TW in the description - read it for this chapter especially
Art by Inkendz - You're amazing as always!
(Song: Lament from the Grave by Tommee Proffit - "After the Massacre")
Giulia POV
Giulia didn't wake because of the early morning light coming through her window.
No. She woke because of the wails. The screams. The cries of despair singing outside. Still, in her pajamas, she raced from the door - and witnessed hell.
Portorosso was streaked with red. Bodies littered the streets, the rain mixed with blood pooling in between the cobblestones. Most of them were Sireni, stuck in their water form in death. Giulia was in shock. She had never seen such carnage. Loved ones bent over the bodies, wailing, trying fruitlessly to bring them back to life. Even some humans lay lifeless on the street. Mothers cried over children that were caught in the battle. Old fishers trying to defend their town lay beside the fallen Sireni.
Giulia stood frozen. This wasn't real. It couldn't be real. If it was - she didn't want to exist anymore. But her eyes couldn't look away from the despair.
"GIULIA!" A voice rang out. She looked over to see Mattias crouched over a Sireno body. His white coat was drenched in blood. She ran to him.
"Help me with this. Put your hand here and press hard." He said, trying to wrap the Sireno's torso, his belly split open. Giulia didn't hesitate. The blood and gore didn't make her cringe. If she could help save a life, then she would endure it. She was numb.
Mattias wrapped the wound and called over a pair of hospital staff with a stretcher. They helped the Sireno onto it, and he was raced up the hill to the hospital.
"Thank you. If I hadn't dressed that wound immediately, he would have bled out." Mattias said, wiping sweat off his brow. But it only smeared blood on his head. "I'm surprised you did it. Most people would have fainted seeing that much blood."
"Where are your nurses?" Giulia asked, ignoring the comment.
"Everywhere. Everyone is in the streets trying to save lives."
Just then, a wail pierced the alley. Mattias ran towards it, Giulia close behind. A young Sirena was screaming out, her rose colored scales shaking. In the chaos, she had become entangled in a metal net. The nurse had almost completely freed her to accept the tail.
"You have to hold still!" The nurse called in a panic, trying to free the child. Her tail was severed, only clinging on by a few small strips of skin.
"Stop!" Mattias called and crouched beside the child. He looked at the wound. "We can't save it." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a syringe filled with a clear liquid. Before the girl could cause herself more harm, he pricked her in the arm, pushing the needle down. In an instant, the girl calmed, then fell to the side unconscious.
Giulia tried her best not to heave as Mattias cut away the last part of flesh connecting the girl's tail to her body. He began dressing the wound as fast as he could.
Another cry came from the ally beside them. There were too many. Mattias looked up at Giulia.
"I got it." She said, taking a handful of bandages and running towards the sound.
It was late into the afternoon when the hospital staff was finally able to leave the streets. They had tended to the survivors, wrapping them and carrying them to the hospital one by one. But once at the hospital, the work began.
Giulia ran with a tray of freshly sanitized surgical tools as another nurse ran with an armful of bandages. Everyone was running, and everyone was covered in blood. There simply weren't enough medical staff to care for all the wounded.
Giulia didn't know how she began working with the staff. But as soon as she stepped in, wrapping wounds, even stitching together skin until a doctor could do it properly, nobody questions her presence. Another helping hand was a blessing. The nurses even began asking for her to help carry a patient into surgery or clean a wound before it was stitched up.
Slowly the cries and moans died down as all the survivors received the attention they needed. Giulia stood in the quiet hallway of the hospital. The floors were streaked with bloody footprints. Only then did she look down and notice she was covered in blood and who knows what else.
A nurse gently tapped her on the shoulder.
"We have sanitization showers on the second floor. Here." She handed Giulia a pair of light green scrubs. Giulia tried to smile as a thanks but couldn't bring herself to do it. Not after what she saw today.
She went to the second floor, washed, and dressed in clean clothes. She looked at herself in the mirror. Now she really did look like a nurse.
Giulia hadn't seen Mattias since entering the hospital. He was in the surgery room, not taking a break between life-saving operations.
As she walked back to the first floor, the glass doors burst open.
