Chapter 11: Beeping Heart
1531 Words
It was like drifting on a wave. Ironic, considering he’d passed out on a broken piece of board in the middle of the ocean during a storm.
In the short moments of lucidness, he could hear voices, it started loud, demanding, in the harsh tone of the humans. Warm hands shaking him roughly, fingers wrapped around his arms, palms on his chest, arms under his legs and lifting into the air. A soft, not-quite whistle uttered at the sudden weightlessness.
A pained rasp, his own, a breathless gasp by his ear, unknown. A soft landing as the arms let him go briefly, only to return to drape something over his heavy, freezing armour.
The voice is now soft, muttering close to him, coaxing him. To do what? He was unsure. The waves lull him again, his hair caught under his back and the new pain in his throat leaves him unable to drift away completely.
He feels the unfamiliar rush of air in his lungs, a soft not-quite whistle makes it past his lips, trying to ask too many questions at once. A gentle hand wraps under his scale-less shoulders, soothingly running his hands through his hair to stop it from tugging at his head. He relaxes further.
A loud wailing jolts him out of the restless slumber, too piercing to be human, too sharp to be an underwater creature. He lets out a sharp not-quite whistle again, struggling to open his eyes, to release himself of whatever warm restriction had pinned his arms to his stomach and rested uncomfortably heavy on his chest.
Hands are on him again, a little rougher. He tries to protests, but he doesn’t have the energy to move his arms, his legs, still numb. They touch his neck, his wrist, his chest, leaving an unfamiliar, sticky warmth behind. One pries his eyes open none-to-gently, flashing a bright, pain light. He lets out a louder not-quite whistle at this, unwilling of the treatment.
Arms are under him again, weightlessness, and then rough cloth under him, an unfamiliar, almost painful cold.
A loud rumble.
Nothing.
Regaining consciousness felt like playing with jellyfish. Soft and beautiful in its own way, but stinging and sharp if you got to close. He could feel the current of the water washing over him, even though the rasp of dry air on his body told him otherwise. Itching cloths rubbed at his chest and left him anxious at the lack of weight of his armour and weapons.
Something uncomfortable was strapped to his face, pushing dry air at his nose. To many times, his chest seized, pulling air from a path that didn’t exist anymore, his nose twitching, air burning as it travelled the new path, behind his nose and down his throat.
His tongue leaned on flat teeth, those replacing his fangs were hardly a pressure against the soft muscle. Clawless hands tugging uselessly at rough cloths, dull against the palm of his hand. And the legs, toes twitching at odd moments, unfamiliar muscles jerking painfully.
Lights flashed countless times, faceless voices drifting to him from the darkness.
And then the constant beeping, annoying, but loud enough to keep him grounded, to know when he was awake not just replaying memories in his mind.
Kaelonne eventually came to his senses, as much as he could at least with the sheer number of new and unfamiliar things that were going on around him. He stayed quiet, kept his eyes close whenever someone was in the room and listened. He didn’t get his tattoos as a genius and researcher by luck.
The beeping noise somehow went in tandem with his heart, most likely mimicking it to alert those that checked on him of his condition, the pins in his arms giving him some sort of liquid directly to his bloodstream that made him feel less of the pain than he expected to.
The mask on his face made it just a little bit easier to breathe, his chest too heavy to corporate. It served as a constant reminder that his nose was used for breathing, not his non-existing gills.
He was in a room, on a bed, bandaging wrapped tightly over wounds that he was awake enough to take note off. No one was aware that he was awake yet, and he wanted to keep it that way until he could pull together his muddled memories and make a plan.
Kaelonne knew logically that he needed to follow the last words of Viatrix, ‘Heal, prepare, learn, get the help you need and return’. But he didn’t even know where to start. He was clearly in a place of healing, but was he safe here?
A human walked near the bed, a white coat draped over their shoulders. The young royal stayed as relax as he could - not that it was hard while drifting in and out a doze - as they checked the beeping machines beside him, the pins in his hand and the strips wrapped around his injuries. Then they talked lowly to another in a similar coat, words worried between thin lips and clipped tones.
They wanted to add another patient to the large room. They were worried by the lack of waking on his part, especially with the number of injures and the lack of a head wound. Another human presence, they said, it might provide enough to pull him in to the waking world or do the exact opposite and stress him out more, hence the conversation. They were running out of options, he’d yet to wake, he had no one to visit him and they weren’t even sure of how or why he ended up in the middle of the ocean.
Another human, one that Kaelonne had consistent contact with, one that he could learn from, and so, he observes. They lacked one of the legs required for walking, - it was an interesting thing to watch – propping themselves up on carved wood and compensating their weight. Kaelonne marvelled at the ability humans had to adapt to anything. Sure, the Mermatians dealt with missing arms, blinded eyes, deafened ears, hindering scars, but a damage to the tail was very dangerous thing, and more often than not, permanent.
They laughed, baring one’s teeth was considered friendly, sometimes even calming, and welcoming, it was strange. They never bumped noses in greeting, choosing to wrap their arms around their visitors or even shake hands. They didn’t whistle as a form of communication, they hummed. That was the most interesting thing Kaelonne picked up on, it stood for so many things, just a slight shift of tone could mean a confirmation, a denial, a prompting, the list never ended.
There was always someone at the human’s bedside at a particular point in the day. He notes the clothes they leave for him in a small bag, crutches that were hardly used leaning on the wall, wires hooked to rounded ears, flat devices in their hands. There was a consistent accompanying of smells that were latched to the visitors, it was not the natural scents that Kaelonne used to identify a familiar friend - a slight, faux underline to it. Jewellery adorned wrists, necks, fingers, ears, sometimes even parts of the face.
Then a strange human came in, his close rougher and a little more worn than the others. They didn’t walk over to the injured human like Kaelonne hoped, instead, the young royal found himself lying deathly still as the human leaned over the bed, peering at him with a piercing glare. They didn’t reach out, just watched his face, the machines and then at the doctor again.
A detective, it was a title, not a name. He didn’t talk a lot, but his short sentences were enough. They were aware, he had no place among their kind. No name, no family, no story. A person found in the middle of the ocean, wearing strange armour, weapons, and nothing more. A being carrying injuries of claws and fangs, the marks of known land animals, not sea.
They talked about the possibility of him waking up, of questioning him, find out why he was here, and most likely, what he was planning on doing. Questions that Kaelonne wasn’t even sure he had the answers to.
If he could walk on land with the legs and lungs of a human, what stopped the Sirinians from doing the same?
That was the thought that made his first scary, reckless decision. He mentally marks the times that the humans check on them, the times of day when more movement was present, the clothes sitting on the ground in a bag near the other patient’s bedside. He was well enough to understand that walking was an unfamiliar concept to him and silently thank whatever deity listening to him for the convenient crutches leaning on the wall. He needed to leave the place of healing before they become suspicious of him.
He needed to do it tonight, two weeks after he was first brought in.
- Writer
