Focus Your Chi [Finished!]

[Bee]

It was still snowing, quite noticeably, but the sky had lightened, and the raging mess that had been going on hours ago had tailed off into the usual fare. Jin felt a brief swell of hope and noted a bit distantly that hope felt a little bit like nausea.

Now there was a decision. Jin knew that his own abode was closer, but Hadyn probably needed better medical attention that what Sana could provide. His mother was quite competent, after dealing with the injuries of so many spawn, but--but really the long and short of it was that Hadyn would likely pass out entirely before making it to the nearest tiny town, and Jin couldn't well carry his ass for that distance without some kind of sled. Whippets were all lean muscle, but they weren't bloody supermen, and he couldn't manage the cold.

Mother it was, then. Hopefully she would be able to do enough. Jin pressed on through the snow.

"We're going back to Mother," he said. "It's not too far off."

[Dark]

‘Not far’ was relative. Hadyn didn’t have any way to estimate how much time had passed--the landscape never seemed to change, everything was white and cold and harsh, and the snow closed in around them, dampening the sound of anything but their own harsh breath--but it seemed like they had only ever been walking in the snow. Hadyn’s limbs felt leaden, and each step was a struggle that he was quickly loosing. He fell once, and he wouldn’t have gotten up if it weren’t for Jin’s harsh words and gently prodding. They kept walking.

Hadyn didn’t remember arriving at Jin’s home; for a small eternity all he knew was putting one paw in front of the other--can’t stop, come on, just a little farther--and than the door was being shut on the cold white world and he didn’t have to walk anymore. He thought maybe he heard shouting, but as the floor rushed up to meet him, he couldn’t find it in himself to overly care. He could rest now.

[Bee]

Sana looked at the collapsed feline on the floor and then to Jin, expectantly.

"You go out for a few hours," she said, entirely humorlessly, "and what do you do?"

Jin explained the situation as quickly and succinctly as he could while he and his mother helped Hadyn to their couch. Sana clicked her tongue.

"I'll do what I can, of course. But that man's arm looks mangled all to hell. It's probably beyond my scope. Get my medicine kit. I'll clean him out."

A couple of Jin's siblings gathered round to watch, but were smart enough to stay the hell out of the way. Together they managed the careful maneuvering necessary to clean all the little scrapes and then begin working on the arm, washing and then adding their medicine to hopefully keep infection from setting in. Sana set what bones she could, but a bit of it was too splintered to do anything with but wrap. Jin knew it would heal funny. Bastard was probably going to be a cripple.

"Give him water regularly," Sana instructed. "Just tilt his head up." She frowned. "And he's a little warm. Lemme get a cold compress."

[Dark]

Hadyn wanted to tell them to go away, but he couldn’t seem to find the words let alone the energy to swat at them; he thought he tried, once, but the resulting wave of agony had made him unwilling to push too hard after that to get his point across. He just wanted to rest.

He drifted, fragments of conversation winding through vivid, harsh dreams that sapped away his energy. He heard them call for a doctor. He couldn’t seem to stay warm.

The next time he surfaced an unfamiliar face peered at him from over half-moon spectacles, saying something that should have been important, but Hadyn couldn’t focus on the words. It seemed like just another dream when the man tied a cord around his upper arm--too tight, Hadyn wanted to say--and someone slipped a sturdy stick between his teeth; it tasted of bark and snow. The man picked up the saw.

[Bee]

Jin was torn between his morbid curiosity concerning the hacking off of limbs--which their good doctor assured them was necessary, and as this particular fellow had been forced to amputate many frostbite victims in the past, Jin and Sana were inclined to take his word for it--and his returning nausea.

Eventually, his desire to not puke got the better of him, and he left the room while Sana made cooing noises at the feline and the carnage began. The act itself was fairly swift--the doctor was good at what he did, and Sana told him later that the limb was removed very quickly. The man cleaned it, dressed it, and gave Sana some instructions. Then he was gone. Apparently this was not the only limb he was taking off today.

Now all there was left to do was tend to the bastard and wait to see if he died.

[Dark]

Hadyn slipped in and out of consciousness and fever-induced delusions for the next week, occasionally surfacing long enough to recognize Sana as she trickled water down his throat and cooed nonsense; sometimes it was one of her faceless spawn, but they mostly remained silent; he hadn't seen much of Jin, but he supposed that made sense. The man hated him, after all.

Hadyn woke the morning of the seventh day feeling rested and mostly in charge of his senses--his fever had broke the night before and they told him it was a good sign. Hadyn wasn't quite sure he agreed.

The doctor had removed his arm from just above the elbow--a clean cut, removing the splintered, mangled mess that the rock had made of his forearm. And while it seemed he would probably live, he wasn't sure he cherished the thought of living as a cripple the rest of his life.

He spent a lot of time contemplating the ceiling those first few days.

[Bee]

Jin had made it a point not to be around to feline often; when feeding and watering duty fell on him, he pawned it off on siblings or just went in while Hadyn was sleeping and gave him the food. He certainly didn't look at the arm. He did, however, sometimes drop in to check on his mother; the woman loved taking in strays, and for the most part this time around she seemed to be adopting a motherly attitude, but Jin made it a point to make coughing noises whenever Sana looked to be taking a little too hands-on of an approach.

Jin usually didn't care what his mother did to guests, as long as she did it discreetly, but inappropriate touching of newly-minted cripples who were in your care seemed a little...sketchy, ethically.

Meh. Whatever. Hadyn would be able to defend himself soon enough.

[carcinoGeneticist]

Bee and Dark receive 7 tokens each, to be redeemed in Ashwin's Shoppe. This will automatically be added to your recorded totals in the shoppe. Congratulations, and keep up the good RP!