37. Doing Fine

I don’t like hospitals. I don’t go to them often, but when I do it’s almost always for a reason like this. The sterile smell, the oppressively beige decoration, and the flimsy cots all do nothing but bring to mind the small, unconscious forms lying with IVs in their arms and heartbeat monitors beside their beds. It’s an inescapable atmosphere of failure.

NOT failure, Minerva reminds me. We got them into danger, but we got them back out. We saved them.

Not yet, we haven’t.

The doctor said they’ll both be fine.

That’s true, but we don’t know for sure. Aurora has been asleep for like twenty hours now. That’s terrifying. I don’t know how you aren’t scared. You’re supposed to be the green mage, here.

I’m practicing what Castalia had us practice. Judging the feelings you have and asking if they’re feelings you should have. As anger and fear mages, we need even more than the average amount of self-control to function at our peak, since our emotions are the most volatile and prone to taking over our actions. Judge first, feel second.

Yeah. Yeah, I know that’s what I should be doing. I’m trying. How did you get all the self-control, anyway? You’re a fucking kid.

Heck if I know. Perhaps my self-control is simply more compact.

Heh.

“Nngh,” Aurora begins to stir, and I jolt in my seat, the entirety of my focus on her in an instant. Aurora’s mother, who has also been sitting by her bed with me, rouses as well, her piercing brown eyes zeroing in on her daughter in an instant.

Aurora yawns, stretching a little under the covers before her eyes groggily flutter open. Her mother leans forward immediately, filling her daughter’s vision as the girl opens her eyes.

“Mami…?”

Aurora’s mother responds with a full-body hug and several rapid-fire words in Spanish that I can’t catch. I stay where I am, letting the two of them have their moment. Aurora’s mother hasn’t said a word to me since she got here, only occasionally looking my way with furious glares that doubled in intensity when I eventually fell out of Minerva’s incarnate form and revealed what we really look like. She probably thinks I’m a pedophile on top of everything else.

It’s fine. She’s right to hate me. I don’t deserve her respect. I never did, and I certainly don’t after all of this.

“M…Minerva?” Aurora asks, still groggy. “Hey. You’re still here?”

“Of course I’m still here,” I answer, not bothering to correct her. Minerva is the one who saved her. The one that’s important to her. And Minerva is here, even if I’m the one in control. “There was no way I was leaving before you woke up.”

“And now she has woken up,” Aurora’s mother interjects. “So honor your word and go. I want time alone with my daughter.”

“Huh…?” Aurora mumbles.

“Alright,” I agree, standing up. “I’ll be back to see you later, alright Aurora?”

“Oh, um… okay?” she allows, and I take a deep breath as I stand up, stepping away from her and poking my head past the curtain to Veritas’ cot, giving her a smile. She perks up from where she’d been watching some cartoon on a tablet and gives me a hopeful look.

“She’s up?” Veritas asks, fiddling with some of her bandages.

“She’s awake,” I confirm. “Talking, too. She’s fine, just like the doctors said.”

“Oh, good,” Veritas says. “Great. I was… really scared.”

“It’s okay,” I promise her. “I was too.”

“Well, you’re supposed to be!” Veritas huffs.

“I think everyone is supposed to be scared when their friend and teammate nearly dies,” I say.

Veritas squirms uncomfortably.

“But I let it stop me,” she mumbles. “I froze up.”

I take a deep breath and let it out.

“I’ve done worse than that before,” I admit to her. “Everyone made it out okay, Veritas. We’ll train harder, get you used to situations like this, and you won’t freeze up next time. That’s all there is to it. Right?”

She stares at me like I’m somehow worth looking up to.

“Right!” she agrees.

I maintain my smile, because it’s the right thing to do.

“I should probably go home and take a shower or something,” I tell her. “You gonna be good here?”

“Yup!” Veritas assures me. “They’ll be letting me out later today.”

“Cool. Have Uma’tama call me if you need anything, alright? No training unless they approve it, though.”

“Okay!”

I step back out from her privacy curtain, letting my body droop a bit now that I’m no longer being watched. Damn, I am so exhausted. I think I’ve been awake for over twenty-four hours straight at this point. I might have a lot more endurance than the average person, but I could pass out like a corpse right about now. God.

