It was a while before they could visit. A few days after the police, and the police, a few days after the fight at the graves. They were terrible days, for Dion at least, who stood in front of the hospital doors every opportunity he could and who resisted the strange inquiries of nurses and officers alike. It took a while before one of the nurses broke, who just had it one day and whispered to him, near a janitor's closet in the hospital, “She blinked yesterday, she can move now.”

When he heard the news, the grand statement, he exploded. In joy, then anger that he could not see her. It wasn’t long after, after the complaining and the harassing and with the help of Claudia (who was now conscious, in the same hospital), he was allowed to see her.

He went into the room now, expecting nothing. Getting less than that. For she was still, for the most part, asleep. She was at least for the first few days he was there. When she did move her finger, he was unfortunate enough to be asleep for the reveal. He missed it, but the doctor's had told him about it and it filled him with cautious optimism. Another day she moved her wrist and from there the machine that was consciousness began to move. Like a golem coming into being, slowly, twitching awake.

“Thirsty…” Was the first thing she said. The hospital rushed in when Dion told the news (he was crying in English, so it was hard to understand) to the doctors. They fed her green juice and mush for food and small drips of syrup from a syringe.

Her sister, Claudia, had not gotten off easy. And eating mush, yes, was the easier path. For Claudia, for all intents, was in police custody. More so a perpetrator rather than victim and survivor, someone who they had no evidence against but having been the only person worth to blame. Of course, the ridiculousness of the crime made her seem more innocent than she actually was. After all, how could a small girl like her kill so many people at the club? That was the argument lawyers had prepared, at least.

Apollo heard the police debating doctors. They shook their heads and moved their arms in a crossed gesture, a no entry allowed gesture.

"You're still here?" He heard Stefanie say behind the noise wall of machine beeps and swirling fans. The tubes up her nose made her sound strange as if her voice was caught in a tunnel.

"Yeah," Dion played with his fingers. "Always."

"Always, huh," Stefania looked up. Her eyes had some dead aura to them, desperate and sad. "They say I won't be able to move my legs ever again. Do you think that's true?"

Dion could not lie, he was not sophisticated enough to lie. He put his face down in that little, white room, with the pale grey tile. He started tracing imaginary lines in his head to buy time, time of which they both had but at that instant, felt pressed to save.

He looked up.

"I've heard it's important to believe," Dion said. "I think that's true, maybe."

"Even if its a lie?" She asked.

"Yeah, sometimes you have to believe in lies." He felt his heart sink. Gods eminence leaving him, a coldness left where his faith once was.

The door opened. Two figures started to walk inside. One in a wheelchair, the other one holding her wheelchair. Apollo stood behind Claudia, pushing her through the door. A slew of police officers answered small walkie-talkies on their shoulders, a signal of admission, a call of observation. Apollo closed the door shut and waited in the corner of the room. He seemed dispassionate, as usual.

"She wanted to see you." He said in a stern voice. Dion felt his eye twitch, a resentment growing towards Claudia and a guilt for that resentment growing too. Each time he would see Claudia, he felt his fist tighten. Every time he saw her scarred, red flesh, his heart sank a bit. It was a strange conflict.

No matter how strange though, they had nothing to say to each other. They just kind of looked at each other, knowing what was done, both of them conscious of the act, but without any grounds to speak. They would open their mouths and start to form sentences, only to interrupt each other. Silence. Apollo coughed.

"I remember everything," Claudia said. Stefania was barely conscious. Perhaps no one cared if she even knew at this point, what had happened. "I have to live with that for the rest of my life. The knowing. You don't forget this stuff.."

Dion moved in his seat, he felt sweat and fear. She remembered everything?

"I don't," Stefanie said.

"That's convenient," Apollo said.

Dion shot him a glare. He shrugged his shoulders to repose.

Claudia however, did not act so coy. Guilt did not allow it.

"I just remember your face..." Stefanie said. "That...face...and then. Darkness."

"Amnesia, it'll come back to you,” Apollo said. “And when it does come back, I’m sure it’ll be a scene. I wonder how you’ll deal with it.”

He looked out the window to see how patient the police officers were outside.

Dion stood.

"Maybe we should just let them hash it out." He said.,

Claudia tugged his arm as he headed for the door.

"It's okay." She said. "You’ve earned your right to be here. You're the reason I'm here, after all."

