Chloroformed or Drugged Away

They held the rag down too long and too wet, and somewhere in the black your breathing all but quit. The doctor works through the night to keep your heart in rhythm and says plain that chloroform kills folk this way, and that yours may carry a stutter in its step from here on.

• Bedridden 5 days while the doctor listens to your chest by the hour
• Heart flutters under exertion, no sprinting, brawling, or hard riding for 7 days
• Chemical burns blistered around your nose and mouth, scabbing dark
• /me presses a hand flat to their chest, waiting out a skipped beat

Recovery A week under the doctor's watch just to be trusted upright; the heart's verdict comes later.·Doctor, urgently

The dose was heavy enough to steal a full day. You surface in fits, vomiting, weeping eyes, the world smeared sideways, with chemical burns rising in blisters where the rag pressed.

• An entire day gone from your memory, you cannot say who took you or how
• Vomiting fits for 2 days; keep to water and broth
• Blistered chemical burns ringing your mouth and nose, plain as a brand
• Bedrest 3 days, standing brings the spins

Recovery 4 days with a doctor purging the stupor; alone, the vomiting dries you out and doubles it.·Doctor, urgently

You spent the black hours folded in a wagon box over bad road, and somewhere between ruts a rib gave against the boards. You wake bruised deep from shoulder to hip and cannot draw a full breath without paying for it.

• Cracked rib, no lifting, hauling, or laughing hard for 5 days
• Shallow careful breaths; long sentences run out early
• Deep board-shaped bruising down one side, ugly for a week
• /me presses an arm against their ribs before easing down into the chair

Recovery A doctor's wrap and 6 days of care; unwrapped and stubborn, every cough sets it back.·Doctor required

Laudanum, and too much of it. They find you barely breathing, lips gone dusky, and the doctor spends the evening walking you in circles and slapping you awake every time the bell of sleep swings low.

• Watched through the night, someone must wake you every hour
• Foggy, pinprick-eyed, and slow for 2 days
• No liquor, no laudanum, no patent tonics for 3 days on doctor's orders

Recovery 2 days to breathe right with a doctor's vigil; without one, some folk just never wake.·Doctor, urgently

The chloroform ate at your skin where the rag pressed. Angry chemical burns blister across your lips, chin, and nose, weeping at first and cracking after, a mask you cannot take off.

• Blistered burns around mouth and nose, dressed in salve for 4 days
• Talking, eating, and smiling all crack the scabs, keep it brief for 3 days
• /me dabs at the weeping blisters around their mouth with a folded kerchief

Recovery 5 days salved to heal clean; picked at or left dry, it scars in pale patches.·Doctor required

Whatever they dosed you with has your stomach in open rebellion. You come to retching over a stranger's boots and spend the next days unable to hold much more than water and crackers.

• Vomiting fits for 2 days, excuse yourself often and suddenly
• Broth, crackers, and water only for 2 days
• Weak and sour-tempered from an empty belly

Recovery 3 days of small meals to settle; forcing a steak dinner starts it all over.·Doctor required

Hours crammed in a trunk with your knees at your ears while the road did its worst. Every muscle set like mortar, and when they finally hauled you out, your legs answered to nobody.

• Deep bruising at hips, knees, and shoulders where you rode the boards
• Walk stooped and slow for 2 days, straightening fully takes a minute and a groan
• No riding at a trot or better for 2 days
• /me unfolds from the chair by stages, one joint at a time

Recovery 3 days of liniment and slow stretching; a week of walking like a hinge if you skip it.·Doctor required

The drink went down easy and took the whole evening with it. You wake somewhere you do not know with hours gone clean out of your head, faces, roads, voices, all of it dissolved.

• You genuinely cannot recall who took you, where, or what was said
• Thumping headache and cotton thoughts for 2 days
• Unease around drinks you didn't pour yourself, you cover your glass now

Recovery 2 days for the fog to lift; the missing hours never come back.·Doctor required

The drug left as rudely as it arrived. A headache like a struck anvil sits behind your eyes, and daylight, loud voices, and cheap perfume all swing the hammer.

