The aftermath of a brisk surgery stained his front crimson, dark feathers hardly distinct against it. He stepped into the light outside the abandoned hovel he previously idled in, dormant and waiting for a command since he arrived in the swamp as a summoned flurry of wings and disease. Too early of summoning to be planned beyond necessity, too brash of a decision when the group harboring the Vessel dwindled in trained healers. The others did not arrive with him, stranding the tool soon replaced by native volunteers.

    Yet he lingered. He could not return to the depths of purgatory unless the temporary form he operated took enough damage to effectively kill it. Nor could he turn to the fellow pawns beneath Belus' control, unable to contact either of them through the veil. Ergo, the lone doctor cursed his luck and cleared a shack far from the town's populace, settling himself to privately work on his research, transcribing countless notes to clean journals simply to occupy his thoughts while he bitterly waited for the next command.

    Months passed. The voice of Belus refused to acknowledge him. And as every day vanished in a fiery plunge beneath the horizon of the unfamiliar realm, growling hunger and miserable thirst and demanding fatigue overtook his body -- his living body. His best explanation for the phenomenon consisted of, in summary, the longer he dawdled around mortals, the more he adopted their traits. Or rather, the more he seemed to revive. Much to his dismay, however, his blood remained a corrosive, tar-like black.

    But then the voice summoned him once again, an urgency to its hissed words. Save her, save her, it pleaded incessantly, a constant tap-tap-tapping against his cranium. Save her! Now! 'Her' was shortly revealed to be an odd combination of doe and feline, with one haunch bloodied, thankfully bound by a gauze tourniquet and severed from a brutalized leg bundled in cloth.

    The owl neglected to wince or hesitate upon glimpsing her condition; much worse had been witnessed before, after all. He had merely clicked his tongue and gathered his supplies, bowed over the sedated female for the next couple hours, cautiously threading artery and tendon and even joint back into one patchwork piece. From there, he cut the makeshift tourniquet, bandaged the external sutures, and allowed his collected legion of leeches to latch onto her ankle and hindpaw, drawing blood flow to the restored limb. An effective artificial vein to kickstart circulation back to its natural current.

    His back ached from the lengthy operation, muscles strained from stitching another's. The owl rolled his shoulders, fringed wings spreading to their full width before tucking at his sides. Pestilence -- better known as Isaac -- glanced back to the dim room serving as his home, glazed eyes passing over the unconscious doecat's form. He didn't expect her to stay long, given her unfamiliar surroundings. He would have to move her before the sedation ebbed from her system then. But first, he needed to rid himself of her blood spattering his chest and wings.

    A hollow sigh slipped from his nares. He took to the overgrown trail, his understanding of true flight lacking despite his short glides from low perch to perch. A brook cut through the woodland near the town, serving as a basin to many. Today, it would be his. The owl deposited his overcoat and hat on the bank, his traditional mask long since discarded in favor of baring his face to his nonexistent company. Funnily enough, a natural mask of white stark against ebony feathers lay behind the cloth beak he previously donned, divided diagonally by a deep slash with two pallid blue eyes on either side. A clawed wingtip traced the scar as he glared into his rippling reflection, features wrinkling in disgust. Ruffling his feathers, Isaac waded into the shallow creek, half-dried blood rinsed away as he preened. Stubborn clots clung to feathers in clumps, requiring his extra attention to wash.

    He supposed it was rather unusual for a bird as large as himself to be splashing about in a stream, even more so considering few even managed to glimpse him in the weeks prior. And yet he couldn't find it in him to care.

    His head twisted around at the steps of a heavy-footed creature lumbering over, heard by the owl even from a respectable distance away. Paled eyes narrowed upon seeing the hybrid cat, unblinking and frigid with annoyance. "Don't you know it's rude to intrude upon someone while bathing? Or were you dropped on your head as a child?" he snapped, vulnerability ruffling his soaked feathers. Scoffing at the voyeur relaxed on the bank, Isaac swiftly dunked his head beneath the brook, wings wiping away excess water when he resurfaced. Even while wetted, the devilish tufts spiking his head remained standing, springing up again after he fussily smoothed the feathers down.

    The doctor looked back to Aurum, a sharp tsk escaping his beak. "No," he simply answered. Wading back ashore, the owl shook droplets from his wings before folding them to his sides. Now blood-free, he reached for his hat, resting it atop his head before turning to the hybrid once again. "From a surgery. Leg reattachment," he clarified, not particularly eager to be assumed guilty of murder right after stepping out into the public eye. Gathering his overcoat from where he folded it upon the bank and slinging it over a wing, Isaac scanned the proxy; he supposed his isolation worked, considering the other wasn't even sure if he belonged within the swamp's borders. Another irritated sigh. "Yes, I do, in fact, live here. And it would do you some good to mind your own business," he chided, talons cutting into the mud as he lingered. But no, everyone always nosed into another's life, always wanted to know, always interrupted. Undoubtedly, this pompous feline was no different.

© LEXASPERATED