|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 Posted: Wed Dec 20, 2023 7:03 pm
The only sound that filled the sanitized room was the rhythmic beep of the vitals monitor. Only when they left the curtain open did he occasionally see and hear activity in the hall — more beeps and the sounds of drawers being pulled out, knocks on doors, sometimes nurses gossiping with each other at their stations. Those few, fleeting moments were his only entertainment for the past several days now.
Sometimes he was able to sleep through the idle repetition that was lying about in recuperative care. He couldn't leave the bed. Couldn't move, really, and couldn't respond to the doctors or nurses who came in to speak with him. It was a doctor who delivered the news for why he couldn't speak, and while Faustite couldn't explain his fury to the man, he responded in a manner that necessitated replacing all the blankets and flammables in the room as well as the doctor refusing to help him any further.
After that, contact was minimal and each day was the same. He would wake to a room that was devoid of much of anything but a couple chairs in the corner, whose floor-to-ceiling windows facing the nursing station left him feeling like he was trapped in a fishbowl. Surrounding him were all the monitors showing that he was, in fact, measurably alive. The IV pole stood nearby with the smart pump attached to it, armed with a button he could press in times that his pain was at its zenith. He'd already hit it a couple times today; he found out thereafter that the button locks him out for a while after use.
Now he was back to being awake and bored. Back to watching the lines bounce on the monitor with little idea what they were for and even less impetus to learn.
It wouldn't be long, he knew, before he would start ruminating on what happened.whimsical blue thanks for your patience while i got this one up heart
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Dec 30, 2023 2:26 pm
To hear that Faustite was once more injured, this time bad enough to warrant confinement to a hospital bed, had sent Fafnir into a spiral of fear, concern, and anger that had made him extremely difficult to live with for the last few days. The make-up artists that usually flocked around him at photoshoots had been reduced to one steal-spined woman who worked with her mouth in a grim line, any photographers walked as though on egg shells, and he was sure at least one client would not be calling on his services again... No one knew how to deal with him like this, least of all his own mother. They'd gotten into a shrill argument last night before she'd flounced off, flustered and offended.
He'd known what he was doing, of course, but there was less will to conceal his agitation and irritability than there had once been.
The medical bay was weirdly incongruous with the rest the Dark Kingdom... but at the same time, nothing like a real hospital. The few doctors and nurses that were on call wore uniforms, for one, and the space was small... just a spare twenty beds. Well-lit for the work being carried out here, but dark with its stone floors and walls. Fafnir never liked to come here... there was never anything good here. He far preferred an Earth hospital... but for some, that was not an option.
He'd waited a few days until his anger had cooled, assured by his brother that Faustite was alive, at least, and not in immediate danger. He hadn't wanted to bust into the med bay in the state he'd been in... or show Faustite that part of himself. Now though... it was time. The others had had their chance to hover over him and smother him with their concern. It was his time now. A call to the med bay had assured him there were no other visitors before he appeared there, sweeping quietly past the nervous nurse to the occupied room with its glass walls. The door slid open quietly to his touch and he was just as quiet as he entered, closing the door firmly shut behind him.
Faustite looked... well, not good, but that was expected, considering. Wan, drawn... unhappy. Fafnir moved without a word to pull the curtains over the glass wall, closing out the eyes on the other side with a proprietary motion. For now, this was his time, and they could very well keep their noses out of it. It was only then that he was able to gather himself and turn back, looking for the bright irises in their fields of black.
"Faustite." He murmured in low greeting as he approached the bed with slow steps, skirts and hair trailing behind him.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2024 7:06 am
Faustite's eyes were dimmer than usual — dimmer like they were in the early evenings when he had but recently woken up. Dim like his fires were starved, or averse to their usual duties. Had his cincher been off, the boy's core would have looked more like a starved campfire that struggled to put out light and heat.
He was unhappy. He was exhausted. Simply continuing to breathe felt like such a labor that he could take a nap afterward. The pain, however, had kept him up. the presence of another visitor had him wanting to sit up, to perk up, to speak up. But when Faustite opened his mouth to greet the boy in violet and blue, all that came forth was a choked, wet sound and a shock of pain so severe that it twisted his face.
So he reached out again, toward the IV pole that housed that stupid button. Still, however, it was out of reach, and his dilemma was refreshed.
