When Grant finally opened his eyes again, he realized that he was looking up at an unfamiliar ceiling but before he could even begin to process his surroundings, a pain like never before assaulted his mind.

The pain shot up his arm like fire. He winced, cringed and grimaced at the pain. It exploded in his head with a blinding whiteness. It made him dizzy. It made him reel. The pain was like needles that had been dipped in alcohol had been jammed through his skin, like his arm had been replaced with ice, fire, and electricity wired straight into his spine.

Grant couldn't help himself from thrashing about due to the overwhelming pain.

[HOLY FUCK THIS HURTS! I'd rather be kicked in the balls than deal with this!!]

Grant's thoughts were interrupted a moment later though.

"You need to calm down sir! If you move around too much, it'll only make it worse. Try your best to suppress the pain as much as you can mentally and try to focus on something else! Mom told me that she did what she could for you, but your arm was badly wounded so you needed to be careful!" Came a voice next to Grant.

After struggling to turn his head just enough to see who was talking, Grant realized it was the little boy from the family of people he had saved. He was about 5' tall with spikey blonde hair, tanned skin, and green eyes. He looked like an intelligent boy, but he also looked scared at the sounds and faces that Grant was making.

"Why am I here? What happened to that giant javelina? Where's my sword? What do you.."

"Please calm down sir! My name is Richard. Mom said you need to relax as much as you can because your arm was nearly shredded to pieces and she is afraid that if you move around too much it will only make it worse. Mom says its a wonder you didn't lose the arm completely."

Before Richard could continue speaking, his eyes became moist and tears started to run down his cheeks and fell to the ground.

In between sobs he continued, "Thank you for saving us. Mom said it was a miracle that you hadn't bled out and died. I feel guilty for not being able to help you when you willingly protected us even though we don't even know you."

After he managed to get those words out, Richard broke down and cried even harder.

Grant felt bad for the little kid. Clearly he was an intelligent young man based on how he spoke. And the fact that he even apologized for the suffering that Grant was currently enduring made Grant respect the little boy even more.

That was when Grant noticed that the little girl from before, walked over and started to hug her older brother. While she was hugging her brother she looked over at Grant.

"Are you okay Mr. Carrot? That monster looked SUPER scary! Thank you for saving us by the way, you are very brave."

Grant couldn't help but chuckle at her statement and even through the searing pain, he managed a smile, "I'll be alright, Mr. Carrot won't fall that easily! You think that monster was pretty scary? I think that's the biggest animal that I've ever seen in my life! I bet it could feed a family of four for months if you ate it! Plus, I did promise to turn him into bacon, so maybe we'll have to go make that a reality!"

The little girl couldn't help but giggle at the fact that Grant had gone along with her nickname which made her smile shyly. She couldn't be more than 3 feet tall and had two small dimples in her cheeks when she smiled which made her cute as a button. She had shoulder length blonde hair that was tied up in a pony tail, which gave her an even more childish look. She wasn't as tan as her brother but she looked like a smaller version of the lady that he had seen with the two kids.

"My brother said he saw you beat that big monster. Did you really beat it?!"

Grant raised his chin ever so slightly trying to look smug for the little girl, "You bet I did! I used my sword like a Q-Tip and cleaned that oversized pigs' brains out!"

Giggling like a kid who was being teased, the little girl said, "Ewww that's gross Mr. Carrot. Don't say that!"

Grant chuckled at the little girls nickname for him once again. At first the idea of wearing the tracksuit bothered him, but when a cute little girl used a nickname like Mr. Carrot, it didn't sound so bad.

"What's your name little miss? My name is Grant but if you really want, I will allow you to call me Mr. Carrot.

Of course, you're the only one in the entire world that can call me that! Not even my best friends can call me that! So you should feel really special!"

The girl immediately lit up like a shining star hearing what Grant had to say before she answered his questions.

"My name is Robin and I'm 11 this year! I'm the only one who can call you Mr. Carrot?! Awesome! You're like a super hero from those movies! You were so fast when you were running too! I wish I could be that strong..."

Hearing her compliments, Grant was naturally happy, but since he had to endure endless pain just to have the conversation with the little girl, he let out a self deprecating laugh. He may look strong to her, but he wasn't nearly strong enough.

"Thank you for the compliment but I'm not really that strong. I almost got beat by a large pig afterall!

You said your name was Robin, huh? What a lovely name! And 12 years old? You're almost an adult!"

Robin giggled incessantly yet again while holding her hands in front of her and twisting around in embarrassment.

