Bruises painted themselves across the right side of her head. Her neck. Her arm. Her chest. Her side. Her leg. The trail of destruction barely missed her eye.
Shattered ribs, and a punctured lung.
Two deep, ragged gashes from her left shoulder to wrist, baring the white of bone beneath.
There almost wasn't enough of her arm to save.
Burns covered the un-bruised half of her scalp, and the doctors had been forced to cut away what little hair had remained there, creating a lopsided inbalance only accentuated by the bandages that hid the wounds from sight.
Little nicks and cuts littered almost every inch of her skin, and frostbite had almost cost her her right fingers and thumb.
The scar on her throat had faded to a pale line, the only thing about her that didn't seem broken beyond repair.
Alana sat in the hard plastic chair, and stared at the hospital bed with eyes that had long since run out of tears.
When had she last found the energy to cry?
Before the plane crash? After? She hadn't even cried when she got the news. It...it hadn't mattered. She knew it should have. She knew she was supposed to care. Supposed to be angry and horrified and grieving.
But it just...it didn't matter.
Because Abigail had been dead, and Frederick was dead, and Freddie was missing, and Will and Beverly...
How was she expected to care about walking when her entire life had been falling apart for months?
But now she was sitting in a hospital room that wasn't hers, because it was Abigail's, because she was alive, and had been the entire time, in a chair that wasn't hers, and Freddie was standing across from her, by the window, her arms crossed over her chest as she stared into the rain-swept darkness as both their daemons sat on the bed.
Kvoris had curled against Senteron's back, and Chayvetz had staggered through the air to perch ontop of the vibrantly red pika, unwilling to touch the marmoset until he was awake, and they could judge how he would react.
It seemed like a miracle.
There was barely an inch of skin on her body that didn't have a bruise or cut or even a scape or scar. But his fur was still as white as the snow Alana had never gotten the chance to see them play in, and there wasn't a single mark on him to mar its thickness.
Her mind was doing everything in its power to stop her from coming up with explanations for that, to stop herself from adding more darkness to what should have been a day of joy.
But it was already dark enough without her help. Abigail had been found unconcious in the same woods Beverly had wandered out of, and a man and a woman had been found with her.
And their daemons were gone. Hannibal had cut them away. There was no other explanation, despite how hard she wished there was.
The room was silent except for the steady rythm of the heart monitor, and that sound should have been comforting.
But it wasn't.
The hair rose on the back of her neck, and a chill ran down her arms.
She bit her lip to hold in a sudden gasp, and Freddie's hands were around one of her own before she even realized she'd made a sound.
Freddie's hands were warm, and Alana clung to them, desperate for the comfort while it lasted.
Any moment now, and all she would know was terror.
Freddie didn't let go of her even as the hair rose on the back of her neck, and a chill ran down her arms.
At the edge of her awareness, something howled.