Chapter 40: Bedridden

…

Link had to stay in the dream until the next morning, which, to him, felt as if he had stayed awake all night. Janni did not bother returning. And, because Link could not startle awake, he heard his crew holler from either the berthing deck or the galley all night. It was a heart-rending experience for him. He knew his crew were vulnerable to falling asleep, but to do nothing but listen to them made him want to jump up and investigate each time he heard someone holler out. Link could identify most everyone by the way they cried out; some of the men were a little perplexing without remembering who was supposed to be on-duty and who was not. For what must have been an hour, Link tried to fall asleep within the dream, but it was no use. He felt wasted and useless lying in the cargo hold; even the three airmen that were supposed to be too sick to work took pains to wander off in search of The Night's victims. He tried to will himself awake as he had done the previous night, but, without Janni to tease him, he could not tell which world he was in.

He eventually came to the point where he simply lost track of time and his surroundings. He did not know when it had happened; the best he could do was stare at the ceiling and listen to his crew waking from their nightmares. Somewhere in that morning, he fell into black and woke to footsteps near his cot.

Nester had shown up to check on him. He first placed a bony hand on Link's forehead. Then he grunted to himself and pulled an oral thermometer from his jacket pocket. "You know the routine, Captain," he said as he touched the thermometer to Link's lips. Link dutifully opened his mouth and pressed the thermometer under his tongue. While Nester waited, he picked up Link's wrist and pressed hard. Link turned a grouchy look on Nester when Nester simply dropped his arm back onto the cot. Nester removed a mortar and pestle from his jacket and set them on the bench. Then he turned back to Link and pressed down on Link's stomach. Link continued to glare at him, tasting the metal end of the thermometer under his tongue.

Nester finally yanked the thermometer out of Link's mouth, catching Link by surprise. He stared at it for a moment. Then he glanced over and said, "Good morning to you, too, Captain."

"I really don't think so," Link said.

Nester waved the thermometer for a moment before putting it back into his pocket. "Cool your head, Captain," he told Link. "You've got an elevated temperature. Which probably accounts for your temper."

"An elevated temperature?" Link repeated, growing concerned. "Why?"

"Peritonitis, probably," Nester said. "With you lying down, we probably didn't get all of that blood out of your abdomen, and now it's infected." He removed a pair of pills from his upper jacket pocket and dropped them into the mortar. "I'll have to give you almost hourly doses of antibiotic to fight it. And I get to stick another needle in your arm."

Link raised his left hand and pressed it against his forehead. "I don't believe this," he said. "I can't be like this."

"Well, you are like this," Nester said as he ground the pills in the mortar. "And you're gonna have to stay like this for at least another day. I can't tell you what running around in that dream world is gonna do to you, but if you do it out here, you're gonna feed that infection until it kills you."

"Are you sure it's… whatever that word was?" Link asked.

"Peritonitis," Nester said. "And, no, I'm not sure. I can't be sure of anything being so far away from a clinic or a lab. But you present with rigidity on the left side of your abdomen. The inside of your abdominal cavity is inflamed, so your stomach muscles are trying to protect it. And you've got a fever. I don't have means to test anything; I have to act. So it's antibiotics and saline on top of whatever breakfast Cookie brings you. It's gonna make you feverish, and you're probably gonna throw up; I'll leave a bucket."

Link sighed. "There's gotta be a better way to handle this…"

"I wish I had a better option for you," Nester said over his shoulder, his tone not as stressed. "This is the best in frontier medicine. Soon, I'll probably be feeding you bark scraping and poking you with needles to bleed you. All I can say is I'm glad I didn't bring my leeches."

"Would all that really help?" Nester and Link glanced at the nearby stairs to see Lilly standing there, a bowl in one hand.

Nester raised an eyebrow at Link before asking her, "Why? Do you have some?"

"You're not bein' funny, Doc," Lilly told him as she moved into the open space on the left side of Link's cot. She stepped up to the standing apparatus Leynne had made and opened the lid on top of the funnel.

