my foolish heart...

[comelately]

WHO: Jonathan "Johnny" "Jojo" "Joe Kid" Joestar & Pleromies
WHAT: post-event failing to relax after getting heroically fucked up in Godsblood
WHERE: Greentruth (main portion and ground-level farms)
WHEN: post-event, late in the month
WARNINGS: n/a other than injury care



A. greentruth higher levels

[ They'd won the day in Godsblood. They'd won the day, and, somehow, he helped them win it. Johnny's not really one for heroics. That said, he is a big fan of winning things, and he has to say that it feels damn good for the underdog to come out on top this time.

Or, rather, it would feel good if he wasn't covered in burns.

After barely managing to crawl back to Greentruth, he's been in the same boat as many other Pleroma: laid up in a sick bed. Their makeshift medical camp up in the trees is "rustic," as are most things in their treetop hideaway, but the presence of a few people capable of using healing powers makes a big difference. Of course, being lit on fire was no small injury, and the medics around insisted that Johnny make time for his body to heal - in his condition, particularly. If an infection set in on his legs, he might not know until it was too late without anyone paying attention.

So he stays. For a day. A day and a half, actually. He's grateful that the place is mostly open-air, because it makes it a little bit easier not to think of dark, stagnant air or remember the smell of blood and piss that sat heavy in it. It means it takes a little bit longer for him to start waking up with his heart racing and a hand clutching at his thigh for a needle that isn't there. Every nurse that isn't an Aion is treated with tense cordiality, Johnny's eyes on their hands, their pockets. It's paranoia, he knows. Knowing, however, isn't enough to make him stop imagining the smile on their faces when they turn away, the things they might be doing when he's asleep.

Those coming to visit on the second half of that second day - whether looking for Johnny specifically, or maybe another injured person - will see him sitting up straight on his bed, still swaddled in bandages, staring quite hard at his wheelchair, parked on the other side of the makeshift sickbay. And, miraculously, the wheelchair actually starts to head in his direction... although it's less miraculous to anyone who can see the supernatural, as they'll see his tiny Stand struggling to push it over towards him. ]

B. greentruth ground level

[ Eventually, he does make his great escape from the recovery ward, such as it is. Since then, he's been trying to keep busy. It's partially because he wants a distraction from the pain of his injuries, partially because he needs the money, and partially because he's realizing that he can't keep living like this. He's not making progress. He saved Vaeka. So what? For him, nothing has changed.

He needs to do something. What that something is, however, he has no idea, and, severely limited in his ability to search for that something, he defaults to the only something he's good at: raising and riding animals. There aren't any horses in Greentruth (outside of one very rude one, and he doesn't want to talk to her), but he's become rather familiar with a handful of the kocsigyik breeders due to his regular need of their animals. One of them, finally, agreed to let him do a little bit of work around the stables, though he'd regarded Johnny with quite a bit of skepticism. Of course, that only made Johnny more determined to excel.

Today, he's helping train a few of the younger beasts. Two of them, towering over Johnny in his chair despite their young age, are following after him, their leads in one hand as he rolls backwards with the other. Despite the uneven terrain, the wheel turns unusually easily under his fingertips, and while he looks tired and bandaged, he's also surprisingly tranquil. They sure as hell aren't horses. But they aren't all that different, and they have their own charm about them, he thinks - not at all like the awful creatures he knew as dinosaurs back home, something that's very, very clear as they reach the end of the paddock and one of them wanders up to him and starts trying to eat his hat. ]

Hey - hey, careful! [ but he's laughing a little, even as the dinosaur makes him wince touching his burns, and the kocsigyik swiftly finds what it's looking for: a few treats that Johnny had hidden up there. ] All right, smartass, you got me.

C. OTHER

[ if you want to meet up with Johnny for something specific, just PM me and let's figure something out! ]

Comments

[comelately]

[ at her comment, she shakes his head slightly, jabbing a thumb in Yuuta's direction. ]

This guy's a healer. I'm just-- [ he hesitates for a second. In their first meeting, he'd been wary of comparing her to a horse for fear of offending her; now, he's certain it would offend her, but hell, what else is he supposed to say? Like it or not, her bottom half is basically identical to a modern equine. ] -- I'm a professional horse racer. I've been around 'em my whole life, including when they get hurt. I don't have any magic or anything, but I bet no one else around here actually knows their way around that half of you.

[ it sounds really odd, but Johnny doesn't know how else to put it. As for how to pay him back...? ]

You can apologize for callin' me a cripple and a charity case, for starters.

