Eternal Beasts

Adjustments

Then Jared was in the hallway and carefully making his way towards the floor's community shower, closing the door behind him. No sense announcing it to the whole floor that he was back, and entertaining a visitor in a room the police had taped off a few hours ago!

Carefully removing the clothing the Watcher had put on him, he turned on the shower in one of the stalls. The eyepatch went onto the stall's towel hook along with his towel. Then he stepped in and began to dutifully scrub Ethaeron from his skin, along with any dried fluids left over from his injury.

His head must've been improved by the shower; he was able to finish without feeling like he was going to topple over even once. As he was toweling off, he stepped up to one of the sinks that had a mirror, currently covered in mist. Using his hand, he wiped a wide swatch clear so he could comb his rather long hair. And in doing so, momentarily caught sight of what was in his left eye socket.

With a blast of discharge and power, the big man was lifted up in that very instant and thrown bodily through the air to slam against the far wall. Hitting with enough of an impact that it drove the air from his Beast-strengthened body, he slowly blinked in shock as tendrils of power momentarily played over his body before fading into non-existence to let him slide down the wall and sit stunned on the floor, staring at the fogged up mirror. 'Okay, just what the hell was that??'

Thankfully his transformation into the Lord of Griffons had made him significantly sturdier than he was when originally on Earth. Or getting blasted into the wall like that would've shattered bones and given him a sure concussion! As it was, despite being hurled backwards like he'd been shot out of cannon, Jared felt only a dull ache in his back.

Then a worried Samantha was kneeling beside him.

"My Jared! I felt you being struck!" she exclaimed, eyes wide as she looked him over for injury, her hands checking his arms and legs. "Are you alright?"

Covering his left eye to prevent him from accidentally blasting her, Jared nodded.

"Yeah. I think I hurt my pride more than anything else," he said with a sigh. Then she was helping him back to his feet with a surge of strength.

"Just need to remember to not look into a mirror with my patch off!"

Oddly enough, Jared felt much better after discharging the eye, walking almost normally back to his room and forcing a worried Samantha to hover warily nearby instead of bodily carrying him. The closest thing he could think of to compare it to, was being hungover and feeling much better after puking. Hair combed and clean, he actually felt almost ... normal.

"Ready to grab some food?" he asked as he pulled a dark hoodie over his head back in the room.

"Very," Samantha said, also pulling on one of his spare hoodies. She had rolled up the hems of the sweatpant legs, which had dragged a bit on the ground due to his legs being longer than hers, and now wore a pair of his sandals on her bare feet. They flopped a bit, but they would keep her from walking around outside without protection. While it was the Pacific Northwest where it rained instead of snowing during the winter, it was still cold, damp and nasty. Especially to a creature that had just spent five thousand years in storage!

Leading Samantha outside, Jared sighed as the cool rain splashed onto his face when he looked up into the cloud-filled sky. As much as he didn't want to admit it, it actually felt good to be back on the world where he had spent the most part of his life, mentally ill or not. Even though his essence was Ethaeron, this place felt like home.

"Such variation in the clouds!" Samantha breathed, her eyes wide as she stared into the sky. "To be soaring amongst those with you, my rider, would be magnificent!"