"What's for breakfast?" Nester asked.

Lilly gave the bowl a disappointed look. "Hardtack powdered into diluted grog," she replied. "It's… all I could manage this mornin'."

"Wait, wait, you're gonna give me grog?" Link asked.

"You need something other than hardtack and water," Nester told him. "This infection is gonna dehydrate you; you need whatever nutrients you can get. Fill him up, Cookie." Lilly nodded and poured the soup into the funnel. Nester passed the mortar to her. "Add this, too."

Lilly nodded and accepted the mortar. "How are you today, Captain?" she asked as she added the pills to the funnel.

Link shook his head. "Not good," he admitted. "Could probably be worse, though."

"I'll say you could," Nester said, crossing his arms. "You're gonna get at least a little worse before you get better. You'd better brace yourself for that."

"Thanks a lot, Doc," Link told him as he took the feeding tube from Lilly. He placed it in his mouth and removed a small spring clamp from higher up on the tube. He tasted the alcohol strongest, and he blocked the tube with his tongue for a moment so that he could let his mouth acclimate to it. The hardtack only thickened the soup a little; it still felt like he was drinking watery grog. "Boy, this is weird," he commented, holding the tube in his teeth.

"I didn't feel it tasted good, either," Lilly told him.

"S'not the soup," Link said. "I'm lying on my back… with a sword wound in my side… and I'm drinking soup from a tube."

"Burdens of command," Nester grunted as he turned to walk away.

"Hey, Nester," Link quickly said. Nester looked back over one shoulder. "How're the other guys doing?"

"Hunter and Stan have been able to keep down their meals," Nester said. "They'll probably be ready for duty tomorrow." He hesitated for a moment before turning completely around. He crossed his arms and said, "Gillam's not looking as good. He's had blood show up in his vomit; I'm worried he's got esophagitis from all the puking. He's on antacids now, and he'll need another day."

Link nodded and put the clip on the tube. "What about Beech?" he asked after taking the tube out of his mouth.

Nester glanced at Lilly. Then he gave a sigh and sat on the nearby bench. "Beech… won't leave his berth," he said. "He'll sneak out to use the head, but he won't eat, and he's moved to the very front of the deck to keep away from the rest of the boys."

"Any idea why?" Link asked.

"Paranoia. He thinks the crew might pound the shit out of him for attacking Geordie. I can only guess we have The Night to thank for this one."

"Oh, no…" Link groaned, placing his right hand on his forehead. "Is there anything we can do for him?"

"Hire a shrink next time."

"Doc…"

"Look, Captain, I can splint a leg and bind a cut the size of a steak." He paused and scratched one of his eyebrows. "Given enough notice…" He dropped his arms. "Look, the point is that I deal with physical wounds. This crew is slowly losing its marbles, and I can only go so far with emotions and messing around with someone's brain. You need someone better with that sort of thing if you wanna get the paranoid loon out of the berthing deck." For emphasis, he jabbed a thumb over his shoulder. Link sighed and covered his face with his hands.

"Uh… Captain?" Lilly spoke up. "I hate'ta say it… but I feel I got an idea."

Link peered at her between his fingers. "Why do you make it sound like we're all gonna regret it?"

…

"Oh, My Captain, how can it be that you have need of my expahtise?"

Nester bowed his head and leaned toward Link as he said, "Now I see what you mean by 'regret it'."

"I cannot help but feel intrigued as well, Doctoh," Leynne said, having ducked away from being smacked in the head by Dholit's melodramatic gesturing.

"Steady, Dholit," Link told her, one hand raised.

"I've no objection to stahting with that," Dholit replied. She folded her arms behind her back and leaned forward. "But time might demand a substantial amount of unsteady."

Nester indicated Dholit with a finger while he confusedly tried to ask Leynne, "Did… did she just…?"

"Yes," Leynne replied. "I'm afraid she did."

"Dholit, I need you to listen," Link said.

"Ooh," Dholit cooed. "My Captain has a plan? Special requests?"

