Echo Through Eternity {A Violet Evergarden Male Reader Insert}

Chapter 1: The Nurse & Her Aspirations

Within the Royal Capital was a region not quite like the rest一it was rich in wildlife and poor in large human populations. The capital ran down the side of the country's vital railway and river, connecting the country to Leidenschaftlich and their southern allies. The now vacant section of rail leading to one of the region's run-down station was once in full use during the war. A prior lifeline for the constant stream of battered soldiers in need of medical assistance.

Bordering fenced-off apple orchards were two skinny dirt roads that were paved by the once-constant presence of automobiles travelling to and from the town.

The town, once filled with the constant rackety low humming engines of trucks, had all but gone quiet. The noises of war were pleasantly replaced by the howls of wind and the light thrashing of trees and the buzzing of cicadas—A stark contrast in the environment from what it had been for four long years. It was this unmistakable sense of peace that the inhabitants of the village hadn't felt and heard since the beginning of the war.

Children who had grown up in the chaotic environment were strangers to the concept of "peace". Some even found themselves missing the cars' clattering metal and the laughter of rehabilitating soldiers. Desperate to revive that life, the children resorted to using their adolescent imagination to play the part of those men.

Away from all the ruckus of the town, up another dirt road that branched off from the mayor's office was alone a two-story building atop an elevated piece of land. It was one time known as the busiest place in the entire region but it is now merely a fraction of what it was known to be. The Town Hospital calmed down from what it previously was, there remained a handful of patients in rehabilitation with only two nurses to keep watch over them.

One of which is a young girl who could be no older than the age of fifteen, whose hair was neatly tied into a fastened braided bun with no imperfections, donning a frilled white apron over her bayoux nurse's dress. The young girl wrung out a sopping cloth over a bucket of crystal clear water, fresh from the stream that ran adjacent to the building. She continued to wring the cloth of excess water as the other nurse hastily entered the lobby; mumbling concerned words underneath her hushed breath, never taking her eyes off the clipboard she carried.

Curious as always and worried for her mother, the young girl known as Zinnia looked to her focused mother and asked in a concerned tone, "Is there something wrong, mother?"

Hearing her daughter's voice, Synthia turned away from her papers and reassured Zinnia with a sincere smile and the truth, "I-I am fine Zinnia. It's just our newest patient, he still hasn't woken up yet..." Synthia's words trailed off into worried whispers.

"Still? It's been three days since he arrived, how could he still be asleep?" Zinnia questioned as she slapped her wet rag against the clouded glass. Moving her rag in a circular motion, Zinnia wiped the glass free of dust, dunking the rag back in the bucket before lowering her head in concern.

"Do you think... Do you think he'll ever wake up?"

Hearing her daughter's crushed query, Synthia could do little to answer Zinnia with the words of reality. Truth be told, Synthia wasn't sure if this patient would be able to wake up again, they handled similar cases to his during the height of the war. Not many woke up, most had succumbed to their injuries overnight, two days after they arrived.

By the time Synthia let out a heavy sigh, Zinnia had already cleaned off two more windows and moved to another across the room.

"I can't say... But we have to keep hope."

The daughter and mother linked eyes as they both understood what each truly meant in their words. Just then, the honk of a horn alerted the two women to the outside of the hospital, a truck marked with a red cross and white circle abruptly parked outside with a soldier opening the trunk.