#the sleeping gown just makes casey look even taller than he already is

[koskela-knights]

OT3 Sleepy Attires

[tb5-heavenward]

artwork by the fantastically talented @birdologist and animation by the lodestar of my heart, the inimitable @awkwardarbor

hey go read this. That is the thing that I didn’t do, but @thelastswallow did, on account of she is an excellent and wonderful friend, and a writer with a far better grasp of just how to handle Scotty.

Anyway, on we go! Coming up on 20k. RIDICULOUS.

a_moment_of_dawn

You can find Heavenward on Tumblr // Ao3 // ff.net

a_moment_of_dawn - part 11

Jeff sits at John's bedside, next to his mother and across from his eldest son.

It had taken four hours to cut the hardware out of John's chest. Blood and tissue cultures tell the presence of infection in his heart. Scar tissue built up around the cardiac leads has been carefully excised, and the device itself was removed without undue complication. Cut out of him and deactivated, it can do no further harm, and while the damage already done is serious, it's not irreversible. John's young, and despite everything he's been through, still relatively healthy. His doctors are confident that with appropriate treatment, care, and rest, he'll eventually make a full recovery.

His son's been started on a course of antibiotics now, and is fresh out of the recovery room, where he'd been vague and frightened and in enough pain and distress to merit further medication. So now he sleeps, and looks like he deserves nothing less, with his eyes shadowed and his chest neatly bandaged, white edges peeking out beneath a pale blue hospital gown. If it's not quite peace, John's at least quiet, and the monitor tracking his vitals pulses the soft, consistent sound of a heart finally settled, and slowly mending, if still a long way from mended.

His mother sits upright, forward at the edge of her chair, with her hands enclosing one of John's. Occasionally something compels her to reach up and brush her fingers through his hair; to stroke his cheek or touch his shoulder, though in the course of each gesture, one of her hands keeps a hold of his. It's not hard to imagine she's reluctant to let him go. If Jeff feels the same compulsion for contact, he also doesn't feel like his touch would be welcome, or that he deserves to take any comfort of his own from the warmth of his son's hand, the persistent reassurance of his pulse. He's no small part of the reason John's in this state to begin with, and knows it.

So it's good that his mother has John in hand, so to speak. The depth of strength in the woman is awe-inspiring, and with what she'd lost restored to her, she possesses a quality of serenity that fortifies the entire room. She'd been the one to send Virgil and Alan away, into Zurich to check into a hotel room. The both of them had been fraught and exhausted, and prohibited from crowding into the small, private room their brother's been assigned. They'll be back in the morning, and will take over for her and Scott, looking after their brother.

Scott had flatly refused to be sent anywhere, though Jeff can't tell if it's John's company he doesn't want to be out of, or his own. There's no reason it wouldn't be both. He can't seem to muster his grandmother's patience, restiveness runs all through him. Allowed to bend hospital rules a bit to stay with his brother, he can't seem to settle. He stands as often as he sits, paces the room, checks his comms by force of habit, though hospital policy has these deactivated. Occasionally he flits back to John's side to peer at him, or to reach down to touch his other hand, fingertips against an upturned palm, as though checking to be sure that John's still real, still there.

Scott's still in uniform. Blue is emphatically his colour, and the silver that slashes across his chest picks up the same threads of salt-and-pepper at his temples—a gross injustice at thirty-one, even if a little bit of grey seems to suit him, gives him a certain air of dignity. Standing, Scott's taller than his father, the same as John is, and even edges John out by an inch or so. But there's something about the way Scott carries himself that has him standing stronger, straighter than ever. He makes his brother look so young, so fragile by comparison. When Scott leans over the bedside, Jeff gets a glimpse of the same protectiveness he should be able to feel himself.

And yet when he looks at John, he can't seem to summon up anything but guilt. There's a part of him that's intensely relieved by the fact that he won't be able to be here much longer, and likely won't be present when his son wakes up. There's too much that needs to be done, he has obligations elsewhere. If John were in worse shape it might be different, but he's steadily improving, going to be fine, and has the rest of the family here to look after him. Jeff can feel better about leaving than he does about staying. There's so much to do. So much is about to change.

Kyrano is on his way from New York, with a personally selected handful of Tracy Industries' upper echelons—lawyers and board members and extra security, to say nothing of a whole phalanx of the PR department, all herded onto a chartered flight and due to arrive in about four hours. It's not that Jeff Tracy's return was expected, per se, but TI is the sort of company that has contingencies for its contingencies. There'd been a plan in place for Jeff Tracy's death or disappearance. There's a framework in place for his return.

Jeff Tracy's story will break with the news by morning, in early versions. The current cycle is already devoted almost entirely to the inexplicable loss of nearly thousand assorted satellites, the collective armament of low-earth orbit, all falling from the heavens and burning up in atmo. The WWSA are scrambling to project debris patterns and to issue advisories around the event, to anyone and everyone operating in low earth orbit. Various world governments are clamoring for an explanation. The GDF have released statements in response, and various high ranking members know exactly what's going on, seven years after the idea was initially proposed. Colonel Casey remains IR's liaison to the GDF and has been briefed and will probably arrive within the hour. Lord Hugh Creighton-Ward has similarly been contacted and, as has always been his intent, is preparing the release of documents and data relevant to project Heavenward, and Jefferson's Tracy's role in its orchestration and execution.

Isolated, away from all this, Jeff sits beside his mother and across from his eldest, at the foot of his second son's bedside. He watches the monitor with John's vitals instead of watching his son directly. It seems easier. His mother's attention is entirely occupied by her grandson, but Scott keeps glancing in his direction, hopeful, quietly expectant, but not yet presumptuous enough to break the silence in the room. For his part, Jeff hopes that Scott doesn't notice just how carefully he avoids even looking at John.

There's a bottle of water on the floor by his feet and he reaches down for it. Unscrews the cap, drains about half of it in one go, and heaves a sigh before clearing his throat. This gets Scott's attention immediately and he drops into the chair on the other side of the bed, attentive. His mother takes a moment longer, adjusting her grip on John's fingers and then shifting in her chair, to reach out and put her other hand gently on Jeff's knee, a comforting little pat and a soft smile.

He takes a deep breath and looks up, glancing between Scott and his mother, before his gaze finally settles on John, and stays there. He's told this story once already, not really all that long ago, because he'd told it to John. And maybe it's fitting that John's here, even if he's not awake or aware enough to hear it again. It was a story without an ending, the first time around, but the beginning is the same.

It's intensely selfish even to think it, but it would be easier to tell this story if his son were elsewhere.

But there's nowhere else his mother and his eldest want to be, and Jeff's time and availability are about to become severely limited. He'll be called away, sooner than later, to deal with the aftermath of his son's loss, EOS' sacrifice and the success of his own grand, vainglorious master plan. It's here or nowhere; now or never. If he doesn't take this chance, then Scott and Grandma Tracy will hear what he needs to tell them from someone else.

God forbid they hear it from John.

So.

He begins abruptly, without any preamble, "After the war, I was involved with a GDF project, under the code name 'Heavenward'."