"I need you to talk to someone."

Dholit's expression blanked. "Huh?"

Leynne's face had done the same thing. "Huh?"

"Wow," Nester commented. "Give her something to do, she becomes less horny."

"Suahly, My Captain jests to keep me from my advances," Dholit said.

"It's a pretty serious situation, Dholit," Link told her. "Beech won't come out of the berthing deck, and I'd prefer not to force him out. I want you to try talking him out."

Dholit only blinked for a moment. Then she asked, "I am… rathah confused by all of this."

"Beech is paranoid that the rest of the crew is gonna kill him if he comes out," Nester explained.

"Well, he is not exactly wrong," Dholit pointed out.

Nester raised a hand. "And that's the attitude we don't need," he told her. "Between no one getting enough sleep around here and The Night knocking on everyone's skulls, the crew is starting to lose their heads. The captain and Lilly think you're the one who can help settle him down."

Dholit raised an eyebrow. "Lilly, I can fohgive," she said. Then she crossed her arms. "Howevah, if My Captain will cast his mind back two days, he might remembah that my own cihcumstances ah not as… accommodating." This caused Nester and Leynne to exchange confused looks.

"I need you, Dholit," Link told her. "You're the only one I can rely on for this." Then he grinned at her. A sly, smug grin, the kind that Dholit always bore when she put her talents for wordplay to work. "As the proclaimed expert of all things to do with the heart. Or was that just you trying to manipulate me again?"

Dholit's jaw dropped open. However, to Link's relief, she could not resist smiling through the expression. "I often cannot find heaht to accuse My Captain of wrongdoing," she said, "but I feel as if my own whimsical natuah is being tahned against me. My mind buhns with fury at the knowledge that I might be so easily manipulated, and, yet, I cannot resist the pride in my bosom that my own fohm of cohruption has finally stahted to affect My Captain." She leaned backward with one hand pressed to her forehead. "Oh, My Captain, this exchange of wits has broken me. I cannot but comply with youh ohdah. I can only pray that I live up to My Captain's expectations." She then winked at Leynne and walked into the berthing deck.

"She always carry on like that?" Nester asked once she was out of sight.

"We weh just lucky she didn't find need to take heh clothes off," Leynne told him.

"What's wrong with that?" Nester asked.

"She becomes even moh obnoxious."

"Ah."

"How's the crew doing?" Link asked.

Leynne shared a concerned look with Nester. Then he told Link, "I wish things could be betteh. Half of the crew has been wandering the deck fretting that you could pass at any moment. Most of us who weh present at youh suhgery have been… ratheh thrown by the idea that The Night has found a way to physically hahm you."

Link heaved a sigh. "I was worried about that."

"Yes, I'm afraid that Line was not in his usual mood when he left with Cale and Ihleen eahlieh," Leynne continued. "The engine room has been… gloomieh than usual, with the possible exception of Sello attempting to propel himself along a line of bottles with flatulence. And, well… while wohd has cehtainly gotten to the Gelto, it seems that Layna has found reason to make hehself scahce."

"Doesn't seem to me that she needs to hang around all the time," Nester told him. "She's always struck me as the quiet type."

"Hang on, hang on," Link said as Leynne opened his mouth. "Layna?"

The trio waited a moment. And then Leynne and Nester looked over their shoulders. "I don't think she heard you, Captain," Nester commented.

"'Inu mima—."

"Yikes!"

"What the hell!?"

Link had to brace himself up on his elbows to see that Layna had appeared from the doorway into the berthing deck. She did not look at any of them, instead keeping her focus on the deck in front of her feet. So, he asked, "Layna, is there something wrong?"

"Ay'a, My Captain," she answered in a voice just above a whisper.

The conversation faltered, each man expecting Layna to elaborate. Nester was the first to lose patience and asked, "Well, what is it, girl?"

Layna took a step into the hold and held her hands up a bit for them to see dark rust caking her palms. "My Captain dha' lwajma'… 'inu nadlwaym'idhiylak 'anw lwajma'."

