Hanna wasn’t sure how long she lay in the dark of her room, barely a trickle of light coming through the window’s curtains to see by, coughing and sobbing and vomiting as her nose bled.
If that evil bitch wants me alive, she’s got a funny way of showing it, Hanna thought angrily. A wave of guilt hit her as she felt torn between calling Sol something so horrible, and the fact that THIS Sol truly was horrible. Hanna couldn’t reconcile the dramatic differences between the two. Her Sol was kind, where this one was cruel. Her Sol helped others when she could, this one basically mocked her as she lay in her own sick.
The vertigo came and left in waves and, finally, Hanna had finally had enough. Just kill me, she thought as she sobbed on the floor beside her trash can.
The rest was sort of like a dream, but she couldn’t be sure. She dreamt that Soohae came to take care of her, clean her up, help her back to bed and put a cold washcloth on her forehead to stave off the fever. But this Soohae was a ghost. A ghost Soohae in a while billowy dress, pale skin, dark circles around her eyes, her long dark hair flowing like gentle waves. She reminded Hanna a bit of the poor, sick Soohae in World 2, with her haunted look.
She remembered a voice in the dream say, “Oh, no,” but it wasn’t Soohae’s. Her mind was clouded and confused and, eventually, it slipped into unconsciousness.
-
Hanna awoke in the worse pain possible. Worse than any hangover, headache or migraine she’d ever had. Her head felt so badly that the first thing she did was sob silently and long for death. The pain only increased when someone cried out, “Oh, dear! Hanna!”. The next thing she recalled, she was in an ice bath, the pain of the water felt as if her body were on fire with a frozen flame. The shock of it was horrendous. She barely noticed she wasn’t in any familiar room. Aema held her hand and called out something to her, but behind her a silver door opened and Sol walked in, a sardonic smirk across her face, then Hanna was out.
-
Hanna wasn’t sure how long she’d been out, what day it was, or even what time it was. She lay in a hospital bed with an IV bag dripping fluids down the long plastic tube into her veins. She followed the trail with confusion—and relief. The pain! There was no more pain! It was finally gone. She wanted to cry, she was so relieved, but her body had no more tears to give, nor did it have the energy it would take to cry. It took a concentrated effort and a few tries before Hanna could swallow, her mouth feeling like cotton laced with a sandpaper tongue.
The door opened and a Nurse she’d never seen before came in, giving her the faintest of smiles and a barely perceptible nod, then checking all of her vitals, including the IV. Finally, she looked at Hanna.
“It’s good that you’re finally awake,” she said quietly. “Are you feeling any pain? I don’t imagine you’ll be able to speak yet, so blink once for yes and twice for no.”
Of course they would give her two blinks for no. Didn’t they understand how taxing it was just to be alive? It took a moment, but Hanna gave two slow blinks, fighting hard to open her eyes after each one. The Nurse watched her a moment, then nodded.
“I’m going to give you some eyedrops to help with the lack of moisture in your eyes, before they start burning on you,” she said as she pulled out a tiny plastic bottle, expeditiously unscrewed the top, and spread one of Hanna’s eyes, then the other, assaulting them quickly with drops that poured down her face like saline tears. Hanna blinked furiously, the job becoming easier.
“Now I’m going to help you drink a little, honey. It’s going to be slow-going and hard, but I need you to drink very small amounts at a time to start.”
The Nurse pressed a button, raising the top half of Hanna’s bed until she was sitting up enough to drink. She held the glass up and helped hold the straw in place for Hanna to drink. The straw felt foreign in her mouth as Hanna struggled to suck. The room-temperature liquid felt cool to her desert-like mouth. Swallowing was still difficult, and it was indeed slow-going, but the Nurse sat patiently beside her, helping her until she’d had her fill and, pushing the straw from her mouth with her tongue, shook her head slightly. The Nurse checked the glass and seemed satisfied, making notes in some type of file on a clipboard while Hanna observed her.
She wore her dark hair pulled up and pinned, partially tucked under her nurse’s cap. Instead of scrubs she seemed to wear a much older version of a Nurse’s outfit, though it appeared to be crisp and new, the whites stark. The woman had honey-colored eyes and appeared to be fairly young. Hanna would have wondered if she’d only recently become a Nurse if she hadn’t seemed so confident in her tasks. Her I.D. badge was clipped to the end of her shirt near her waist, the words still blurry to Hanna’s recently wetted eyes.
