And now, for that missing bit between last week’s episode and the beginning of this episode
Oh dear. This just wouldn’t do.
Ed stared at the body splayed out on the ground before him. Broken, bleeding, and just a few shades too pale, Oswald Cobblepot was in bad shape indeed. His hair was matted with knots and dirt, and his whole body smelled like a corpse left too long in the Gotham river. He had heard the rumors that the Penguin had been shot and quickly disappeared in the night. Ed had been waiting, oh so patiently, for his body to turn up in the Gotham M.E.’s office. He had wanted, for some reason, to pay his last respects to a man he barely spoke two sentences to previously.
But here the man was, flesh and blood, desperate and broken. Right on the verge of crossing to the other side, and yet he still found the strength to force open the trailer door (and nearly broke Ed’s nose in the process), and emerge weapons blazing, ready to take down any potential enemies with him.
If he were honest with himself, Ed had never, in a single moment become so enraptured by another living human being. Not even Ms. Kringle had ever invoked such a strong response in him.
No. This wouldn’t do at all. Mr. Penguin wasn’t going to die. Not on his watch.
He was lighter than Ms. Kringle, surprisingly so. But, perhaps that was due to the extreme blood loss? Although, Mr. Penguin had always been a lanky sort of fellow, he had always appeared horribly underfed. So maybe it made perfect sense that he was naturally lighter than the woman. Before he could stop himself, Ed realized he was planning a day by day nutrition plan for the nearly dead man. He was getting ahead of himself. First, he needed to make sure they got home.
It was a delicate procedure really, driving just fast enough to get home in time, and yet not so fast that he alerted any potential authorities monitoring the roadways. Ed had always had an exceptional sense of hearing, which he found himself grateful for as he carefully monitored the slow and shallow breathing in his back seat. Time was of the essence. Luckily, he had everything he needed at his loft.
Bringing Mr. Penguin up to his apartment was much easier than trying to sneak Ms. Kringle out of it. The big difference of course, being that one of them was alive and the other was dead. But still, Ed was grateful for the amount of discretion granted him by the building he lived in. The doorman asked no questions, and neighbor interaction was minimal at best. On top of that, Ed lived in a fairly secluded part of the city. No one would be looking for a presumed dead criminal here.
Now, the real question was, did he have any clean underwear to spare?
Ed wasn’t used to pulling bullets fragments out of live bodies. Thankfully, Mr. Penguin was unconscious for almost the entirety of the procedure. But oh, how the man bled. Dead bodies don’t bleed, but live bodies do, which made the whole removal process a lot messier. It didn’t help matters when Mr. Penguin would occasionally wake. His anguished cries pierced a part of Ed that he couldn’t identify. The man had already lost so much blood, and Ed hated having to spill more. He laughed a little despite himself. How bizarre was it, that he was reluctant to spill the blood of a man who had murdered at least ten times as many people as he?
Somehow, Mr. Penguin’s wound hadn’t become infected, even though Ed knew that there was absolutely nothing in that trailer that would have sanitized a bullet wound. Mr. Penguin had gotten lucky, surviving alone in the woods this long. Ed had gotten lucky, finding the man when he did.
By the time Ed finished pulling out all the bullet fragments, his apartment looked more like a murder scene than it had when he’d accidentally choked the life out of Ms. Kringle. He’d used up all the gauze in the apartment, and some of the sheets too. They’d need to be burned, along with the terrible smelling clothes Mr. Penguin had been wearing. Ed thought that they were too gaudy looking for him anyway. His plaid pajamas suited the man much better.
Ed doesn’t sleep that entire night. He passes the time alternating between reading and checking on Mr. Penguin’s vitals. He calls out of the work the next morning, when he realizes the man’s condition isn’t changing. He isn’t sure how long it will be before Mr. Penguin wakes up, if he wakes at all.
Finally, his patient begins to stir. Ed smiles. The night hadn’t been wasted after all. He peers over the man with barely contained glee…
Much thanks to @gil212 for helping me write AND edit this *snuggles*
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