Chapter LVII.

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"Aaron," Miles said, "I'm too scared to go sleep."

In the waking world, there were things to distract himself. There were things to briefly take his mind off the kind of things that were plaguing him. In his dreams, there was no kind of safety barrier. It troubled him.

"You need to rest," Aaron objected, though he sounded lenient.

"My head is full of Ty and I think my nightmares will know that."

Aaron twisted his lips in consideration, not that it was his decision in the end anyway. He looked from Miles to the medical equipment that he had yet to put away. "Are you willing to help me organise what we got from the store?"

"Yes," Miles breathed without question. It was a mystery as to whether he'd be able to keep his eyes open or withstand the pain for long enough to actually perform any kind of efficient work, but he was more ready than ever to try. Without a second thought, he pushed himself to his feet, and almost immediately a stream of curses fell from his mouth. Either the world was spinning or he was, because he felt like he was about to topple over and he hadn't even moved a step forward yet.

Aaron, who seemed desensitised to Miles' vulgar langue, ignored that part of the situation and just moved to immediately support Miles. He felt like he was situated on a violently rocking ship, and each step he took would only make him more likely to lose his balance.

The pills he'd taken moments ago to numb the pain could only go so far.

"Can we organise the stuff on the floor?" Miles asked, though it wasn't really a question.

"Miles, I really think this is a bad idea."

"I do not appreciate your concern," Miles hissed, grabbing Aaron's forearm in his uninjured hand and using it like a railing to grip as he slowly lowered himself to the carpet. Aaron helped, but unwillingly.

"Your stupidity will be the death of you," Aaron remarked, leaving Miles' side for a fraction of a minute to collect the medical equipment he'd just used. He set it down in front of Miles. "This isn't all of it. I'll be right back."

Lia and Eira and Percy were already working on rationing the food, but there were still other supplies that had to be sorted. Aaron just picked up the three unopened backpacks along with the half-unzipped one that contained what he hadn't used of the medical things and carried all of it back to Miles.

Miles had his hands pressed to his temples when Aaron returned, his gaze fixed firmly on the floor, trying to ignore the spinning sensation that had gripped him.

"I feel so unwell," Miles muttered. What he meant was, Everything hurts and I'd like to cry some more, but the word unwell suitably encompassed it all to some degree anyway and had a bonus of concealing the part about wanting to cry.

"Miles," Aaron said with a tone laced in warning, "last chance right now to go lay down and have a proper rest. I don't want to do this with you if it's only going to make your condition worse."

"No, no. I'm... okay." He was typically good at lying, but it didn't sound very believable this time.

Defeatedly, Aaron sat down across from Miles and dumped the four backpacks in the floorspace between them. "First aid is most important to organise, since there's so much of it and if we need it, we'll need it quickly," Aaron explained. "I think we should sort it properly. Into like, bandages, pills... just, the logical categories. Then, when we need just one of those things in a scenario, we don't have to go rummaging through the whole stack to find what we need."

"Whatever you say, doc." Miles shuffled around a bit to find himself a more comfortable position, but when everything hurt, no position was really comfortable.

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