2019-08-29 - The Wrong Three

All in all, the surgery wasn't all that complicated. The cut from Alexander's ear, down to just before his major arteries was amazingly clean and neat, and while Alexander lost a lot of blood, the artery wasn't cut - and he didn't seem to have lost as much blood as you might expect. And the would maybe didn't seem quite as bad as they originally thought it was. All of that blood made it hard to tell. Surely. Definitely.

Either way, there's a lot of back-patting among the various doctors about how clean this case is likely to turn out. Unless he suddenly turns septic, or something, but hey, how often does that happen? So Alexander is wheeled into an observation room for now, one side of his head bandaged up pretty thoroughly to cover the stitches and sutures underneath, and there he sleeps, for a while. There are still bloodstains on his skin, but he's been changed into one of those horrible hospital gowns, and he looks overall healthy, just very, very pale. Machines beep. Blood is fed in through an IV. And, eventually, slowly, he fights off the drugs and awakens with a raspy sort of groan, blinking up at the unfamiliar hospital ceiling.

Hospitals are the closest equivalent to Purgatory on Earth. It certainly looks like it from Alexander's perspective when he wakes up the way he does, the hazy details of the scuffed, off-white ceilings the first things he would probably see upon waking. It is early enough that the room and its surrounding corridors are relatively quiet in comparison to its busiest hours. A low hubbub can be heard somewhere outside, where nurses and other staff confer with one another about patients and whatever extraneous details of their lives that they deign to share with one another, and the distant click-clacks of keyboards as patient files are coded in Addington Memorial's systems.

His windows are shut, as typical of general hospitals, with the airconditioning in moderate blast in an effort to keep the patients within comfortable, and ward off the heavy humidity that has inundated in the city in these final days of Summer. It hums in the background, adding onto the mechanical cacophony of diagnostic equipment attached to the man's body, reflective the fact that his vitals are strong in spite of the lack of color on his face.

As wakefulness continues to descend upon his addled senses, drawing him out from a traumatic haze, he would find that he's not alone.

It may have been due to Isabella's own charming demeanor, or Captain de la Vega's pull with the staff, but she is there, freely admitted to his room and given a reclining chair situated close to the side of his bed in which to rest her tired bones and aching muscles. The evening before had been a long exercise in logistics and patience, using every effective resource to which she has access to ensure that Alexander remains in this specific mortal coil. Assistance came in angles that were either expected or surprising: Byron Thorne, kind enough to do something for her if not for the man on the bed, having returned sometime in the night to deliver her laptop, a couple of her books and a fresh change of clothes; Lilith Winslow, who ensured that the procedure was executed seamlessly and stayed with her until Byron returned, once again using her frightening ability with great and less destructive effect; Captain Javier Ruiz de la Vega, who used his influence within those who are in the trenches of the hospital every day to ensure that she had early access to its latest patient.

A blanket has been thrown over her long legs, though it's been twisted around it, signs of a restless sleep in spite of her exhaustion. The blood has been cleaned off her and she's managed to switch out her bloodied clothing into something more comfortable and presentable: A long-sleeved shirt with a wide collar, drooping off one shoulder to expose the white surgical scar marring her tan, peeking out from underneath whatever small, expensive set of Parisian lace and straps she tends to wear under her clothes - feminine secrets that she had largely kept to herself, for herself, until very recently, a pair of shorts and thigh-high socks that keep bare skin modest. Her hair is in that same messy twist; all the moreso now that she's slept on it.

And she's still sleeping, her head tilted back and to the side, lashes heavy against her cheeks and her chest rising and falling in deep, steady breaths. Her arm is folded over her torso, the weight of it pressing a book left open and face-down over her stomach - Dead Men Do Tell Tales: The Strange and Fascinating Cases of a Forensic Anthropologist, written by noted anthropologist Doctor William R. Maples of the University of Florida. He is deceased, now, but like any typical academic, if she's going to read something strange and macabre, she's going to read one penned by an expert with a legitimate scholastic pedigree.

Alexander doesn't really expect to find someone in the room when he wakes. It takes more than a few months to break habits of a lifetime. So when he glances to one side and sees the woman in the chair, his first reaction is alarm. Widened eyes, a harsh inward breath. But the moment passes, and he recognizes Isabella in the sleeping form. A slow smile blooms. He doesn't wake her up, he just watches her for a while, his dark eyes a bit unfocused but warm. In this moment, he doesn't quite remember how he ended up here. That will come, soon. But right now the panic of unknowing is held back by her presence, and he's willing to wait.

