[002.b. - spam/network]

[reformedsinner]

cw: eye & hand injury, likely some self-destructive thought processes in tags

[open/spam, the infirmary]

Gonou does not fight back when his punishment is given, nor when it is carried out. The Infirmary is busy, the cries of pain from the beds around him disorienting; he gets up, after a few minutes of rest have cleared his head enough that he doesn't think he'll fall, and tries to find his way to a seat away from the beds. He's slow and clumsy, his one good hand held out in front of him to avoid running into anything important. Eventually, he finds a wall, and turns to plant his back against it and sit down there.

He hopes he's out of the way. He'll just -- take a little time to rest, here, and hope that at some point someone will arrive who's able and willing to take him back to his room.

[open/spam, afterwards]

He's been assigned to hard labor at the oars, but even though he heals a little faster in this body than he had in a human one, the stump of a hand takes more than a few days to heal over enough for a prosthetic to be fitted on it. He's spending a fair amount of time in his room, practicing mapping the space, practicing listening. He's trying to keep his fresher socket cleaned and bandaged; he knows the routine, even if it's harder one-handed, and harder still blind.

He goes to meals. His ears flick with paranoid speed when he's in a crowded room, trying to track the multiplicity of sounds around him, trying to feel out the echoes of the space; sometimes he walks into something, and sometimes this means he drops the tray he has to balance in one hand. When he does, grimly determined, he'll drop to his knees and do his best to clean it up.

Once or twice, he's allowed into the yard, but he finds that space even more overwhelming than the mess hall, and lingers very close to the door, keeping his head down.

After the first week, he adds rotations on the oars. Wherever he's seated, quietly, he'll ask the name of the person beside him.

Network, audio, a few days after the mutiny

[Gonou's voice is soft, a little hoarse. He just has one thing to ask:]

Who's still alive?

... Please don't reply in text.

Comments

mess hall

[riseunparalleled]

In terms of official judgement, Xie Lian benefited greatly from a combination of the general chaos and a subtlety that wasn't just tied to not having a weapon. While he'd been clearly involved to some degree, there was no proof of any murders, theft or that he'd been part of any conspiracy.

Which is why he just has long sessions on the oars, and visible bruising that he at least doesn't have to worry about trying to conceal from Gonou. A positive he doesn't he'll bring up.

He waits until Gonou's tray is on the table before moving to sit down.

"Hello, Cho Gonou."

Re: mess hall

[reformedsinner]

"...Xie Lian," Gonou says, a wave of relief hitting him that's strong enough his shoulders sag and his ears dip as he falls the last few inches to the bench. Xie Lian is alive. He runs his claw-tips lightly over the side of his tray, locates the spoon, and lifts it, tapping his way over the plate with the edge of the utensil to find the food.

"Are you all right?" he asks, turning his head in Xie Lian's direction. With the gauze bandages over his freshly injured eye in the way, he's given up on his eyepatch, and he's just wrapping the bandage directly across both eyes now. "What-- was your sentence?"

Re: mess hall

[riseunparalleled]

Xie Lian can't help but be reminded a little of Xiao Xingchen, a comparison that isn't exactly funny but is a bit lighter than some others. Among his many worries for Gonou, how he'll do without his eyes isn't particularly high on the list.

"I was just charged with assault."

Re: mess hall

[reformedsinner]

It's -- an adjustment. But, compared to his other worries, the things that losing his remaining eye deny him are all very low on Gonou's own personal list.

He won't be the fighter he'd been, but he thinks he might even be able to handle himself in a fight, if there's not too much confounding noise.

"Ah. I'll join you on the oars soon enough, then," he says, lifting his bandaged stump briefly. "I have a week, once this is healed enough for it."

Re: mess hall

[riseunparalleled]

"Yeah, I'll still be there."

He is glad that he managed to avoid more serious punishment, though, in his own careful way, not grateful.

"Have you heard anything of the, ah, aftermath?"

the oars

[tarakan]

"Alexander Hilbert," he answers, looking over Gonou. He feels his blood boil as he looks at the man. This is what he was talking about with Eiffel. This is what angers him the most about this place. Just the sheer needless cruelty of it all.

"I am medical doctor. When we get off our shift, I can change bandages and help clean wound."

