SAGE
I made it back to Jack’s room in four minutes two seconds.
It didn’t look like Jack had moved. Even his head was at the same odd angle as when I’d left him, his chest barely lifting with his breath.
“I’m here,” I said to Caesar. “Do I have time to inject this stuff?”
“You’ve raised no alarms,” Caesar said.
I knelt down next to Jack, heat still radiating from his body. One of his arms hung limply off the side of the mattress.
“Still alive?” I whispered.
Only his shallow breathing answered me.
I grabbed a random bottle from my waistband. I prepped the syringe and swabbed a spot on his upper arm with the alcohol pad included in the syringe packet. I filled the syringe half-full with liquid. As the antibiotic flowed into his arm, my eyes flickered to Jack’s face, searching for any sign of response. He didn’t shift or groan. In fact, he didn’t seem aware I was in the room at all.
After I emptied the liquid into his arm, I carefully pulled out the needle and sat back on my heels. Nothing happened. Anxiousness rolled through me. Was I hoping for some sort of miracle? It wasn’t like this would work within seconds.
“Finished,” I said to Caesar.
“And?”
“Nothing,” I said.
Neither of us wanted to state the very real possibility that none of this would work at all, and that we’d compromised our position in the meantime. I couldn’t shake the nerves that settled in the pit of my stomach.
“I guess we just wait,” I said.
“Nice work.”
“Same to you, Caesar.”
“You may want to leave the earbud for Jack? For when he comes to?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Over and out?”
“Over and out.”
I pulled the earbud out and hid it under Jack’s pillow. His eyelids looked heavy and bruised, his jawbone as relaxed as I’d ever seen it. I brushed back a sweaty strand of hair from his forehead with my finger, and then patted his face dry with the pillow case. Even sick, his face looked as perfect as ever, but it held an innocence to it now, a vulnerability that came with unconsciousness.
More surprising was the pull, just as strong as when Jack was fully awake—maybe even stronger in this moment, with his defenses down.
What was drawing me in so forcibly? Making it hard for me to leave the room? Nervousness about his illness? Fear that he might die? Whatever it was, it felt deep—like a current running through me on a cellular level, making me frantic to know he was going to be okay, desperate beyond cognitive understanding.
I leaned closer, listening to Jack’s breathing, making sure I could hear it, and somehow found myself staring at his lips. The thought of touching them came suddenly. I jerked back, but I knew why I’d thought it. Close to him, I lost awareness of myself. The draw to him took over.
I shoved the syringe packets and antibiotics under the mattress and stood up, knowing the only way to relieve the awkward feeling in the pit of my stomach was to leave. Once I was a few feet from the bed, Beckett’s face flashed in my mind, and feelings of guilt flooded me. It wasn’t like Beckett and I were together together, and yet, we were together, and we’d been that way for a long time, even though nothing had ever been official.
I sighed and rubbed my forehead. Don’t think about it now.
Jack wouldn’t die today. Finn wouldn’t die today. Soon, we’d all leave, and I could sort out these feelings when we were safe again.