#they'd probably be happy to just have a non-life-threatening problem for once

[bitemedotmp3]

‘  i don’t want to be overdramatic, but today felt like 100 years in hell and the absolute worst day of my life.  ’

"Bite me! I said I was sorry!" shouts Uzi, on her hands and knees. With a pair of long rubber gloves, one of her arms is submerged elbow-deep in a bucket of soapy water, and the other wields a bristly scrub that she drags back and forth across the tile in a futile motion.

"I just don't see why you had to leave the oil can open," snaps Mika, pouring detergent into her own bucket. "Oil doesn't go in the kitchen!"

"The kitchen's for food, and that's my food!" Uzi slams the scrub down, splashing bubbles onto her visor. "You're being... racist? Something like that."

"No, I'm being reasonably upset that you spilled a bottle of drone oil on the floor! It's... it's dirty, if it got on any food I'd have to throw it out!" Mika draws an arm across her brow, sighing. "At least it didn't get on my clothes..."

"Humans cook with oil all the time, why is this such a big deal?"

Mika kneels back on her feet, dunking her sponge into the bucket. "It's not the same. That's cooking oil, you can eat it. Your oil is for engines. Listen, if I spilled a bottle of... of olive oil in your room, you wouldn't be happy, would you?"

Uzi thinks back to the time she spilled oil on one of her old hoodies, instantly transforming it from a nice article of clothing into a piece of garbage. Or, robo-god forbid, imagine if she got it on her hair. She still doesn't have any replacement wigs in this city yet, and if someone saw her bald she'd have to find out if worker drones had a self-destruct function tucked away somewhere.

"I guess not," she says, frowning. "Fine, fine, you win. I don't care enough to fight about it, anyways."

"That's surprising, coming from you. You were yelling about the Sailor Moon remake the other day," says Mika, laughing.

"Crystal didn't need to exist! The original was fine!" shouts Uzi. "Clearly, I only fight about important things!"

"Like anime."

"Like anime!"

Mika laughs again, and Uzi huffs. A short silence ensues as the two girls work at the oil stains, and Mika marvels at how much cleaner it all looks.

"I think we're almost done, Uzi. Uzi?" she looks back to see her housemate, head lowered to the floor, making slurping sounds-

"A-are you drinking the oil off the floor?" she asks, eyes wide.

Uzi snaps upright, a neon purple blush on her visor. "N-no! Maybe! Bite me! I'm not gonna let it to go waste, I paid for it!"

"But it's mixed with water and soap now, there's no way it's okay for you to drink."

"No, over here it's okay. Haven't washed this part yet."

"Well, maybe you should! Because the sooner we're done, the sooner you can... I don't know, watch more anime, I guess."

"Whatever, mom."

The two lapse back into silence, grumbling at each other in their thoughts. Both are so focused on cleaning that neither of them notice V enter the room, drawn to that delicious smell. But when she sees both Uzi and Mika furiously scrubbing at a greasy, black stain on the ground, she backs away without saying a word. She used to work as a maid for rich assholes, she's had enough of cleaning for one life.

[trashcatsnark]

I'm glad you liked my AU, I was kinda nervous that I'm bothering you ':D 1. V is of course allowed to stay with the Aldecaldos with no problems, since they're already a part of the family, but Johnny is only allowed to stay if he 1. will work on jobs with them to earn his keep 2. will do different chores around the camp 3. will behave; he starts a fight or something like that and he's out. Johnny is determined to be on his best behavior so that he's allowed to stay and look after V. After what they've been through together, he couldn't bear to be split from them again, especially not over something so stupid like starting a brawl. 2. He doesn't really socialise much, he's too focused on V. Aldecaldos tolerate him, but he can feel that they are a bit uneasy around him, and he can't really blame them, he's a man who died 50 years ago and was brought back to life, not exactly something you see every day (though I'd imagine they'd warm up to eachother after a post-gig bonfire, with Johnny showing off his guitar chops). 3. Johnny and V live in the same van, of course. Graciously donated by the Aldecaldos, it's their new home and mode of transport when the caravan moves. It's a bit small, but it's managable and slowly starts to fill out with different trinkets, items, postcards and photos from their travels. They usually sit on the steps in the mornings and sometimes look at the starry sky on the roof in the evenings. 4. If V feels good enough to leave the van, Johnny is always near, like a shadow. Just a local oddity, a merc who died and came back to life twice and a world-famous terrorist rockerboy that now watches over them in pretty much complete silence and a permanent scowl on his face, nbd. 5. Johnny usually keeps his hair tied, partially because it's more practical and he hates having a swety neck, and partially because it fucks with his facial features and he's harder to recognise by bystanders like cashiers. 6. V is in no condition to drive, so Johnn usually does it when the caravan has to move. V either chats with him to keep him company, reads him books or screamsheets out loud or does crossword puzzles with him. 7. Johnny sometimes missess the fact that he can no longer feel what V is feeling, mostly because it would make the whole "caretaking" thing much easier for him, just letting him know what V needs without words. Now he actually has to guess or ask, and he doesn't know which is harder. He looks at V and feels like he should be able to do more for them, but he has no idea what that more would actually be.

