“What did you do?”
“Illusion,” he says. “Nobody will see the door from the other side.”
“Sit,” he orders.
He doesn’t have to tell me twice. I collapse in the nearest chair, stifling the groan that nearly slips my lips. Ender crouches down beside me and begins to unstrap my vest, the fabric is shorn on the side, cut by the shrapnel. He raises my black t-shirt,staring at the bleeding gash by my ribs. There’s a cut of metal stuck in the wound, and the sight makes me queasy.
Ender finds an old medical kit and cracks it open, rustling around.
“Did you call for backup?”
“Comms link is broken,” he says. “We’ll have to find our own way out.”
“Painkillers,” Ender says, thrusting two blue little pills at me. “Take it.”
I hesitate before I swallow it, dry. Now that the adrenaline has faded, the pain is impossible to ignore. Ender pulls out a tweezer and I scramble back in fear.
“I don’t want thatthinganywhere near me,” I say. “What if I die?”
Ender glances up at me.
“You don’t get to die, Warrick. I forbid it.”
I rack my brain, trying to find a way to buy myself more time. I can’t have that thing next to my shorn flesh. I’ll pass out.
“I used to collect dead bugs,” I blurt. “Mercy used to read, and I wanted to find a hobby of my own.”
Ender frowns. But thankfully, he doesn’t judge me.
“I always eat the cone before I eat the ice cream.”
“How…” Ender begins.
“A bowl and a spoon,” I explain. “I dump it out first.”
“Okay,” he says slowly. “Can I get to work? Silence would be ideal.”
“My favorite part of a man is their forearms,” I say, glancing down at his. He discarded his coat and rolled up the sleeves of his black thermal shirt. I can see the black hair lying flat on his tan skin and the veins racing upwards like train tracks. “It makes me want to lick it, you know? Or bite.”
His brow furrows, and his mouth parts slightly before he swallows.
“Where are you going with this?” he asks hoarsely.
“I cried for two months because Mercy’s breasts came in first, and we were fighting one day, and she said she took all the big-breast genes, and I believed her,” I add. “I was so scared people would be able to tell us apart by our chest, or my lack thereof.”
Ender’s eyes drop down. But my chest seems to remind him of the wound I’m trying desperately to ignore.
“Shut up, Warrick, while I work,” he says. “I don’t have time for this. Brace yourself.”
“Vale, no.” I groan. “Please don’t use that on me. I can tell you some more fun facts. One time I?—”
“These facts aren’t fun; they are just strange and quite disturbing,” he says. “And I need to get this thing out.”
His eyes soften the slightest bit, his mouth unraveling from its scowl.
“How do I make it better?” he asks.
“Maybe you could sing a?—”
