Jonah woke with a gasp, his eyes wincing at the bright sunlight filling the area he was in. He might as well have been dead and was so surprised he drew breath again. His physical reaction was restrained, a gown covering him, a blanket across his body, they might as well have been made of iron. Heartbeat slowing, his thoughts swirled, trying his best to spring himself from this restriction. All that would move was his head and he saw an IV tube running into his arm, saw the glass bottle of clear fluid. Glass? That alone caught his attention and confusion, his vision already blurry. Blinking brought clarity and he looked down the bed he laid on to see an old timey couch of red cloth and golden wood lining. Panic surged through him, seeing a tiger so close to him. This had to be a dream, it had to be.

Within the blink of an eye the tiger was replaced by white house cat. Whatever had been draped over its back, flopped down to the couch. All he could see was a shock of dark red hair and a set of feet poking out the other side. He snapped out of a layer of restraint, sitting up numbly on his elbows a few inches from the pillow.

The redheaded figure groaned, looking at him with a drunken expression. A girl, a young woman, chest messily restrained in a wrap of cloth, hair lumped against her face, drool down her lips. After a few seconds her eyes grew wider and she blinked rapidly. Getting up, she wrapped the blanket around her body.

“Aiko, entertain him, go, do something! Give me a moment,” she said in a loud, proper voice. She wiped at her face, bolting into a small doorway, it slammed with a crash.

The white cat hopped up beside Jonah, mewing. His eyes went all over the room, taking in this new cell. Vaguely he felt motion, noticing a subtle creak and shift in the furniture. Through the window was a passing sky, clouds high above them. The chemicals, drugs or whatever, had begun to fade on him. He sat up at the waist, his body felt so weak, but there was strength in his lower arms and legs. Then he lifted his arm and cried out at the steel limb.

“Calm down, it’s far worse than the alternative,” came the woman’s voice, much closer than before.

“Did you just fucking talk?” he asked, his voice tinny and underused.

The cat opened its mouth. “No, Aiko did not, but I did. She is my familiar,” the projected voice said.

Jonah went shuffling out of the bed, his weak body sliding off it and slamming into the floor. Feebly he tried to raise himself, but his limbs were clumsy, so he stumbled like a newborn horse. His heart beat pounded in his ears. Two strong arms looped under him and plopped him on the bed. In his fear he hadn't heard any doors open. Sitting down, he was face to face with a tiny woman and her cherub face in some sort of surreal nurse outfit. The short pointed ears caught his attention, they looked so real.

“Jonah, is it?” the small woman said, waving at him.

“What?” he asked.

The woman shook her head, checking on his IV. “You’re lucky this detaches, the rest of the tube is still in there,” she said, patting his arm. Her small gloved hands tapped at his arm, going down to the metal. “Feel that?”

He was so stunned he couldn’t think or answer.

Smiling, the woman pinched his nose until he had to gasp for air, he defensively swatted at her hand and she moved it out of the way. “Good, now can you tell you’re not dreaming?” she wondered.

Air filled his lungs and he admitted that it felt quite real. “I’m sorry, what’s going on, where am I?” he said, looking around. He was so tired and hungry, but he couldn’t go back to sleep.

“Honey, you’ve been out for weeks. That long in stasis will turn anyone loopy,” she said, shaking her head. “Should have taken that damn mechanic to see one of his friends to help finish his work. That would have taken longer than two weeks…” She sighed.

“Stasis? Am I in the future, what the fuck?” he asked.

“He keeps swearing, it must be his custom,” said the other woman as she sprung from the smaller room. The blanket was tied at her shoulder, like a college frat boy wearing a bedsheet toga.

“Miss, can you imagine what it would be like if you were in such a state for so long?” the small woman asked.

The redhead, who had combed her hair and put on some kind of light makeup, frowned. “I wished I could be in one a lot recently,” she said.

“I understand that, but this boy is from another world, he must be horribly confused,” the nurse said. “I am Kalyah, and this is Princess Diana, we helped to heal you. You came to us missing all your limbs, now you are not.” She gestured down to his arms and legs.

He lifted his hand, opening and closing his new mechanical fingers. Another world? Missing limbs? He felt faint and started to collapse forward. The two women grabbed a side of him and slid him back onto the bed.

“Oh goddess, he had enough Spores to kill a horse and hasn’t eaten in weeks. He’s lucky to have gotten this far,” Kalyah said, shoving pillows behind him. Was she an elf? Being so short, was she like a tree elf? Like a cookie elf? What did that make the other girl? He couldn’t see her ears, but they could have been pointy.

“Why are you squinting at me?” Diana asked, taking a seat where her cat was before. Now it jumped on her lap, mewing as she petted its head.

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“The windows are so damn bright, it didn’t matter when he couldn’t wake up at all,” Kalyah said, rushing over to the windows. With a turn of the porthole ring, the light ceased and nothing could be seen through the glass at all.

“You still squint,” Diana said, her pale skin and blanket dress now washed in the lonely light from the bathroom. “What’s wrong? Do you hurt? You can speak, but I suspect your throat is dry.” She spoke much softer, head turned in curiosity.