Firstly, never worry about bothering, I absolutely adore how many asks and messages I’ve been getting lately! I may be slow to reply sometimes but I’m honestly just am really happy to see people wanting to read my dumbass replies, if anything I worry about giving bad replies since I am the “queen of fuckups” as Johnny has so elegantly dubbed me and my V before. 

Ahhhh, I love it so much, firstly I love bitchface Johnny always lurking over V because he’s a protective heathen. V just has to be like, yeah, no he’s really a sweetie though...well, okay no he’s kinda an asshole, but like he’s my asshole so it’s fine.  And the rule of Johnny, please behave, and he’d try so hard but you know there’s a part of him that’s always like that son of a bitch looked at V the wrong way and i want to punch him but god damn it, i cannot and will sit here consumed with internal rage for the rest of the night 

Also ponytail Johnny owns my whole soul. my V wakes up to him in sweatpants and hair in a ponytail once and is like shit I died and gone to heaven. I like to imagine if anyone still is ever like wait... “are you Johnny Silverhand?” he just gives a completely vague non-committal response of like “who knows.” (I also love ideas of him being like Tony Hawk in that he’s never fully recognized or people assuming he’s some fanatic who just runs around dressed like Johnny Silverhand like Elvis Imposters or him more often being confused for Keanu Reeves since he exists in universe) 

Johnny pulling a here’s Wonderwall at the campfire just for the joke of it, sometimes when he’s in a really good mood he’ll take requests (tho mostly just V’s, if anyone really for sure wants to hear him play something specific they know to ask V to ask for it) 

Living in a van, I imagine it majorllllly reminds Johnny of band days, touring, he’ll tell V all his stories of living in a van with Kerry, Henry, Denny, and Nancy for months at time. Having to listen to Henry and Denny fight the entire damn time, nearly puking when they’d had to listen to the two make up. Nancy losing her mind trying to reign in her feral children of bandmates, at times just choosing to drive instead of stay in the bus because you can handle so much. Kerry constantly stealing Johnny’s pants. Johnny bringing people back to the bus and later getting yelled at because he inevitably left...evidence of it on something that didn’t belong to him. (sometimes accidentally and other times, well, Kerry deserved it) Having to share a bathroom with them all and threatening to piss on Kerry’s bed if he didn’t hurry it the fuck up.  He has a billion stories, that he knows V already knows, but they still wanna hear em, so why not. 

I also fucking live for Johnny and V just hating the fact they aren’t linked the way they were before. They actually have to talk, god the horror. I definitely imagine  my Johnny and V following the separation occasionally find themselves having to tell the other person “we have to use our big girl/boy/person words, now” They’ll catch the other staring off into the distance and be like “you just were trying to talk to me through your mind rn werent you?” or V will be thinking things to Johnny and be like “why are you ignoring me???? wAIT I HAVE TO TALK” They feel this distance that they never knew existed before. 

I know in your AU V probably wouldn’t be up for it, but when they would be or any V and Johnny with nomads verse;  part of me feels like Johnny would be torn on wanting to pilot the Basilisk with V. Because half of him is worried about the claustrophobia of it, he hates cramped dark, closed in places. But fuck fuck fuck, he wants that neurological link with V. He wants it. And if they do it, he’ll feel so at peace that he finally has his person back in the deepest sense of it, that he forgets all about being stuck in that coffin.  

