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The Raiders have Momoa tucked away in a quiet corner of their lair while the allotted month trickles painfully by. The light of the sky comes and goes over the jagged edges of the rocky ring above their heads. Momoa doesn't move a muscle, save for the regular rise and fall of her chest as she continues to slumber on.
Well, the corner where Momoa rests is usually quiet. But not when Jabber sits with her.
He either talks, and talks and talks and talks, barks out a long, loud, very drawn-out laugh, then talks and laughs at the same time. Or he slams down a beatbox he pilfered from some poor schmuck who had the misfortune of becoming a target of Jabber on the table where a solitary glass of water resides and cranks up the volume to the maximum level allowed by Zodyl, filling the space with music with enough beat drops and profanity and endless guitar solos that would jolt Momoa out of her coma if it had been possible.
But Momoa keeps still, but sometimes her eyes flicker behind her eyelids, like she's in the middle of dreaming.
At least, that's what Jabber observed once while lazing around on his watch of Momoa. Cthoni doesn't pay that much attention to Momoa. Everyone else seems to do plenty of that.
Cthoni doesn't see the point in blaring such awful music while they squirrel away in this crevice of the Ground, but Zodyl permits it, so she just has to swallow that down along with Jabber's overly arrogant grin that he throws at her before spinning back around to list every event encountered and thought discovered by Jabber that day.
Jabber talking to Momoa is not an uncommon thing. The two of them would often spend time together before Momoa's coma, Momoa apparently using it at a way to distract herself from all the thoughts belonging to other people crowding in on her own thoughts, seeming to find Jabber only mildly irritating.
Sometimes, the need for such distractions would grow so dire that Momoa would mumble nonsense to herself, or call one of them a name none of them have ever heard before, or wake up screaming in the middle of the night, unable to calm down until someone grips her by the shoulders, or holds her close, and reminds her of who she is.
The first action would be done by Zodyl. The second is Jabber's preferred weapon of choice. Momoa would usually respond faster to Jabber's method, which Cthoni doesn't think is very respectful of her, considering Zodyl is their boss, their king, and a better man than Jabber in every conceivable way.
But Cthoni is digressing now.
So now Zodyl will sit by Momoa's side like he had stationed himself in front of that television before, staring at Momoa as if his powerful gaze would be enough to stir Momoa out of her state. It isn't, yet he sits by her side everyday until Jabber comes to relieve him of his post, first dragging the chair around to the other side of Momoa, then crashing into the chair with his typical boundless energy too sloppy to contain.
His arm is still broken, but with his other hand, he'll toy around with Momoa's limp hand, the one not holding her jinki, experimenting with cupping his entire hand around hers or interlacing their fingers together; it's probably the reason he moved the chair around. It's not the first time Cthoni has seen the two of them holding hands, and it makes her think that Jabber may miss Momoa more than he lets on.
Her theory is further supported by Jabber's random expositions.
"Hey, Cthoni," Jabber directs at Cthoni one time he and Zodyl switch posts, Jabber fresh from a mission, still stinking of the outside. Cthoni's eyes trail after Zodyl's retreating form, slinking back into the shadows he finds so comforting. Dawn is coming, the sky lightening above their heads, signaling a time to retreat and rest. Their deeds are better done in the dark.
"What?" Cthoni responds, not bothering to shift much of her attention on to him, not even turning her head, eyes still on Zodyl.
"Do you know Momoa sometimes talks in her sleep?"
Of course Cthoni knows that. The Raiders live in tightly constrained quarters on a good day. And Momoa's night terrors are more frequent than any of them would like. "What of it?" she asks, nothing better to do in this hideout.
"Nothing. Just thought she might when she's like this, but no." Jabber speaks like he's bored, but that itself is a giveaway: Jabber is never truly bored. His observation almost sounds like a lament, which is something Cthoni had not thought possible of Jabber.
Cthoni cuts a suspicious glance in Jabber's direction. He's sprawled out on the chair in an absurd way that is only ever able to be achieved by Jabber, leaning way too far back, boot planted on the side of the mattress Momoa is lying on. His cast is lolling off in a very lopsided way, indicating that he had been unwisely messing around with it again. His head is thrown back, dark dreadlocks suspended behind the chair. He stares up at the hole in the sky, their only connection to the outside world. His expression is unreadable, as usual, but even Cthoni can discern the tinge of sadness somewhere deep in the edges that make up Jabber.
"She's comatose, not asleep," Cthoni says matter-of-factly. She doesn't like sappiness, and she already doesn't like much about Jabber in general.
"Wonder what that's like," muses Jabber absentmindedly. "Must be hella boring. Can't feel shit. But ah well. Hopefully she's lost in that world she likes so much."
The legs of the chair slam down on the rock, and Jabber slumps forward, reaching out his good hand to flick on the beatbox, bringing on that 'world' of Momoa's. The same brash, jarring music punches through the air. The light outside is growing brighter. Jabber sinks down and lays his head against Momoa's arm, forehead resting in the space between her arm and abdomen. In seconds, he's asleep, the unearthly sounds he usually makes unheard in the blast of the music.
Cthoni wrinkles her nose for a second. Then she writes it off as weird, insignificant, like she normally does with anything concerning Jabber, and goes to stand by Zodyl, awaiting orders.
Momoa doesn't know where she is. She feels like she's stuck in a maze. She feels this way. That's all it is. The feeling of confusion. No images, no smells, nothing else. Just confusion enveloping her like a shell. Confusion, and voices. The usual whispers, groaning, chattering that occupy her brain. All that noise, even when it's dark and still.
Distantly, she feels like she can hear... music? Somewhere.
The beat of the music is its only saving grace. She grabs at her own thought, absorbs it more than thinks it.
The music sounds like something Jabber would listen to.
In this dark and unexplainable confusion...
It feels nice.