Changing Oneself (Entangled side story)

22, Too Much

Light slipped into my vision. My head felt crowded and foggy, thick with sluggishness and aching. My voice tried to work, coming out choppy, questioning.

Lights were above me, metal stood beside me, a smell of antiseptic filled my nostrils.

"Hey, easy there," a familiar voice said. A face entered my field of view. Through the grogginess, I recognized Sang. "You're safe. I'm taking care of you, don't worry. I need you to keep resting. That's all I need from you. Just rest. You're safe."

Sang's words began to fade out, the sluggishness overtaking my head. I was so tired.

"You're safe."

~~~

A soft tickling feeling on my face roused me again. Consciousness took hold of me in the same slow fashion as before, even though it felt like only seconds or minutes had passed since the last time I woke. 

I blinked once. Twice. Slow and tired. My head still felt like a bundle of thick cotton. 

It soon registered in my head what I was looking at. A small familiar room. A familiar vampire's face. A familiar human's face right next to him. 

Ieli smiled as my gaze met his. "Hey there," he greeted in a soft tone. His hand was what caused the tickling. He had been brushing the backs of his fingers over my forehead and temple. 

Sang was standing, and he sat down in a chair next to Ieli, who was already sitting next to the bed I laid in. Or was it a bed? It didn't quite feel like one. More like a cushioned table. 

"It may take some time for you to fully wake up; there's still morphine in your system," Sang told me.

"Mm...mor...?" I croaked. My voice was so scratchy I briefly wondered if I was sick.

"Painkillers, for your injuries. Do you remember what happened?" Sang responded. 

My brain still felt sluggish, and processing everything still went slowly. I tried to remember. Gradually, images arose in my head. Bartok smirking at me as he held the packet of my Omega history in his hand. Yenthyr staring at me with bone-deep fear. A flash of colors and light, heading straight for my eye--

I gasped and tensed all over. It suddenly occurred to me that something wasn't right with my eyesight. Only half the world was visible. The other half was dark. 

"Wh-where is my eye?" I asked in a hoarse whisper. I reached a weak hand up to my face and felt around. The rough texture of bandages met my fingertips. "Where is my eye?!"

"Shh, shh, it's okay," Ieli coaxed, while Sang pressed a hand onto my shoulder. 

"Relax Malik, you're alright," he tried to soothe me. I swallowed and blearily lifted my head to look down at my body, because I then remembered the searing pain of magic burning me in other places. There were only more bandages, and a blanket.

"Is- is it-?" I whimpered. Ieli cupped my face in his hands while Sang picked up a syringe and inserted the needle into a tube, which was connected to a bag hanging from a metal stand, which led into a different tube that went into my arm. 

"Breathe, Malik, it's okay," Sang said, and whatever he put into me started to take slow effect. The panic left little by little, and my head rested back on the pillow it had been on as my breathing evened out. Ieli stroked my temples with his thumbs. 

"W-what happened?" I asked. "After I..."

"We rushed you out here. We tried using our saliva on the way, but due to the nature of the magic Bartok used, it could only help so much. Sang did his best," Ieli explained, and that was where he paused and looked at the doctor to pick up from there.