The night ride back to retrieve the trailers was a silent one. They all suffered from that post battle adrenaline crash everyone knew about but never admitted to feeling. Everyone was dirty, aching, and ready to sleep even in the saddle. Everyone except Finn.
Finn was feeling good. Very good. So good he could almost ignore the pounding in his head, persistent as it was. Saul had told him he'd taken a good knock to the noggin, so maybe after some rest and meditation he'd be back to one hundred percent... or better.
His thoughts and actions felt so focused and deliberate…alert to a level he’d never experienced before. The motion of Eggo’s saddle, the horse’s breathing, Finn’s gentle pressure on her sides, he felt in control of it all. His eyes picked up on subtle shifts in the terrain, the flow of the landscape. The deep shadows of the forest were no longer dangerous unknowns. Now they were simply gaps in an infinitely complex equation, whose variables could be at least partially solved to predict what they held. He guided Eggo around exposed roots and washouts the horse never saw. He knew to pat Eggo on the neck reassuringly just before they approached a concealed hunter spider den no one but Finn and maybe Carl knew was under their feet.
His level of confidence in his knowledge of things previously unknowable was exciting but also terrifying. This was not him. He didn't have the sort of knowledge and experience in the woods that would allow for this kind of divination. More than once he detached himself from the present and activated his Gift to shake off any foreign influence on his mind, but it made no difference. He was seeing the world clearly, or at least that was what his mind was telling him.
Do crazy people know they’re crazy? What would he “know” next?
Finn wasn’t an idiot. At least, he liked to think so. He knew touching the carnobear's c-core without the protection of the goddess’ potion was a mistake, one he would not have ever considered had he not just been gassed, knocked around, and mauled by a giant mutant bear. Now, he had to come to grips with the aftermath of what could be the most idiotic decision of his life. Luckily, the chaos energy he’d been exposed to hadn’t given him taste buds in strange places like he’d feared, so he had that going for him. What’s more, the experience, at least after the initial sand blasting of his soul, wasn’t entirely unpleasant if his present state was anything to go by. If anything, he felt giddy, slightly euphoric, and that, more than anything else, terrified him.
A little bit before midnight they got back to the site where they’d stashed the trailers. The clearing was there. The tree where they’d tied the horses and the watermelon sized boulders they’d used as chocks were there. One of the trailers, however, was not.
Cap sent Carl sniffing around, and after a full minute, the man, looking like he'd just bit into sour, reported that a dozen people had been over the area, some of them in boots, others with bare feet. Several of the larger people had moved the chock and rolled the trailer out, in the direction of Fistshollow. They’d even searched the Ranger’s packs then piled them on top of the remaining trailer as if to say “no thanks” to what they kept in there.
There was some talk of going to the little village and demanding it back, but Cap said to let it go and get a fire going. “Believe it or not, they took it as payment for giving us the opportunity to hunt the bear,” Cap stated matter of factly, already laying wood down for a fire.
“Bullshit,” spat Carl, scowling and staring off into the night as if the thieves might materialize for a thrashing. “That’s some twisted ass logic.”
“Twisted to you and me, yeah. Not to them,” replied Cap, getting a tinder bundle out of his saddlebag.
Everett, snapping a log as thick as Finn’s thigh to add to the night’s fuel, voiced his theory. “They took trade goods. Mechanical scrap. Plastics. Perishable food. They left our ammo and rations. That’s them saying they aren’t robbing us. Even if they are.”
“That’s right. From their perspective… from Raymond’s at least, the carnobear was something he and his people would have had to deal with eventually, but it would've cost them. Just another day at the office for us.” Cap struck flint on steel and got his tinder smoking.
“They can’t safely harvest monsters, can they?” Everett asked. “So, they considered it like buying hunting rights.”
“Shitty thing of Raymond to do, but I understand his reasoning. He knocked a dangerous critter off the board and got some salvage today. All without risking his people. It’s all positives for him.”
“In exchange for having our asses kicked for a good sized c-core, one Raymond can’t safely use,” Everett said bitterly now peeling off mud caked armor. It had dried about half an hour ago, but as he pulled off his outer layers, everyone got a whiff of the still wet musk muck that made its way into the most intimate of places while he was subsumed.
“Damn, Big Man, you smell like an ogre whorehouse. Permission to burn everyone’s clothes, Cap?” Carl asked bringing his sleeve to his nose only to get a sniff of his own situation and rocking back in disgust.
“Denied,” Cap said. “It ain’t fair ‘bout the trailer. I know. But that’s what’s good about being a Ranger. We don’t have to worry about what’s fair. We don’t fight fair, and we don’t expect to be fought fair. We’ll take the hit now, but they’ll remember us when we come back through.”
