Chapter Fifty-Three - Unhurt

Emily looked around quickly for a place to talk to Maple at. It didn't take long to spot one, a little private bedroom with a bed and TV and currently no one in it. She ushered Maple in, but left the door open. The bed was without sheets, but there was a cart in the room, and it looked like whoever was taking care of it was just gone for the moment.

She squatted down a little, bringing herself to eye-height with Maple. "Okay, okay," Emily said. She didn't think she was very good at this kind of thing, but her mom was great. When Emily was younger, and even worse at communicating, her mom was always able to tease out what was wrong.

It usually took a lot of yes or no questions, and some good guesswork. Emily hadn't appreciated it as much before she had to take care of so many little sisters.

"Are you hurt?" she asked.

Maple shook her head.

"Did someone say they were going to hurt you? Hurt me or one of your sisters? Did they ask you to do something you didn't want?" Emily asked. Her mind went to dark places for a moment. Emily didn't want to be a villain, but she'd make a big exception if something that awful happened.

Maple sniffled, swallowed, then coughed a little. "It's nothing," she said.

Emily decided that it wasn't nothing, but she couldn't very well demand that Maple spill. "It's okay, it's okay. Do you want a hug, then you can tell me all about it?"

That trick had worked a few times on a younger Emily, and it seemed to work now. Maple pressed into Emily, and Emily patted the back of Maple's head as she gave her the best hug she could manage.

"It's the people," Maple said.

"The people?" Emily repeated.

"In the beds. They're sick, and old, and it hurts."

"Oh," Emily said.

"I said I could fix them. I can make stuff for that, but then the old guy said that it was normal. People get old, and they get sick, and they get broken, and then they die." Maple was full on crying now, the hug seemed to have done exactly the opposite of what Emily intended.

"Hey, hey, it's okay," Emily said.

"No it's not," Maple whined. "Big Sister is old too. You can't get sick and broken, and you can't die!"

"Uh," Emily said. She was nineteen, and while she liked to think that she was level headed and somewhat smart, she had also not spent all that much time contemplating her own mortality yet. "I mean, I think I have a few years in me?"

"No!" Maple said. She shook her head from side to side, spreading snot and tears across Emily's shoulder. "No, no, you can't."

"Hey, hey, it's okay," Emily said. She decided that she'd have words with Silver Fox. Or maybe not. The man was kind of intense and charismatic and loud. So maybe she'd just think very rude things in his direction. "Alright, so... um... I'm very bad at this."

"I know people can die," Maple said. She sounded a little petulant. "I'm not dumb. But it's other people who are supposed to die. Not us."

Emily took a deep breath, trying to find the right words to say and knowing she wouldn't. "Life is... complicated. And sometimes really unfair. But I think we just have to work hard to make sure that it's not us who does the dying, right? That means listening to your big sister, and eating your greens, doing your homework, and if any one of us gets really sick, then maybe we can figure it out then, right?"

Maple nodded slowly. "If you die, I'm going to bring you back," she said.

"Um... yeah, okay," Emily said. She wasn't sure if she should be agreeing to that. It felt a little risky, but at the same time, she didn't like having Maple be sad.

"And I'll make you bigger, with more arms for hugging, and bulletproof skin, and you won't have to worry about the weakness of the flesh, because the machine is stronger. And you can have a retractable bed, and a freezer for snacks, and..." Maple continued, her words turning into a small litany under her breath.

Emily was no longer worried for Maple, but was instead worried about Maple.

"Just don't turn me into whatever you're thinking of the next time I take a nap, alright?"

"Okay," Maple said meekly. She rubbed her face against her sleeve until Emily reached into a pocket, tugged out a small ziplock baggie full of tissues and wet wipes and bandaids and fished out a tissue to help Maple blow her nose and wipe her face clean.

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"You'll be just fine," Emily said. "All of us will be. I promise."

Maple sniffed one last time, then nodded. "Promise?"

"I... yes. Look... I think that sometimes, things don't go the way we want. Sometimes things don't work out. It happens... often, even. But I think that the best people, those that come through the worst things and are still able to keep on going, are the ones that have a lot of hope. Hope that no matter what, things will work out in the end."

"Oh," Maple said.

"Hope... or spite," Emily said more truthfully. "Spite can also work well. Sometimes you just need to hate all the bad stuff so much that you're able to keep on enduring it, even when you really don't want to anymore. So, have hope that you can come out on top one day, and have enough spite to keep you going."

Maple looked up, lips twitching into the hint of a smile. "Spite sounds very villain-y. I think I like that."

Emily held back a cringe. "Well... maybe a little," she said.

"Hope and spite. Okay, Big Sis. I can do that."

Emily gave her another squeeze. "That's the spirit."

The two were silent for a moment, the tension leaving, the quiet only swallowed up by the faint hum of the hospital and the occasional footsteps and calls outside. "I don't like hospitals," Maple admitted.

"That's okay. I don't think many people do. But we'll be out of here soon. Do you want to come with me? Instead of staying with Silver Fox?" Maple nodded, and Emily stood up straighter while tucking her little baggie away. "Alright then. Trinity can come too."

Emily took Maple's hand, then left the room. It was just in time as a nurse slipped by and went to make the bed. She found Soothe-Sayer and Silver Fox chatting by the nurse's station.

"Can you go get Trinity?" Emily asked. She saw Trinity further in, entertaining a trio of wheelchair-bound older ladies. She was letting them pet her tail while... while she ate from one of the lady's lunch tray.

Emily sighed, but let it pass.

"Hey, you're back," Soothe-Sayer said. "Is everything alright?"

"Ah, it's probably nothing. I wouldn't want to be in charge of so many kids. It's trying enough when we need to do this kind of thing at schools," Silver Fox said.

"Yeah," Emily said, she was feeling a little terse with Silver Fox. "She just... hospitals were a bit much for her. She'll be fine."

"Poor kid," Soothe-Sayer said with what sounded like genuine sympathy. "Yeah, it's not always easy, no matter how old you are. That's why we come here. It's so much harder to be in a place like this when you know that not only are you suffering, but you're suffering alone. If we can make people smile, take away the pain for a moment, and just give them a little bit of hope, then it's worth all the effort, right?"

Silver Fox scoffed. "Are you practising that speech? There aren't any cameras around."

Soothe-Sayer shook his head. "It's not a speech. It's what I believe."

"That's... nice," Emily said. She felt a little queasy in the stomach hearing that. Soothe-Sayer was genuine in a way she'd never felt in herself before. Not in a way that mattered. Emily wanted to be... well, not a hero, but given all the options for powered people, Hero seemed like the best bet if she wanted a quiet life.

She had half expected the hospital visit to be little more than a performance, but also an opportunity to do a little good. Watching Soothe-Sayer made her wonder if there wasn't a kernel of true goodness in all of it.

"Are we going?" Trinity said as she bounced over. There was pudding on her face, and on her wagging tail.

Emily sighed, ditched the philosophical mental ramblings, and pulled out her baggie again. "Give me a minute, Mister Soothe-Sayer."

"No problem," he said with a chuckle. "I'll do my rounds up here real fast, then we can head back down. It's okay if you need time to take care of the girls. Family's important too."

"Thank you," she said.

This hero was making the whole villainy thing a lot more complicated than it had been before.

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