Days – a week past until she was fully healthy again, Mar'i was back to being semi-normal now. However, her mind was still slightly garbled from hitting her head so hard. The wind was hitting her face as she walked down the street towards one of the posh breakfast restaurants. She was meeting her sister, Sindi, and Arrow there for some breakfast. Her sister had called early last night, scaring Mar'i half to death when she had jolted awake from the annoying ringtone her phone blared.

     Sindella was very vague and only told her that she had to meet them at this restaurant and at a specific. The place was like expected, packed with people, most of them being adults in business attire likely stopping in for breakfast on their way to work. The little place reminded her of the family-run cafes in London. She missed London dearly and hoped that she would go back in the near future.

     Her fiancé managed to convince her last night that they could have their wedding here in Gotham and head back home to their cozy townhouse in London. She used her tall height to her advantage and looked around over the tops of peoples head for her sister and her secret girlfriend. Truthfully Mar'i had no idea if her sister had told their parents yet that she and Arrow were together. She locked eyes with her sister who stood up from the booth they were seated at and waved her over.

     The model brushed past a few people and made her way through the packed place to the booth. She slid into the empty space and almost knocked over the cup of tea with her elbow in the process. "This for me?" she asked motioning with her hand to the steaming cup of tea on her side of the table. Sindella nodded and took a sip of her personal sized carton of chocolate milk. Arrow was seated at Sindi's left size looking through the small laminated menu.

     She reached out and picked up the smooth china cup and brought the gold rim to her lips. She blew lightly, steam being pushed away as she cooled her tea down. Mar'i took a sip feeling the sweet warm liquid travel down her throat. "I know how you like it so you don't have to add any sugar or anything." Sindella said aloud, leaning over Arrow to take a glance at the menu. The place had a lot to offer food wise.

     It was often that Sindella came out to breakfast so the teenager was intrigued by all the mouth-watering dishes that past by their table. She finally sat up straight and folded both hands in her lap and said, "We need your help, well your friend Damian's help." Sindella coughed and looked away awkwardly. The oldest of the latter placed her teacup gently on the table and leaned back in the booth, arms crossed and an eyebrow arched quizzically. "That's quite the bold move there Sindi." She commented with a smirk before leaning forwards.

     This boldness came from one of their two parents; she couldn't quite decipher which one. Mar'i couldn't fathom what her sister could possibly need from Damian Wayne of all people. Nonetheless, it had her intrigued. "What do you need his help with?" she asked, picking her teacup up again and taking a sip. Arrow twisted uncomfortably in her seat, not once had she looked up from her menu since Mar'i had arrived. "I just need to ask him some questions." Sindella said rather quickly.

     It was unusual for her to speak in such quick choppy sentences. Mar'i also could see right through her little sister, she was never a great liar. "What do you really need from him Sindi?" Mar'i asked.

Sindella sighed. "Look, when you got hurt I was worried so I went to the hospital to visit you. Mar'i you were hooked up to all of those machines and I was so scared – I thought you were going to die. He was there and we talked and he said that if I ever needed to talk or just vent he'd listen." She admitted.

"You have me for that, you know that right?" Mar'i asked.

     Her sister nodded and looked down at her hands as she picked at her nails. The young woman never thought what her family and friends must've felt while she was in the hospital. She was unconscious for a long duration of her hospital excursion, what her family and a friend felt wasn't the first thing on her mind when she woke up. "It's stupid, I shouldn't have asked you in the first place." she shook her head and began to stand up from her seat at the booth.

     Mar'i's reflexes were sharp, reaching across the table and grabbing her sister by her wrist. The woman's grip was like a vice around the girl's thin wrist. "I don't think it's stupid, I've confided in him before too. He's trustworthy that Wayne although I hate to admit it." She said with a short laugh at the end. The youngest Wayne was many things and trustworthy was definitely one of him. He had a knack for keeping secrets. "I just wanted to thank him, I guess, for being there and listening to my pointless rambling." Sindella explained.

     There was a flash of images that crossed Mar'i's mind as she thought back to that night she and Damian shared on that building roof. Of course, they were both arrested soon after that but nonetheless, it was still a good memory. The two of them were both confiding in each other last night, talking about really anything that came to mind. It was nice to have someone listen to you. "Well, I do know where the guy lives. We can pop in and visit him after breakfast." She smiled.

"Doesn't he work?" Arrow asked, finally piping up.

"Don't worry, I'm ninety-percent sure he's at home." She smirked.

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     Damian was home, currently seated in a slowly expanding pool of his own blood. God, he was so stupid. He closed his eyes and clutched his side tightly to try and slow the bleeding. The last thing he needed was to die but calling the cops would prove a problem. He'd much rather bleed out then enlist the help of Dick Grayson and his rat-like officers. They listened to the Commissioners every word and much like rats they were easy to keep in line.

