Ander - Part 4: Subchapter 2
2
- gasped for breath, his remaining eye open and staring. His first instinct was to get up, to get moving, to lash out, but he felt... tired... so tired... like he could barely move his arms.
Banno closed his eye and took a long, slow breath, forcing air back into his lungs like he always used to be able to force anything, willing it to give him the strength he wanted.
He got air, but that was all. With a dawning sense of horror and disgust, Banno realized that he was feeling something he had never felt before, something he never would have believed could even be possible. He felt...
... weak.
He groaned and tried to move his arms and legs. His muscles were sore and aching, but it wasn't the pain that stopped him. He didn't give a damn about the pain. It was his lack of strength that kept him from getting up. It was like his strength wasn't there anymore, like it was -
(dead)
- gone.
Banno ground his teeth together. He didn't like this feeling, this weakness wrapped around his body like chains. He tried to move again, but all he got for his troubles was that annoying shot of pain in every muscle and a strange whispery noise.
Wait, what was that? He heard that before, while he was still uncon... sleeping. That whispery sound every time he moved, not water, but...
Banno opened his eye, angered by the sheer amount of energy it took to accomplish a feat as minor as that.
The first thing he saw was the whispery thing on top of him, some kind of white pelt, but not_a pelt. A blanket, maybe? Not important. He looked straight up and saw planks of slanted wood. To the left and right, also planks of wood, not all that different from the walls back home, but horizontal and smooth. In one corner was some kind of big square thing with a little handle in it. Was that supposed to be a tiny gate? He had no idea, but it, too, was wooden. Everything was wood. He was _surrounded by wood. He couldn't see the floor, but he bet that was wood, too.
If he wasn't feeling so awful, he might have been more concerned with where he was, but right now all he could think about was his pounding headache, the burn in his throat, and an overwhelming sense of fatigue. He felt hot and feverish, and not only that, he was thirsty. And hungry. By the Cora, he hasn't felt this hungry in years. And then there was the plain old cruddiness that came with being stupendously sick. He hated being sick. It was one of the few things he had no control over, and he hated that! He hated relying on Mother and all her noxious medicines, he hated being laid up on his cot, not being able to do the things he normally did, and he really hated feeling so... vulnerable. Of course, he wasn't really vulnerable. He couldn't be vulnerable. Being Banno and being vulnerable were mutually exclusive, but still.
He didn't like it. Not one bit.
This thing he was lying on wasn't a cot, though. It was much too soft for that. Banno ran his hands back and forth underneath the blanket, feeling the texture. It was some kind of woven material, but ridiculously fine.
Where in the world...?
Banno looked around again, but slower, trying to find more clues as to his whereabouts.
To the left was a medium sized block of wood, almost like a table, but solid, and beyond that was a square hole in the wall he had missed before, with sunshine pouring in. He could see part of the Cora through it, but it looked weird. Different. It took him a while to realize it was backwards, which could only mean that the mountain had either flipped itself around while he was out, or he had somehow ended up on the wrong side.
Well, he couldn't stay here forever. Banno tried to sit up, but failed spectacularly. He could barely twitch his muscles, let alone lift his entire body. It felt like somebody had dropped that backwards Cora on his head.
"Urrr..." he grumbled, painstakingly working his arm free from underneath the weird blanket. When he finally got it loose, he placed it against his forehead and tried to rub his headache away -
There was something wrapped around his head.
Oh, what now? Banno traced it with his fingers, trying to figure out what had been done to him. It felt like a long strip of cloth, wrapped all the way around his head and over his eye. The broken one. Heh, maybe 'broken' was too optimistic. What he really should be calling it was 'gone'. He could actually feel the emptiness in there, like a bubble. If he pushed his finger against the cloth, it would probably dent quite a ways inside, not that he had any intention of doing so. The other end, though... that was a different story.
