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“This is the worst.”
The understatement of the century, sitting in a bed at Hyacine's infirmary with a cut so deep into her arm that it hasn’t stopped bleeding yet. Or aching. Or shaking slightly because of the aching.
It’s not exactly Stelle's fault she got a bit distracted during combat, nor is it her fault her bat went flying out of her grip because she wasn’t holding it tightly enough. There’s a lot of coincidences there, she’ll tell you should you ask, and there was nothing she could do! It was entirely unavoidable!
Hyacine’s worry isn’t, though.
“Please stay still while I look at it, Grayie…”
Stelle can’t help but groan, she hates staying still for too long.
Though the careful touch of Hyacine’s hands upon her skin is grounding and the healing uttered by her soft voice all the comforting, it’s still more of an annoyance than anything else – just a scratch, really, even if it runs down from her upper arm to her wrist.
Little Ica does their best, nuzzling her cheek with a quiet and hopeful du du! and yet it doesn't help settle the restlessness.
“Hyacine…” She groans, trying to pull her arm back and yet she finds the physician's grip firmer than ever, essentially trapping her in place.
“Don't, Grayie. This is a really serious injury and you won't be escaping this time!”
This time, she says, because the last one was only found out about once Dan Heng walked into their room and found her cleaning blood off the floor with a towel while it was still dripping from her leg.
Little Ica settles upon her lap, crooning up at her at an attempt of distraction. Unfortunately for the little companion, Stelle is bored out of her mind.
“Can I go now? You bandaged it already.” She almost whines, trying not to squirm too much. “It’ll be okay anyway, this is nothing!”
Hyacine has to pause right then, before she looks up from her work with an uncharacteristically deep frown. Stelle almost flinches, but she's seen worse – namely that one time she accidentally scrambled several documents at the archives while looking for information on her favorite gacha game.
Go figure, Dan Heng has a menacing glare.
“You could have lost your arm from this, Stelle.” Hyacine says and her voice, for once, seems to grow a tone deeper and several degrees graver. “Or worse, even. If Phainon hadn't seen you get hurt, would you have even come to me in the first place?”
Caught red handed, Stelle clicks her tongue as she looks away.
“Don’t worry, I've done this before, see?” It takes but a swift movement to reach underneath her shirt and lift it. “Didn't kill me, so this puny cut won't either!”
Hyacine freezes in place, eyes locked onto her chest.
And maybe it's the familiarity with it that turns it into such a casual affair. After all… it has been a while now. Stelle doesn't pay attention to time, not when it doesn't really matter save for remembering birthdays or when Robin's next show will happen so she can mope around all day until March's back, so when it comes to this…
The scar is probably faded, the once reddened skin growing lighter and grayer. It seemed quite nasty the last time she looked at it properly, what, two years ago? But by now… it shouldn't look too bad.
The last scar Cocolia left on her is healed, has been for quite a while now, and Stelle survived being dead quite spectacularly if you were to ask her!
She grins, confident down to her core. “I'm not dying to some nobody out in the Tide!”
But Hyacine doesn't match her energy.
Rather, she stares a little bit and her eyes don't trail away as one would have expected them to. Little Ica, on their part, flies to her side just as quickly.
“...Grayie, what happened to give you this?”
Stelle is suddenly thrown off balance at the blunt question.
“Oh! Uh, um, battle with a very… angry lady?”
An angry lady with a flaming lance – or was it freezing? Stelle doesn't remember it anymore, the memories drowned in a sea of other adventures she's already gone through, but she does remember it was far from pleasant. She remembers feeling something within her grow warm, then the cold against her skin, then sweating, then screaming in pain.
She looks down then, if only to remind herself and indeed, it does still look quite bad.
Under her bra, a blooming web of charred skin stretches outward from the center of her chest, having healed slightly wrong and pulled taut to desperately cover what shouldn't be exposed. The closer to the center the more scorched the very obvious cut becomes and as if serrated, the lance left an impressive trail of spiked drags along the edges of where it pierced, painting a vivid image of what it must have felt like.
Not that Stelle remembers that part. She thinks she heard Welt say something about trauma responses and selective memory, but she was busy with her dailies right as he was talking, so she wasn't really listening.
Hyacine takes a very long moment, almost as if she's gathering her thoughts on it. For a moment Stelle conjures up the image of Natasha, all the way back when they saw each other the day of the departure from Belobog – her worried frown, her instructions on how to care for the still fresh wound, the haunted glint to her eyes as she realized Stelle was supposed to be dead.
Maybe it's what makes Hyacine pause.
Staring at a walking corpse.
She sighs suddenly, shaking her head.
“Grayie, from now on do make sure to come to me, yes?” She asks and it's not really a request so much as it is a promise. If Stelle doesn't come to her, she will come to Stelle, and that will definitely be worse. “Even if you get a very minor cut or bruise, I promise to help you. Please do tell Dan Heng to do the same thing.”
Stelle huffs, a little bit annoyed as she lowers her shirt and hops down from the bed. At least she's free for now.
“Do I really need to?” She clicks her tongue, before Hyacine's chuckle makes her smile a little bit.
“I could always inform Phainon of your refusal, Grayie. Are you sure you can resist the puppy eyes?”
“Me making Snowy sad?” Stelle gasps dramatically, a hand to her chest. “How dare I? Never!”
And it's playful, a little dumb, but still a bit of a promise.
Oh, fine. If it helps you not worry then it'll be okay.
She doesn't notice the way Hyacine is still staring a bit, the way her teeth runs over her lip ever so slightly.
Worry evident upon her gaze.