Everglow: Friend From Far Away

11 - Renovations

The door to the shed opened with a slight creak. Ko put down the hacksaw she was tinkering with and turned around to see Fischer hauling a large rectangle, about the same size as himself, through the door. "Here, you can sleep on this. It's not great, but it beats sleeping in metal scraps,"

Heaving the mattress onto its side, he pushed it over and it hit the floor with a springy 'thud'.

"Is this a mattress?" Ko guessed, judging from the fact that it landed with a soft thump rather than a hard one.

"Yup. Did you not have mattresses wherever you came from?"

Ko looked down at the floor, the same look of guilt as she had by the road, crawling over her face. "I didn't have many things where I come from."

Fiddling with the mattress, trying to stuff some of the cotton that had escaped through the numerous tears back in, he once again began to grow curious as to her origin.

"So. . . this Diamar planet. I've never heard of it before. What's it like?" he questioned, his head still facing the floor.

Ko let out a small, but audible, sigh. "I don't really know. I never got to see much of it. All I know is it's covered in snow and ice. I don't really want to talk about it right now," she lamented. It became evident to Fischer that whatever place she came from, clearly she wasn't planning on going back.

"Oh. Well, ok then. Look if you ever do need someone to talk to about it. . . well I'm probably not the best person for it but you don't really have an abundance of options, so I'm here if you want,"

His words came as a surprise to her. She'd known him for less than three hours but already he'd practically saved her, welcomed her into her home as best he could and now he was offering to console her. Maybe he was wrong about his planet?

"Th-thankyou. . . Fischer," she stuttered. Hearing his name spoken back to him by her for the first time was enough to pull his eyes away from the mattress and onto her. He felt a small smile creep it's way across his face and he found himself staring right at her.

"You're welcome Ko."

A small smile found its way onto Ko's snout as well. Turning her head away, she limped over to the workbench and tried to clear a space to sit. The gash in her leg was making it increasingly hard to support her own weight and she was beginning to have trouble standing on her own.

Noticing her posture and the grimace that had now replaced the smile, Fischer decided that the mattress could wait. Getting Ko cleaned up was a much more important task.

"Hey, I'm going to go grab some stuff that can help fix up your leg ok? Just wait here, I'll be right back," he explained.

"Ok. Thank you,"

Finishing up with stuffing the mattress, he got to his feet and dusted himself off, wiping away the dirt and grime that had accumulated all over his jacket and pants. Opening the shed's door, he took one last look at Ko, then headed down to the house to grab some first aid supplies.

Ko found herself alone, again. At first things seemed fine, everything was as it should be.

"Light the Lantern. The Divide is nigh,"

"The Divide is nigh,"

She quickly snapped around, desperate to find the source of the voice. Her heart began to beat rapidly, remembering the scene she found herself in before Fischer had snapped her out of it. But it was no use, as nothing was out of the ordinary.

The voice faded quickly, leaving as soon as it had arrived. There were no flashing pictures, no rushing static in her ears, no screaming white noise. Just the tools on the shed, the mattress on the floor and herself, standing next to them.

---\/---

Rummaging through the closet, he finally found what he was looking for. Heaving out the box with the green and white cross on it, he looked around for a bandage, or anything really that could help cover up the gash in Ko's leg. His eyes came to rest on a roll of bandage that sat in the corner of the box, as well as some antibacterial cream that could be used to treat infections.

He had absolutely no clue if human medicine would work on an alien, but there weren't any other options available. The last thing either of them needed was for that gash to become grossly infected. Besides, she was on a human planet, which means any bacteria she came into contact with should be killed off by human medicines. With that being as good a logic as any in his head, he grabbed the tools and headed off back to the shed. Well, was about to head off to the shed.

"Fischer? Where the hell are you?" a grouchy voice called from the living room. His eyes rolled into the back of his head at the sound of his mother's voice.

"Uh. . . just in the kitchen. What do you need?"

Taking advantage of the fact that his mother was too lazy to walk to the next room to talk with her son, he quickly stashed the medical supplies in a nearby drawer, keeping them hidden in case she did walk in.

"Listen here, I'm going out later today so that washing and those bloody dishes better be done by then, got it?"

Instead of letting out a groan like he normally would at his mother's inability to do even the most basic of house work, he smiled. His mother was going out, which meant getting everything set up for Ko would be much easier.

"Yea mum I got it. They'll be done."

"They better be. And clean the fucking bathroom while you're at it. It's a bloody pig sty."

Her request fell on deaf ears however, by the time she'd gotten the last word out, he'd already grabbed the supplies and shut the door behind him.