[recursive]

( hey, let's not allow this rika blasphemy to stand. she only tries to hurt people who try to hurt yuuta in the first place! and the only reason that yuuta and johnny are as ambulatory as they are right now, given how relatively soon it was after the operation in godsblood, is a testament to the efficacy of reverse cursed energy. it had taken him some time to regain his strength and powers, and it would take time for the healing to set them to rights, but it at the very least cut down weeks of painful recovery to a few (admittedly uncomfortable, but at least tenable) days.

yuuta is quick to pick up that her response isn't a swift and unswerving refusal. his eyes brighten, and his mouth opens just in time to say something exactly like what he had just said when she tosses that out of hand. the words die in his throat, and he shrinks back a few inches, worrying his hands together. he's not really used to doing something like this and expecting anything from it — it was just something that went without saying, doing a kindness for someone as you hoped they might for you if your positions were reversed. he supposes he'd joked with toge and maki about them footing the bill the next time they all went out for lunch together, but that was about it...

wait. well, that's an idea, maybe? yuuta's the type to let bygones be bygones — he's not all that torn up about hayame shooting an arrow at him, even if rika was still uneasy to let him anywhere near the jinba. )

You can, um... well, if you ever catch something more than you can eat down here, you can give that to me as payment, if you want? I'm sure I can find someone up there who can cook it into something nice, and I'll never turn down a good meal.

( he looks beseeching. )

The technique I use — ( and he realizes, wow, he is really not qualified to explain reverse cursed energy technique! he'll probably make it worse if he tries. he thinks back to ieiri-sensei's lessons on it, thinking of what might allay some of her concerns. ) It just boosts and speeds up the natural healing of your body. So it - hopefully won't be too weird for you.

[warmare]

[... Hayame doesn't want this.

Standing there, listening to their responses to her request that they name their prices... She understands very well in that moment that she wants to refuse their chosen costs and walk (limp) back into the mists to lick her wounds in peace. The cripple wants an apology for being called what he is. Should she apologize for thinking the sky is blue, or that grass is green? The exorcist at least is reasonable, even if she doubts he really means what he asks for and has just thrown something out to pacify her rather than take the debt seriously... But now they've come as a set, and she doesn't want to accept.

She has bowed her head countless times in her life. Growing up as property, a valuable investment that would only be profitable if she could be sold to humans in the end, Hayame had learned early on in her life how to bow and scrape and apologize for mistakes, failures, and offenses. She has swallowed her pride and her own thoughts to do so even when she didn't think fault was hers, because hers was simply a society of performative regret. But this isn't her world, she was supposed to be free, she was supposed to be able to choose for herself-

But now... She needs this healing, no matter how much she hates that. No, it was disingenuous to say that she needed it... she wanted it, because without it... How will she track down and prove to that man that he had made a mistake breaking his word to her, not trusting her by his side in battle? Who else in the Pleroma could do such a thing as this, just heal... The idea of their hands upon her makes her skin crawl, her body tense, her jaw tighten and a look that is almost... disgust? fear? almost show through on her face. Her fingers curl into fists that quake just slightly with frustration and shame.]

- You may have a third of my game this month.

[First, Yuuta, addressed cold and clean. Easy. Done. But when it comes to the next...

Hayame swallows.

As if the act physically pains her (and technically, it does, straining how her weight settles on her damaged foreleg, stretching the sword wound, jostling her fracture) she bows low from the "waist", her long ebon mane slipping over her shoulder and her eyes locked balefully on the ground in front of the cripple's wheeler chair, his feet and shoes.]

I... apologize... for maligning your character. It is obvious now that you intend to make use of yourself.

[Though her head stays bowed, as is proper, waiting to raise it only once the apology is accepted... That seems to be all she intends to say, each word forced out heavy and somewhat resented.]

[comelately]

[ he's not so noble that he doesn't take some satisfaction in seeing her swallow her words with great difficulty. In fact, he's just petty enough that he allows himself to relish her obvious resentment. After all, it's not like this is actually hurting her. It's for her own good, in fact, to apologize to him and get her injuries checked out. If Gyro was here, he'd have some cool one-liner to drop in response to all this, but, alas, he's only Johnny, and he can't think of anything. He just nods his head. ]

Now you're learning. [ with that said, however, he gestures upwards, a little bit hastily. ] Hey, quit doing that - you're gonna hurt yourself worse putting weight on that foot. I don't get that Japanese bowing thing, anyway.

