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'Mm.'

He reaches out, for Jim's hand, and squeezes it gently before he curls up on the bed. It's thank you and sorry at once.

'Stay here?'

He exhales. He's already standing by the time Kyle talks, but he stops, and nods once. Then he just slides down beside the bed, his back against it. Sitting on the floor. He's at that state of being too tired to sleep, and too manic to do anything but sit and vibrate. He wants to go out and get drunk, but that's probably a monumentally bad idea. So he just tips his head back against the mattress and kicks out one leg in front of him. The other one he draws up and wraps his arm around it.

"Sure."

Kyle plays with the hair around Jim's ear briefly, before he withdraws, and curls up completely. Something about the silence feels belligerent, but he's too tired, and too drunk. (Somewhere out there, he's not suffering.)

'Don't tell John,' he says, before falling asleep.

Less belligerent, more wounded. Jim sits in perfect silence, listening to Kyle's breathing. That makes him think of the cell, too, where breathing was the only noise and it echoed, loud and hollow--

That reminds him about something, and he gets onto his knees and turns to look at Kyle briefly, and then at the ring he's wearing. He's not supposed to sleep with it on. So Jim, frowning, says his own name, and the code he'd chosen, and slides it off.

It's a heavy weight in his hand, and he curls his fingers around with it. So much power in such a small thing. But it can't put planets back together.

He rolls it between his thumb and index finger, and then he reaches out to put it on the nightstand.

He doesn't dream. He's tired enough not to and the wave of joy from spending the night drinking too much means the dark things are at bay, even if he cracked a little, earlier. He's always slept in fits and starts in a strange place, but the bed is warm and the blankets comfortable. He barely moves at all.

Guy sometimes stayed awake next to Kyle when he slept, watching over him, ready to wake him up when he saw the signs of uneasy dreams. Jim's presence hardly measures up in terms of closeness (his brother knew him on such an instinctive level Kyle highly doubted anyone could reach it) but the trust is enough.

When morning comes Kyle wakes quietly, taking a moment to look around, confused. He barely remembers coming here, let alone the conversation that followed, and his instincts almost scream that he's been kidnapped.

Then he spots Jim. 'Hey.' Rubbing his eyes, he looks again. Yes, it's him.

'Morning.' He's cheerful, having slept well.

Jim jerks out of the light doze he'd been in, head tucked down against his chest. "Wh-- morning." His mouth feels like an ashtray, and he rubs at his face to wake himself up.

Kyle coughs. The alcohol is still in his system, and he feels a bit fuzzy, but for the most part, he's much more clear-headed.

'How'd I land up here? I usually sleep in the living room.' Next to the paints, in case he got inspired to do something. He looks around for his ring and slides it on.

"Believe it or not, I carried you." It's teasing, and Jim gets up, heads into his bathroom. Comes back a moment later with a glass of water.

"Do me a favour and drink like four more of these. You were pretty wasted."

He accepts it without complaint. 'Sorry,' he says, sheepishly. 'I'm... usually a lot more careful. I guess I needed the good news.'

A pause, and he looks more worried. 'I didn't say or do anything to you, did I?'

He knows how vicious he can be, when he lacks restraint and forethought. Alcohol was a bad catalyst, but normally he didn't drunk that much, and when he did, the ring purged it so he could concentrate properly.

Jim raises an eyebrow. It's in him, to point out that it was the last time Kyle got drunk that he broke his damn nose, but he lets it go. Everybody gets one free shot, he's not going to hold a grudge about it, though he does wonder where the vitriol came from in the first place.

"I'm pretty sure my ass is asleep from sitting on the floor all night, but that's not your fault."

He hasn't forgotten what happened the last time he'd been this drunk. And Jim had stayed with him, too, which makes him wonder. Maybe the ring recorded it and he can consult it later. Or maybe he's just better off not knowing.

Either way, he just smiles. 'I'll make it up to you. Breakfast?'

