Chapter 3: There's More to Heal than Muscle and Bone
Tick tick tick. The clock was about to receive a face full of shoe if it didn't stop its wretched ticking. Peregrine had spent six weeks in the medic tent with very limited freedom. Akari had insisted she stay under her care so that she could pull a miracle out of her arse and make Peregrine well. After a long healing cry Akari had been filled with the fires of motivation. "I'm going to make you whole again Perrin! If I cant then we'll both leave together!" Peregrine was touched by her best friends motivation, but after a long look inside herself she knew she wasn't going to get better. Perhaps, she didn't really want to get better.
This was not her first bout in the medical tent, but it was the first for a performance related injury. As a smuggler she encountered less than savory individuals. High rollers that would rather pay a group of thugs to take her out than pay the price of the art she smuggled. Rivals that would shoot her for the prizes she carried and leave her body to rot. There were also bounty hunters that would prefer her dead rather than alive when they claimed their reward. So many friends had been lost she wondered if what they were doing was worth it. Peregrine had been born into this life. The circus was the only family she had and by the tattoo on her back she was branded to them. That was the only reason she kept working, but if they could drop her so fast because of an injury… was it worth it to get better?
Peregrine watched Akari scuttle around the room chittering to herself about all the useful exercises she would put Peregrine through. Akari was the one who was given hard the job of watching them die. She was a first rate nurse, but most of the time her patients were beyond saving. Akari had been holding her sister Karen in her arms as Karen bled to death from a bullet to the chest. A buyer had betrayed the band sent to sell a rare statue of the Goddess to him. Peregrine had been fourteen at the time and it had been her first run. The buyer pulled the gun on her, because she was the most helpless of the crew. If Karen hadn't taken the bullet in her place, Peregrine would have been the one to die.
For Akari she would get better. Peregrine owed her that.
"Hello my lovely sirens of the sea! I'm sure you missed me terribly!" Skye sauntered in wearing his traditional saucy grin and mischievous flair. Akari blushed sweetly at the comment and fluttered her eyes a bit at the handsome intrusion. Peregrine pulled the spoon from her cereal bowl that was on the table and made a game of trying to catapult cheerios into Skye's lovely silver locks.
"You're early old man," She griped at him as he made a valiant effort to dodge the Cheerio hail. "You're not supposed to be delivering for another week." Skye glared at her from behind Akari his meat shield.
"I'm not old my hair is naturally this color that we share. And why do you always throw things at me darling cousin?." He growled as he moved with Akari to get closer to her.
"It's how I show my love." She countered. "Now answer the question or I start throwing bigger things." Already she reached for the solid teal flower vase that sat heavily at her bedside.
Skye sighed with the weight of the world on his shoulders. "One day I will invent a technique that will allow me to freeze women in place, and then I won't have to deal with your tantrums anymore." Still he smiled and from his pocket he drew out a small finely wrapped present.
"You, Sleeping Beauty, were snoring through your birthday. After all the effort this bauble took to retrieve I wasn't about to let it out of my sight till it was in your hands." He said rather proud of himself.
"Its not stolen I hope?" She asked tentatively. Skye shook his head and with a sly grin replied. "Of course it's stolen but its not missing. You can wear it in broad daylight and no one will care." Peregrine's expression dripped with annoyed skepticism. She unwrapped the gift as if it was unsavory and she didn't want to be contaminated by it. Skye looked amused at her mannerisms but wisely did not comment.
Inside the box was a necklace with three tear drops gracefully descending from the main body of it's chain. In the middle of the chain pendant a red jewel sparkled and twinkled from the gold setting in which it lay. Peregrine narrowed her eyes in scrutiny of the gift. Upon further inspection the golden necklace was gold-plated and the jewel in the center was made of some sort of laminate. "It's a fake!" she cried out indignant at the gall of her mischievous cousin. "What madness overtook you that you thought stealing a fake necklace was a good idea? If you're going to commit a crime at least steal something worth stealing!" She lectured him punctuating each sentence with a whack to the back of his pompous head.
Skye made his escape as gracefully as he could after peregrine's ego-deflating assault. "Well no one will bother you if you wear it!" He smirked once again adopting a haughty tone. "If it ever causes you trouble I invite you to seek vengeance upon me." He left the room snickering to himself.
Peregrine turned to Akari "For some reason I don't like how he said that." Akari just giggled. "Oh come on Perrin, its not like he meant anything by it!" It was then Peregrine felt a very cold chill.
