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 Posted: Sun Apr 10, 2011 10:52 am
Ladon woke up late. Very late. While days of sleeping might have worked out, he was hungry again and also, with a bit of energy, wanted to get a bath. It was a welcomed sight to see that Billy hadn't gone, and waking him, he told him he was taking a bath and that, after, Billy should do the same. Helped along, Billy started a bath while Ladon ate another soft, easy meal of bread and broth, a Roadinger specialty, and once done, took a fresh set of clothes and took a bath. Door closed, it was the one time that Ladon demanded privacy and to not constantly see Billy somewhere in his line of sight.
It was because he knew it would be painful. The hot water cleaned, but it also stung, burning against sores and popping a blister. With his only good hand, he used a bar of soap and worked on cleaning himself, getting off grim and blood (some his own and some from others), and loose pieces of torn flesh. In the end, he only managed to get a bit of dead skin off, but looked vastly better. The tub drained and while he knew he'd need a few baths to get all the grim away, felt far more human now.
In fresh clothes, he settled on the futon couch, taking a fresh blanket from their room and tossing all the dirty sheets to the floor, and curled up on the couch as he waited for Billy to get washed - despite the boy's protesting that he'd just wait.
It was then that he got a call and found out, in a short conversation, that Alkaid would be over to help fix him up a bit. Considering he had exhausted his first aid kit that it was in no way prepared to handle the damages he had, he nodded and told her the address.
When Billy stepped out, he set the phone down. "Alkaid is coming over ..for some first aid." He wrapped the blanket around him as he sat up, looking at his mangled hand in his lap.
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Posted: Sun Apr 10, 2011 11:06 am
Billy was just stepping out of the bathroom, rubbing at his wet hair with a towel, and in just his pants which, considering he only had the clothes the had been wearing before, had been quickly Febreezed to death. His shirt which had gotten a similar treatment lay draped on the back of the couch. Satisfied with his hair being dry, Billy began putting on his shirt. He smelled like a walking bottle of Febreeze. Thank goodness he liked the smell...
Still, he couldn't complain too much. He was the one that refused to run home and get clean clothes, and hadn't showered properly in the past weeks. The poor bath tub drain was probably gagging by now with their collaborative efforts.
When Ladon said that Alkaid was coming, and why, Billy was somewhat glad. Ladon would get the care he needed. That was good! BIlly sat down beside him and leaned his head back. He moved his own hand to rest lightly over Ladon's broken one.
"That's good," he then looked over at him lazily, and with the faintest of smiles, "She better be good."
It was a sort of threat, in a way. Alkaid had better know what she was doing, and do it well. If Billy could have gotten a hold of the best of the best in care for Ladon, he would have. But circumstances dictated they they not reach outside for help. And Billy didn't really have the money. It was...frustrating.
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Posted: Sun Apr 10, 2011 5:54 pm
Kaia had taken on the role of medic almost as soon as she'd joined the negaverse. In an army full of teenagers, people with knowledge past basic first aid were hard to come by. Luckily, Kaia had both the patience and the time to learn and deal with such things. The only unfortunate thing about the entire situation was how it affected Kaia. She often put off her own injuries and problems to deal with those of others, especially when it was expected of her.
As she was walking down the sidewalk towards the address she had scribbled on a spare slip of paper, it was clear that she was doing so now. There were dark circles beneath her amber eyes from a lack of sleep and violent black and purple bruises dotted her arms and legs in a stark contrast against her pale skin. Her steps were a little rigid, suggesting that she was either in pain or at least had stiff muscles after such an exhausting, long night.
She stopped outside the gate of an apartment complex, looked down at the paper in her hand, and then walked through. It took only a few minutes of wandering around until she found the right apartment number and then she was there, standing outside of Wolframite's door.
She had covered most of her own body up with a sweater dress and leggings to avoid a hundred questions about her various injuries. At her side was a large, unassuming messenger bag pack to the brim with medical supplies she had stocked up on from the negaverse subspace.
She was as prepared as she was ever going to be and truthfully, she was too tired to be nervous. So, without any pause, she reached up and knocked on the door of the apartment - and for good measure, she made sure she called out as well.
"Ladon? It's Kaia!"
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Posted: Sun Apr 10, 2011 7:28 pm
He wondered if he would be missing fingers or if his whole hand was useless, and while a hospital visit was out of the question, he at least hoped he wasn't going to be missing a hand. Leaning back, he moved the blanket around him more and leaned on Billy, content and close to ready to just going for another nap. Sleeping was the only thing on his agenda for the week, and he had been doing a good job so far. Then again, he could feel himself feeling guilty with all his resting and wanting to do something and be useful.
