-Griffin King-
"You have no idea what the hell you've done do you?" Rin's arms were crossed where she leant up against her door frame. "You have no idea who she is?" It had taken all of five minutes to get her to stop and talk to me. She seemed as amused as she was pissed.
I frowned towards the bathroom door. "Apparently you do, though?"
Nicodemus rested his hand down on my shoulder where he stood behind me. "Have you ever heard the expression 'the bosses daughter,' Griffin?" His hair more puff than usual, which told me he was stressed and had been pulling it up with his fingers restlessly.
"Quite simply, we're in for some trouble." Takeichi sighed, standing straight as the bathroom door opened.
Kate stood there, wet hair sticking at the prickled skin around her neck, back in Rin's dress. Her brown eyes were wide and button like as she stared across at us. The hallway was filled with uncomfortable silence as she stepped out into it. Her damp, bare feet tapping very gently against the laminate floor.
There were small droplets in her ducts, thicker than water. She was in a melancholy that her hearts thrum seemed to match in a slow beat. She approached the three of us slowly, hesitating before she reached me as the other two stood off. Her breath quickened a little, as did that beat.
She blinked back the sadness and leant her head against my chest tiredly, muttering, "I'm sorry I was so stand offish."
"Uh-I..." I stared down at her, then glanced up at Rin for guidance.
She was wearing a subtle smirk and simply looked away.
"There's nothing to forgive. You were right earlier, you have every reason not to trust me, in fact, you have every reason to be angry." I rested one hand down in her wet hair atop her head, the other on her back gently.
She nodded sleepily, I could tell by the subtle flutter of her eyelashes against my shirt that she couldn't keep her lids open. "I was right, earlier. But I figure you can't exactly keep anything from me if you tried." Her hand rested up over my heart to steady herself up perhaps. It wasn't a calculated action so I couldn't be sure.
I felt my lips curl up into a smile, "I suppose not."
Rin cleared her throat at the same time as Nicodemus chuckled low to himself. My eyes drew up to Takeichi, a little bewildered. Kate was starting not to support herself up. She was drifting into sleep where she stood.
"You'd better put her in bed," Takeichi looked both incredulous, but entertained at the same time, pointing towards her own door. "She's in with me until further notice."
I nodded, turning Kate around, whilst she was still able to stand on her own two feet, and guided her in through Rin's door. The room was only a little less cramped than mine, and had space for two old spring beds. The kind that are barely a foot off the ground, fold open from the middle and squeak under every movement made on them. They were narrow and padded with a flimsy mattress each.
Rin had never been concerned with personal comfort, just a things effectiveness. She wasn't the type of leader to take liberties, either. She knew something that made her more powerful than most who have ever been given charge of others. She is there to serve those under her, not to be served. She calls the shots not to benefit herself, but those she works with. Collective good, she called it. So despite having a little more breathing room than Nicodemus and myself, she made other sacrifices.
Guiding Kate to the bed close to the wall, opposite the door, it was almost as if she were sleep walking. I didn't know whether to be amused or concerned with how quickly exhaustion took her though.
She sat down on her little bed, making the springs creak gently under her weight. I had to put my hands on her shoulders to remind her to lay back. She went surely with another little creak from the bed and the clip of a spring against another. Her eyes closed the moment her head met the pillow, her breathing stabilising into an even pace. She was gone instantly.
I carefully pulled up the cover from underneath her legs, it was a scratchy wool blanket, and rested it over her. I wasn't sure whether the little sparks travelling between her shoulder and my fingers were due to the static of the wool or the odd chemical reaction we set off in each other. Either way, little blue sparks of light flashed in the dark for a moment, making my fingers tingle in an odd numb.
I stood straight, withdrawing my fingers and rubbing them together to dissipate the effect of the electric current dancing in them. Staring down at Kate, I held my breath. Her scent was quickly filling the room, making it more potent.
"I wouldn't get attached," Rin muttered from the doorway. "She may not be around for long."
My eyes snapped up towards her, narrowing. "What do you mean?"
