Throwing Stones in Glass Houses (Tentatively Ongoing)

Chapter 11: Resurrection

Hey folks. Some of you might already want to kill me, given the title, but have faith. This is one scene that I had in my head which was really important for the plot going forward, so I'm sticking with it as it is. If you still want more retribution, I've hidden a teeny spoiler in the comments for the fate of said harpy. She will be well dealt with, trust me.

"What do you mean she's dead, North?" Luke was the first to speak, after what felt like the longest minute of my life. North hadn't moved a muscle, as if he were somehow frozen in place, unable to free himself. He was in shock, I realised, recognising the familiar symptoms. I'd seen them in the mirror enough times, after all.

"What's wrong?" I tore my eyes from North's face to see Dr Green appear from within a dimly-lit alcove at the far end of the hallway, followed closely by Diana and the others. "Why did you...?" He broke off as he noticed the rest of our group, gathered around the immobile North. "What's wrong with him? North, what's wrong?"

"I don't know," Luke, again, was the only one that seemed to be able to speak. I could feel Silas and Nathan filling the remaining, scant space behind me in the doorway, but they exuded nothing but stunned silence. "He said something about Jade. He..."

"I killed her," North spat out harshly, his voice oddly void of emotion. It was chilling to witness. His head snapped up to meet Sean's gaze so fast that it had to have hurt him. "She's fucking dead!"

"Okay." As I watched, Sean's facial expression became almost scarily calm, between one heartbeat and the next. This wasn't the happy-go-lucky, jovial Sean anymore. This was a highly-trained medical professional, doing his job. "Where is she, North?"

North's aggressive façade crumpled like a house of cards, leaving a broken shell in its wake. I would have reached out for him but Luke's arm was still looped around my waist, firmly holding me in place.

"In here." North pointed back into the room he had just burst from with a shaky hand. His voice was steadier now that the doctor was here, but I could still hear the taut, panicked undertones that he didn't make any effort to try to hide. Sean swept down the corridor towards him, pulling his cell phone out of his pocket and up to his ear with crisp, unaffected efficiency. He barked out a few undecipherable instructions to someone on the other end, then rounded on the rest of us.

"Victor. Gabriel." The two boys stepped up behind him and stood to attention, like they had been trained for this moment their entire lives. It was quite possible that they had been. "Go and retrieve the emergency med kit from the nearest storage unit, then one of you go and inform Dr Roberts that we have a Code 15 on site." The two of them nodded and were turning to leave, when Diana spoke up quickly.

"I will go with them Dr Green," she offered, and Sean nodded sharply in agreement. "Somebody will need to inform the President if we have a potential fatality." She, unlike Victor and Gabriel, didn't need wait for instructions and hurried off towards the exit with two subdued manifests in tow.

"The rest of you, stay where you are until I can assess the situation. North, with me!" This was a side to Dr Green that I had yet to see and, if I was honest, it scared me a bit. The detached, clinical way with which he approached the unimaginable horror of what had just happened left me in awe of his skill as a healer but, at the same time, made me wonder how two such distinct personalities could exist inside a single person.

The instant that the two of them disappeared through the open doorway, the rest of the boys moved as one to approach the scene, despite the instruction to stay clear. No one actually entered the room, instead choosing to crowd around the entryway, but they all still felt the need to find out what was going on. I didn't blame them.