel it inside me, it's gonna burn me up --

cw: magical bondage (for medical purposes)

[rehandle]

[ Spikes and spines and pins and needles, words like skewers, you're supposed to be my friend. But what is he going to do? Relent to soothe him? Let him siphon all the blood from his body to prove that he cares? ]

It is not. [ Firm. ] It isn't. And if it does, at least you'll be alive to feel it.

[ He releases him - but only for the moment it takes to conjure bright red bands of magic that bloom thick around the narrow parts of Tony's wrists, just shy of the tube that pierces one. Each band calls to the other like a magnet, catching his hands close, the only sensation from the spellwork a warm thrum where the magic touches skin.

He threads one of his arms between Tony's bound ones to hold him up in place, and then Stephen's free, finally, to wad the cloth he's been holding over the skin around one of the inserted tubes and begin to slowly, as carefully as he can, draw it out. ]

[ingeniar]

[ It's not pretty. Once Tony figures out what's going on, he goes back to trying to get free, throwing himself from side to side, cursing between gritted teeth, not really getting anywhere against a man who has all ten pints in his body. ]

No, come on! I just need to fix it, it's my nanotech -- I'm gonna.. sue you for medical malpractice -- [ He pants and gasps, makes a pained noise as the tube comes free of his arm and sluggish blood seeps into the cloth clamped to him. The stress is making the symptoms of blood loss worse, sending the room spinning gently around him. His skin is pale and clammy, a flop sweat breaking out across his face. ] I just need to.. need to get to it..

[ His breathing is shallow; he stops fighting, just turns his gaze up to look at Stephen. ]

You stopped it. [ He says it in a faint voice. ] You stopped.. I was fixing it. The itching is coming back. Stephen. Let me fix it. What am I.. supposed to do if I can't fix it?

[rehandle]

[ It's— horrible. Each passing second worse than the last as he grips Tony firm, works to oppose his bids to get clear, his urging pleas. One tube pulls free of his body and Stephen pays no mind to the way its contents spill over bedsheets, trail a line down the leg of his pants as he lets it drop to the floor, focus on stemming the bleed that itself seems only halfheartedly interested in spreading through the cloth packed against the wound.

And then the fight goes out of Tony entirely. And that's almost worse. Stephen's focus raises to his face as he speaks in a voice that sounds so helpless, so lost, that he almost yearns to force the tube back in beneath his skin to let him find some peace.

But the itching is coming back. And it's a symptom of something neither one of them understands yet. He can't let himself get caught up in the delusion - he can't. A fresh red band moves to replace his hand clamping down over the cloth, and with a brief snatch of clarity Stephen clamps the remaining tubes with the same method. Stops the flow.

Then his freed hand is a cradle for Tony's head, fingers through damp hair and palm a cushion for his skull, thumb hooked around an ear with its pad pressed to his cheekbone. ]

I'm going to help you. I'm going to help you, Tony. It's always worse before it's better. You have to let me help.

[ingeniar]

[ In the fog of paranoia and blood loss, Stephen's hand is a beacon and an anchor, a holding point for Tony's consciousness. He leans into it, looking up into Stephen's face, a childish vulnerability in his expression, wanting to hope and trust that he's right. Wanting, so very badly, to believe that he can help.

But -- ]

No. You can't help. Unless you help me get them out. [ He licks his dry lips and doesn't pull away, or move; he doesn't have the strength left to do it, or to resist very much at all. ]

You need to fix it. Help me do it. Or you're just gonna.. let me die.

[rehandle]

[ There's a moment where he thinks it might be enough. Where he thinks he sees some shift in Tony's face - hope, or maybe just plain exhaustion - that'll see this part over. See him place trust, stop the battle.

The moment passes. Stephen blinks with the vehemence, the certainty in the statement, drawing back just a little as if buffeted by it.

But so be it. If he needs to do this against his will, he'll just have to see it done. Stephen shifts, hand still a careful cradle, the other arm hooking the bands holding Tony's wrists together over his forearm as behind him tubes lift from their containers to drip residue into glass and bowl and floor in a bid to prevent any worse spillage when Stephen guides Tony around and down, controlling his weight with that hooked arm, settling him back onto his bloodied bed. He only eases his hand free once Tony's head is safely in his pillow.

Then it's onward to the second tube, new cloth ready to soak up tired blood. ]