He looked at her, wanting to yank away his wrist. Seeing her thin face, her trembling lips, and deciding not to.

"We did what we were trained to do. It was duty."

"Yeah, duty,” Her eyes fell. “I won’t tell anyone. Promise."

"Good," Apollo said. "But that’s not the biggest problem right now. The biggest problem will be getting you out of prison. Are you ready to deal with the courts? Lawyers? The money?"

"No. No, I’m not." Claudia said.

“We can help,” Dion said.

“How?” Apollo just wanted to hear his plan, just wanted to humor himself.

“I don’t know. We just will.”

Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

He was disappointed. He wasn’t even trying anymore.

“There you go, mouthing off again. You can’t help yourself from helping, can you?”

“N-no, it’s fine. Really.” They hadn’t even suggested anything and she was already rejecting the help. “It’s not like I don’t deserve anything coming to me.”

Her English was good. Her voice was soft, fading.

Stephanie went back to sleep. Not by choice, of course. Her eyelids shut down on their own and her brain was too tired to stir them back up. She settled into a nap but fell into sleep. Soon, she snored. Lightly. Like a whistle. Everyone looked at her, watching her chest gently go up and down. alright just simply drifted for a moment and she settled into a short sleep.

“What do you deserve exactly?” It was as if Dion was trying to convince himself as well, to reason that she was not herself at the time. “You were being manipulated.”

There was silence. Apollo tapped lightly on the floor. They turned to attention.

“That's not absolutely right, is it?” Apollo asked. “You weren’t fully manipulated, were you?”

“No, I wasn’t.” She said. “It felt like…how do you say in English...it was like I gave up.”

“What set you off in the first place?”

She looked down at her wrists. Two streaks of burned flesh, though painless, wrapped around her forearms.

“I felt like I was stuck. I was in danger, I think. And I just wanted to be free, escape. That’s it.” She said. “I was never good at being angry. I always just ran out of arguments and...well...I ran into something I couldn’t escape.”

Apollo got off the wall, eager, his shoulders and chest flexed upward. “And why the grave? Why your grandmother? Were you mad at her too? She’s dead, have you held onto some kind of obsession?”

Dion glared at him. Though it did not matter, Apollo had on him that growl, that keen glowing eye for an answer. A joy, he had seen in Purgatory, worn by the false king.

She stayed quiet. Maybe she had nothing left to say. Apollo waited. For a while, before he shook his head and started going towards the door, looking out the window where the police officers waited outside in a courtly matter.

“Why do you care?” she said.

“In my line of work we don’t get paid much. Even fewer celebrations or congratulations. In my line of work, the only satisfaction is an answer. If there even are any answers in this universe.”

She rubbed her hands together. Apollo twisted the doorknob. She rose, to speak, releasing a pneumatic sigh like air trapped in a century-old coffin.

“My grandmother was a diabetic.” She said. “A sick woman who was very strong in her youth and very mad in her old age. A woman who needed help, but hated getting it. A woman who...well...was mean I suppose.”

Apollo turned around with arms crossed.

“She never approved of anything we did,” Claudia pointed to Stefanie sleeping easily on the bed. “She never approved of my talents, singing. I think she hated me, I was never smart or useful as she put it. Well, one day, I just got mad you see.” Her eyes trailed to the corner of her sockets in thought. In remembering. Her face softened, her chin trembled. “I left her. I forgot, I didn’t think it was that bad at the time, I just wanted to get out for a bit. I just thought To leave, to have fun and Stefanie wasn’t there you see, she went off to another city for a job interview. A couple of them and it was just me and I left.” She repeated. “I left her alone. Left. Well, I came back a day later. A bit hungover, tired. And I find her on the stairs. Dead. The doctor’s said they didn’t know what killed her, the lack of insulin, the lightheadedness and weakness that made her slip. They ended up saying that her death was due to complications. That was the first time I ever killed anyone,” She sighed.“And I was never caught. The charges on me were dropped.”

She brushed her sister's hair.

“I’ve had this coming to me for years now. Always trying to forget it, always being too guilty to ever let go.”

“And now you hate yourself,” Apollo said. “And you think your sister hates you too?”

“Why wouldn’t she?”

He looked at her markings, which now seemed disgusting to him though they hadn’t moments ago.

“You’re right, you might deserve it.”

“Hey!” Dion screamed.