The Nurse finished writing something on a clipboard and slid it into a slot at the end of Hanna’s bed, then excused herself. She was halfway out of the door when Hanna was finally able to croak in a harsh whisper, “Toilet”.
The Nurse turned and studied her for a long minute before saying, “Honey, I can help you to the toilet later, after they remove the catheter. I know it feels like you have to go, but there’s a little baggy that’s collecting everything. There isn’t much this morning, so hopefully that water will get things moving along. There’s a bag of fluids that I attached just before you woke up, so you won’t dehydrate. I’ll be back in an hour to check on you.”
The Nurse’s voice was soft. Hanna liked it. It was gentle, like a lullaby. She was wrapped up in this thought when the Nurse left, and as a warm feeling spread throughout her body. The machine beside her let out a little beep, and Hanna was swimming in a world of scarcely-lucid pleasure as she slipped back into a relaxed sleep.
Hanna woke up in the afternoon. She could tell by the slant of the light and shadows breaking through the blinds of the windows on the wall behind her to the wall before her. She awoke sore. Her joints ached and her muscles groaned. It began to increase over time until it was straddling the line between discomfort and pain. Then, the spread of warmth followed by the beep of the machine. The warmth washed the pain away, relaxing Hanna and making her feel good.
“They can’t keep you on morphine forever.”
Hanna opened the eyes she hadn’t realized she’d closed and there, back against the closed door, stood Legacy. Her hair was still unkempt, and the bruising around her eyes appeared darker. Her skin was still paled, but there was something different about her. She stood calmly. Her wild, feral side seemed to be resting, but her eyes were steeled with determination.
“I’m the one who found you, you know,” her soft voice felt loud to Hanna’s ears after laying in near silence. Legacy’s lucid demeanor was strangely calming, soothing to Hanna’s relaxing mind.
“You were the ghost?” she asked absently, feeling as though she were asking from a great distance away, her voice barely a whisper.
Legacy studied Hanna for a long moment then, seeming to decide something, attempted a brittle smile, which didn’t quite become more than a thin line.
“I’m going to let you go back to resting—for now,” Legacy said, observing Hanna carefully. “When you’re off the morphine, I’ll come back. We need to talk about a few things,” she said cryptically. “Before it’s too late.”
Hanna blinked and Legacy was gone. Had she even opened the door? Maybe she was a ghost. Hanna’s heart slowed into a soft rhythm, her breathing deep and even as the morphine gently rocked her into an easy sleep.
-
Hanna’s body was heavy. Behind her eyes, her lids were dark. She wanted to open them, but instead it felt as though her ears opened instead.
“These aren’t the results we were hoping for,” a woman’s voice said softly. The Nurse?
“We’re seeing some new, interesting data, at least. Finally,” Fake Sol’s voice replied, unphased.
“I’m worried she might not last much longer,” the Nurse insisted. “Please, Doctor, we need to stop the regiment before we lose her. Isis said she found her unconscious with her nose bleeding. She was burning up.”
“Yes, I’m quite aware,” Fake Sol replied flatly, albeit with a hint of annoyance. “I was there, if you’ll recall.”
“Of course, Doctor. I apologize,” the Nurse backpedaled. “I just know how important this particular Subject is for you. I wouldn’t want you to lose an important part of your research because of an oversight.”
The abrupt silence that followed filled with a dangerous tension. The sound of soft footsteps approached slowly, then stopped beside the bed. Fake Sol’s voice became low and dangerous. “Do you believe that I made an oversight, Nurse Jance?” she asked slowly. The question lingered there, laced with venom. An obvious test of loyalty.
“N-no, of course not!” Nurse Jance stammered with alarm, a slight waver in her voice.
“Good,” Fake Sol replied, her footsteps moving away a few feet. The sound of the clipboard being taken from the bed’s foot-tray preceded the shifting of papers. “I’ll talk to Isis about this as soon as I have a moment,” Fake Sol mumbled passively, more to herself than to Nurse Jance.
Hanna forced her eyes open a crack. The evil Doctor Sol stood at the foot of the bed, flipping back and forth through several pages of the clipboard file in the barely dimmed room. Nurse Jance, who was opening the door to leave, paused and turned back. “Would you like me to call her for you, Doctor? I can have her sent here.”
Fake Sol waved her off without bothering to look up. “No, no, I’ll speak with her later,” she muttered absently before looking up at Nurse Jance for a moment. “Where are the filed documents on the DNA/RNA sequencing?” she asked with an air of impatience.
“I believe they’re still in the lab,” Nurse Jance replied warily.
