Chapter Twelve: Recovery and New Love
A couple days after the rescue
It had taken the doctors a couple hours to stabilize Tia and get her into a room where she could have visitors. In the room there was the hospital bed and all of the medical equipment keeping Tia alive while she was in a coma, a bed along the far side of the wall that someone could sleep in and a couple of chairs in the room for people to sit in.
Lavi had taken up residence in the chair closest to the bed, he didn't quite understand why he felt so protective of her, but he didn't mind staying at the hospital since it meant he didn't have to deal with his team fighting. He held one of her hands between both of his gently, so that she would know that she wasn't alone.
The rest of teams LAPS and JSTS were all in class, but since Jezie couldn't focus very well the teacher dismissed her, so she headed to the infirmary to visit Tiana, she was a bit shocked to see that Lavi was in the room, let alone holding one of the girl's hands between his own. Jezebel stopped outside the door, watching them for a little bit before deciding to leave them be and come back later.
Tiana couldn't figure out why she wasn't waking up, it was almost like she was trapped in her own body. She was a little confused by the feeling of someone holding her hand but the warmth was comforting to her. She willed herself to wake up, if only for a few minutes, but her body wouldn't respond to her brain. The fact that she couldn't hear anything made things a little worse since she wouldn't know if someone was talking to her.
A doctor walked into the room to do his first check on Tia since she arrived. He carried a clipboard in one hand and a notepad in the other, "hello, I'm Tiana's doctor, I will be watching over her while she's here," he said to Lavi as he passed the notepad and a pen from his pocket to Lavi.
Lavi looked up from Tiana to the doctor, letting go of her hand to take the notepad and pen from the doctor, he looked down to write out a response to the doctor, "my name is Lavi, I helped find her and I've taken it upon myself to keep her company. Do you know if she is going to be alright?" He showed the notepad to the doctor.
The doctor read what Lavi wrote, glancing down at his clipboard to read his notes before responding, "she will be fine yes, and she will make a full recovery….." he trailed off, rechecking his notes before continuing, "except it looks like she lost her hearing at some point during her kidnapping."
Lavi's fox ears drooped a little, he glanced at Tiana before writing out his reply, "is there anything you can do to bring it back? Also was her voice damaged at all? I ask out of curiosity because she didn't seem to speak when I found her."
"We couldn't find anything wrong with her vocal cords, she may have wanted to stay quiet so you guys didn't get caught or maybe it's something else…." the doctor replied vaguely.
"Something else? What does that mean?" Lavi wrote out, the fur on his ears standing up a little as he became frustrated with the doctor.
"I'm not sure if I should say anymore since you aren't a family member or a significant other," the doctor responded, turning to head towards the door.
Lavi shot of the chair, grabbing the doctor by the arm and spinning him around, "listen here you overpaid swine, you will tell me all you know about her condition or so help me I will make you pay!" he wrote out angrily, shoving the notepad in the doctor's face, if Lavi had the capability to growl, he would be.
"Alright, calm down, I'm not intentionally hiding anything, it's just that it's a speculation of mine, not a medical diagnosis….. That speculation being that she may have convinced herself that she can't speak since she can't hear herself," he replied, holding his hands up defensively.
Lavi backed off, a guilty look on his face, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to overreact, it's just that I didn't like how you were dodging my questions when all I was trying to do was find out information," he wrote out, turning the notebook around as he looked to the ground in embarrassment.
"It's alright, you care for your friend and it's understandable to get upset. I shouldn't have been dodging your questions," the doctor replied, "now if you'll excuse me, I have other patients to see," he walked out of the room.
Lavi walked back over to the chair he'd been sitting in, setting the notepad and pen down on the table, figuring he could use it to talk to Tiana when she woke up. He couldn't quite pinpoint why he felt the way he did about her, but he knew that he cared about her.
Ares was in the training room working on his punches against a punching bag when Nova walked in.
"Can I help you?" Ares asked, pausing his punching to look at whoever had walked into the room.
"S-sorry, I didn't mean to bother you, I just wanted to ask you something but you're busy so I'll leave…" Nova turned to leave, pulling the door open slowly.
"You aren't bothering me, do you need something?" he asked, his tone more gentle.
She turned around, letting go of the door, "I was just wondering why you chose to go with me over your teammate, I mean, you don't even know me so it's just kinda confusing to me."
He shrugged his shoulders a little, "I dunno, maybe it's because I didn't want to pass up an opportunity to spend time with a beautiful girl."
Her cheeks went a light red, "I u-umm…. Y-you think I'm b-beautiful?" she stuttered.
"Yeah I do, do you have a problem with that?" he walked over to her, a slight smirk curving his lips.
"No, not at all, it's just a little shocking…" she replied, her voice a little more confident this time around.