It doesn't take her long for her to open her eyes, though this takes around half an hour more, extrasensory perception being what it is, twigging her that someone is active and moving in the same space that she is, as always unusually alert when it comes to her physical space and where she is situated at any given location. Lashes flutter before they part, green-gold eyes foggy and clotted with sleep.

His awake and seated form draws her out of the lingering brain-mists steadily, and after a blink, Isabella lifts a hand to press against her lids, shifting so she could adjust her position to one more conducive to conversation. Loose strands of dark hair fall around her face, and she pushes her borrowed blanket aside so she could get up. Stockinged feet pad through the negligible distance between her perch and his, her lighter weight sinking into the edge of his hospital bed. "Hey," she murmurs, rubbing her eyes with the curl of her knuckles, her voice low and husky from exhaustion and last night's exertions. There is some part of her that is thankful that he has been blissfully unconscious for a few hours - it has given her the time to put herself back together, to change her clothes, scrub off the blood and stop her fingers from twitching spasmodically at the remembered exhilaration and terror of sinking deep into the nuclear core of her potential, and give her the overall facade of a strong and steady presence.

Her hand reaches out, slowly, to give him enough warning that she is going to touch him. Should he allow her, light fingertips brush the dark half-curls off his brow. "How are you feeling?" Unlike the time their situations were reversed, this is a legitimate question to ask - Lilith lent her assistance, sight unseen. She doesn't know how she fared, just that he was going to live.

"Hey," Alexander says. Or tries to, anyway. While the cut wasn't deep enough to damage his vocal cords, between the swelling and the stitches, his throat is a right mess; the word is formed by his lips, but the only sound is a rattle and croak. He grimaces in pain and irritation. Both of which clear to some degree when her hand comes to brush through his hair.

He leans into the touch, eyes closing. There's the flutter of power against her mind. A mental knock on the door. If she answers, his voice sounds in her head, warm and maybe not as strong as usual, but better than what passes for his real voice right now. <<Hey. You okay? Everyone okay?>> Warmth and worry in equal parts. <<Sorry. For worrying you.>>

There's a quiet frown when Alexander attempts to speak, but does it poorly - the worry that the damage might be permanent is there, but considering Lilith's display of power the other night, Isabella shakes that specific worry out of her mind. There is enough to deal with, really, without adding more onto the pile.

She lapses into silence, unable, for the time being, to form the words, meeting his dark, but hazy eyes and how the one side of his head is bound up in bandages. Exhaustion helps, it keeps her face from being as emotive as it usually is, but the ready lean he makes against her stroking fingers - a far cry from how he had recoiled from her the last time he was here - earns him a small smile. That slender hand turns slightly, to let her palm cup his cheek, feeling the prickle and graze of two or three days' worth of growth against it. It hadn't been all that long ago since she felt it on her skin in other ways, while his mouth charted maps and graphs over the bare elegant lines of her. Her thumb absently strokes the ridge of sturdier bone underneath.

When he knocks on her mental doors, she stiffens. It has been a while since anyone has tried that - their explorations there had been limited on the surface, like skimming the top of the ocean on a board and for the briefest moment, hesitation is there. The occasional image slipped underneath the cracks these inner passageways. But never...

...finally, perhaps due to what she sees in his expression, and his clear difficulties in communicating, she slowly opens the door a crack, enabling her to hear his thoughts. He would find, however, that she elects to use her physical words - and keeps her own mental voice hidden.

"Minerva and I are unhurt," she assures him, unable to stop from stroking his cheek. "You caught the worst of it." She falls silent, unable to trust herself to address his apology - for worrying her, not with any words that wouldn't implicate the overall state of her. He doesn't need that while he's recovering. After a pause, she continues, gently: "What was the last thing you remember?"

There's too many drugs coursing through Alexander's veins for him to hide his emotions to even the poor extent that he usually manages. There's the pleasure in her touch, clear on his pale features, and in the way he cranes his head despite the pain to embrace the caress. But so too is hurt, the recoil both mentally and physically at her difficulty in accepting the light touch of his mind. He shuts down the connection hastily.

"Good." It takes him a try, but he manages the word, careful and raw. He thinks about the question. It takes a few moments, and his face reflects the unpleasantness of the memory. "Gohl. Wrong three."