[ the last part is muttered as an afterthought. forgive him his ignorance... ]

... For starters, tell me what happened with your shoulder. This one, [ he says, gesturing mildly to the injured part - she has two sets, so he may as well be thorough. ]

[warmare]

[Now you’re learning, he says, as if he were one of the many groomsman that had ruled her life since fillyhood, tasked by the stable master to ensure his prized armed jinba grew up strong, healthy, well-brushed, and well-mannered. Good girl, Hayame. She can still feel the human hand on her head forcing her head down to the proper depth of bow, the same that rewarded her obedient lack of resistance by gentling into a pat and proffering a slice of half-dried fruit on a palm.

She’d been so stupid and blind then. Now… she’s just angry. If she didn’t cut her nails to the quick to keep them from interfering in her archery they might draw blood from how fiercely they dig into her palms, but she forces herself to swallow her pride one more time, telling herself it might not be the last. She just had to endure it—]

There is a Kenoma who moves the earth with just a motion of his hands.

[Grudgingly, her humiliation still painfully clear in the tight hold of her body and the grit of her teeth, she straightens up while trying to bite down the accompanying twinges of pain.]

When my arrow hit his shoulder instead of his heart, he ripped a trench into it right in the middle of my stride… and my leg was pulled from its proper place.

[… Dislocated, she must mean, ripped from its moorings by the weight of her heavy body tumbling three fourths into a ditch and the one leg left hyper extended on what used to be the solid ground. The entire shoulder is swollen still, throbbing and aching, because-]

I managed to force it back into place.

[Mostly. There are other things she does not mention. The scrapes and cuts along that leg and the other foreleg from the rubble and scrambling, unlike the sword wound across her rump, are not particularly aggravated or re-opened by her movement, so they’ve already started to scab over. There is also a rather deep notch cut into her hoof from when she’d had to rear up in alarm and try to ward off a sudden stab of a blade, but…

She falls silent, holding herself all together too tensely in anticipation for the fact that the cripple might be about to lay hands on her.

And as much as she hated it, would hate anyone for daring to say it aloud…

There is not much difference in her equine body language then between her and an abused mare that knows the crack of the whip more than the stroke of a hand.]

[comelately]

[ boy, she hates this. Not that he blames her - if their positions were switched, he's sure he'd be resentful as all hell. Even if her disgust in doing so is barely concealed and even if Johnny knows plainly that she hasn't really changed her view of him, there is something admirable in her ability to swallow her pride regardless. He can respect it. She might be a dick, but she's a tough woman. ]

You forced it back? Christ.

[ it's hard to believe she's even walking around like that, especially in addition to the other injuries, like that nick on her hoof (which also needs attention, most likely, but Johnny's not particularly eager to put himself at the mercy of her hooves.) He'd call her crazy if he hadn't done similarly stupid things in the past... the very recent past.

It would be nice if he could harness the Spin the way Gyro could - he's sure he could use it to ease some of her muscles and accelerate the healing of her torn ligaments - but, alas, his skills with it don't extend much past fighting. Really, the best thing for her to do would be to get rest. If he saw a horse with this kind of injury, he'd be strict about keeping it off the track - maybe even in the stable. Hayame, however, is certain not to listen to advice like that. He frowns a bit.

At least she has the advantage of being able to talk about her injury. A blessing and a curse, considering her personality. He inches forward a little bit on his chair, then stops. ]

... I'm gonna have to touch it to get an idea of what the damage is. You all right with that? [ if it's any comfort, he doesn't seem particularly thrilled about it, either; the request for permission, however, is genuine. There's still a southern gentleman in him deep down. Somewhere. ] If you don't like the chair, I can get off, but you'll have to lay down for that.

[ maybe it bothers her -- he doesn't know. people can be strange about it, and so can horses. ]

[warmare]

There was no other way.

[She herself had not viewed it as a desirable move, but if the choice was use her heavy weight and momentum to try and shove her shoulder back into joint or be a sitting duck for that upstart Kenoma and his perversions... She'd done what she had to do.

Alright isn't the word to describe how she feels about him touching her. About most people touching her. Since she had become a woman against her will, she had tolerated touch only from the stable master, who ruled the entirety of the stable and her fate. When it came to the touch of others... only one day a year, on Exhibition Day, did she subject herself to the indignity of letting prospective buyers run their hands down a leg to urge her hoof up, move along her withers to test her make, or curl at the base of her tail to test her readiness. Since arriving in Horos... ?

She has not touched or been touched in kindness once. But if she doesn't allow it--]

Touch what you must.

[She looks straight ahead, locking her knees (three of them, the injured leg refuses to comply) and bracing herself for the sensation she sometimes feels that she has all but forgotten. If she is lucky... perhaps it will hurt, so she will not have to remember how much she'd loved it, when Matsukaze's hands had curled around her shaking shoulders and awkwardly tried to hold her.]

