The Adventures And Mishaps of a Half-Plant Apothecary - Febuwhump 2024

Day 22 - 'You weren't meant to be there'

CW: Poison, blood, injury

AN: I have no idea how poison works and this is a fake plant

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Calixto do not have a good feeling about this trip in particular.

It steps carefully through the underbrush, making sure not to prick itself with any of the many poisonous plants in this area. Seriously, why did Nyxie have to build her place in the middle of nowhere?

Calixto breathes out, staring up into the sky. It's starting to become dark out, they better get to Nyxie's place soon, or at least get somewhere to stay for the night so they don't die out here.

"Hey, Calio?" Emery calls from behind her, "When're we making camp?"

Calixto thinks for a moment. "Well, I don't actually know," it says finally, "I might scout out ahead. Just stay here."

"Wait, what—"

Calixto starts to continue walking, a little faster than before. They really need to find some place to sleep, before nightfall at least.

It just hopes it won't take too long.

---

Calixto doesn't manage to find any sort of campground, but what she does find is a crap tone of mobs.

"Shit," it says, pulling up its shield just in time for something to explode in front of it. It feels the gunpowder sprinkle over its skin a bit, but thankfully it's the unignited part.

It exhales heavily, its steps beginning to falter as it tries to block off the many mobs coming its way. It shifts its shield to its other hand, and starts to build a temporary dirt wall just ahead of it.

It's not the mobs, however, that cause its downfall.

It steps back into the wall in hopes that it would be easier to defend itself from there, when it steps into a thornbush.

Immediately, shivers go up its spine, and it looks down to see the dark sap mixing into the cuts on its ankles. It quickly slices the bush up and shoves it out of the way, where it can't hurt anyone else, and boxes itself up before grabbing a torch to have a look at the damage.

On the one hand, it's not as bad as it could've been. Sure, some has definitely gotten into its bloodstream, which isn't great, but it's not enough to kill it, just enough to slow its reaction time and make it black out a bit every few seconds.

Some part of Calixto, shoved deep into its brain, kind of wishes it'd just die instead of dealing with that.

It shakes its head, trying to stave away the incoming dizziness, and sits down properly on the floor. For some stupid reason, it didn't have the foresight to bring any sort of medical kit, or even any ointment or something to make it throb less. Still, there are some bandages shoved into the bottom of its bag, and it fishes them out and starts to wrap its cuts.

Just when Calixto finishes up, the dark spots in its vision start to come more and more often. Whether it be from exhaustion, the poison, or from simply giving up, it passes out.

---

Calixto hadn't returned for a good few hours, and Emery was worried.

She set down another torch on the ground, putting up her shield just in time for an arrow to be caught on it, and continues on the trail where she assumes Calixto must've been. "Calio?" she calls for the millionth time, "This isn't a joke, you can come out now."

Just as she's starting to give up, she sees a weirdly shaped dirt box of some sort a few feet ahead of her. She rushes to open it up a little, peeking inside the hold she created.

There, she finds Calixto.

It's splayed out on the ground. A pile of suspiciously bloody thorns sits in the corner where she's looking in; she shoves more dirt on top of it. Its ankles are messily bandaged. Its shield stands on the other side of the box, a few arrows stuck in it and a couple more scratches on it than before. Its face is considerably more pale than it should be.

"Hey, Calio?" Emery whispers.

As expected, there is no response.

Emery glances down at her pocket watch. If it's correct, it will be sunrise in a little while, then it'll be able to try to find Nyxie and get themselves sorted.

For now, though, there isn't much to do other than wait.

---

Calixto wakes up to someone standing over it.

It nearly screams, but the sound is caught in its throat when it realises that oh, it's just Emery.

After a good few seconds of contemplation, it then realises, in very quick succession, that 1, she was told not to follow it, 2, she did anyways, and 3, it has no idea where they are.

"Em?" Calixto says, wincing a little bit at how slurred its voice is, "You weren't meant to be here."

Emery shoots up suddenly from where her head was in a hole in the wall. "Uhm, hey Calio?"

Calixto hums, just to show that it heard her. "Why're you here?"

Emery shrugs. "It'd been a few hours, and you weren't back, so." A pause. "We really need to get to Nyxie's, now, don't we?"

Calixto nods slightly, then tries to stand up. It manages, but as soon as it attempts walking, it almost falls over completely.

Emery catches it. "Bad idea, Calio," she says in a voice that sounds way more menacing than it should.

Calixto just hums.

Emery sighs, then, after a bit more digging, manages to pull Calixto's lanky frame out of the box. "Think I might know where to go from here," she says conversationally.

Calixto makes a motion as to respond, but it's already falling asleep again.

---

Nyxie opens her door for the first time in three weeks to find Emery at her door again.

Sighing, it opens up the front door, to find that it's not Emery who needs medical attention, it's, surprisingly, Calixto.

"What did you do this time round?" she says.

Emery scratches the back of its neck nervously. "Uhm," it says, "I wanted to visit you? We, I mean."

Nyxie squints at the tall figure in Emery's arms. "And you couldn't do that without someone getting hurt."

"Yup."

Nyxie drags her hand down her face. "Just— come on in."

Emery quickly plops Calixto down on the medical cot. "So," Nyxie says, unwrapping the messily-done bandages, "What are you even doing here? You aren't meant to be here, y'know. I'm technically on leave."

"Which means that you aren't meant to be here either," Emery points out, "This is your workspace, technically."

"And my house."

"But also your workspace."

Nyxie huffs, wincing in sympathy at a particularly bad-looking cut. "Touché," she mutters.

She can practically feel Emery's evil smirk from behind her.

"I swear," she says, "Can you just focus on your girlfriend, who literally got poisoned?"

"I know you've got it handled."

Nyxie carefully finishes her work in silence, before turning to Emery. "And you," she says, putting on her best stern voice, "You go get some sleep."

Emery sputters. "Wait," she says, "I didn't agree to this!"

"I can see the circles under your eyes from here, Em."

Emery waves her hands around for a moment, before huffing in faux-annoyance. "Fine," she says, walking away, presumably to her room, "I'll go annoy you sometime else. Happy?"

Nyxie smiles at her. "Yeah. Good— morning, I guess. See you later?"

"See ya."