A New Kind of Army

Chapter 7: Chicken Soup and Flying Books

Beeping.

That was what I heard when I regained consciousness. I didn't want to open my eyes. The same beeping had already confirmed everything had happened in the past...had it been days? Hours? Do I count the decades I missed? Exactly how long have I been awake? I'll just have to log that with the millions of other questions I had.

The footsteps became noticeable. It sounded like there was only one person in the room, and they were walking away from me but that quickly changed. As I heard the door open, a second set of footsteps walked in and closer to my bed. They paused for a moment, before a female voice, with a thick southern accent spoke.

"Alright, soldier boy, no need to pretend any more. We know you're awake."

I slowly opened my eyes, to see the women with red hair. She was standing over me, with a kind smile, and her light brown eyes were sparkling through the magenta-colored mask she wore on her face. It almost felt like I was staring up at family member, she seemed so warm and welcoming. It was almost terrifying.

"How you feeling, sugar?" she asked.

"Tired," I coughed, my voice was so hoarse and dry, that it hurt to talk.

Her smile turned in to a sad one. She turned around and came back with a paper cup in her hand. She gently slipped one of her hands under my head and brought the cup to my lips with the other. Sweet, cooling water washed down my throat, soothing it.

"Take it slowly," The woman advised.

She took the cup away, once I was finished.

"Better?" she asked.

I nodded and leaned deeper in to the mattress. At least it was comfortable. It wasn't a cloud, but it wasn't a rock either. I looked around the room again. Now, that I wasn't either dying, or...panicking...I can finally get a good look at the room.

It was a decently sized room. On one side of the room there were three beds, with me in the one on the left, or the one closest to the entrance. The other two beds were empty. On the other side of the room were some machines that I didn't recognize, that were sitting on desks; a boy, Taiga? He was sitting at one for them. In the far back corner of the room was a bunch of potted plants; a lot of potted plants. The plants were resting underneath an orange-ish light, that was probably there to keep them warm. I was honestly surprised that they were even alive, because it was freezing in here.

"Any pain anywhere?" the woman asked.

"My arm," I rasped. My arm still had a dull ache, but it still felt like it was still there. Like I could still move it. Was that normal? My throat didn't burn anymore thanks to the water.

The woman hummed, before beginning to gently unwrap the bandages on what was left of my arm. I winced when the bandage finally was off. My skin was stained red, thin and scabbing. It was being held together with large dark stitches, and the cold air made the wound sting. It looked awful, and suddenly hurt a lot more than it did a few minutes ago.

"It doesn't look like it's inflamed or anything. So, you don't need to worry. Anything you feel is from it is just your nerves trying to make sense of what happened," She began to rewrap up my wound and then flashed me a warm smile, "Which is a good thing, really. It means that your nerves are still active enough that we can attach them to a good prosthetic."

Prosthetic? Do they honestly think one of those would help me? I've only seen ones for cut off legs, but I don't even know if one would work for my arm. But then again, I'm in the future, so who knows what they came up with. Maybe these guys have Stark's line.