"How is it shocking?" his lion tail swished curiously.
"I'm not used to people complimenting me, that's all, but there is something else I wanted to ask you about."
"And that is?" he raised a brow.
"I want to get better at hand to hand combat," she stated, adding, "right now all I've got is my bow, but if anything happens to that, I'd be a sitting duck, so will you help me?"
"Yeah, I can help you, it'll give me someone to practice on, but don't worry, I'll go easy on you," he replied.
Nova snorted, "thanks for the vote of confidence," she said in a sarcastic tone.
"I wasn't trying to be rude by saying that, I was just saying that I didn't want to go to hard on you, since it's your first time," Ares explained.
"Oh…. that would makes sense…." she responded softly.
Ares and Nova started training in hand to hand combat, Nova getting a few good punches in before Ares knocked her on her butt.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Peach and Star had decided to meet after class and head to Peach's dorm to get to know each other a little better.
The two sat on Peach's bed in an awkward silence, Star nervously brushing her hair behind her ear as she tried to think of why someone like Peach would be interested in a girl like her.
"So, what kind of things do you do for fun?" Peach asked, breaking the silence between them.
"Oh, I u-umm, don't really have a whole lot of hobbies, usually I just read magazines while listening to music, that is if I'm not teasing Jezie about her crush on Azure," Star replied, immediately facepalming, "crap I wasn't supposed to tell anyone that…"
"It's alright, Azure has a major crush on Jezie, Lavi and I are constantly teasing her about it," Peach smiled gently, her mind wandering to her own crush and wondering if she should say something.
Star glanced up at the taller girl, she'd felt some sort of pull towards her, but she didn't know what to do about it, "well that's something we have in common…." she muttered.
"Yeah, I guess it is, Beautiful," she replied to the shorter girl, deciding to come clean about her crush on the pink haired girl.
Star blushed, her eyes widening a little before she looked away, "I'm not beautiful…." she whispered, seeming to shrink into herself.
Star's response shocked Peach a little, "yes you are, you are one of the most beautiful girls I've ever met," she smiled a little, reaching out to rest her hand on Star's shoulder.
She shrugged Peach's hand off, "no I'm not… I can guarantee that there are girls far more prettier than I am, take yourself for example…." her voice as soft.
She couldn't believe what the shorter girl was saying, well the compliment she got, but why was Star so adamant on putting herself down? Peach decided to ask her, "why do you insist that you aren't beautiful?" she hooked her finger under Star's chin, turning her head so that she was looking at her.
"Because it's true… it has to be…." her voice was shaky, tears were welling up in her eyes a little.
"Why is that? What happened to you that you don't believe you're beautiful?"
"There was this guy…." was all Star could get out before the tears started to fall.
'So it was a bad break up, that would make sense,' Peach thought to herself, "just tell me that you two were safe…."
"We were at first…. I thought we had something special…. But I was wrong….. I was so stupid and naive…." Star replied in between sobs, "I caught him with another girl….. I broke things off but he didn't believe that we were over….." her sobs got louder.
Peach wrapped her arms around Star and pulled her close, "shh it's okay, he's not going to hurt you, I won't let him."
"But he already has….. A few weeks ago, I ran into him in the hallway during my morning walk….. he said he wanted to catch up, but I refused and tried to walk away… he locked me in a broom closet and…." she trailed off, unable to say the word rape.
Just then it clicked in Peach's head, Star had been raped…. that would make a lot of sense with how she'd been acting, Peach tightened her grip on the other girl, "where is that scumbag now?" she asked, unable to keep the slight growl from her voice.
"He transferred out of the school last week….. he's probably long gone by now…." Star replied softly.
"Dammit…. Well I'm not going to let anyone else hurt you, that is if you'll give me a chance," Peach pulled away a little to look into Star's eyes.
Star gave her a confused look, "what do you mean give you a chance? Like a relationship?"
"Yeah, exactly like a relationship, don't worry, there won't be any dates or anything like that until we get to know each other better," the taller girl replied.
"I don't know why you'd want to go out with someone like me…." the pink haired girl replied, burying her face in her hands.
"What do you mean someone like you? What happened to you doesn't define who you are, it only defines the bastard that did it to you. Like I said before, you are the most beautiful girl I've ever seen and I'm going to do everything I can to show you that," she responded, her orange eyes searching for any negative reaction.
"Okay, I'll go out with you, but you can't tell anyone about what happened to me, you are the only one that knows right now," Star said, looking up at Peach.
"I promise, my lips are sealed on the matter," she wrapped her arms around her now girlfriend and placed a gentle kiss to her forehead.
The two girls spent the rest of the afternoon talking about random stuff and getting to know each other, although, Peach could tell that Star was hiding something. However, she couldn't tell what it was, and she was determined to get an answer.