"I need a few hours of real sleep." It was selfish, staying here through the entire night. Most of it he spent awake, thinking. Trying to get halfway through some harebrained scheme before his brain jumped rails to the next topic it wanted to dwell on.

He throws himself down across the foot of the bed, drags the blanket up over his head. "Besides, tribbles probably ate everything."

Kyle slides around him and adjusts the blanket so there's more space for Jim to make himself comfortable. 'I'll make it anyway, for when you wake up.'

It's a thank you, of sorts, for sticking by him.

He's about to just give Jim some privacy, before he fiddles with his ring. 'Do you want me to give you dreamless sleep?'

That actually makes him throw the blanket back so he can look at him more seriously. His gut instinct is to say no, half a snarl, but he reins it in. Cocks his head and smiles, just a bit. He's a lot closer to the edge than he'd thought, and he needs some time to himself to just. Relax. Sleep. God, he needs some decent sleep. But not enough to let someone else - even Kyle, whom he trusts - mess with his mind. Which is why he shrugs.

"Sure. How does it work?"

He stretches, moving his newly-healed leg to work out the residual soreness, and sits up. Eyeing the ring. Curious and a little wary, that he can't help.

There's something wrong here, even somebody as dense as he usually thinks he is can sense it. There's a little do you hate me? in the way his head tilts, watching Jim. That was some climb up the stairs if he's that grumpy.

Climbing. Jim couldn't walk, not that easily, not with him on his back-- and Kyle's gaze drops to the leg. His expression changes from worried to horrified.

'Your leg,' he says hoarsely. 'Are you--'

Did someone hold you down? What happened?

"Whoa, hey." Tiredness aside, he scrambles up and off the bed so he can wrap a hand around Kyle's arm. "I'm fine. It got fixed."

He stills, glances down at the leg in question, his throat suddenly dry. Then, he nods.

'May I?' Look at it, check it, to know you're really okay?

Jim sits on the edge of the bed and gestures, go ahead with one hand.

He expected a fight, and he's more than a little surprised when one doesn't happen. Very carefully, he approaches, and kneels, moving his ring hand up and down the leg, scanning it. A construct screen comes up and he studies the diagram. He'll want Sora to look at it too, but Jim has his own doctor now and McCoy can take care of it.

He smiles at Jim, extremely relieved. 'You're good.'

Kyle getting to his knees inspires a way more visceral reaction in him than he'd been expecting, and he grimaces, not even trying to hide it. There's a sort of... subservience in the gesture that just... isn't something he wants or needs to see in Kyle right now. Not after their chat the previous night. He reaches, automatic, for his hand to pull him back to his feet.

"Yeah, I know. She did a good job."

Puzzled, he accepts the gesture and lets Jim pull him to his feet. There's a lot here he's missing and Kyle had a nasty feeling he'd said or done something while drunk that was inspiring this kind of reaction.

'Anyway.' He brings up another screen, showing a generic scan of a human brain, with certain highlighted areas. 'This is how I can affect dreaming.' He means nightmares, that's really the only reason he'd even consider this solution, but it also helped when one needed rest.

Damnit, Kyle, he's a captain, not a neuroscientist! But he studies the scan, and then he nods. "Good enough for me. I only need about four hours." And there's a part of him that's still got its heels dug in because he doesn't want this, he doesn't want other people messing with his head, but he shuts that thought out and grins. "Now when you say dreamless... I don't suppose I could request, say, a beach volleyball match instead? Cute chicks, tiny bikinis...?"

'No can do, Captain, it'll have to be supermodels playing ping-pong.'

He grins back, cheekily, choosing not to remark on what's under the surface. Neither of them want another fight, especially since he's quite sure they don't really hate each other at all.

"Have I told you lately I like the way you think?" Jim's grin goes cocky, and he drapes himself artfully across the bed once more. He can sense the tension, though, and he clears his throat.

"It's nothing you said or did. I'm just dealing with some stuff on my end. Okay?"

His expression softens, to fondness and amusement. 'Okay.' He won't push, if it needs to be discussed, it'll be brought up. If not, he'll just have to live with it.

'Ready?'

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