Difficult Conversations, Part One
[SV-240 masterlist]
Timeline: set after Lost in Space.
contents: rescue and recovery from slavery whump and forced relationship, medical setting (medbay on a space ship), wounds, trauma, referenced: recapture attempt, major character death, mouth gore, noncon touch, noncon kisses, branding.
~~~
Wren barely registers being carried back to the medbay, his mind filled with a chorus of he’s dead, he’s really dead, he can’t hurt me anymore, I’m free. His shirt is removed, the reopened wound cleaned and secured with bandages. The medic crouches in front of him, studies him, and he looks her in the eye with an absent smile. He’ll be okay, he’s just in shock. He can’t quite understand her words, any words, really, and then there are more gentle ones, can you lie down? you need to rest, and he finds himself looking at the smooth metal ceiling again. He takes a deep breath and shudders at the spike of pain under his ribs.
He turns his head to the side and frowns when he sees that the other medpod is occupied too, that there’s another ranger lying there, unconscious or asleep.
“Who’s that? What happened to them?” His voice is hoarse and unfamiliar as he asks no-one in particular.
“Private Golubev,” he hears an answer from the medic, who appears in his field of view again, walking up to the unconscious ranger to check the display of the pod. “He was on guard duty when…” She hesitates and shoots a glance at Wren, who is clearly not entirely present. “He was knocked out, has a minor head injury, but he’ll be okay.”
“Daniel did this,” Wren whispers with a slight frown. “He could have… he could have killed him.”
“But he didn’t. Golubev should regain consciousness soon, he’s strong.” She smiles at Wren and pulls a sleek white stool closer to sit by his side. “Do you remember what happened, Wren?”
“He’s dead,” he spits out the only thought occupying his mind and falls silent for a moment until he can reach further back in his memory. “He wanted to take me away again, we fought, the gun… fell.” He swallows and his fingers twitch from the lingering sensation of closing his hand around the gun, holding it up - and pulling the trigger. “And I killed him.” His voice trembles and he looks at the medic with more clarity. “I killed him. I shouldn’t have. I-I should have just- But he wanted to-”
“You were defending yourself. No-one is holding it against you. It was…” She briefly looks at Golubev again, and when she continues, her voice is quieter. “It was a mistake on our part that allowed him to break out.”
Wren nods, absent-minded, and closes his eyes, then exhales slowly.
"I think you need to rest now. When you feel better, do you think you could answer a few questions? Lieutenant Johnson needs to make a report."
"Sure," he says, not quite processing her words, overcome with exhaustion. "No problem."
When she leaves him alone, he falls asleep again, but despite his newfound freedom his sleep is nowhere near as peaceful as before.
-=-
He doesn't wake up on SV-240, in Daniel's bed, expected to go downstairs, eat breakfast, accept kisses, accept everything else. He doesn't wake up bound and gagged, hearing the familiar sickeningly affectionate voice. He wakes up on his rescuers' ship, and Daniel is gone.
He smiles to himself despite everything, and when he looks to the side, he sees the medic examining Golubev's wound. Golubev himself is awake, sitting up, and when he notices that Wren has woken up, his eyes go wide and he looks away. The medic looks back over her shoulder and smiles.
"Feeling better?" she asks.
Wren takes a deep breath. Is he feeling better? The pain under his ribs has been reduced to slight stinging, but his mind is still filled with dense fog, and everything feels unreal.
"I think so," he replies after all.
"I'm sorry," Golubev blurts out, shooting a brief glance at Wren before averting his gaze, clearly unable to look him in the eye. "It was my fault he broke out, I was stupid, and you- I've heard about what you had to do, I'm so, so sorry, lieutenant-"
"Private," the medic gives him a gentle reprimand that makes him fall silent.
"It's okay," Wren says, forcing himself to smile. "Really. No need to apologize, private."
It feels weird to address someone by their rank again. It feels weird to do anything here, on this ship, anything other than being with Daniel. And it feels weird to so readily comfort Golubev after what Wren went through, the nightmare and the threat of it all happening again, having to listen to Daniel's words and fight down his brainwashing, then taking his life.
Deep down he wants to blow up. He wants to say something else. He wants to scream at him for making him go through this all over again, but he doesn't.
He's young. He made a mistake. And in the end, Wren prevailed.
Golubev smiles with uncertainty, and the medic pats him on the shoulder and nods in the direction of the door. He gives Wren one last apologetic look and leaves the medbay.
"Okay," the medic says, sitting down by Wren's pod again. "You can sit up if you need to, just be careful."
He does, wincing at the stinging of the wound when his body shifts, but he's aware it's as far from the worst pain he's felt in his life as possible. He still feels slightly weak, but he manages to straighten his back, then looks down just to make sure he's not bleeding anymore.
"Thanks," he says, "for saving my life again. Would be pretty stupid if I had just… bled out after all that."
"It was a close call, but we're all glad you're alive. And now nothing like this will happen ever again."
"Good." He hesitates for a moment. "So… what did you do with him- with his body?"
"Cryo," she replies. "Then… his family will decide what to do next."
"Family?" What a stupid question, he realizes as soon as he asks. "He still has a family on Earth… And-" he swallows "-now they'll mourn him all over again."