Yawning as I wander out of the patient area and into an elevator, I return to the hospital lobby, just trying to seem like a normal person who definitely doesn’t have a gun hidden in her vest and a significantly more dangerous weapon on her necklace. It just feels like the kind of day where my illegally acquired pistol will somehow be found out in the middle of the hospital and people will assume I’m here to shoot the place up. Not because any part of that is remotely logical, I’m just getting those kinds of vibes from the world right now.

Nobody around is paying any attention to me, of course, not even when my paranoia causes me to keep glancing in every direction at once. This is just a normal hospital, after all, most people are here because they’re just getting a routine checkup and shit. It’s not like… huh.

Is that the mute girl? What’s her name again? It was some Roman goddess, it sounded so familiar. I halfway thought she was an Earth Guardian, but I guess not. What was it? Luna, right? Luna. I could swear I’ve heard that name before.

She’s at the front desk, looking like she’s paying for something. She finishes up before I approach, but almost immediately looks my way. I give her a wave. She nods and waves back, her face still covered by that medical mask. I suppose it’s less weird in a hospital.

“Uh, hey… Luna,” I say, still not one hundred percent certain that’s actually her name. Fortunately, I don’t feel a bump of confusion or irritation from her, so I’m pretty sure I got it right. Her emotions are strangely easy to read. Not by a lot, but solidly above average. More power than most people. There’s a good chance she occasionally casts minor magic by complete accident without ever knowing it.

“What are you doing at the hospital?” I ask. “Everything okay? Or… shoot, sorry, I guess you can’t really respond, can you?”

She furrows her eyebrows at me for a moment, and then to my absolute shame and horror she pulls out her phone, instantly making me feel like the biggest dumbass in the universe as I have to stand here and watch her type out a response, which is obviously something she can do.

“Hey so did you know there’s this super cool niche thing they’re calling ‘writing’ these days?” her phone screen says as she turns it so I can see it. I’m not blushing. You’re blushing.

Are you talking to me? We share the same body!

No! I don’t know! Shut up!

“I… in my defense,” I say, “I have had a bit of a rough couple of days, and I’m not really… thinking well. Right now.”

“You don’t say,” her phone reads when next she flips it. “Wouldn’t have guessed. In all seriousness though, it’s cool. Chloe told me something happened and Castalia filled me in when she got back.”

“Oh. Uh. Okay. Are you… here for that, then?” I ask, a little confused. I literally just met this girl, I don’t know why she would be here for my sake.

“No? I just had a normal checkup,” Luna types out. “I’m happy to run into you, though, if you wanna walk home together?”

Huh? Why would we… eh, whatever.

“Sure,” I allow. Maybe I’ll get a second friend or something. Wouldn’t that be novel. Who cares if she knows where my house is anyway. Luna gives me a thumbs-up rather than typing anything else out and we start walking, me mentally trying to figure out where my house is from here. I take a good look around when we make it outside, my brain doing its absolute best to form thoughts. I think… that way?

I start to walk and feel a flash of confusion from Luna, which… yeah, I mean, what was she expecting? She taps my shoulder and starts pointing a different way.

“…What?” I ask. “Did you expect us to live in the same direction?”

She gives me a bewildered look and rapidly starts typing on her phone again.

“Yes??? We live in the same dorm complex??? We moved all your stuff in there a couple days ago, remember?”

Huh? Oh. Oh! I totally forgot. I have an apartment now. Or… a dorm? An apartment-dorm? I’m not living with my brother.

No better time to test out our new bed, since we CLEARLY need it.

Oh god I moved in with Chloe and straight up haven’t seen her since. She’s gonna kill me.

What? No, she’s just going to be all quietly supportive and secretly concerned.

Yeah, and it’ll kill me!

Oh no it totally will, you’re right.

“…I am very tired,” I admit. “I haven’t slept since I got to the hospital.”

Luna looks at me like I’ve grown a second head—

Nope, still stuck in just the one.

—and grabs me by the wrist, turning and stomping towards what I’m going to assume is the direction of our dorms. She keeps tapping away at her phone with one hand, which… I mean, kind of impressive actually, I kind of suck at using cell phones.

