destinystrings | Farewell Happy Fields!

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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

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?"

"I wasn't exactly working... I was just that I didn't need to be tended to much; I've already recovered, so I was simply...." A vague gesture, to a wing, as he buries his fingers in its plumes again. "Trying to raise morale again, is all."

He glanced down the hall. It would be best to get out of the way of traffic, wouldn't it.

"The cafeteria would do well, I'm certain... were you hungry?"

Actually... maybe the cafeteria here would have ice cream?

It was a thought that greatly appealed to him.

"You've raised my morale. So, good job! And time for a break, hm?" She turns towards the direction of the cafeteria, and waits to see if he'll do the same.

"I could eat. I think I'm more in the mood for a cup of coffee, though. And it's a good place to sit and talk, right?"

He nodded. "It could be." Not that he's been there yet. Or that they'd be likely to serve him what he does subsist on. (No, the nurses brought him some of that a good while back.)

He'll follow along after her, assuming she knows the way. He'll figure out the way once they get close enough for him to smell it, but until then, well....

She can follow signs, and has done a bit of pacing here and there in the hospital, so locating the cafeteria isn't too terribly hard. They're there before long, and Dakki has gone to get in line so she can get a nice hot beverage. She's making sure that Avitus is still not far behind, of course.

"Coffee never does seem to cost much. Which is good, I'm not sure how I'm going to go about making money, here. And I don't want to be an imposition on anyone..."

"Ah... well, I've taken to making things in my spare time; there are stores about here which seem willing to sell them for me. It's not a lot, but it's something."

He walked with her, curious as to what was being offered in the cafeteria, looking over the spot that held the coffee machine and hot water and--

Were those packets of hot chocolate mix?

They were.

Well! He knew what he'd be getting here now....

"I'm glad we came this way." He glanced at the other things in the cafeteria, too, wondering about them. There was... er... well, he had no idea. Human food, clearly, but he still wasn't good at identifying most of what was common to this city. "Were you hungry, as well?"

"I wish there was something that I was good at making. I've been learning to knit, but I'm still not very good at it. I think I've finally figured out socks, though!"

She sounds quite proud of herself. She's also mixing in a fair bit of sugar and just a splash of cream into her coffee.

"Hm? No, I'm not particularly hungry yet. Are you?"

Mmm, hot chocolate! A nice big mug of it, with two packets of the chocolate powder mix stirred in, instead of the recommended one....

He shook his head. "The doctors gave me what I needed earlier... and there really isn't anything which would sate me here, even if they hadn't." He didn't really elaborate on that, shrugging, his eyes on the mug of chocolate as he kept stirring it, having carefully picked it up, to take it away from the counter and from being in anyone's way. "But knitting, you said? I've never been good at that, even if it does look entirely enjoyable.... Hopefully you're having fun with it?"

Farewell Happy Fields!

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

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

Hooray!

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