[Veltzeh]: 39.NaNoWriMo.2006: Tales from Kyerrion.6

The next morning, Tegafel was pondering how to kill emself. Ey thought ey could maybe suffocate emself with the blanket, hang emself from it or then rip open all eir wounds so ey would bleed to death. It sounded like the homehans outside were fairly busy. The building in which the cell was located in sounded fairly empty, and when people came in, they sounded hurried.

Toward the night, the homehan leader figure and the two guards came in. Tegafel pretty much automatically backed away from them and twisted eir face into crying mode. The leader spoke: "Consider yourself lucky, Tegafel Darrelter. We managed to contact some representatives from your side today and we negotiated a peace of sorts, deciding that what happened between our armed forces was just a grave misunderstanding. You're free to go, but we offered to clean you up for tomorrow since we killed all the other soldiers from your squad and held you prisoner." Ey turned to the two guards. "So, guards, wash em, clean em up, take em to the field medic, feed em good and have em sleep in a nice warm tent tonight!" The leader left.

"Well, tables turn, eh?" said the guard who had declined from raping Tegafel yesterday. "At least kind of."

Tegafel was pretty speechless. On the other hand ey almost did not believe ey was so lucky, and on the other hand ey was very relieved and eager to be treated well. The guard came to Tegafel, wrapped em up in the blanket and lifted em. Holding Tegafel in eir arms, ey walked outside with the other guard.

Tegafel saw more homehans by glance outside before the guards took em behind a building that had a crude washing place set up. There was a smallish silo of water and a cauldron with a fireplace for warming up the water. There were also a few buckets around, a tap on the silo and a bench.

The guard placed Tegafel sitting on the bench. "I hope you don't mind us seeing you naked anymore, heh heh." The guard was fairly happy, the other one not so. "I suppose people usually have persons from the same sex help with stuff like this but you with your twelve sexes... No offense still, but it does sound really weird and complicated." Tegafel just grunted a sound as an answer. "We even have soap for you. Don't have a lot of this stuff around, but the lieutenant thought it'd please your people. Come on, wash your hands, after that you can start washing up other places."

The two guards helped Tegafel wash up and clean up the wounds, though most of them started bleeding again.

"Hm, I suppose it isn't any use to leave this place. Go get the medic and bring em here, it's easier that way." The other guard left while the other one kept on pouring water on Tegafel's wounds to keep them from being clogged again before the medic could stitch them.

The other guard arrived with the medic. The medic did not really say anything save for a short greeting, and went straight to examining Tegafel's wounds. After having taken a look at them all, ey said: "Hm well, the cuts on your legs and arms and cheek aren't bad, but the rest need stitches. I'm gonna drug you because it'll hurt like hell, especially that one on your face." Tegafel nodded weakly, and the medic took out some bottle of liquid. "This doesn't exactly taste good, but drink two mouthfuls of it." Ey handed the bottle to Tegafel, who then drank. Tegafel grimaced and felt a bit like throwing up. Meanwhile, the medic had produced a few leaves. "Now chew on this and then place it under your tongue in your mouth. Try not to swallow any pieces of the leaves, and make sure you don't swallow the whole thing. You can swallow your spit though.

Tegafel did as ey was told and eir mind got very foggy indeed. Ey felt more like an observer in eir body than actually a part of it. Ey had trouble doing much anything and registering the commands ey was given, but that mostly served the purpose since ey was calm and immobile while the medic sew shut eir wounds. Ey had to be told a few times to spit out the leaf mass before ey did it. After having washed eir mouth, the medic washed eir wounds with a very stingy substance and bandaged them. Tegafel had not felt much pain while being stitched, but it started returning now, though after the sting of the liquid, the pain was just a vague throb in the wounds and eir head.

The medic smiled at eir own work and seemed to be thinking about something. "You'll need a walking stick for a while. Good thing your left arm is in better shape than the right one – considering the leg, I mean."