About to sleep, he heard a knock and then his name, and he sat up, looking out from across the living room to the door. "COMING!" He called out, and started to cough. Ugh. His throat was still dry. Dropping the blanket, he moved up slowly, touching the wall as he moved himself over to the door and started to work the locks with one hand....and failed.
"Uh...Just a moment." He called to Kaia behind the door, before looking back at Billy. "Can you open this?" He asked, not able to undo all the locks with one hand.
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Posted: Sun Apr 10, 2011 7:33 pm
Automatic kneejerk reaction? Get up and get the door before Ladon so he didn't have to get up. Conflicting kneejerk reaction? Run and get him some water.
Since Ladon had managed to get up before he could, he did the second, and was returning with the glass of water as Ladon asked for help with the locks.
"I've got it," He said quietly. The locks were then undone, and he opened the door.
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Posted: Sun Apr 10, 2011 7:39 pm
Stepping aside, Ladon took the newly refilled glass and stepped back, taking a sip as Billy undid all the locks and opened the door. Kaia was standing there, her features looking tired, but overall rather well. At least comfortable in her warm dress. Seeing as he had only seen death and mangled faces for two weeks, Kaia looked rather gorgeous, and he stepped back to let her have room to step in. He noticed the large bag she was holding and didn't want her to fight to get in. "Hello Kaia. Sorry about the door. Can't really..do much with this hand." To which he just slightly lifted his other hand, it's fingers broken and the tips discolored. Two fingernails were also missing, haven fallen off days ago.
Noticing his hand, he slipped it behind him and headed past the kitchen and to the living room so that they could all sit and get comfortable. "Here. There's more room here. The apartment is pretty small." He said, thinking about the task ahead. He was a mess and didn't think it would be a great joy for Kaia to start looking at all the damage and destroyed flesh he had. Taking a bath and riding himself of a layer of grim let him see his discolored flesh, burns, and blisters. His nose was broken too from several punches to the face and probably needed reset.
Setting his glass on the coffee table, he sat on the couch where his blanket was.
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Posted: Sun Apr 10, 2011 9:36 pm
Kaia waited patiently as she heard movement in the apartment beyond, her eager attitude quelled by the answer she heard from behind the door. It did begin to take considerably more time than she expected, however, and just when she was about to knock again and call out with a more worried tone, the door swung open.
Only it was quite who she expected it to be. Ladon was there, standing to the side, but this boy was unfamiliar to her. Given that he was obviously here taking care of the teenager, she had to assume he was a negaverse soldier - but which? Glamor was sometimes more of a pain than it was a help.
"That looks bad," she said softly at the sight of his hand, all greetings forgotten because of it. Still, there was a job to be done and lingering outside of the apartment wasn't going to do it. She moved quickly through the door and followed him into the living room as the bulky bag bobbed at her side, shaking with her movements. Once Ladon showed her through to the area she assumed she'd be working, she set it down. The deep sigh from her lips and the way she flexed her shoulder suggested that it was probably extremely heavy - maybe more than injured Kaia should have been doing on her own.
She took a seat on the couch near him, but not within his personal space, and pulled the bag towards her. Looking at him, she really had no idea where to begin - she had no training in helping torture patients recover. She let her gaze slide over the injuries she could see in silence, despite the fact that it was probably uncomfortable for Ladon and maybe a little rude. It was just really important that she understand the extent of his injuries.
"Alright, let's just get down to business. Looking at you, I probably should have been here sooner." She held out her hand between them, palm up, and leveled her amber gaze on him. "Let me see your hand, please? I think, from the looks of it, that might be the worst. Unless you have something hidden under your clothes."
While she waited for him to comply, she threw a glance to the pale-haired boy that lingered in the room with them. "Can you look through my bag while I do this and dig out one of the white boxes, please? They should both be in the main section, but near the bottom." There was no reason she couldn't put the boy to work helping, especially if he was already here to take care of Ladon.
Then she glanced back at Ladon, expectantly, her hand still extended and waiting.
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Posted: Mon Apr 11, 2011 10:40 am
If not for the cicumstances and certain people involved, Billy might have been inclined not to obey the simple order, although it was polite enough in its own right. That was just how Billy was, though. So remarkably enough, he complied with out a word, and then resumed being a lingering prescence, setting on the arm of the couch nearest Ladon.
