\chapter{10}

There was no way he could tell how long he had slept,
but there was one thing that was definitely different:
The unconsciousness that he had fallen into had given way to a normal sleep after a while,
even though it wasn't particularly long or restorative in any form.
Even as Andrew's consciousness glid over the border between sleep and being awake like a dead-tired swimmer,
he could feel that there was real relief on the other side.
Not too much had changed.
He still had a headache and he was still a little queasy;
at the very best the two weren't as bad as before.
And his knee had stopped hurting.
At least something.
It was surprising how undemanding you get when you're feeling bad enough.

He opened his eyes and at first he felt like he was still on the other side of the river in the burnt city,
because he was still surrounded by grey twilight that removed all color and blurred the outlines of things as if he were inside of a blurred black-and-white picture.
On second glance he realized that the explanation was much simpler.
It had gotten dark outside and the holey curtains that hung in front of the windows in the surprisingly large room he was in blocked out even more of the murky light.
If he recalled the few short moments before his senses had faded it was early afternoon.
Apparently he had slept a little longer than he had thought.

That memory let a different,
more alarming picture rise to the top of Andrew's conciousness that he hastily dismissed.
He already felt miserable enough without the tasteless jokes that his overstimulated imagination kept handy.

He blinked a couple more times to get out his stupor,
propped himself up on his elbows and carefully sat up.
Something glid off his chest with a rustle and as Andrew looked down he discovered two things:
He was completely naked and someone had covered him with a shoddy sheet that was bristling with dirt and smelled as bad as the bed he was laying on.

Lightly disgusted, but also at least just as embarrassed,
he sat up completely and swung his legs off the edge of the squeaking folding cot that he had woken up on and slung the grubby sheet around his hips.
The floor that he set his naked feet on was warm.

Andrew slowly turned his head to look around the room with more attention.
The pale twilight was making it hard to discern details,
but nevertheless he saw that the room was very big and furnished with a surprising amount of furniture,
although they were all very old and in not too good of condition.
Anything near enough to discern details seemed to be made exclusively out of metal and had burn marks on it;
apparently anything flammable hadn't survived the catastrophe on this side of the river either.

He heard a sound and turned towards the door that, like the windows, only had a sheet hung in front of it.
The scrap was pushed to the side and Katt stepped in.
Andrew could only recognize her silhouette,
but he could tell that she had stopped abruptly in the middle of taking another step as she saw him sitting on the edge of the bed.

``You're awake?''

``As you can see.''
Andrew started to cough and had to swallow a few times since his voice wanted to fail him.

``Wait'', said Katt. ``I'll get you water.''

Before Andrew could stop her, she turned on her heel and out of the room.
Andrew stared after her befuddled, but he actually was thirsty;
either way she had left so quickly that she would surely be back soon.

He stood up, slung the cloth closer around his hips,
and clumsily felt around the room for his clothes.