“What's going on?” Zayzann demanded as he rushed forward and puffed out his down feathers. “What’s wrong with Iris?”
“I do not know.” Khazmine admitted before clenching her jaw and hugging Iris more tightly in her mechanical grasp. “She collapsed at the front door. Zay, move those articles off the couch, so that I might set her down.”
Zayzann obeyed Khazmine’s command, removing the various piles of rulebooks and papers from their haphazardly stacked heaps on the couch. Khazmine glanced down at Iris as Zayzann made progress on clearing off a space for her. She could hear the pained rumbling of Iris’s stomach amid unconscious groans from the tiny woman and looked up to confirm what she’d heard with Byxx.
“I’ll whip something up for her.” Byxx asserted, as he ran a warm hand against Iris’s pale cheek.
“Gruel or porridge would work best.” Khazmine advised. “Rice or oats. No seasonings. Add some salt.”
“Got it.” Byxx skillfully readied a thin oatmeal gruel on the stove, throwing in a pinch of salt, per Khazmine’s directions. “It’ll only be a few minutes. Can you take a look at her in the meantime?”
Zayzann finished scrambling to tidy the couch enough for Iris, and Khazmine gently deposited her in a seated position that Zayzann supported with fluffy throw pillows. He didn’t know what else to do, as medicine wasn’t a specialty of his, and so crouched low to Iris with a pained, low-pitch growl.
Khazmine needed him to move out of the way, so that she might better examine Iris’s condition discreetly. Remembering the icy coldness of Iris’s hands, Khazmine conjured up an excuse to send him away.
“Zayzann, her hands are cold.” Khazmine recognized the earnest stare of the Paxoram, who mere hours ago was reduced to tears by her harsh words. A twinge of regret pecked at Khazmine before she sent him away on an errand. “Please go to the bedroom and find the softest blanket she has. We need to keep her comfortable.”
He departed for his objective without a word, padding rapidly to the bedroom with utmost seriousness. Zayzann’s departure allowed Khazmine to get a closer look at her sickly charge. She had decades of providing basic health examinations during her mission and felt confident in her ability to narrow down what was causing this worrisome illness. Khazmine pressed a long, pointed ear to Iris’s chest and listened carefully.
Makers, please, it cannot be…
Khazmine’s glacier-blue eyes darted back and forth as she silently begged for her instincts to be wrong. Frigid, trembling limbs, insomnia, difficulty eating, fainting, and now this. Khazmine’s brows twitched at the recollection of the bathroom medicine cabinet. She crept silently to the ancient laptop and began searching for what the numerous medications were used for.
The scent of bland oatmeal gruel filled the apartment, like the world’s least-appetizing breakfast. Zayzann returned to the living room with a soft, tattered blanket trimmed in velvety fringe. He tucked Iris into a snug cocoon while Khazmine continued her search. A troubling trend was emerging as she looked up each medication.
No, little one…
Khazmine’s eyes blurred from the unexpected glassiness of fresh lubricating fluid that filled them. It was designed to prevent damage to her sensitive eyes, and only expressed itself when Khazmine was under duress. After the Conversion, this was the closest she could get to tears. The lubricant stained her dark tear troughs from the medial corner of each eye as she wiped the excess away. She came to the painful realization of what might be wrong, and she stifled a cry at the idea of it.
I can’t tell them… I can’t say anything at all…
She struggled to conceal the unconscious soft rattling of her metallic plates, whose motion broke her concentration enough for Khazmine’s camouflage to fail. The leaking smell of ozone wafted into the kitchen as Khazmine’s disguise collapsed, drawing the attention of Byxx. He sidled to the edge of the entryway and spied Khazmine with her head in her hands, silently despairing.
Byxx contemplated his conundrum, weighed the pros and cons of his options, and arrived at a difficult decision. He slinked to the entryway closet to retrieve his sword from within. From inside the pommel, he extracted a pinch of the fine blue powder and resealed the secret compartment. Byxx snaked back to the kitchen and added the fine dust to the burbling gruel unobserved.
Hang in there, Iris. Byxx winced as he stirred the powder until it dissolved without a trace.
Impatient and antsy, Zayzann alternated between lifting one clawed foot from the carpeting and then the other. His twitchy toe talons caught the fibrous Berber carpet pile and snagged at it like a cat’s claws. Zayzann’s down puffed on end, which gave him an idea. He moved at a sloth’s pace and carefully nestled beside Iris on the couch, tucking a wing around her for warmth.
Zayzann tried convincing himself that his unusual behavior was mere instinct, but Khazmine knew better. She observed with pained eyes and drooped ears as Zayzann nuzzled close to his weary watch-mate. Paxoram were fearsome defenders of their watch-mates, whether they were a nesting pair or not. Just how far along did Zayzann believe they were? Khazmine deflected any unnecessary fancies and refocused on her immediate questions.
Byxx decanted the piping hot gruel into a weighty ceramic bowl and allowed it to rest on the coffee table to cool. He meandered around the table, only to be met with snapping and snarling from Zayzann when he got too close. Zayzann’s cries had a desperate, frightened sound to them, just like the time Byxx had first met him.