“Go get them and bring them to my office,” Fake Sol commanded absently, walking off to the other side of the room. She disappeared through a door, head buried in the file, without even waiting for a reply.
“Yes, Doctor,” Nurse Jance whispered to an all but empty room, her eyes met Hanna’s and, for a long moment, she held her gaze. She nodded her head slightly, her face awash in pity. ‘I’m sorry,’ she mouthed before she slipped out of the door, pulling it closed silently behind her and leaving the room in near darkness.
“They were talking about you, you know.” Hanna turned her head to see a figure rise in the darkness from behind a table, where it had clearly been hiding.
“Legacy? How long have you been there?” Hanna asked, her head feeling kind of numb. It was a lot to process while just coming down from the effects of the morphine. Her head was beginning to clear, albeit slowly.
“Long enough to know that THAT Sol is going to get you killed,” Legacy replied, pointing towards the door a the end of the long, narrow room.
Hanna’s brain swam for a moment. “That Sol. You said THAT Sol.”
Legacy stole a look at the doors, silent for a moment, then crept as quiet as a cat to Hanna’s bedside. “Yes,” she finally responded. “I said THAT Sol.” She looked at Hanna appraisingly, then asked slowly, “Do you know what I mean when I say that?”
Hanna stared into Legacy’s hard eyes, unsure of what she saw there. “Yes,” she whispered quietly. Legacy nodded as though finally receiving a conformation of something she already knew.
“They’ll probably let you out of here in a day or two,” she commented offhand as she watched the doors. “They won’t do anything more to you right now. Not until they know you won’t expire.”
“Expire?” Hanna asked, scrunching her brows.
Legacy turned her head back to Hanna and frowned. “Dead,” she replied matter-of-factly. “They need to know you won’t be dead before they do anything else.” Legacy shook her head slightly, as though annoyed to have to explain something so simple.
“We’ll have more time to talk then. I can tell you’re still messed up from the morphine. But,” she said, her eyes flashing dangerously, “There is a lot more going on here then even you understand. The things they’re doing.. The things SHE’S doing.” Legacy took a shuddering breath as though trying to calm herself, eyes closed before turning back to Hanna. “Be careful who you trust. In fact, don’t trust anyone,” she warned.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
“Even you?” Hanna questioned.
Legacy gave a hard nod. “Especially me.”
-
The next day and a half moved very slowly. The morphine came less because the pain came less, so she had a lot more lucid, waking time to ponder and drive herself crazy. Legacy did not visit again, nor did Hanna have any more dreams about Soohae or ghosts, which she chalked up to being dosed by the morphine. In her mind she said a little thanks to the drug.
The uneventfulness was sometimes broken by a Nurse coming in or going out, but it seemed like it was never the same Nurse twice—and Nurse Jance seemed to have disappeared completely, which made a pit form in Hanna’s stomach. It seemed these new nurses were informed not to speak to her, for they simply went about their business, occasionally asking a brief clinical question or two before leaving, but never greeting her or being personable. They avoided eye contact whenever possible. So, when, during her second afternoon after the Legacy encounter, Nurse Aema showed up with a wheelchair, she was thrilled.
She had a million questions, but the watchful eyes of the halls and occasional staff that passed by made her hesitant to speak. She kept her eyes in her lap demurely whenever anyone else was present, but was alert and observant otherwise. She tried to memorize the layout, but too many twists and turns got her confused. Even more so when they took an elevator to another floor.
The elevator had no numbers, no up and down buttons, just a place for a key and a thumbpad that Aema pressed her finger to. It scanned and, with an affirmative beep, a computerized female voice came through the speaker saying, “Where would you like to go?”
“Lobby and commons,” Nurse Aema replied curtly, and the elevator responded at once. The strange rise and fall of her stomach reminded Hanna of the vertigo and she felt momentarily sick. Then the doors opened and Aema wheeled her out. She went down a few more corridors, taking a few turns, then Hanna found herself in the familiar corridor of her room.
Nurse Aema leaned down slightly as she pushed Hanna forward. “I know you have a lot of questions,” she said quietly, “And you probably just want to go back to your room, but we’ve been ordered to put you back into your routine. Someone will bring you a late lunch or snack while you relax in the Lounge. Do you want me to wheel you over to the television? At least then you might not have to talk to anybody.”