     One wrong move and they would be deader than a mouse caught in a trap. He cursed under his breath when he heard a knock at the front door. Damian stayed quiet hoping the person outside would leave. No one ever really visited him so who could it possibly be? Perhaps it was the mailman or a girl scout; whomever the person was proved to be persistent because they kept knocking for what felt like hours to him. "Damian I know you're inside, open up." The feminine voice called from behind the door.

     If his day couldn't get any worse now he had to deal with the nosiest person he's ever met. She knocked a few more times and he cursed under his breath a few more times in Arabic. Reluctantly, and painfully, he pushed himself up with his free arm and stumbled towards the doorway. He looked through the peephole to see if she was actually there and he wasn't just hallucinating.

     Truly Damian thought he was cursed because the woman outside his door also had two teenage girls as her entourage. He groaned feeling a sharp pain in his side as he opened the door a crack. "Good morning sleepyhead!" she smiled throwing her hands into the air and fluttering her fingers dramatically. He gave her a tight smile and took a quick glance down at the crimson colour spreading across his white button-up shirt.

     Mar'i Grayson was brilliant and her joyful expression quickly shifted to that of concern. He usually wasn't a very friendly human being but even this was a little, awkward for him. "Are you okay, you seem kind of pale." She said; worry glossing over her peculiar green eyes. Damian nodded, the young man needed to get rid of her. He tried to stay as still as possible to avoid any unnecessary pain. He suddenly hissed, nose scrunching up and eyes squeezing closed.

     The young woman took one glance at his face and immediately knew something was wrong. "Are you sure –"

"I'm busy, you need to leave." He growled.

     As he went to shut the door the young woman used both hands and pushed it open. She was pretty strong and in his condition, he didn't have much of an option but to let her – them in at this point. All emotion seemed to drain from her face as well as the colour as she looked him up and down. The apartment around him was in tatters, looked like a fight had gone down. "Oh my god." She gasped and raised her hand to cover her mouth.

     There had been plenty of times where she had seen blood in her life, she used to get bullied mercilessly before her parents sent her to that all girls boarding school. The blood wasn't the problem, the problem was the fact that the place was destroyed and her friend looked as if he were about to roll over and die. "What happened?" her voice was louder and harsher than she meant it to sound.

     As she approached him, fast with long strides, she reached out to see how bad the wound was. Before her hand could even get close he had swatted her away like an annoying pest. "Damian, what happened?" she asked, softer this time. The young man turned his head and looked away from her pleading eyes. It would've been better if she hadn't shown up at all. She looked back at the dark-haired teenager behind her, Damian recognized her.

     She was Mar'i's sister. They had had a chat a few days ago when the model was in the hospital. The two teenagers looked stunned, deer in the headlights more than anything. "Sindella call an ambulance." Mar'i said hurriedly reaching into her pocket and pulling out her cell phone. As soon as he heard anything about paramedics he snapped. "Do not call an ambulance." He growled grabbing a hold of her wrist.

The two of them locked eyes. "Damian you need an ambulance, we need to get you to the hospital."

     His grip on her wrist tightened holding her hand in place. The last thing he was going to let her do was phone an ambulance. Damian's palms were sweaty and his skin glistened underneath the hanging light fixture. "Okay, okay no ambulance but at least let me help you." She sighed and pulled her arm out of his grip and slipped her phone back into her pocket. He snorted, there was no way in hell this supermodel knew anything about treating injuries. Sindella and Arrow lingered watching the two adults interact with one another.

     Mar'i stepped forward and wrapped one arm around his waist helping him to the nearby couch. It was one of the only pieces of furniture that weren't overturned or destroyed. He hissed when his body bent for him to take a seat. The young woman kneeled down on the floor in front of him and cautiously reached forward removing his hand from his side. There was blood gushing out and a cut in the fabric of his shirt. "Damian how in the hell do you get stabbed in your own apartment?" she asked aloud, turning her head took look at her sister.

     The teenager seemed to be rooted in place like an old tree in the middle of a forest. "There's a first aid kit in the washroom down the hall." He said pointing in the general direction of the hallway.

"Sindella go get it. Arrow I need you to get a cloth and a bucket or large container of warm water." She instructed.

     They lingered in place for a moment, batting their eyes before racing off to their assigned tasks. Mar'i heard Damian snort from above her, her eyes narrowed and she returned her gaze to the young man before her. "You're an ass you know? If I didn't care so much I'd leave you to bleed out." She said shaking her head. He was a pain to be around especially when he was bleeding everywhere.

     He seemed to act even worse when he was injured. Damian smirked his typical Wayne-esque cocky smirk. Sindella and Arrow came back with the things Mar'i asked them to get placing them on the floor next to the young woman. "You two sit down and if I need anything you need to get it right away okay?" Mar'i said looking up at her sister. Sindella gulped and nodded grabbing her girlfriends hand and pulling her with her to the nearby sofa.