“Though I can’t blame you. Hating family isn’t rare. It’s actually quite common, as a matter of fact, you could probably find more people on this earth who hate their family than love them.” Apollo walked up to her. “You do deserve everything coming to you. But your sister deserves peace, even more.”

“What am I going to do then?” Her voice rose, her fist tightened.

“Lie. Shamelessly, I don’t think they have anything on you. There weren’t any video cameras, and the place of the murders was such an isolated incident. So lie. They’ll harass you I’m sure, but lie.” He said. “Lie because you don’t deserve prison. Because your sister, the cripple, needs you more. Deserves you more.”

Dion wasn’t sure if he was being noble or not if his words were any good or not. But he felt, perhaps, that above kindness or brutality, that they were necessary. So he kept quiet, for he too, blamed Claudia.

“Can I even take care of her?” She rubbed her sister's cheek, her ruined hand flashing briefly behind the bandages. Stefanie jerked underneath. She made a strained face but fell back into slumber.

“You’re going to have to.” Dion stood. “And I’ll help, as much as I can, for however long I need to.”

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” Apollo said.

“I don’t want to be taken care of you. I don’t want anything. Not this life, most of all.”

“I can’t help you there,” Apollo said. “And with your track record, I wouldn’t be surprised if you tie yourself off. That’s the only escape left.”

“That’s something I won’t let you do.” Dion walked up to her, imposing even, angry, definitely. “Death is the thing you deserve least of all. You have your life, which is more than most could say. And you have your sister. Don’t throw it away.”

“Don’t lecture her,” Apollo said. “Living and dying are both just as selfish. Let her do what she will.”

“You’re just going to let her get away with all this?” Dion screamed.

“Relax buddy, don’t be so righteous. So vengeful. I’m just pointing out a truth. If she wants to escape the pain of her life, if she wants to make her sisters life even harder, that is her right. And I wouldn’t blame her for it either.” He said. “Living is tough and it’s something only the strong can do.”

“You’re....” He saw Astyanax in him, or perhaps the synthesis of all the worst things about the two. “You really have no mercy or shame or anything?”

“No, I don’t.” He turned to Claudia who stood there absorbing it all. “Do you?”

She looked at her hands. Then to her sister. Then to Dion, expecting an answer from any of them. Getting nothing. She gripped her forehead, lowered herself, in defeat, in prayer, in forgiveness.

“I can’t…” her voice quivered. “I can’t let her down anymore. I can’t.”

Dion lowered himself, his stature crumbling at her mournful pose.

“I’ll help, I promise. You’ll get through this. We will.”

Dion held her, looked at her. The thin girl with perforated arms, with the needle holes unhealed. Apollo opened the door, Dion watched him walk out towards the elevator.

"Where are you going?" Dion asked.

“Home. You have the problem solved.”

He ran up to him, past doctors and officers and looked at him as the elevator dinged open.

“You told her to kill herself.” Dion hissed.

“I told her the truth. Life is hard and it’s going to get harder.” He said. “I don’t like patronizing people, least of all the most helpless of society. There’s a cruelty in giving false hope, you of all people show know that.”

He couldn’t rebuke it. He couldn’t say anything, only that the bible in his pocket began to burn again and that his neck was tensed and aching.

“What’s she going to do? You’re just going to leave it as is?”

“Yeah, I’m done.” Apollo pointed to the unconscious girl behind the door. “I’m leaving the rest to you. She’s your girlfriend, after all? So I guess that makes Claudia your step-sister. Right?”

“I thought it’s forbidden. The eunuch's and the monks and all that…”

“Breaking rules is the only thing we’re good at.” He smiled. “So go help them. I can’t. I’m too mean for it, you know that. But you? You’ve got the heart for it.”

Apollo walked back, into the open elevator and waved goodbye at Dion who stood there in the stupid fluorescent light, with the red and blue Christmas lights flickering on and off and breathing deeply that smell of pine from the small dwarf tree decorated with small, dwarf ornaments. He turned behind, to the police officers lined up and the doctors with their clipboards and the girl crying, and the lover sleeping and he thought, life is hard.

But he walked forward anyway, shutting the door to the officials and their cold stares, to reporters, to the world itself. He held Claudia, who still trembled and held Stefanie, who slept cold and nervous and said, with as durable as a voice as he could make, “We’ll get through this.” He gripped their hands tighter. “Yeah, I promise.”