--For you, Nate! Because, because... you are way nicer to me than I deserve, even if you still haven't checked your email... (death-grip hug) Also because you gotta love all the skeleton jokes in this series-- they really tickle my FUNNY BONE! AHAHAHAHAhahahahaha...hahaha...haha..ha.... (clears throat)
Written at three o'clock last night, and edited in a half-asleep daze this morning, so, yes, comments and criticism would be extremely appreciated =_=
Disclaimer: The Skulduggery Pleasant series belongs to a genius named Derek Landy, which sounds similar to the genius Destined To Repeat but is not, in fact, the same....
Dis-o-ri-en-ta-tion
"So, that went well," Skulduggery Pleasant remarked as he climbed into his Bentley and shut the door behind him, Valkyrie Cain following suit.
"Mm-hm," she murmured.
"As a whole, I mean." He considered that. "Actually, it wasn't all that great as a whole— especially with, you know, the you-getting-your-head-whacked-into-a-brick-wall-repeatedly thing. But, oh well. Battle casualties will be battle casualties."
He stopped, waiting for a response. When he got none, he went on, "But we did catch the bad guy. Which is good. Not that you get any credit for it. Because you don't. So basically what I'm trying to say is that it went well—for me."
Now there was a comment just begging for an argument- or at least a snarky retort- if there ever was one, but all Skulduggery got for his efforts was a quiet, "Mm."
"What," said Skulduggery. "No witty comeback? No clever yet admittedly immature back-and-forth? Have I taught you nothing?"
She still didn't take the bait. Either Valkyrie had become incredibly adult within the past, oh, nineteen minutes or so, or she had gone deaf. Or that skull-smashing awhile back had bashed out one too many brain cells.
Valkyrie blinked. "Why aren't we moving?"
Skulduggery had officially thought up the single greatest wisecrack of all time (he was sure), but as he processed the girl's question, it died on his tongue— Or, well. It died, anyway.
If the question had been asked in an irritated tone it could have been written off as typical Valkyrie finally getting fed up with his witticism. But her voice was unmistakably bewildered, as if she had just woken up to find herself in Skulduggery's Bentley, which was… just the tiniest bit odd.
"Oh, we're moving again," she muttered, a little, relieved smile crossing her face as she slumped back into her seat.
If Skulduggery had eyebrows and a hairline, they would be in each other. Just to make certain that she was the one going crazy rather than him (although one could never be sure), he turned to check the dashboard.
Yep, they were definitely parked. He glanced out the window. Still parked.
Skulduggery would-be frowned. "Turn your head this way?" It wasn't really a question. He could see the beginnings of a particularly ugly bruise beneath her collarbone, but from this angle that was all. That didn't mean that she wasn't injured, though….
"Why?" she asked suspiciously, reminding him once again that he was dealing with Valkyrie Cain, Notorious Disregarder of Direct Orders— But she ruined it by turning to wrinkle her nose at him, and for the first time since they'd gotten in the car Skulduggery saw her whole face.
So the skeleton did what every skeleton does best. He stared.
There was blood all down the right side of her face from a wound that cut upwards and disappeared into her hair. Already it had dripped onto the black material of her clothes. Skulduggery couldn't help but appreciate the color black just then, especially since he knew how hard it could be to get bloodstains out of anything else.
"You…" he began, his mouth on automatic, not quite sure what he himself meant to tell her.
Now that he was looking for it he could see that her eyes were hazy and unfocused, gazing at-him-but-not-really with an expression of vague curiosity.
"You're bleeding" was what finally came out. Ah, yes, insightful as always….
"No, I'm not," she said.
He paused, the sheer inanity of the statement taking him by surprise, floundering briefly for any reasonable response to that. "…Yes, actually, you are," he said slowly and carefully, almost afraid of setting her off.
"I'm not," she said stubbornly.
"The whole right side of your face is covered in blood!" he cried in disbelief, gesturing toward the rearview mirror, where she could see for herself. "How could you possibly say you're not bleeding?"
She didn't even bother looking. "It's my face. I know perfectly well when it's hurt. Who are you to say if it's bleeding or not?"
Skulduggery opened his mouth, really, really considered replying to that, but before he could allow himself to do anything he knew he would slap himself for later, he snapped his jaw shut and shoved his key into the ignition. "This argument is pointless. Just take my word for it. You're injured."
"All of our arguments are pointless," Valkyrie pointed out. "And I'm not injured." To prove her point she put a hand to her forehead, but when it came back full of blood she didn't seem surprised at all, just looked at it as if it were mildly interesting. "Oh. I'm bleeding. Huh."
"Valkyrie," Skulduggery said, numbly and the slightest bit tentatively. "I think you're concussed."
"I'm not concussed," she insisted, sounding lucid enough that Skulduggery almost believed her for a moment. "In fact, my head feels totally clear—like it's got all the unimportant stuff knocked out of it…"
"Really," the detective murmured, bemused, torn between laughing his head off at this discombobulated Valkyrie, and racing her to the nearest hospital. In the end he settled on humoring her, at least for now.
"Yeah. It's like when that flower died. But I don't care."
"You don't… care?"
"No."
He stared at her, utterly nonplussed. She stared right back, a comprehensible explanation clearly not forthcoming.
