Barely Breathing ~ 3 Days In The Infirmary Fic

Day Two / Two

"Shirt off." Will instructs simply. I comply, as much as I'd rather not, because having any of my body be visible is not fun.

"Do you have any pain, anywhere?" He questions.

"I think my back got sort of sliced up too, so some there. And the scratches still hurt." I answer. He nods, looking me up and down before walking around me and checking my back.

"Yeah, your back's a little bit fucked up. Bruises, just a few small cuts. Should be easy enough." He pauses, "I do wanna apologize for touching you and making you take your shirt off. I know you probably aren't super comfortable with it."

"It's fine." I state.

"Still. Sorry." I can tell he's genuine, and that's... Nice. I don't know quite what it is, but him saying that is extremely nice. Probably because he's not wrong.

"It's fine." I repeat. Suddenly, I feel his hands on my back, and it sort of sends a shiver up my spine.

"Shit sorry are my hands cold? They're usually weirdly warm, thanks to Apollo."

"No, you just surprised me."

"Ah okay, yeah, sorry, didn't mean to do that. I'm gonna be healing you magically again, so-"

Someone burst into the room. Or, just quickly opened the curtain. "Will, we need you out here!"

"On it, coming. I'll be right back, sunshine." He flashes a smile before following the other camper, closing the curtain behind him.

And it's silent. Even the rest of the infirmary is silent, for whatever reason.

Silent.

Silent.

Silent.

I pull my shirt back on and grab a pen from a nearby open drawer, tapping on the side of the cot with it before my vision can start blurring. It seemed to do that, whenever it was too quiet. Tunnel vision, blurred, thoughts of Tartarus, memories-

Silence isn't fun. Which is unfortunate, because I know I'd be the type to love silence if it wasn't for... Everything.

Will finally starts barking orders in the main part of the Infirmary, and I get to focus on his voice. I can't say I don't appreciate and love how much of a leader he is. He sort of has to be, to be fair, being the head of his cabin.

"Let's go! Kayla, mortal stitching, James find the Ambrosia wherever the fuck it went, I'm getting magic healing going! Work quick!" Will shouted. He was, clearly, going to be busy for a time.

I glance around the small room, looking at everything a bit closer than usual. I'm not one to snoop, but I have nothing else to do, so I open up a cabinet.

Everything's extremely well organized, all in small baskets and in alphabetical order with labels. Most of it is just Doctor stuff, though there's one with stuffed animals? A little sticky note on one of the shelves reads "Organized by Will, you unthankful children >:(." Cute.

One basket catches my eye-"Cassettes + Old Music Players"-It's sort of out of place among all of the medical supplies. I pull it off of the shelf and sit back down on the cot.

Sure enough, it's cassettes and old music players-mostly walkmans. All cassettes are labelled, of course, with Will's handwriting.

Emo, Metal, Classical Focus, Classical Bops, 90s, 80s, Pop, Sedatephobia, Stuff Dad Recommended- a whole array of genres, along with a few that just have camper's names. Two are at the very back.

Loss Of Patient, and Will's Panic Attack Playlist.

Huh. I guess I never really thought about what it's like to lose someone as a healer, the aftermath, how they'd feel knowing that it was their job to save the life.

The other cassette was odd too.

The other room goes silent, and I sort of start to panic, but then Will barks another order and all is good.

I put the basket down behind me, and go through another cabinet, finding classic supplies.

I'm holding a cotton ball as Will finally walks in. I'm startled, and I end up chucking it at him. Or maybe I'm taking that as an excuse to throw something at him.

"I just SAVED A LIFE and my reward is getting a cotton ball thrown at me? Rude." Will chuckles, picking it up and throwing it back at me.

So I grab a few more and throw them at him, and it becomes a mini-war with cotton balls.

"Okay, okay, stop, I do not need to clean up a winter wonderland of cotton later. Hey, did you go through shit?"

"Yeah, sorry. I was bored."

"I mean it's fine, just making sure it wasn't, like... a raccoon. Went through all the music?"

"What's Sedatephobia?"

"Fear of Silence. The playlist is mostly like, white noise? Either that or study type lofi music, I don't know, someone who actually has sedatephobia made it. Which is good." He shrugged.

"And," I hold up Will's Panic Attack Playlist, "This?"

"I get panic attacks, kind of a lot. It's just for the aftermath, getting myself to be okay fairly quickly so I can get back to work. Not a big deal."

"Oh." I guess I should have figured that, but I don't think I would've ever guessed that golden boy Will Solace would have any sort of panic disorder.

"Yeah. Music can help the healing process, with dad being the god of music, you know. And some people need music to sleep, so. Music storage. And the stuffed animals, I know you saw them, are either for younger campers in pain or comfort when we lose a patient. This room kinda becomes a cry closet then." He sort of talks a lot, but I'm more than fine with that. I know I used to too. Plus, his voice is nice.

"Did you heal whoever just interrupted us?"

"Yeah. They should be asleep now, letting that naturally work on healing. Now, shirt back off. We do have to get you worked on."