Re: the oars

[reformedsinner]

"Doctor Hilbert," Gonou says, softly, considering the sharp, unfamiliar-sounding accent. The name is familiar, though.

"--Yes," he says after a moment. "I've heard your name from Eiffel. Thank you for the offer, but I -- have been managing."

With a flicker of morbid amusement, he adds, "It's not the first time I've lost an eye."

The hand, admittedly, is harder to manage, and the force of rowing has already pressed the prosthetic into the bandaged stump in ways that he suspects are damaging the barely-healing skin.

Re: the oars

[tarakan]

Hilbert matches Gonou's amusement with a sarcastic little tone as he points out, "But is it first time you've lost a hand?"

You're bleeding from two different places, buddy.

Re: the oars

[reformedsinner]

Gonou pauses at that question, then sighs, ducking his head slightly.

"Well. Yes."

If he is bleeding, he won't know until he does change the bandages; the pain swamps anything else he might feel from the stump, and it's not as if he can see it.

Considering that.... One of his long ears flicks slightly; under the bandage his expression is resigned.

"... well," he murmurs. "If you don't mind. It would help."

Re: the oars

[tarakan]

"If I minded, I wouldn't have asked," he points out, like it's the most obvious thing in the world. "This is something I can do."

And that, more than anything else, is what Hilbert needs in the moment.

Mess hall

[deuceoftears]

"I'm coming to sit on your right," Jedao warns in a low, steady voice from a few paces away. He'd considered the other side, part of him wanting fruitlessly to defend it, but - he suspects, under the circumstances, that Gonou may want to touch him.

Re: Mess hall

[reformedsinner]

It's too loud in the mess hall to accurately locate footsteps, much less recognize them. It's also only the second meal Gonou's been able to leave his room for, the day after his penalty was inflicted. Even if it were possible to identify those sounds amidst the noise--

-- there are a number of different things that are overwhelming, for him, at the moment.

When he hears Jedao's voice, he drops his spoon with a clatter onto his plate, face going slack for an instant before it twists with the relief of too-tightly controlled terror. He bows his head almost to the table, one tight nod all he can manage in response, and fights to get his face back under control.

Re: Mess hall

[deuceoftears]

Jedao slides into the seat beside him. He wishes he could draw a curtain, raise a shield. Instead, he does what he can to be Gonou's eyes, surveilling everyone around them. He puts his arm on the table so that his sleeve brushes the back of Gonou's hand.

"No one is focused on us," he reports after a few slow breaths.

Re: Mess hall

[reformedsinner]

Gonou nods again, and as Jedao's sleeve brushes his skin, he reaches blindly (sleeve there, so hand-- there?) to catch his hand. He does, desperately, want to touch Jedao: he can't see that he's really there.

But he can at least still feel it.

"I didn't know if you were still alive," he says, very, very quietly indeed. If no one's paying attention to them, he'll risk a touch, but he does not want anyone else to hear the fragility in his voice.

Re: Mess hall

[deuceoftears]

"I'm not even hurt," Jedao says quietly, squeezing Gonou's hand carefully. "I tried to catch reinforcements, buy you time," he explains, haltingly. "There weren't - any witnesses." Left.

[brotherblack]

It's still chaotic, with so many dead and so many of the surviving Advocates running around in disarray, trying to figure out who to round up and what to do with them, trying to deal with the bodies and the damage. Chaotic enough that Shen Wei, with his downcast gaze, slow step, and robes still immaculately clean of blood combine easily with the stump of his missing hand and the socket of his missing eye still covered in bandages to paint him as clearly harmless and uninvolved in this madness.

He makes a show of appearing cowed, of wanting to be helpful, and so finds his way into the infirmary, to where those prisoners who are being maimed for their punishment have been brought. He doesn't let himself appear eager, or concerned, doesn't let himself feel worry or hope or guilt, he just scans the area, and when he spots Cho Gonou-

Rage is harder to bury under the mask than any of the others, but he breathes deep, clings to the veneer of meekness with iron-willed determination, and then lets himself pad over to where Gonou has curled himself against the wall. he makes his steps heavy so his approach is not a surprise, even in the bustle of the infirmary.