Man, she’s really going at it. Look at that. Her thumb is so fast. I wonder what she’s doing. Are we already out of the hospital parking lot? When did we do that? Maybe I can shut my eyes and let her just drag me around.

Terrible idea, don’t do that.

Bleh. Fine.

“Are you chatting with someone else or do you just have a really long message for me?” I ask, starting a conversation just to help keep my eyes open. Luna responds by covering most of her phone screen other than the top and showing it to me. It says ‘Chloe.’ Heh. That’s my friend. Wonder why that’s on her screen.

She’s texting Chloe.

She’s texting Chloe! Right, yeah.

God we need sleep. This is almost as bad as the time you got us shot.

Oh no. I hope no one shoots Luna. I hope my gun doesn’t randomly discharge and shoot Luna!

Why would it… ugh. Please don’t jinx us like that. Look, we’re almost to campus.

Oh! That was fast.

Either that or our sense of time is collapsing along with our consciousness. I’m kinda hungry, too. When was the last time we ate?

Also over a day ago.

Right. Yeah. Wow, we are bad at this.

What’s this?

I dunno. Existing?

Oh, true. But we kinda knew that about—ah! Stairs!? Stairs. Right. Yeah. We live upstairs.

God, we need to focus on where we’re walking.

Where are we walking?

Open our dang eyes, Fulgora!

I do so just in time to see Luna pounding on the door to some apartment (my apartment?) loudly enough to wake the dead. Chloe swiftly opens the door.

“Luna! Oh, thank you so much,” Chloe says. “I’m so, so sorry, you really didn’t have to bring her back, I could have picked her up myself.”

What am I, a lost dog? Luna waves Chloe off and just points at both of the bedroom doors in sequence.

“Huh? Oh, that one!” Chloe says, indicating one of them. Luna nods, walks over to it, and jiggles the knob, finding it locked. Turning to look at me, she holds out an expectant hand, palm-up.

The key.

Right! She wants the key. The key to my room. My room that I have definitely had a chance to look inside of after starting to live here. I… do not know where my key is. I don’t remember getting one…? Do we have to check in for that? Did Chloe check in for that? Did she give me a key? I can’t remember. I check my various pockets, not finding anything of note.

Luna seems to pick up on my increasing embarrassment, and responds by rolling her eyes, pulling a bobby pin out of her hair, and snapping it in half, bending the tip of one end with her fingers. Kneeling down, she goes still for a moment, staring at the lockpick intently before sticking both halves of the pin into the lock, jiggling one around, and opening the door not even ten seconds later.

Holy crap.

“That seems illegal,” I point out as Luna opens the door and shoves me onto the sheetless mattress inside, causing me to collapse back into the bed. Mmm. Comfy.

My eyes open as Luna snaps her fingers twice, pointing at my shoes and then at the floor.

“…Fine, fine,” I mumble, sitting up to take them off, tossing them onto the ground. She’s so pushy. Literally. Because she pushed me. If I didn’t have superpowers I might have gotten hurt.

Fortunately, we have superpowers.

Sure, but she doesn’t know that.

…Yes she does.

Oh, right. I’m gonna try to sleep I think.

YOU THINK!? YEAH GOOD IDEA.

The next thing I know, I’m curled up in a completely different position on the bed, a familiar and delicious smell wafting in from under the door and rousing my ravenous stomach. What is that…? I don’t want to move at all, my entire body feeling so heavy and so comfortable that the idea of getting up almost physically hurts. But my stomach also hurts, and it is ordering me in no uncertain terms to get my ass out there and eat whatever is making that smell. I drag myself up to a sitting position, forcing myself to stand up and stagger over to my door, opening it.

Luna and Chloe are both in the kitchen, Chloe pulling a bunch of things out of the fridge as Luna chops up vegetables at an impressive pace while something on the stove simmers—and produces that incredible smell.

“You’re really used to making the whole sauce from scratch?” Chloe askes. “You don’t just buy a sauce base?”

Luna nods, upending the contents of her cutting board into the pot.

“That’s really impressive,” Chloe admits. “I love cooking for me and my dad, but you’re like… an actual cook!”