"No I'm not! I'm not even allowed to be outside after dark! How is that almost an adult?!"

And with that Robin started to giggle even more uncontrollably as if the mere thought that she was almost an adult was the funniest thing in the word. Grant couldn't help but laugh along with her despite the pain it caused him.

[This is nice. It makes me miss my own family. I wish I had a cute little sister... it's a shame I only had the older one and we never got along.. Just seeing her smile and hearing her laugh makes the pain hurt a little less..

I've never been appreciated like this before..]

{I appreciate you, Grant.}

[Shut up Sherlock, you're ruining the moment.]

While Grant and Robin were having their little back and forth, Richard finally managed to compose himself enough to continue talking to Grant.

"I'm sorry for crying. I am just so thankful that you showed up and saved mom.

I will try to answer your questions the best I can. I guess you have already figured it out, but we are the family that you saved in the park.

As to where you are, we are inside one of the houses near the park. After you turned around to face those monsters, we continued to run until we heard a loud impact. My mom directed us towards this house, and once we were inside, she got distracted by the trying to fix her leg, so I snuck out to see what had happened to you.

It was scary, but I didn't want to leave you to fight such a scary monster all by yourself so I tried to gather my courage to help.

However, before I even got the chance to help, you were already in the process of killing the monster. Or at least I think so, since you both collapsed onto the ground shortly after I arrived.

After I saw you pass out, I tried to wake you up but you were just laying next to the monster. Since I thought it would be risky to leave you there out in the open, I wrapped your arm in my t-shirt to try and control the bleeding, and then dragged you to this house.

Mom is currently resting in the other room. She said she felt tired after she fixed your arm as best as she could, so she went to lay down. Mom used to be a nurse, so after she scolded me for sneaking out, she did her best to fix your wound but the wound on her leg was still bleeding really bad so I think it was hard for her to work for too long."

After his long winded explanation, he took a pause to let Grant take in everything.

[So basically this family saved me from potentially being killed while I was unconscious. Wait..]

"You said that your Mom helped me? Didn't she have a really nasty wound on her leg? How could she endure that to help me..."

Richard paused for a few moments before he responded.

"By the time I got back to the house with you, Mom had already bandaged her leg so I'm not sure how or what she did to stop the pain but when she saw you and I covered in your blood, she seemed to forget about the pain because she moved like she normally would without the wound."

At first Grant was surprised that the woman would suddenly overcome pain like that, but then it hit him how she had accomplished it.

[Probably adrenaline, I bet she thought that some of the blood was Richard's and she ignored her own plight to try and help him. Thankfully it seemed to keep her going long enough to treat my wound..]

"Did your Mom say whether I would lose my arm or not?"

That was really Grant's main concern now. If his arm couldn't be saved then he'd have to somehow learn to fight and survive with only one arm, which would limit him severely. Luckily he got a positive response from Richard.

"Mom said that she believes that your arm can and will be saved. After I got you back here, she cleaned and dressed your wound as best as she could.

It has been nearly 24 hours since then and she said she can already see that your wound has started to heal. She estimates that in a few weeks your arm should fully heal. She also said that if you woke up in pain, it was a good sign because it meant your nerves weren't completely shot or dead.

Plus, when she was dressing your arm wound, she noticed that your leg had been wrapped in two different locations but when she removed the bandages, she said that she saw no visible wounds or even scars.

She said that based on the amount of blood in the wraps themselves, it was likely you had some serious injuries at some point."

[My bodies ability to heal itself must have increased as my stats increased. This is big news. I'm starting to feel a bit like one of my favorite characters from one of the best novels I've read... Wounded arm just like him, super regenerative abilities, fighting monsters. This is awesome! Wait, no it's not.. I almost lost my entire fucking arm! Get your shit together Grant, people are probably dying all over the world right now. This is not something to celebrate.]

Unaware of his inner monologue, Richard continued on, "As for where your stuff is, it is on the table in the other room. we have not opened your bag or touched any of your belongings other than bringing them here with you."

While still bearing with the unbelievable amount of pain, Grant forced another smile and, "Thank you. I may have lost my arm, if not more, without your help. I am grateful that you were there to help me."

"It was the least I could do. As I said before, I couldn't leave behind the person who saved my little sister and my mom."

Noticing that the conversation was coming to an end, Robin ran up to the side of the bed and pushed Grant back down onto the bed which wasn't hard since he could barely keep his head propped up.

"Thank you again Mr. Carrot! Now lay back and let this adult take care of you!"

[Why does it sound like someone is screaming, "FBI OPEN UP!" in the back of my mind?]