Rot Gut Whiskey's Gonna Ease My Mind

Everything felt heavy and crushing. A weight lay over his mind and his body that made every thought, every attempt at movement require incredible effort. Tarnish was vaguely aware of his surroundings from time to time but unable to make his body move, unable to reach out and let anyone know he was there before he was dragged back down into the depths.

Tarnish had lost all concept of time, only knowing that in this moment he felt the pull of possibility. The feeling today that if he mustered up enough effort maybe he could open his eyes. His hearing and smell were muffled, he had no idea where he was but it didn't really matter. He was going to do it, he was going to open his eyes. Fighting through the exhaustion and the pounding in his head he willed his eyes to open and for the first time in ages they did.

He groaned as the light met his now sensitive eyes. Everything was blurry but he thought he could make out a fuzzy, whitish form. "Sid?" he said weakly.

The last... however long it had been... felt like a blur. It was as though she, too, had been asleep, just like her brother. Siduri drifted through her own mind like a ship without a sail and there hadn't been many moments where she'd fully felt like herself. The girl found that she was closer to the surface when she had a task; something that she cared about. And so, Siduri spent her time with Tarnish.

After learning that her father had been murdered, Sid had disappeared, gone off to who knows where. And then Gilgamesh had shown up in her path, suddenly alive. Because her mind was such a mess, Sid thought that perhaps it was a lie, an illusion, but it had been Gilgamesh in the flesh. Losing and regaining her father had done something to the girl. She no longer laughed or smiled. She was serious, sullen.

Siduri spent her days and nights curled up against Tarnish. Being with her brother and caring for him while he was incapacitated was the responsibility that she required to keep her brain where it was supposed to be. You know, she also loved him.

Sid was curled up next to her dark coated sibling when a soft, weak voice met pale ears. Sid was on her paws in an instant, staring down at the stirring form. Rather than immediately launch herself at him, the girl raced to the doorway and bellowed, "SAKANAAAAAAA!" Only once she called for the healer did she fly back to Tarnish, skidding to a halt and dropping to her belly before him. "You had me so worried!" Pale forelegs wrapped about Tarnish's neck and Sid pulled him into an embrace that was both forceful and gentle at the same time.

"Siduri"

It wasn't entirely unusual to have his name hollered down the ravine these days, the fact it was Sid that was calling him had him slinging on his new saddlebags and waiting for Blondie to climb up on his shoulder before he made his way to Tarnish's treehouse. He made it there in time to spot Siduri choking the patient out and he failed to keep a small smirk off his face. “Y' tryna heal him or finish th' job?” Sakana teased lightly, taking stock of the dark boy from a distance. First order would be getting some food and water into him before they got to the bottom of what had knocked him out for so long.

“Speech”

Rot Gut Whiskey's Gonna Ease My Mind

Tarnish flinched as his quiet question was met with a scream. He was still too drowsy to react much more than that or to recognize the name the scream formed. He blinked, trying to clear the cloudiness from his eyes then smiled as he saw Siduri's form embrace him. He willed his shaking arms to return the embrace for a brief moment before they fell limp. The smallest of movements still seemed to take so much energy and his stores were burnt out. Tar's memory was foggy but he didn't recall being in a fight before falling unconscious. Shortly after the raiders second victory over Ethne he'd returned to his den to grab a celebratory drink and then… darkness. Now he was here.

"W-what.. happened?" He asked weakly. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Sakana wander in… and then he realized he was in a tree house. He saw the trunk stretching up through it, the limbs branching out. Had that always been there? Meh. Tarnish decided not to worry about it, instead turning his focus back to Siduri. "How's your… eye?"