Chapter 226: Day 225

Day 225,

Morning thought: I’m going to take multiple baths in a hot spring in one day, say it’s for medical reasons, and not feel guilty about not doing anything, and it’s going to be glorious.

 

Just had a bit of a panic attack, afraid that the spring had actually damaged my lungs more instead of healing, but I’m fine now.  Mostly.  Still kind of shaky and focusing enough on my breathing that it’s practically manual, but I’m fine.  As are my lungs.  Probably.

At my insistence that I’d be okay left on my own, the others went to see what they could catch  fishing at this island’s surrounding reef.  Or rather, Maiko’s fishing and the other two are following along in a boat because they don’t want her alone in strange waters with the general conventional wisdom of flora and fauna getting stranger and more dangerous the further from the Village you get.

Point is, I was alone without even the nature sprite for company, relaxing in the upper pool, breathing in the warm vapors and having a lovely morning when I started coughing.  It wasn’t much at first, but over the next several minutes it grew in frequency and intensity.  Before long, I’m not sure how to describe it save to say that it felt like my lungs themselves were itching.  And while my reflex was to cough to try and scratch that itch, no amount could soothe it.  The most I did was make my throat sore.

I got out of the pool quickly of course, afraid that I was having some manner of allergic reaction to whatever “healing” agent might be in it.  And afraid that it was already too late.  Feeling lightheaded as I stood, stumbling and shaking as I walked, I tried to put distance between myself and the spring.  Tried to force deep breaths to clear out whatever it was I’d inhaled.  Just ended up coughing more.  Not just coughing but coughing up.  Looked to be just phlegm at first.  Felt like it.  And then I started noticing horrible, terrifying, tiny specks of red and pink mixed in with the yellow-green.

I stopped thinking clearly at that point.  Started running, hoping, needing to find the others.  To find help.  But what help could they give?  Comfort of not dying alone at the very least.  Trust in the bracelets for that much at least.

As I ran through the jungle, still hacking up a lung (literally I feared), the sticks and stones and roots of the forest floor tearing at my bare feat, branches lashing my face, underbrush scratching my sides, I regretted not taking the pale ring back from Lin.  At last reaching the beach, I saw the boat out on the water.  Panting, I waved to them.  Not realizing my distress from a distance they waved back.

As I started questioning their lack of response and pondering how to properly alert them to my plight, realizations started hitting me.

They didn’t realize I was in distress.  The bracelets weren’t signaling me as being in danger.

That could mean they just trigger on exterior, physical threats.

I was panting.  Not coughing, not wheezing, panting.

I was winded from practically running the length of this island, but I wasn’t collapsed on the ground.

I’d just run practically the length of this island.

I was breathing hard, there was an ache in my side, air felt sharp to breathe, and I was sore, especially my feet, but I’d just run that whole distance.  That was normal.

Yesterday I would have had to stop and rest walking half that distance.

The healing spring was working.

I’m not really one for wild displays of joy.  No shouting or whooping in celebration.  No tossing my hands up in the air and running around jumping to release my building emotions through physical exertion.  But, as on edge as I was, I did wind up teetering over the edge into a sort of manic, shoulder-shaking, head-sometimes-throwing-back laughter as I started slowly walking down to the water to cool myself off and wait for the others to come back my way.

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The rapid transition from fear of death by respiratory failure to hope for succor from lingering illness will do that I suppose.

As it turns out, walking into salt water right after tearing your feet up running through the jungle barefoot isn’t the best idea.  Although even that sting momentarily renewed the fits of off-kilter laughter that I hope the others were too far out to hear.  I settled for just sitting on the sand and admiring the sea breeze.

When they did come back to shore (with enough catch for lunch and dinner) I explained what had transpired, both my initial seemingly adverse reaction and my apparent recovery.  After escorting me back to camp, Lin examined me and found me mostly to her satisfaction.  She wants to observe me for a while before I try going back in the spring and she wants to be with me the next time I do.  Understandable.  Once I finish up in a minute here I’ll ask her if she thinks it’s been long enough.  Meanwhile, Cass and Maiko are doing a more thorough exploration of the island.

Also, I found out that Lin has a stethoscope.  Not quite the form that I’m familiar with, but the principle and function is the same.  Hers is a wooden tube with a bell-like flare at one end.

Huh… now I’m wondering if they have rubber here.  I can’t recall if I’ve seen anything made from it.  But rubber trees are tropical, right?  Maybe if not on the main island than one of these outliers.  Not that I have any idea what a rubber tree looks like or how you get rubber from it.  Something with extracting and processing the sap I guess?

 

I’ve been in and out of the spring a few more times.  Some mild coughing a few times, and some itching from the scratches earlier, but no more terror/excitement.  Once Lin was satisfied it wasn’t killing me she got in too and eventually noted a similar itching on her hands where they’d been rubbed raw with the rowing the past week.  In retrospect, we should have brought gloves.  Maybe we’ll wrap a shirt around the oars or something on the way back.

Maiko and Cass returned in the late afternoon/early evening and joined us as well.  They found another, smaller spring and thin, shallow stream running from it to the beach.  It wasn’t warm like this one, and they’re guessing no weird healing properties, but it should be suitable for drinking and cleaning the grime from days of seawater and sweat from our clothes.  Which is a relief of sorts.  It’d just feel sort of wrong to do laundry in these pools in a way I can’t quite pin down.

 

The others are all asleep, but I still feel oddly wakeful, energized even.  Side effect of the spring perhaps?  Sure, they were in it nearly as much as I’ve been, but then again, I had more to heal.

Speaking of the spring, I’ve come back over to it so as not to wake anyone.  I don’t really have much to write about at the moment, but maybe the act of doing it will help lull me like it usually does.

Oh yeah, there is one thing I forgot to mention in yesterday night’s entry with everything else going on: 

The frogs.  

Pretty sure they’re frogs anyway.  They seem to be nocturnal with their chorus starting as the sun goes down and growing in volume and complexity as more of them join in throughout the night.  Normally I’d expect that to be what’s keeping me up, but I actually find it rather soothing.  They sound uncannily like rain.  A strange adaptation in a place that heavily rains for three months in a row every six months and then not at all for the next three months.  Maybe they can tell the difference but other creatures can’t?

They’re going right now and I keep expecting to see the ripples of raindrops whenever I glance at the pool, but of course I don’t.  It does look inviting though.  On the one hand, if that’s the source of this insomniac energy, then I’d only be compounding the problem.  On the other hand, it would feel nice and soothing and how much worse can it really make it?

Maybe just a few minutes in the upper pool and then I’ll head back to bed(roll).

 

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