"Why not?" he asked haltingly.
"Because there's still the grass, obviously."
"…Oh," said Skulduggery.
There wasn't much to be said to that, so she and Skulduggery stared at each other some more, until finally Valkyrie piped up, "I don't know for sure if it's red or orange."
"You don't know if what's red or orange?"
"I think it's orange."
"What's orange?"
"The spots, Skulduggery," she told him, as if it took a lot of her patience to do so more-or-less tolerantly.
"What spots?" he cried.
"It means that they're growing," Valkyrie said, her voice growing more and more irritated, as though she thought he was being stupid on purpose.
"What's growing?"
"Pay attention when I'm talking to you!" she shouted, arms waving.
"Would you believe I actually was?"
"Fine," she huffed, folding her arms across her chest, and if not for the stream of blood making its way down her cheek the situation would be almost normal. "If you were listening, what was I talking about?"
"Um. Whether spots were. Red or orange," he managed, the words coming out in chunks.
"Really?" she asked, that curiosity back in her expression, but this time it seemed a little…drooped. She sounded almost lost, as if she really couldn't remember what she had been talking about.
"You're concussed," Skulduggery repeated, the affirmation ringing unreservedly true—and equally bizarre—to his own ears.
"'M not," Valkyrie muttered, and the detective ignored her.
"Symptoms of concussion include but are not limited to: blurry vision, temporary impairment of hearing, mild nausea, unnaturally short attention span, unfocused eyes, sharp pain in the head— well, obviously pain in the head, you crashed into a wall— disorientation, short-term memory loss—are you paying attention to me?"
She had spaced out near the end, fiddling absently with a stray thread on her pant leg, but she had jerked up when he had addressed her, and then promptly tried to pretend that she hadn't. "I get it. Concussion equals bad. Good thing I don't have one."
Skulduggery resisted the urge to start laughing. Loudly. Hysterically. Entirely inappropriately. "Really? Funny coincidence then, because I'd bet my hat that you have almost all of those symptoms."
"Do not."
At least the detective knew better than to answer 'do too.' That would be a patent invitation for a go-around-in-circles conversation, and now that he was on the straight-man end, he was rapidly discovering how exasperating they were. He made a mental note to get more of those in his own repertoire. "No?" he said.
"No," she said firmly. "I'm just a little tired."
"Tired," Skulduggery mused, resting his chin in his hand and wondering what exactly he was going to do with this kid. "You do realize that I'm not going to believe you anymore when you say you're not hurt, don't you?"
"Just tired!" she insisted, as if saying it more loudly would make him understand. "Really tired. And sorta dizzy. The whole world's been kinda…" She spun her index finger in drunken circles, fumbling for the word. Skulduggery waited. "…twirly," she said at last, a satisfied little smile on her face, as if she'd accomplished something important.
"…Twirly," Skulduggery echoed faintly. Her coherency was deteriorating as they sat there. Now, Skulduggery could very well take her to Kenspeckle's right away—after all, he did have the transportation accounted for—but he was actually sort of unwillingly intrigued by the nonsense that was coming out of the girl's mouth. He wasn't quite sure what that said about him, but there it was.
Remembering that he had been cut off mid-diagnosis, Skulduggery continued, speaking mostly to himself at that point, "Concussions aren't just a bump on the head— They should be brought immediately to the ER. If they're bad enough they can even cause permanent brain damage."
That thought made him pause. Valkyrie's concussion couldn't possibly be that serious, could it? …Nah, it couldn't.
"At least I have a brain to damage," she said, sulkily.
Well. Then again, what did he know? It could. Maybe it was. Skulduggery contemplated a Valkyrie stuck like this forever, and shivered.
"It's funny because you're a skeleton," Valkyrie explained patiently, misinterpreting his silence. "So you have no brain, see…?"
"Yes, I got it."
She looked up at him, affronted by his dismissive answer. "Well you don't have to be so heartless about it." She stopped, rolling the words over in her mind, and it took her just two beats too long to start giggling hysterically.
"G-get it?" she gasped between laughs. "Because—because—"
"Because I'm a skeleton," Skulduggery said dryly. "Yes. I got it."
The laughter dropped off with almost no warning no whatsoever, aside from the small flash of shock that flitted across her face. "You're a skeleton?" she said, staring at him with wide, stunned eyes.
Ohh, sweet mother of disco.
Skulduggery started up the car. "We're going to Kenspeckle's," he said firmly, because that at least was a fact that wouldn't up and turn crazy on him. He was starting to get a little dizzy himself, swinging between Valkyrie's rapidly-switching moods. "Put on your seatbelt."
"Hey…" Valkyrie murmured as the car began to move, putting her arms out in front of her a little unsteadily and gazing at them with a childlike wonder that made her look even less stable than before. "Now I'm spinning too. But you're not. 'Ts like you really are the center of the universe, like you always say you are." She laughed, harder this time, doubled over with her arms hugging her stomach, her whole body shaking with hysterical laughter.
"We're going to Kenspeckle's now," Skulduggery muttered, pressing the gas.
Valkyrie giggled the whole way there. Skulduggery fully intended to repay the laughter tenfold just as soon as she was in her right mind again.
--Fin