faderift | [open] general hospital: envy edition

"Needs must, we can take on each other." Har har.

But, he nods. He can make it to the courtyard.

Practical, the arm he has across Abby's shoulders, where he makes no attempt to burden her less for the sake of his pride. She is nearly of a height to him, sturdy and sure despite concussions, and likewise, the hand he has clasped at her opposite shoulder is secure without digging in desperately.

Occasionally, he wanders his other hand out to a wall or a corner edge, tentative in keeping a light weight on the foot between them.

"No one mentioned the teleporting," he grouses after a while as they go. "That was unfair."

"That was fucked up," is general consensus. "I didn't know they were that fast." She hasn't fought very many demons before; the ones that come out of rifts sure, but they didn't teleport like that, they threw their weight around, they charged and you could get your weapon up before they fell upon you. There was time. Abby has one arm free and she touches the back of her head gingerly, brushing her fingertips up, feeling the dried blood in her hair with some relief. It might have stopped bleeding already.

Outside it is much brighter. She squints; it makes the headache worse. When she forgets to keep her head cocked to one side, Loxley's horn bumps against her temple.

She says, "Here," and finds a spot for him to sit, a stone bench onto which she helps lower him, slowly. "Get your leg up." Elevation is important.

A sound of apology when he senses his horn knocking her already well abused head; the domino effect of him tipping his own out of the way, as they go.

And then, glad to sit, a breath of relief and thanks gusting out of him. Scarlet has bloomed dense and damp somewhere around the knee and then heaving streamed downwards to soak through the cuff and fill his boot on their short walk. Still, his tone of silver skin hasn't taken on the ashier quality it can get when in true dire straits, and he lifts his leg up onto the bench under its own power.

Slumps back on his hands, showing fanged teeth briefly as he tips that knee aside to evaluate the damage done to his trousers, both the blood and the slash to the fabric.

"You'll be kind or admiring of the scars I already have around this area, I hope," he says, and sets about one-handedly undoing the sash around his waist. "I've yet to meet a fight that didn't spend some time below the belt."

Abby snorts, which is meant to be her agreeing. Conversationally, "What's your worst one?" Scar, she means. Everybody she knew from back home had a worst scar, a best story, a scariest near-miss; survivors collect each other's like trading cards.

There is a leather pouch at her waist that she digs into while he busies himself with pant-leg and sash. After unpicking the tie, things come out of it, a little tin which she puts on the edge of the bench, a spool of waxy thread and curved needle accompanying it, dried elfroot (essential) and a little vial she passes to him.

It smells strongly of alcohol. "For your leg, or drinking."

She doesn't care which.

The water pump is for wetting a square of clean cloth, but Abby washes her hands methodically first, taking the time to make sure that demon gunk is well and truly out from underneath her fingernails.

The sash is a colourfully patterned thing, all warm hues—golds, reds, plus a thread of cyan, so not even a little bit stealthy. Ever since he appeared in Thedas, shaped into a species he had never heard of before and the luxurious brown-gold of his skin tone drained to grey, his choice of garments have gotten more colourful. Today, minus the sash, loosely folded and set aside, he's a little plainer, but for the addition of fresh blood.

Very fetching. Seemingly without mind for being in the courtyard (or confidence in the relative decency of whatever he's wearing underneath), Loxley unbuttons his trousers as he thinks, still swallowing around the taste of biting alcohol.

"A devil woman speared me with her tail," he decides on. "In the chest. This was back home. The second worst was when a drunk stabbed me in the thigh several months back, and I had to explain it to Richard."

He shuffles to push trousers down his hips with the intent to gather around the knees, or lower, where his boots will catch it. His drawers beneath, dark blue with some light patterning to the stitching, stop high up on the thighs, which makes the new slash that arcs just above a knee easily accessed—besides the mess of half-dry, half-wet blood caked to the skin—and exposes the scar in question, a neatly healed seam that might have done considerable damage if it went up much high.

His breath out is sharp and impatient for the blood. "I can get this tidier, first," he offers. No sponge baths needed. "If you've another rag."

It seems overly saturated against his skin, drawing Abby's eye when she comes back with wet hands and a damp rag. Loxley's legs are bare where his trousers have been pushed down, calves held tense, doing their job of holding his wound as still as possible. Above it, that drunk stabbing is outlined, thin and dark against his thigh, a near fucking miss by anybody's standards. She breathes out. "Shit."

Had to explain it to Richard, huh. She passes him the rag as she says, "Did he...?"

You know... Did he do that thing she isn't allowed to talk about and hasn't talked about, even post Dickerson disappearance?

Now she's hunting for another rag, taking another little wooden container out of her kit, digging her fingernails into the tiny seam to remove the lid. She sniffs; it seems good. It goes near the other supplies. There's the other rag—

In the considering of positioning, wondering how best to crouch and put needle point against skin (facing him? Her back to him?), Abby realises she's been staring at his thighs, watching as he clears the skin of blood enough for her to work, the rag clinging to the shape of his leg, stained. She blinks.