The wood was ablaze now, the light of the fire pushing back the night. The horses were unsaddled and cared for. The Rangers, all but Finn, put down their bed rolls and collapsed into sleep. Finn had the first and second watches tonight and a whole lot of nervous energy to burn off, which he put to work as he assessed the damage on his rifle as the others settled in and began to snore.
Diagnosis: not good.
The weapon’s action and the barrel were separated by a sizable crack now, and if he tried to fire the thing, he’d probably get a misfire or a face full of quickly expanding gas. He valued his face too much to test the theory, though.
The pounding in his head was heavier now, more pronounced, like every beat of his heart increased the pressure behind his eyes. More than once, he reached up to squeeze the bridge of his nose to distract himself from the pain temporarily, but it wasn't going away. If the sensation kept intensifying, it wouldn't be long now before he'd be forced to go into meditation to take care of it, and he wouldn't be able to keep much of a watch buried inside his own head.
Next, he cleaned and oiled his revolver which he’d retrieved from the mud near the dead carnobear’s head. With his rifle out of commission, he’d have to rely on the hand cannon to do his ranged damage, and that meant it’d need to be taken care of. With proper bracing and a good shooter’s stance, at least he wouldn’t break any bones next time, but he made a mental note to do some strength training for his hands and forearms in the upcoming weeks. His sword was doing alright, having been saved from bending or breaking by some luck and very soft ground where it had been crushed under the monster’s weight. It needed cleaning and oiling too.
It was while he was oiling his blade that he started to sweat despite the coolness of the night air, lightly at first but then trickling down his face in rivulets that, when he wiped at them with his sleeve, left the fabric discolored and rank. Soon, his clothes were damp and sticky, and tiny tremors rippled through his body. They started at his hands, little spasms as he moved the oil cloth over the steel, but soon the tremors moved their way up his arms and into his chest where they could no longer be waved off as fatigue.
It was at this time that Finn admitted to himself that he was in trouble. Tremors in one’s heart were funny that way, the way they cut through one’s self imposed delusions. What’s more, a terrible pressure was building up behind his eyes, intense enough to fill his vision with spots and muddle his conscious thoughts.
He shook his head as if the sensory data were a sheet of water that he could cast off with a rough thrash. Of course, that didn't work.
He had to do something. Anything.
Anything but call for help, that is. If this was a physical problem, his Gift could handle it.
If it was something else… something chaos-y... well, there wasn’t much to be done other than pray. If he made any of his fellow Rangers witness to his accidental heresy by telling them about what he'd done, the Church would dissect them all to pray over the remains when the truth came out, and the truth would, most certainly, come out. The Rangers didn’t deserve that, as good as they’d been to him.
The sickness progressed quickly, quickly enough to observe the changes now that Finn was paying closer attention. Mere minutes after he first noticed them, the tremors were everywhere, in every muscle, inside of him, flowing through parts of his body that had no business moving on their own. He was barely able to bring his canteen to his lips, the shaking was so severe. What’s more, his breaths were coming in gasps now, shallow and desperate. Curiously, he felt his Gift poised just on the edge of his consciousness, ready to fall over him like a leaden blanket, a dark, heavy, comforting presence that would smother his conscious thoughts but possibly help to relieve some of his misery. He'd not called upon it.
It had never done that before, even when he was in the most dire of straits. Hell, he'd almost bled out in the rafters of an old depot just two weeks ago, and it hadn't felt like this. Finn had always had to consciously call upon that part of himself to activate the Gift's power. It was one of the myriad downsides to meditation magic. Meditation required mindfulness, and you weren't always in your right mind if your arm had been ripped off or a blood vessel in your brain had just exploded. What was different now other than the obvious?
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It didn't matter, did it? The tremors racked Finn's body as the fever did its best to cook his brain, and he felt his jaw clenched so hard, he feared his teeth might shatter. Something needed to change, or he'd be forced to call for Saul and get him involved. Could he even call for help, or was it too late? What if the company medic tried to help him and got a dose of chaos himself? With Saul's already rocky relationship with the Church, he'd have no chance to plead his case. If Finn lived through the experience, he'd never forgive himself.
Panting, sweating, burning up from the inside, Finn dragged himself, shivering, out of the circle of firelight and propped himself against a good sized tree. Then, he closed his eyes and let it happen. Let his Gift drag him down into the silent void, the empty place where he’d found tranquility so many times over the years. The place where his mind went when he meditated himself back to health.