I also majorly think, while not as severe as the one between the twins in the beat on the brat fights; they don’t wanna be the same person. But they do want some form of neural synchronization implants. I imagine they might have something where they can read each others minds, it do be the future, just something that lets them always feel connected. Vik looks at them like they’re stupid, you fought to be separated and now you just wanna climb back into each other’s head. 

[la-appel-du-vide]

06•14•19

After the cookie class, Kena and I went to grab some food. She took me to HuHot, which is one of her favorite Mongolian places. We started eating, and the food was actually really good! And that's when I got the scariest phone call of my life.

Whitnie was calling, and when I answered, I first thought that she was laughing. Everything that she was saying was incoherent, and I told her she needed to speak more clearly. That's when I realized she was not laughing, but actually crying. Basically all that I could make out from the conversation with her is, "Dad's hurt. Mom's crying. You need to come home."

From there, it's a bit of a blur. I remember trying to ask her what happened to Dad, but she had no information for me other than it was serious and my mom needed me home. We rushed out the restaurant and Kena drove me to my house to meet the family. I knew that Dad had been up at a Fathers and Sons camp-out for the stake, so my mind was racing wondering what could have happened. 

When I got home, there were a few visitors and mom was still on the phone. I started to learn a couple more details, like they were working to get a pulse and he wasn't breathing. Someone up at the campground with him told us they were life-flighting him to the hospital, and we should meet them there. It was a rush to collect our things and our emotions, and drive up to Ogden Regional Medical Center. We were met there by Heidi and Sean Brophy, President and Sister Jacobson, Isaac and one of Dad's coworkers Jay. It was a confusing time as we were hearing different pieces of the story, and waiting for Dad to get there. Mom had to go fill out some medical paperwork, and the rest of us sat in the waiting room. Once Dad arrived, they let my mom and siblings go see him. He was awake, but completely out of it. All he kept saying was, "Help me." It is so hard to see such a tough guy in that kind of state. Really shook me up. They'd cut all of his clothes off of him, and he was connected to all kinds of machines and wires. I'm not really sure he knew we were there, and he definitely didn't know what was going on. We stayed back there a few minutes, then went back to the waiting room while the staff worked to stabilize him. 

That's when President Hjorten showed up, and told us the story (I'm also adding some details we learned later from the two men that saved Dad's life.):

They had just finished a devotional, and Dad had helped pass around doughnuts as refreshments. Then he went and picked up his camp chair, and sat near a large fire-pit, with only a small fire going. Brother Brown, and his son Alex, and Brother Zimmerman, and his son Christian, had just come over to stand around the fire when they noticed my Dad's head suddenly drop, his phone fall out of his hand, and his body begin to slump. They tried to ask him if he was ok, but they got no response.  Brother Zimmerman pushed his body back up in the chair, and realized there was no pulse and that he wasn't breathing. He yelled at him and tried to get a response, but there was nothing. Luckily, Brother Brown happens to be a doctor. He instructed Zimmerman to get Dad on the ground and start CPR while he called the paramedics. They did CPR for nearly 30 minutes waiting for the ambulance to arrive, and the decision was made at some point during that time to send a life-flight helicopter in as it would be a faster route from the campground to the hospital. President Hjorten said that after 15 minutes of CPR, he was pretty sure they'd lost him. His eyes had rolled back into his head, his body was cold, and it was starting to turn blue. The doctor had the inspired idea to ask for an epipen. They could use the burst of adrenaline to help kick-start the heart. A nearby man happened to have one on him, so they quickly shot it into Dad's stomach. They said when they did this, Dad became semi-conscious for a minute and looked around and took a couple of breaths, but then went back into unconsciousness. They yelled out for another epipen, and after a couple of minutes, a kid came running with two. They used one more just a couple minutes later, and got the same kind of response. Finally, the ambulance arrived, and they were able to shock his heart back to life. He woke up and became kind of angry, they said, fighting the paramedics trying to strap him to the board so he could be placed in the helicopter. They had six or seven guys holding me down, because he is STRONG. Then they flew him to Ogden Regional, where we met him. 

