"It's touch and go. His left lung is deflated, and the subclavian artery in his left arm was clipped by the bullet. His heart stopped twice on the operating table. If Mr. Andrei is a fighter, he will make it. It's up to him; we've done all we can. If any of you are religious, I suggest you pray."
With those words the Doctor walked off. He hadn't seen this kind of extensive wounds in a while. He hadn't mentioned that the two bullets that had entered the chest cavity had torn out the back, severing muscles that they had desperately tried to reattach. The exit wound on the left arm had broken the humerus almost at a half-point for the bone, splintering it around the entry and exit wounds. His heart had stopped beating twice during operation, only coming back after they used a defibrillator. This was touch and go of a level most doctors did not want to see in their patients, all they could do was keep him on life support and hope he kept breathing.
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Otis was fighting a losing battle. He had expected to wake up on an operating table, but he hadn't. Instead, he had woken in a small cave wearing nothing but a loin cloth and sleeping next to an axe and shield. This was definitely one of his weirder fever dreams. Most likely a byproduct of no sleep, intense shock and pain, blood loss, and then whatever the hospital had pumped him up with. Deciding they meant something important in the dream, he grabbed the shield and axe, slipping his left arm into the straps on the backside of the shield and holding the axe with the handle in his hand and the head resting on his shoulder.
The shield was around three and a half feet all the way around, a center boss shield like Vikings had used, but instead of wood it was iron. It had a snarling wolf painted on it, with the words Iron Within, Iron Without in a raised Roman style type around the edges. Death Bringer was inscribed in the iron haft of the axe, pressed into the iron instead of raised like on the shield. As Otis walked across a hellish landscape of cracked earth and bone dust, a voice tore open the red and black sky, shaking the ground. Its sheer power and terror nearly dropped Otis to his knees, but he refused to bow, even in any fever dream.
"Listen to me mortal child! I have given you this chance, this chance to prove your deserve life and not death. If you show yourself worthy of all the attention I have placed in you, then you shall return to your body. If you fail, then your soul will be cast back into the forge until it is remade, like Iron."
Otis had no idea what any of that meant. A slight niggling at the back of his mind caused him to turn suddenly, barely avoiding been stabbed to death by a weapon he recognized as a spatha like the Roman infantry had used. The creature using it wasn't Roman, it wasn't even human. It wore a Roman cassis and lorica segmenta, and carried a clypeus shield. Otis almost lost to the spatha as he froze in a bit of consternation. He was a history buff sure, but he didn't know enough about the Roman army to give him that information. He felt a trickle in the back of his mind, a trickle of information telling him all kinds of things, battle, arms, armor, codes of honor, not just Roman in nature but from all over the world. Dodging the swing of the inhuman creature, Otis blocked the sword with his shield.
The Daemon was about six feet tall, and shaped like a gorilla. Short legs, long torso, long arms. Lots of muscle, and Otis felt another strike of the creatures' sword almost dislocate his shield arm. Dodging, Otis swung his axe in a one handed grip, lodging it deeply into the creatures' collarbone, smiling grimly as the subclavian artery was cut in half, drenching them both in the demons foul blood. Yanking the axe blade from the wound, Otis spun, putting all of his weight and force into the hit, striking the daemons head clean from its neck. As the head went flying, the daemon fell to its knees, its armor jangling and shield and sword striking the ground. Then, a whispered voice spoke from the very same ground the demon had spilt its black blood upon.
".... My name was Doras...."
Then the earth shaking voice roared with laughter and spoke again.
"Well done! You have only slain one. There will be many, many more my little warrior. Until you water these grounds with their blood, then we will see. If you die before then, go to hell knowing you are a failure!"
Otis still didn't understand what was going on. As he looked around for anywhere, anyone, to explain that voice, he watched new shapes rise from the ground. Two tall Daemons, dressed like medieval knights, both in full armor. One carried a sword and kite shield, while the other held an axe to mirror Otis's own. Gripping his axe handle hard enough for the depressions of the words to mark his hands, Otis waited for the charge.
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Ariel knelt sat in the waiting room. Her parents had left, had asked her to go with them. Couldn't they see she couldn't leave until she knew? What if she left and he died? Or worse, what if she left and he woke up and she wasn't here? That would be worse to her. She wanted to go in his room and look at him, but the doctors were forbidding everyone except family, and his grandfather had just went in there about half an hour ago.
"Ariel, take this. You'll need it."
Ariel looked up as JB handed her a cup of coffee, sipping it thankfully. She looked over to the other man that had arrived with them, she still didn't know who it was. JB apparently knew him, and from what she understood, JB, Otis and the other guy had went to school together, and always ran around with each other. Whatever explanation he had given, JB was satisfied with it.
"What was it like last time? When he got shot over Makayla?"
JB looked at her, and the other man moved closer. JB thought for a moment, and then spoke.
"Just as bad. Didn't know if he was going to live. Didn't know if he was going to die. Doctors couldn't tell us a damn thing either way. One day he was never going to talk again, the next he'd be fine. One time Makayla came in here, trying to get them to turn over his wallet and apartment keys, even went toe to toe with Papaw. It was ugly. Then one day, the nurse went into his room and he was glaring at her, trying to talk around the tube keeping him alive. He was... Very unhappy to say the least."
Ariel nodded. She wouldn't mind him opening his eyes, she knew that much. As she thought, Otis's grandfather walked back into the waiting room. Sinking down into a chair offered by the still unnamed man, he looked to have aged 30 years in only thirty minutes. JB grabbed him some coffee as well, and the old man wrapped his hands around it, letting the cup warm his hands up. They all sat in silence for a moment or two, waiting on what the old man would say. Sipping some of his coffee, he blew out a long breath.
"He's fighting, that's for damn sure. I haven't seen him toss and turn that much since he was thirteen. They've got him strapped down to prevent harm to himself or others. He's fighting though. Fighting to stay alive."
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Otis grunted as his back got opened up by a shallow slash. Turning, he smacked his newest opponent in the face with the edge of his shield, then ducking a return slash of the scimitar, brought his axe up from underneath, the sharp edge splitting the tough leather armor and the skin underneath. The Daemons blood and intestines fell out of his stomach cavity, and he fell to the ground on one knee, using his blade to hold himself up. Looking at Otis from behind veiled turban, he spoke, his voice like snakes slithering over sand.
"My name was Ahmed Ibn Abbas."