He probably should have taken this opportunity to go do something, and leave Ladon in her care. It would have probably made for a more comfortable atmosphere, at least. There was a little voice in the back of his mind that said 'you should trust family.' After all, the Negaverse was like a family. However trust was going to be a long time coming. Not until things were back the way they were before. It was obvious now that Billy didn't deal well with upheaval or massive changes.
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Posted: Mon Apr 11, 2011 10:47 am
Ladon sat, staying statue still and holding his breath a few times as Kaia looked him over, trying not to move so she could continue looking about. It was weird being surveyed, but he took her judgment as if she was a professional doctor. As far as the Negaverse went, she was at least someone who knew their way around a first aid kit. Usually he would get by with sewing up his own wounds and doing the bandaging, but he was more or less useless at this point. His left hand, while not his best, didn’t help him do anything at all, and he often forgot before he tried moving it and curling in pain.
When she asked for it, he lifted it up, somewhat repulsed by his own hand, and set it down. Despite washing it, the fingernails were discolored, the tips an odd blackish-blue, and he couldn’t really feel anything in them. Two were set at odd angles. “Sailor Gunn broke them.” He said, to explain what had happened. “Snapped them back.” If that helped any. He didn’t look at Billy when he said this. His injuries with Gunn had been because the senshi wanted to find Bismuthite. He didn’t have the heart to tell the other Captain that he sustained injuries because of him but would warn him later that the senshi were after him.
“I only have bruises and a few cuts. It’s…mainly the hand…and the burn.” The bruises littering his body like massive continents would go away on their own. The cuts he had, some clawed and some from small blades, were not deep enough to need anything other than patches of bandages and a lot of peroxide. He just..hadn’t yet. Thick scabs had taken care of most of them though if he moved too much, they tended to leak. Seeing as Ladon was private, Billy had not seen most of the damage that wasn't otherwise visible when he was fully dressed.
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Posted: Mon Apr 11, 2011 6:45 pm
Kaia's expression was one of complete seriousness, but her hands were gentle as she maneuvered Ladon's hand to get a good look at all the various things that were wrong with it. She nodded as he explained what had happened - she could tell they were broken, even if she didn't have a doctor's tools to figure out exactly how.
The name he spoke sent one sudden, but brief, flash of anger over her otherwise calm face. She didn't know her personally, but that was one more name on her mental list of 'senshi that needed a good lesson'.
She laid his hand down on the couch then, carefully, and reached out to grab the box that Billy had dug out for her while she was examining Ladon. It looked like a small care package when she finally open it and began to pull out various pill bottles and tubes. She set each one out and then put the box aside temporarily to level her gaze on Billy.
"Thank you for getting this for me, but I need you to pay attention to this as much as he does since I assume you'll be around to help take care of him." It wasn't that she didn't trust Ladon to remember all the bits of information on his own, but she was very well aware that he might feel more miserable before he felt better. Truly miserable people had a way of forgetting things.
"These two bottles," she picked up the two pill bottles she had pulled out of the box, "are from a stash I found at headquarters. One is mild painkiller and the other is a fairly generic antibiotic." She set them back down, closer to Ladon so he could see. "Even if you don't want the pain pill, please take that antibiotic twice a day. Your body is going to be working overtime to fight infections in every open injury you have - especially that burn." Then she reached out to pick up the two tubes she had taken out, holding each of those up in turn. "One is a burn salve and the other is a numbing cream. Again, you can choose not to use the numbing cream, but this salve will help your burn heal faster." She set those down near him too, in case he wanted to look them over, but as soon as she had done so, she leaned over and started to dig through her bag.
"As you for your hand, those fingernails should grow back on their own." When she sat up again, she was holding finger splints - two long metal objects with a layer of blue padding on the inside - a roll of bandage, and medical tape. "I don't have the means to x-ray those, the best I can do is try to straighten them out and immobilize them so you don't do anymore damage." Except, she was frowning. It was a frown that was half worry and half frustration and all of it was directed at Ladon's mangled hand.
"The blackness is troubling though, Ladon." She reached out and picked up his hand again, delicately. Her free hand hovered near his finger tips, but she didn't quite touch them. "It tells me the circulation is blocked off, probably by broken bone, and it might be that we can fix that. But if it doesn't start to get better.." She stopped then and looked up at Ladon, as serious as she possibly could. "If it's too late, there may be nothing we can do. You can't bring dead tissue back to life." She didn't want to outright tell him he might very well lose those fingers, not after everything, but she didn't want to give him false hope either.
It wasn't fair that he should still have to deal with the consequences of the BMC, but Kaia couldn't change time.
