Fall from Roof, Ladder or Hayloft

The ladder kicks out and the world flips, the crown of your skull meets baked earth with a sound like a dropped melon. They carry you inside limp as wet rope, and the doctor keeps checking your eyes by candlelight and not liking what he sees.

• Carried to a bed and kept there, a dark room and quiet for 3 days minimum
• One pupil sits wider than the other; speech comes slow and wanders
• Vomiting and confusion whenever you try to sit up
• /me lies grey and still, eyes fluttering half-open at the lamplight

Recovery A week flat on your back under a doctor's watch, waking a little more each day; untreated, you may simply not wake at all·Doctor, urgently

You land stiff-legged on the stone threshold and feel both heel bones crack like walnuts. Your legs fold and you sit down hard in the doorway, boots already too tight with the swelling.

• No standing without crutches for 5 days, you go where you're carried
• Boots cut off by the doctor; feet splinted and propped high
• Cold sweats every time weight so much as brushes a heel

Recovery 6 days splinted and off your feet before you hobble; untreated, the bones knit flat and wrong and every step bites for a season·Doctor required

You come down flat-backed across the corral fence rail and hear two ribs give at once, your head snapping back hard enough to fill the sky with sparks. Breathing feels like being stabbed politely, over and over.

• No lifting, roping, or riding hard for 5 days
• Shallow careful breaths, can't finish a sentence without a wince
• Headache and blurred edges to your sight for 2 days
• /me presses a forearm flat across their ribs before daring to laugh

Recovery 5 days wrapped snug with a doctor's care, 7 slow days if you tough it out, and coughing will punish you either way·Doctor required

You throw a hand out and the wrist snaps back on itself, the forearm ending in a bend God never drew. The doctor braces a boot, hauls traction until you howl, and buries the arm to the elbow in plaster of Paris.

• Arm in plaster and a sling, no use of that hand for 5 days
• Fingers poke from the cast fat as sausages, too swollen to bend
• Buttons, reins, and card-dealing are all somebody else's problem

Recovery Set and cast, 6 days before the fingers work again; unset, the wrist heals in its dinner-fork bend and never grips right·Doctor required

Outstretched hand, all your weight behind it, the small bones of the wrist crack clean, the break every doctor in the territory knows by heart. He splints it before you've finished swearing.

• Wrist splinted and slung, no gun hand for 3 days
• A deep ache that wakes you when you roll onto it
• /me adjusts the sling knot at their neck with their teeth

Recovery 4 days splinted with a doctor's care, 7 if you keep working it, and it'll ache before rain for years·Doctor required

You come down sitting on the plow beam and the jolt goes up your spine like a rifle shot. Something back there cracks, and now every chair in the county is your enemy.

• Cannot sit flat for 3 days, you stand at the bar, kneel at the table, and perch sideways in the saddle
• Rises from any seat in careful stages, hissing
• /me lowers themself onto one haunch, gripping the table edge white-knuckled

Recovery 3 days with a doctor's cushion-and-rest orders, 6 if you keep sitting on it wrong·Doctor required

A ladder rung clips your temple on the way past and the ground finishes the job. You come to with straw in your mouth and two of everything, the barn cat has a twin now.

• Seeing double on and off for 2 days, no shooting, no riding fast
• Sick stomach in bright light; a dark room is your friend
• A goose-egg above the ear, tender to the hat brim

Recovery 2 quiet days with a doctor watching your eyes, 4 foggy ones without, and don't take a second knock·Doctor required

The hayloft edge catches you side-on going down. Something in your ribs creaks like a wagon axle every time you breathe deep, and laughing is out of the question entirely.

• No lifting anything heavier than a coffee pot for 3 days
• Guards their left side, flinches from every friendly backslap
• Sleeping propped upright because lying flat steals your breath

Recovery 4 days wrapped with a doctor's care, 6 stubborn days without·Doctor required

You land on the edge of your boot and the ankle folds under with a wet pop. By supper it's swollen over the boot-top and the color of a stormy sunset.

• Walk, never sprint, for 3 days
• Boot loosened or off entirely, the ankle wrapped tight in strips
• /me favors their right leg, wincing with each step

Recovery 3 days wrapped and rested, 5 if you keep walking fences on it·Doctor advised

You come down kneeling on an upturned feed bucket and the kneecap takes the whole argument. The joint swells tight as a drum and bends about as well as one.