Banno lifted his tongue and pressed the tip against the roof of his mouth, working it backwards, sweeping it left and right, looking for Ander's little goodbye present. He found it near the back: a clean little slit, and it felt much smaller than he remembered. He stuck his finger inside his mouth and explored the edges, just to make sure, sticking the tip of his claw inside the hole. There was a lot of pain, but it was his gag reflex that made him pull back. The last thing he wanted to do right now was throw up. He looked at his claw, the tip all bloody, and then licked it clean. He didn't like the taste of his own blood, but he hated seeing it outside his body even more. Best to get it back inside, where it belonged, and not do that again. Oh no, definitely not.
"But Daaaad!" a voice suddenly reached his ears from outside. It sounded quite young, and very distressed. "Whyyy!?"
"Because it's the right thing, of course." This one sounded older. Male. "I know I raised you two better than that."
"You weren't there when it grabbed me," a third voice said. This one sounded strangely familiar, but Banno couldn't quite put his finger on it. It was like a voice heard only once in a dream long ago.
"I would have grabbed you too if you were poking around in my eye. Honestly, what were you thinking?"
"Oh but it was Tim who started it!"
"Nuh-uh!"
A strange sound, sort of a... thuddy clack, and suddenly their voices were much louder. They were inside.
"I don't care who started it, you're both just as guilty. And I expect you to give him an apology when he wakes up."
"But he nearly killed me!"
"He picked you up. After you rooted around in his head. I'd hardly call that an attempt at murder. Poor fellow must have been scared out of his mind, waking up in a strange place with all those wounds..."
"Wounds!? How about my wounds!? He nearly broke my wrist!"
"You shoved a stick in his mouth."
"By the gods, Dad, that's Tim again!"
"Nuh-uh! I said that would be disrespectful, but you wouldn't listen!"
"You little liar, I said that!"
The voices were coming closer. Banno could feel his heartbeat speed up in his chest, could feel the familiar heat rise in his cheeks. His mouth started to water, like right before a good hunt. But he didn't feel energised, he felt drained. His muscles tensed of their own accord, but he was too weak to use them. Just lying here, listening to their approaching footsteps was making him feel lightheaded, like he would go to sleep again, against his will...
The world was starting to blur... and every time he blinked his solitary eye in an attempt to clear it, it would take longer and longer for it to open again...
The handle in the gate turned and the slab of wood started to swing open. Banno tried to sit up yet again, and failed just as miserably as last time. His head throbbed, his heart raced, sweat poured down his temple, his breathing was heavy and laboured, but none of that mattered. He did not know what was coming for him, he did not know what manner of creature was right on the other side of that creaking slab of wood, but even if he couldn't move, even if he couldn't open his jaws to bite down on the flesh of whoever or whatever was foolish enough to approach him, even if he was on the verge of that emptiness that would consume the world in his absence, he would not be denied this final taste. He was Banno. He licked his lips in anticipation, watching as the gate revealed his prey, inch by inch, first an arm, then a leg, then -
There was a little girl, almost completely hidden behind the gate she had pushed open so slowly with her tiny, delicate little hands. Black hands, in sharp contrast to the rest of her yellow-orange fur. A pretty little thing. A petite little thing. She peeked around the gate, staring at him with an eye so wide it almost seemed to take up half her face. They regarded each other, one eye to one eye, until her shock gave way to fear. But Banno didn't mind. He liked that spark of fear. It made her look even prettier...
"Daaaad!!" she suddenly yelled and slammed the gate shut. Her voice just as pretty as the rest of her, despite its piercing volume. "Dad! He's awake! Daaad!"
Hey, come back here... Banno tried to say. Let me see all of you... Let me touch you... Let me taste you...
The blanket resting on his body felt heavy, even heavier than the water that had tried so hard to drown him, pressing down from above, pulling down from below, getting heavier... flowing like a river... covering everything in its icy cold... a black cold... black... black like her delicate little hands...
Banno drifted away, floating on the currents of unconsciousness, a Wolf perfectly aware of the tremendous amount of pain radiating throughout his body, but more concerned with his inability to get up, to run... to chase...
To feed...
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