Haunted and Holy

Shattered Halos, Broken Wings

"How long till they heal?" Asked Gwen, staring at the two other occupants of the Infirmary with a furrow between her brows. "It's been two days, shouldn't they be awake by now?"

Raphael sighed. He looked tired– did Archangels even get tired? They didn't need sleep.

"I mean, I don't know," he admitted. He took a seat at the edge of her bed and frowned, dark eyes lingering on his two unconscious patients. "They both suffered severe injuries, and not to mention the emotional trauma as well. It could be anywhere from three days to a week."

"A week?"

"Yes."

"Well can't you just–"

"I know what you're going to say and no, I can't." He stood from his chair in the corner and made his way over to her. His grip was loose on her arm as he began to unwrap her bandages with gentle hands.

Gwen had seen a lot of things, endured a lot of injuries, but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't bring herself to look at her arms.

Every time she would try, she felt sick and panicky, the walls closing in on her.

She would feel the need to just grab Tess and hold her and make sure she was okay, they were home and safe and healing.

Raphael continued to speak, repeating the same words she's been hearing all day, "Like we can't heal from heavenly weapons, we can't heal wounds caused by them. You think I wouldn't have tried that?"

Though he didn't say it, she could still hear, 'you think I wouldn't heal my sister if I could?'

She huffed and cast a glance over at Tess.

She was all bandaged up, almost resembling a mummy– a pretty one, of course, but still. She still looked too pale for her liking, a thin sheen of sweat coating her forehead and a greenish tint to her skin.

Her cheeks and eyes were sunken in, hollow almost. She lay on her back with arms limply resting at her sides and red hair laid out on the pillow, framing her head. She would have looked almost peaceful if not for the faint grimace pulling at her chapped lips.

And at her feet, ever so loyal, was Hiro.

He was a constant presence in the Infirmary, switching between the three girls beds, keeping Gwen company for her whole day of being awake. He was surprisingly gentle with all of them, only laying below their waist and not leaning too hard against their legs.

On the cot to the left of Tess was Amber.

She was pretty bad, a close second to Tess. Her wings and pretty much every inch of her body was coated in cuts, some deep enough Gwen could swear she saw bone.

Her once pearly white wings were now bandaged and still stained with blood no matter how many times they had cleaned the feathers. Dark bruises were all over her skin, a particularly nasty looking one covering her right eye.

The worst wound, though, was the one in her gut.

Gwen was very shocked, to say the least, that she hadn't died from a wound like that. She'd been run through, Raphael had told her when she'd gawked at her first time seeing it.

Raphael had been the one to tend to the three of them. Every hour he'd change their bandages or sometimes use his powers to slow down the bleeding or speed up the healing a little.

There wasn't much he could do, but he did his best.

"All done with that arm!" Raphael announced with a satisfied grin. It didn't reach his eyes. "The other one should be fine– I'll check on it in about thirty minutes just to make sure. Do you feel much pain?"