Chicken Scratch

ETA: I just noticed there is a love meme going. Thank you for your comments, and I got through a few on my DWircle this morning. I intend to pick up tonight until everyone's been acknowledged! <3

I am failing hard at NaNo. Like so hard. But I made a couple of snippets, so here:

1. Other Nations
You awake prostrate with your head swimming and a sick in your gut you haven't felt since you were a child rocked by waves as your vessel approached its first shore. How is the world too bright and too dim all at once? Everything is darkness edged in blinding light, and when you lift your head, the distorted images trip clumsily before your eyes. Where they settle, you think you see the silhouette of another person, hunched over, their back turned to you. You open your mouth to speak; your jaw does not oblige you, but instead offers the sensation of things shifting wrongly and agony so sharp and intense that it is, for a moment, the only thing of clarity in your world. Then you find yourself awakening - apparently, because the unfamiliar figure is gone - with the same bleary-headedness but your pain dulled the way frigid fingertips lose sensation: with the acknowledgement of damage just beyond the numbness.

You understand injury before you can recall the circumstances that yielded it, and the sinking sensation is more than just a drift in and out of consciousness. There is no medic, and you are days of travel from Vortex.

--Don't insult us.-- You startle as an unfamiliar voice scolds you: the voice of a Transcendent, heard in the mind and without the ear. You attempt to rise, to find the source, but lifting your head makes your vision tunnel and your throat to spasm; it is only under the threat of the inevitable pain that you choke back the urge to vomit. --And don't try to sit up. I will come to you.--

You see movement more than form, and as you struggle to squint to sharpen the image, you feel the tug of something encrusted over your left eye - realize, for the first time, that you have not been able to see out of it at all. You fumble for your own face, wince when your fingers touch your swollen brow and come away slick and ruddy.

--I did not prioritize the laceration,-- explains the stranger. --To be perfectly honest, I have only provided you with pain relief and a place to rest. I am sure you understand, Raftian, that resources are scarce and should not be wasted on those who will not survive.-- A face looms closer; you find sharper ears and a longer snout than you've seen so far in Sobak. --But I think, Ambassador, that you will make it.--

The stranger moves beyond your field of vision, so you look up, trying to get a feel for your surroundings. There is a distant, hollow whistling noise, and the source of the light you squint away from appears to come from high above you. The air feels cooler and more humid than that of the border lands, and while the stranger attending you does not speak, his movements have a resonant quality.

--It's a cave, a sort of pocket in the rock of the earth,-- he explains before you can wonder further. --I don't suppose you've encountered many on Vortex.-- A chuckle rumbles through your mind. --Personally, I dislike the humidity, but they do keep a more stable temperature, and this one has built-in lighting.-- He points above you. --I'm sure you're too concussed to see it clearly, but there is an opening in the rock, far above us. It provides sunlight even this far underground. Though one drawback of natural lighting is that I'll have to do my work quickly now that it seems as though you should make it. I hate to operate in the dark.--

The words alarm you. Operate? Here? With no medic?

The stranger snarls at the thought. --I happen to be one of the most experienced and honored military medics in all of Sobak; you're lucky I even agreed to see you, Raftian. Borz must truly care for you to have sent for me; surely Vortex doesn't pose enough of a threat to justify squandering resources on one of its Ambassadors.--

You are not sure which strikes you as more peculiar: that this stranger purports Borz's caring, or that she is not here, doubtless to snarl some admonishment rather than to offer comfort. You attempt to sit up again and make it as far as propping yourself on your elbows, arms trembling and lips pinched tight with the threat of vomiting. You try to say Borz and get as far as a garbled grunt that is choked off as pain anew courses through your jaw. Your face is still partially numb, but you feel saliva dribbling down your chin. Rough hands that take no caution not to pinch your flesh with claws force you back against the... for the first time, you actually feel what is beneath you; the scratchy sensation under your sweating palms suggests a thick pad of cut grass. You can not fathom wasting so much plant life for the sake of providing comfort to one person.

