Alienus

Chapter Forty Four

This is the actual update. I'm sorry about the confusion. I seriously have no idea how the chapter updated without me pressing the publish button.

If you've read the previous update of this chapter, read this anyway, because it has been changed. And extended.
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When the sound of the blast finally ceased, I had my face buried in Rafe's neck, with Ryx in between us. My ears were ringing when I opened my eyes.

I looked at Rafe and realised he was talking, but I couldn't hear anything over the ringing in my ears.

I shook my head and said, "I can't hear you. My ears are ringing."

I couldn't hear a word I said but Rafe seemed to because his eyes narrowed and he rubbed a thumb against my ear lobe.

Rafe said something but I couldn't understand what he said. He said it slowly again so I could read his lips.

Does it hurt?

I nodded, "A little, yeah." I said, wincing because I was paying more attention it.

Movement behind Rafe had me looking up as black suited C'Riel men rushed into the now barely recognisable room. There wasn't even a "door" left anymore. The remnants of the wall was on the floor, in splintered litters. Rafe deactivated the device on his arm and the blue lit ball that had shielded us disappeared; then with the arm around me, he pulled me to my feet.

I swayed a little, my ears still hurting. I looked down at Ryx who was barking incessantly and he kept scratching at his ears.

Was he going through the pain I was because I was?

Rafe's men gathered around him and he was tossing instructions from what I could tell from his face and their immediate actions. I tugged on his arm and he immediately gave me his attention.

"Rafe, I think my condition is affecting Ryx." I said, tapping my ear s and then looking down at Ryx.

Rafe looked down at Ryx and kneeled down, seeming to say something to him. Ryx stilled, shivered a little then settled down.

From then on, everything was chaos. I was quickly ushered to the Health Care Centre where doctors (yes, plural) worked on me. Rafe had sent Ryx with me (after kneeling down and giving him a long minute of speech that was lost to my ears), refusing to send me anywhere alone; he would've come too, but I think he was needed at the 'bomb site' more.

And Ryx was more wary than a porcupine, his hackles were raised and he growled at (and threatened to attack) almost anyone who came too close for his comfort. So I let him sit with me on the bed and he sat with the upper half of his torso resting on my lap. I wrapped my arms around him, holding him back when someone came too close while treating me.

The human doctors had applied some kind of salve on my ears and it quietened the ringing almost immediately. They asked me to provide some urine for them to test, but Ryx wouldn't let me get up, so I requested if I could take a blood test instead. When one of the human doctors came to me with a syringe, I saw people still and turn around in my periphery. I looked up too and watched Rafe walk into the the Health Care Centre, anger radiating off him in waves. People moved out of his way almost immediately and the poor doctor in front of me swallowed visibly when Rafe turned the weight of his angry gaze on him.

Rafe, having moved so fast I missed it, took the syringe away and stared at it impassively. Then he tossed it aside with a disgusting look.

"Rafe!" I gasped, but he had already gone somewhere into one of the—I'm pretty sure Restricted to Doctors only—rooms. He returned with a data pad and a small crystal like pen, with a circular structure at the end, in his hand. He came to me, placed the data pad aside, took my hand in his and as gently as he could, pricked my index finger with the pen like device. I watched as blood welled from my finger tip and filled the small crystal ball at the end. The data pad lit up and Rafe handed the pen/needle/crystal device to a C'Riel nurse who came to stand beside him for assistance and took the data pad from where he'd laid it beside me.