In some ways, he wished Fafnir was the vindictive sort. The power-hungry kind that saw perfect opportunity in smothering a superior with a pillow while he was hospitalized and helpless to stop it. It would have been kinder, Faustite thought, to put him down the rest of the way, rather than force him up the long, hard road to recovery with little solace or assurance that he would be able to walk or speak again. If caught, he could have called it a mercy killing, or insisted that Faustite had asked him to do it; he doubted that Fafnir would see much trouble for that beyond what the rest of the team would raise. But Fafnir was smart — even if he was that power hungry, he was wise enough to know what waited for him if he did that.
So, once again, Faustite was stuck with the more difficult duty of living on, of recovering, of learning a new normal. A normal that he never wanted, that he found too cruel and harsh to inflict on himself.
He reached again for the IV pole. As if it ever got any closer. He could feel the sweat once again collect on his brow.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Mon Jan 22, 2024 6:47 pm
That noise sent spiders crawling up Fafnir's spine. He had to be very careful to school the horror from his face before Faustite could see it. The horror and the panic he'd been feeling ever since he'd heard that the general king was injured so badly he was in the medical bay under intensive care. He'd thought that he'd waited long enough to master those emotions before coming, but with all the damage on display before him, he wasn't sure he had.
Deep breaths. Smooth features, sympathetic expression. He could handle this. He had to handle it. Faustite needed support now, and getting the General King back on his feet was critical to so many of Fafnir's plans.
The reach of a thin arm drew his attention and blue eyes flicked to follow it.
"I hope I didn't wake you up... I wanted to come check on you and keep you company for a bit. I can imagine things have been... hectic, for lack of a better word." He said as he stepped around the bed. Was it the IV bag Faustite was reaching for...? Taking a stab it was, he reached to push the pole and it's hanging bags closer to the bed.
"I also brought you a gift, which I hope will make up for not letting you sleep." Fafnir flashed a smile as he captured one of the side chairs, dragging it closer to the bed so he had something to settle himself into. A flourish of his gloved hand produced a small, vibrantly-red, velvet box wrapped with a black ribbon that he held out as he settled his elbows on the edge of the bed. "I'm also hoping it'll prove useful."
He kept himself from glancing at the boy's gauze wrapped neck by focusing on his own smile and relaxed attitude, working to project a calm and confident facade to put Faustite at ease... or as much as he could. This whole situation was trash, but focusing on that part of it would do no one any good.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Wed Feb 07, 2024 6:58 pm
Fafnir was ever a pretty sight. A balm, in his own way, to the world of pain in which Faustite swam right now. A smart, useful boy who knew to nudge the IV pole a margin closer for Faustite to catch hold of and use. That they didn't have a ******** fire insulated cord to give him some reach for the PCA was infuriating — or would be infuriating if Faustite wasn't in enough pain to smother all of his rage.
Once he could press the button on the pump unit, his pinched features started to relax. His shoulders were unburdened of some of their tension, and the heart rate displayed on the vitals monitor dropped palpably. He could hear again. He could think again.
Fafnir was here to keep him company. Faustite pointed to his own throat, then drew an X over it. Any company he would keep was necessarily one-sided, though Faustite nevertheless appreciated the view of someone who wasn't attending him out of obligation. Fafnir was a familiar face, one he could trust, and as far as he was concerned, the boy could entertain him perfectly well by shirking the shoulders of his senshi outfit with its plunging neckline. The sight alone would promise him pleasant dreams the moment he fell asleep.
It wasn't a suggestion he could make, however, and the frustration for that simmered under his skin. While weary and bleary-eyed, he was soon understanding why being unable to speak was so galling. How the ******** was he to tell Fafnir anything? How could they have a conversation? It wasn't as though he could cross his thumb over to hold a pen with his hands so mangled.
His attention strayed to Fafnir's box, the professed gift, and he wondered over the occasion. was it a 'sorry you were beaten within an inch of your life again', or something more like 'thank you for not murdering my brother'? Was it an 'I'm a thoughtful and exquisitely good-looking boy who you should fall for' gift? Because the lattermost example was the one that was happening, irrespective of the intention.
When the box was set down for him to open, Faustite picked at the ribbon to little avail. The wrapping on his hands rendered manipulation difficult, as his thumb was largely isolated to avoid stretching the wounds. He couldn't simply seize and pull the end of the ribbon without having to finagle it between two fingers instead. It was a frustration, but Fafnir's presence granted him enough tolerance to push past it.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
