Lost Change

Chapter 28

I woke up to the sound of the cage door being opened.  The fuzzy feeling had faded to a light background sensation, and I jerked up to look towards the noise.

I lost my footing and fell back down into the sand.

Sand?  When had I moved to the sand; I thought I fell asleep on the floor...

The glass door swung open and I glanced back into it, seeing her right on the other side of the glass.  I lowered myself against the sand and hissed, flattening my ear tufts and trying to shift my wings down for added effect.

My wings still wouldn't move, but the Kymari's hand paused in the opening.  "Well, looks like you're awake this time.  You slept right through changing your bandages last night; I was hoping you would sleep through this part, too."

She pulled her hand away and reached off to the side, and I watched her grab a small tube from beside my cage and squeeze a clear substance over her finger.  She lifted up another box with her other hand, one slightly bigger than I was and designed out of a soft material that looked more like fabric than anything sturdy, and she slowly brought her first hand back into the cage.  I started hissing again and glared at the hand.

"It's okay."  Her voice was calm and steady.  "We just need to get you to Senica so she can take a look at your wing.  She needs to see if the skin and muscle have grown back enough to put you in a real cast, so your bones can finish healing the way they should.  You've got a lot of delicate bones in your wings and they shattered when you hit the water; if they aren't kept completely still then they'll heal wrong, and you won't be able to fly anymore.  And we don't want that."

She slowly brought her hand closer to me while she talked, and as she finished her statement she lifted the box to bring it closer to the cage door.  I hissed louder and backed up, stopping when I felt the edge of the bowl bump against my good leg.

"It's okay.  It's okay.  You don't have to worry.  I'm just going to put you in this carrier for a little bit so I can take you to the doctor.  You'll like it, it'll be fun.  You can trust me."  I glared up at her and bared my teeth in an added warning, but her hand just kept creeping closer, and she kept talking in that same level tone... though I saw her start to grin from out of the corner of my eye.  "And I've coated my hand in the sedative, so even if you bite me, you're still going in the box.  So you might as well just relax, and let me pick you up, and we'll all be happier..."

I stared in utter fascination at the side of the box, marveling at how even in the near total darkness of the traveling container, the side of the box was still just so neat to look at.

Worth it...

I was still out of it when the side of the box opened back up.  I felt a bit of disappointment at not being able to stare at the wall anymore, but then I noticed a bunch of new things that were just as engrossing.  It took way too much effort to get my head pointed in the right direction to stare at a truly fascinating cabinet door, but in the end I managed.

And as soon as I did that, a hand reached in the box, lifted me into the air - Wheeeee! - and sat me on some cold metal shelf, in completely the wrong direction to still be able to see the cabinet door.

I warbled in disappointment... then thrummed happily as I felt a gentle warmth stroke over my head and neck.  "It's okay.  You're doing good."

I stared at the wall in front of me - it wasn't as neat as the cabinet had been, but it was still close - and tried to think through the haze.  There were a lot of strange scents here - animal smells, some familiar but most of them not, the smell of harsh chemicals, and a floral scent that might have been pleasant if it hadn't been so strong as to leave the impression it existed for no other reason but to drown out any other scents.  Which it utterly failed to do for my nose, but maybe it worked for the Kymari.

There were also a lot of noises.   Something was making a shrill screech, though it was muffled as if it was several rooms away.  The gentle hum of electricity and lights.  Conversation around me.

Another hand began to feel along my wing, pressing gently against the bones there.  I whimpered when I felt a bit of pain make it through the haze.  The hand drew back.

"That was what I was afraid of.  The flesh and muscle has grown back in, and the bone in his leg is actually almost finished healing, but his ribs are still in bad shape, and some of the broken bones in his wing have shifted out of place.  We will have to straighten them back out before we can put the cast on.  This will take a while; I can call you when we are finished?"

Some shuffling noises, then the hand pulled away from my head.  "It's fine, I brought some course work.  I'll wait in the lobby for him."

I was vaguely aware of a clear cone being pulled over my mouth, and some new scent tickled at my nose.  It suddenly became even harder to concentrate, or even to keep my eyes open, and I let my eyelids droop slowly closed.  I made a halfhearted effort to stay awake, but the idea of sleep was just too enticing...

I was back in the cage when I woke up.  My wings hurt.

I glanced up from the bowl of sand and looked at the glass wall.  The cloth had been pulled over the cage, but the red glow gave me enough light to see a reflection with.  

The bands that had been wrapped around my body were gone.  So were the splints.  Instead, the entire right side of my body was covered in a hard grayish material, just like my hind leg had been.  My left side was only slightly better - silver scales gleamed in the reflection along that side of my body and belly, but my wing was just as hidden beneath the material.  The cast.

Other than the severe pain radiating from them, I couldn't feel anything in my wings at all.  I certainly couldn't move them.

I hobbled out of the bowl of sand, wishing as I managed the enormous task of climbing out of the bowl on three legs and unmoving wings that the Kymari would have just put me on the floor, then limped over to the bowls.  My wings had at least been folded up against my sides, thankfully, so I didn't have to worry about accidentally knocking anything over.  

I dimly noticed that the bowl of food had been changed again, and now held only dried mangos with none of the bits of fish I had been ignoring up until then, but food was not a priority to me at the moment.  I sniffed both bowls of water until I caught the one with the metallic scent, and I drank, and drank, and drank... until the fuzzy feeling overtook me again.  I sprawled on the floor by the water, barely managing to get comfortable with the strange weight of the casts against my sides, and let sleep overtake me once more.