Norbert stared up at the stone roof, white curtains in his periphery on all sides. The groans of people around him filled his ears, combined with the sound of people's shoes squeaking across the floor. The smell of cleanliness hit his nostrils, sticking to the hairs inside.
Sitting up, Norbert’s position does not move at all. His muscles flex as they try to move, but nothing happens. Relaxing his body, Norbert shouts out gurgling noises coming out of his throat.
COUGH COOOOUGH
Norbert moved his tongue, spitting out the saliva and phlegm in his mouth, only to dribble down his cheek. He tried to rub his head on the pillow, but only his eyes moved about as he continued to look up at the ceiling.
An angry garble came out of his mouth as he tried to shout to someone he could hear walking about, not knowing why he couldn’t move. The muscles in his jaw strained as he failed to open his mouth.
He was relaxing, looking internally as he felt the energy inside. Cringing in pain, the channels they had taken frayed and half destroyed; Norbert did not know how that was even possible. Or, more to the point, what happened to him to place his body in this position??
Thinking back to his fight, the last thing he remembered was a bright light, his right arm ripped from his body and the dark orb crumbling from the power.
Moving his eyes to see, feeling them hurt in their sockets as he just saw his hand, laying where it was meant to. He rests his eyes, letting them rise to start the ceiling again. All his options are gone, and he is still unable to move. He closes his eyes and lets the sounds of the hospital wash over him.
***
“And who do we have here?” A voice came from the foot of the bed.
Norbert opened his eyes and saw who the stranger was, not recognising their voice in the hospital nor one of the expected welcomers. The man was standing there, looking at a board, fingers swirling about as they moved whatever was being shown.
The stranger looked up from their notes, eyes locking with Norbert. “Well, look like you’ve finally awoken.”
Norbert tried to sit up but could not sit still, looking about with his eyes around his room.
“Give me a moment here; I’ll be releasing the ropes momentarily. If you do anything sporadic, I will lock you up.” The stranger stared into Norbert’s eyes.
Looking back, Norbert tried to nod his head, but he was still unable to as he moved his eyes up and down in confirmation.
The stranger crouching down at the foot of the bed, seeing them frown and move their finger about, Norbert looks up at the ceiling as he waits for … something.
“And there we go,” The stranger spoke; a moment later, pain shot up Norbert’s body as he could feel everything again. Breathing out panted breaths, laying completely still, the stranger's words of not doing anything sporadic banging within his skull.
The pain quickly disappeared, only the feeling of pins and needles remaining, entombing his entire body. Wiggling his toes and fingers about, feeling the fabric brush between them, letting out a relaxed breath as Norbert felt his body sink into the mattress, closing his eyes, proper sleep knocking on his eyelids.
“Still awake?” An object poked him on the cheek, and twisting his head about, he felt the drool and phlegm finally removed from his body.
“Yes, I’m awake. Just … resting.” Norbert spoke, his heavy eyes fluttering open. The stranger stared over Norbert, their noses nearly touching each other. Norbert jumped out of his skin in proximity to the workers, banging their heads together.
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Norbert rubbed his head with his hand, slowly getting upright, the stranger backing off. Norbert is is looking at the person that just smashed heads with. The stranger is standing in their white lab coat, with a stethoscope around their neck and a little nametag over their heart.
Black hair was slicked back, and brown eyes were staring over Norbert, who was lying in bed and feeling like the health worker was doing more than a cursory glance.
Trying to change his vision, his head erupting in pain, squirming as he forced his eyes tight until it went away. Squinting, he looked at the name tag. “Doctor Doctor?” Norbert read aloud, raising an eyebrow questioningly at the name.
“Yes, that is,, in fac,t, my na, Norbert. Now, have this.” Doctor Doctor produced a small vial from within their lab coat.
Norbert looked at the contents as they were handed over to him. Holding the concoction to the light gave it a slight swirl as the multi-coloured particles moved through the celeste-coloured liquid. “What is this?”
“A small dosage of health and mana potion combined should help with your recovery.”
“But I’m perfectly fine?” Norbert waved his left hand in front of him.
“Externally, you might be fine, but you can even tell that internally, your shreds. Whatever you did to your body in that last fight threw it in a loop.”
Norbert felt the energy within him stall and splutter, leaking out of its normal pathways to the rest of his body. He saw why he was locked up, as the leaking purple energy would make him spasm, and the muscles were juiced up.
Nodding his head, Norbert placed the vial on his lips, downing the contents. Crushing the glass in his hand, and his muscles clamped down, the shards of glass cutting his hand up, blood marking his covers.
His body recovered as he looked internally, his pathways no longer wrecked. He was picking the specks of glass out of his hand, watching as his skin remained damaged, not healing up like all the previous times.
“Looks like you need a bandage. Good for you that Doctor Doctor is here!” The Doctor shouted, pulling a white bandage out of his lab coat, taking Norbert’s hand
“Are you a doctor?”
Pointing at the name tag, “What does the tag say?”
“Then yes, I am no case of my name being that, completely different to Major Major.”
“Then why do you have a doctor twice?”
“It's Great for you to mention. I'm a GP with a PhD in Renaissance history and the cutlery of the time.”
“Pulling my leg?” Wiggling his toes from under the bed sheets.
“Of course not; a man’s education is a serious matter. It takes pure brains to hop to another world. Or, in your case, pure luck?”
Norbert moved his hand to grip onto the bed covers, flicking them off him. Halfway through, Doctor grabbed his injured arm. He was tearing the bed sheet off it, taking the bandage and wrapping it around Norbert’s hand.
“Who are you?”
“Can't one champion talk with another?” Doctor Doctor asked, finishing his bandaging of Norbert before sitting on the bed, taking thee stethoscope from around his neck, and lacing the cold piece of metal on Norbert’s chest.
“Not really, and especially not when someone is half dead.”
“But this evens the playing fields. Most people don’t want to get on the bad side of the one that defeated Arzlan.”
“What do you want, now that you trapped me here?”
“Just to meet the legend himself. All the other champions have banded together; only a few stragglers are left out of the loop.”
“What loop?”
Doctor Doctor shook his head. “Well, at least nobody else has poached you yet. Surprised since you spent so much time with Grimm.”
“Are you going to give me a straight answer?”
“You’ve answered everything I need.”
Norbert’s brain whirled as the doctor stood up, heading out of the way. “Did Sally send you here as a way to strong-arm me?”
“For this interaction, no. She’s been treating you like a pet. Not letting any of the other new champions play with you.”
“Then why are you here?”
“Stemming curiosity, others have heard of your exploits, rumours going about what you can and can’t do between the champions.”
Norbert just staredat him.. “I’m really out of the loop.”
“And that’s where you will remain. Sorry. Sorry, kid, not my call.” Doctor Doctor told him. I am standing up as he walked away from the bed. “You need to rest up; don’t use that ability of yours. And stay low; I should have never been able to overpower you like that.”
With that, the doctor left the doctoring stepped curtain and sectioned the patient from the other patients, disappearing from Norbert’s view.
Resting his head back on the pillow, Norbert closed his eyes, thoughts whirling in his head of what Doctor Doctor had told him.
Feeling the energy within him lazily move about, feeling it dissipate in the wrong places again, Norbert opened his eyes, already bored.
Throwing the blanket off him, finding his clothing in a neatly folded pile on a chair, his boots and blades resting on top.
Carefully putting them on him, his muscles in pain like the second day after returning to the gym, remembering the last time he was in a ward like this,, a lot of walking was required to get out. Walking that would be painful now.