a good space boy from a good space family (pethdorn) wrote in incompletedata, @ 2017-10-03 18:15:00 |
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Poe was becoming intimately familiar with hunger. It was something that until now had only really beset him in intense and fleeting bursts - after a hard morning out in the field, or a diverted hyperspace jump, or a mission that had blown up on him, he had sometimes found himself famished - and had promptly stuffed his face with whatever was at hand, be it a massive lunch from his own kitchen, a ration pack, or the greasiest plate of junk available at whatever portside dive he stumbled into. But wherever he was, whatever had happened - there was always something at hand. Hunger pounced on him, and he grappled with it, and then it was gone. This was different. He'd sworn days ago never to touch another damn mushroom, or consider another rat or snake, but of course those vows meant nothing. Adding insult to injury, it was work to collect these don't-call-them-meals, slow and difficult and low-yield. He spent more calories than he ever had on collecting fewer than he'd ever made do with, and this was to share. All the while, the deprivation of sleep, of food, of heat wore on him, dulling his senses and his reflexes. It had been difficult to collect food in the dark and cold before; now, it felt next to impossible. He couldn't think. He knew, though, that running out of iodine was a more serious problem than losing a few more kilos. He'd left his last food collection at their camp - Bail hadn't been there, which was odd, but they were all moving slower, these days, and he tried not to let his worry and dread weigh him down when so many other things were doing the same job - and had walked through the brackish, unpleasant smelling water toward dry land. The Cornucopia, with its just as non-potable supply, was off to his left. The last he'd seen of Phasma was at the spring, and so that he would avoid. He went straight instead, to the beach where he'd first found water, hoping that if he ventured in far enough, perhaps he'd find an offshoot that was purer. Wading into the water, he let his fingers trail along the surface at his sides, his sword hanging at a cumbersome angle at his hip. His attention wandered, creeping back to Bail's absence. A thousand awful things might have happened, and his imagination was kind enough to present him with a large percentage. He could be injured, trapped, captured, forced to hide, terrified, in pain; and those images, which always would have pricked at him, now made deeper cuts. He had come to find Bail reassuring, grounding, necessary, and maybe it was just the gnawing, twisting feeling in his stomach, but there had been things Bail had done or said that reminded Poe so vividly of his own father that he thought of Leia and he just wanted to - His ankle snagged on something, and he froze. It was the wrong instinct. The rocks were falling by the time he realized he should have leapt out of the way, and he had time only to throw his arms above his head - his shout echoed into the cave and silenced abruptly as he went under. Pain washed through his shoulder, scalding and sharp, radiating down his arm, into his neck, and, for a moment, everywhere. Panic seized him, his body demanding that he breathe, never mind that he was underwater - and he thrust himself up with his good arm, and gasped, and coughed as he sucked in the water running down his face, and cried out in pain as the violent motion sent another wave of agony across his body. He forced himself to stop, and think. It was nearly useless - his mind was a fog of pain, on top of everything else - but he realized he wasn't trapped. Nothing that had fallen had been heavy enough to pin him. He'd have a nice set of bruises tumbling down his back, he imagined, and there were some other places that felt raw with impact, but there was nothing keeping him here. Shaking, he tugged the sword out of its makeshift loop, and stabbed it into the ground, and hauled himself up with the arm that wasn't singing. He swallowed back the fear that threatened to overtake him - he wasn't sure if it was in his collar bone or his arm, but it didn't matter, he couldn't protect anyone now, he couldn't hunt, he couldn't feed his partner, he couldn't, he couldn't - and he walked, one step, then another, his teeth digging into his lower lip with every footfall. It was an interminable trip back to camp, awkward and frigid and wet, made worse by the cold, strung-out aftermath of adrenaline that set his teeth chattering. But it was nothing like the chill that set in when he found their camp again, still deserted, the food untouched. Where are you? He knew he should go look - he had to go look, what if Bail was lying somewhere under a pile of rocks, what if - but the prospect was overwhelming. Biting back another cry, Poe sat, his bad arm slung across his chest, which seemed to alleviate the pain at least a little, and squeezed his eyes shut, and tried to regulate his breathing. And he told himself he would get up - in five minutes, or ten, or half an hour. He would go searching. It was better than sitting here, and counting time by the pulses in his bones and waiting. He would go. He just ... needed a minute. |