--Do not attempt to speak. Your jaw is broken, and as I have already mentioned, it has not yet been set.-- The medic's teeth are close enough to your face that you can see them bared clearly in a threat. His breath is hot against your cheek, the odor not helpful to your nausea. --As for Borz, she will come to see you later. She has some diplomatic matters to attend to on account of biting an Adui national in your defense.-- His tone is amused at that, and his lips relax over his fangs. --I don't know if your Vortexan doctors ever told you this, but it is disadvantageous to your health to anger anyone from Adu. I would recommend against it in the future.--

You wish you could speak to defend yourself; the attack was unprovoked.

--I am having fun at your expense, Raftian,-- the medic clarifies gently. --Even I understand that your mere presence is provocation enough for some.--

2. Raze: Vol 3
Vincent kept his shoulder pressed lightly against mine as we took our seats at the bar. Herschel had already been instructed by Lucille to make no significant show of our acquaintance, but he smiled warmly as he brought us our drinks, and squeezed my hand when he passed me my glass. He lingered close as he idled behind the bar without speaking; it was a slow night with few customers, though this did not make him abandon caution. As I took a sip, Vince smiled at me, his head cocked in an affectionate sort of way, and said, "I've missed this."

I winced. "You know I'm not staying."

He shrugged. "So you say." Flashing a charismatic grin, he added, "I don't believe you."

I finished my glass and asked for another. Herschel frowned, and it took me a moment to understand the meaning of his hesitation. "I believe that maxim only applied while I was still part of the pack," I said, speaking quietly enough that other non-human ears in the room should not have heard. Then I tapped my glass on the bar and pushed it his way. "Another, please."

He reluctantly obliged my request.

"Keeping your mind sharp for sleuthing, I see?" Vince teased, though his face grew more serious as he added, "You have the smell about you of someone who perhaps favors alchohol too much."

I wrinkled my nose in distaste. "I've barely had a drink since arriving."

He prodded the base of my ribs with one finger. "Just because that therian liver can heal itself doesn't mean you aren't stressing it. I'm sure Herschel knows the smell of a drunk as well." He glanced to the other man for backing, who found an excuse to be absorbed in cleaning a glass. Vincent heaved a sigh. "You're not happy, and it saddens me." Quietly, he added, "Won't you come home?"

The conversation was putting a taste in my mouth more bitter than the liquor. "This is one hell of a welcome," I replied sharply. "I didn't come here for accusations."

"Mmm." He purred as he took a sip of his own drink, looking up at my from the rim of his cup with brows raised. "That does beg the question, why are we here?"

I cracked a smile. "Well, I was hoping to play you at your own game, get you drunk enough to do something you'd normally oppose - but I can tell you're wise to me."

He tapped the side of his nose. "Testing a theory, more. Thanks for the confirmation, though." He leaned against the bar on one elbow, chin propped on his palm. "I would be angry, but I suppose if I can't handle what I dish out... tell me, what is that you wanted me to do?"

I glanced around the room; there were three other patrons. One was having a lively conversation on his cell phone on a matter of business; his own volume was enough that he wouldn't hear us. The other two were a couple who were surely too busy indiscreetly groping one another through their clothing to listen in on a chat between two friends seated at the bar. Deciding it safe enough, I leaned closer. "I spoke to Bridget earlier. She said that pret traffickers look specifically for identification numbers - not the legal, government sort, but signs of ownership. Ear notches. Lip tattoos. Brands. The kind of marks people nobody will miss have." His lip twitched with anger at the mere subject. I proceeded. "I need to be authentic; nothing can rouse the buyer's suspicion."

Vincent's eyes widened in alarm. "Surely you're not suggesting..."

I rested my hand on his shoulder. "Vincent. Would you do the honor of branding an old friend?" Thinking on it a moment as he fumbled for a response, I added, "Or, hell, if it's easier to think of it that way: how about a deserving bastard?"