Hanna nodded, not trusting her voice to speak. She had barely spoken in the last week, and so she wasn’t sure what exactly would come out. As she was pushed through the open doorway that led into the commons, Sam gave her a worried smile and a little salute. “Welcome back, Hanna!” he said sincerely. On her right side, Gerald gave her a warm smile and a tight nod. “Good to have you back, bedbug,” he said lightly. “We heard you had a bit of a flu, but we’re glad you’re all right now.”
A flu? That’s what they’ve been telling everyone? How many people really know the truth? Hanna pushed the thoughts back as she forced a small smile in return with a nod of thanks as Aema wheeled her into the Lounge and towards the TV area.
Anderson lay sprawled on the shorter sofa until he heard the sounds of their approach, then he sat up and straightened the sofa. “Hey,” he said awkwardly, gesturing toward the TV. “They have The Greatest Chefs cooking show on. Want to watch it together?”
Hanna nodded slightly, glad she didn’t have to speak.
For a long while, they watched the show in mostly silence, Anderson making a comment or observation here or there as if to keep Hanna engaged. Her muscles felt twitchy and her bones felt weak and tired. She figured it was likely that a week in bed would do that to anyone. Still, she didn’t like it, that feeling of weakness.
After a while, Anderson began to talk softly, as though he were trying to keep his words from prying ears. “I don’t know what happened,” he began softly, “And, of course, you don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to, but that day you collapsed and started having a seizure, that guy who sometimes comes here—Cris?—that mean Nurse took him away and he hasn’t been here since. I don’t know if that’s a coincidence.” He watched her expression and turned away as his face turned blank.
Anderson pointed at the television as if telling her something about the show. “They said you were just sick, but nobody just starts having seizures out of nowhere,” he remarked thoughtfully. He looked at her from his peripheral, eyes sliding back to the television, but his body angled slightly more towards her so she could hear him better. “You just looked, like, really surprised. I guess you probably don’t remember much,” he said sympathetically. “We were watching television and then you went to eat. A little while later, I heard your tray fall and when I looked over.. You were just shaking. Not a little, but, like, violently shaking. Then you just hit the floor and seized. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen Nurse Jennings get scared.”
Hanna made a mental note that he didn’t refer to her as ‘Nurse Sasha’.
Anderson sighed and, stretching his arms, threw an innocent glance over his shoulder. “I suspect she must have gotten into trouble for something. Maybe for bringing you your medication during lunch? Usually they’re supposed to do it at the Nurse’s Station.”
For a while it was quiet and Hanna slipped into her own thoughts, trying to piece things together into a sensible timeline.
First, she thought, I watched TV with Anderson, who is very familiar to me. Could he have been in the house with us back home? Second, I used the bathroom and went to eat. Third, she recounted, Cris came and talked to me, took my food, and said his was drugged.
Without realizing it, she’d leaned back in her chair and let a long sigh release through her nose, her hands fidgeting with the blanket in her lap.
That’s all I remember before waking up sick. She closed her eyes and tried to focus, concentrating. Try as she might, she couldn’t remember Nurse Sasha bringing her medication to her while she ate lunch. She couldn’t remember dropping her tray or seizing. She didn’t remember being taken away. And why, if she had been seizing, hadn’t they taken her to the medical wing sooner?
She rubbed a headache beginning to form in her temples. Nothing made sense because there were just too many gaps. She turned to Anderson whom, for all appearances, seemed to be engrossed in the chef contest playing out before them on the screen.
She wanted to ask him more. What did he remember, what else did he see? Who took her away and where was she taken? But before she could even attempt to find her voice, a girl she didn’t recognize came up behind the couch and threw her arms around his neck. “Come play with me, Anderson!” she said in a mock whine that instantly annoyed Hanna. Anderson turned to Hanna sheepishly, a look of guilt on his face. “Sorry, Hanna, but do you mind if I go over with Nea for a bit? I promised her a chess rematch the other day. She still thinks she can beat me.”
“Nea stuck her tongue out playfully. “You just still think you won last round when you KNOW I did,” she laughed. “I’ll go get things set up!” she announced brightly and bounded away.
Anderson gave Hanna a half-hearted guilty shrug and smiled gently. “She’s actually really nice. She’s one of the few people here I feel safe—and comfortable—to talk to. She’s not always so perky. I think she tries to be that way to make everyone else happy and feel better. I’m hoping she’ll open up to me if we can become friends.” He stood and gave Hanna a little wave. “I’ll be back later,” he said cheerfully, rounding the sofa to follow Nea.