"Guess what? I was smart and got one!" said the guard who had went to get the medic. "I also brought your clothes. Your other stuff is safe too but you don't have much business walking around with a backpack, armor or weapons anyway." The medic seemed content with that and left.

The guards helped Tegafel get dressed and then took em to get something to eat. They arrived at a similar food depot as the military camp had had at Ailanihi. The guards left Tegafel sitting at a table and went to get the food. They returned with portions for themselves and a smaller portion for Tegafel. The other guard said: "Now, you probably feel sick an' all and that drug isn't doing anything great to your stomach, so you can't eat a whole lot tonight. It's better to feel a bit hungry than to spend the night throwing up, right?"

"Besides, you'll get a full meal tomorrow, I hear the lieutenant even told the cook to make something nice for you."

Tegafel just nodded vaguely and started to eat. Ey was hungry and did eir best to eat the food slowly – food eaten fast was more likely to come up. The food did make em feel nauseous, but that was probably just because of the drug ey had drunk. After the meal, the guards took Tegafel close to the place where the "cell" had been, but instead took em to a tent that was under a wooden shelter. It was a fairly big tent, so big that Tegafel almost didn't have to crouch while in there. The friendlier guard helped Tegafel to get down on the bed, and after that was done, the guard stroked eir hair a bit.

"You know... I'm sorry about the... well, you know, the raping. That wasn't very nice of us. I hope you won't harbor too many bad memories about this whole thing." Tegafel grunted a response, and the homehan was about to pull eir hand hand from Tegafel's hair when eir expression went a bit funny. "You know, you haven't really said anything today. You've just nodded and grunted at us", ey said a bit amusedly.

Tegafel managed a spontaneous but uneasy half of a smile. "I guesh." Even Tegafel felt amused by the fact that eir mouth was fairly numb. "I shupposhe talkin' like an intoxhicated d'unka'd ishn't what... mosht would like t' hear."

The guard grinned at Tegafel. "Good night, Tegafel. We'll come wake you up in the morning. There's a bucket of water outside the tent in case you get thirsty." The guard left, leaving Tegafel to sleep in peace.

Tegafel felt nauseous but managed to fall asleep without too much of a problem. Ey woke up in the night due to a nightmare and felt even more nauseous. That time ey sat up and drank a bit of water. The nausea did not want to go away, so Tegafel just lied in the tent, immobile. It started to rain at some point in the night, and hearing the dripping on the roof and ground calmed Tegafel down and ey fell asleep once again.



Tegafel woke up on eir own in the morning, barely remembering the last nightmare, and stretched eir aching limbs a bit, letting out a few whimpers when the stretching hurt. The friendly guard's head popped into the tent from outside and ey said: "Great, you're awake now. Let's go and eat, you'll get a full breakfast today. Your people will arrive around noon, I'm guessing. That's still some hours away." Tegafel got up and they went to the eating area, where ey got a fairly decent breakfast – it was almost as good as the food ey had often eaten at home.

After the eating session, the two guards just hung around Tegafel and inquired more about the femehans' sexes. Tegafel also asked questions about the homehans' sexes while at it, and they ate something small before it was announced that the femehans had arrived.

The femehans had set up a small camp-like thing right next to the homehan settlement, and both of the races' groups of representatives met at the vague border of their camps. Tegafel was with them, the other guard by eir side. Ey felt uneasy and ey did not know what to think of a meeting such as this one. Ey did not even know whether it was official.

The spokesperson of the homehans had been instructed a bit about the sex system of femehans. Tegafel was fairly sure that the femehan captains knew about homehans. Ey did not pay much attention to the communications and only barely noticed when eir name was mentioned. Ey was supposed to go over to eir own kind now, so ey went. The homehan guard came along for a short distance, carrying Tegafel's equipment. Tegafel greeted the captain who instructed em to go with the field medic. The homehan guard was vaguely confused, but gave Tegafel's equipment to the medic. Tegafel and the medic went to the temporary infirmary tent.