Only, this time, there was no tranquility to be found here, no vitality drifting upon the wind that he could breathe into himself to soothe his ailing body. No comforting stillness.
No, this time, the pain and discomfort from his illness followed him, invaded him. It seemed magnified, immense, crashing into him like great waves of red molten iron, rising out of a sea of fire. Disconnected from his body like he was, Finn only vaguely felt his physical body's spine crack and his body contort as it seized. Meanwhile his "self" that was present here in the void burned in its own personal hell.
No. No. No, this wasn’t right. He'd never been so lucid in his meditations, and he'd never experienced anything like... this. This terrible tidal wave of fire that crashed into him over and over.
For the first time in his life, Finn’s Gift betrayed him. Always such an infuriatingly benign, gentle companion in his life, he’d taken its presence for granted, always expecting it to be there to sooth his aches and fix what was broken. Now, after having been exposed to chaos, it had been turned against him.
His consciousness was hanging on by a thread, logical thought falling away until all that was left was Finn’s all consuming need to live. Damn the consequences, he needed help now. He needed Saul. Cap. Anyone.
He tried to surface, to leave the ocean of fire and come back to himself. Failed. He flailed at the roiling sea of molten iron even as it stripped him of his being, but no matter what he did, he could not surface. He threw the entirety of what was left of his will into the effort, but it wasn’t enough. He couldn’t get out.
The waves broke against his soul again and again, burning him, breaking him. He screamed and screamed until, finally, true darkness took him.
—----------------------
“There he is. He’s coming ‘round now, Cap,” Saul’s voice came from somewhere in the dark.
"Good. Let him up." Cap's gravelly reply sounded tired but still irresistibly commanding.
Multiple points of pressure on Finn's arms and legs he hadn't had a chance to notice yet slowly lifted away. Finn's chest ached, and his limbs were leaden. Laboriously drawing in a ragged breath, he tried to speak, but all that came out was a dry mouthed groan that he immediately regretted as his stomach cramped. Reflexively, he attempted a roll that would put him on his side and allow his abdominal muscles to relax, but the hands came back to keep him still and on his back.
“Easy there, Finn. He’s conscious now, fellas. You can let him up, “ soothed Saul from Finn’s left somewhere. “It’s okay, Finn. You made it through.”
“Whuuaughf-” Finn moaned through his raw throat, eyelids fluttering open. Saul was perched above him, dark hood impenetrable as ever, one hand poised above Finn’s face with the black tendrils of his Gift weaving themselves among each other languidly mere inches from Finn's face, but Finn didn't have the energy to be alarmed. If Saul's creepy black eel things wanted to eat him, they were welcome to do it, as long as they put him out of his misery. He felt wrung out. Everything hurt.
All around him were the Rangers, Everett towering behind Saul with a worried look on his face, Carl crouched down on Finn’s right side with one hand braced on the mossy ground and the other hooked into his belt. Cap was at Finn’s feet putting on his hat and surveying the woods around them like the trees had somehow offended him. His clothes were wet at the chest and armpits, and his jeans were muddy.
Once the old soldier had done his visual sweep of the perimeter, his gaze dropped back down to spear Finn with a hard stare. “Welcome back, Ranger,” he said, his tone flinty and his eyes probing. “When you’ve recovered a bit, I expect a full report on what the hell that was all about.” Then, he straightened his hat and popped his neck before he swaggered off to do Cap things.
“Got it, Cap.” Saul answered for Finn before turning back to face his patient again. “You scared the hell out of us.” Saul disclosed as he retracted his Gift back into his hand and sat back with sigh. As he did, Carl relaxed visibly as well, though the scout rested on one knee like he expected to have to restrain Finn again at any moment.
Finn worked his mouth around to try and work up enough moisture to speak with only a little success. “Ho- How long was-” he coughed. His throat was raw and tasted like old blood. Ouch. “How long?”
Everett stepped forward, crouching down and putting a canteen to Finn’s lips. Cool, clean water dribbled down his throat, and before he knew what he was doing, he had the canteen clutched in both hands, tipping it further and further and squeezing the metal sides of the container to get the water out that much faster. As Finn gulped greedily, Everett took over the conversation.
“I don’t sleep too well in the field, so I woke up early after you didn't come get me for watch. Found you collapsed next to that tree over there, shaking like a leaf, and you had a hell of a fever. Think I might have a couple little burns from handling you.”
Finn coughed as he choked on his final gulp from the canteen. “Was it that bad?”
“You heard him,” answered Carl, his eyes narrowed at Finn while he wiped his hands on the knees of his pants. “Never seen a guy sweat so much.”