I do not care about your chair.

[Her voice is smaller, but still dark, as she glares off into the distance. Would he have asked a human, if they minded he sat in a strange wheeled chair to move? No, judgmentally, she thinks he would not have. She had cared that it was somehow expected of her to know what the chair meant just by sight, and she had cared that it seemed to her they would need carry the weakness of a cripple, but-]

I am not going to spook.

[Like some horse frightened by the opening of an umbrella or the sudden snap of a flag in the wind.]

[comelately]

[ he rolls his eyes a little at her haughty denial, though he takes her at her word, rolling up beside her. ]

You sure act like you care about it, [ he comments dryly. However, he continues: ] People act like they're gonna catch something from me if they get too close to it sometimes.

[ as if, somehow, being around him would be enough to disfigure them, too. Like it made him unclean. It's stupid, but surprisingly common nonetheless. Hayame certainly seemed like the type, too, the way she judged him so quickly, but maybe she's just being tough about it. Doesn't matter; he's spared the indignity of having to shuffle around on the ground for now, while she, unfortunately, is not spared the indignity of getting manhandled.

It's not particularly easy for him to reach her - he's sitting down, and he's short to begin with - but he manages, his touch perhaps surprisingly gentle. In spite of his baby face and small stature, his hands are tough and calloused from years of hard work. There's a sort of nostalgia in the feeling of her fur; it's been months, now, since he saw Slow Dancer. Since he's been around any horses. Sadly, this is no horse - one quick glance upwards at the rest of Hayame confirms that much. This is a woman. One who probably wishes he'd trip in a deep puddle. ]

You've got to take a break. Walking around on this is making it swell up more... [ it's got to hurt like hell. It was pretty clear to him from seeing her (and from what she said, obviously) that she dislocated it, and it's more obvious feeling it - it's in the right place, as she said, which is... good, but it's definitely inflamed. ] I can show you some stretches that'll help, too, but rest is the only thing that'll actually heal it.

[warmare]

[She wasn't going to say it. She was going to be good, and swallow her acid in order to get the healing she required... but then has to say something about it, practically baiting her, and Hayame's teeth grind.]

I care what you can't do, not where you sit your rump.

[Looking straight ahead, she tries to temper it, in the only way she can manage, not willing to walk away from this humiliation without what she'd caved for.]

Being cripple isn't catching.

[... She might not have a modern understanding of how viruses and other afflictions spread, but she knew being unable to walk wasn't contagious. Unless this man kept shoving people down stairs or something.

Though Hayame makes an attempt to remain stoic, her hide twitches and shudders in an unmistakably equine reaction to sudden stimulus. But he isn't a horsefly, her reactions do settle, and as he moves his fingers over her dun coat she can at least... recognize, that it is a careful touch. Beneath the pain of any touch at all, that was. But what he says-]

I cannot rest.

[It's unacceptable. As much as she didn't want to rely on magic healing, that perhaps this Yuuta person was apparently capable of... as much as she did want to take the cripple's "advice"...]

There is someone I must find. I leave tonight.

[Whether she was at full strength or not.]

[comelately]

[ a snort. ]

No shit. Common sense ain't so common, though.

[ that being said, he would definitely shove someone down the stairs. watch out, hayame...

he's unfazed by the familiar twitching; indeed, unconsciously, his hand lingers on her injured shoulder for an extra moment, giving it a sympathetic rub the same way he'd do for Slow Dancer after a long day. It's more obvious up close, even with the injuries: Hayame is in peak condition, or at least the horse part of her is. She looks as fine as any racehorse he's ever known. Johnny hasn't seen her in action, but he has to imagine she's both incredibly strong and very fast, and, honest lover of horses that he is, he can't help but admire that. It's... also unspeakably strange realizing he's admiring the musculature of another person.

Immediately, he feels weird about it. Shaking his head faintly, he drops his hand to her elbow, the other going to her forearm. ]

Can you lift your foot? [ he says before continuing with a click of his tongue. ] I can barely believe you're walking around today. I know this has to hurt like crazy. This guy really can't wait?

[warmare]

[... As much as she would dislike to agree with this man. Mmm. Common sense isn't so common. She had felt that acutely her entire time in Horos... even if it inspires a certain bitterness, knowing that what she considered to be common sense was hardly what others did.

