Broken Hourglass (Sanscest Multiship)

Chapter 22 - Med Bay

Another splash of icy water hit Horror in the face, the frigid liquid soaked through all of the layers he was using to try and keep warm. The little light that shone in this region was beginning to dim as the sunlight disappeared behind distant snow storms. He'd need to get inside soon to prevent hypothermia.

Dock duty wasn't so bad, that was what Horror kept telling himself. It wasn't like he had done anything particularly bad to end up here. Maybe socking his ranking officer in the face hadn't been a great plan, but the man was a prick.

All he did was ask a question, make some suggestions, attempt to change the entire battle strategy because the commander's plan was stupid and clearly going to get people killed unnecessarily.

The problem was, the people in charge cared more about birth status than actual knowledge. So that was how he ended up here, breaking ice chunks in a frozen harbor.

Horror trudged through snow banks, avoiding any spots where the ice was thin enough to fall through until he thought his legs might fall off from frostbite. Finally arriving back at the lighthouse, he found the door already open.
—

Horror looked out blankly at the sea of stars as he sat on the bed in the med bay. The others had dragged him here after the disaster that was a few hours ago. The space ship was bland and mostly white except for the windows, and the med bay was no different. Compared to the ice plains, this was a very different type of cold and barren. It was compact and mechanical, rather than the open fields of snow drifts and ice flows that Horror had come to appreciate.

Hop would love this place with all of its weirdness and the massive windows looking out at space.

Hop. That single thought felt like a knife.

He hadn't allowed himself to think about the Selkie since he started this mission.

"Are you ok?" Dream asked. "You could have died out there. It's understandable that you may feel a bit scared."

"I'm not scared," Horror muttered, unconvincingly. There'd been plenty of times he'd almost died and it didn't bother him, but now he was afraid of leaving Hop alone.

Damn that kid.

This would be much easier if he didn't fear death, but he had to go and care.

"Does it hurt anywhere?" Dream interrupted his thoughts.

"Hrm?"

"That seems my role in this team. I'm the medic, so are you hurt?" He reiterated.

"No." If Dream was the medic, Horror supposed he was the brute. His magic wasn't that useful outside of combat and he generally won fights based on pure strength. In some way, he understood Lust, neither of them felt all that useful and just wanted to go home.

"Well, I would like to check anyway." Horror rolled his eyelights. "This will probably feel strange."

Dream held his hand outstretched, a few inches from the other's ribcage. A strange sensation spread from the spot where the healer's hand hovered through Horror's body. It was much like the feeling of when he sat on his leg wrong and it went numb.

"You're not in any physical pain, but you're definitely distressed," Dream said.

"No shit," Horror snapped, standing up and pacing as he ranted. "I'm stuck in this stupid space ship, being forced to save the world and the only people I have for company are a bunch of fucking idiots who can't learn to leave me alone!"

The healer's patience had finally run out. "Listen. I'm not any more thrilled about this than you are, but I'm trying to make sure everyone makes it out of this alive! Which is much harder when you fucking people decide to throw yourselves out of a goddamn space ship!" The smaller skeleton was fuming, but did not stop his tirade. "I have not had my magic in years and all of a sudden it comes back! I get to save a world that has never once given a shit about me! And to top it all off, I get stuck with you! I don't fucking know why but you've had a problem with me since the beginning!"