Note: I know nothing about brains and brain injuries. This is fanfiction and I made it up based on what I figured would sound about right in a magic world
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Chapter 118
One day awake
The first day was the hardest. Valkyrie's family stayed at the hospital, sleeping there uncomfortably, at least in Tanith's case, and waiting for Valkyrie brain to essentially 're-wire' itself. 'Re-wiring' was the best way Nadia knew to describe it, but Civet used big, medical words when he spoke to the Dead Men or his husband or Doctor Kenspeckle.
'Re-wiring' was easier. Valkyrie relearnt within an hour how to control her facial expressions and had a quick memory jog when she poked herself in the eye and remembered that it hurt and not to do it.
Kenspeckle had made up and had given to Civet, who gave it to Valkyrie, a lumpy, disgusting mixture that was standard to use on coma or memory loss patients. It was slow acting, they said, and had been used for centuries. Throughout the day and that night, Valkyrie took gulps of it to speed up her recovery.
Her first fit of anger had been the worst. Nadia had been taking a break on her bed, her own rather than snuggled up with her girlfriend, staring at the ceiling and unable to sleep, and Dexter had been reading to Valkyrie. She'd been captivated at first, staring with her mouth open and drooling, seemingly happy to listen, but when Dexter closed the book at the end of the chapter, she had begun screaming and hitting.
Nadia had hated it and ran to the waiting room while Valkyrie's brothers restrained her. Civet had run it and helped, telling them to keep calm and giving Valkyrie a mild sedative that made her sleepy and passive. It had shaken Nadia massively to see the anger on Valkyrie's pretty face, but she had known there was a chance of it happening. Valkyrie was like a small child at that point, and just like a child, she demonstrated her emotions more so than her voice. It just had scared her.
The second day was far, far better, though much, much harder. Valkyrie, during her sleep, had worked out how to eat with her hands, albeit messily, and how to grin, and how to point and demand basic things. In a toddler, it would be cute, but in an almost full-grown woman with the physique of a six-foot-plus lightweight bodybuilder, it was incredibly difficult. And that was before the cringing when Valkyrie had a temper tantrum and screamed her lungs out that she couldn't have a syringe or dirty bowl or be hugged all day.
The hugging part was cute. Her brothers spent the whole day sitting on the floor with an arm around her, cushions all over the floor to make sure Valkyrie was safe. Unfortunately, she hadn't worked out her own strength yet and Nadia couldn't hug Valkyrie because of it. She'd had her hair pulled and it hurt too much to try again. She couldn't blame Valkyrie – she reminded herself of that when she'd cried – because Valkyrie was currently not herself. But she wished more every hour for the moment Valkyrie would be whole again.
.*****.
Three days awake
Nadia was in the waiting room taking a breather when she heard footsteps coming up the stairwell. She put on a smile because that was polite, but it fell away when she saw who it was.
"Nadia," Ghastly said, taking his hat off. He looked miserable and had black bags under his eyes.
"Have you been in a fight?" She asked instead of a greeting. She was not a friend of his right now.
YOU ARE READING
Skulduggery Pleasant: Raising Cain
Fanfic(This story is written as a fanfiction, but can be read as a story without having read any of the books.) Valkyrie Cain, the adoptive daughter of the Dead Men, has had a life full of love and magic. But as she gets older, times become scarier and sh...