The man in the chair is spared her disdainful look or perhaps more volatile notice of any potential strange mix of admiration on his face by Hayame's intense glare straight ahead at a tree trunk that she's currently boring into with her eyes. Her equine features are in... near peak physical condition. The body of a woman who has trained and worked her body almost every day since she was a filly old enough to to curl her tiny fingers around a bow, who had a field jinba's physique ideal for a balance of speed and power. Th place where human-looking features became equine is disguised slightly by the pelt wrap she wears on her "waist", but her upper body is no less honed. But there is... a few tells, to someone who knew horseflesh. A lingering thinness at her withers and along her spine that spoke to either a loss of weight in an unhealthy manner, a certain dullness in her dun coat that came from lack of brushing or nutrients, a cracking in her hooves thanks to the unforgiving hard streets of Venera and a lack of oiling or filing.

Someone who has forgotten or lost the will to take care of herself outside of focus on physical strength.

When he asks her to lift her foot... Well, at least he asks, instead of just sliding his fingers down the sensitive tendons along the back of her foreleg to try and trigger the instinctive reaction to pick her hoof up as if she were an actual horse. With a hiss of pain she cannot disguise, (he was right, she shouldn't even be walking around right now), she shifts her weight to her other foreleg and gingerly picks up her left, struggling to get it up far enough to get her hoof to the level of his hand, her shoulder throbbing. There seems to have been an attempt at picking her hoof out to keep the sword wound clean, the cut is smeared with a crude poultice, but.]

I do not know.

[Can he wait? Her attempts to reach him via communion had failed, and she does not know why. Had he left her behind, because she'd dared to admit to him the weakness of being injured, turning herself into someone unworthy to fight alongside? Had something foul happened to him?]

So I will not wait.

[... Common sense.]

[comelately]

[ perhaps the only good thing here is the fact that she can speak and listen, and therefore, he doesn't have to accidentally hurt her or coax her into doing painful things.

... Of course, that doesn't help if she does it herself anyway. It's obvious immediately that even this simple action is causing her a lot of pain; Johnny shakes his head, taking her foot carefully to give it the quickest once-over he can manage. Okay, no stretching, then. The main injury seems to be her shoulder rather than any of the bones or tendons in her leg, at least - something of a relief. Her hoof doesn't look great, either, but he can see that she's attempted to take care of the wound; he'll put not exacerbating her shoulder injury over investigating it further. Once again, he wonders how she's walking around like this at all. ]

... Okay, you're good.

[ he releases her foot hesitantly, not wanting her to drop it and accidentally put a lot of weight on it again. ]

You really should wait. Nothing's gonna make this feel better except resting... I know I talked about stretches, but that'll only make it worse at this stage. [ a sigh. for all the vitriol between them, he does seem honestly concerned for her health. He can't help himself!! ] Not that you're gonna listen to me... You should at least get some shoes put in so you're not puttin' so much stress on your hooves.

[warmare]

[When he releases her hoof, Hayame catches it just before it hits the ground in what would likely be even more pain, shoulder twitching as she adjusts her weight gingerly back onto that leg.

But what he says is not what she wants to hear. A lot of what she doesn't want to hear. Had she debased herself and apologized for this- ?]

As much as I would prefer to heal naturally... There is no time.

[Though she has largely been annoying the boy from the bridge... Yuuta... Her gaze flicks to him with a bit of a shudder Johnny might be able to notice, if he were as keen about horseflesh as he claimed.]

... We will rely on... magic.

[And she will once again wonder why it was that no one else had issue with the feeling of another person's powers coursing through their body and forcing it to unnaturally reknit. - But there is one more thing she cannot allow, and before she turns to Yuuta to reluctantly allow him to lay his hands upon her injured body...]

If you think I'm going to put iron nails through my hooves, you are sorely mistaken.

[Even if it didn't just remind her too viscerally of actual animals... Shudder.]

[comelately]

[ he does notice, not that it matters - her tone makes it clear enough that she's none too pleased with the notion of magical healing, even if he couldn't feel it through her hide. It's a pleasant surprise (relatively) when she says she actually would prefer to let it heal naturally; Johnny was beginning to believe she was the hot-headed type who couldn't bear to sit still. Maybe she would listen if she didn't desperately believe this mystery man needed her company at once.

Maybe. It's a big maybe.

Her reaction to the suggestion of horseshoes gets a raised brow from him, and at first, he chalks it off to her being determined to shoot down his suggestions. When he thinks about it, though... it does sound pretty unpleasant. Even if he's pretty sure that it's painless, it's probably different when you're fully aware of what's happening. Horses have the benefit of blissful ignorance, he supposes. ]

All right, all right. Leather ones, maybe.

[ he has his doubts that anyone in Greentruth knows how to make such a specialized bit of equestrian equipment, but maybe in Godsblood...

in any case, he's done all he can to help, which is pitifully little. The rest is up to Yuuta. ]