The Loyal Alone

Chapter Four

I almost fell asleep again with the swimming in my head nearly claiming me, but I felt tugging at my feet again. My socks are gone.

I tried to open my eyes, the world around me was dark, but the little light I saw was enough to hurt my eyes, it all spun into a mass of colors. I ripped my wrists out of his hold and reached for the nearest body part I could get my hands on digging my nails deep into skin as I swiped left and right, aiming for the big bodily-ish masses in front of me. I felt myself backing up, but I couldn't move anywhere except for the couch. I willed my legs to work, to move, to do something. All I could do was sit up, I knew I was swinging my arms, but my hands were numb. I felt an ache in my fingertips were my claws should be.

"Don't touch me!"

There was another low growl in the room, but it sounded more like a warning than a threat.

"Miss, be calm. We are just trying to help."

I punched forward blindly, the color spinning around me, turning mostly black, I felt it rush to my head in a panic, I thought I might pass out.

"It's too easy," I slurred. "Too easy now..."

I felt myself sink forward and fall off the couch. I hit the wooden floor below me with my shoulder first, causing pain to shoot up into my spine and down to my side were my ribs were already pulsing and sore. For a moment, everything went black and blurry. It's too easy for them to hurt me. I need to stay awake.

I felt arms around me again, placing me back onto the couch.

"That is the third time she's lost consciousness." Cole says.

"Hand me your jacket," said the other man, "And go find Evelyn."

"I'm right here." I heard a female's voice, and I tried to reopen my eyes. I saw something thin and lightly colored come through in the swirls.

"I feel sick." I feel sick, did I say that out loud?

"What's your name?" The female asked.

"Mireya." Cole says.

"M-Mira." I whimper.

"Mira, I am Evelyn, I am a doctor. I am here to help you. Understand?"

I nod slowly, I think.

"Good."

I feel a hand on my forehead and after a few moments it went down to my wrist. "Her body heat is low, bad pulse." I hear rummaging and then I feel a finger on my eye lid pulling it back. "Mireya, can you follow the light?"

I try, but the light takes up all of my vision, it's like it's not even moving.

"Okay. Cole, go get something warm to drink, put this is in and let it dissolve."

"K," and he left.

"What is?" I feel like I'm going to heave again. "What is it?" I ask torpidly.

"Something to keep you calm. That is key for you right now. Mira, we need to get your wet clothes off you, it's keeping too much cold to your body and not allowing heat to reach you."

Are my eyes open? I can't tell anymore which shadows are real shapes and which are a part of my mind's abstract reality, I open them as far as I can.

"Don't touch me," I say weakly.

"Look, I'm going to take off your pants and cover your legs with a blanket, it's the farthest away from your core body heat and will need extra help warming up. I will cover you, we will not be inappropriate."

"No."

"Can you manage to do it yourself?" She quipped.

I growled, but said nothing, my stomach turning. My lungs pinching themselves closed with anxiety

"Ulric?" asked Evelyn to the other man in the room.

"Here," said Ulric. "Hold my hands."

I tucked my hands into my arms, but he stopped me and pulled them out in front of me and wrapped his own hands back around my wrists, stronger than the first time.

"This is so you know that it is not me who is touching you. Evelyn is going to remove your pants now. Do. Not. Hurt. Her." When he said it, it was less of an instruction, and more of a threat. As if hurting Evelyn would be the last thing my life counted on, not just getting warm. It took a moment for me to understand what was happening. It didn't click in my head that I needed warmth to survive. What did click was that if I didn't let them do this, I would die; as in, he would kill me; and I wasn't sure that it was as comforting as Ulric was trying to make it seem. I was afraid. I couldn't stop whimpering, and once my pants were down past my waist, I was full on crying.

"I will keep your underwear on." She promised.

I wasn't wearing any underwear... Was I?

I held onto Ulric's hands tightly and tried to stop myself from crying but I couldn't. I felt the tug of my pants, I was a skinny woman, with very few curves to hold my long johns on, but when they are wet and tight it makes it all that much harder. It took a moment before they were off, but I couldn't tell until I felt the heat from a blanket being placed on me and hands rubbing my legs vigorously to get warmer.

"Jacket first, then shirt." Evelyn says. "We'll keep a blanket over you, but you have to let go of Ulric's hands."

Meaning, I have to control myself and make sure I don't hurt her.

I don't know if I released his hands or not, I was barely holding on to him anyways, he was holding on to me. I felt Evelyn's hands, soft and feminine on my skin near my wrist as she coaxed the jacket off of me. I pulled my arm away and under my shirt, taking it off myself, unwilling to have these people touch me when I was so weak and can barely see. I pulled it over my head, it is easier for me to move my arms than it is to duck my head, because I felt so sick. Someone helped me pull off the last bit of wet clothes as it just hung on my other arm. I felt another heavier blanket fall on me.

"Try to stay awake," Evelyn warned.

It was all I could do to pull the blanket around me and will myself awake. Despite the fear from the lingering smell of men in the room, the warmth made it difficult to not drift away.

"Don't leave me," I whisper catching her scent in my throat with a deep breath as the world collides with darkness.