Washed Away

Bass's "smile"

You woke with bandages covering your stomach. You lay on your bed, your cut up shirt replaced with a tank top. You breathed a little heavily, your abdomen still stinging, you tried sitting up, but immediately gravity returned you to the bed. You could hardly move. Your hand traveled to the bandages wrapped around your abdomen. The slightest amount of pressure from your hand caused you to cry out.

Someone hurried to your side. You hadn't even been aware of their presence in your room. You looked up at them and waited for your eyes to get it together and adjust.

It was Quick Man, without all of his armor. It was hard for you to recognize him. He now looked like a normal human, despite you could still hear the slight whirrings of fans inside him. He wore a red long sleeve shirt, and some jeans that were a little too big. His blonde hair had been pulled back into a ponytail. Beside him stood bubble Man and Bass. Bass looked rather nervous now.

"Don't move, you need to stay still." Quick said. You gave a small nod, and tried to speak, but it wasn't much but a mumbled mess. Quick carefully lifted your head a bit, and raised a glass of water to your lips. This felt extremely embarrassing.

Honestly, you were getting tired of these robots having to take care of you. You were tired of passing out and waking in different places, and tired of being a damn damsel in distress.

But there was nothing you could do to change this for now.

You were stuck in bed.

Once you had drank enough water, Quick laid you back down and set the glass on the bedside table.
"How are you feeling?"

You took a breath. "Awful." You weren't going to lie, and part of you resented Bass for stepping out of the way. It was much easier to fix a robot than it is to fix a human. But that thought was probably selfish of you, you shouldn't wish bad on someone else in favor of your own well being. And either way, none of this would have happened if you had never traveled into Snake Man's room.

Quick Man gave you a look of pity. Bass stepped forward and said your name to get your attention. "I'm very sorry. I.. should have protected you."
He had his helmet off. To your surprise, this robot had messy brown hair, only on one side of his head. The other side had been stylishly shaved down to look sort of punk, you assumed.

You wondered if that was Wily's doing or if it was Bass's.

You decided it was probably Bass's.

"It's okay." You said quietly. You suddenly felt a little bad for your short period of resenting him.

"It must have been rough." Bubble said. "I heard Wily didn't have anything to put you to sleep with."

Bass punched him in the arm, causing Bubble to yell out. "Don't talk about that, idiot! She doesn't want to hear about that!"

Bass was right. The sudden mention of the event brought the painful memories back to your mind. Your eyes couldn't help but well up with tears, your hands shook slightly. That burning pain within you... You never wanted to experience anything like it ever again. Never in your life. You'd never wish that upon anyone.

Part of you thought that perhaps you were over-exaggerating.. Of course people had felt worse pain than what you experienced. You decided it would be best to push the thoughts of the pain out of your mind and focus more on the fact that you were alive. You blinked away your tears and took a deep breath.

Yeah. You were alive and breathing. That's what was important. You weren't dead, you survived the ordeal. In fact, you had survived a lot since that boat. You weren't going to let this get you down.

You broke yourself out of your train of thought to respond to the three robots in front of you.

"It's okay. Let's not talk about it, Bass is right. But.." You looked up at Quick Man. "How long will it take me to heal up from this?" You tried easing yourself into sitting up, but only a moment after that did you realize that was not going to be possible. It sent pain streaming throughout your abdomen, and you decided once more that you would just stay still.

"It's going to be a while.." He scratched the back of his head. You wondered why he was the only one out of his armor. Bass did have his helmet off, but the rest of his armor was still here.

"For now, I just want you to focus on resting, okay?" Quick gave you a reassuring smile, and you could kind of tell Bubble Man was smelling through his helmet. Bass noticed this, and made a feeble attempt to recreate such a genuine smile. In the end, he just looked rather creepy. You laughed a little at his attempt, earning you a glare from him.

You looked at Quick Man. He genuinely looked concerned. So did Bubble Man. And Bass, well, kind of. 

Part of you rejected this feeling, but.. your insides felt all fuzzy and warm. These robots genuinely cared for you. It was sweet. They were so kind to you, mainly Bubble Man and Quick Man. Bass was kind to you that one time. But, you weren't going to forget him shoving you against the wall and threatening you. That wasn't something you forgot easily.

But knowing these robots were here and caring for you made you feel a little safer.  And the part of you that rejected this feeling rejected it hard. The same robots that were caring for you were the same robots that had caused you to need to be cared for. Bass is the one who got you shot. Quick wouldn't let you leave your room. As for Bubble, well. He is just Bubble Man. Hasn't done all too much wrong.

The fact remained the same, the same robots taking care of you are the same robots that are keeping you here. The same robots who won't let you go home.

Home.. You missed home.