“Hey now,” Byxx coaxed. “It’s all right, Zay. We gotta get her some food, that’s all. Be easy with me, buddy.”
Zayzann’s instincts screamed at him to refuse, calling out “DANGER” and “RIVAL” in Paxoram loudly enough to rattle his skull. Byxx motioned closer still, despite any worries of being bit, and kept his eyes fixed on Zayzann’s. Khazmine could hear the faintest whimper coming from the Paxoram, driving her to a heightened state of agitation. Zayzann lowered his wing and retreated from the embrace with his crest of cranial feathers tamped flat against his head.
With the gruel cool enough to eat, Byxx laid a gentle hand on Iris’s shoulder and jostled her awake. She was groggy and disoriented at first but smiled weakly at each roommate in turn as her vision sharpened.
“Wh-what happened?” Iris mumbled.
“You had a fall.” Khazmine admitted from behind the archfiend. “Gave us quite a scare, too.”
“I’m sss. I-I’m so s-sorry.” Iris choked out with a trembling stutter.
“Don’t be, honey. It’s not like that, honest.” Byxx blew on a spoonful of gruel for her. “Here, eat this. I promise you’ll feel better.”
Iris took a feeble bite of gruel from the spoon but had difficulty holding it herself. Instead, Byxx carefully lifted the bowl up for her to drink from, making sure she had consumed every drop of the bland slurry. He forced a pained, tight smile once she had finished. Byxx watched Iris drowse before falling asleep again. She would feel better soon, he was sure of it.
At least I bought her more time.
Khazmine’s nose twitched, tugging her lips into a sneer. She despised even the thought of losing her new roommate and began teasing out options to help with their most pressing concerns. After all, Iris was her best and only lead on how to return home. The possibility that she would be stuck on Earth forever left Khazmine feeling hollow and irritated.
There was no time to dwell on negative possibilities they had no control over, so Khazmine resolved to take things into her own hands. She scooped Iris up into a blanket burrito and carted her off to the bedroom, trailed by her remaining roommates, who lingered in the doorway. Khazmine shooed both away, insisting that she watch over Iris all night.
“I should be there for her.” Zayzann protested while reaching out with a feathered hand.
“She needs rest.” Khazmine soothed. “I’ll watch over her tonight, and you can take over tomorrow.”
Zayzann pouted before complying with Khazmine’s directive. There was little point in arguing with her, especially when she was right, but he felt uneasy leaving Iris with the Augment. Still, it was better than having Byxx watch over her, as at least Khazmine showed no interest in Iris as a prospective partner. Zayzann skulked back into the living room and prowled around restlessly long into the evening, much to Byxx’s annoyance.
“Hey, would you please cool it with the pacing?” Byxx entreated from his splayed position on the couch. “She’s going to be fine, Zay.”
“You don’t know that.” Zayzann insisted while rattling his feathers nervously. “I want to help, but I don’t know how.”
“Be patient,” Byxx leaned up to get a better look at Zayzann. “She’ll be fine. Have a little faith in the process, okay?”
The hours lingered languidly until exhaustion overtook both Byxx and Zayzann. Only the mechanical Khazmine resisted the urge to rest, and instead stood as a sentinel for Iris, waiting for her to stir from sleep. The clock on Iris’s phone screen slowly blinked 3:51 am when Khazmine went near it to check on Iris, and the tiny woman’s eyes opened to the darkness. She was half delirious from the medicine, calling out for ghosts in the night.
“Are you there?” Iris mumbled from under the covers. “I’m afraid…”
“What are you afraid of, little one?”
“I don’t want to go.” Iris sniffled. “But I’m s-so tired…”
“How can I help, Iris?” Khazmine asked while brushing a lock of purple hair from her teary eye. “What do you need?”
“I’m s-so sorry. We’re broke again.” Iris wheezed tearfully. “I’m doing my best, but it’s not enough. Doan wanna lose the house. Pleece, help, Ama…”
Iris drifted back to sleep, and silence overtook the room again. Khazmine stalked back to her perch on the far end of the room and hovered over the stool, wrestling with tough decisions.
Poor thing. Sounds exhausted. She must have mistaken me for her…
Khazmine plugged herself into the wall socket to recharge as she parsed through what Iris had said.
If it’s money she needs, at least I can get that. We’ll need to be a little more creative with it, but what other choice is there?
The Augment stood watch over the sickly woman until just before dawn, only leaving when Iris began waking up from her prolonged rest. When Iris emerged from the bedroom feeling refreshed, Byxx and Zayzann rushed over to greet her.
“Good morning. How are you feeling?” Byxx asked eagerly. Iris looked confusedly back at him, as if he were overly concerned over nothing.
“I’m fine.” Iris trod over to the pantry to pack a light sack lunch for work. “It’s funny though. I don’t remember much from yesterday. I got home and must have crashed hard, huh?”
Byxx and Zayzann eyed each other warily. These lapses had become worrisome, and they both feared another collapse. Though she looked much better this morning, Byxx knew that his elixir was not a panacea, and would only be effective for a short while. It was up to Iris to heal properly, and he had no way of knowing if that was possible.
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