Anderson was the only person here, aside from that weird run-in with Legacy, who really talked to her. Well, there was Cris, but he was… Well, maybe he’s not so paranoid afterall, she frowned thoughtfully. Still, even though they didn’t know each other, Hanna felt like a kid on the playground when they’ve discovered their first friend has now made other friends, and so they had nobody to play with but themselves—meaning she took an instant dislike to Nea.
But it couldn’t be helped. The truth was she was just starting to get angry at her circumstances. Maybe it was just nice and convenient to have a fall-guy.
Hanna sighed again, lost in thought until a male voice said, “Ready for lunch?”. Pulled out of her reverie, Hanna sighed and resigned herself to being wheeled about like an invalid. “I think Geneva’s cooking today, so it could be hit or miss,” the man said with a chuckle. Hanna inwardly groaned and looked upward to say she had no idea who that was, or what it meant, when the air was sucked from her lungs.
Pipe.
In all the chaos, she had forgotten about her former leader. And she hadn’t realized she’d squeaked his name aloud until he looked at her with a perplexed expression. “Pipe?” he repeated, cocking his head slightly. “Is there a problem with a pipe in your room or is there something else..?” He trailed off, quite obviously confused.
“No, it’s your name,” Hanna replied numbly. She felt like she was outside of herself, watching this unwitting girl make a fool of herself.
Pipe shook his head and gave a laugh, his face clear and bright. “You always give me a laugh, Hanna! Sure, I’ll be ‘Pipe’. And you can be…Skip?”
Hanna made a face at him and he backed up, raising his hands in defense. “Okay, okay, we’ll find a new name,” he chuckled. He said something about…something. She wasn’t sure anymore. Was it about the food? What was he saying? She looked down where her lap should be to find a table, but she didn’t remember being pushed under a table yet. How did I get here? she wondered, an odd fogginess working its way into her head. A ringing began in her ears, sharp and high. Tinnitus. Wonderful, she thought distantly.
She felt as though she were being stretched and stretched, but each stretch was another image of herself, like when a mirror faces another and there are infinite fractured scenes playing out forever. The ringing seemed to be slowly rising in volume. At its crescendo, it held the note. She felt her head dip, her eyelids were heavy. So heavy..
Her head snapped up and her eyes shot open when the sound of a tray slapped onto the table before her with a hard ‘clack’ sound.
“Oh, sorry,” Pipe said, his face and voice truly seeming apologetic. “Were you nodding off there? Falling asleep? If you’d rather go back to your room, you can always eat something later.”
It took her a moment to realize the tinnitus was gone. Had it gone when she snapped to? Either way, she absently waved Pipe off, feeling as though she just woke up from a deep REM sleep without ever having slept. “Okay, well, don’t forget to come get your pills when you’re done,” he gave her a measuring look, as though trying to determine whether or not she would break if he left her alone. “If you need help, just wave me or one of the others down, okay?”
I’m not that fragile, she thought with a flash of irritation. But just like that, it was gone as soon as it came, and she just felt empty. She looked down at the food. Some sort of noodles in turkey gravy, but the turkey looked like fake meat. It tasted like cafeteria food from middle school, which made her feel a wave of nostalgia for the simpler days of childhood, when everything was decided for you and your image of what adulthood would be like was glamourized in your mind.
Hanna sighed. Her biggest problem then was the lack of control over her life. Looking around, a strange smile formed on her crooked lips and an even stranger quiet laugh bubbled out.
This is how it starts, her brain told her. Get a grip before you look like every maniac who ever belonged in places like here! Maybe she did, she thought glumly.
Maybe she did.
-
After she picked at her lunch, leaving the hard, would-be biscuit untouched alongside the bland, flavorless green beans—which looked as though the very life had been leeched out of them—she was wheeled to take her medication, then wheeled back to her room. She wheeled herself before the desk and, with an effort, she lifted herself and sat in the chair, staring without seeing out of the window.
She didn’t remember changing clothes or getting into bed, but she was sure Aema must have helped with that. She wondered how many wonderful, loving, nurturing versions of Aema there were, and how many versions were like Isis. How many have different names? Is there a Hanna that wasn’t even a Hanna? Even Pipe had said his name was different. What was it? Oh, she should have asked..
It felt like she blinked and was back at the lunch table, staring down at the unappetizing piece of cafeteria ham that likely wasn’t ham at all. The lumpy potato flakes stared from their round, unnatural shape from the scoop that was likely used, not even gravy to accompany it. She knew without even trying them that they were unseasoned, tasteless.
Bland. Everything had been bland since that day.. She had the urge to throw the piece of stale cornbread across the room. In her mind, she did exactly that. Her brain tried to argue that it was one step away from actually doing it and to be careful, but she didn’t care.
