Fic: The Summer Intern (cont.)

[jeriendhal]

Nan had to check the chronometer on her pad to realize it wasn't even 0900 yet by the time she and the First One left the little doe and headed back towards his tree house. When they got there, he judged the fifteen meter leap to the porch, shook his head, then dug his claws into the bark of the tree and started climbing up instead. When he got to the top he tossed down the rope ladder Nan had found stuffed into the back of a storage cabinet the fourth or fifth day on the job and she followed up after him. By the time she'd got there he'd already tossed his soaking tunic on the floor and disappeared into his bedroom, emerging a few minutes later dressed in his usual cargo shorts and t-shirt. He accepted the tea she silently handed him with a nod of thanks and dropped down heavily into the cushions of the conversation pit, looking tired, as if he felt every one of his hundred and fifteen years.

"Do you need anything else, sir?" she asked.

"Not right now, thanks," he said. The First One glanced at her, as if seeing her for the first time that morning. "You're soaked, Vix. Go home. No, go grab a towel, dry off and put some fresh clothes on. There should be some clothes in the closet or something. Does are always leaving them lying about."

I imagine they do, she thought, if some of the rumors about him were even half true. No, that wasn't fair. Monogamy was not a concept any ferin bothered with, except perhaps to please their mate if they were one of the very rare ferin/vulpine pairings. "I don't think a doe's clothing would fit me, sir," she said instead.

He blinked, looking a bit fuzzy headed. "No, I suppose not. Get dried off anyway. You can throw your clothes in the dryer and wear a towel or something."

"Yes, sir." Built to ferin specs, the shower lacked full body drying fans, but she made do with a fuzzy towel and a lot of rubbing. She did find a dusty male bathrobe, made of soft cotton and printed in a red tartan pattern, hanging in the back of the wardrobe in the bedroom. It hung down almost to her footpads and there was no split at the back for her tail, but it did cover everything and allowed her to chuck her wet clothes in the dryer.

The First One, who'd dozed off in the conversation pit while she'd dried herself, woke up again as she entered the living room. "Where did you get that?" he demanded, when he saw what she was wearing.

"I found it in the back of the wardrobe," she said. "Is it all right that I wear it?"

For a moment the expression on the First One's face said that it was certainly not all right, but it was quickly replaced with a look of sorrow. "Yeah, it's all right. Keep it if you want," he replied.

She backed off and bustled in the kitchen for a minute, to both fix a tea and allow him to compose himself again. When she returned he was staring up at the ceiling, fingers laced across his chest. She sat across from him, clearing her throat diffidently. "That was a pretty amazing thing you did today, First One," she said.

He shrugged, waving away the praise with a flick of his tail. "I didn't do anything that any other ferin with the right kind of training could have done."

"Do you think that doe is going to be all right?"

"She'll survive," he answered after a moment's thought. "I've established a strong bion link with her. Given her past trauma she needs to be immediately aware that there's a damned strong alpha buck in the vicinity to keep her safe, on the unconcious level of her mind. That's deeper than just being fed the abstract fact that she's on a vulpine world with vulpine and ferin protectors. I can already feel her unwinding enough that she'll allow herself to heal and build up her strength. The only downside is I gotta stick to the village for the next week, so I don't go out of her range."

"That's good, I guess," Nan said. "What I meant was though, do you think she'll... recover?"

The First One turned her head to look at her, his violet eyes old and weary. "If you're asking whether she'll learn to be happy, to not be afraid, to not look at every stranger and automatically wonder how they're going to hurt her, to sleep through the night without wakin' up because the nightmares are so bad... she might. She might find a good, patient buck and a pack of troupe-sisters to watch over her and get enough happy in her life to drown out the bad. Or she might get angry enough to try and hurt everyone around her, because she can't find that trust and wants to keep the world at tail length the rest of her life." He let out a long sigh. "Or I might be feeding her enough strength that she'll finally have the will t' off herself a lot more directly than just starving herself to death. I seen it go all sorts of ways,Vix. No way to tell at this point."

"Oh," she said, then shook her head. "Why does the world have to be like this?"

"Because it is. No rhyme, no reason, no Holy Den Mother to watch over us. Just bunches of people, blindfolded and covered in knives, stumbling into each other and crying out confused when they get cut."

Nan winced at the image, recalling the old scars on the little doe's body. "But if you believe that, why do you even get up in the morning?"

The First One snorted. "Because there aren't any gods. The closet the ferin ever had was that deluded old DNA splicer, the Gene Mage. He's outta the picture, so now they just have me. They believein me, Vix. Believe that just because I'm around there's some kinda justice in the universe for them, despite all the crap that gets thrown their way."

Nan thought about that one for a moment, then dared to ask, "So what will happen when you're gone?"

The First One didn't answer her.

Comments

[jeriendhal.livejournal.com]

Yeah, getting tied down at the moment is going to be... not very convenient for him, or restful for Nan. *grins back*

And the detail about the dressing gown was just one of those things that popped up when I realized no doe's clothing would fit her. Poor Teri.

[mjkj.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I thought it was his, the way Teri acted, it must have been Matt's... :)