They say bad things happen for a reason, but no wise word's gonna stop me bleeding.

[sarkraticmethod]

Training dictated that he wasn't supposed to care and yet, care he did, and he'd already been in this situation once before enough to recall the feeling. This was almost worse. He couldn't see the loss for the guilt that first time. It was a sobering reminder that he probably wasn't all that he had tried to be for almost a year, one that left him

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[prince_stupid]

The cat has been sticking close. Asleep, he doesn't notice when Sark wakes up. He does notice when the man sits up, however, slipping off the side of the bed and landing awkwardly on his still-stiff leg. He hisses, limping around to face the bed.

"Julian Sark," he says, quietly. He jumps up, three-legged, and sits down next to him. "You are not well. Please do not move."

[sarkraticmethod]

"Don't coddle me, Ragnar. I'm not going to die." His tone is flatter than usual, almost lifeless, but that might be because his voice is so hoarse from disuse... Yeah, that's it and not the fact that everything's fucked up and he has no idea how to deal with it. When has he ever?

Despite his words, he doesn't actually make a move to try to get up again. The pain he could deal with, but there's no real dignity in trying to fight past dizziness and nausea. He's stuck. For the moment.

[prince_stupid]

"Very well. Do not attempt to move, or I shall have to act roughly." His tone doesn't change an iota. "I think, perhaps, food of some kind. Liquids."

He flicks his tail. This is the problem, he's noted in the past, with not having hands. That is one distinct advantage humans have.

[sarkraticmethod]

Sark sighs and contemplates the merits of just being unconscious again. He's sure he can fiddle with the morphine a bit. He's not even that drugged if he can still feel pain and form coherent sentences. Really, those doctors are slipping.... Then again, people probably tend to lessen your morphine intake when you've been unconscious for almost a week.

"I'm fine. Really," he grumbles, too dizzy and apathetic and grief-stricken to really formulate a better argument than that. If Sam Tyler is anywhere near this room to hear that... We're sorry, Sam.

[superiorspectre]

And there's a Suzie. She's been coming by to check on him when she can, and the sight of him awake...

On one level, it's an immense relief. On another... She has no way of knowing what state he might be in, and she hasn't dared look for a shadow to find out.

"...Julian?"

[sarkraticmethod]

There's a subtle twitch in his jaw at the name, but not much more than that. Is he really so drained that he can't even react properly to Suzie and that the only glimmer of emotion he can muster up is related to the fact that April was one of the few people who called him that?

God, he feels so empty. He'd welcome it if it didn't come with a side of feeling wrong. He ought to be happy to see her. He is... He thinks.

"Suzie," he responds, voice hoarse. He winces and tries to force himself to sit up a bit that neither makes him dizzy nor in pain and actually succeeds this time. "I can't say I'm particularly at my best right now."

It's both an understatement and a statement that means a great deal more. The fact is, he's worse off than he would have been with just April's death weighing on him- at least then, after the shock had worn down, he'd still be able to feel properly.

[superiorspectre]

Suzie just nods at that. "We went to where the Carnival had set up, right after..." She doesn't say it.

"They were gone." There's more anger and despair under the surface of her voice than she'll let show, though someone used to reading people might just notice.

Better that he hear it from her, anyway.

[sarkraticmethod]

Sark sighs and lets his head fall back against the pillow. "I might have suspected as much."

After that idiot drove through the whole lot with his bloody car, it's no wonder they scattered. Instinctively his fists clench at his sides, digging into the sheets and his expression darkens. That place should have burned and he should have been the one to do it.

At least it's a reaction, even if it's not a particularly good one.

"I told her to run while she had the chance," he sighs after a few moments of silence, finally easing up on the tension just a bit and descending back into quiet apathy. If there's one thing, he's bitter over, it's that. She could have just left him. All those months of expecting her to and then she doesn't even take the option when presented with it. "But she was brilliant until the end."

Suzie deserves to hear that much, and nothing will ever get him to tell anyone any more than that, because no one wants to know that someone they loved got trampled by a demonic carousel pony.

