Caleb stood at the bed rail.
His brother had closed his eyes again. Not the coma sleep of the last two years. Real sleep. Tired sleep. A person finally allowed to stop holding everything up by himself. The monitors beside the bed showed the brain harmonic dropping out of the three-line pattern and into a normal sleep cycle.
The room was very quiet.
Caleb's left hand was on the bed rail. His right hand was in his coat pocket, around the folded gown. The fabric was still warm. He had not pulled it out to look at it. He didn't need to.
Soma had been gone for nine minutes.
In nine minutes, his comm had said nothing. The Hacker had stayed silent. Iharu, Hiro, Kikaru. Silent. The squad knew he was sitting with his brother and the squad was leaving him alone for it.
Caleb had not asked them to leave him alone for it. They had decided.
He let himself notice that.
[Hacker: Tali is twelve floors down.]
"Okay."
