Layan

Ele: Layan?

Tab: GO TO YOUR CORNER ELE!!

Ele: Fine!

Nic: Now that Ele is finally in her corner there won’t be much talking before a chapter.

Kla: and what exactly are you guys doing now?

Ele: Being idiots.

Rail burst through his room door into the empty hallway, well, it was supposed to be empty. Children with wings on their backs ran down the hall shrieking ‘curse’. Rail quickly pressed against the wall as the kids ran by screaming. If one of them hit him and made him drop the box of medicine he carried, he would kill them. Rail gritted his teeth and stepped away from the wall.

“Calm down!!” Rail shouted, his voice sounding demanding and echoing down the hall, making all the children suddenly stop and half of them start to cry. “Now, what’s going on?” He demanded.

A young boy stepped up and sniffled. “It’sh a curse! My momma said it’sh a curse!” the boy screamed, his voice high pitched as he practically wailed.

Rail grimaced from the scream. “Shut up!” all the children suddenly hushed up and stared, their eyes glassy. “Where?”

Half of the children started to run down the left hallway, leaving Rail behind. “This way!” they all shouted.

Rail quickly followed behind the kids, easily catching up with them because of his long legs.

The tapping of the little shoes from the children and Rail’s heavy boots echoed down the hall as they ran past rooms where people peeked out from the screaming. Rail never stopped to reassure them, he just kept running; from his knowledge he only had a few minutes. The hallway soon became fragrant and moss and algae grew at the corners of the hall. Rail realized they were headed towards the garden.

The garden was apart of the building itself; a corner of the building made by a glass dome for the flowers that grew out from the concrete. Rail emerged from the shadowed hall directly into the garden where he gazed up too the glass dome to find a large hole where the glass shattered. His eyes filtered down from the hole down to a bundle of flowers where a group of teenage Wingens gossiped and pointed at something hidden in the flowers.

The children pushed past the crowds towards the bed of flowers. “Make room! Rail needs to see!” a boy yelled as him and his friends pushed aside the teenagers to let Rail through. Rail squeezed past the crowd that began to part and stopped dead at the end of the crowd.

A young girl lay on the bed of flowers, the buds and leaves of the flowers barely covering her naked body. She gazed up at the ceiling with closed eyes, making her breasts visible.

Rail quickly swallowed down, keeping his composure as he fished out a blanket e had stuffed into the box full of medical supplies. He bend down and gently laid it over the girl’s naked body. Calm now, he placed the back of his hand on her forehead. Satisfied the fever wasn’t too bad he turned her head to the side to observe her ears and hair.

The girl’s ears were red, maybe from embarrassment, and her hair a pure white. Her hair was long at the bangs, pushed aside because she was on her back. Rail turned her head farther and noticed a bump on the back of her head where blood seeped into her white hair. He fished into his medicine box and nursed her cut quickly.

The crowd around them continued to gossip about the strange phenomenon. Of course, they had people come before, but this was different. Wingens were either born or wondered into the town from the road, not suddenly come from the sky into the town. No, this was different, which was the reason everyone was gossiping and thinking it was a curse. Rail knew it wasn’t. Once before near the first years of the Wingens, the same thing had happened. Someone had fallen from the sky into the clock tower before it was built. That time it was a boy who had fallen and everyone thought that people could fall from the sky all the time. After everyone from that time died, it seemed unusual, but Rail knew; his father was the one who had fallen from the sky, whom had died only four years ago.

Rail gently lifted the girl’s back off of the grass and quickly wrapped the tower completely around her. He glanced around him. “Well? Are you going to help me or not?” The first to step up, he noticed, was his brother; Jendin. Jendin carefully stepped up and looped one of the girl’s arms over his head and rested it across his shoulders. Rail rolled his eyes at the other nervous people and did the same with the other. The lifted her up to limb feet and dragged her away from prying eyes.

««…

She could feel people carrying her, yet her feet and arms didn’t obey her when she tried to tell them to move. She could hear the strange voices fade away and felt her feet touch something cooler then what she had been lying on. She felt her feet stop and suddenly she was moving again. She felt her arms suddenly shift and suddenly, she was lying on her back again except her head laid on something better than a flower head.

Voices echoed around her but she still couldn’t understand them, her fingers twitched and started to wiggle around the thing she laid on. Her arms moved better now and she started to feel around the thing that covered her now and she reached up to her face where she began to suck on a finger. It felt childish but she was curious to the taste and what fingers actually were. Her legs began to move, wiggling around like she couldn’t find a comfortable spot. Her mouth opened and closed, her tongue rolling around making saliva drip from her mouth. She scraped her tongue against a tooth but hardly noticed it as she licked her lips and her fingers.

