Killing Butterflies - Empires SMP

Thirteen - Argue

If they concentrated hard enough, they could swear that they could remember what was going on in their dream before they woke up to somebody-

"Xornoth."

They squinted their eyes open and came face to face with Scott's face, his expression that of a moldy block of marzipan that discovered the existence of algebra. They scowled, as violently as their face could muster, and shrugged away when he tried to shake them again. "What the fuck do you want?"

"Rise and shine, idiot." He made his own scowl back, letting his hand fall off their shoulder like they were some kind of infectious disease. They glared up at him, pushing themself up and only then realising they had fallen asleep on the chair. What in Aeor's name had caused them to sleep on the chair?

They straightened in the chair, leaning as far away from him as possible and ignoring the way their blanket was awkwardly strewn over their shoulders. They glanced up at him with a lingering suspicion, eyes narrowed to slits as they prepared for him to bring out something awful.

Then they took the moment to observe him and caught notice of the healers kit in his hand within seconds.

"No." They snapped before he could open his mouth to talk. "No."

He looked faintly annoyed, but what did he think was going to happen? That they would nod and smile politely and not have a negative reaction at all? Fuck him. "I need to change your bandages."

"I said no."

"Xornoth-"

"No." They cut him off.

"Come on." Scott insisted, although they could guess that he didn't like the idea of bandaging them anymore than they did. "You're going to get an infection."

"Okay." They couldn't really see what was that bad about getting an infection if the wizard could apparently just heal it with a few spells. "Your point being?"

"It could kill you."

They scoffed. "No it won't. I've had infections before, and they're not as bad as you're making them out to be."

He paused, taking the moment to flick his eyes over them, like he felt genuine concern. Disgusting. "What do you mean you've had infections before? Where have you had infections before?"

"None of your business." With a steep huff, they tried to push themselves up from the armchair, trying to stand up from the pale white cushioning that annoyed them the more they thought about it. They shrugged away from him, really wishing they could bite his hand off, and made an overdramatic show of stretching, making it a point to visibly try and stretch their wings.

"Aeor above." Scott groaned, pressing a hand against his face. "You are the worst."

They laughed at him as best as they could, uncaring for the way it felt brittle and forced. "And you," they jabbed a finger towards him, knife like claw threatening to stab if he moved just an inch closer. "Are not the best, no matter how hard you try to be."

"Well it's not like you can try to be any better if you apparently get infections on a regular basis." He raised his eyebrows. Did he… did he not understand? How infections? Worked? "Why are you only bringing up your frequent dates with Death now?"

"Death is married, actually."

"That's not my-" He closed his eyes. Took a deep breath. He might even be internally counting to ten in a little sing-song voice like bitchy toddlers did when they were about to be out on timeout. "-point."

"Did you enjoy your calm down count to ten? You could spice it up and go to eleven next time."

"Says the person who could only calm down by imagining a rotating cow."