Something twists in her expression when he recoils and cuts off the link, raw and undefined, whatever ghosts or demons that Isabella constantly struggles with plain in her eyes and on the light tan of her weary, but lovely features. Frustration thickens the air, her free hand balling tightly into a fist on her lap, unconsciously done - but painful enough to be felt, when her nails bite into her skin so hard that blood flushes to the surface and slowly trickles out from the tiny scratches that she has instinctively inflicted on herself. Her pulse tics on the side of her throat like a bird's frenetic flight, cords framing her throat at the tension present in her swallow.

"No, Alexander, that's not..." She grits her teeth, girds herself and pushes the words through. "I can't...I can receive just fine, transmit images just fine, but I can't...I can't talk back. You..." Her heart lurches painfully in her bones, reminded once again of how long and how much she has craved the kind of connection she has lost, has found someone who does not hesitate in doing so, only to find herself unable. Her green-gold eyes dart away from him and towards the window overlooking the clear day without, her voice dropping quiet and low to mask the conflict warring within. "...you won't be able to hear me."

What?

She isn't recoiling out of indifference, or hatred...but shame, and the gnawing reminder that significant parts of her are missing. He doesn't mean to do it, but it happens anyway and it isn't as if she can blame him either, when she is awfully, terribly aware of the fact that she hasn't told him anything.

Her hand remains against his face, supporting the lean. She is careful to touch the undamaged half of it. "Don't strain yourself," she murmurs. "Alexander, please. You've been through enough this week already." She slowly lowers the barriers, these formidable parapets guarding the entrance to her mind - or at least, just enough so she can hear him speak to her unencumbered. "What do you mean wrong three?"

"'s fine," Alexander is quick to reassure her, giving her a brief, lopsided smile. His non-IVed hand reaches out for her, rising to cover the hand over his face. "'s good." He closes his eyes; he doesn't try to re-establish the link, but he does let his hand slide down and offer itself, palm up. "Phone? Easier to type. Or pen. Paper." He swallows, grimaces - as much in irritation as in pain. Getting one's throat cut is hampering to basic communication skills, and he does not approve. He glances over to the other side of the bed, with all the various apparatuses of care, and gives them a half-hearted glare. Beeping machines, things that people have stuck in him. He hates it all, even when it's to save his life.

But it is what it is, so after he gets out that little snit, there's a turn back to her, and his face is back to smiling. "'s fine," he says, again, and his fingers twitch for the phone.

She keeps her eyes averted, sunk low within herself though one wouldn't know it by the look at her; the way she keeps her stare steady on the window and the line of her jaw firm and set. It's only his touch, the way he covers her knuckles with his that has Isabella looking back at him. With a sigh, and once released, she reaches for the device packed in a sterile plastic bag next to his bedside, pulling it open and rifling through it. They had to cut his clothes off him during the procedure, leaving his personal effects bagged and tagged - she is familiar with this already. It hasn't been all that long since her own discharge from the hospital.

She retrieves his phone from the array containing his wallet and keys, and whatever change and other detritus he keeps in his pockets. She deposits the thing carefully in his waiting palm, retrieving her own phone and letting it rest over her lap, ostensibly in readiness to receive his texts so he doesn't have to keep typing and erasing every message across his screen. The fact that he manages to smile does unwind some of the tension in her, and she returns it, however faintly.

"Do you need anything?" she asks. "I can ask the nurses to bring you coffee, or some food. You've been out a while."

Takes the phone, giving it a critical once over. There's some dried blood stains on the corners, and he works at one with a fingernail, flaking away dark brown bits with a frown. Stupid blood messing up his phone. But he realizes quickly that it's a larger job that one fingernail can handle, so he abandons it. A flicker of a finger to unlock the phone, and then he taps his way to the texting screen. Texting and electronic communication is already easier for Alexander than speaking, a lot of the time, so it's perhaps no surprise that, even one handed and on medication, it's not long before the first text comes through.

Coffee would be nice. Thank you. And I'm glad you're here. And yes, the grammar and punctuation is as good as he can make it. Trauma is no excuse for sloppy texting.

Twin noises - text sent, text received. He offers her a warm smile. Then types again.

Gohl. Someone built a box to trap him. We're the wrong three for another box. Implies there is a right three. Don't know who. Got a long, thoughtful pause distracted. Sorry.

