Back on the submarine, I was brought to the infirmary. I would have much rather first taken a shower, as I did not feel comfortable in my own skin.
"Say, can't I take a shower first? It must be uncomfortable for you too.", I asked Law. He looked over his shoulder to his crew member, who tried hard not to put on a grimace, and sighed. "Alright. Corel will get you something to change.", he talked to his mate, who must have been Corel. Then he directed me to come with him.
"You have ten minutes.", he would have rather treated me first, I could see that. But with bandages there was no shower in sight either.
"I feel the pain, don't worry.", nearly in the bath, I turned around again, "Thank you. For saving me."
I felt much better after the shower. Still not very comfortable, the dwarf captain's hands couldn't be washed off that easily, but it was a good start. Only the tattoo caught my attention over and over again. Of course, it wasn't removable by rubbing or scratching. That just resulted in a scratched arm.
I slipped into the overall given to me. Upon seeing the female underwear, I remembered a woman being part of the crew. "What was her name again? Something starting with an 'I', I think. Hopefully the bra fits." I welcomed the distraction. The bra was about one or two sizes too big, but better than nothing.172Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡG0uljRdFmu
Law was waiting impatiently in front of the bath. When I came out, he eyed me, now wearing an overall of his crew. "Does it fit?", he asked. "It's alrgiht. Thanks.", I responded selfconciously.
At the infirmary once again, I couldn't prevent myself from looking at the closet against which Fernus pressed me and then used the spock handle on me. Law cut through my thoughts, though.
"I need to treat your wounds and I need to touch you for that. If you can't stand it tell me. I'll have to sedate you then."
"I'll try. Just be careful."
"You don't have to tell me that."
I wasn't comfortable taking off the overall but I knew it was necessary. Law first inspected the wounds visible. His expression darkened upon seeing my left upper arm. I looked away while saying: "I couldn't stand it. Sorry." He ignored my words.
Law and Corel were extra cautious when they touched me. Law even went as far as to tell me when one of them would touch me where. It wasn't very easy to pull myself together and I couldn't restrain a flinch at the first few touches. I tried telling myself that the two were doctors, though I didn't know if that worked. But over time, I flinched less. I still couldn't relax. There was this terror inside of me. It made me cling onto the bed I was lying on.
"I'll examine your stomach now.", I nodded. But as soon as Law put his hand on my waist, I had to hold back a scream. A whimper escaped my lips nevertheless. "W-Wait.", he pulled back his hand.
"I need to feel whether you have inner wounds.", he explained.
"I know. Just... give me a second.", to my surprise, he waited patiently. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. "Alright. Go ahead."
Law scanned my stomach carefully with his hands. I imagined them to be my dad's hands. The fear was still there aside from the pain and I kept clinging to the bed. But the thought of my dad being the one scanning my stomach made it bearable. Oh how I wished he could be here with me.
"[There is internal bleeding. We have to operate on that immediately. I'll prepare her, you take care of the instruments.]", nodding, Corel hurried away. Law's voice sounded serious.
"Did you find something?", I asked. "You have internal bleeding. We need to operate on you."
He administered an anesthetic and within seconds I was gone.
I was back in my world. Home. In my room. I needed a few seconds to realize I was back for real. I ran to the living room. No one there. Suddenly I heard a song play.
"Try not to upset you – let you – rescue – me the day I met you"
I ran to my brothers' room. No one here too. The bedroom of my parents empty as well. Where was everyone? And where was that music coming from?
"I just wanted to protect you"
There was no notice on the kitchen table. Why wasn't anyone here? I tried calling every single one on the phone. Mom, Dad, Michael, Daniel. None answered. Desperatly I hurried out the door. But as soon as I stepped out, I fell into emptiness. After falling a few seconds, I woke up on a stretcher. I was... inside an ambulance? What happened?
"Where did you go – I should know – but it's cold – and I don't wanna be lonely – was hoping you'd come home"
Everything went black again and I heard the last verse of the song.
"I don't care if it's a lie"
I woke up under a bright light. Blinded, I blinked heavily. But I knew this light creme white painted room. "Nur ein Traum.", I concluded with a tear in the corner of an eye.
I cleared my throat a few times, which called Law and Corel to my bed. Corel gave me a glass of water, which I drank carefully. It reminded me of Fernus, how he brought me food and water.
"Does anything hurt?", Law asked. He carried a clipboard and pen, noting down my data from the machines.
"No I just feel a bit fuzzy."
"You mean fuzzy-headed."
"Yeah, probably.", I couldn't think straight yet. But what he said sounded correct.
"That's still due to the anesthetic. You should rest. Your wounds are taken care of for now.", he claimed before going back to his desk. Corel readjusted the machines connected to me when our eyes met. He gave me a smile. I smiled back a tired smile. I felt kinda weird. Tired and awake at the same time. Was that an aftereffect of the anesthetic as well?
A calm and quiet atmosphere lay itself over the room. I used that time to think back on the dream I had. What was that exactly? My dream were weird ones since I could remember, but this felt so real. There was that song. I remembered hearing it before coming to this world as well. I still couldn't remember what happened exactly. I was on my way home. Listening to that song. It rang through my head once again. I didn't like earworms. Even songs I actually liked, they were awful as earworms, since the same part repeated itself over and over again endlessly. And it was so hard to get rid of them.
I tried remembering anything nevertheless. What was that part in the ambulance? Did I maybe have an accident? That thought was followed by a violent headache.
"Ah! Scheiße!", I rolled over to the side and held my head. My stomach hurt as I moved over. Law instantly came over, "What's the matter?", and rolled me back so I was lying on my back again.
"Shit, my head hurts. God it hurts so much!", I never had a headache this strong.
