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“You’re an idiot, you know that?” Ellory, to her credit, had at least waited until she had made sure that Seven was actually okay before laying into her.
“You know, you’re actually not the first person to tell me that,” Seven said dryly. “But in my defense I did manage to successfully navigate the ship through an asteroid field while you put the fire out, and I really feel like I’m not getting an appropriate amount of recognition for that.”
“And almost irreparably damaged your hands in the process. Let me take a look.” Ellory grabbed Seven by the sleeve of her knit sweater, which appeared to have partially fused to her skin, and winced. The skin on her hands was reddened and raw, with blisters that had formed and popped all along her palms. “That’s… gruesome.”
“I’ll be fine,” Seven said, though Ellory could hear the tension in her voice now, the concerted effort to not sound like she was in as much pain as she was. “But could you maybe do the dermal regenerating? I’d use my good hand except I don’t have one right now.”
“Like I said. An idiot.” Still, Ellory grabbed the dermal regenerator, a pair of scissors, and some tweezers. She knelt down on the ground in front of the chair where Seven was sitting. “I’m going to have to cut this off you. You’re not going to enjoy it.”
Seven shrugged. “Better a live idiot than a dead genius.”
Once she had sliced the knit sleeve of Seven’s sweater, Ellory began meticulously plucking stray fibers out, only stopping for a moment when Seven hissed in pain. “I know, sorry. It’ll be worse if I don’t.”
“I know.”
It was silent for a long time after that, save for Seven’s stifled hisses as each bit of fabric was plucked away, and Ellory’s sympathetic hums in response. Eventually, Ellory switched the tweezers out for the dermal regenerator, and gestured to Seven to hold her hands out.
“I never said you weren’t,” she said, allowing the low hum of the dermal regenerator to fill the silence between them.
“That I’m not what?” Seven asked, sighing in relief as her skin started to reform itself.
“A genius,” Ellory said, like it was obvious. “You’re both. An idiot and a genius.”
“And alive either way.”
Ellory rolled her eyes, turning the dermal regenerator off and setting it aside. “Yeah, yeah. My hero.”
Seven flexed her fingers and shook her hands experimentally, as though testing to make sure the dermal regenerator had really done it’s job, before cupping Ellory’s cheek and leaning down to give her a kiss. “That’s right."