"Please tell me that's—" Nester began to say.

"It's probably Link's blood from last night," Leynne interrupted him, one hand raised to calm him. "She's saying she can't wash it off." He then used the hand to gesture to Layna. "Come along, Layna; we'll find a way to wash that off."

"'Inu nadlwaymsifiynak," Layna replied, dropping her hands to her sides.

Leynne looked over his shoulder at Link for a moment. "Why not?" he asked.

"Zaxib 'agolwnin lwaykilwubat sazhlya'ak My Captain," Layna said, her eyes still on the floor. "'Inu milaxomak niygodhot My Captain."

Leynne was silent for a moment, prompting Nester to ask, "What'd she say?"

Leynne heaved a sigh and confessed, "I'm actually not very suh. Moh than one vehb, and I've completely lost the convehsation." He looked back at Layna. "Though, judging by heh history and previous actions, I suspect she would prefeh to remain heh to protect Link. Right, Layna?"

"Ay'a, Amda Lyayn," Layna answered.

Leynne turned to Link. "It is, of couhse, youh decision, Captain," he said. "Howeveh, I feel obliged to point out that ouh deck crew is slowly dwindling."

It was Link's turn to sigh. "I wish we could accommodate her in some way," he admitted. "But you're right. We can't short ourselves airmen." He looked at Layna. "Leynne needs you on-deck, Layna. I'm sorry."

Link saw her arm jerk. However, she slowly nodded her head. "'Inu mathosak, My Captain," she said. "'Inu nayx fizhubak 'imayn taris."

"I suggest you eat fihst," Leynne told her. "Youh shift doesn't staht foh anotheh half an houh."

"Ay'a, Amda Lyayn," Layna replied before slowly walking away.

Nester waited until she had disappeared from sight before saying, "If anything, I'm a little worried that she's gonna be the next one to lose it."

"We cannot allow ouh feahs to govehn us," Leynne said. He shot Nester a glare as he added, "Especially when it comes to naming victims aloud."

"Did you not see the same girl I did?" Nester asked.

"Paht of ouh recent problem is that The Night is taking ouh ideas," Leynne said. "We cannot have these soht of thoughts about each otheh."

"I can't just stop thinking, Number Two," Nester said in an irritable tone. "I've got people to treat, and I'd rather be prepared to have more than just act like nothin—"

"Nester, Leynne, just hang on," Link interrupted. This caused both men to look at him. "I'm-I'm just trying to get you two to calm down. Okay? I trust Layna not to do anything. And as much as we may think it, there's just no telling what's gonna happen next." He had to pause because his head reeled slightly. He realized that he was struggling to sit up, not because of pain but because his stomach felt stiff. So, he settled back on the cot on his elbows. "I, uh… I think I forgot what else I was gonna say."

"You'h sweating," Leynne observed. "Ah you all right?"

"Am I?" Link asked. He leaned on his left arm so that he could wipe his forehead with the opposite hand.

"He's fighting infection," Nester said. "Probably peritonitis." He shrugged and addressed Link, "I told you you'd be worse before you get better."

"You weren't kidding," Link said as he let himself drop onto the cot.

"And, with that," Leynne spoke up, "we should probably end the ahgument heh. Agreed?"

Nester grunted and scratched at his unshaven jaw. "Yeah, yeah… I'll try thinking happy thoughts."

"I wouldn't tell you as much," Leynne said. "That soht of thinking just might confuse The Night, though."

Nester grinned at him. "I wonder if The Night likes stripes or polka dots." Leynne deigned to respond with half of a smile before shaking his head and walking away. Link could only roll his eyes.

…

Link spent the afternoon in a fever-induced haze. He barely recalled speaking to Leynne once more, and he could not remember what he had said about the crew. At best, he knew that the shore party failed to find any sign of the technoworks. At one point, he must have been delirious because a humming bird was flying in front of his face squawking. His mind cleared up in time to see that Dholit had succeeded in bringing Beech out of the berthing deck. At least, he assumed as much; it was hard to tell because the creature that had accompanied her out looked more like a scrawny Goron wearing an airman's tunic.

