Ora's ink-blood flowed from her body and she watched it go into Jace's. There was a throbbing where the syringe had entered her arm, right in her vein. With every second passing, Jace shook a little more, whether from blood or pain was anybody's guess. Ora was barely aware of a slight hissing noise that was filling the air, like oil bubbling and boiling, and Jace was sweaty and hot. His skin was slowly turning pinker. Ora reached her hand over to Jace's face and touched his forehead, it was burning hot.
"Come on, come on." 3 kept whispering, monitoring the transfer of the ink-blood. Callie kept on watching Jace's vitals, giving 3 info when he needed it to keep the ink transfer going.
"Is his body accepting Ora's ink?" Celine asked cautiously from the head of Jace's bed.
"No clue," 3 told her, "This is kind of a first for everybody in the history of squids. There's never been a cross-species blood transfer between Inklings and Octarians, I'm just kind of winging this."
Those words did the exact opposite of comfort Ora and Celine. Ora felt her blood pressure raise when she heard 3's words, and ink-blood spurted out a little bit from the syringe as a wave of new blood washed into it.
It didn't feel like too long before 3 took the needle out of Ora, tossed in a red container on the side wall, and wrapped Ora's arm. "You need to go get some food, you're weakened, Ora. We've got pastries in the cafeteria, you should have some of those."
Ora opened her mouth to protest, but 3 didn't let her talk. "I'm going to patch up Jace on the assumption that the ink-blood was accepted. It's the only thing we can do right now. Maybe Jace will make it through this, maybe he'll pass, if anything happens, I'll make sure to send Callie to get you. You just gave away a ton of blood, you've helped out enough, there's nothing else you can do but get in the way as you rest. Celine, please help Ora to the cafeteria."
Ora was about to argue, stay, and say that she was fine, but as she stood up to do so, her legs suddenly felt like liquid and Celine barely grabbed her in time before Ora collapsed.
"I think I'll go sit down in the cafeteria." She mumbled.
Ora and Celine walked slowly out of the room. Celine supported Ora all the way to the cafeteria, and sure enough there were pastries lying on a platter on the tables. Donuts… so many donuts. It was truly majestic. Celine grabbed two plates and a bunch of donuts while Ora sat gingerly down at a table.
Ora looked terribly fragile, her eyelids fluttered lightly as she tried to relax with her eyes shut.
"You gave a lot of blood." Celine said, sitting next to Ora. "Are you feeling okay?"
"I feel like somebody hit my arm with a truck and my head with an eighteen wheeler." She told Celine, reaching over to grab a donut and stick it in her mouth. "Ohh, that's some good stuff… maple glaze."
She finished it off and grabbed a second donut (chocolate with sprinkles) by the time Celine was halfway done with her first.
"That was super stressful." Ora said, then rescinded that statement, "still is. I can feel my heart beating out a dubstep."
Celine nodded, agreeing with her friend, "I'm legitimately afraid right now. Didn't you see how Jace was? He was ripped to shreds. It was like somebody had tried to play connect the dots on his chest with a scalpel. Imagine how much shrapnel is inside of him right now… he was so torn up, I actually don't know if he'll make it."
Ora frowned, "He better, damn it, I sure as hell am not losing him after you promised to help me convince the idiot that he should ask me out."
This elicited a laugh from Celine, "You sound just like me… that's something I would say."
"You're so violent." Ora chided, "But only to Jace, I've noticed."
The donut Celine was eating disappeared, "Well… he needs it. He forgets stuff quickly, and only because I'm tough on him… and a little mean, does he remember. I think I do it for his best, but also 'cause it's funny. Have you seen his face whenever I shoot him in the back of the head when he forgets something. Comedy gold."
"Comedy platinum," Ora countered, "He gets this doofball face that just screams 'Did I forget something Celine?' we should film him and stick the video on Callie and Marie's newscast. Nobody would forget that in a second."
A short silence developed between them… driving out the minutes. During this time, the donut pile slowly wore down as Ora and Celine devoured the sugary pastries.
"Have you noticed something recently?" Ora asked Celine, "Jace has been trying to avoid the public as much as possible. He hasn't even gone to the turf war battles."
"Well, there was that time where we were hanging out with Callie and Marie and Jace was seen by the paparazzi. Since that happened, I think that he's been avoiding the spotlight. I don't think he wants to get publicity."
Ora nodded, "That sounds right. He doesn't like the thought of being popular or famous, just knowing that he was on t.v. is enough to get his face red, even when it's in the most minimal of ways. It's going to be something he can't avoid, he's going to have to face it someday. Whenever I've been outside at all, I've heard somebody talk about who Callie and Marie were hanging out with. If Jace shows his face outside of the Academy, people will start talking even more."
They kept on the subject of popularity and association until the doors opened and Callie walked in. She walked straight into the cafeteria and saw the empty platter that used to be filled with donuts, and then the two friends who were relaxing in their seats. She walked over and touched ora and Celine's shoulders.
"Hey," she said, "3 is done patching up Jace, do you want to come with me to see him?"
Ora stood up quickly, stumbled, and then steadied herself against the table.
"yeah, let's go."
Celine stood up right after Ora and put a helping arm under her armpit. They walked their way slowly back to the health office. Outside of the office was 3, cleaning up the messy shirt remains Jace had torn off of himself before 3 could work on patching him up.
"How is he?" Celine asked 3.
"Well, he's not dead yet at least." Was all 3 could say. Ora and Celine looked at each other, then walked inside.
