For the past few weeks—months, maybe—Hyperlaser couldn’t see.
Not because he’d lost his vision or anything. The doctors had managed to save that part of him, at least. His skin was still marred with the flames that had berated him that fateful day, & his hair was a charred mess, though slowly recovering. His whole face was bandaged, however, which prevented his sight from breaking into sunlight for the foreseeable future.
“It’s only temporary until your vision heals, Mr. Hyperlaser,” the doctor had told him.
So, Hyperlaser remained like that, mostly chained to his hospital bed as it was much too risky for him to go out wandering throughout the hospital without a guide or attendance.
One day, he was lying in his bed with his hospital room door open, when he heart a soft voice down the hallway. It was a pretty sound, the sort that relieved Hyperlaser’s ears in an instant from all the incessant beeping & monitor sounds he’d been hearing his entire stay here.
He called out instinctively to the bearer of that pretty voice.
“Hello?”
The voice paused mid-tune with a curious hum, after which Hyperlaser could clearly hear the soft padding of footsteps approaching his open hospital door.
“Why, hello there!”
The person, a fellow hospital patient, he so presumed, had found him. He grimaced a little at his decision first, fearing that they’d be weirded out by his burnt body & bedbound form, yet…
They seemed ever the keen to get along with him, despite all that.
“I… I can’t get out of bed, my apologies. Do you mind coming over here? It gets a little lonely.”
The voice chuckled. An even more captivating sound than their voice, Hyperlaser soon observed.
“Gladly. I know just what you mean.”
That afternoon, Hyperlaser had made a new friend; Katana. A patient at the hospital too, taken in for the exact same reason as he—burn injuries, although theirs were more corrosive than his. They seemed quite lonely as well, Hyperlaser soon noticed at their compliance with hanging out with him every time he called out for them in the hallway.
With their assistance, he managed to get out of bed more often, led down the hospital corridors by their linked arms. Every passing day in their presence, he grew more & more thankful to them; for their assistance, for their attempts to get along with him despite their opposing factions. Hyperlaser’s occupation of being a Blackrock mercenary hadn’t even hit his mind ever since meeting them.
They quickly seemed to gain more importance than his prized occupation, so it appeared.
As time went on, Hyperlaser couldn’t see Katana’s face, so he began to build a mental construct of it in his own head. The picture-perfect face of beauty, he built in his mind; long, flowing blond hair, gorgeous sleek blue eyes, plump lips accompanied by a cute smile & rosy cheeks. He built the mental image of their appearance in his head by feeling the faint brush of their long hair brushing along his scarred skin as they helped him back into his bed one night, & associated the look of full lips with their face due to the mesmerising tone that their voice generated—every night, they sang to him in gentle Japanese tunes.
Soon enough, Hyperlaser received the news that he’d be having his facial bandages taken off next week, & would be discharged from the hospital in the following month, following the full recovery of the rest of his burn scars. He told Katana the news, & the ensuing chuckle that left them made Hyperlaser feel a little guilty. Were they… nervous? Nervous that he was to finally see their true face for once, perhaps?
Nevertheless, the day drew closer. Soon enough, Hyperlaser found himself lying down flat in his hospital bed, a doctor hovering over his face as he undid the bandage, Katana also waiting by his bedside in support.
Finally, the last roll of bandage was off his face.
“&… done! Take a look around you, Mr. Hyperlaser.”
Well, the first thing Hyperlaser’s bleary vision chose to focus on was Katana’s face—hovering above his bedside, smiling & expectant.
He was instantly struck breathless.