"Giulietta!" Massimo called, nearly crying.
"Papa!" Giulia broke into a fit of tears as her father's arm wrapped around her.
"Are you ok?"
"Yes, papa, I'm ok." She pulled away. Then she noticed Massimo cradling his hand. Deep cuts etched into the skin.
"What happened?" She asked as she simultaneously found a cart with disinfectant wipes and fresh bandages. She began cleaning and dressing her father's hand.
"Luca. He ran away." Massimo said.
"Luca did this!?" Giulia couldn't believe what she was hearing.
"It as an accident." He said, shaking his head. "But Giulia, I came here to find them. Have you seen Alberto or Luca?"
Giulia had been in every patient's room at this hospital since she arrived. She knew every single patient here..... well, the ones that were still alive.
"No. They are not here." She said. But they couldn't be dead. She had seen all the fallen bodies as she searched for survivors. None of them had been her brother or Luca.
"It is what I feared." Her father said, trembling. Her father was shaking. She had never seen him so broken. It made her fear spike even higher.
"Where are they?" She asked.
"I think they have been taken." He said, his deep voice cracking.
"No." She stumbled, almost losing her balance. She sat on an empty chair, her head in her hands. "This can't be happening." She moaned.
"I am going to search for them. There was a ship close to the harbor. I think they are on it."
"You'll never catch them, papa!" Giulia cried out. Her insides felt dead. If her brother and Luca had indeed been taken - given what she had seen today, there was little chance either of them was alive.
"I will try!" Massimo shouted, making Giulia jump. "I will not give up on my son!" And he turned, storming from the hospital.
Giulia watched her father march away as she cried into her hands.
Luca and Alberto. They were gone.
~.~.~.~.~
Mattias's hand rested on her shoulder. She looked up at him. He looked absolutely exhausted.
"Are you ok?" She asked him. He smiled.
"All day, I've been asking other people that. It's the first time someone has asked me. But to answer your question - yes, I am ok."
But he didn't look ok. The dark circles under his eyes were the most prominent she had ever seen them. His hair was in knots, his clothes covered in blood. There was a distant look in his eyes, like he was watching from afar away, disconnected from the devastation around them. Yet despite his exhaustion, his hand was steady. The sign of a true surgeon.
He squeezed her shoulder. She reached up a hand and placed it over his.
"Luca and Al are missing." She said. Mattias sat beside her, sighing as he leaned back onto the chair.
"I was watching carefully, Giulia. I didn't see their bodies in the street." He said. Her heart screamed out at that sentence. Just the thought of their bodies lying still. Dead.
Fresh tears bubbled up.
(Credit: Inkendz on Instagram)
"I- I didn't mean to upset you," Mattias said, placing one arm around her shoulders. With the other, he reached out and took her hand gently. She turned her head into his chest and let the new wave of tears fall.
"They're dead, Mattias." She cried.
"You don't know that." He said, but he didn't sound confident.
"Yes, I do!" She yelled, suddenly jerking back. "Why would they be taken, prisoner? Because they are going to be sold and...." She couldn't bear to think about the next part.
"We will keep looking." Mattias urged. "We haven't had any contact with Carollina since the attack. Maybe they took refuge there."
"Maybe." Giulia sniffed.
The night rolled by. Massimo hadn't returned to the hospital. Giulia could only assume he was on the ocean, chasing after Mercenary ships. She continued to help around the hospital. She was assisting patients to the bathroom, bringing medications and food, redressing wounds, and comforting those that had lost loved ones.
Mattias came by around four o'clock in the morning.
"You should go home. Get some rest."
"Papa won't be there. And... I can't stand to be alone." She said, her voice exhausted.
"Then follow me." She walked after him like a zombie. Both physicaly and emmotionaly drained. He led her to a private hallway reserved only for staff. Then he unlocked a door with a nameplate that read.
"Dr. Mattias Romano"
"This is where I sleep when I'm on call. You can take the bed and rest." Mattias offered, holding open the door for her.