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Posted: Mon Apr 11, 2011 8:06 pm
Gunn. It was hard not to hear the sharp clack as his jaw tightened, and then the grinding that followed. All the guilt he felt for the abductions came flooding back, casting dark clouds over those pink eyes. He blamed himself. He blamed himself for it all.
Before he could dwell on it too long, Kaia was asking him to pay attention. And so he did. Once the medicines and salves were dealt with, matters turned to Ladon's hand. Billy knew re-breaking and setting those fingers was going to be painful for Ladon. Hell, painful enough to just watch and he wished it'd get done and over with so he could stop holding his breath. As the possibility of losing fingers was brought up, Billy again tightened his jaw. It...it was a real possibility. Too real. How much did Ladon have to lose? An eye - which Billy hadn't really known about until the rescue. That pure black eye was kind of a dead give-away, though - and now possibly fingers?
A hand went gently on Ladon's less injured shoulder in a motion meant to reassure the boy that fingers or no he'd be there. And Billy wasn't really the sentimental type, but after all this? He could afford some show of true care.
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Posted: Mon Apr 11, 2011 11:48 pm
Ladon wasn’t one for drugs, but even he could admit that after a rest and a bath, the pain would get worse before it got better. It had been worse, and any moron who said you got used to it or became numb to it was a right idiot in his mind. It was still fresh, still constant, and while he barely moved, his entire body was stiff for the desire not to move a single nerve and spike some sore muscle or injury. Then there was the possibility of further loss. A finger or maybe more. He had been concerned about the fingers each day after Gunn broke them, and had watched them feel warm, discolor, and look worse and worse. If he hadn’t died, he felt sure his hand would have eventually gotten infected and just rotted off. There was hope that they could be saved, but he was a realist when it came to injuries. He could lose a few digits.
“What’s another loss at this point?” His other hand curled, and he didn’t further comment on the grim note. “I’ll take the antibiotics.” The painkillers were something he was wary of and wondered if he’d ever to the point of needing. The option was there at least, and he was sure that was what Kaia was giving him. The option to have some relief if his injuries got too bad to bear.
What mattered most was that he dealt with the injuries he had now and soon. Even he knew what would come next when he saw the splints. “Billy, can you go to another room for a moment. …….please.” He didn’t look at the teenager close by his side and kept his eyes on Kaia. He was sure she could set his fingers in place without Billy, and Ladon didn’t need the boy to see him hold in any cries of pain.
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Posted: Tue Apr 12, 2011 8:18 pm
The request brought a visible physical tension to the pale-haired boy, and for a moment the irrational thought of rejection flashed through him - Ladon didn't need him now. Though some part of Billy that was still capable of thinking straight, still capable of not reacting emotionally worked to reason with him.
It was with stony silence that he left the room. Silent because he didn't trust himself not to say something unfitting.
So instead, he went to the bedroom where he closed the door audibly, perhaps a bit harder than he meant to. But that's okay guys, cause we all know how male PMS is. He'll get over it.
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Posted: Wed Apr 13, 2011 7:32 pm
She stayed silent as the exchange passed between Ladon and Billy. She stared down at the finger braces and the bandages, toying with them for no real reason other than keeping herself busy. As the door closed loudly, she flinched in surprise, but said nothing.
Her eyes rose slowly to Ladon and she tried not to show too much pity. She felt sorry for him, but it didn't do him any good to feel sorry for him. These things had to be done and that was simply the way of it.
"Do you want something to bite down on?" she asked, her expression not changing in the slightest as she did so. She wouldn't think less of him if he wanted to do so - he was letting her put him through an immense amount of pain with nothing to dull it. That was braver than she thought she could be in such a situation.
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Posted: Wed Apr 13, 2011 8:13 pm
It didn't take a brain surgeon to know that Billy wasn't happy, but for once, he was being selfish in this matter. It didn't need apologizing. There was no way he could have Billy being hurt looking at him and making him feel worse because of it. It was going to hurt enough without seeing the teenager react beside him. It was better that they were set, wrapped, and hidden in braces before Billy came back out. This was his decision on that matter.
Adjusting himself, he lifted a knee to lay flat on the couch, and then took a few cushions that he brought to take a nap. Setting then on his leg, Ladon set his hand on that. "I won't yell. I can brace myself. I did just that before plenty of times. What's another few minutes?" It wasn't a question she was meant to answer.He curled his head down to rest into the pillow while his hand arm rested on the same cushion, his hand out, ready for her to take, pop, break, pull, and yank into place. His other hand was curled around his knee, gripping his sweat pants tightly. He wasn't going to lie that this was going to hurt like hell, but he clamped his eyes and mouth shut, preparing. "Do it."
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