The medic put Tegafel's equipment on the ground in the tent and had Tegafel lie down on a bed before speaking: "I'm Fronel Certneget and I suppose it's obvious that I'm a medic... Now, I think the captain will ask you what exactly happened, so I'll just ask what was done to you. At least you seem to be fairly well treated..."

"Yes... I received most of the wounds in the battle and immediately after that. They did torture me but they didn't make any new wounds, they just tore open the old ones."

"Is the worst one on your leg? How deep is it?"

"Yes, it's... hm, I don't really know how deep it is. I've never even had wounds as big as these."

"Well, what can you do with the leg?"

"Walk. At least I could move it fairly normally right after I'd gotten it but it hurt and after that I've just been trying to not use it."

"That sounds good. Was it cleaned and bound when you got it?"

"No... I tried to clean it though."

"Hmh... do you know if it's infected?"

"I'm not sure. But it didn't look that bad yesterday when it was bound."

"So it was bound yesterday? At what time?"

"Uh... evening?"

"Good... I'll change the dressings in the evening then and examine your wounds. The ones on your face don't look too bad. If the other ones are like those, my guess is that you'll live and won't lose your leg, but they'll leave nasty scars." Tegafel just nodded. "Well. That's about that. You should just get some rest now and move your limbs around so you won't get all stiff." The medic was quiet for a moment. "Just one more thing... Did you... did you see your friends get killed? Are you having nightmares?"

Tegafel went quite grim. "Y-yes... I..."

"Shh. That's okay. Having nightmares is normal. They will eventually fade and you will forget. It's something soldiers just have to live with."

"But... they're so..."

"Yes they are. I'll talk with you about that later. I'll talk about something else now. I happen to know that for many soldiers, the worst part of being hurt and surviving is the boredom they're subjected to when they rest and heal and the fact that they can't think of anything but happened in the battle... which, in a case like yours, is not good at all. So I have a great method of eliminating the boredom and loneliness. Can you read?"

"Uh, yes. Not very well but..."

"That's good enough." The nigecod dug out a book from a backpack. "This is a book about plants and what they're good for. It might not be very entertaining, but it's damn useful. I'll go wander around the camp. If you need me, start yelling, somebody'll hear it. I'll bring you food when it's time for that."

"Thank you." The medic left and Tegafel started reading the book.



Tegafel was brought one meal and toward the evening, not too long after the medic had examined eir wounds properly and changed the bandages, ey heard some faint commotion some distance away from the tent. Ey could not make sense of it yet and ey could not see the source either, at least without moving from eir spot and ey thought that the medic did not exactly want em to do that. Therefore, ey just sat still and kept reading.

After a moment, the sound of arguing went civil again. Shortly after, the medic peeked in and said, in a vaguely frustrated voice: "Do you know an ancod whose name is Krezagon?"

Tegafel's eyes lit up. "Krez– – Is... is e– – I mean... yes, yes I do!"

The medic looked vaguely confused. "Do you... want to meet em?"

"Yes, please!"

The medic gave Tegafel a glance, but said nothing. Ey turned at something outside the tent and made a gesture. Tegafel then heard running steps and finally saw Krezagon's upper body at the entrance of the tent. The medic still held Krezagon for a little while. "Ey's supposed to be resting. So don't be disturbing."

"Yes. Thank you, sonige", said Krezagon, agitated. The medic then let em through. A ridiculously wide smile appeared on Krezagon's face and ey sat down on eir legs beside Tegafel, carefully bent eir upper body over em and hugged em. "I can't – – I'm so glad you're alive."

Tegafel massaged Krezagon's shoulder lightly with eir left hand and just touched eir side with the right one. "I'm... so glad that you're here, too", ey mumbled. "But... how'd you get here?"

"I was... Well, I'd just been worried at the camp. It had been over two frindos and we hadn't heard any news about your squads... and when we did, they just said that you all were killed. So I... I just had to come see. And it was so much worth it, because I got to see you again." At this point, the medic, who Tegafel and Krezagon thought to have left, actually left.

