Walking Amongst Them (Among Us, Book 2)

welcome

We were escorted inside.

They took our things and handed us each a new pair of clothes and escorted us to bathrooms. I didn't like it when Cody went in to a separate bathroom, but I couldn't complain. I wouldn't, either. He'd looked unwilling to let go of Stephanie, only doing so when Trish offered the younger girl her support.

I noticed that Clara was the only one to take her time in the showers. She babbled to us that this was all just protocol, as Stephanie knew and Trish should know. She avoided addressing me outright, but an audience was an audience, and so she spoke.

For someone who was trying to get back to her father's side, she seemed perfectly patient as Trish and I took the opportunity to clean Stephanie's wound and help her get cleaned up in general. While I didn't doubt that Stephanie would get medical treatment, I also knew to not waste a shower opportunity.

Stephanie didn't seem to mind me helping.

When we emerged we found Cody sitting on a couch, bent forward with his elbows on his knees as he stared at his clasped hands. Trish and I walked Stephanie to him, and we were all encouraged to take a seat. When the woman who'd escorted us from the showers to this apparent waiting room left, I noticed that Cody still had flakes of blood on his neck.

He had apparently not cared for the shower.

He had probably gotten in long enough to look wet, and then gotten dressed to wait for his sister.

It made me feel guilty for having taken my time. I looked away, finding my eyes on Clara. She sat in a love seat across from us, and looked as if her only real concern now was how to get her nails to look less ragged. Behind a door that I hadn't noticed- I must have been getting tired by then, a conversation grew louder.

It stopped abruptly, just before the door knob was twisted, and the door flung open.

"Clara! Darling! You're safe!" a man said, as he rushed into the room and knelt on the floor next to Clara.

She threw her arms around him, clinging to him in a way that made me feel bad for the horrible thoughts I'd had towards her. This feeling was enunciated as her father pried her off of him after a moment, holding her at arms length. At first I thought it was like they did in the books, he was getting a good look at his loved one he thought to have been lost to him.

"So where is it?" his voice was excited, breathless, his head swiveled away from Clara's slightly fallen expression.

When he turned towards us, I got my first real look at him. A porky man, with around belly and full cheeks that had a permanent blush on them. His lips were wet, even as he licked them in his excitement while peering at the rest of us. He pushed up his rectangular glasses and dropped his hands from his daughter entirely to face us, his eyes mainly on Trish.

"Where's the medications?" he repeated, his hands going together over his chest as he awaited our response.

Trish looked slightly uncomfortable, "I was told to get the girl."

The doctor blinked at her, several times before his face broke from its frozen expression. I couldn't tell if he was more disappointed by the news, or by the fact that Trish didn't appear to be joking about it.

"I brought back your daughter," Trish said, slower than usual.

She waited, we all did. The doctor sputtered a bit, looked down at his daughter, and then back at us.

"Right, yes, well... no medicines you say?"

I couldn't help but glance to her, finding Clara's eyes to have taken a glossy quality. She wasn't emotional, exactly. I wasn't even sure she was present in the moment.