“You were seizing and frothing at the mouth, when he called me in. Everett was holding you down, but you were a slippery one,” Saul went on. “It’s not my forte, but best I can tell, you had some kind of viral infection that I wasn't equipped to fight. A nasty one that caused… well, a lot of things in your body to rupture and necrotize before the fever broke. Lots of internal damage. If the big man hadn’t found you when he did, you’d probably be dead, but we saw you through until your immune system licked the infection on its own. What do you remember?”
Finn didn’t know what to say. The truth? He was too tired for the truth. “I- uh-” The words felt like ash in his mouth. "I just remember feeling a little feverish then I went into meditation to try and fix it," he replied, already hating himself for the half-truth. These men had just sat up with him for hours to keep him alive while he dealt with the consequences of his own actions, and all he had for them were lies. Did he have a choice though?
Carl moved closer, tilting his head and leaning in toward Finn’s face like a bird scrutinizing a dead worm it could eat but didn’t necessarily want to. The twitchy scout's face held a complicated mix of puzzlement and unease. The intensity of man’s stare was unnerving, but Finn didn’t have the strength to turn his head for the long seconds Carl looked him over. Then, either satisfied with what he saw or unwilling to give Finn any more of his attention, Carl sat back again and began manically sharpening one of his knives he got from God knows where. “We had to hold you down and put a gag in your mouth for the screaming,” he stated as if talking about what type of melons he bought at the market. Meanwhile he ran the whetstone over his blade at a speed that made Finn nervous just watching.
“What Carl means to say is that he had a hard time holding onto you,” Saul half-whispered.
“Yep. You threw him off like he was a toddler,” chuckled Everett as he capped his now empty canteen.
“He did not!” the scout shouted indignantly, reeling back as if to throw his whetstone at Everett, but then thought the better of it, going back to his sharpening. “He was all sweaty and gross, and I couldn’t hold on proper like.”
Saul laughed tiredly. “I wouldn’t say it like Everett did, but you put up a hell of a fight, even with my magic killing a bunch of your nerve signals. Scary what a fever can do to a man,” he contemplated, scratching the top of his hood. “If I wasn’t constantly repairing you, you’d have dozens of torn muscles and internal bleeding right now… also you’d have an acute case of death. Still, between you and me, we got the worst of it taken care of, didn't we?”
"What do you mean?" Finn asked, not quite coming out and asking directly. Was the medic talking about his Gift? Finn had thought his Gift had been turned against him, but if that's what Saul meant... Was his Gift healing him even as he was drowning in the burning sea? What did that mean?
"Um. Yeah. Honestly, I was impressed by just how fast your body was putting itself back together, even if it was losing the battle. Figured that was your meditation mojo at work. I didn't have time to really admire the process, you understand. I was busy doing my part," Saul answered with a pensive tone, patting Finn on the forearm a couple times before he noticed his patient wincing with every blow. "Uh. You'll probably need to take things easy today still. You had two back to back life or death fights last night."
“I’m…” Finn began shakily before coughing up something black, which he spit weakly into the dirt. When he spoke again, he couldn't keep the deep shame and regret out of his voice. “I’m sorry, guys. I didn’t mean to-”
Saul shook his head, only slightly shifting his hood side to side. “You go on and forget about that, Finn. Honestly, it was a miracle you got out of the bear den without rapid onset infection like everybody else had, even if theirs was bacterial. Lucky for you, I got a chance to rest between healing them and then taking care of you.”
Finn sighed, closing his eyes again and marveling at the warmth of the sun on his face and the presence of his friends, so far removed from his terrible experience from last night. “Thank you. Thank you all. I don’t…”
“He said forget it,” Everett declared, leaving no room for objection as he put his jacket back on. “Seriously, what are brothers for if not to hold you down and let the doc dig into you?”
Though he didn't say anything as he brought out another of his knives for sharpening, Carl made his agreement known with a grunt and several rapid nods.
“Now that it’s over, how do you feel?” A little bit of the gruff Ranger medic leaked back into Saul’s voice. “What’s your status, Ranger?”
Finn thought about it. What could he-
---------------------------------------
Status:
Finn McIntire - Level 1 Shard
Type - Human(ERROR)
Physical- 0
Mental- 0
Chaos - 1
Dominion - 1
Territory - 0
Spell Forms - 1 [Meditate - Evolved]
Minions - 0
---------------------------------------
Before he could stop himself, Finn’s mouth was already moving, giving voice to his feelings with no consideration for anything else.
“What the f-”