She peeked in. It was more of a closet than a room. But there was a small bed mounted to the wall. That was all she needed. But just as she was about to lie down, she looked at the tired doctor. If she was exhausted, she could only imagine how he felt.
"You should sleep too." She said.
"I'll get a few hours in once my head nurse wakes up." He said. Giulia nodded.
She sat on the edge of the bed, staring down at her feet.
"Giulia," Mattias said from the door. She looked up at him. "Everything is going to be ok. The world isn't going to fall apart."
But she just shook her head. He didn't understand. Her family... was gone.
"Mattias," She replied back, letting her head hit the pillow - begging for the relief of sleep, "It already has."
~.~.~.~.~.
Over the course of the next week, boats were sent to float above the village of Carollina. They dropped weighted bottles with messages, asking if everyone was ok. But they never received a reply.
Either the villagers had fled, or they all perished in the raid.
Massimo didn't return to Portorosso for nine days. When he came back, Giulia fell into his chest - and it was the first time she ever saw her father cry. He chased the Mercenary ships for miles and miles. But his little puttering boat simply couldn't stand the mighty waves of the ocean outside the harbor. Only when the boat began to take on water did he finally succumb to defeat and return home. She helped him into the house where he didn't leave his room.
Now that her father was home, she stayed at the house. But she was alone. Massimo had barricaded himself in his room, and the rest of the house was empty.
Giulia made the mistake of walking into Alberto's room in the late hours of the night. It was exactly as he left it. Dirty clothes were strewn on the floor, his shark tooth necklace lay on the dresser. She picked it up and broke into hysterical tears. Clinging to the necklace.
The door knocked as she sobbed, clinging to the door handle of her brother's room. She composed herself and answered.
"I came to check on you," Mattias said. He wasn't in his doctor's clothes. She rubbed her eyes.
"Don't you have patients to care for?" She grumbled. But it was all a farce. She couldn't have been more relieved that he was there. She invited him in, and they sat on the couch in the living room. It was silent. She couldn't bring herself to turn on the TV.
"My resident nurse has it handled for now." He took her hand, giving it a squeeze. "But I am more worried about you."
"It's been almost two weeks. We haven't heard anything." Giulia said. She knew that after this long, the chances of seeing her brother and Luca again were almost zero.
"Come here." Mattias didn't wait for her response before pulling her into him, wrapping both arms around her tightly.
She didn't pull away. It wasn't that kind of hug. It was solidarity. It wasn't flirting - but sharing in pain. She let her cheek rest on his chest.
And this is how they spent most of their evenings. Every day, when Mattias should have been resting from running the hospital, he came to see Giulia. She began to feel some of the darkness in her chest go away. Every time she heard the door knock, a small spark of life came back into her chest.
They cooked meals together in the kitchen. They talked very little, and when they did speak, it was never about what was happening. Rather they spoke about random things, travel, planes, movies - anything to avoid thinking about what had happened to Portorosso. To Giulia.
Giulia took meals to her father every day. He ate very little. One night when Mattias was watching a movie with Giulia on the couch, Massimo came out looking haggard. He looked at them. For a moment, Giulia was worried he might protest how close they sat.
"Thank you for watching over Giulia while I was unwell. And thank you for taking care of Portorosso during this crisis."
Mattias stood and offered a hand.
"Of course, Signore." They shook hands.
"I will no longer let myself drown in my sorrows. I need to do my part in healing Portorosso. Like you have my Giulietta."
Giulia walked up and gave her dad a hug. It was back to just the two of them. Their big family had been cut down by half. Giulia felt like two pieces of her heart were missing. They would always be missing.
"Now, I must go. There are hungry families." And he walked out the door, making his way to the Pescheria.
"Your father is a strong man," Mattias said respectfully. Then he looked down at her, "And so is his daughter."
Giulia reached for Mattias's hand, taking it in hers. "Will you stay?" She didn't want to be alone.
He smiled down at her. Then every so gently, he leaned down, planting a soft kiss on her forehead.
"Of course. As long as you like."
Words: 2,441
Italian Translations
Sireni - Merpeople (Plural)
Sirena - Merperson (Female)
Sireno - Merperson (Male)
Authors Note
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