It had been a very long couple of days for one Isabel Kiers. All she wanted to do was sleep, relax, take a bubble bath or maybe call Banning for another dinner date or something that didn't involve an epic fucking disaster of nightmarish proportions. At the very least, it seemed like she was finally getting things back to a reasonable level of normalcy-- she had made nice with her brother, and while she hadn't nearly gotten to explain everything, at least he was talking with her. Willing to listen.
There had been a mild interruption, as there often was, when tests needed to be run or when someone else came to visit. Izzy felt more than a little annoyed each time, but wisely kept her mouth shut. She didn't want to broach the subject of Jon's admission into the DoSaM psych wing with strangers about. It was something that needed full explanation, not just dropped like so much dirty laundry. Chance was in no place for that kind of bullshit.
And so, when she was interrupted for the third time, Izzy decided that now was as good a time as any to get a cup of coffee. Something sweet and sugary to keep her going for just a few hours more, until she could finally clear the air and hopefully return home with a clear conscience.
Or so she thought. Her phone buzzed insistently, and she frowned down at it even as she pulled the styrofoam cup from the coffee machine's compartment. She flicked open her com's messages, and immediately frowned at the name displayed on the little blipping window.
She opened the messages between herself and Gerard, and her confusion only doubled as a result.
Gerard: Are you still with Chance? I am sorry. I felt it necessary to answer Lufti.
Necessary to answer Lufti about what? Izzy's frown deepened, and she took a sip of her coffee, thumbing out a slow and likely less than properly punctuated reply.
Izzy: I mean, I was just with him but I went to get something to drink from the vending machines
Which was true. She had literally only left a few moments before, and Chance had seemed in perfectly good spirits. Or at least, as good spirits as he could have been, considering his knee had been violently dislocated and his eye was no longer functioning and he was confined to a single hospital room for several days. That was the part Chance was having the most trouble with, the sitting still. Well, so far that was the most troubling thing. Izzy hadn't had a chance to talk to him about Jon, about the whole mess with the pills and the overdose and the absolute fucking meltdown the Pilot Cardinal had suffered. That would take time, would take easing into, would take every ounce of gentle understanding and careful wording.
Anything less and Chance would likely take a flying pirouette right off the handle.
Izzy: Wait, what do you mean
She flipped back to the Pilot Chat, wondering if there might be some evidence there. What she read was enough to turn her blood to ice, fear gripping her chest and causing her hand to spasm violently against her coffee cup, spilling a good third of it over her hand and onto the floor.
Izzy: OH HELL
She didn't wait for Gerard's reply, instead booking it back in the direction of Chance's room, where already she could hear shouting; and none of it was louder than the voice she recognized as being so terribly close to her own. An impressive number of nurses had their hands full trying to keep Chance in his room, to get him back onto his bed, but the stubborn asshole was clinging tight to the doorframe, keeping himself upright on one leg and a healthy dose of willpower.
It was a mark of how incapable he was of being up and about like this that he hadn't gotten any further-- his face was ashen, covered in a thin sheen of sweat, though Izzy wasn't sure how much of that was due to pain or terror. A definite heady mixture of both. Chance looked up as she approached, and she felt her heart shudder.
Upon their reconciliation, their connection had been reestablished. They very rarely kept themselves apart, letting one another into the surface worlds of one another's minds. It was a privilege they both fought to maintain the integrity of, never digging deeper, never using what they knew against one another. The tragic side-effect, however, was that when their eyes met, Izzy could feel every raw emotion of Chance's as deeply as her own, could feel the sudden wave of fear and despair and all the anger that came with such things.
"Iz--" Chance said, though the distraction of her arrival had allowed one of the burlier orderlies to grab him up and remove him from the doorframe.
"Chance, stop it--" Izzy said, loudly, over all the ruckus, moving into the room after her twin and pressing down onto his shoulders to keep him on the hospital bed. "Stop it, you're just going to hurt yourself--"
"Gerard isn't answering--"
"--You know he can't, he's not at liberty to--"
"What happened with Jon! Izzy don't you lie to me, don't you lie to me too!"
"Pilot Echo Kiers you will cease this nonsense right this very instant!" Izzy barked, and the ingrained discipline in Chance's bones gave them a moment of pause in which he stopped fighting so hard. Chance grunted as an orderly pricked at his arm, pushing a sedative in before Chance had the opportunity to do a damn thing about it. It didn't take long for it to take effect, even against a hemokinetic, and after a few moments Chance's eye went glassy, his struggles weakened, and he fell back against the bed.
"Please, please, just tell me what happened. Fuck, Iz, I don't... I can't just..."
"Tearing your joints apart and flailing around DoSaM isn't going to help him any, Chance." Izzy said, her hand sliding up to pet at her brother's hair when it no longer became necessary to hold him down.
"I'm such an asshole, I'm such-- such a stupid asshole--"
"Chance, none of this is your fault," Izzy said, firmly, staring down into Chance's remaining eye, trying to get him to focus on something solid and real and not all the terrible what-ifs that were plaguing his head. "This was something that was necessary. Jon needed to see a doctor and that is what he is doing, okay?"
Izzy wasn't even sure where her coffee had gone. The sleeve of her shirt was wet and cold where a portion of it had spilled, but that was about the extent of the evidence for its existence. She slowly settled back down into the chair she had pulled up beside Chance's bed, sighing heavily and gesturing for the hovering nurses to leave them be. No sense in crowding the man once he was already drugged. Besides, they had a lot to discuss.
Gerard: The Chat.
Gerard: Yeah. Do you want me to come down there?
The silence was answer enough of an answer. He wasn't going to let Izzy deal with this alone. Not after she had to deal with Jon by herself. That foreign born imbecile was dragging down both of the Kiers twins, though that line of common sense seemed to be lost on kind hearted souls. Pilot Cardinal Rheeves was trash, simply put. There was a reason losers like that were rank locked, and it was because they weren't fit to be Pilots in the first place. Of course useful ones like Rheeves managed to graduate candidacy thanks to their abilities, but it hardly made them worthy of the job.
It definitely did not make him worthy of Chance. He had been through enough now too.
Gerard made his way down just a few floors on the elevator to were he was already well aware Chance's room was. He made sure the Pilot was as comfortable as possible, with a private room and the best nursing staff they had. After all, Pilot Echo Kiers deserved the best. Gerard regretted not being able to save Chance's eyesight in the one eye, but fortunately the organ was intact and the venom had not spread further into Chance's system. Still, there was nothing more frustrating as a doctor than knowing there was nothing you could do for a patient. Especially if there were special to you.
By the time he reached Chance's room the Pilot had already been sedated and the nurses had left the twins to their privacy, though the door to the room was still open as was protocol. The older Pilot knocked on the door frame just loud enough to be heard and alert the twins to his presence. "Chance, you really cannot be getting up and trying to walk just yet. You exacerbate that leg before you are even able to do physical therapy and you might end up never walking right again." He said frowning as he moved into the room and sent a soft sympathetic smile Izzy's way.
"There is still much I cannot discuss with you but I came here to speak with you about what came up on the Pilot Chat. There is still doctor / patient confidentiality and issues of clearance in play, but I can speak with you more honestly now than I could where anyone could see it. I wasn't trying to ignore or upset you Chance. As your doctor and your friend please understand I only want what is best for you."