Gears of Remnant.

Treatment & new friends.

Private Carmine stared at the hospital room ceiling silently, his eyes were red and puffy, and most of the night he spent more sobbing than he ever had in his life. The pain of his injuries made it worse, so he was thankful the nurses upped his dosage of morphine. He felt like a failure to his squad, to his family, to the COG. He wasn't certain if this was all real just yet, despite his initial thought from the previous day, this was just too outlandish. The leading hypothesis was that he was dying in reality, that the stomach acid fumes must've had some sort of hallucinogenic effect that his respirator wasn't able to stop.

His huts must be mush right about now, those parasites were eating him, Something in their saliva or some sort of venom put him in a coma and it was only extending the last moments of his life in a hallucination, that's what it had to be. Something smart and scientific, something Daniel would say.

The Dull pain from his wounds told him otherwise though, he felt the IVs in his arms, they were so distinct, but could that have been a side effect of the hallucination? Piecing together old sensations and memories to make it seem so real so he wouldn't fight back? Maybe he had been watching too many sci-fi and superhero shows, maybe he was overthinking a situation he could not explain. In either event, he had to think of something to say to the gray-haired man and the blonde hottie, something, anything that didn't sound batshit crazy.

"Fuck." Carmine muttered to himself, wiping his eyes shut.

His stomach flipped and flopped, nausea washed over him like a high tide. It took a great deal of reservation to not puke. The anti-nausea medicine only did so much for Ben, his stomach grumbled but he wasn't too excited about putting food in it just hadn't yet. He had half a mind to try and escape the hospital room but he was without his uniform and weapons, safe to say he wouldn't get far with his bare ass exposed to the cold air, without a gun, or a destination.

His hand tenderly touched the stitches beneath his gown, along his leg and waist. When he was struck by the giant scorpion, Ben had failed to notice that he was impaled by small branches and slashed by small rocks, coupled with a few broken ribs, he was lucky to even be awake right now.

The clicking of heels brought his eyes back up to the nurse, Miss Yarrow Blanche, she was a sweet older woman who gave him a puke bucket after his midnight vomiting episode, he gave her an apologetic smile, "I'm really sorry about last night."

"It's alright mister Carmine, you just rest now." The woman's smile reminded him of Mama Carmine's; she must've been a mother herself to be tentative and have such a familiar smile, "Do you feel like you could keep anything down?"

"Beacon?" He asked redundantly, there was no way in hell he could keep something that greasy down.

Tenderly she adjusted his pillow with a soft smile on her lips, "I was thinking more along the line of porridge with a bit of honey in it."

"I'll try it, please, ma'am." Benjamin was the most polite son out of his brothers, despite his occasional cursing, something he picked up from Clay and basic training in general.

Nurse Yarrow patted his arm softly, yet stopped short of leaving, "Oh, Headmaster Ozpin will be down soon to ask you some questions, something about the initiation from yesterday."

While Ben nodded and thanked the woman, his blood ran cold, he had no idea what he was going to say to the man, 'Hi, I'm Private Carmine of the COG, please don't throw me in the looney bin.'

The young Gaer lay down in dread, he supposed that the truth was the only thing he could tell him after all, Ben Carmine was no liar. Clay pointed out that whenever he tried weaseling his way out of things, Anthony was better, Clay and Dan however had the best poker faces, none of them could withstand Mama Carmine's glare.