Mary was waiting when he arrived. “You’re a little slow today, James,” she said in her tired voice.
“Sorry. I got, ah, caught up.”
“There’s only one person left to deal with, lucky for you. Saved the best for last.” Mary jerked her thumb towards one of the beds and James’ eyes followed her motion, stopping at the black-haired man sitting upright on his bed, blankets tossed uncaringly to the side. His customary coat hung on his shoulders. A short sword James didn’t recognize laid next to him.
Thomas.
James let out a small sigh and set his jaw.
That’s what I get for being tardy.
Resigning himself to his fate, he stepped over to his waiting patient. “Hey.”
Wordlessly, Thomas thrust out his leg to show an angry red slash across his shin.
“That doesn’t look too bad. Fairly shallow.” James knelt down to examine the wound more closely. “You got cut? Sword?”
“Yes.” Thomas spoke quietly, but his voice carried enough menace to rival Richard’s roaring.
“Could you try to sound nicer when you talk? You sound like a murderer…” James stopped himself. Thomas raised an eyebrow.
Everyone in this room except Mary and the other doctors are murderers, you fool.
“Ahem,” James grunted. Thomas had an amused half-smile on his face. “I-I’ll just go get – yeah.”
James went over to the cupboard, feeling Thomas’ eyes boring into him from behind the whole way. He took a length of cloth from the top shelf and ripped two squares off, moistening one under the sink. He returned to Thomas and sat on the empty bed opposite him. “Give me your leg.”
Thomas silently obliged. The other doctors had been kind enough to clean most of the area before James arrived, but there was still some blood oozing out. He showed no sign of discomfort as James swabbed the wound with the wet cloth.
Better not make this awkward.
“Uh… can I see that sword?” he asked.
Thomas took it out of its sheath, and James stopped to examine it. The length of it couldn’t have been any more than fifty centimetres – nothing like a sabre. No hilt, straight blade. It looked like something between a kitchen knife and a cleaver.
“What kind of…?”
“It’s a seax. Used in early medieval times.”
One last swab. “Why are you using this over a sabre?”
“It’s better,” Thomas said shortly, explaining absolutely nothing and simultaneously killing the conversation in two words. James remained undaunted.
“How many people did you get today?” he tried.
“Only two.”
“Only two people. Right.” James began wrapping a new cloth around Thomas’ wound. “And how many guards were there in total? Eighteen?”
“Yes.”
“Well, you got one ninth of them by yourself.”
“Would’ve been three. Mark finished off one.”
“I reckon that should count as at least half.” Across the room, Mary was nearly done with her last patient. “Do you do anything besides stabbing people?” he asked.
“Jobs for The Rat.”
Here’s an opportunity to find out about him.
James spoke carefully, trying to make his next words sound casual: “You’re his… lieutenant or something, right? Second in command?”
“Yes.”
“What kind of jobs would the second-in-command of The Rat be doing?”
“Stabbing people.”
He was unprepared for that response. “Didn’t know you had a sense of humour.”
The corner of Thomas’ mouth twitched. “I also steal, kidnap, blackmail, threaten, and torture, if you wanted to know.”
Hell.
Valiantly keeping up his indifferent air, James shrugged. “Sounds fun.”
“It really is not.”
“The Rat’s in charge of just surveillance and information here, right? Why would he need someone to… do all of those things?”
Thomas cocked his head, looking James with his dark, almost dead-looking eyes. “Why do you need to know?”
“Never mind. Forget I asked.” His patient was looking more and more threatening by the minute. James finished wrapping the bandage and got up a little more hastily than he should have. “Right. That’s done. You should be fine with running, but, uh… don’t try to do anything too hard on that leg for a couple days. It will stress the wound, and also hurt like hell.” Thomas nodded. “I’m going to go out and get dinner. You should too.”
Thomas made a dismissive gesture. “Later.”
“See you, then.”
James moved to go outside and stopped at the doorway at the sound of the man’s low voice: “Thank you.”
“No problem,” he called back.
God, he’s scary.
Points:
Time spent:
Canary word: Present
Possible AI signals:
Original Text:
Are you sure you want to delete this comment? This cannot be undone.
Mark this comment as a review? Points will be awarded to the poster.
Your comment was posted, but it wasn’t long enough to count as a review. Reviews need about four complete sentences (at least 250 characters). Try writing another review that explains your thoughts in more detail — the author will appreciate it, and you’ll earn points for it.
125,005 Literary Works • 672,797 Reviews
From the sound of your title these works are just bits and pieces of a much larger story, understandable. Although, it would have been nice to put the title somewhere, interested readers squeal at finding relatable content to the title and it's easy to remember when recommending to others. I'd also suggest you be more descriptive on the setting as it sets the tone and tells the reader about the world you've created. I do know it's a hospital by the implications and actions of the character as I continue to read, but in the beginning I find myself thinking of many other places and scenarios. Maybe the description of the hospital was in a earlier part that should be posted if you know your going to only post small pieces, so you can remove any speculations.
Hi, Jy. Looks like it's your first work! *feels great to give the first review* ^-^
Also, welcome to YWS! Hope you enjoy and learn a lot here.
Now, to the review part-
Cool. Interesting. Short,simple yet something that had depth. That's how I would like to describe your story. I really loved the story. I enjoyed it a lot. Just like I said, it was a little dose of something enjoyable. I read this after having my lunch. And, I think it served as a "desert for lunch" XD
The title is awesome,too. Although, I didn't quite get the meaning of it. I mean, how it turned out to be the title of this story. And the story seemed not to have any influence of the title either.
Most importantly, this kind of seemed more like a short story than a novel chapter. There were a few things which indicated "incomplete explanation" which is required to make it a chapter. Still, it seemed more like a short story. So, I think you gotta add something more to bring that "curiosity" or "mystery" in the chapter.
Throughout the story, I couldn't really get what the italics were meant to be. I had a feeling that those were James' thoughts. Still, not so sure about it.
Some editings-
I think it's better to write it quite thus-
This made me completely confused. The description "a black-haired figure" was opposing to make it sound like a human being. I got that it was a guy from the next line. A bit more description was needed to make it clear. Clear and not overdone description of his physique would really help.
All other things seemed to be well-done to me. The conversation felt real which was the best part of this story and that's why I got to enjoy this after my lunch with beef curry and rice. XD
If it's a novel, then I would definitely like to read further. I am liking the doc, James cus he seems to be a person who gets interested in his patients and wants to know about them or at least he wants to reveal the mysteries of the whatever-underground-gang he is working for. This should be a really interesting novel. Keep on writing and let me know when you have written the next chapters!
Hope I could help you. ~
I agree with TahaT11n for the story part and the parts that confused me. It was hard for me to follow.