Twisted Reality AU

Chapter 13

"Anyone? Please help, it's Alex!" Samheed said, bursting through the Ward. The night shift nurses glanced up while Samheed hastily left Alex on a vacant bed. Then he shook his hand as if he can just shake the burning sensation.

"Are you alright dear? Did you burn yourself?"  said one of the free nurses.

"I'll be fine, but could you please help out Alex." Samheed requested desperately. He lost two of his friends, he wasn't about to lose another. "He's covered in burns and bruises while feeling ice cold at the same time. that it burns to just hold him" His voice broke at the last couple words. Why did he decide just standing there? He could have just pulled Alex out a lot earlier and possibly saved him. Samheed let out a shaky breath and combed his hair back with his fingers while another Nurse lended him some burn cream and pulled over a chair. The other staff was called over to tend to Alex after noticing how severe the bruises looked, and thankfully there weren't too many patients in here.

Samheed watched the drastic scene, feeling panic rise as more and more nurses crowd. "What am I supposed to do if he's gone? I've lost everyone." Samheed whispered to himself, while reprimanding himself at the same time over not helping Alex earlier. Or maybe, if he didn't interrupt, Alex could have successfully performed it avoiding harm. He brought in his knees and glanced at Alex's bed where nurses hovered with all sorts of items. This felt scarier than the Quill Fire, or the past battles.

The rest of the night until bright morning, nurses shifted in and out while Samheed waited, panicking over most of the hours, rethinking all his actions. Occasionally he's heard something of "His pulse is extremely low, I'm concerned" or a "How did the head mage burn himself so bad? And these deep gashes. . ." 

Perhaps it was the late hour of 4 am where Samheed was that tired that he ended up tearing up until he fell asleep. "Hunny," was the first words Samheed heard when a nurse gently shook him awake. "You should go hun, he won't be awake for a while."

"I'll be fine, I can wait." said Samheed, using the sleeve of his hoodie to wipe his tear soaked cheeks.

"Hun, It seems it may be days before he wakes up. He must've gotten so hurt that his body temporarily shut down from being unable to register all the burns and pain. Don't worry, he's breathing." the Nurse said, with a comforting smile.

"He's all I have left, I can't lose him---"

"I can't make any promises but I will assure you that he's stable right now."

After constant convincing, Samheed left, feeling worse than ever. He honestly felt mad at Alex for doing such a thing, for doing all these things. He covered his face with his hands, unsure how to feel.

Before when Alex had fallen into the ocean during that attack from Eagala, Alex wasn't awake for three days, but even then he wasn't worried. Sky was busy at Quill replenishing the place with her brother, and she wouldn't have known anything about this. Sky would be the only one friend he had left and even then he felt empty. "Alex, you idiot. . ." he muttered with a broken voice.

With the next two days, Samheed would check in with Alex every morning and stay there throughout the nights. One of those nights the Nurse had passed Samheed that ripped page which she found in Alex's robe. That first night, Samheed had deciphered it and figured the spell went wrong. He guessed that the swirling lights must've gotten "cursed", like the spell warned. A poisoned soul, cursed magic shall seek.

Or perhaps Samheed was wrong as well. Didn't matter much anyway, he had enough nights to figure it out. The second night, Samheed gave the spell another shot. He figured out the first two lines which Alex was committing too, but something caused it to go wrong. A poisoned soul, Samheed repeated, cursed magic shall seek. It was getting late by now, so Samheed randomly tested things out. Cursed magic shall seek, he repeated. Cursed magic shall seek a poisoned soul. Well that was some progress. He sighed and pocketed the page. It wouldn't even matter if Alex didn't manage surviving.

The third day Alex was still unconscious, Samheed couldn't bear checking on him. The past other nights, he heard nothing but negative feedback. Most of the day went to him skipping rocks at the lagoon, or sculpting some spells, or helping Sky out with Quill. It was getting kind of lonely. The night, Samheed spent staring at the ceiling, throwing a ball up and down until his blackboard rung.

It was pretty late at night, so this caught Samheed off guard. A message from Henry, who had taken over care of Alex after the night Samheed brought him in. The message gleamed, waiting to be said, and Samheed held his breath over opening it.

"Samheed, I'm sorry. . ."