The nurse sat on the other side, giving him a cup of water. He drank the chill slowly, head swimming with questions while he felt like stagnant water himself. “He’s terribly confused. Honey, why don’t I ask the questions and you just nod or shake your head, okay?” she said.

He nodded.

“You come from another world, right?”

Yes.

“Do you know where you are, world wise?”

No.

“You didn’t mean to travel here?”

No.

“So it was an accident?”

He coughed, she gave him more water. “I crashed my car, then I was in the water,” he said weakly, mouth quickly turning to cotton.

“It’s okay, you don’t need to speak. The Spores we filled you with for the surgery, they dry you out. The IV helps. Can I put it back in?” Kalyah asked.

Yes.

“There, better?” The nurse patted his face lovingly.

Yes.

“Alright, good boy,” she praised, taking hold of his left hand. “Now, nod if you can feel this, okay?”

Yes.

She tapped up his arm with her finger. It was a different kind of sensation than normal, kind of as if he had a thin glove on. The finger touched the metal as fabric, it gave a tiny bit, but in trying to shift it like regular skin it hardly moved one way or the other. She was happy at his nods, removing her glove. “Can you feel the heat?” she asked, gripping him with her palm. He could, but there was still a barrier in place. “Does it feel like your old limb?”

“No,” he said aloud.

Kalyah swallowed. “Not that different though?”

He stared at the cuff of his arm, seeing where the organic met the steel. It was pink, slightly inflamed. He had lost it, his arms hurt so much because they were gone when he crashed his car. They had been cut off. He tried to remember, what had he been doing? Why did he crash? What happened? He remembered the fire, then the cold water. Then nothing, black, oh God, he thought he was dead. He could have died and that would be his last memory.

Jonah jolted, struck by a cold dread. Death could have come for him. All he saw was cold black. That’s all it would be. No one left to mourn for him, no sensation, just the endless black. He shifted around as wildly as his exhausted body would allow him to go, the blanket kicked off of him.

“Honey, honey, it’s okay, it’s okay, you’re safe, you’re fixed, ugh oof,” Kalyah said, trying to hold him down. She had her arms around him and his metal knee caught her in the ribs, not on purpose, he would never hurt her on purpose.

It was Diana that shoved his legs down, gripping his other arm and pinning it to the bed. Or at least he thought it was all her, then a roar tore through the air and he froze up, realizing how much force was on his legs. Kalyah backed off, holding his left forearm as she rubbed at her side. The restraint on his legs set its blue eyes on him, growling low and deep, so forceful that it shook the bed.

Jonah straightened out, hair on the back of his neck raised as he stared at the tiger. He had never seen one so close, but the last time he had seen one in real life was ingrained into him. A primal fear. The last tiger was behind a flimsy fence, not motivated to break the chain link, but it could, if it wasn’t fed. At least according to the zoo handlers. That apex predator had satisfied itself by growling at the audience, bringing out shrieks from the young crowd. He was older than the other kids, they had forgotten while he never did. His young mind was terrified that every tall grass had a tiger lurking in it.

“She won’t harm you, none of us will,” Diana said evenly, taking a seat on the bed. She stroked the tiger’s back as it ceased its growling. “Can you feel her on your legs?” Her soft features could get so harsh and cold.

He nodded, whimpering. Tears had formed from the fear of dying, and they had yet to stop.

“Oh goddess, stop it Diana, he’s been through enough. Call your beast off!” Kalyah commanded.

“He’s got far more to worry about than my bloody familiar,” Diana defended. “He’s arrived on a ship set out for war.”

Kalyah huffed. “Hardly, we’re stuck doing miserable reconnaissance,” she said, wiping at Jonah’s face with a clean cloth. “You read your histories, you know that Blodwyn was able to hide for months at a time. And that was two hundred fucking years ago. I can only imagine what resources the Order has now!” The little nurse patted his face, shaking her head. “Off to war…”

Diana’s expression warped into such a pained sadness and fury, a tear running down her face. She snapped up from the bed, gathering up a pile of clothing and hard looking wood and padded to the door.

“Where are you going?” Kalyah cried.

“To bathe and put on my bloody armor! The Witch wanted to see him when he woke up. I want to see if she has any news,” she said, leveling her tone with each statement after the first. She took a deep breath. “I was assigned here without my consent, I have better things to do. I did enough already…” She snapped her fingers at the tiger.

It looked back, snorting, staying put.

“Why?! Why won’t you leave him be!?” she screamed.

“Keep that Witch out of here,” Kalyah said firmly.

Diana wrenched the door open, bringing in a powerful column of sun beams. “She’s coming here anyway,” she said and left, leaving the door cracked.

“That ancient wretch is not going to pester you,” Kalyah assured him, stomping to the door. She opened and shut it just as it started to move in.

Jonah stayed focused on the tiger, who looked placidly at him. In a sudden collapse it was gone and the cat was back. Mewing at him, it pushed its head into his chest. It kept going until he lifted his arm and scratched at its head with the slight lip of his mechanical fingertips.

“Are you trying to tell me you aren’t scary?” he said, coughing. “You aren’t trying to eat me?”

“Meow.”

“Huh, I see…” he said blankly.

Its paws climbed his chest, eye to eye with him. “Mew!”