Shower Thoughts

Cold water stabbed through Blackbird, beating the weariness out of him.

His teeth chattered at the icy temperature, but he forced himself to stay put under the shower. The black mantle of feathers flared out, an instinctual response to retain insulation. Water trickled down his sides as his wings flapped softly, the rustling echoing in the empty shower rooms.

The mystery drug concoction that the technicians had pumped into him had started to manifest. It had woken him up at unspeakable hours of the night, feverish and in a puddle of his own sweat. Even during the years he worked under relentless sun, he had never faced heat like that. He had peeled himself off the bed, somehow evading his roommates and had escaped beyond the holding areas.

Unable to sleep in the discomfort, he found himself stumbling along the facility corridors. He was thankful to have inched into the yellow trust levels, granting the privilege to use the showers at any leisure hour. Otherwise, the solution would have been asking a handler to hose him down. And while his dignity was already on the negatives, he didn’t need to push it more.

The water was granting him some level of relief, but every time he neglected a limb, a new infernal wave surged through his body. It felt like a bonfire within his ribcage, getting fanned and threatening to take hold of him again. He focused on getting the water under his feathers. It would make drying off a pain, but feeling the chill reaching skin made him forget about that.

While the unrelenting heat was uncomfortable, he was thankful that at least it wasn’t that bad of a reaction. Sometimes, the shots did nothing. Other times, they made his muscles feel like wasp nests, stinging every inch of his body. And once, it had sunk him into a coma, plagued with abstract dreams that he couldn’t remember. That's what he got for not being the weapon people wanted him to be. His only use was as a sack of meat put to the whims of the technicians.

Claws against tile distracted him. Blackbird’s pointy ear twitched at the sound, letting him gauge the source. He couldn’t help but get on edge. The main expectation was to get interrupted for a scolding, perhaps even kicked out. He could have gotten demoted and his keeper hadn’t been updated yet, or maybe the handler in turn felt like giving a show of their superiority.

But none of that happened. Instead, there was only the sound of a new water stream. Just another Stratos in for a nocturnal wash. Blackbird sighed, shakily resting his weight with an arm against the white wall, letting the tension uncoil through his body.

With the limb in front of him, he stared at the little bands at the shot sites, and the large bandage covering up half of his forearm. While the downsides of his stay were many, he sometimes did marvel at the medical resources. The material was waterproof, translucent, and healed shit faster than he thought possible. Cuts like those would have normally taken days to scar. Yet, one day had passed and the wounds had already been replaced by white lines in a reddish aura, still tender to the touch but nothing that caused him issues.

Knowing how easily they could patch him up, he wondered in what ways they planned to keep breaking him down. His gaze strayed away. That was a dangerous line of thought. He had already given up trying to figure out what it was that they were infusing in him, he wasn’t about to break into the bad habit again. He never knew when the next shot would come, or when they would decide to schedule him for a deeper intervention. It was better to remain in the present.

Eyes closed, his mind strayed only on what he could sense. The sounds of drops hitting the tiles, foreign feathers flexing and collapsing against skin. Heartbeats. A stomach grumbling. The ever-present background noise that was the ventilation system.

He felt the weight of his body against the wall. The effort his back made to keep him upright. The streams of water coursing through his body, trailing down his back, his wings, his tail. It was cold. His breath hitched.

He hadn't realised how the cold of the water wasn’t unlike the touch of metal.

It reminded him of when they measured rods against his arms, cutting them to size before they put them in his bones. In his muscles. In his wrists, in his neck, impassive.

When he lost himself, they couldn’t use the soft leather harnesses that were the standard. Only metal worked to restrain him. Metal that dug into his wrists, into his wings.

Water trickled down his chin. It felt like a muzzle.

He turned off the shower in frenzied panic, the world swaying under his feet. He wiped off his face forcefully, leaving red streaks on the path of his fingers. His wings flared, primary feathers banging against the walls of the shower stall. A haunted reflection stared back at him on the white floor, red eyes framed in dark circles. Only the keeper enveloped its neck. Nothing more, nothing less.

The reflection was prodding at its wrists. In the feeling of the rubbery bandage against blunt claws, Blackbird caught his behaviour and forced his arms to drop at his sides.

He had to find better grounding methods.

His heart raced, he was unsure if out of the hot flashes still lingering or residual panic. A hand in his chest, he breathed deeply. The blood pumped like a little bird trying to force itself out of his keel. Inhale. The air sacs expanded, helping to cool off his body with the chilly air. Exhale. Little drops of water spluttered below his nose. Inhale. Vast wing muscles slid as his chest expanded. Exhale.

It wasn't a perfect solution, but at least the war drum that was his pulse had left his ears. Somewhere in the process, the fire that had woken him up had quelled. At least, enough to make him shiver. He needed to dry off, he mused with dread at his sopping plumage. Wings shaked and flapped, his tail following with a vigorous bobbing and throwing a downpour of water in every twitch of feathers.

The Cyclone snorted, looking up at the shower head. Had he really had an outburst over water?

At least this time it had been in privacy. He made a mental note to not mention it during psychotherapy, and stepped out of the stall in search of a towel.