Law administered something through the cannula that still remained from the surgery in my arm. The touch was drowned out completely by the headache. "It should get better in a few seconds.", he said while checking the stitches on my stomach. But he didn't feel this pain. "It feels like it's going to explode! Fuck!", I kept cursing until the medicine finally took it's effect.
Luckily, the painkiller didn't take long to take it's effects. What remained was only a slight throbbing. I lay in bed, exhausted.
"What the hell was that?", I asked myself more than Law.
"I don't know. That's unusual.", he admitted, deep in thought. "Do you know of any trigger?", he asked.
"Thoughts.", I replied briefly. "Thoughts?", he raised a brow.
"I had a weird dream and was thinking about it. I tried to remember what happened before I woke up in your room."
"Maybe you don't want to remember.", he claimed after a moment of silence, walking back to his desk.
"You mean I subconciously blocked those memories?"
"Exactly."
"I get a headache every time I wake up since I got here. It's not that bad and it fades after a few minutes, but it's still there every time. It's weird since that almost never happened at home."
"Hmm.", not revealing his thoughts, he wrote down something into a file. Was that mine?
"My subconcious blocking those memories?" Cases like this weren't that rare. It was completely new to me, though. Too tired to think about it any further, I soon fell asleep.
As two of my rips were fractured and because I had surgery, I had to remain on the infirmary for some time. Law actually offered to erase the tattoo on my arm after my desperate tries have healed. I accepted of course. The scar, that would most likely remain was much better than that awful jolly roger.
I was not allowed to get out of bed. It was extremely boring! The captain was with me most of the time, but worked on something at his desk. The few times he was not here, Corel would stay in the infirmary. Someone always had an eye on me. But still I could not talk with anyone. There was the language barrier keeping me from talking with Corel. And there was Law's disinterest keeping him from engaging a conversation with me. Every time I tried starting one, he just wouldn't play along.
Sometime when Corel was in the storage, checking the medical supplies, I couldn't stand this any longer. "I'm so bored!", I shouted into the room.
Right in that moment, Law stepped through the double doors. Corel hurriedly looked out the storage, holding the back of his head. I guessed he jumped in surprise upon my shouting. Feeling a bit bad about it, I apologized in my mind. Law only sighed in frustration and pinched the bridge of his nose. I definitely did not make things easy for him. I nagged at my boredom everyday over and over again. There was just nothing for me to do!
"[I'm so close to put her into an artificial coma.]", he grumbled. Corel smiled an understanding smile.
"[She might actually welcome that.]", he responded.
"[No. If things go wrong that would make things complicated again. I don't want her talking about any weird dreams again either.]", he sighed yet again.
Seeing Law sitting at the table with his back to me again, I sighed too, realizing they'd just ignore me.
I tried processing the days I spent on the other ship. Especially the last one. Everytime the bandages needed to be changed, I thought of it as some kind of confrontational therapy. My body just needed to understand, that touches from other people weren't bad in general. They didn't hurt. My stomach was the most sensitive area. It was there that the dwarf captain touched me the most. I just needed to think of something else for my chest, since there was no bandage around there. I couldn't just ask some random guy to touch my chest for confrontational therapy either. No. Definitely not.
A few more days passed. The self called confrontational therapy seemed to work quite well. The last time my bandages had to be changed, it was only my stomach that felt uncomfortable. I thought about it the same as a car accident. One'd need to get behind the wheel again as soon as possible. Otherwise, the fear might settle down deep within. I loved hugs before this day, that probably helped as well. I was satisfied with the result right now at least.
Law still didn't want to tell me his plans with me. I asked him a few times, but every time he just said: "I'll tell you once you get out of bed."
The only thing he told me was that I was supposed to do something for him. It was mean keeping me in suspense like this. Even if he enjoyed this very much. No, because of that.
Salvation came at last and I was released. Since it was time for lunch, Law led me straight to the mess. As we got closer, laughter and conversations reached my ears. It didn't take long until Law opened the door and stepped inside.
It strangly put a smile on my face as I saw how the lively crew didn't really get to eat as they talked and laughed together. Nearly everyone wore light grey overalls with the jolly roger of the Heart Pirates on it. Just like I wore one. My clothes had been washed in the meantime, so I wore my black t-shirt with wolfs howling at the moon printed on it and blue pants again.
I spotted Ikkaku within the men with her dark, curly hair. She laughed as loud as the men around her, if not louder. And then I spotted Bepo. He sat at the back, but was still easy to find with his orange overall.
Law gained the attention of his crew through a quick whistle. The mess deck grew quiet all of a sudden. One could easily see how much the crew respected the captain. All attention was on him. Now that everyone looked at him, some eyes swifted to me for a second, I could see the cook who stepped out of the kitchen now. He did not wear an overall, but typical chef clothing under a yellow apron. He seemed older than everyone else. I guessed somewhere in the fifties, which made him the oldest here. After being interested about the age, I looked around once more and noticed that I couldn't see Jean Bart anywhere. Did that mean they hadn't reached Sabaody Archipelago yet?
"In which timeperiod did I get here anyway? Judging by Law's hat, the two years time skip didn't happen yet. So I could really be before sabaody happened.", I concluded.
Law spoke with his crew in the language I didn't understand. The language barrier started to annoy me. If I had to stay in this world longer, I wished Law would teach me their local language. Then he finally said: "Come, you'll get something to eat now."
The bigger part of the crew watched me with stunned looks, some with disbelief, as if I was a ghost. A few whispered as we walked by. What did Law tell them?
# The song in Catherine's dream is ilomilo by Billie Eilish172Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4MJibvtRFc
Translations:
(1) "Nur ein Traum." - "Just a dream."
(2) "Ah! Scheiße!" - "Ah! Shit!"172Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡux3trNTGJN