Tegafel was flattered in a confused manner. Ey had almost forgotten about Krezagon when they finally accomplished the mission the squads were sent to take care of, and ey had spent the days in captivity mostly grieving Roinynin. Ey had not really thought that Krezagon would even remember em after all that time. Tegafel could not really come up with anything to say to Krezagon, but ey wondered just how important it had been for em to come. However, ey was afraid that eir questions would sound like rejection, so ey decided to mask it with eir own ignorance: "I didn't... I didn't think... I mean, I'm surprised, that... that you cared about me so much that you came all the way here."

Krezagon looked down at Tegafel's eyes and seemed pretty much as confused. Ey had not really thought why exactly ey had wanted to come. A soldier did not think about the reasons as much as the goals themselves. Ey found emself wondering the same: ey had really cared that much about Tegafel to have come all that way. "Me too." Ey looked at Tegafel and stroked eir shoulders.

Tegafel continued being slightly confused, but it made em mentally smile that Krezagon said ey was confused as well. Tegafel looked at em a bit more closely and saw a few fainted bruises on eir shoulders, arms and face. It was easy to spot them, since Krezagon's skin was so pale. "You're... a bit bruised..."

Krezagon bit eir lip. "Yeah... I'd rather not talk about that." They were quiet for a moment. "So... what WAS that mission you went on?"

Tegafel smiled and started telling what had happened on the mission, mostly things about eir late squad members and Roinynin. Krezagon listened and smiled, feeling glad that Tegafel got to experience such good times. Ey was jealous for it, but of course ey did not ruin Tegafel's mood by expressing that.

Tegafel started to get toward the end of eir story when they heard footsteps outside the tent. They turned to look at the entrance and one of the captains from Adenelihe came in. The captain had traveled with Krezagon and the rest of the people currently in the camp from Adenelihe.

"Attention!" said the captain, a gewacod. Krezagon turned to face the captain and greeted em. Tegafel greeted em from the bed, though it looked awkward. "You, dismissed", the gewacod said to Krezagon.

Krezagon hesitated, long enough for the captain to frown. "Can I come back here later, captain?"

"Get out, ancod. Eat and go to your tent." Krezagon did not question that anymore and just left. "So, you're Tegafel Darrelter?" ey went on, as if Krezagon had never been there.

"Yes, captain."

"Tell me what happened after you left Adenelihe a week and a day ago."

"Uh... nothing much first, but on the second day I was scouting and met a homehan. We fought but it was a draw and we both got away... I went back to my squad and we prepared for the fight. Then the homehans came and we fought. I was captured and brought – –"

"You were captured? How? Why you?"

"I uh... I was feeling weak because I had already fought, so I had to keep back. My partner tried to protect me, but well... ey was... ey was wounded... and then someone hit me with a... with a sledgehammer." Tegafel was confused because ey still did not quite believe that it had really been a sledgehammer. However, there was no doubt, ey had seen it very clearly. "So... I was unconscious. I suppose my partner fell on top of me and protected my body... When I woke up, the homehans were looking for survivors. I think they stabbed everyone who was still alive except me. I figured it was because I wasn't hurt badly enough... because I'd live for a longer time."

"I see. Why did the fight start? Did anyone try to talk?"

"Uh? I... I don't know... I don't think so. I was at the back then so I couldn't know then. I just got the order to fight."

"How about when you met the homehan scout? Did you try to speak?"

"Scout...? Oh. I um... No... I was very startled and I think we drew our weapons at the same time. Ey jumped at me and then I figured I couldn't do anything but defend myself."

"I see. Do you have any idea why the squad leaders didn't attempt to speak to them?"

"I... I think there was some talk about surprise... Maybe they wanted to catch them by surprise so they'd have an edge."

"Hm, good. Alright, then what happened?"