Even when drugged and typing one handed, Isabella can't help but marvel at how he can still manage to think - she had just been about to tell him about how she thought the Ghoul seemed agitated about a box. Glancing at the texts she receives from him, she smiles quietly as she tucks her leg underneath a knee, turning to face him fully. "I was going to bring that up once you were better," she tells him. "That he seemed agitated about a box, and how he seemed to get set off by it in the conversation." She furrows her brows faintly. "I don't see how three people and a box would be connected, however. Why three?" She pauses. "And would it be worth speaking to the people who brought the bones back to try and examine the container that the bones have come with?" Rebecca Carr immediately comes to mind.

She leaves those questions for his consideration as she slowly slips off the bed, pausing as she watches his face and the bandages wound around one side of his throat, remembering all the blood gushing out of it, scarlet staining dark hardwood floors and coating her hands and fingers; what it had taken to tape the injury shut. Leaning forward, she presses her mouth gently on his forehead.

"Let me go get your coffee," she murmurs, a hair's breadth away from his skin, before slipping away so she could go find the closest nurse, to inform her or him that a patient is awake after post-surgery, and will probably need some food and drink.

He doesn't like being caged. Boxed. Angry about it. Alexander pauses, adds. Fuck him.

Just because he feels that clearly needed to be said. Or typed. Whatever. His grumpy, resentful expression clears as she leans in to give him a kiss on his forehead. His eyes close again, basking in it, and he manages to make a pleased sound, not quite a hum, at the contact. A slight, slight nod at her words. It still hurts, that movement, but his eyes open and follow her out of the room, wistful and a little disbelieving - like he feels it's possible that she won't come back, and it would have all been a drug dream.

Under the presumption that it isn't, or so he hopes, he attends to typing. With her out of the room, it's slower, more labored, and he takes a couple of rests in the middle. The twin sounds of text sent, text received, appear. Gohl knows there are people who can build another box to contain him. He knows that we weren't them. We should find them. Maybe the Addingtons might know. Maybe the Carrs. They might have built the first. I don't know if 'box' is metaphor or reality - he associated it with the pine box, but could be a ritual or something put on the original box. Don't think that box will work anymore. He got free, and Thomas trapped him again. But Thomas is weakening. Could feel how brittle his mind is growing.

Somewhere down the hallway, she checks those texts. Otherwise, she is presently out of sight for a few moments.

Whenever Isabella returns, a few items are held in her hands - two cups of coffee, as well as a pack of soft snack cakes from the vending machine down the hall, shying away from foodstuffs that are more cumbersome to chew. It isn't her first choice of something to feed him with, but it has carbohydrates and sugar and either is good for the brain. She carefully sets these on the bedside table next to him, her slighter weight folding back down on the edge of the bed next to him. Long academic's fingers hand him his cup carefully, and then turn their attentions to the package. While presently unsure whether he is a chocolate, vanilla or strawberry guy, she has elected to get him the first, if not just because of the caffeine.

As always, she does this properly, as if this isn't a hospital room and that there aren't persons outside who are ill, dying or worse. She fishes out a piece and sets it on one of the paper napkins she has brought - it's no plate, and the hour is much too early for tea time, but it will have to do.

...though she realizes that with a cup on one hand and a phone that he uses to communicate with on the other, he doesn't exactly have another arm to eat with.

Her expression flattens comically. "Christ, brace yourself, because I'm about to become one of those," she says in a mock groan, and she proceeds to break off a piece of the cake. "I hope you know, Mister Clayton, just how fortunate you are that you're really cute." And with that, she holds out the piece, for him to bite into.

She says nothing about it, but at the moment, it is glaringly crystal clear as to where her current priorities are, though she does exhale a quiet sigh. "Yeah," she mutters and while the word is mild on its own, this single syllable hints at the bladed edge of anger that remains unaddressed in her stomach. "He can suck it." One of the very rare moments that emphasize that in spite of her intelligence and how eloquently she puts her opinion that she is still a young woman in her twenties. "As for my earlier suggestion, I meant taking the prior box for the purposes of reading it and trying to glimpse its emotional impressions or whatever history lingers there in hopes that it'll point us in the right direction. I know the bones themselves have been scrubbed...but it might not be the same for the box."

She sets her phone down and picks up her own coffee, blowing the steam off the top before taking a sip. "If that doesn't work, we have several avenues of inquiry we can pursue," she murmurs thoughtfully. "The Addingtons, yes, also the Carrs, and since we're asking about people, maybe we can set another appointment to see the Archivist if all else fails."

