Valkyrie

Chapter 3

My body is like a finetuned, exotic sports car. As long as I maintain it properly, it'll run like a dream, getting me from point A to point B with a minimum of fuss. Eat the right things. Sleep enough. Hydrate. You know, all of the normal things a normal person does. If I do those things, I'm good to go. Neglect them for too long and unfortunate things will start to happen. I do not do those things for my finetuned, exotic sports car self because I am not a normal person and I am dumb on a regular basis.

I don't sleep enough. I drink too much whiskey and not enough other things and my diet is basically shit. Because of this, I sometimes do what I like to call a "hard reset" where I will pass out.

Cold.

Dead to the world.

No amount of stimulation will rouse me from the comalike state that I fall into. Usually, I get a little warning before that happens. I'll get a little dizzy, my ears will ring, my vision will swim and my head will feel kind of floaty like when you have a buzz that's on the edge of falling over to the drunk side. When that happens, I know I have about thirty minutes to get some protein packed food and about a gallon of water in me STAT or get off my bike and somewhere I can safely sleep for an hour or two or I will be in serious trouble.

I had zero warning this time. Zero. Unless you counted the weird ear popping. That's why I found myself pacing around a dimly lit hospital room with no shoes on, arguing with a well-meaning but annoyingly persistent nurse about staying and letting a doctor see me before I hightailed it out of there like my ass was on fire and the end of the world was nigh. They had taken me out of the little curtained cubicles they have in the emergency area and stuck me in a private room when the other patients started complaining about my language.

Puh-lease. Like they'd never heard anyone drop an F-bomb or twelve before.

"I told you. I'm fine. I'm just tired and I have issues with low blood sugar. I haven't eaten all day and it got too low." I tugged at my braid before tossing it back over a shoulder. I was still tired despite the reset and my belly was still empty. If you looked up "hangry" in the dictionary, you'd see a picture of me glaring back at you from the page.

"We really should check you out and make sure that you're okay." She was standing in front of the door with her hands tucked in the pockets on the front of her floral scrub top, washed out blue eyes still kind and patient but the smile she'd had earlier was gone. I'd quicky worn away that friendly smile when she first came in about twenty minutes ago when the EMT's rolled me in and I started talking to her. I have that effect on people sometimes.

"I said I'm fine," I practically growled. I needed to get out of there. I don't do hospitals. Too many bad smells. Too many icky sounds. All the sickness and the dying. It's a little overwhelming for someone with senses as sharp as my own. I'm good at tuning stuff out but not when I'm tired and I was tired. Very tired.

She blinked a couple of times and took the tiniest step back and closer to the door. I guess I actually had growled. I cleared my throat and glanced down at my mismatched socks, one foot wrapped in a yellow Pikachu sock and the other in a black one with "fuck" printed all over it in hot pink letters. Where the hell were my boots? They were my favorite boots. Black and heavy with steel toes that laced up over my calves just right and had the zipper down the inside so you didn't have to unlace them all the time to get them off or on. I'd just gotten them properly broken in. I didn't want to leave them behind and walk out of there in my socked feet but I would if I had to.

"At least let the doctor examine you," she said, sounding completely reasonable.

"No, thanks. I don't need to be examined. I just want to go." All I needed was food and sleep and I'd be as good as new. I didn't need any type of exam to tell me that. Besides, I couldn't let them take my blood. They would have no idea what they were looking at. It's not even red for fucks sake. They'd never let me go then. They'd be calling the FBI or the CIA or the fucking CDC. It would be a total shit show consisting of every letter of the damned alphabet.