Luna doesn’t seem to know how to respond, but she glances behind herself long enough to spot me and seems content to change the subject by pointing in my direction.

“Huh?” Chloe says before turning, spotting me, and immediately exuding a bloom of worry and anger, which is somehow so much worse than either of those things individually, and stomps over to me. “What are you doing up!?”

“I, um… hungry,” I babble like a caveman.

“Food will be ready in an hour or two, just go back to sleep until then,” Chloe insists.

How am I supposed to sleep when a smell that good is right outside my door? Luna puts down her knife and makes a few hand signs, causing Chloe to scowl at her.

“She needs sleep!” Chloe insists.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

More signs. Man, being left out of conversations about me is so cool.

“…I guess so,” Chloe allows, sighing. “Well, sit down, Eliza. You look like you’re about to fall over.”

“I am,” I admit.

“Then sit down!”

Oh, right. I hobble over to the couch and collapse into it. Cozy. I groggily watch Chloe return to the kitchen and start prepping some chicken. Mmm. Chicken. I’d eat that shit raw right now if she put it in front of me.

Please don’t.

Oh, hey! Good morning, Minerva.

I don’t know what time it is but it definitely isn’t morning.

You’re so grumpy lately.

I’d take control of the body to slap some sense into you but I think if I tried that I’d end up too loopy to move.

Yeah. Maybe I’ll just close my eyes a little here on the couch. Just rest a bit while the yummy food is getting made.

“Eliza?”

“Huh!? I’m okay,” I say instinctively, jolting up from where I was lying down. My face hurts.

“Um… the food’s ready,” Chloe says, hovering over me with a plate in her hand. Luna stands behind her, drying her hands off with a towel.

“Oh,” I say. “That was fast.”

“It’s been like two hours,” Chloe answers.

Luna rests the towel on her shoulder and makes several signs, including pointing to me and pointing to her own butt.

“Pfft,” Chloe laughs a bit. “I mean, yeah, I can tell.”

“What?” I ask. “What did she say?”

“She said ‘her ass is not okay,'” Chloe answers. “Come on, let’s sit you up and get some food in you, alright?”

She sets the plate down on the table in front of me, helping me right myself a little as I stare at it, a couple of the few working neurons in my brain firing back and forth at the sight of what’s in front of me.

“Hey, wait,” I mumble. “This is what you made when I went over to your house that one time. T…Tiki Malasada.”

Luna twitches like she’s holding back a laugh.

“C-close, but no,” Chloe says, her smile a bit strained. “Tikka masala. Eat up. Luna says you probably haven’t eaten in a long time.”

“Just like, a day,” I mumble.

“God,” Chloe groans, turning to Luna. “You see what I’m dealing with here?”

Luna nods, makes a few more signs, and gives Chloe a thumbs-up. I’m way too tired and hungry to care about whatever it is she just said. I wolf down the food, and despite it being the best thing I’ve ever tasted I barely have the energy to enjoy it. Luna waves goodbye and leaves our dorm, an exhausted-looking Chloe sitting down on the couch next to me with a plate of her own.

“Luna’s not eating?” I ask. “I thought she helped you make everything.”

“She did, but she said she ate earlier,” Chloe frowns. “Which… seems implausible, given she walked you back from the hospital hours ago, but I’ll worry about whether or not she has an eating disorder some other day.”

Yeah, that’s a little weird. Why make all this delicious food and not eat it?

“What’s an eating disorder?” I ask.

Chloe gives me an incredulous look.

“Jeez, you really were raised by a boy,” she says. Which, well, I think is uncalled for. Jim has many effeminate qualities.

What?

Huh?

“An eating disorder is when some kind of psychological issue causes a person to develop unhealthy or outright dangerous eating habits,” Chloe explains. “It’s particularly common for girls who feel pressured into maintaining a particular weight or figure, but it can be from all kinds of things. For example, someone might feel guilty over someone else getting hurt and refuse to eat or sleep for twenty-four hours like a complete moron.”

Yeah that sounds dumb.

She’s talking about US, you idiot!

What? No, what we did was different. We had to be there when she woke up.

I… just keep eating.