Running back, he kneeled beside the two men. Tearing open the packet around the syringe, he filled it as far as it would go, and…stabbed it into Foxx’s chest where his heart would be, because Foxx was more important. Also…he’d be damned if he was going to stabhisvampire with a used needle.
Pressing the plunger, once it was fully empty, he pulled it out, refilled it, and injected Doc next.
Setting it aside once it was empty again, Harlow sat back and watched…waiting. Not that there was much to see. Foxx’s eyes were scrunched closed, the man grimacing in pain.
The longer he waited, the more his pulse beat away in his throat. Part of him wanted to demand his brat to open his eyes, so he could see if it was working. To see if the odd brown color was reversing…
Was this it…? Was he going to lose Foxx to this…? To whatever the fuck this thing was…
No…he couldn’t… Harlow swallowed, doing his best to push back what could only be rising panic.
But then…Foxx’s eyes slowly cracked open, and Harlow’s shoulders sagged on noticing the brown was gone. His gazeflicked over to Doc, and the vampire’s eyes were still only slightly cracked, but the brown that had dominated the whites of Doc’s eyes had started to recede, white slowly reappearing.
A few minutes more passed, and Foxx’s breathing returned to normal, the man no longer squinting or looked to be in pain.
“What the hell, Doc?!” Foxx hissed, glaring at the other vampire.
The doctor rolled his eyes—eyes that were very close to being normal again. “It’s fine, we’ll survive. Just relock the front…” The vampire frowned. “Wait…how did you get in?”
Foxx smiled sweetly. “I broke the lock.”
“You…” Glaring at Foxx, the man stretched with a groan, rubbing at his eyes. He used the wall to stand up, his gaze flicking down to Harlow. “Well, that’s new.”
Helping Foxx up, he stood. “Yeah, yeah, dhampir. The council knows, we solved our differences. Now, like Foxx asked, what the hell was that?!”
The man rubbed at his eyes again. “Well, I…was being careful, keeping people out of my lab…and then…I slipped.”
“You slipped?!” Foxx croaked, sounding bewildered.
“You worked on the counteragent fast, it seems. Unless whatever fucking got Foxx is some other poison you decided to cook up.” Eyeing the doctor, Harlow frowned as he noted the man had some serious bags under his eyes.
“How could that be the poison?! Those people were likely infected for hours before it made them collapse and go insane.”
Doc cleared his throat. “I’m afraid the reaction was so fast because of how concentrated the amount was. I’m guessing they didn’t release a whole vial’s worth in a small airtight room.” The vampire yawned before eyeing Foxx, the man’s eyes going shiny. Foxx’s eyes did the same seconds later, both of them just staring at each other.
“You two are looking at each other’s threads, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” they both replied.
“Nothing…is tearing apart,” Foxx mused. “But it looks like it was progressing a hell of a lot faster than it had been in those vampires… Luckily, what has been torn is weaving back together.”
Doc’s eyes returned to normal and he nodded. “Yours are obviously not as progressive as mine. But what damage was done is reversing.”
No longer feelinglike his insides were being torn to shreds, or that someone had shoved a lightbulb powered by a thousand suns into his eyes, Foxx closely examined Doc. Mainly the huge bloody bags under the man’s eyes. “You slipped, huh?”
Doc cleared his throat. “YES, I slipped.”
“What exactly did your daily schedule look like before you ‘slipped’?” Foxx asked sweetly.
The vampire glared, crossing his arms as he let out a deep sigh. “I may have canceled all of my appointments, and put off sleep for a while.”
“Which is why you fucking slipped! You know we can’t function without fucking sleep, right?! You, as a doctor, should know that!”
“Well, I probably would have become one of those lost vampires from the other day if you hadn’t come, so feel free to be smug about that, you bloody lowland British fuck!”
“Highland Scottish bastard,” Foxx hissed.
“Okay…” Harlow said slowly. The man was eyeing them both. “I feel as if I shouldn’t get in the middle of this, but also, I reallydon’t fucking care. We did come here for a reason, other than to save your ass.”