The evening began with another round of Lilly's 30-proof soup. Link found that the intake during the day left his head a little light, and he vaguely remembered Lilly sharing a joke with him because he was giggling about it for hours afterwards. He knew that Nester had given him more pills, and then he fell asleep. He could not tell what he was dreaming, but he knew he ended by stepping backwards into the cot and pressing his back into it until gravity felt like taking over.

He took in a breath and wiped the sweat from his forehead with a hand. He glanced over at the bench to see if Janni had shown up.

"Hi, Link."

"Yipes!" Link cried out when he realized that a dark face with bright, amber eyes was staring at him just a hair's breadth from his nose. He jerked in the opposite direction and fell off the edge of the cot. K-thump! Since Nester had seen it necessary to use his only IV stand to give Link more fluids, Link's fall on top of the tubing caused the wooden stand to topple onto his head. Pop. "Doh—" Krsh! "Ooooow…"

"Hahahahahahahah!" Janni cackled as she lifted herself onto Link's sleeping body and sat on his chest, looking down at him writhing on the floor. "That was great."

"Nice to see you're in a better mood…" Link grunted as he pushed himself up. He faltered a moment as he felt a fresh slice of pain in his side on top of his wound. He pressed his right hand against it as he slowly settled back onto the deck. "Oh, this hurts…"

"So, Link, what do you wanna do tonight?" Janni asked.

"Definitely not the same thing as every night," Link groaned. He rolled onto his left to examine the IV stand. "I hope I can survive this dream without that." He looked up to confirm that the IV stand in the real world was still standing.

"You probably will," Janni told him. Link placed a hand on the nearby edge of the cot and attempted to pull himself up. However, he had forgotten that his body lying on the cot only weighed down the cot in the real world, and he slammed his face into the deck when the cot flipped onto its side. Janni giggled as she told him, "Yeah, you reeeeally don't wanna go out there today."

"I'm figuring that out…" Link grumbled through the deck. He shoved the dream cot against the bulkhead and carefully rolled onto his back, cautious of the broken glass on the deck next to him. He looked up to find Janni's clawed feet hanging over the real cot, the rest of her body a vague shadow on the underside of the cot. "So. How does The Night like me now?"

"Actually, I kinda think that whole thing took it by surprise," Janni replied. "It's one thing to torture you in its own realm of blood and gore. The one thing it doesn't wanna do is outright kill you."

"You can tell that?" Link asked.

Janni shrugged. "Call it an intuition," she said. "Kind of a feeling I get every now and then. I've been poking around this dream for a long time, Link. I notice these things. Really subtle things."

Link felt another twinge in his side and pressed a hand on his bandage. "Certainly seems like those mystics knew what they were doing," he commented. "I'd hate to accidentally swing that sword around my own crew."

"Yeah, yeah, props to the Sorian club of the creepy blue eye," Janni replied in a bored tone. "They couldn't have done anything without the Dreamweaver's work."

"So the Dreamweaver did have something to do with all this," Link said, halfway surprised that his guess was correct.

"The Dreamweaver started all of this," Janni told him. She lifted away from the real-world cot and floated above Link with her arms folded under her chin as if she was lounging on a sofa. The fact that she was lying on her stomach on a theoretical sofa that stood vertically, leaving her facing the floor, made Link wonder if she ever cared about gravity. "Not a bad trick, huh?"

"A trick?" Link asked.

"This dream world was made before The Night became a thing here," she told him. Link noticed her kicking her feet as she spoke. "Just this little sliver of reality that one only saw while they were asleep. Granted, you couldn't do anything constructive here unless you're killing nightmarish creatures. It was… well, it kinda falls somewhere in between a vision come true and a happy accident."

Link examined her face for a moment. Then he said, "For someone who was imprisoned here, you kinda sound like you admired the Dreamweaver."

