destinystrings | Farewell Happy Fields!

Entry tags:

Farewell Happy Fields!

Farewell Happy Fields!

☯

What: Aftermath of Anoli Attack: Hospital
Where: Leo Ward - Caduceus Hospital Headquarters
Summary: It is the aftermath of the Anoli attack on the Closing Ceremonies. The injured have been taken to Caduceus Hospital Headquarters, and it is time for reflection, visting, or old-fashioned escapes from the hospital rooms.
Warnings: Mild squick if people want to describe their wounds in explicit detail.

Caduceus Hospital Headquarters. It has a distinguished history within Hinoto-Ri, boasting of a staff of well-trained Healers, as well as possessing the most cutting edge medical technology possible. There was no limb they couldn't reattach, no organ they couldn't replace... - they even claimed to be able to bring someone back from the dead (with the small disclaimer that it could only occur under certain conditions and with an obscene amount of luck).

So needless to say, the hospital was more than well-equipped to deal with the aftermath of the Anoli attack on the Closing Ceremonies.

---

Nearly every hospital bed had been filled by an injured patient that night. The A&E room had been in constant chaos, with civilians crying and shouting, searching for loved ones, or demanding to see doctors or healers to help so-and-so...

There had also been plenty of reporters milling about, shouting and crying over the status of the Mayor's Secretary, and whether the Red Lion had really died at the scene, or if he was still alive and well within the safety of the hospital's ICU.

By the time morning broke, there was a false sense of tranquillity within the hospital. The healers had been pushed to their limits with the sheer number of patients being wheeled in and out of surgery, but otherwise, the situation had finally gotten under control. Now, both civilians and visitors were merely waiting for word of the conditions of their injured friends and family...

[Welcome to the winding down of the event! You are now at the hospital, where you may be visiting the injured, or be one of the injured yourself! Those with RED injuries will be in the ICU, and those with YELLOW injures will be in normal wards, for obvious reasons. Those with GREEN injuries wouldn't have had to go to the hospital at all, so they are free to come and go as they wish!

You may all start your threads and mingle!]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

There was a fellow wanderer out in the halls, wearing a hospital gown and with her arm in a sling, a lost look in her glassy gold eyes. Though she had quite a bit to think about, the sight of a rather blue-looking figure doing... something... in one of the nearby rooms caught her attention. She took a step back, turned a little, watched from a good distance outside the doorway... and spoke up when Avitus exited.

"...what were you doing?" It's not an accusation. It's more curious than anything.

He paused, blinking at her, surprised. She's... not human.

Well, no, that was obvious. But that the most easily obvious not human thing about her was her color, and there's something oddly familiar about it. Purple wasn't blue, and she didn't have huge feathered wings or long ears, but....

"Leaving a gift," he said, after a slight pause. He brought his wings around himself again, somewhat loosely hugging his torso, hiding his odd hands in their undersides, as he resumed preening without even looking at what he was doing. "I-- where I'm from, my clan's feathers are considered good luck. And I thought... perhaps people would appreciate them here.

"Would you like one as well?"

He put his wings up just a little more, starting to smile faintly. Blame his general shyness and uncertainty, sure, but he was still looking over her face, his eyes meeting hers, and taking her in. Hers is an appearance he finds himself liking... and finds himself a little curious about, too. What was she?

His surprise surprised her in turn. Being boggled at wasn't uncommon by now, but perhaps she expected a fellow non-human anomaly to take the strange more in stride. But her surprise was quickly giving way to warmth and interest. He, too, was something a bit familiar to her. Ears like a newman, a skin tone not too far from other CASTs she had known... but he had wings. Wings! How wonderful!

"Oh. I see! That's very thoughtful of you. I think we could all use a little good luck, in this place."

The offer of a feather brought further brightness to her smile. "I... I would, if you're offering. That's very kind of you." If he had been in Hinoto-ri long, he might note that her voice sounds as though it was coming from a computer. It has that digitized edge to it. And there are seams and joints at her elbows and knees, barely covered by the sleeves and drape of her hospital gown.

He may have noted an oddness to her voice, but he's spent far, far less time on the network than he has just wandering about most of the districts and taking in the sights, or in his apartment, working on various projects, like lamps and combs.

He wasn't sure what to make of the faint seams on her cheeks, and hadn't noticed the others yet -- she might note he had none on himself; whatever she was, exactly, he wasn't that -- but her eyes being the color they were, a yellowy gold color, not that much unlike his own... the smile he gave her widened further.

"Which sort would you like? There's plenty that're coming loose all over. It's... called molting," he clarified, just in case she were worried. Most likely a stress-induced molt, but he wasn't going to give her that detail.

He raised one of his big wings up a little, not really stretching it out very far, but enough that she could get a better view of it. The feathers were arranged much like those on a bird's wing, with the bigger, somewhat stiffer ones toward the bottom, and smaller ones, rounder and softer, toward the arm... but there were far more of them than a real bird's wing would have.

((...now I want to replay PSIV.))

"Ah. Molting. Like a bird, right? Does it hurt?" She appreciated the clarification of how his wings worked. And she also appreciated the better look at one of his wings, making a little "ooh!" sound, and stepping in closer.