• Pounding headache for 2 days, bright light and noise make it worse
• Short-tempered and squinting; saloons are misery
• /me pinches the bridge of their nose, eyes shut against the lamplight

Recovery 2 days of dim rooms and willow-bark tea; 3 if you insist on the saloon.·Doctor advised

The road wrote its whole opinion of you in bruises. Hip, shoulder, and ribs are stamped blue-black in the shapes of boards and buckles, and sitting down calls for planning.

• Board-edge bruises down one side for 5 days, ugly in the bathhouse
• Eases into chairs and saddles gingerly for 2 days
• Sleeping on one side only for 3 days

Recovery 4 days for the worst of the color to fade; a week for all of it.·Doctor advised

The dose is out of your blood but not out of your mouth. Your words come slow and slurred at the edges, and more than one stranger has already assumed you started drinking at breakfast.

• Slurred, deliberate speech for 1 day, strangers take you for drunk
• Slow to follow fast talk; ask folk to repeat themselves
• /me speaks in careful, over-shaped words, half a beat behind the room

Recovery A day, maybe two, for the tongue to catch up with the brain.·Doctor advised

The body healed on the ride home; something else didn't. Small rooms breathe wrong now, trunks, cellars, even a crowded stagecoach puts a bird in your chest that beats to get out.

• Must sit by doors and windows for 4 days, tight spaces bring a cold sweat
• Refuses cellars, wardrobes, and wagon boxes outright
• Sleeps poorly with the door shut; better with it cracked open

Recovery The fright fades over days with patient company; alone, it lingers longer.·Doctor advised

The drug left your balance somewhere on the road. The floor tilts a degree or two when you turn your head fast, and nausea rolls in like weather, in slow gray waves.

• Dizzy spells when turning quickly or bending down, for 2 days
• No ladders, rooftops, or riding at speed for 2 days
• Queasy at strong smells, tanneries and frying grease especially

Recovery 2 days for the world to level; 4 if you keep testing it.·Doctor advised

A sicky-sweet chemical taste has moved into your mouth and won't pay rent. Coffee can't drown it, tobacco can't smoke it out, and every meal for a day tastes faintly of the rag.

• Everything tastes wrong for 1 day, you eat less and complain more
• Mild queasiness after meals

Recovery A day or two and it fades on its own.·No doctor needed

You woke quick but your feet are still drugged. There is a sailor's roll in your walk for a few hours, and stairs demand the handrail and your full attention.

• Unsteady on your feet for the rest of the day, take the rail, take your time
• /me drifts a half-step sideways, corrects course, and carries on with dignity

Recovery Steady by tomorrow morning.·No doctor needed

A raw red patch sits across your mouth and chin where the rag pressed, like a shaving mishap gone ambitious. It stings under whiskey and sun, and folk keep asking about it.

• Visible red patch around mouth and nose for 2 days
• Stings on liquor, hot coffee, and wind

Recovery 2 days with a little salve; 3 without.·No doctor needed

They hauled you folded like a rug, and your neck kept the receipt. It's a plain crick, but a proud one, you turn your whole body to look at anything on your left.

• Stiff neck for 2 days, shoulder-checking on horseback is a whole maneuver
• Winces when nodding off in a chair

Recovery 2 days with a hot cloth; it works itself out.·No doctor needed

You caught the smell coming and got half a breath of clean air first. The dose only half took, you were groggy an hour, playing possum for two more, and you remember more than they'd like.

• Mild headache, gone by evening
• You recall useful pieces, a voice, a boot, a name half-said

Recovery An hour of grog and done.·No doctor needed

The drink was doctored, but you'd only sipped it. You let your eyes flutter shut and played the sleeping cargo the whole ride, cataloguing every voice and turn of the road while they congratulated themselves.

• No worse than a short nap's grogginess
• You know exactly who took you, and they don't know you know
• /me lets their eyes drift almost shut, listening to everything

Recovery Nothing but the crick from lying still so long.·No doctor needed

You didn't like the way the stranger watched your whiskey, so when he glanced at the door you traded glasses. He went face-first into the card table twenty minutes later, and you walked out with his coin, his little notebook of instructions, and one hell of a story.

• Untouched, unrattled, and holding evidence, their plans are in your pocket now
• Bragging rights at every card table in the territory
• /me raises a glass, sniffs it theatrically, and smiles before drinking

Recovery None, though the fellow at the card table may need a week.·No doctor needed