It's a dangerous thing when you start to stop caring. But Hanna was already going down the rabbit hole. With nobody there to stop her, it was quite easy. It was as if she had slid into a strange Groundhog Day-esque existence where every day she woke up and it was lunch. She phased out and she was staring off out of the window. She lay in bed. At night. In the day. She felt like her life was a montage in a really long and boring movie. Bland. She lay in bed, sleep evading her before blinking and having light. She started to think some of the shadows that play on the ceiling were spiders, waiting to bury her in their silk and suck out all of her insides. When had she last dreamed? It was hard to tell. What was a dream? Where did dreams go?
Her mind began to wander aimlessly, grasping unsuccessfully at thought after thought. She had a brief flicker of images, as though it rolled by on 35mm film in rapid succession. Anderson, standing beside her table, talking to her. Trying to. He seemed disappointed. Nea, sitting at her table, saying something she couldn’t hear, a faint memory of tinnitus at that time. Legacy. Standing over her in her bed, looking determined. Looking angry. Looking afraid. Looking desperate. The images blurred together. The old, old days of film, she thought numbly. No feelings accompanied it.
Between the numbness, the loss of time and the depression, she hadn’t thought to consider that something was wrong. She hadn’t been able to focus enough to notice that the color of the pills in the cup given to her at the Nurse’s Station was off—the wrong color, the wrong count.
Wrong. Wrong. Bland.
She woke up feeling numb, as if her whole body were falling asleep, distant pins and needles and limbs she could not move or feel. Legacy stood over her again, a flurry of hair and balled fists, her face a kaleidoscope of emotions. But Hanna didn’t feel any of it. She didn’t even have the sense to wonder if she was even there or if she was dreaming. Talking. Disembodied talking. Strange sounds, stranger words. It was the first time her brain tried and began to grasp something. The concentration took all of her focus, so she the more she heard, the less focused her eyes became.
“What’s wrong with her? Why is she like this?!” Ahh. Angry Legacy. Tiny Legacy with the ferocious presence and the bravery of a lion. Young Legacy.
“I’m sorry, but I didn’t have any choice in the matter. You know that as well as I do, if the Doctor orders it—”
“Pah! The Doctor!” Legacy spat out the word as though it repulsed her to have it touch her tongue.
“Shh,” Aema scolded in a harsh whisper. “They might hear you! You don’t know who’s patrolling these halls at night!”
Legacy gave a dark laugh and threw back her head haughtily. “Actually, I do. And most of the time, guess what? It’s no one. They think because they lock the doors we’ll all just go to bed like good boys and girls and do what we’re told. They don’t even care that we’re dangerous to them!”
Aema leaned close, her jaw set, whispering through clenched teeth, “It’s that kind of talk that gets you in isolation!” The two glared at each other before Aema growled lowly, each word spoken clear and slow. “What good are you dead?”
Dead.
“They won’t kill me.”
Dead.
“They will!”
Dead.
“They can’t kill what they can’t catch.”
Why is that so familiar? Dead.
“And when they do catch you, they will kill you. You haven’t exactly been giving them the kind of data they want. And what will Hanna do then? With you gone, what stops Sol?”
Sol.
Hanna blinked, her eyes coming into quiet focus as the two bickered over her bed in harsh whispers and sardonic laughs, growing larger before her eyes. To the side, her nightstand began to stretch and morph, bleeding into the air. Her mouth quirked at the side. Quivered. The two over her fell silent as she exhaled a loud breath through her nose. They looked down at her in shock as her mouth parted slightly and she began a breathless laugh.
“This all started because of a basement,” she chuckled in an airy whisper. “A stupid basement.”
-
Aema and Legacy stared down at Hanna as if she had finally lost her mind. It took the space of a few heartbeats before Aema sank down and wrapped Hanna in a hug. “You’re awake,” was all her quivering voice could speak.
For her part, Legacy stared for a long time, then dropped her eyes to the floor, scuffing at it with the tip of her slipper. “Welcome back,” she mumbled.
It took a long time before the room began to look right, but the girls stayed by her side until Hanna felt lucid and the walls and tables were just solid walls and tables, and the girls weren’t giants anymore. She squeezed her eyes shut and rubbed her face.
“You’ve been gone too long,” Legacy mumbled, acting tough and irritable despite the tears welled up in her eyes. “You’ve missed a lot.”
“Tell me everything,” Hanna said struggling to sit up, her eyes flashing.