Chapter Text
Corinthians 6:19-20
Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.
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Returning to ALC was harder than we thought. With the adrenaline of the battle slowly clearing out, everyone's posture relaxed, their backs curved, caving slowly to gravity, their legs dragged. They resembled the hunch-backed Graces. Some carried huge bags of food and medicine that they looted in New Nazareth to the kitchens, some carried people to the infirmary. We're safe now, but people are still hurt.
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A mixture of gratitude and guilt claws from where my organs used to be. The cot I was forced on in the former lounge—now a makeshift nurse’s office—feels awkward under me. I sit unevenly, my legs unable to be still. Cots are evenly placed within the room, chairs are stacked in the corner, ash that had been forgotten rests on them as a painful reminder of the fire.
At least no one died this time. I correct myself—not no one. Nobody in the ALC. That's what counts. That's all that matters now.
The savior of New Nazareth became its destruction today. I killed them all. Theo. Mom. Every face I looked at as a child. I've erased everything in my past except my memories, and I can't get rid of those.
Hey.
I look around to find the source of the voice, but it's flooded around me, inside of me, so I can't locate it. It's Nick's voice. I search to find him lying on a stretcher across the room.
Can you hear me?
I force my eyes to close and open, some unnatural form of blinking.
Hello? It feels weird, talking to your head. Or his. Maybe I'm in shock and making up his voice right now.
It works! I see Nick smiling from afar, and it looks unusual on him. I like it.
Is this... Are we telepathically speaking? I'm frowning with the semblance of eyebrows I have left.
I can't believe I'm right about this. The Flood remnants I have in me, I can speak to you through it. Never thought the Flood had its pros.
Oh. That's new then. This could be useful.
I don't even have to move a muscle. This is awesome. For a second he sounds like he doesn't have the weight of the world on his shoulders. He sounds like a teenager.
It is a pretty neat party trick. Do you want to test stuff out? Emotions, memories, senses? Try to see if they transfer? That could be so useful for missions. Mental maps, communication without even looking at each other.
Yes. Then my broken spine shivers, from my lower back to my shoulders to the tips of my wings, and I feel an emotion—one that doesn't belong to me—through every fiber of my feathers, filling out every pore on my rough skin. Hope. I recite Jeremiah 29:11, but I don't let Nick hear—receive— it. For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for good and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.
Did you... feel that? Nick tests, and he sounds so gentle you'd think I'm still human.
Yes. It's... I find my words. It's like going to sleep on Christmas Eve, hoping that the next day will be filled with joy.
I miss Christmas. I feel my shoulders slump and my muscles weaken not of my own accord. His sadness, his nostalgia, that's what's doing this.
I can feel that. Try showing me what Christmas was like for you. I want to remember the good through his eyes.
Every Christmas in New Nazareth was worse than the last for me. I got dresses, hair accessories, but never anything I asked for. And yet. Yet. I still had hope. I always hoped that the next Christmas would be better. It never was.
My head squeezes like it’s being caved-in on all sides. I reach up to touch it, and it feels fine.
I can feel an intruding memory at the back of my head, so far back it's down my throat, and I try pulling it forward. It does not give.
Stop- don't. A wave of discomfort washes over me. I stop reaching for the memory. It softens. Shyly, the edges of my vision blur with swirling reds and greens and warm yellows. I see people flash by in this memory, but it's not scary like having a swarm of doctors around you. It's homely, knowing that you are loved through all these familiar beings.
I see no blinding white, no robes, so this must be from before New Nazareth. The only proof of God is a little statue of His son being born in the corner. He's tiny and lacks detail and cracked over the eye.
I hold the warm fuzzy memory with gratefulness. It fades out of my field of view, walking out the door as if blown out like birthday candles.
Nick trusts me to see this. To see from his eyes.
It's beautiful. I think, for the lack of a better word.
By the time I'm done with the memory, Erin stands near me, holding various medical instruments I doubt anyone here knows how to use.
“I'm sorry for the long wait, we're kind of in a rush at the moment.” I nod politely. She continues. “So, from a scale of one to ten, how bad is…” She takes a second to take me in, my face, my bloody broken wings. “Everything? We have… painkillers.”
“I feel fine, Erin, I swear,” I lie, I'm just used to the pain. If I take those painkillers I will know what it's like to feel okay again and I don't think I can handle that right now.
“I can clean and wrap up your wings if you'd like. They seem to have been hurt in the fight.” She offers, and I nod. She's never going to let me go if I still look hurt anyways.
Erin picks a somewhat clean cloth and dips it into the murky water. I don't think I can get an infection even if I tried, so I let her. She waits for me to adjust myself so she can reach my back. She cleans and combs the top feathers first where they emerge from my back very delicately, like she's scared of hurting me.
“Thank you.” I whisper hoarsely. Her smile doesn't quite reach her eyes, but I understand. We all do. She continues to wash my wings, and I bask in the rare calm.
She hums a familiar tune. I try to hum along, but my vocal chords are barely even good for talking, much less singing. Erin giggles light-heartedly at my attempt.
“Pst. Why don't you lay down on the cot, stomach down, so you can rest while I clean you up?” Erin can be a genius sometimes. I scooch down and settle into my cot.
She runs the cloth full of too-cold water over my coverts and I shiver. I don't complain, the cold numbs the throbbing pain I feel, well, everywhere. Erin continues to hum like that for a while.
I fall asleep after the second wing is cleaned.
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1 Corinthians 2:11
For who knows a person 's thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.