Eyes | Amphibia

Chapter 20

TW: This chapter contains violence and fighting. Proceed at your own risk.

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There was a small hospital within the castle for Amphibian royalty, so that's where Sasha went. Thankfully, she was almost immediately recognized, easily standing out against the rest of the patients around.
"Sasha?" A newt doctor asked as he approached her, his eyes wide with shock. "What are you doing here? Are Marcy and Anne here too?"
Sasha was admittedly getting quite sick of explaining the situation to everyone she ran into, but she knew she'd have to tell the doctor regardless in order to get the best possible treatment for her injury. She went on to explain the situation to the doctor in the simplest terms possible, but it was still enough to leave the doctor with his jaw agape in bewilderment.
"It zapped my arm with the stone before it left for Amphibia," Sasha explained, holding out his damaged arm for the doctor to analyze. "It's mostly numb, except when I try to move it I get a shooting pain all the way up to my shoulder."
"Oh, wow..." The doctor squinted his eyes as he examined Sasha's arm. He took note of her pale, cold skin, as well as her darkened veins. "I've never seen anything like this before."
Sasha sighed. That wasn't helpful. "Well, is there anything you can do? To help with the pain or just make it movable again? This is kind of urgent."
"I'm not sure," The doctor stepped back. "We can run some tests and try to treat you for electric shock and similar conditions I suppose, but I can't promise you any positive results. Besides, don't you think it'd be beneficial for you to stay here awhile and let us study this? If The Core is out there with that stone, it could do this very thing to many others, and we need to know how to treat them."
The blonde's heart sank. He hadn't thought of that, but this situation was dire, and he needed out of here as quickly as possible. "But Doctor, I told you, this is urgent! I need to be out there helping... I need to help save Marcy!"
The doctor sighed. He was silent for a few moments as he pondered over the situation before finally asking, "Have you informed the king of this?"
"Of course I have," Sasha affirmed after a bit of hesitation; Grime being king would take some getting used to. "He's working on coming up with some defense with a friend of mine as we speak."
The doctor looked relieved, but his eyes were apologetic as he gazed as Sasha. "Then it looks like the situation is under control, Sasha. You need time to recover, and we need to study this condition. It'd be in your best interest to stay here awhile... King Grime can handle everything else."
Sasha furrowed his brows and gazed down at the ground. As much as he didn't want to admit it, he knew the doctor was right. Besides, Anise was right: He was in no condition to fight. Surely it'd be okay if he rested here just for a little while.
"Okay... fine." She gave in. "But if Grime calls for me, I'm going to help."
"Deal." The doctor smiled. "Now, follow me. We'd better go run some tests."
Sasha nodded, sighing as she followed the doctor to an exam room. She just had to hope that Grime and Anise would be successful without her for awhile. And Anne... she just had to hope that she would be safe.

...

"Alright, human whose name I didn't catch," Grime began, looking down at the unfamiliar person before him from where he sat on his throne. "Do you have any experience with battle?"
"My name is Anise," The pink-haired teen chuckled. "And not necessarily, but I am pretty good with a bat! I'm the captain of my school's softball team back home." They adjusted their grip on their bat and smiled up at the King.
"Well, I don't know what softball is, but being adept with a bat is promising." Grime nodded. "And 'captain' you say? I was a captain once. Oh frog, I was so different back then. Sasha and her little friends really softened me."
Anise raised a brow. "Are you and Sasha close?"
"Close? It was my toads who found her when she first got zapped here!" Grime chuckled fondly at the memory. "Sasha was a lot different back then too— almost unrecognizable, if you compared him to now. After proving his strength, Sasha served as my lieutenant back at the tower, and later went on to lead the resistance: A rebellion against King Andrias." Grime let go of a reminiscent sigh. "She was... like the child I never had."
Anise remembered Sasha and Anne telling her about the resistance. "Wow. That's... cool." It was in this moment that Anise realized how truly out of place they were here. They didn't share the same experience and connections Anne, Sasha, and even Marcy had in Amphibia, and they were barely given any time to process any of this before they were thrown into the deep end. They felt like a newt in a town full of frogs.
"Yeah," Grime breathed out another sigh before straightening out his expression, focusing back on the mission at hand. "Alright, let's get down to business. You and Sasha haven't been able to locate The Core yet, correct?"
Anise pushed their feelings aside. Time was limited, and they had to focus on finding and saving Marcy. They could take time to process all this craziness later. "No, we haven't. We were actually starting to lose hope before you found us. I suggested that The Core might not be in Newtopia, but Sasha seemed to think that was preposterous."
"Well, it's possible," Grime hummed in thought, "But if it really wanted to take over Amphibia, it would make sense for it to be somewhere around here."
"Maybe it knows it's not capable of taking over without any army or allies, so it's gone somewhere else for the time being?" Anise suggested.
"Maybe, but either way, we need to be ready for when we find it or it decides to show itself. And I know the perfect newts who can help us." Hopping down from his throne, Grime beckoned for Anise to follow him. "Come with me; I'll introduce you to Lady Olivia and General Yunan."