Litvir shuddered as consciousness returned to them. They were experiencing something new. All-over body aches. Litvir had felt pains in their body before, mostly from tussling with metal meanies at the edge of the universe, but Litvir normally won those fights, and the pain would only be in several places. Right now, Litvir hurt everywhere. Mostly across their face.
It was a struggle to climb out of bed. It was cold and horrible. The wind outside was blowing rather fiercely. That made sense, Litvir did live on the top floor. Litvir didn’t have many requests for their first apartment, but they did want roof access so they could easily leave and get to work. It was a tad easier than phasing through the window when five storeys up and immediately having to fly as Litvir did so. But there was definitely no flying or walking through walls today. Litvir was in too much pain.
In fact, Litvir was in so much pain that they limped to the bathroom to inspect themselves in the mirror. And maybe have a warm shower. Litvir didn’t have a bath, but warm water was good water. They didn’t actually know at first that one was supposed to use warm water to shower, they’d always just thrown themselves in and cleaned themselves as fast as possible before Litvir worked out their scheduling and school problems. Looking in that mirror though shocked Litvir. The entire side of their face was bruised, and there were more bruises up and down their body. Litvir made the mistake of removing their stomach wrap, only to see more bruises. Too many bruises.
That shock made Litvir back out of the bathroom completely and rush back to bed, where they had left their communicator. It was on the bedside table but not in its normal charging bay. Luckily it still had some battery, but Litvir immediately plugged it in to get it charging.
As they did so, the screen lit up and they noticed the date. It was the 24th. Didn’t Litvir want something to do with that day? A day off or something? Litvir’s head was fuzzy. They couldn’t even remember the 23rd. Was that a special day too? They knew the 26th was their birthday but they had plans today as well, right?
Litvir looked down at themselves again. They were wearing work armour. Why would Litvir go to bed in work armour? That would explain why they were uncomfortable. It didn’t explain the state of Litvir’s body. However, as Litvir inspected their room and checked the charge of their wristbands, they noticed something. There was a sheet of paper on the bedside table. A note. Written by someone with very large hands, because the paper was folded up quite a lot. Litvir guessed it was written by Dalosisaar, because he was a Thraki hand had weird hands.
Litvir read the note. It just had a simple message.
“Thank you for the help! I know you only wanted a few days, but we decided to give you until the 3rd. Our treat.”
Litvir blinked, then read the message again. As they did so, memories started trickling back.
They had gone to Dalosisaar asking for a few days off. They had walked in on the Whenvern being mean to Dalosisaar. Litvir hadn’t liked that. They had tried to defend Dalosisaar. It… had not gone well. The Whevnern had done the one thing Litvir couldn’t really defend themselves against. He had slowed time down, to the point that they couldn’t move. And neither could Dalosisaar. In fact, no one could.
Things were blurry after that. Someone came to help Litvir, right? There were other people. But the Whenvern slowed them down too. But suddenly… Did the Whenvern disappear? Did they stop, get bored and leave? Litvir didn’t know.
With a sigh, Litvir went back to the bathroom. They were in a lot of pain, and they had some pain killers in the cabinet behind the mirror. Litvir didn’t like taking tablets, but they swallowed them awkwardly. It would take some time for them to kick in, and Litvir used that time to look at the mirror again.
They looked bad. Really bad. The bruises were fading but slowly. Not fast enough. The ones on Litvir’s body were particularly bad.
A knock on the door distracted Litvir. They literally jumped in surprise.
“Hang on!”
Litvir rushed back to their bedroom and quickly threw on a stomach wrap, which, for some reason, they weren’t wearing. They also put some wraps around their arms and across their shoulders, to better hide their bruises. Hopefully, it was just mama Elkay, checking in on them. More knocks suggested otherwise though. Who knew that Litvir lived there?
Eventually, Litvir made it to the door. They opened it up and blinked.
“Oh. Hello, Miisa.”
“Hi, Litv- What… what happened to you!” Miisa nearly screeched in shock. “Are… are you alright?”
“Not… not really…” Litvir frowned.
“You… did someone hurt you?!
“Yes. But I do not know if I can tell you… what are you doing here?”
“I…” Miisa stuttered. It almost hurt to look at Litvir. “I… realised that you do not know where I live. So I thought I would come and show you where I live and we can go and get ice cream and cake on the way… But you really do not look well! Seriously, who did this to you? Was it one of those metal meanies you told me about once?”
Litvir hesitated. “It… it was… the Whenvern… I… I think… I think I angered them. I do not really remember.”
Miisa took Litvir’s hand and stroke it. “I was going to walk you to my place, but I think it is better if we stay here. You need to heal up! Do you have a TV? We can watch TV together.”
“My… my TV is not set up. I do not know how to do it.”
“Well, do not worry, I will help you!” Miisa tried to be more optimistic. They nudged Litvir back into their apartment then closed the door. “You will be better. I will make sure of it.”
Litvir frowned, then rubbed their eyes, hiding tears. “Thank you, Miisa…”