Dan sighed. "I guess so." Nadia, on the other hand, was mostly
upset at Colt, not because she thought that he was being
condescending, but for not trusting her, for not thinking about how
much it would hurt her if he had been injured, or worse, kiled. She
avoided his gaze, the hurt imminent on her pale face. "I think it's
time we go inside," Dan said hurriedly. Standing up a little
straighter, he helped Nadia and his sister into the hospital. The
receptionist, as well as a doctor who was in the lobby, saw them
and hurried over. Seeing that Colt was the only one uninjured, she
asked him, "Sir, what happened?" as the doctor ushered the three
others away.
The boy watched Nadia go with a look of sorrow on his face. He'd
been trying to protect her, he really had. Had it been worth it? He
wasn't sure, but it had put Nadia in a position where she was able
to save their behinds, and for that, he told himself, he should be
grateful. He would deal with it later... "Ma'am, you know the whole
Morshton Academy thing? The people who caused that were holding the
younger girl hostage and using her to manipulate the boy, her
brother. As far as I know, they injected some sort of technology
into her against her will. The older girl has a knife wound a
couple days old that she aggravated while we broke in to their
headquarters to free the younger. So... call the police?"
The receptionist stared at him in disbelief for a minute,
muttering, "You're one of the kids who stopped the Killing Game?"
She shook her head, returning to proffesional mode. "My apologies.
Yes, of course I'll call the police." As she walked back to the
phone on her desk, she called out to him, "Are you injured in any
way?"
He shook his head. "Not physically, no." He certainly couldn't say
anything positive about the outlook for his mental state, though,
or for that of the others. He knew he was lucky to have them, to
have a family that loved him. Perhaps they would take in Dan and
Amaya, too, or maybe his grandparents on his mother's side could.
Foster care didn't seem like the best option for two children who
had been through what those siblings had. He'd suggest it when he
got the chance. Sitting down on a couch in the waiting room, the
boy pulled out his phone and shot a text to Cam, though he knew his
older brother was most likely still asleep.
It was a few hours before the nurse came back, holding a clipboard
and going to Colt, glancing at him and then the paper. "You must be
the boy that came with them, no? All three are doing just fine.
Nadia, as she called herself, just needed some care to the wound.
She tore a few stitches and the bleeding was a concern at first,
but she's alright. Dan just has some major brusies and nothing an
ice pack won't fix. As for Amaya.." she flipped a page. "We ran
some scans, and it apears there's some kind of metal in her spine,
back, limbs, and legs. There will have to be a few surgiries, we'll
need some kind of parent or guardian." She looked up at him in
concern. "Young man, you don't look too old yourself. Where are
your parents?"
"Legally, I can authorize whatever you need authorized, I believe,"
he said, pulling out his wallet and showing her his ID. "Her
parents, if I understand correctly, had no knowledge of that but
wouldn't care one lick if they did. They willingly handed her over
to the people who did it, and therefore relinquished all
guardianship of her and her brother. My parents are currently more
than an hour away and likely asleep, but I could contact them if
you so desire."
The nurse took the id, scanning it with her eyes for a minute
before handing it back. "Yes, they most certainly have. If there's
no other family memebers we can contact for consent, I suppose that
you qualify." She dissapeared into a room, coming out with a few
papers and handing them to him. "If you would please sign these, we
can arrange the surgery as soon as possible. Would you want to see
any of them? As far as I know, Nadia and Amaya are okay for
visitors, though not for long."
The nurse nodded. "Yes of course." Storing the papers away, she led
him down the hallway to the room where she was at. Nadia was
leaning back in the bed, staring at the ceiling. She didn't look at
the door when they entered, but she did mumble, "Hola.." and went
back to staring at the ceiling.
"Salve," he said gently, testing out a bit of humor, trying to see
if he could get through to her. "Nadia, look... I'll admit it, I
was scared," Colt began, flopping down on the ground beside her bed
and crossing his legs. "I was scared for you, I was scared of what
would happen if we ended up in a situation where I'd have to chose
between you and something or someone, be it my own morality or the
life of another. After Dan showed us that video... Nad', please
understand what was going through my head! Okay, I wasn't just
scared, I was terrified, horrified. If I'd been able to see a way
in which you wouldn't be put in any of those situations, I wouldn't
have made you stay, but I didn't; there was a huge chance it
wouldn't work, and I couldn't allow you to be caught up in that."