• Stairs and stirrups are misery for 3 days, mount from the block like a dude
• Leg held stiff and straight when sitting
• A bruise on the kneecap deep enough to have its own weather

Recovery 3 days favoring it, 5 if you insist on squatting to work·Doctor advised

Flat-footed onto packed earth from a full story up, nothing breaks, but both heels feel like you danced barefoot on an anvil. Walking is a negotiation you lose every step.

• A flat-footed old-timer's shuffle for 2 days
• No running, jumping, or dancing for 3 days
• /me eases their weight from heel to toe like the floor might bite

Recovery 2 days of soaking and sitting, 4 if you stay on your feet all day·Doctor advised

You catch the ladder half-falling and your own weight yanks the shoulder near out of its bed. It stays put, but only just, and it lets you know about the favor all week.

• Can't raise that arm above the shoulder for 2 days
• Throwing, roping, and hat-tipping all done with the off hand
• Rolls the sore shoulder slow, jaw tight, before any chore

Recovery 2 days rested and rubbed with liniment, 4 if you keep hauling on it·Doctor advised

You land in a heap and stand up almost fine, then your back seizes stiff as a fence post while you're reaching for your hat. Now you turn your whole body like a ship coming about.

• Bends at the knees, never the waist, for 2 days
• No heavy lifting for 3 days
• /me straightens up by degrees, one hand pressed to the small of their back

Recovery 2 days of hot cloths and moving gentle, 4 if you try to prove something·Doctor advised

You ride the ladder down its whole length with your palms and one cheek. The fall's nothing, it's the toll of splinters that'll keep you busy by lamplight with a needle.

• Palms peppered with splinters, gripping stings for a day
• A raw red scrape along one cheekbone, impossible to explain with dignity
• An evening's worth of needle-work picking wood out of your hands

Recovery A day of smarting, 2 if a splinter's left in to fester·No doctor needed

The landing slams your jaw shut on your own tongue and floods your mouth with copper. You spit red into the straw and take inventory, bruises everywhere, but everything answers.

• Talking with a lisp for a day, whistling's out entirely
• Hot coffee and whiskey both punish you tonight
• Assorted bruises down one side, none worth a doctor's time

Recovery A day of careful chewing, 2 before soup stops stinging·No doctor needed

You land square on your back and every ounce of air leaves you at once. For one long minute you gasp like a trout in the dust, certain you're dying, while somebody laughs.

• A minute of theatrical fish-mouthed gasping, witnessed by at least one soul
• Chest sore to deep breaths for a day
• /me sits in the dirt a while longer, relearning how lungs work

Recovery Right as rain by morning, though your pride takes 2 days·No doctor needed

You catch three rungs with your shins on the way down and the ground takes your elbows. Nothing's broken, but you're striped and spotted like a map of bad decisions.

• Shins barked raw, flinches when the dog brushes past
• Bruises blooming yellow-purple down both forearms for 3 days
• Rolls up a sleeve to show the damage to anyone who'll look

Recovery 2 days for the sting, 4 for the colors to fade·No doctor needed

Of all the places to land, providence picks the soft one. You rise from the manure pile entirely unhurt and entirely unwelcome indoors.

• Not a scratch on you, but the smell rides along for a day no matter the scrubbing
• Banned from the bunkhouse until you've been to the creek
• /me stands downwind of everyone, dripping with dignity and worse

Recovery Nothing to heal but your standing in polite company·No doctor needed

Your hand snags the eave trough as you go and you dangle there a heartbeat, boots swinging over nothing, before dropping the last easy few feet. Your fingers ache and your heart hammers, and that's the whole bill.

• Strained fingers, flexing them absently for a day
• A story that gets three feet taller every telling

Recovery By tomorrow it's like it never happened·No doctor needed

The roof pitches you off backward and somehow, nobody can say how, least of all you, you turn full over in the air and land square on both feet in front of witnesses. You straighten your hat like you meant every bit of it.

• Knees ache faintly for a day, sole cost of glory
• At least two witnesses to swear it happened, ready to be bought drinks
• /me dusts off their hat, wearing the calm of someone who absolutely did not plan that

Recovery Nothing to heal, the legend does all the work·No doctor needed