Choices
an excerpt

“Morgan,” he said softly and reached out with his now clean free hand, touching her shoulder. “Hey, look at me.”
She forced her gaze up, biting her lip. “What?” she asked, trying to sound short, not sure she wanted to hear what was coming next.
“I’m sorry I ever got you into this.” He shook his head slightly. “It wasn’t right of me to conceal my past.”
“Everyone’s got something they hide, Russ, you’re not alone.”
Russ took a deep breath and now did rub his eyes. “Still, I-”
“Shut up, Russell.”
He blinked, surprised at the real sharpness to her tone now. “Morgan…”
“Shut up, okay? Gods’ Breath, Russ, it is not your fault. None of this is your fault. Chris would have been fucked up whether he knew you or not. You didn’t do this to him and you didn’t kill Matt. None of is your fault and if you start in on it one more time, I will punch you.” His jaw dropped and she snorted. “Okay, when I tell you, I need you to put the fresh dressing on your shoulder when I tell you too.” She sighed, inspecting the damage to try and see how badly he had hurt it further in jumping Chris. “Why did you jump him?”
“You’re not seriously asking me that question, are you?”
Morgan shook her head. “No. Did you notice that he was limping? One of his got him pretty good at least.”
“I can’t believe you jumped him. What if he’d done the same thing as last time?”
“I’m not a child, Russ,” she said, looking up at him again and bristling. “I know what I’m doing. He probably would have killed you too if I hadn’t stepped in. And I’ve lost one friend today, I’m not losing another, understand?”
“That wasn’t a doubting question,” he said with a small smile. “Not really, at least. I’m allowed to worry, aren’t I? Or does that qualify as blaming myself?” he asked and Morgan could hear a bit of the Russ from before Chris stabbing Matt seeping through.
She managed to return the smile, cleaning up the last of the leaked blood as she did. “No, that’s allowed. No one can stop worrying just because they’re told to. I can’t stop you blaming yourself either, but that at least is easier to yell at you about,” she said with a shrug. Very carefully, Morgan peeled back the saturated binding and peered critically at Russ’s shoulder wound. It wasn’t as bad as she’d thought, and he hadn’t opened it as widely as she’d feared either. “Can I…?” she asked, gesturing with the cloth to the wound.
Russ nodded and she could see him tightening his jaw, eyes closing as she dabbed gently at it. He twitched but didn’t make a sound until she stopped and he glanced down, taking it in for himself. “Might lose a bit of motion in my arm from this,” Russ said, frowning.
“If you keep attempting to punch Chris in the face with it, I can almost guarantee you will and I don’t know all that much about healing.”
“There’s something very satisfying about punching Chris in the face, though,” he replied as he held a new dressing over the wound so she could tie it off.
“Use your other hand,” she informed him dryly.
“What’s the fun in that?”
Morgan knew he was making an effort to be positive and she smiled. “It’ll save you from being in pain for the rest of your life?”
“Way to spoil the fun, Morgan,” he muttered. She felt her smile widen despite herself as she tied the cloth off tightly.
“Is there anything else I need to fix?”
“No, just bruises. I would have had him if he hadn’t managed to catch me in the shoulder,” he said, sounding frustrated.
“How did he catch you anyway?”
“Used his cronies. We started to fight, I started to win as usual, and his men jumped me. That’s when he stabbed me.”
“Yeah, well, he seems to like the defenseless ones,” Morgan agreed sourly before gesturing towards the bowls of cooling stew. “Eat it before it gets cold,” she said before shifting around so she was leaning against the wall next to him, resting her head back against the wonderfully cool stone.
“Going to follow your own advice?”
“I’m not hungry,” she said flatly without opening her eyes.
“Morgan, eat. That’s an order.”
She frowned, sitting up again to glare at him slightly. “What if I refuse?”
“Colin will write you up for insubordination to a superior officer.” She stared him for a minute and then started laughing. It began as a giggle but she soon found herself holding her stomach as she laughed. Russ blinked before the ridiculousness of his statement, all things considered, sunk in and he grinned, chuckling. “Okay, so maybe that wasn’t the best response, considering. But seriously, you didn’t eat last time he fed you either. I saw the full bowls. You need to keep your strength up as much as I do. Matt,” he paused, taking a breath, before pushing on, “said you’d lost a lot of blood. And head wounds are just as dangerous, if not more so, then regular wounds.”
She rolled her eyes, reaching over and picking up the bowl. “If it’ll shut you up, fine,” Morgan agreed.
He grinned briefly, expression shadowed but not as much as before. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” she replied automatically and stared down at the stew, wondering why life sometimes forced people to have to get past horrible things just to survive. It didn’t seem fair to Matt that they were already laughing and smiling, but there wasn’t much else they could do. Not if they wanted to manage to make it out of here with their sanity still in tact. She sighed and Russ nudged her gently.
"Eat," he ordered.