When she returns, Alexander is already half-asleep. It really takes only a moment or two of quiet for the drugs and his general, on-going sleep deprivation to try and assert themselves whenever they're given a chance. He rouses at the scent of coffee and the feel of Isabella returning, his head coming back up, turning just enough to follow her back to the chair. He takes the cup with a grateful sound, and puts it on the little tray long enough for him to adjust the bed to a sitting position. Then back for coffee, which is lifted to his mouth and sipped very carefully. The burn of the hot coffee going down his throat is simultaneously painful and welcome. He takes another sip while watching her set out the snack cake. One eyebrow lifted.

And then she is offering to feed him, and the look he gives her is just -- really? Is this a thing we're doing? A grin splits his features, and the pain must be worth it, because he just stares at her, brimming over in amusement. He accepts the tidbit, carefully, and not without teasingly running his tongue over her fingertips once he's picked up the piece of cake. He sits back, chews and swallows. Then puts down the cup of coffee on the tray, and breaks off the next piece for himself. But clearly not in any hurry to eat more.

Instead, he turns to the phone. Good thinking. If the box can be read, it should be. It bothers me that the elder Addingtons are so unhelpful. But we work with what we have.

Really? Is this a thing we're doing?

Her expression is utterly resigned, when it is so indicative and emphatic of her response: I guess so, now shut up and eat your god damned cake.

It doesn't help that he stares at her with that shit-eating grin and Isabella tilts her head back and groans, and this time it is sincere, self-deprecating and absolutely eloquent in her exasperation, though she does manage to still hold an aura of good humor throughout this entire production. "Look, I'm not in a particular habit of regretting my life choices, how dare you make me start now, by the way."

Morsel offered and the accompanying tease, the familiar flick of his tongue against her skin sends her laughing, finally, and it feels good to do so after everything else they've endured in the last twenty-four to forty-eight hours. "I'm no doctor," she tells him, mirroring his mirth. "But I'm relatively sure you shouldn't even be entertaining those overtures in the state you're in. I already have my doubts that you'd survive me, there's really no need to experiment on that front." She tilts her head at him, lashes lowered. "And as you know, I'm not above scandalizing hospital staff."

She peeks at the text message, and she shakes her head slowly. "I told you, they seem confident and unyielding in the idea that this town is theirs - to save or ruin as they will," she tells him. "So if we're going to meddle, we'd have to come at them sideways instead of straight on. As much as I am a fan of the kick-the-doors open approach."

Laughing is SUPER painful. It doesn't stop Alexander from doing it anyway, at least for the first couple of wheezing moments. His face goes from pale to plummy then back again as he sounds like he's trying to choke himself. But his eyes are merry, and when he gets control of himself, he reaches out and taps on the phone. You're adorable. Just that, and then he reaches for the coffee again, and takes a sip.

After it burns its way down, he reaches for another small bit of cake, puts it in his mouth. He chews slowly, probably more slowly than the vending machine treat deserves, and washes it down with more coffee. Once that's done, he picks up the phone again. You're probably right. Frustrating. Irritating. Considering we ARE trying to save Thomas from hell-asylum. But right.

"And intelligent, and clever, and gorgeous, and adventurous..." Isabella, ever shameless, enumerates her best and overinflated qualities as she reads the text she receives from her phone. Naturally, his good humor only inspires her most incorrigible self, and she ends up smiling at him, the pliant line curved upwards in a manner that somehow manages to be both rueful and wry all at once. Setting her phone down, both hands reach for her own cup of coffee, before she neglects it the way she normally does, and takes a sip.

Even now, in spite of everything, he's still trying to save people she isn't quite certain deserve that kind of regard, and her earlier levity fades as she glances at the text message on her screen. "Either save him or make sure he's committed if there are no other alternatives. I'm still not entirely convinced that he'd reach the facility without the Ghoul taking over. Like you said, he's weakening, and his mind is growing brittle. The more they delay his transfer, the risk becomes higher that our quarry would take over completely and continue wreaking havoc in the city. Not to mention I don't think Thomas and Margaret are entirely blameless - they knew this was happening and didn't act quickly enough, and now eight people are dead. Thomas' commitment at the very least is a reflection of some culpability." She glances down into her cup. "But the priority in the end is to end it. I suppose the how is just as important...I honestly don't know how you're managing to keep your objectivity."

She falls silent at that, before she draws her fingers over her eyes and takes another pull from her cup.