"Well, I woke up... and the homehans took off my equipment and threw me in a cage. They kept asking me if they were being followed and poked me with sticks and swords... I was cold and I had terrible nightmares..."

"How long did that last?"

"Uhm... well... I think three days?"

"Yes. Then what?"

"I was thrown in a wooden cell... The next day they interrogated and tortured me."

"What did they ask?"

"How much armed forces we had and how far were the major towns and stuff like that..."

"What did you answer?"

"Uh, I don't know the answers so I couldn't say much anything... I did tell them about the towns I knew and when they started torturing me, I made stuff up that I thought would make them stop."

"Heh, that's nice. Did they ask anything else?"

"Well... the next time they interrogated me they asked really specific stuff about places and other things I couldn't have known... So I just told them I don't know all the time."

"Hm. Anything else they did?"

"I... uh..." Tegafel hesitated to tell about the raping. Ey did not want to admit to having been subjected to that.

"Yes? You can say what they did. It's not like it wouldn't have been done to someone else before. That's interrogation and war for you, rookie."

"Aeh. They... raped me."

"Do you think you're pregnant?"

Tegafel went quite pale. "I-I sure hope n-not."

"Well, I really doubt you are. Did they take good care of you after they heard we'd come here and definitely not fight with them?"

"Uh... yes, I was treated very well then. They cleaned and tied my wounds and let me sleep in a warm tent and gave me very decent food."

"That's good. Well then, soldier, the medic will bring you some food in a moment. Heal well."

"Thank you, captain." The captain left.

Tegafel got eir food. Ey did not meet Krezagon that night anymore. Ey got very sleepy a few hours after having eaten and therefore slept.



Tegafel woke up due to nightmares twice, but was always sleepy even afterwards, so ey just went back to sleep, though sleeping itself started to scare em a bit. The third time ey woke from one nightmare, it was already quite light outside. Ey immediately noticed that Krezagon was sitting next to eir bed. The ancod startled when Tegafel woke up so suddenly, but ey brushed that aside and instead turned toward Tegafel and said: "Hey, Tegafel. Good morning."

Tegafel smiled. "Good morning, Krezagon." They spent a few minutes talking about generalities like the weather and how bad Tegafel's wounds were. "You know... I just told you yesterday about my only real army experience I had. I bet you have some more since you're older and all. So could you tell me something, too?"

"I suppose I can. What would you like to hear?"

"Well... I don't know. Anything?"

"Heh. Well... How about when I came to the Ailanihi camp?"

"Yeah."

"Well, we came from Ertenhine, that's the opposite direction from Ailanihi than Adenelihe. It's a seven-day trip... I wasn't exactly in the best of conditions right then, so a day before we arrived, I got suddenly very sick. I wasn't really wounded or anything, it just felt like the worst flu I ever had. Anyway, I felt so bad I could barely get up from my tent. I tried to pack it and I fainted... I woke up to hear someone ask whether I had fainted or not. I was kind of dizzy so I'm not that sure what was said... But I think that they were talking about whether to leave me there or carry me to the camp. Oh and of course what kind of disease I had. I said to them that I didn't know. I don't remember why, but they figured it wasn't that dangerous. A lot of people were ready to leave me there, but one argued that it'd be better to carry me to the camp to be healed, because it was just one day. It was that gewacod who takes care of the inventory. Ey's usually been relatively nice to me. I know ey doesn't consider me a friend or anything, though. Anyway, they then made some stretcher, put me on it and my stuff too, and off we went. I can't remember much of that trip because I was so sick, though. What I do remember is that when we got to the camp, I was taken to that infirmary room close to the squad leaders' loft. It was the first time I'd been in a real bed!"

"What? You'd never been in a real bed before?"

Krezagon shook eir head. "Nope. I had always slept on the ground in tents or in hammocks. So there I was, in a real bed with sheets and a quilt and all! It would've been awesome if I hadn't been sick. I was sick for about a week. I really enjoyed the bed when I was almost healed. Groshje, it was so soft and warm and comfy..."