Not That Far

Chapter 6-Death's Door

  I woke up to what I guessed to be only minutes later since there is a faint, ever present light lingering on the other side of my tightly closed eyes. Or maybe it's been an entire day and night and this is evening or even morning again, I thought belatedly. My head ached horrendously as I struggled to form that coherent thought.

  Either way, I woke to a symphony of muddled noises. Fear was my first reaction to the sounds of course. Though I was faintly ashamed of it.

  I couldn't understand what or if something was being said. All I could sense was a jumble of sounds and the occasional flash of light behind my eyelids. I halfheartedly cracked one eye open to investigate and that tiny, insignificant movement made the sounds escalate into unbearable, high-pitched peal. It briefly reminded me of a nest of insects being stirred up.

  Colors swirled and swam around in front of my cracked eye and I blinked several times before I could even begin to make out the objects around me. Red, orange, brown, white, pink and blue fill my immediate field of vision. The colors finally stop spinning enough that I manage to focus on them a bit. I detachedly realize that my head is pillowed on my folded cloak.

  A blurry face hovers above me and something that I assume is a hand keeps shaking and prodding me. Wanting me to respond. I try swatting it away, but that only seems to encourage it further. Stop it! I want to snap at whoever was bothering me. It's hard enough to focus while thing are still. Since swatting had already failed, I tried to deter them with my vocal cords instead.

  "Rrrmmhhrrrmmm," That was all I could manage for the time being and I close my eyes. But that insistent hand nags at me till I slit my eyes open again. I glared through slotted eyes at this irritatingly, persistent person. Obviously not satisfied by this anymore, the hand kept at it. Erred by this, I opened my eyes fully and stared at the nuisance.

  This time I can see a lot more clearly. The colors have stopped rearranging themselves and are beginning to take shape. The face above me is slowly coming into focus, like a microscope being adjusted. I see swimming bluish-green eyes, framed by orange hair staring back at me.

  The person above me is trying to tell me something, that much I can tell by their mouth opening and closing rapidly. But I can't understand what they're trying to say. The sounds are confusing and indistinct. I recognize a few words. But this one word bothers me. Dead. Over and over again, I hear it repeated. It's seems like the more they say it, the more I understand and grasp it's meaning. Most of the other words remain slurred and incomprehensible though.

  I blink rapidly and groan in protest of all the noise. The face disappeared. Shortly thereafter, I feel a soft impact on my left shoulder followed by a gentle vibrating sensation. The sounds fade into a white noise after that and only one noise that I can't quite place is left behind.

  A moment afterwards, a large, white mass settle down on my other side and soon warmth creeps into my right arm. All I want to do now is close my eyes once more and go back to sleep, this time for a thousand years; but I can't shut out that lingering sound, quiet as it may be.

  I painfully turn my head to the left and immediately wish that I hadn't. Suffocating, orange fuzz partially cuts off my air supply and simultaneously threatens to blind me. But I don't pull away. I lift my left arm and gingerly slip it under Shay's wings, being careful to avoid touching them.

  From what I came make out over Shay's unruly hair, the feathers looked rumpled and some were broken or even missing entirely. I finally notice that his primary feathers are streaked, and in some cases dripping, with blood. Fresh blood. His muscles twitched and jerked involuntarily, as if from extreme exhaustion or exertion. But I felt his entire body shuddering uncontrollably under my arm.