"Oh, don't get me wrong," Janni told him. "I was pretty sad and bitter when I realized he put me here. Well, I might have been. All that was a lifetime ago."

"Do you have any idea how long you've been in the shield?"

Janni shrugged. "It's kinda hard to tell time when you've lost your mind. I don't even know when my birthday is anymore. Not that it matters, really; I'm sure I passed one hundred some time ago."

"I wanna say that the Sorians battled Cunimincus nearly two hundred years ago. Hylians have only lived here for… maybe the past hundred years."

Janni shrugged again. "Time doesn't mean a whole lot here. Hang around long enough, and you'll see."

Link sat up, causing Janni to switch to a standing position as she floated backwards out of his way. "I don't intend to be…" He paused as he experienced more pain in the process of getting his feet under him. "… here that long."

"Where are you going?" Janni asked.

"Up on deck," Link said as he slowly rose, his voice strained from the effort. "I spent all last night listening to my crew scream itself awake. I think I'd like to be somewhere else right now." Once he stood at his full height, he had to give himself a moment to breathe, his side stinging from the movement. "Being stuck in this cot isn't fun, either."

"I agree," Janni said as she drifted aside. Link moved forward with a stiff gait, carefully drifting toward the port staircase against his wound's protests. "You're a lot more fun when you're moving around."

"I'm sure I am," Link grunted. He placed a hand on the bulkhead dividing the stairs that led up to the main deck from those going to the galley. "I can't believe how hard this is. It's like my body's made of lead."

"Probably has something to do with all that blood you lost," Janni said.

Link put on a wry smile and turned his head to tell her, "I guess Randy's blood just isn—…" Link cut off when he looked over Janni's shoulder.

Janni, a little surprised by Link's sudden urge to freeze in place, glanced around toward Link's cot. "Oh," she commented. "When did she get there?"

Link felt his heart punch the inside of his chest. He did not know when, but in the time it took for him to stand up and move over to the stairs, Layna had appeared. She was straddling his sleeping body with one hand close to his neck. She must have sensed him looking at her because, in the same moment that he had spotted her, she turned to look straight at him in wide-eyed surprise despite not actually being able to see him.

In her reaction, Link's eyes also caught a glint of steel in the hand near his neck.

"Oh, crap…" Link uttered.

"Wait, what is she—" Janni began to say.

Link did not catch the end of it. He had closed his eyes and tried to force himself to wake up in the same manner as two nights ago.

Link opened his eyes to find Layna hovering over him. She turned to face him, suddenly aware that he was awake. He could feel cold metal against his neck. Whatever she had in mind, Link was convinced that she had not wanted to be caught.

He swallowed and slowly asked in as level a voice as he could manage, "Layna? What are you doing?"

Layna, her eyes still wide, stared at him for a moment. Then Link felt the blade slowly pull away from his neck. He remained still out of fear of startling her into doing something to defend herself. This was the closest he had ever come to being attacked by her; he was certain that a bad move now would cause her to switch to Kill Mode.

Then, she fell onto him. Her lips landed on his and pressed hard. Link heard alarms sounding in his head, but he could not resist the new feeling of warm ecstasy coursing through his body. For a moment, he completely forgot that he had just seen one of his crew, the assassin of the bunch, mounted on top of him with a blade poised to slice open his neck.

Layna pulled away just as sudden, the smack of their lips parting shocking Link back into reality. He looked up to find a different look on her face. In the lamplight, she looked wistful, longing, like something about what had just happened was much sadder than it should have been.

"I love you."

Clearer than anything he had ever heard before in his life. The first words Layna had ever deigned to tell anyone in Hylian. At any other point in time, Link might have been ecstatic, might have tried to pursue this new line of communication between him and the only one of his crew who staunchly refused to let anyone else know what was on her mind.

Instead, Link was fearful. And, in the single second after she uttered the last word, it happened. Layna's face turned blank, emotionless. No remorse. No mercy.

She raised her blade and drew it across her neck.