     Damian was in pain and Mar'i fiddling with the buttons of his dress shirt to get it undone was making it worse. Her fingers glided across his stomach over the scarred skin. Mar'i stared at him; well she was really staring at his torso which was littered with scars. Her lips parted as if she were about to speak, last second she changed her mind and instead dampened the cloth in the warm water. She rang it out, squeezing the excess water from it and bringing it to the area around the wound.

     There wasn't much to work with and with the little time they had she was on a time crunch. She cleared the blood, as much as she could, that was smeared around the wound. "Damian you need stitches." She said, raising her gaze to look up at him. The fact that he was so adamant about not going to a hospital still eluded her. You would think after being stabbed he would want professionals to fix him up. "In the kit." He mumbled, lazily pointing to the kit on the floor.

     She opened the small kit and examined the array of medical supplies inside. Mar'i knew how to suture a wound. During her time attending the English boarding school, she learned many things. Originally she wanted to be a doctor at one point in time so she took a first aid course. They taught the basics as well as how to suture a wound for survival purposes. She never thought she would actually be using these skills.

     Her eyes glanced over the kit and picked up the bottle of the sterilizer. An infection would be a pain in the ass to deal with; cleaning it now was the safest bet. She poured some on a separate cloth and twisted her body back to face Damian. He was quiet, suppressing the pain on the inside. "Damian I'm cleaning it but just remember that it's going to hurt, like a lot." He nodded.

"Just do it already." He grumbled watching her sit there idly.

     The next thing he felt was fire. It was like flames flaring and travelling around the area of the wound. He hissed and jerked away from her causing blood to spill out even more from the gash. Mar'i tried another few times resulting in him violently jerking away whenever it touched the gash. "Now you're pissing me off." She growled glaring up at him. Instead of trying again, she knew she would receive the same result; she climbed up and straddled his lap.

     It would be slightly more difficult for him to jerk away with her weighing his lower body down. She raised her left arm and placed her forearm against his neck pushing his head away so he couldn't see what she was doing. "I apologize that I'm the one pissing you off Grayson but I'm the one stabbed!" he snapped. She rolled her eyes and ignored him pressing the cloth with the sterilizer against the wound.

     She felt his muscles tense and she could see his hands balled into tight fists, so tight his knuckles were stark white. Damian let out a long breath and a string of curses. Mar'i worked as fast as she could and finished the whole sterilization bit in a few minutes. Her hands were beginning to shake, fingers covered in blood – his blood. She hastily put the cloth down and picked up the medical thread and suture. Her hands were trembling as the weight of the situation was finally dawning on her.

     The wound itself clearly hadn't hit any vital organs but she had no idea how long he had been bleeding out before she arrived and began helping, for all she knew he could die today. He was looking sickly pale and his body was drenched in sweat. Sindi and Arrow were dead silent, eyes glued to the scene playing out in front of them. The girl believed in her older sibling, she could fix him no problem.

     Her eyes focused on the head of the small needle as she tried to push the thick thread through the small hole. If she couldn't stitch him up then he was as good as dead. The gash was too deep and needed to be held together, he would continuously bleed out otherwise. "This isn't going to be fun either." She told him when she finally managed to thread the needle. She looked back at the wound and quickly dabbed away some excess blood with the cloth.

     Damian hissed when he felt a brief burning sensation travel through the open wound like it was an electric shock. He never remembered the sterilizer hurting so badly. Then again the last time he had to stitch himself up and use the sterilizer was a few months ago. Suturing a wound together was quite different from sewing fabric. Skin was definitely thicker than fabric and required more force to push the needle through.

     There was also all the blood and the spastic moving surface from the patient moving around. Before she did anything she placed either hand on the side of his face and positioned his head so he would look at her. "You have to promise me you won't move." She whispered.

"Kind of...hard." He whispered between heavy breaths.

     Her hands slid down his neck, fingers dancing down his torso towards the wound. The young man would definitely be delighted by these feather-light touches if he weren't bleeding to death. He was actually feeling quite faint, blinking a few times slowly to try and make the dark spots in his vision go away. Damian was focused on keeping himself awake, his head swaying ever so slightly. He could smell her hair, water lily, and fresh rain. His breathing was heavy and slow, he craved air.

     A weight fell on her shoulder causing her body to freeze. She was mid-stitch, thread pulled through the skin and needle in her hand waiting to be pushed back through. "Shit," she gently placed the needle down and raised her hands back to his face, "- Damian wake up. Damian." She breathed out, pressing her lips to his forehead.

"Wake up." She whispered against his skin. 

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A/N: I hope you all enjoyed this chapter! As of when I'm posting this I'm preparing for a cooking competition so updates will be delayed until next week when it's finished. Anyways, I would love to hear what you all thought about this chapter. 

Skycrystal23 ;)