"They're all very nice. They're yours, though... you know them best. You decide?" Her experiences with feathers were limited, mostly, to retrieving nice-looking ones from rappies and selling them to raise funds for new equipment. They didn't give her the context needed to know which kind of feather it would be alright to ask him for.

((It is always a good time to replay PSIV! :3 ))

He couldn't help some small sound, almost a giggle, at her reaction, and spread it another foot or so, so she could see better, angling it more toward her in an invitation for her to inspect it more closely. He reached over and started running his hands through the feathers, pulling them apart a bit as he combed through them gently, letting her see the different sizes and shapes, from the much smaller, circular contour feathers, only a couple inches in diameter, to the feathers about one and a half feet long, and half a foot wide, at the bottom.

"In molting, the base of the feather starts to let go, and the feather gets loose. It doesn't hurt to pull it out; it has to be removed, or fall out, either way, to make way for a new one to grow. They don't all come out at once, but I'm certain that most of them, if not all, will be replaced within a month. So the question is entirely of what sort of feather would appeal to you."

In other words, point him to a size/shape, and he'll check for one of that kind that's loose.

((...except it's 3am. *eyes the Genesis*

....oh, who am I kidding. Chucking it into the emulator on my PSP now. It was my first JRPG; I ought to have it on that mem card on principle.))

He thought she was funny, being so impressed? She was alright with that, if it meant she could have a better look. She came closer still, lifting a hand as though to touch, but hesitating without doing so. "...may I?" For it was polite to ask about that sort of thing.

"Aah... I didn't know that was how it worked. I suppose if they're already going to come out, then... ah..." And she indicated one of the longer feathers with a little gesture. "One of those?"

Avitus lifted his wing up to better reach the lower ones... and as he did so, pushed its leading edge right into her hand, giving her a little nod; it wasn't as though his wings were made of glass. In fact, judging by the way he was preening through those feathers, looking for one to pull out, they probably had more in common with limbs like arms than not. Something about the way the surface of it moved when he messed with it, and how the shape seemed to bend halfway down, bringing that bottom edge up closer to him... it must have had a batlike structure under its feathers, rather than a birdlike one; he was curling its fingers up.

He ended up reaching over the arm and pulling one from the backside of the wing, in the end -- but it was one of those largest feathers, like she'd wanted, and he ran his fingers over it, making sure all the barbs were neatly locked together, before offering it to her.

"Here you are." Have the feather and a smile!

Dakki made another little startle-surprised sound when her hand made contact with the wing. Her look shifted to a questioning one, but the answer seemed to already be there. And so she let her fingers run along the feathers lightly... and then a little more firmly.

"They're... they must be powerful. Can you fly with them?"

And then, a feather just for her. She took it with her one good hand and brought it closer, looking at it this way and that. This... this was making her feel better, after her unexpectedly unpleasant meeting with Garviel. It was such a small thing, but it gave her some hope that she wouldn't be alone in this strange place for very long.

"...thank you!" Abruptly, she snapped out of her reverie and renewed her eye contact with him. "Really, I do mean it. Thank you. Ah... I'm Dakki Sigal. And..." There was an awkward moment where she tried to extend her one free hand for a handshake, realized it was still full of feather, and scrambled to find somewhere to put it... then the feather vanished in a small flash of blue light as she filed it away in her nano-storage. Satisfied with that, there came her hand, ready for a proper greeting. "...and you'd be?"

"I'm sure I can...." They were big enough, he could surely at least glide with them. He folded them both up behind his back when he was done, watching the feather disappear into thin air, and stared at the spot where it was. It took him a second to respond, but at least he did, taking her hand in his.

At least he knew what a handshake was! "My name is Avitus. You... can teleport things?" Surprised, yes. Put off by it, no; that smile was hinting at coming back already.

"That's so wonderful, being able to do that..." She missed the subtext that he didn't much care for flying, she was so taken with the idea of having wings and flapping about. And besides, a bit of an explanation was in order. After a firm handshake from a cool, mostly human-feeling hand, she withdrew it and pulled the feather back out of nano-storage.

"No, it's not so much teleporting, as it is placing something into a pocket of warped space. I carry most of my things in my nano-transformer." And she lowered her head and pulled the collar of her hospital gown away a bit to indicate a circular object that rested at the base of her neck between her shoulder blades. "I know they're not terribly common outside of where I'm from. They're very convenient, though!"

He didn't say anything to that comment. Oh, he'd be fine with flying, honest! You know, if it just... didn't involve heights. Unfortunately, the two seemed to go hand in metaphorical hand.

And of hands, his was differently built; his fingers were just a bit thicker, and two fewer, and his nails were decidedly not the same. Their curve suggested he should rightly have had talons or claws or something, but they weren't; they'd been filed down, rounded and manicured into soft, almost humanlike shapes, their thickness ensuring harmlessness, strength aside.

They were withdrawn again soon enough, though, held to himself as he watched, eyes still just a little wide, as the feather reappeared and she explained. He was quiet a long couple of seconds after she spoke, trying to sort his thoughts to say something.

