Two-Thirds Blue

Chapter Nine: Wounds

Dusk awoke lying on his back with an intense headache hurling itself against the inside of his skull. He gave a slight groan at the sudden pain and moved his hands to his head, feeling them sting as his cuts reopened. His entire body was wrought with a bizarre tingling, his stomach turned cartwheels, and a dozen superficial lacerations marked every inch of him.

He took a stab at spitting out the best word he could articulate.

"Gah."

"Hey."

Attempting to peel his eyes open, he turned his neck toward the source of Onyx's voice. His head started beating itself with a hammer.

"You alright?"

He made another valiant attempt to speak.

"Guh."

His eyes refused to open on their own, so he rubbed at them with his hands, and regretted it as his scabbed palms stung in protest. Sunlight flooded into his vision, and his head incited an armed rebellion against him. After a few moments, the blur before him came into focus and morphed into an image of Onyx sitting against a tree.

"So is that a yes or a no?"

He wrestled his tongue into submission. "I'm... feeling sick."

"I didn't know Syk was your type."

Dusk attempted to laugh, but accidentally said guh again, and immediately desisted.

"We haven't moved at all, by the way," Onyx said. "I'd have tried to find somewhere safer but I can't walk on my own." She indicated her leg; it had been hastily splinted with sticks and torn fabric.

Dusk cleared his throat and swallowed. "What happened?"

"You mean the whole sort of..." She gestured vaguely. "...Thing?"

"Yeah." Dusk tried to pull himself upright and then collapsed when his vision spun alarmingly. "That." He put a hand to his searing jaw and found it thick with congealed blood where Delrox's power had first made contact with him.

She shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine."

Dusk squinted at the light filtering through the treetops. "Did it look awesome?"

"What?"

"When we fought Delrox," he said. "Did it look awesome?"

Onyx nodded somberly. "Yes," she said. "It did look awesome."

"Good." He shut his eyes as the light became too much. "That's all that matters."

It was a while before Onyx spoke again. "We've got no food, no water, and no shelter," she said. "We're in worse shape than we were last night, and it's only a matter of time before something finds us. Any ideas?"

Dusk thought he would very much like to remain right where he was and sleep for a year. "How far do you think we can walk?"

"Maybe six or seven steps."

"That's not very far."

"Still, it would be six or seven steps away from where Delrox was."

"You've got a point." Dusk tried to sit up a second time and managed to keep himself from falling.

"Do you think he might come back?" Onyx asked.

Dusk recalled the last few moments before he'd blacked out. "I don't think he will."

"Why not?"

"How much did you see? Something about me was forcing him away. Then every time he got close to me, I sort of..." he waved his hands and made explosion noises with his mouth.