"Try not to think about it, okay? He hurt you and tried to kidnap you again. There was no easy solution."
"Mhm," he mutters, but still looks away, digging his fingers into the soft padding of the pod, guilt tearing its way into his heart. Not once did he stop to think that the monster had a family. It felt irrelevant, it didn't matter on SV-240; nothing did. They were isolated from everything else, from other people, from civilization. There were only the two of them there, and there were only the two of them in the shuttle.
"Do you think you're ready to answer some questions now?" The medic asks quietly, and he nods before he can think it through. She turns on her communicator and types something, presumably a message to Johnson. "Well, I haven't introduced myself yet, so - I'm doctor Terese Vitkus."
"Wren," he says with a barely-there smile, and she laughs, taking out a digital notepad and scrolling through it.
The door to the medbay opens and Johnson enters; they smile at Wren and pull another stool closer to join the two of them, holding a notepad of their own.
"I'm glad you're feeling better now, Wren," they say. "So, tell us at any point if you don't want to talk about this anymore."
"Okay." Talk about this. About what he went through. They'll know. His heart starts beating faster.
"Do you know why you were targeted?"
"It was…" he starts, and his heart skips a beat when he hears the familiar voice.
"It's not only about revenge, you know."
"For revenge. On my father- that is, general Rackham."
"Why?"
The mission. There was a mission involved, wasn't there? He searches within his memory, but can't find anything - especially when the only clear memory is that of Daniel calling him his pretty thing.
"I don't know," he mutters. "He just- he thought it was funny, to buy- buy," he repeats and can't help but laugh bitterly at the absurdity of that word, "Rackham's son."
Johnson nods and writes it down. Wren makes a mental note to ask to see the report later, just to see how they handled wording his absurd tale.
"Do you want to talk about what was happening while you were there?"
"He was torturing me," Wren says quickly, then pauses, because there was so much more, but he can't tell them about it, can he? But with this vague statement, torture, they won't take him seriously, and so he continues, speaking faster than he can think. "You know, burning, cutting with a knife-"
Bloody knife under his chin, Daniel saying sweet nothings that he can't hear.
"Whipping, um, beating-"
"I love you too."
"Drowning, and-"
Hands on his body- Kisses pressed to burning skin- Thread pulled taut, keeping his mouth shut- Affection, pain, tears, "I love you," "I love you, Wren," "I love you too."
"And that's… it, I think," he almost whispers.
It's so little when there was so much more, but he can't tell them about everything else, about the relationship, about him becoming Daniel's partner against his will, because what good would that do? It would sound so… stupid, said out loud.
"Okay." Johnson swallows and writes everything down, their hand visibly shaking.
Wren's fingers hurt from how hard he's digging them into the padding - but, as he realizes, it's just one hand, because he had unconsciously lifted his right hand to run his fingertips over his lips, making sure there's nothing there. There never will be again. He shakes his head and lowers his hand, and he can only hope he won't be asked about the habit he has long forgotten about and Daniel never commented on.
"There's something that I wanted to ask you about," doctor Vitkus chimes in, carefully weighing her words. "It's okay if you don't want to talk about it, but… What is that… scar on your back?"
Of course. His throat goes dry and he shudders.
"A brand," he says, fighting through the painful lump in his throat. "He… made it ages ago, with burning hot metal. A month after I was taken there." He closes his eyes for a moment, and he can see it clearly, every individual burned letter. "Property of Daniel Rooney." Vitkus' and Johnson's eyes are full of horror when he finally looks at them, and he dares to ask the question he already knows the answer to, but still irrationally hopes for a different one. "Can it… be healed?"
Vitkus presses her lips into a thin line.
"I… examined it," she says, "but it's been too long. There's no way to remove it entirely. I'm sorry."
It's like a punch to the gut, even though he's always known that - or at least since he lost all hope of escaping soon after he was branded. He nods, trying to stay composed, but before he knows it there's a knot in his stomach and tears in his eyes; the weight of everything he can’t tell his rescuers, the persistent voice in his head, the permanent brand on his back, are crushing him. He shakes his head, frowning with fury, but he can’t stop the tears.
“Sorry,” he mutters, turning his face away, lowering his head, and he has to wipe the tears away before they fall on his shirt. He feels Vitkus’ and Johnson’s eyes on him, they’re seeing him like this, in this pathetic broken state, and to them it must seem like he's overreacting, because he didn't tell them the whole truth about everything Daniel had done to make him like this. "I'm sorry."
"You don't need to apologize," Johnson says, reaching towards him, but hesitating, remembering the way he flinched when they tried that before. "This is… completely unprofessional on my part, but… would you like a hug?"
Wren snorts through tears, but then nods, because there's nothing he wants more at that moment. When Johnson hugs him, it finally becomes easier to accept that he's been saved, that his nightmare is over, that these people, his rescuers, are real, palpable.
And yet there's a shadow in his mind and heart, and there is another layer to the hug that Johnson doesn't know about - it's from someone other than Daniel, it's truly comforting, and he can't say that out loud; he can't talk about so many things that happened to him on SV-240, the crucial ones, the ones that almost broke him.
Somehow, even surrounded by people who aren't going to hurt or abandon him, he has never felt more alienated.
~~~
Next
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