Alexander's eyes fix on Isabella. The warm mirth that he projects, when she lists off her best qualities (without notable disagreement from him, of course) fades into something a lot more complicated as she goes on. By the end of it, he frowns - not at her, necessarily, but just as he considers his own reactions and everything. He looks away, staring at the blank, unseeing eye of the television on the far wall. His fingers tap tap tap on the phone, but along its outer cover, not the keyboard. Then he reaches for the coffee, takes a sip, puts it down.

When he turns his attention back to texting, his fingers are slower, his expression blank. Not objective. I don't like the Addingtons. Never have. Don't like Gohl, either. But can't fix the Addingtons. Can't fix Gohl, either - can't kill a dead man. Can only contain. And I don't have to like someone to not want them sent Over There. Gohl escaped his box. He was free. Thomas captured him again, somehow, in his mind. Didn't have to. Might be killing him to keep Gohl there. He's a drunken, overbred asshole, but he did the right thing. As far as he was capable of doing it. Deserves someone to do the right thing back. Save him if we can.

He sends the text, then flexes his fingers to work out the kinks - that's a lot of tapping! But his eyes go to her, studying her reaction to the text with intensity.

She is clearly not serious when she showers herself with exaggerated praise, but the slow fading of his reflected mirth has her expression sobering faintly, replaced by one that is equally puzzled and curious. Isabella doesn't bother to hide it, the way her laughter dies and how her smile vanishes, green-gold stare fixing on his profile as he looks away and stares at the far wall. But she doesn't ask. At least, not yet.

When she finally receives a response to her remarks about Thomas Thomas Addington, there's a thoughtful frown at her screen before she lifts a hand and runs her fingers lightly over her own nape, her thumb rolling over the pressure point she finds there. There's a stubborn set to her features. "When he assumed the responsibility of keeping the Ghoul at bay, that's where it stayed. I still don't understand why they waited this long to do anything about it when they realized their stop gap was failing..and you know they did, Alexander. They didn't bother to hide the fact when we confronted them directly. If we knew that, if I knew that, then maybe it wouldn't be so frustrating for the rest of us." Then maybe they wouldn't be so quick to judge the Addingtons and their choices.

After a few moments, she sighs. "If he won't be more forthcoming with us, maybe he will be with Erin."

A long silence descends after that, and one that isn't entirely comfortable. But finally, she speaks. Watching his face, devoid of all emotion, she can't help but ask. "What is it?"

She never held back on that either, this tendency to simply ask if she wants to know something.

For a while, it seems like there won't be an answer to any of her questions. Alexander closes his eyes. It has a different quality from the last time he did that in a hospital room - his face is turned slightly towards her, and he's just not projecting that aggressive 'go away' vibe of the previous experience. But he's thinking about something, it's taking a while, and he's tired. So, it almost looks like he's going to fall asleep before he manages to get his thoughts to a coherent place of sharing.

But then, he shakes himself, and looks down at his phone. His fingers move. I'd like to know, too. But knowing wouldn't change anything, right now. Still gotta box up William, and if they won't help with that, fuck 'em, but it doesn't change anything.

Her last question, it takes a little longer before he types out an answer. I'd hoped he would have a reason. For what he did. That he wasn't just a monster. But he is. Was. Is. And that's in my blood. He could recognize that. I think.

She wouldn't blame him at all, in the end, if he wanted to sleep. She wouldn't have been opposed to that.

But Alexander would not be denied a proper intellectual discourse over the entire affair; in that, at least, they were the same, unable to simply rest, their brains refusing to shut down no matter how many punishments their bodies have endured. Isabella's expression, fraught with tension, softens palpably at seeing him struggle - the suggestion is on her lips, at the tip of her tongue, to tell him to table the rest for tomorrow and go back to sleep. But her phone chimes again and she looks at the text and by the faint resignation returning on her sunkissed visage, it's evocative of the idea that he is speaking truthfully and it is always something that she has agreed with him about, though they may disagree on the methods later down the line: This all has to end, and preferably with nobody else dying.

It's his reply to her last remarks, though, that has her frowning visibly at him, with that signature defiant tilt to her chin. But when she reaches out, her hand is gentle, fingers curling inward to draw the light brush of her knuckles down his cheek, on the uninjured side of his upper extremities.