"You good?" What?? Hold on. She clears her throat. "To — start?"

Did he, dot dot dot?

Loxley's sidelong glance is a lazy prompt, otherwise preoccupied in very gently cleaning away blood—pressing the rag to wound gently, letting water loosen where crimson is drying stickily, and dabbing it away. Anyway, he's never been told otherwise—

"Bring me back to life?" he fills in, as he works. "When I got speared, he certainly did. The drunkard's knifing kept, between a hasty healing potion and a very slow walk upstairs."

The mouthful of biting alcohol is already beginning to warm through him—numbing nerve endings, thinning his blood, but he'll take the former at the cost of the latter. Makes a sound that implies that this is about as good as he'll get it, before slouching right back, teeth showing in a vague grimace.

He catches her eye, and goes still.

"Oh," on a delay. "Yes? Is this alright?"

At least he didn't accidentally resort to a 'how do you want me?', though his eyes crinkle in more amusement than anything else. He sure did unthinkingly take off his trousers in the courtyard.

Yeahhh, he did.

Abby presses her tongue into her cheek and says, "Uh huh." Like, it's not bad. He's clearly wounded and Abby is going to be stitching him up, providing clear, undeniable evidence for any passersby: it's not what you think. Obviously. Just a simple needle in the leg moment between coworkers.

When he slumps backward like that, head tipping, the column of his throat briefly flashes her. She swallows. Crouches down beside him.

Conversationally, as she is making sure that antiseptic paste is within easy reach by smearing a glob of it onto the back of her hand, "I watched him do that to somebody else once. Had no idea it was gonna happen, it was the craziest thing I've ever seen."

He has been gone for months now and Abby still has to resist the urge to check over her shoulder. No polite warning before the needle goes in by the way; the first stitch is now halfway done.

It is sublimely painful, that sharp needle piercing already aggravated, torn flesh, no matter how skilled the hand that wields it. Some instinct in him kicks into gear just in time, and so Loxley does not make a sound even as his eyes water, a grimacing glance aside (she's not looking at his face, anyway) before (okay, she will hear this part—) a sharp breath out.

No, no, he's good. What were they talking about? Oh yes, Richard.

For whom he didn't mind making little-bitch-sounds around as much when stitched up from injuries, but he has absolutely no desire to give Abby Anderson the wrong impression.

"It's not extremely common magic even where we're from," he says, once he's certain his voice will come out normal. Save him, alcohol. "But I suppose those of us in this line of work deal with an uncommon amount of corpses. Some of them bound to be friends."

She's actually pretty impressed that all he's doing is breathing about it and holding himself still, because this is a particularly tender spot to be getting a needle in. The wound is protesting already, blood welling up. She's got that rag handy and dabs with it, smears a bit of that paste over where she's been with the needle to soothe it. Shhhh stop bleeding.

Distractions are probably helpful.

"Yeah, that sounds right." Richard did not seem, overall, like an extremely common kinda guy.

"I went there," she adds. Her stitches are good, quick and neat, well practised. Settling into the work. "To where you're from. When we were going to all those different places in the Fade. I nearly got my face chomped off by a man with a snake head, it was fucking scary. Richard helped me kill it."

Ow. Ow. Ow. Owww. Ow-wwuh.

Is what he is thinking, his gaze settling hazily on Abby's shoulder. It would be extremely embarrassing for him to pass out, he reflects, so this motivates a hard blink and a tuning back into the things she is saying as flop sweat prickles cold at his hairline, down his back.

"It was strange being home," Loxley offers, an added strain to his voice. Breathes in, out, continues. "Home-ish. The face chomping is certainly part of it."

But she is skilled, and sure. No sudden too-deep stab, no complaint to issue. He fidgets at the hem of his drawers in a semi-self-conscious fashion, making certain the fabric is sitting right for the sake of decency.

"I understand that yours has its own monsters."

Abby nods, unsure if he's even looking at her; his response has that far-away sound of somebody muscling through pain to deliver it. It was strange being home. Maybe she should have been happy to be back in a place she knew or relieved, some positive response, but she was stressed out the whole time and barely slept. Too worried somebody was gonna walk off and get lost, come back bitten.

(Later she realised that's how she always felt back home, that living in the Gallows has been more relaxing by far and enjoyable; a sobering realisation.)

"I know." He didn't say anything about the pain but he doesn't have to. "I'm nearly done."

She completes another stitch. He's mucking around with his drawers, fidgeting, she can tell out of the corner of her eye but she doesn't dare look. "Yeah. They were face-chompers, too. I guess we have a lot in common."

[open] general hospital: envy edition

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