"Oh."

Well, something beyond that.

What kind of sorcery was it? It had to be magic, he knew that much, because he hadn't the faintest idea how it could be a technology thing; technology was heat and light, perhaps, but it was mostly gears and valves and glass lenses and stuff like that. Small objects that made things disappear into thin air, and held them in a pocket dimension of somewhere else-ness? That was certainly an enchantment of some kind.

Had to be.

"...Did you make it?" He was hoping so. Maybe he could get her to similarly enchant something for him, and thus make it so he didn't need to keep a tote bag for keeping his sketchbook and whatever else in, when he traveled around with it. Or library books. Or new supplies. Or--!

Oh, there were uses for something like that!

The unusualness of his hand didn't seem to register with her. Her handshake was without hesitation.

"Ah, no, I didn't make it. I'm a soldier, not a scientist." She laughed a little, giving an apologetic shake of her head. "I wouldn't know where to start. Which is a shame, so many people could benefit from having nano-transformers. But that's a bit beyond me."

"Oh...." Yes, a shame. But she'd said something else just now that caught his interest, and he shifted his focus to that instead. "You're a soldier?"

He seemed vaguely surprised about it... but also kind of impressed.

Dakki nodded quickly and unselfconsciously, confirming the statement. "Yes. That's what I was made to be. And that's what I do best. So that's what I am. And that's how I landed myself in here. I dove into the fighting at the arena. But so did a lot of other people..." And she trails off, casting a glance up and down the hall.

"Oh." Quiet at that, his cheeks turning a decidedly purple hue there now, smiling a little less for a moment. "I'm... not a fighter, myself. I... never really... ah... it wasn't why I was made, so...."

He shifted position subtly, putting his weight on one leg, barely lifting the other up. Clearly, this was some point of embarrassment for him. "I mean... some of my brothers are soldiers. And the rest of our clan...." Oh look, an inconspicuous subject change!

Now that was a strange sort of answer for him to give. He considered himself to be made? She wanted to more, but... maybe not now. Maybe later.

"Not everyone has to be. Not everyone SHOULD be. I fight, so others don't have to. And I think that's just fine. What sort of things do you like to do, Avitus?" Yes! An excellent subject change! And also, she's quite curious. What kinds of professions did blue bird-elfy sorts have?

He shrugged. "I'm... my clan's architect, actually. I draw up plans for buildings, I do a lot of stained glass, especially what's in our castle...." He paused slightly, thinking. "I recently restored much of the clans' hall, in the library. The displays were aging, and the statues were in need of repair again, so there was that...."

In other words, art. He looked a little... hesitant, though. Almost. He wasn't explaining whatever reservations he might've had at the moment, though.

"An architect!" She looked very impressed and very interested. Had she ever met an architect before? She wasn't certain that she had. "Do you just design, or do you help with the building as well? And stained glass... that's so beautiful. You so rarely see the real thing, where I'm from. Are you working on anything here? I suppose you might need a workshop for that, though..."

And again, in her enthusiasm, she wasn't fully picking up on any misgivings or uncertainties that Avitus had.

"I--" So many questions at once! But it was certainly taking his mind off his guilt of what he couldn't do, and that could only be a good thing, right?

"I've been able to make little things, on my table, in my quarters... but back in the Citadel, yes, I did have a larger room for it. I often enough needed assistance with carrying the windows out to where they were to be installed, though. I'm not all that strong. So when it comes to buildings... those, I mostly drew up the plans for. I helped with the smaller things, but the hunters and the humans were almost always the brawn for the majority of the actual construction work."

Dakki was very good at asking lots of questions. It's how you learn about things, after all.

"Aaah, if the window were big enough, I suppose you would need a crew to help move it around... the best things are a team effort, hmm?" And then she gives her head a curious tilt. "Hunters?" That was familiar to her... though it couldn't be the same sort of thing that she was thinking of at all... could it?

He simply nodded, to the first part. "The rest of my clan, yes. They're the human guards' upper ranks... they go out and hunt the other clans with them, to keep everyone safe. Most of them are quite strong, so they make short work of construction jobs."

"Ohh. I see." It was a perfectly good explanation, and something that only mostly dismissed the thoughts of the Hunter's Guild from her mind. "That sounds like the sort of thing that Hunters from my world sometimes do. Though most of our jobs on Pioneer 2 were combat-oriented, I was told that it wasn't unknown to hire us on for labor of that sort in hazardous zones."

"...in hazardous zones?" Have a curious head-tilt. "Because you're more easily able to defend yourselves, than most?" It was his guess, anyhow.

"Mmhmm. Places that are in danger of attack, and all that." And she gives a quick little nod. "That was mostly back on Coral, though, from what I've been told. That's a long time ago..."

She trails off, and looks the slightest bit sad, but is quick to move right along from it. "...do you have the time to keep talking? I might be keeping you from your work. If you've got the time to talk, maybe we could go to the cafeteria?"

Farewell Happy Fields!

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

This is astonishingly late. Would you still want to continue?

backtagging's fine. :) Besides, I'm curious how this'll turn out!

Hooray!

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)