They got him stabilized, and then moved him to the ICU. He was in and out of it, but the doctors were amazed at his condition, for 30 minutes of CPR and lack of oxygen. He never had to be intubated, and he was pretty alert. Confused, for sure, but alert. They put him through many tests to find out what happened, but learned that there really was no explanation for it. His CT scan and EKG came back normal, he was free of blood clots and blocked arteries, and he didn't have a heart attack. The random event is kind of scary, so they decided to keep him in the ICU where they could keep a close watch on him until they could implant a defibrillator, which basically monitors his heart rate 24/7, and shock it back into normal rhythm when needed to try and prevent a life-threatening situation from happening again. 

We were all at the hospital pretty late that night, but Aubrey, Isaac and I left for home about 3 AM to grab some stuff for Mom and Dad, who would be at the hospital for awhile. And Whit couldn't get herself to leave. We slept for a couple hours, and then headed back over there with all the needed stuff. 

Dad seemed to be more conscious on Saturday, but clearly had short-term memory problems. He asked the same questions over and over and over again: How did I get here? Where is my truck? I was supposed to cook breakfast at the camp-out this morning... Did anyone track down any stoves? Isaac and I had an appointment at the car dealership today - He should probably call and cancel. So we went over and over those details, but within 10 or 15 minutes, he'd ask them again. One funny side-note: Each time we told him that he had to be life-flighted to the hospital, he'd get a look of pure shock on his face, and go: "What!! That's going to cost like _______." And each time, his estimated cost went higher and higher. He started with $5,000. Then $10,000. Then $15,000. Then $30,000. Then $50,000. And by the end of the day, we got: "That's going to cost like, $100,000!" Hahaha every single time he began his response, we'd all look at each other in anticipation of what amount he was going to say, and try so hard not to laugh. 

He remembered very little from Saturday. He had all kinds of visitors, but by Sunday, he'd forgotten seeing anyone at all.

Saturday night, we all left (except mom who stayed with Dad the whole time) around midnight and went to get some Father's Day stuff ready for Dad. (Sad, right? Father's Day in the ICU?) It took us way longer than it should have, but it was fun to take Dad a candy poster and some presents to try and brighten his morning and celebrate him a little extra for sure. He seemed to like it, but apparently forgot all about it, because he never remembered opening his presents when he saw them all again at home later. I also made him a buttermilk pie for his Father's Day dessert, because they're his favorite.

It was a long few days in the hospital. So many drives back and forth, trying to keep the house cleaned and take care of Archie, but also be there for Mom and Dad, and bring everyone what they needed. We had mostly awesome nurses, but on Sunday, encountered one who wouldn't even let us all go sit with him at the same time. Not even on Father's Day. When most of the other nurses would even let non-relatives in to see him! Basically ridiculous. We were heated.

I was getting 2-3 hours of sleep a night, which is more I'm sure than my poor mom who was sleeping on a hospital floor, but I was still exhausted. By the time I rolled into work early Monday morning, I was physically and emotionally spent. I would cry at the smallest criticism, or sometimes at nothing at all, all day long. The hospital and the trauma really takes a toll on you. 

Dad got his defibrillator put in on Monday, and they said they'd monitor him for 24 hours, and then he could go home. We were relieved because no one was getting the rest they needed while at the hospital, and Dad was truly just miserable there. But after 15 attempts during the operation, the doctor was never able to get the wires in a place he was happy with. X-rays and ultrasounds afterward proved that. So he had to go back in on Tuesday, and get his incision re-cut open, so the doctor could try again. Depression really started to set in at this news. This time was easy, the doctor said. He didn't know why, but it only took him one try to get the wires in a place he was happy with. And because he was so confident, he allowed Dad to finally come home.

Dad's extremely sore from 2 broken ribs caused by the CPR, and complains about a lot of headaches, but he has a beating heart and we are so thankful. So many things lined up for him that night: it happened when people were around, instead of an hour later when he would have been sleeping alone in his truck; a doctor happened to be at the campground, and one of the only two men near dad when it happened; and they were able to use two epipens to help the resuscitation efforts. If this had happened at home, he may have already gone to bed for the night as he goes to sleep early, and we never would have known. It could have happened while he was driving, which would have been tragic no doubt. But it happened at the right place, at the right time. And he's made a truly miraculous recovery. His short-term memory has returned, and he never lost any long-term memory, which is a miracle because his brain was without oxygen for so long. 

We are so grateful to still have him with us, and for the reassurance that the implanted defibrillator gives us that this won't happen again.

Now he just needs a few weeks for the ribs to heal, and he is practically good as new.

We sure love our Dad.