Jace was lying on a bed, covers pulled up to his bare stomach. The bed underneath him was soaked with his sweat. Ora reached out a hand and touched his arm, "Jace?" she whispered. His eyes fluttered open weakly. "Ora?" He sounded like he'd been gargling sandpaper for three weeks, "Where am I? And where in the world is my shirt?"
"You're-in-the-health-office-an-explosion-went-off-and-you-were-right-in-the-middle-of-it-and-I've-been-worried-sick-about-you-and-oh-my-God-I-am-so-glad-you're-okay." Ora spewed this out all very fast. Celine wondered if Ora had gotten too much sugar from the donuts.
"Slow down please? I couldn't understand you one bit." Jace said. Ora took a deep breath and tried again.
"You're in the health offices. Earlier, you were apparently doing experiments on those packages we picked up in the infiltration mission and they blew up. Marie said that you jumped in front of the explosion, saved her life in the process. You were so close to dying, you were blown to bits. So much shrapnel. I was so worried about you-" Ora couldn't say any more after that, tears started streaming down her face and she buried it in Jace's shoulder.
"I'm so glad you're okay, Jace." She finally said.
Jace felt a little burning sensation on his shoulder, and looked at it to see Ora's tears… ink-tears, on him. Octoling ink. But it wasn't burning, so much as pleasantly luke-warm, and the ink wasn't eating into him. It in fact, tickled.
"Ora, why is your ink not hurting me?" Jace asked, touching the tears curiously. The ink drops went onto his hand and the tickling feeling followed them, along with the slight heat. Ora followed the drops as they traveled down his arm, her eyes displaying her own curiosity.
"It could be because of the fact that you've got Ora's blood in your own veins right now," Celine told Jace, going in for a hug. "I was so worried about you, Jace. I'm so glad you are okay. But, Ora gave blood to save you, and that's what's in your veins right now. Maybe that's why her ink isn't hurting you."
"That's so weird," Jace said to Celine, "Are you serious when you say that she gave blood? Why am I not dead?"
Celine shrugged. "Like I have any clue on the fluids of the body. I never studied that stuff in school… I'm no scientist."
From the door, Callie smiled, "Well, we can study this later. All we know for sure, is that after this ink-blood transplant, Jace now has a resistance to Octarian inks. Why don't we use this to our advantage?"
"Not so," Ora said, "We shouldn't risk Jace that much, he just almost died. And remember, the Octarians have a water based armory now. If he's got a resistance to Octarian ink, then it's safe to assume that water's going to tear him apart twice as fast. Maybe we should get him a new suit, one with all resistance to water and no resistance to ink?"
Celine seemed to agree with that, but Jace wasn't a big fan of the idea. "I like my suit and its capabilities. It's really helpful. And we don't know anything for sure, doing anything right now would be too premature to be really useful to us. We'd just be putting me at risk. I'm much safer in my current suit with my current skills."
"It's something to keep in mind, though." Callie said, "You never know when that knowledge will come in handy. Do you want to do some tests?"
"Right now?" Jace said, gesturing to his bare chest, "I've kind of just woken up, I don't feel good at all. I mostly feel really hungry, but I can't breathe in all the way, my legs feel asleep, I can feel a massive soreness in my chest, and I've got a headache like no other."
"Right," Callie told him, "Maybe later."
"Right now you need to get some rest." Came another voice from the doorway, 3 with a torn up shirt. He held it out and spread it. The shirt looked like somebody had turned it into a very flimsy cheese grater. There were holes nearly everywhere. "I counted at least forty different entry points for shrapnel, and some separated while inside your body. You were lucky to survive the blast. Take a look to your right at the jar."
There was a peanut jar to Jace's right filled to the brim with metal, stone, and other stuff.
"That was all inside of your body."
Jace felt his blood go cold. "All that?" He said weakly, "Was in my body?"
"All of it was lodged in your chest. Your ribs blocked a ton of it, but there was plenty to patch up. I now know you better inside and out than you know yourself. Did you know that your gallbladder is actually a couple of centimeters larger than the normal? Go figure."
Jace felt his blood go even colder, he felt violated. "You poked around inside of my body?"
"To save your life."
"That's still pretty weird man, you're creeping me out. And how do you know what my gallbladder looks like? Isn't that hidden behind my liver."
"You had a small piece of metal lodged below your liver. I was just curious."
"You're creeping me out man."
A/N: So let's see if I can keep a bi-weekly schedule. Here's hoping life doesn't get in the way. So, I was wondering about something, how many of you are artists? I've been looking for somebody to do some art for this story, I can't go around with that lame cover forever. So, I wanted to do some sort of a contest with everybody who's read this story. The contest is this, you guys make some art, do whatever you want as art for this story, and the best drawing will become the cover to my book. Any and all art that I get from you guys will also be an Easter egg in the video game I'm creating, I'll have a whole room dedicated to this art. The game itself is just a fangame (I'm making a different game with a company called Geektank, that one's legit, I'm just working on the fangame on my own time) to the youtuber Markiplier. He's more than willing to play the game, so there's a possibility of your art being seen by a couple million people (Which I think is pretty awesome). PM me if you have any art to turn in, I'll be waiting. I know a bunch of you out there are really good artists, and I can't wait to see what you have in store. (Also, whoever sends me a picture, I'll do a favor for them, whatever they want. Whether it's a face reveal from myself, basing a character on you, whatever you'd like. And it's for anybody who sends in some art.) Whether it's a picture of a ship of your favorite characters, or of the academy, or of a fight, I would more than love to see it. Thank you so much for participating and reading what I have so far in the story, you don't understand how much I appreciate this. And as always, Have Yourselves a Damn Good Day, Dlahm out!