[der_weevilkonig]

Owen doesn't typically watch over his patients any more closely than is necessary to ensure their health. If they're stable, they're stable; if they're traumatized and in need of counselling, that's entirely someone else's job; if he needs to check in on them, he'll check in on them and not hover too much. Hovering isn't something he does well, and it's not a skill he's interested in learning.

But he has nothing else to do in this place, and when all else fails... well, there are infirmary supplies to tidy up, and vital signs to monitor.

And then Sark has to go and wake up, and... well, then. He snags a penlight and walks over.

"Good morning," he says, without regards to the time of day. He tells him the date, and "and you still look like shit on toast."

There's a faint note of apology to his tone, which is more than most people get from Owen, but probably not enough to many anything about the situation better. Especially as he immediately shines the penlight into Sark's eyes to check pupil dilation.

"How's the pain?"

[sarkraticmethod]

And this is one of those reasons why Sark didn't particularly want to be conscious until he was sure he could make a bolt for it. His attempts to glower at Owen like he's seconds away from tearing out his endocrine system (don't ask how that would even work- it's a perfectly valid threat when you've just been through Hell) are greatly impeded by unexpected penlight and he flinches back a little more than he probably should at it.

"All things considering, I suppose it's not the worst I've ever been in," he mutters, which isn't exactly an answer and Sark doesn't caaare. The fucking skewer incident put pain in a whole new perspective, if anything good could be said about it. "I'll live."

[the_vesmier]

The Vesmier notices Sark's return to consciousness more or less immediately, and extracts himself from whatever he was doing to head to the infirmary. Despite all the time he's had since Sark came back, he hasn't quite prepared anything to say - he's unsure of what exists to be said.

So when he steps into the infirmary and walks to Sark's bed, all that comes out is a warm, solid mental presence like a hand on the shoulder. Humans. He's a sight older than any of them, and still hasn't experiences loss like this - hasn't experienced much of what they seem to go through as a matter of course. If he can, he'll let them tell him what they need. It seems easier that way.

[sarkraticmethod]

Somehow the psychic presence gets him to react in a way that isn't apathy or anger, which he's starting to wonder is all he's capable of, even if it is just a twinge of nostalgic sorrow. He's entirely sure why at the moment- there's something he ought to be remembering, he knows that much.

And then he does remember and he laughs a little, a dry, hollow sound that's only like a laugh in the vaugest sense. "You would have been proud of her, sir. Everything she could do, I had no unearthly idea she could do anything like that."

Which, okay, Ves has no idea what he's talking about, but he's not at his most coherent right now and Ves is very psychic. Sark has faith that he'll figure it out.

[the_vesmier]

...well, he's not making any sense, the Vesmier knows that much. Still, he's making an odd sort of half-sense which reminds Ves of the Doctor - the Doctor after one of his regenerations, half-mad with trauma and who he's supposed to be.

It's painful. Not that much about this situation isn't; not that the Vesmier is the sort to deal with pain in any way other than locking it up where the rest of the damage is, to be unpacked and more thoroughly reckoned at a more convenient time.

"She was surprising," he says, though the mental twinge that accompanies the word surprising says so much more than the word means. And now, perhaps, in some companies, he should explain. At least offer a reason for his being here. But with Sark, it... doesn't seem quite necessary, or appropriate. He doesn't understand humans, but between Sark and April, there was almost a Time Lord.

[sarkraticmethod]

It takes Sark a moment to actually realize that didn't make any sense at all and he sits up, trying to avoid moving his torso as much as he possibly can and even then, it still hurts.

"Before she died, she did something to me... To my mind." He's talking slowly to make sure his words come out clear, but, really, even he doesn't know quite what she did, but it's there, he can feel it still, although it's faint. Inexpert, though it may be, it was for him. And somehow in his determination to get this across, he doesn't flinch as much when he mentions that she's dead. It almost doesn't seem real right now, even if he knows full well that it is.

He looks up at the Vesmier with an almost pleading expression. He can't explain what she did, but he can, at least, look at it, find out what it is, and maybe fix it. It's something anyway.

And somehow it doesn't even matter that the idea of someone poking around in his head sends shivers down his spine- this is important. And he trusts the Vesmier, as much as he trusts anyone, especially right