"Cho Gonou," he calls quietly while he's still well outside his personal space. "I've come to take you back to your quarters." It's a valid excuse to be here when the Advocates all seem very focused on what they doubtless consider more important matters. "May I come closer?"

[reformedsinner]

Gonou's head snaps up as he hears the voice, ears lifting from their droop. Shen Wei. Shen Wei is alive, which means it worked; he's heard already what happened to Flint, and he fears the other deaths he now can't easily verify -- who might have fallen in the corridors with no legal process at all, who else had been saved only for the Judge's sentences.

But at least he saved Shen Wei. So that's something.

"Yes," he says, soft and unsteady. He hates asking, but with neither his eyes nor the energy-sense he's barely started to learn to use, he's so disoriented he doesn't know if he can make it to his feet on his own, so he forces out, "If I could-- your hand--?"

-- and lifts his own remaining hand, the right, palm up.

[brotherblack]

"Of course." He steps closer and reaches down to clasp Gonou's remaining hand with his own, resting the stump of his left hand against his shoulder to help steady him as he rises. Shen Wei would do a great deal more than help him to his feet and lead him to his quarters, given he owes him his life, though he can't risk even thanking him right now, with Advocates swarming the infirmary and the halls, looking for anyone to punish.

[reformedsinner]

"Thank you." Gonou's hand closes around Shen Wei's with a hint of panic in the strength of his grip, careless of his claws. With the grip to steady him, and the press of Shen Wei's stump against his shoulder, he manages to get to his feet. He takes a deep breath, ears flicking as he tries to make sense of the noise around them again.

"All-- all right. I can follow you," he adds. "If I can hold onto your arm."

[brotherblack]

He positions himself instinctively in the best place for Gonou to do just that, those few days of Zhao Yunlan's blindness ingrained deeply into his psyche in a way that sends a shiver of unease down his spine.

"I do not know if Zhao Yunlan ever told you," he murmurs as he turns smoothly but carefully towards the door once Gonou has taken his arm. "But he was blinded for a short time, and I became quite experienced in guiding him, though he also learned quite quickly how to find his own way as well." Despite Shen Wei's best over-protective efforts to the contrary.

Mess Hall

[choosetoforget]

Daniel did what Daniel does best. He hid. He squeezed his small frame into an exceptionally tiny space and stayed there, hands over his ears while chaos erupted around him. Because of that, he was spared any and all involvement in what happened. No one found him, no one approached, and he stayed out of the way.

But he isn't unaware of the consequences. Jon dead. Gonou maimed. Countless others with the same fate. He doesn't quite know what to feel.

"Let me help," he tells Gonou as the tray chatters to the ground. "It's me. It's - Daniel."

Re: Mess Hall

[reformedsinner]

"...Daniel?" That's-- also a relief. Gonou is collecting the things he can reach: plate, there, spoon, there. But he's going to have to trace the edges of the spilled food with his hands to find them. He turns his head in Daniel's direction, offering the slightest nod.

"Yes," he says, and drops the cardboard carton with the drink (he doesn't know what drink) back onto his tray too. That, at least, isn't ruined. "...Thank you. Ah - if you have a napkin..."

Re: Mess Hall

[choosetoforget]

Daniel does what he can before setting his own tray onto the table and gathering up a towel to clean it up.

"Go and sit down," he insists gently. "I will make this right and join you."

Re: Mess Hall

[reformedsinner]

"...Are you sure?" But the work of trying to clean up a spill he can't see is frustrating enough that Gonou doesn't fight too hard; he takes his tray with the soiled dishes, reaching out first with his leg in a light sweep until his shin touches the bench, and then settles himself down on the bench. He finds the tabletop with the elbow of his handless arm, turns in a neat semicircle, and sets down the tray.

(He is learning, at least in some ways, to handle himself.

It makes everything so much harder, but it's not impossible. Just... difficult.)

Re: Mess Hall

[choosetoforget]

It pains him to see Gonou this way, bit he doesn't dare try and bring it up. He does clean up the mess and sits down, his eyes trained on his own prisoner, who seems subdued in the corner.

Gonou gets his bowl of stew, as well, though he's quick to try and push it his way, touching his arm, without being noticed.

"What - happened?" he mutters. "What was - your - part?"