After he'd finished, the boy just sat there, eyes fixed on his
hands in his lap, shoulders shaking a bit.
Nadia glanced at him, shaking her head. "Colt, I get that you were
scared. If I were in your shoes, I would have felt the same way!
That's not why I'm mad.." She looked up at the ceiling. "Ever since
my mom dissapeared into the unkown, my dad didn't really have time
for me. It was always work, work, work, take your mind off of her,
forget about evreything. I couldn't comfort him without being
brushed off, I had to work so hard to take care of myself, and
whenever he stepped in to help, I felt like a burden. A useless
burden. And then evreything got worse, and even now I felt like a
burden, to you, your family, to evreyone! And when you told me to
stay behind, I..." She buried her face in her hands. "I'm sorry,
but I felt like I was useless again."
Shaking his headand moving forwards to gently lay his hand on her
shoulder, he said hoarsely, "Please, please, don't think that. It's
because you're the opposite. You've become so important to me..."
His voice broke and he couldn't continue, tears forming in his
eyes. Forcing himself to speak, though his voice was barely a
whisper, he continued, "I told you to stay behind, not because I
didn't want you there, but because I didn't want to even think
about what would happen if the end result was that you weren't
anywhere."
She looked at him, starting to cry. "Y-you seriously think so? You
really do care about me, huh? Smiling through her tears, she choked
out, "Aunque seas un idiota, eres lo más cercano a mi familia que
he estado. Así que no me derrumbes, Colt." "I'm sorry for scaring
you. I'll admit, what I did was dumb."
Colt smiled softly, moving his hand to brush a tear away from her
face. "I'm just glad you weren't harmed; if you were going to come,
that was probably the way to do it. I honestly think I was more
surprised than the guards, and that's saying something."
Nadia laughed a little. "Do you want to hear the whole story? It's
a bit of a laugh now that no one is in mortal danger, if I'm being
honest. Now that my adrenaline has stopped pumping and I'm in a
hospital again, it's not as bad."
"You kidding me? Of course; I must know how you tracked me down and
ended up in the ceiling of a top-secret compound. Let me guess, let
me guess; magic?" he grinned, wiping away his own tears with his
arm.
Nadia rolled her eyes, grinning. "Well, uh, not exactly. I stole
Cam's phone, used the app to track you, and got to what looked like
an apartment building. Guess the society didn't want people to
suspect them. Used the fire escape to get in, and knocked out a
guard, stealing his phone. Found out about the ambush, though I
knew I wouldn't be able to get there in time, so, I snuck out,
making my way through. When I heard two people crawiling through
the vents, I figured that was you, and most likely Dan's sister.
So, I hid in a matiance room, using the guard's phone to determine
that I was on the second floor. I wanted to figure out what to do.
But, I heard the scuffle underneath me, and realized I was right
above the enterance, and since I had only heard three people, I
guessed that you were meeting him and he had been found. Since you
would want to make it a quick getaway, I knew you'd be by the
enterance. I grabbed a pipe from a shelf, and waited. Turns out
there's a little storage unit inbetween the ceiling and floor, and
all it took was moving some panels in the nick of time to drop
down."
He shook his head in amazement. "You are quite something," he
laughed. His eyes then widened and he muttered, "Oh dear, well, if
you have Cam's phone, that means he's still got no idea where we
are and didn't get my message."
"Nah, left it behind. Though it is in the kitchen, so I'm not sure
which he'll read first, the note that I, err, editited, or the text
message." The amount of confusion Cam would go through when he woke
up was honestly enough to make Nadia laugh, hard, but aprubtly
stopped. "Ow."
"Oh dear," he grinned, imagining just how vexed his older brother
would be. He quickly sobered, though, concern flickering back into
his eyes. Slowly getting to his feet as he glanced at his phone and
realized that it was past 1, he said in a soft tone, "It's late;
I'll let you get some rest. Don't worry about anything, it's all
going to be okay. Okay?"