On Sick Leave
The next morning, I wake up a little late. When I look at the clock it’s already half past five so I quickly jump out of bed, get dressed and get ready to leave when Rayla stops me.
“Hey Thoma, I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to go today. You’re sick, you’re exhausted and quite frankly you look horrible.”
“But I want to help. cough cough”
“I know but not at the cost of your own health.”
“Please ane…Cough I want to contribute too…Cough.”
“I know you do but not like this.”
“Please…I don’t want to be useless…cough cough Scarlet said if she visits me during my break today and I’m not looking better she’ll take me back anyways. Cough cough
Even if it's just for a bit, they might show up during that time, please let me help. Cough cough”
Giving me a skeptical look, she eventually relents, “Sigh Alright, but let me accompany you to the factory just in case you change your mind.”
“Okay. cough cough”
We then walk to the factory together and I barely make it in time for work.
“Cuttin it close today, huh? Did you oversleep?” Jerry asks.
“Yeah, a little. Cough cough”
“Well, at least you made it. Let’s get going, it’s shoveling time.”
Walking up to the furnaces, the air feels thicker than usual. When I get to work I’m surprisingly not feeling too bad, I’m just feeling very light. It’s about an hour into the work when I feel a little strange and start to bleed out my nose again. I’m about to go to the bathroom to clean up but on my way I get a huge coughing fit and start to cough up blood. I think I can hear someone call my name when I pass out.
—--------------------------------------------------------------
Shortly after Rose passes out, Roland picks her up, “Shit, let’s go to the break room Jerry, this looks bad.”
They quickly go to the breakroom and place Rose on a bench, “Go get me a water bucket and some cloth.”
“On it.”
Taking off his shirt Roland puts it under Rose’s head as a cushion to elevate her head. With the wet cloth he cleans the old blood off and says, “It’s not stopping…Fuck. Do you know where Tom lives?”
“No, but his sister is a prostitute right? She’s probably waiting outside the gate.”
“Good point, it’s best we don’t wait for his other sister to show up, he should get to a doctor. Try holding his nose closed. If he stops breathing, open it again.”
Roland then picks up Rose and they quickly go outside the factory.
“Do you see her?”
“Yeah, over there!” Jerry says pointing at Sher Aka and Rayla sitting near the gate in revealing clothing while John in a suit with a hat covering his eyes sits behind them like a pimp.
“Oy! Tom is with you right!?”
Looking over to them, Rayla's face seems like it suddenly loses all color as she stands up and runs over to them, “What happened!?”
“He started bleeding out the nose again and passed out after a coughing fit.”
“What do you mean again!?”
Jerry answers, “Well, he started getting nosebleeds yesterday. He didn’t want to worry you guys.”
“Damn it Thoma, you idiot! John! Come here now!”
John rushes over and looks at Rose, “This doesn’t look good…The breathing is shallow but stable. Let’s get him to the inn.”
Quickly running to the inn, they burst through the door to Scarlet’s surprise and carry Rose on the bed.
“Rose!? What happened, Rayla!?”
“He collapsed with a nose bleed. John says he might also have been coughing up blood. So far he seems stable but very sick. Apparently he was hiding from you that he started having nosebleeds yesterday.”
“She did what!? What do we do now? Can you heal her?”
“I can give him some of your energy but that's about it. It will help but it won’t heal him.”
Rayla asks, “What do you think is the cause?”
“I’m not sure but my guess is Smithy Lung, which is iron and coal poisoning, paired with exhaustion.”
Scarlet yells, “Why do you not know!? Aren’t you a healer!?”
“I am but I’m not sure how to treat him. If I look at this from him having the body of an adult he’ll be fine after some rest, if I look at this from the view of an infant he might die.”
“What!?”
“What!?”
“He lost a decent amount of blood. In an adult it’s not that much but for an infant even a small amount of blood loss could be lethal. I’m not sure where on that spectrum he falls.”
Rayla panics, “So what do we do!? Do we leave?”
“No, he must not be moved in this state. The best we can do is have him stay in bed in a heated room like this. If we put him in the cart his condition will worsen. I’m going to watch over him to see if his condition worsens. Scarlet, please give me your hand so I can transfer some of your energy to him.”
“Of course.”
“Life a mysterious thing, transfer vitality from this person to another. Life Transfer.”
A black current of magic flows from Scarlet through John and then into Rose, causing her to breathe a little deeper than before.
“Is that it? Nothing happened!”
“He’s breathing a bit easier now. That’s all we can do. Life transfer can’t help with poison, it can just help the body survive it long enough to get rid of it by itself.”
“So what do we do now?” Rayla asks.
“We wait. I’ll stay here with Scarlet in case his condition worsens, as for you, go get some cloth and a safety pin.”
“Alright, what for?”
“So he doesn’t soil the bed in case he is in a full blown coma.”
“Understood, do I need to get anything else?”
“A sponge for bathing and some skin ointments if you find any. We also need to move him every few hours to avoid him developing pressure ulcers if he stays like this long.”
“What about food?”
“I’m not sure yet, I will need to talk with Scarlet more about what nutrition is right for him.”
“Alright, I’ll go get the things then. I’ll make it quick so take care of Thoma. I swear John if he dies whil-”
“I know. Just go.”
“Alright…”
Later in the early evening, Rose still hasn’t shown any signs of waking up or getting better and the Shooting Stars sit around her bed completely distraught.
Rayla asks, “Is Thoma getting better?”
“Thanks to the treatments he’s not getting worse.”
“I see…”
“...”
Sher Aka lets out a deep sigh, “I’m going to talk to Mr. Clarkson if he wants to do the job Thoma Ahad wanted to do for us.”
Rayla gets angry, “Really? Thoma is dying and that’s what you’re thinking about!?”
“I can’t do anything for Thoma Ahad besides continuing the quest he thought was so important he needed to end up like this. You can stay with him while I finish the quest alone.”
“And have you be the next one ending up on this bed!? No, we’re not going to do anything dangerous alone again. Forget it!”
“Then what should we do? Twiddle our thumbs doing nothing until Thoma Ahad gets better or dies!? What if he never wakes up!?”
Rayla, taking a deep breath, goes from her angry and desperate looking expression to a completely calm one, “That’s not what I was trying to say. I’m not going to let you go alone because I will accompany you.”
“You will?”
“Yes. Unless Thoma is suddenly getting worse I will continue this quest with you. We are going to have to determine if we can do it with just the two of us. Either way once we do, I ask you to drive the wagon to the nearest city, report it and get a healer with the water affinity. If we can free them we’ll have to assess if we are going to put Thoma in danger by freeing them. If we do, we cancel the quest, if we don’t we finish it.”
“Understood.”
“Good, please try to convince Mr. Clarkson. Today I’m not leaving Thoma.”
“I understand, I’ll talk to him.”