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Since he had taken over, Toby had the guest kitchen to himself. This is where he carefully constructed each meal, almost always in silence, usually by himself. Usually.
As he washed the dishes he’d need for that night’s meal, Xiphos stood by, taking the clean dishes, drying them, and stacking them neatly on the center cooking island. The process repeated: clean, dry, stack, all wordlessly. Xiphos didn’t announce herself when she came in. She started drying the dishes Toby had stacked next to the sink, and when she ran out, she waited patiently for the next, picking up what Toby set down. Catching on to the pattern, Toby just started handing Xiphos what he finished.
Toby opened his mouth to speak, but didn’t quite know what to say. He handed Xiphos another dish, and she put it away. Toby hazarded a glance, finding Xiphos focused on the dishes. She didn’t look when he stopped, just waited. When the sink was almost empty, Billy stuck his head into the kitchen.
“Kitten,” he said, and Xiphos’s ear swiveled to him. She looked back over her shoulder. “Come with me.”
Xiphos dried her hands with the towel and draped the towel over Toby’s shoulder. She slouched after Billy, a couple doors down to the infirmary. Billy patted the paper-covered chair in the middle, and Xiphos dutifully climbed on.
Billy’s infirmary was immaculate, everything tidy, everything exactly where it should have been. Xiphos knew it from rote, having put away, charged, cleaned or restocked every single item in every cabinet, drawer, or decorative canister. But that had been before the Ugliness, back when she was a medic.
Billy turned back to Xiphos, clicked on a little flashlight, and shone it into her eyes. Xiphos squinted and tried to wrench away from Billy.
“No squirming, please,” Billy said, leveling his gaze at Xiphos. “I need to gauge how bad that blow was.”
Xiphos’s ears twitched. “…what she said,” she mumbled under her breath, each word forcing its way out.
“Hush,” Billy said. “Any headaches? Dizziness? Trouble seeing? Hearing a ringing in your ears?”
Xiphos shook her head to all of these.
“Disorientation? Trouble focusing?”
“I’m fine.” Xiphos dropped her eyes away, leaning back on the chair, propping herself up with her arms.
“Hmm…” Billy said. He clicked off the light and tucked it away into his pocket. “It does seem that way. You look like, physically, you’re recovering well.”
“That’s a weird tone,” Xiphos said.
“Yes, well,” Billy said. “You need to talk about it.”
Xiphos started to climb off the chair. Billy stepped in front of her.
“I’m not going to let you bottle things up,” he said.
Xiphos sat back down on Billy’s medical chair, folding her arms over her chest. She squinted at nothing in particular, and then, very slowly, her ears dropped, her hard gaze melting away. She took a deep breath.
“I could have saved her,” Xiphos said. Her jaw trembled, and she held it shut as best she could. “I was right there. I could’ve pulled her away before-” She covered her mouth, closing her eyes to blink back tears. Billy pulled up a rolling chair and sat down across from her. He gently stroked her arm. When Xiphos regained her composure, he said,
“I want to show you something.” He rolled up his sleeve, revealing four names tattooed on his shoulder. The first read, ‘L. Cooper – ’74,’ and then, ‘B. Stonewall – ’77,’ and ‘J. Goodly – ’78′. Xiphos remembered something vaguely about Lat and anti-pirate operations in the Northern Ocean that matched up with those dates. Fighting had been hard, and often brutal. The last name, dark and sharp, the skin around the tattoo still pink from the procedure, read simply ‘Nina – ’97.’
“These are all people I lost personally. Every one of them I failed as a medic and a doctor. I did everything I could to save Nina, but she slipped away before I could save her.”
Xiphos wiped her tears away, still not looking at Billy. “But I could have stopped her.”
“Not with that head injury. You were hit hard, and that hard of an impact robs you of your motor control. There was nothing you could have done.”
“Is this supposed to make me feel better?”
“No,” Billy said. “Or at least, it’s not supposed to make you less sad. But you need to stop blaming yourself. Gumes flipped a coin and Nina happened to be the one to make the catch. It could have been you. It could have been Tobias. It could have been me.”
“I don’t like it.”
“Me neither, kitten.” Billy stroked her ears back, and Xiphos leaned in, resting her head on his shoulder.
“I miss her so much,” Xiphos said. Billy pulled her into an embrace.
“I know, kitten,” he said. “I miss her, too.”
“Does this mean we’re not going to look for the Travelers anymore?”
“Oh, no,” Billy said. “We will find them. And if it were up to me, I’d murder them on the spot. I think Cait would object to that.”
Xiphos made an entirely disinterested noise. Billy squeezed Xiphos, and then separated. He rubbed her arms. “We’ll make sure she didn’t die in vain.”
Xiphos only nodded.
“I don’t know if Cait said so, but you performed well when you had to.”
Another nod.
“Let me know if you start feeling anything weird. I’ll need to treat it as soon as possible.”
The cat nodded, and slid off the medical chair, and went back to the dishes. She found Toby almost where she had left him. He stared down at the sink, his eyes on his work, but he couldn’t hide the dark matted fur on his cheeks. He handed Xiphos a dish, and she wiped it dry.
“I shouldn’t have been there,” he said, barely audible over the din of the water. “If I hadn’t been there, you wouldn’t have been there,” Toby said.
Xiphos eyed Toby carefully, watching as, eyes down, he handed her another dish. She took it and dried it.
“It’s not your fault,” she said.
[g]
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