"Alexander, if you were born human in this world, you were born with a capacity to kill," she murmurs as she leans over at him to meet his eyes squarely, forever drawn to the fathomless depths of those near-black eyes while sweeping a light thumb over the curve of his jawline, his stubble awakening sleepy nerves on the pad of that stroking digit. "No matter how smothered, no matter how pacifistic, once it's do or die time, the rules and everything we think we know we're capable of go out the window. That's nature, not blood. Just because you share some mitochondrial markers with him doesn't mean that you'll suddenly turn into some facsimile of William Gohl. If we were going by that logic, if that pattern is to be followed without contestation, I would be the same." Directly descended from a darkly-aligned witch burner as well as a man who wouldn't just kill his fellow, but his wife and children.

She pauses. "You told me just two nights ago that you might not like yourself, but you know yourself. Are you going to doubt that now after all the years you spent fighting all of this?"

If Alexander doesn't quite understand Isabella's issues with Glimmer and her brother, then it is clear from the frustration on his face that she doesn't quite understand the place where his worries in this particular regard come from. And for the same reason: there are things that Alexander doesn't talk about that would provide context to his fears. And from his sigh, and the way his fingers don't immediately type back, it's clear that he can't - or won't - try and open that conversation now.

He takes his hand from his phone to reach for the hand that caresses his face. He squeezes it gently, smiles up at her, letting the warmth of his affection banish his concerns. At least for now. At least in this conversation. He draws her hand to his lips, and kisses her knuckles one at a time, just a whisper of his mouth over the skin. Afterwards, he releases her, reaches instead for the phone.

Let's concentrate on what we can do. Find those who can build a better Gohl-trap. Figure out how to get them to do that. Trap Gohl. Bury trap in the deepest, darkest hole we can find. Profit.

She missed the mark, somewhere, but she is familiar by now of the existence of the secrets that have broken off pieces of him that he might not be able to reclaim - and due to the fact that she is coming from a similar position, she understands it well. That, at least, doesn't draw a single iota of frustration from the heavy sigh he makes. She only keeps rolling her thumb against his cheek in response, in the hopes that she is capable of providing some small measure of comfort.

It's his smile that gets her in the end, the sort that he only, mostly shows around her and quite possibly her second or third-most favorite expression on his features, whenever he allows himself to let it show. Electricity thrums over every open nerve at each light pass of his warm mouth over her knuckles, her heartbeats escalating in pace and pitch when he meets her eyes with his own while doing so. This wouldn't be the first time she has wondered - and in fact, has often wondered whether Alexander Clayton was born in the wrong time, somehow. It softens the look of her, enables her to smile in spite of the not-quite comfortable tension in the room.

There's a glance at her phone. "If the bones were interred in the Veil, it stands to reason that information about the means and methods would be there. It might be worth looking into, if you're still intent on embarking on the trip to the asylum and any attempt reading the box comes up empty. Do you know where it is now?" She hesitates, the mad thought slipping through her mind - of volunteering to come with him, to join that particularly dangerous expedition...but her mind rebels, her stomach seizes up, her cranium filling with what she had just attempted in her house. There was simply no way.

Her released hand settles on her lap, watching him and his present state. Her smile returns shortly, albeit it's a rueful one. "I couldn't do anything for you in the end," Isabella tells him, gently. "Not really. When you were in the OR, I called Lilith. She made certain that you survived the procedure while sitting in the waiting room. She can do it without a reader looking for the body, Alexander, but as you observed, she's absurdly powerful."

Tap tap tap. The text is especially vehement, and it's accompanied by a quick, stern frown.

Don't. Don't do that. Don't say you didn't do anything. Not true.

Then, more gently.

I do owe Miss Winslow a favor, though. Thank you for calling her. Thank you for being here when I woke up. For being you.

Then his hand goes rather slack, his body settling more heavily in the pillows and the mattress. He gives her a half-lidded look. Not even the coffee, strong as the hospital does tend to make it for nurses and the like, can keep the fatigue at bay forever. There are things there he wants to ask about, clearly. But just as clearly, he's fading. He licks his lip, and says, his voice hesitant and rough, "Think...need a nap. You too. I'll be fine, Isabella." A brief, sleepy smile. And then, as people under the influence of The Good Drugs often do, he goes from 'awake' to 'asleep' remarkably quickly, and apparently without much conscious choice.

And just like that, he drifts off.

Isabella glances at his final texts, her expression inscrutable - it holds, for a moment that seems interminable, and witnessed by no one.

Later, she finally moves; she draws up the blankets higher up Alexander's chest, and leans forward to press her mouth gently against his hair.