Chapter Text
Despite the calm and dark, despite the soft blankets and the first semblance of safety since everything had gone to hell, sleep would not come.
It wasn’t that Virgil wasn’t exhausted, but the exhaustion came accompanied with a wired tension running from his scrapes to his bones. The feeling that the day hadn’t ended persisted.
Virgil rubbed his eyes and sat up, allowing the short blanket to fall from his torso. He wrung his hands-- a habit adopted from Patton-- before rubbing his casts. The blankets slipped to the floor. Virgil sighed and reclined back again.
It’s safe, Virgil reminded himself, although the effort proved useless; he knew any such mantra wouldn’t distract him from the awful truth, one that had been growing on him since the others left: his presence on the ship put both Patton and his friends in danger; his absence in the ring could condemn the other human, who would be forced to fight his battles. No, his own safety was not the issue.
In open space, who could say the ring leaders wouldn’t pursue the ship? Who could say if they wouldn’t draw other smugglers? It certainly seemed more likely than not. Virgil supposed that he should ask Logan if they were prepared for that, although his voice of reason informed him that such a small transport ship could never stand against fighters.
Virgil’s arms hit the ceiling as they stretched with a dull thunk -- another testament to how out-of-place he was. A giant in Space.
Logan’s footsteps had been pattering down the echoic hallways for hours now, oftentimes accompanied by Roman’s heavy pace and the clank of what was presumably medical equipment, although Patton had left with a gentle “goodnight” into a nearby bedroom some hours ago.
Informing two aliens, one a stranger and another who would toss him out the airlock given half a chance, that he, the Deathworlder, might be bait for a fleet of raiders and smugglers did not seem wise.
The right-minded course of action for anyone with half a sense of self-preservation would be to not mention the truth that could kill them instantly-- to wait or commadere the ship for his own escape; to use the ship’s resources to get as far as he could, then ditch the crew.
But it would hurt Patton. Virgil sat on the thought for a painfully long moment, then slid off the bed. Even knowing a human was dangerous in space.
For his lack of functioning limbs and a cracked shoulder, the trip to the door-- a half-minute’s walk away-- turned into five minutes of butt-scooching and some pained crab-walking.
Panting by the doorframe, Virgil parked himself against the wall, limbs throbbing… perhaps he’d overestimated himself.
The original plan had been to search around until he found Logan (hopefully avoiding Roman), but now, he doubted he could even get back in bed.
His eyes shut in a paltry effort to shift his focus from the pain. Deep breaths.
“What are you doing out?”
Roman growled, fully armored and armed with something horribly similar to electric prods, and for a moment, Virgil mistook him for a guard.
“What are y-”
“I need to speak with Logan. It’s important.” Virgil interrupted squeakly, ignoring his own rudeness. “Please move that away,” he said through gritted teeth, gesturing at the weapon.
“Why? So you can attack us?” Roman sneered, waving the prod closer.
“No, just please move it away.” Shifting, Virgil unconsciously pressed a recovering burn mark against the wall. Memories of cruel guards flashed in place of Roman-- electric spears and shock collars.
Roman pointed. “Aha! It hasn’t even been a full night and you’re already moving to attack.”
Virgil’s jaw tightened and he compressed another flinch as the prod waved menacingly in his face.
“Roman, stop.”
Faced with Logan’s disproportionately grotesque features, Virgil really did flinch that time. Hard. Then cursed.
“Shit, sorry.” Virgil looked up to see Logan had drawn back too, although he had been much quicker to compose himself.
Roman’s cloven feet scraped the metal floors as he shuffled to conspicuously place himself between the other two.
“Virgil, are you okay?”
“Yup, sorry, just surprised.”
“Surprised or attacking?” Roman flattened his ears in what Virgil read as suspicion.
His flat teeth grinding exasperatedly, Logan responded before Virgil could: “Roman, stop. Virgil, did you need something?”
“Er,” Virgil eyed the prod, now pointed away from him, “Yes, I need to speak with you. It’s important.”
“Of course, what...” a pause. “How did you get out here? Have your limbs healed already?” He scratched the scales around his blowhole.
“No, they’re still broken. Um… I… shuffled?” Virgil pursed his lips.
“Of course,” Logan continued, ignoring Roman’s increasingly confused gaze. “Er, I presume you meant now?”
“Hey!” Roman interjected, not fond of being ignored. “Explain yourself! What do you mean by ‘shuffled?’”
“Let’s listen to what Virgil has to tell us first.” Logan inclined his head patiently.
“No, let’s not.” Roman clipped back.
Virgil twisted uncomfortably in the shadow of the doorframe and in an instant, Logan and Roman were a foot farther away. The clinical yellow lighting hit Virgil in the movement and he jerked. Logan and Roman did the same, Roman’s more pronounced than Logan’s.
A beat fell heavily, then, “Virgil, please continue.” Logan rubbed his hands.
Roman stayed quiet this time.
By the time his stuttering, uncomposed excuse for an explanation drew to an end, Patton still hadn’t woken. For all his half-panicked rambling, he’d said it as plainly as possible: there was another human. He was being tortured. He’d probably be forced to take Virgil’s job-- cage fighting to the death. No, Roman, he’d never wanted to fight and neither did this human. Hence, they had to save him . It would have made Virgil nervous if he didn’t feel that way already.
