To Love A Beast | Gay MxM |

22. The Lab

-Chase-

I had a lot of time to think about my actions. I spent hours and hours with Roe's words echoing in my head while Dante fought for his life on the couch. I changed his bandages three times an hour every hour because the bleeding just wouldn't stop. I did everything I could to keep his temperature down because he was almost boiling. I tried to hold him still whenever he started thrashing around in his nightmares, partly awake but never really conscious.

I did that to him. My actions caused this.

On the next day, when Dante was sleeping peacefully in the guest room, I stayed next to his bed. I still couldn't sleep. The images of blood gushing out of his stomach whenever I changed the bandages invaded my mind, filling me with anxiety, regret, and fear.

"...the chaos that resides in you..."

And Roe's words made it so much worse.

I took Dante's hand in mine, finding some kind of comfort in the fact that his fever was gone. By some miracle, he had begun healing again. It was almost surreal to think the wound on his side was the same one I couldn't keep closed last night. It looked so... innocent. There was nothing threatening about it... And yet, it almost took Dante's life.

I had so many regrets... I couldn't even stand myself at that moment. My thoughts repeated themselves over and over again... I should've been more careful. I should've spent more time planning this. I should've listened to Benjamin when he tried to warn me. I shouldn't have been so goddamn confident. All I could think of was getting to the lab, even when Dante was wounded.

He could've died because of my recklessness.

I brushed my hand through Dante's hair, swearing I would never make that same mistake again.

An hour later, my own aching body demanded me to move, so I made sure Dante was comfortable before I stepped out of his room, leaving the door slightly open. I walked down the stairs to the first floor and stopped to look around, trying to replace the negative thoughts with something else for my own sanity. Everything was covered in dust, especially the thousands of books that lined the walls. There was not an inch of room on the countless shelves.

I walked to the closest one and peered at the titles, but none of them rung a bell. Not the authors, nor the books. I slowly walked past them, noticing that some of them were really old, but looked untouched.

And then, just when I found something interesting, I heard a quiet cough behind me. I turned to look at the old man Benjamin, who was stepping through the door, carrying a few bags with him.

"How's your werewolf doing?" was the first thing he asked while placing the bags on the ground to walk to me.

"He's resting," I said, and turned to take the big, brown book from the shelves. "Elven cures and other natural remedies," I read the title out loud.