…

Rail started to boil a pot of water and came out of the kitchen to look at the girl as she slobbered over herself like a baby. She’s acting like a newborn infant… he thought to himself and sighed. He never wanted kids but now he was taking care of a girl probably the same age as him who acted like a baby. He rubbed between his eyes as he thought about how to handle this. No doubt he would have to take care of the girl until she was more grown up. He pulled up a broken chair that leaned against the wall because of a missing back leg and sat on it; teetering on the other three legs.

The girl was now waving her arms in the air with her eyes closed; she was able to lift her body up a little so she tossed from side to side on the bed. Rail got up from the chair; ignoring the fact it fell to the floor. He crossed the room towards the girl with her waving arms and grabbed them. The girl’s face wrinkled in annoyance from being stopped from her exploration.

“Wake up… open your eyes.” Rail said softly. The girl pulled back and struggled but she was too weak. The girl opened her mouth and started to scream. Rail grimaced and covered her mouth. “Calm down.” The girl soon quieted and he removed his hand. “What’s your name?” The girl’s mouth hung open as her tongue roamed around her mouth, she couldn’t speak. Rail sighed and let go of her hands and sat down on the edge of the bed.

The girl let her arms fall and she squeaked and yawned. Rail massaged his temples and glanced over to the girl whose eyes lids were fluttering. Rail reached over and shielded her eyes from the glare of the sun that filtered in from the balcony doors. The girl’s eyes slowly opened and she glanced around her.

“That isn’t so bad now, is it?” Rail asked. The girl blinked several times as she explored her surroundings and then noticed his hand above her eyes. She moved her arms and grabbed his hand where she turned it around and started to pet at it. “It’s my hand.” The girl didn’t seem to react but she moved his hand aside and looked at her own. “That’s your hand.” Rail explained. He grabbed her hand and put his hand against hers, their fingers aligned. “Both of our hands. Can you say it?”

The girl’s tongue had settled and she mumbled for a while. Of course, since she was not an infant, talking should come easier for her. “Ha…” Her voice sounded raspy and she gurgled the ‘a’.

“Hand.” Rail repeated, the girl blinked and stared at her hand against his.

“Ha… Hank.” She quickly shook her head bit on her tongue. “Ha… nd.” Rail sighed and nodded.

“Good. Now, can you say your name?” Rail asked. He was pretty sure she had a name and knew it, he remembered his father had one when he came from the sky.

“La…” Her ‘a’ gurgled and her tongue slapped the bottom of her mouth as she said the ‘l’. “Lae…”

“Laeh? Laen?” Rail insisted he tried to piece together her words but she wacked him with the back of her hand against his shoulder. Rail rubbed his shoulder, it actually hurt.

“Lai… Lae… Layan…. Layan.” The girl repeated it twice to confirm she was right and looked at Rail where she poked at his shoulder. Rail blinked; confused.

“Me?” he asked, pointing at his chest. The girl poked at his shoulder again and made a ‘n’ sound. “Oh, I’m Rail.”

The girl glanced at the ceiling and moved her lips, trying to form the ‘r’. “Rrr… Rah… Rai… Rail… Rail!” Rail smirked as the girl smiled at her accomplishment. She poked at his shoulder again. “Rail.” She then patted her own chest, wrapped in a blanket. “Layan.”

Rail rolled his eyes. “Yeah, I’m Rail… and your Layan.” He agreed, he was annoyed, he had to teach the alphabet to a almost grown girl.

Layan. Layan reached out and suddenly grasped Rail’s wing as he was distracted. He yelped and pulled her hand off his wing. “No, don’t do that.” He said softly and suddenly he stood still. Layan, the girl, had no wings. He faintly recalled his father talking about how he could relate to a woman going through labor for he had experienced incredible pain himself. Rail pulled Layan up to sit by her shoulder and glanced at her back. Two lumps had formed where bruises covered them. He ran his hand over one of the lumps and Layan whimpered.

Rail quickly flipped Layan onto her stomach and stood up. Layan struggled but couldn’t roll over onto her back. Rail quickly ran into the kitchen and grabbed the pot of boiling water. If what his father had told him about unbearable pain was true, then Layan was in for one hell of a ride.

Nic: Uh oh.

Kla: That looks like it’ll hurt a lot.

Tab: She has white hair…

Nic: Just like you Tab.

Kla: Cool, Mar must like you a lot Tab.

Ele: Actually she likes the idea of white hair on young people. She thinks guys with white hair look cute.

Kla: Now you ruined it for Tab.

Nic: Go back to your corner Ele!

Tab: -sniff- Anyways, Reviews are greatly appreciated.