There was only so many shapes one could make with the natural patterns of a ceiling, Bracken mused.
It had been a few days since the incident and at the very least, her concussion was finally clearing up slightly. Thanks to Leander's medicine, she was feeling better in terms of pain but they'd quickly discovered a very slow acting side effect.
She'd been feeling horrendously sick since the third day of her recovery. Since earlier today when the cause of the illness was discovered, they'd immediately taken her off the new medicine and switched it with a much weaker, yet less stomach churning, version of it.
Thanks to this sickness, Bracken's time just staring at the ceiling above her bed instead of doing anything else had increased tenfold.
On the bright side, her head was much better now. She still had the odd dizzy spell when she did decide it was safe for her to move but the point was, she was getting better. And today, her stomach wasn't in knots.
Progress.
Taking an experimental roll onto her side, she deemed her stomach settled enough to at least stand up. The ceiling and Leafbook were only so interesting after all.
Carefully sitting back up, she reached for her walking stick. She did her best not to take full notice of her room to avoid any more reminders of how long she'd spent here.
'Knock! Knock!'
The sound was followed by the opening of her bedroom door and Leander stepping in to see her.
"You're looking better today." He remarked as he drew nearer to her seated form. Noticing the unfamiliar pill bottle in his hand her eyes widened a small fraction.
"Keep your new pills away from me! I actually want to get better!" Her tone was a mix of teasing and deadly seriousness. He glanced down at the medicine in his hand before placing them back into his pocket.
"My apologies. These are the improved versions of the previous medicine we prescribed you. If you don't want to try them out, that's fine. Your last encounter with these weren't exactly favourable." He explained as he took the desk chair that had been moved to her bedside for any visitors to use.
"Yeah, no kidding." She grumbled a little but smiled her encouragement at him. "But they did do wonders for pain. Pretty good in the short term."
"But of course, you need them for a longer term than just a few days." He tweaked his glasses smartly.
"True. But you'll get there. With the way it's developing, it shouldn't be long now." Bracken continued to smile. "And on the bright side, the side effects are wearing off! Isn't it great?" He sighed as he shook his head.
"Optimism is a good sign of recovery I suppose…" Bracken frowned at that. People weren't optimistic about recovery? "Do you not remember?" She shook her head with a curious glimmer in her eyes now.
"Remember what?" The engineer watched him carefully as he began to speak.
"When your illness was at its peak, you became very distressed. You said you thought you were never going to recover." He shook his head again. "Though I suppose you were rather deep under the influence of a fever. It makes sense to a degree that you would act out of character."
"Huh. Well I guess it can be a sign of recovery." She mumbled thoughtfully. "Even more reason to be optimistic!" She smiled again and she could see, in his eyes was a glimmer of happiness over her improvement over the last few days. "Speaking of, what's the chance I can sneak outside without an Evan lecture?" Leander actually smiled a little at that.
"I'd say pretty high, since he, Roland and Tani are on a visit to Ding Dong Dell today." He answered as she nodded with anticipation. Evan had made it very clear that she was not to leave the castle under any circumstances so that if something did happen, there was guaranteed to be someone nearby. "However, I must advise against it."
"Aw, don't be a spoil sport. I've been cooped up in here for so long, I'm considering breaking apart my Leafbook just so I have something to do." An idea suddenly flashed in her mind as she could practically feel the answer she didn't want to hear on its way to being spoken. "What if, I made a deal with you?" He paused at that.
"A deal?" The confused look on his face made her give him a reassuring smile.
"Relax. It's not a battle to the death of anything." She chuckled before continuing. "How about, you let me leave the castle for some much needed space, and in return…" A pause for dramatic effect. "I will try your new medicine." Leander took a few moments to mull it over.
"I accept your deal on two conditions." He started as she leaned forwards in anticipation. "You promise to be back before King Evan returns and you stay close to the more populated areas of Evermore." Now it was Bracken's turn to pause.
"Can you help me get passed the guards?" She queried with a head tilt.
"Very well." He tweaked his glasses again.
"Then deal." She held her hand out, to which he firmly shook it. Taking the bottle from his pocket, he tipped one pill out before handing it to her. Bracken gulped a little as she stared at it for a long moment.
"This is better… right?" The gravity of her deal suddenly kicked in, full force.
"Of course." Leander nodded encouragingly. Taking the glass of water from her bedside table he offered that to her as well. Bracken nervously took the glass before taking a deep breath.
"Here goes nothing then." She swallowed the medicine down with some difficulty before downing the rest of the water in disgust. "Ugh! How come this one actually tastes bad?!" His head tilted in question.
"It shouldn't have a taste…" The two blinked at each other before she felt it. A sudden weight seemed to latch onto her mind, slowing her thought process down to a snail's pace.
The dizziness hit her next. She could have sworn there was only one Leander here a minute ago…
The urge to vomit very quickly arose and with that, so did she. The engineer raced across the room to her bathroom, crashing into the doorway on her way through, before collapsing on the floor beside the toilet to empty her stomach.
She felt Leander at her side in an instant as he tried to help and make sense of the situation. Once her retching stopped and her breathing had calmed, she slowly pulled herself away from the toilet to lean back on whatever was behind her.
The sudden heartbeat she could hear had her realise just what – or rather who – she was leaning on. Glancing up, her now exhausted eyes found his and she smirked a little.
"Keep this up and your Queen might get jealous…" She coughed a little awkwardly as he sighed.
"You know, Tani thinks you only say those things because you're jealous of her." His tone was a little shaky from the panic he still seemed to be experiencing. Bracken chuckled at that.
"Don't get your hopes up… You're…" She yawned, cutting herself off. "Just easy to tease…" She paused. "Not my type anyway…" And with that last grumble, her eyes began to close and Leander's panic seemed to increase.
"That's a relief. T-then what is–" The rest of his sentence was cut off by her consciousness.
He could ask her later if it was important…
Min Ti will show up eventually I promise.