“We need to go back,” Virgil summarized.
“No.” Roman slapped his tail for emphasis, hunching his shoulders. “We are absolutely not going back to that- that prison for a human of all things.”
Logan leaned his long body against Roman’s stout leg, and it seemed to have a grounding effect on both of them. Likewise, Virgil pressed his palms to the impersonal metal floor-- something solid in the void of space.
“Although I agree with Roman’s conclusion,” Logan began, “I say so because there’s next to no chance of us successfully completing a search and rescue mission with our current resources. However,” he continued, cutting off Roman’s proud look, “we can appeal to the counsel and involve galactic authorities.”
Virgil looked up. “Absolutely, let’s do that. I didn’t know there were space-police, otherwise I wouldn’t have asked that we go back-- wouldn’t want to bring Patton back for the rest of his life.”
The hope in his voice must have been too much because Logan averted his eyes, almost subdued.
“That would seem to be the safest option, but taking that route presents its own unique obstacles: a free-roaming human in the galactic empire with full sapient rights is unheard of. Speaking technically, by harboring you we are either holding contraband, smuggling, or both. While bringing you before the council would undoubtedly draw attention to your friend, it will undoubtedly bring you under extreme scrutiny.” Logan’s face pinched. “Having said that, it wouldn’t be unheard of for a dangerous species to gain sapience rights after proving their goodwill and control, both of which you definitely have.”
Biting his lip, Virgil thought.
“What happens if they take me in?”
Captivity would happen if the council decided they didn’t want a Big Bad Deathworlder roaming their galaxy-- possibly the okay-ish kind of captivity in a cushy reservation, but possibly the kind as a test subject, Roman had told him with an unbothered voice and content face.
It was almost as unsettling as Logan’s answer-- that he didn’t know. No human had ever been taken in by the council, that Virgil was an unprecedented case.
Did he have the strength to walk back into another cell? For a stranger? Even for Patton?
Even if they somehow pulled this off, would he just be dragging the other human with him to a legal torture and imprisonment?
Virgil slapped a hand over his face, groaning.
Something tapped at the door. He’d long since made it back to his bed. “Virgil? Everything alright? Can I come in?”
“Hi Pat. Yeah.”
The door creaked open and not a moment later Patton was at the side of the bed, struggling to clamber on, and Virgil remembered his flight feathers had been clipped. He lowered his arm, letting Patton step up on it.
Once curled at his side, Patton spoke. “Logan told me what’s going on.”
Virgil felt his lips pull taut.
“I think we should see the council.”
“Logan thought we should too.”
Patton huffed. “He’s always been the smart one of the group.”
Virgil didn’t answer. The silence between them grew-- not uncomfortably-- with time as he searched for the right answer. If there even was a right answer, it didn’t seem easy to find.
“Did Roman tell you the council might hold me in captivity?”
Patton’s face pinched. “I won’t let them.”
“Could you stop them?”
“No,” a pause, “but they’re obliged to give you sapient rights if you can prove your sentience and goodwill before a court. Besides, I’m not letting them take my family… and you’re a baby.”
“I am not a baby,” Virgil retorted weakly. “I’m 15.”
Patton trilled, amused. “You’re not even an adult by human standards-- a toddler by Amygdam ones. You’re a baby. As such, the council has to give you minor protection.”
“They’re not going to like a human.”
“We´ll make them. Victim blaming is heavily monitored by the federation.”
“As if humans can be victims.”
“We’ll sue the galaxy!” Patton chirped, grinning.
They both laughed gently in place of the threatening uncertainty. Then, Silence.
“Would the federation experiment on us?” The question came out without thought, and he still wasn’t sure he wanted the answer.
Patton hummed with the ship’s rattling-- something else unstable in his life. Virgil breathed deeply, and the urge to take back his question swelled.
“I doubt it. This type of thing is more up Logan’s ally, but at most I think you’d be placed in a sanctuary or wiped and returned to earth.” Patton’s mane flared at the end, not in the cheery way. “They won’t experiment on you though-- not if we prove you’re sapient.”
Virgil frowned, unwilling to argue something to his benefit, no matter how skeptical he was. There wasn’t much else to say between the two of them. Silence stretched again.
The shimmering coat of feathers of his closest friend pressed into his arm. Virgil grinned in wonder, glimmering primaries had started to poke through, like flowers from dirt, and although small, they already threw reflections onto the arched walls and fine sheets, painting them in proof of his healing. Patton moved closer, and the reflected light followed, now casting itself along Virgil’s skin, hands, hair, so that they both glowed.
The ship rattled, making the newborn feathers shake and the glowing lights dance across the beams in harmony. Patton warbled, letting Virgil know he was content.
“Your feathers are beautiful,” Virgil whispered a minute later, not sure if Patton was awake.
He wasn’t, and Virgil didn’t speak again, at peace with his friend by his side and the sounds of his friend’s family chatting, teasing, moving in the background, despite the choice to come and all possible outcomes.