Senseless

For Him

Christopher-

After staying at Jade's for a little over an hour and keeping an eye on Jake after the single-worded conversation between him and Jana, Christopher finally slid back into his car. Unfortunately, he wasn't going to be able to return home yet. He'd gotten a text five minutes before he'd planned to leave from Domino, asking him to return and check on Jana. He wouldn't explain much, but Chris had a feeling that him or Jana would need a bit of stitching-up.

When he parked outside of the apartment, he could already see a light coming from the open door. As he walked up, Tera greeted him at the door, tail wagging slowly with a cautious look in her eyes. Before Chris could try to move past her, she darted back into the apartment and disappeared beyond the hallway.

Follow the dog, then.

Christopher shut the door first, then calmly headed in the direction of the far bedroom. When he ducked into the hall, he noticed Tera hurry out of sight, likely toward the bed. Squaring his shoulders, Chris followed, stepping into the room. To his surprise, the room wasn't in terrible shape. He'd expected at least a struggle, possibly some blood splatters and what not. The only thing that seemed out of place was the crack in the dresser to the left and one of the comforters from the bed mostly having fallen off onto the floor.

"Hey guys," he said, announcing his presence since Domino wasn't facing him and Jana had his eyes closed as he lay on the bed.

There were dark red marks circling his throat and upper left arm, but nothing appeared to be broken or causing him visible pain. The look on Jana's face seemed surprisingly peaceful as his eyes slowly opened. The previous dilation was completely gone, leaving behind his normal ocean blue irises.

"Hello, Jana. How are you feeling?" He asked as he took one step forward and set his medical bag on the floor.

He expected Jana's eyes to narrow as they did, and when the man didn't reply, Chris looked over to where Domino stood.

"I had to hurt him to get him to calm down. It's mostly just going to be bad bruising, but I did punch him initially, to keep him from easily being able to run out the door. Can you check his torso?" Domino said, his eyes wandering over toward Jana as he finished speaking.

Christopher could actually see regret in them, but he wasn't going to comment about it. The two of them had enough issues without him trying to be a shrink. Well, a second shrink. "Alright," he noted as he picked his bag back up and walked over, setting it down near the bed.

"Jana?"

It was just the man's name, but Chris knew that often asking a sexual abuse victim to remove an article of clothing could cause an easy trigger to psychosis, so he refrained from putting forth that question and instead just added the inflection to the man's name as he spoke.

At first, Jana didn't seem interested in cooperating, and Christopher sure as hell wasn't going to try and force him, but after several quiet seconds, he slowly pushed himself up into a sitting position. Chris watched silently, noting a few winces as the man got himself situated against the headboard. Another minute passed before he hesitantly lifted up the left side of his shirt to reveal a darkening, medium sized circle on his lower left side.

Instead of reaching for the injury right away, Christopher got on his knees, then looked up to meet Jana's cautious eyes. "Can I check your injury for just a moment?" He asked, not looking away even as Jana narrowed his eyes on him.

"Yes."

When Jana's response finally came, Christopher didn't hesitate. He gently pressed against the man's damaged skin, glancing up at him every few seconds to check his expression for pain or aggression. After about twenty seconds Chris sat back on his heels and pulled out a small tube of cream from his bag, then offered it to Jana.