"Sweat beads are forming on her skin, Griffin, she's growing paler." She paused, "When you figure out what it means, let me know." Then she pushed off from the door and walked down the hall towards the kitchen where I heard the clip of the kettle switch being pressed down.
I frowned towards Kate. Rin had been right, small glistening beads of sweat were starting to appear on her forehead. She'd taken the serum on perfectly well to start with, rejection is an automatic thing, so why was it coming on slow like a virus? I wondered if maybe this wasn't a sign of rejection, instead adjustment.
Yes, I told myself, it has to be adjustment.
* * *
It was mid-afternoon, I was laid up in my bed with the cover pulled up over my head. I tended to sleep in my clothes and change after I got up near dusk. It was just in case I needed to act quickly, it made sense to always be ready.
From down the hall I started to hear a scratchy sound in my ears, my eyes slowly twitching open to the disturbance. A frantic squeak of springs shuddering against movement, quickened breaths, then a painful moaning rang through the walls. I shot up from my bed, pulling my sword from the space between the bed-frame and wall, and rushed out into the hall as a scream ripped out of Rin's room.
The springs had silenced, but I could hear four heart beats, all going ten to the dozen. My own, Nicodemus's where he emerged from his door up the hall, Rin's and the fastest flutter of all, Kate's heart.
Rin came out into the hall, a juddering body in her arms. Sweat glittered across Kate's skin, which had turned a shade paler. Her fingers were twitching where her arm hung down, her lips too and her eyes were moving rapidly behind her lids. Her breath stuttered through her lungs that had started to spasm within her.
Nicodemus rushed towards the lab, we both followed at a pace, no words exchanged. Out of my peripheral vision I caught the small trickle of red coming from Kate's nose. My heart froze for a moment.
"Rejection?" I wondered aloud.
Rin shook her head gravely. "It's worse than that."
Nicodemus was stood by the secondary door in the lab room. He quickly slid off the metal casing of a false light switch just next to the door. It revealed the black pad beneath it. The pad sensed the change and a little red light flashed to green, a screen started up that Nicodemus bent down in front of. It made an almost inaudible sound as it scanned his eye. A scratchy type of sound, like an old DSL modem whirring to life but so quietly most would miss it.
The secondary door opened into a little lift. Nicodemus stepped back, allowing Takeichi in first. I entered last typing in a code at the console near the doors and pressing my thumb into another scanner panel. I was trying to ignore the scent of blood going stale in the air. It was making me dizzy, one reason I was glad Rin was taking care of Kate.
The lift, like most of the gateway, was lit with ultra-violet lights. As it started to descend I felt my stomach churn a little. Instead of make the transit smoother, being a Nocturnal exaggerated the effects of motions sometimes. Times such as these.
The elevator came to a holt. Nicodemus brushed his hair down in anxious habit as the doors parted in front of us. It revealed long white walls stretching forward and glowing under the UV lighting. The smell of cleaning chemicals greeted us all, this place was sterile and as bright as Nocturnals could stand it on a daily basis.
We stepped out of the lift, rushing down the hall towards the medical room. White doors parted into a wall to show a room filled with equipment. Rin ran in first, placing Kate down on a white table. Nicodemus turned at the threshold of the door where my feet were planted and giving me a sullen glance pressed a pad next to the doors with his thumb so that it closed in my face. I was useless in the hall, but I'd have been less than that inside that room.
Instead I took to pacing, monitoring vital signs and minor sounds from outside.
This was the Sanctuary, a small space under an innocuous building, where miracles could sometimes happen and those in need of disappearing can be kept hidden away. Currently, it felt more like a rodent run.
What could be worse than rejection? I thought.
Then again, Jake had suffered that and survived. His body and the glitchy serum learned to work together. It was possible it could do the same with Kate. But if it wasn't straight forward rejection, were the chances the same?
* * *
Kate's breaths were even again along with her hummingbird heart. The violet light above her brought out the faint mahogany tones in her dark hair. I'd been sat in a chair next to the little metal framed bed for a couple hours, just watching for signs of change. Her skin had some colour back in it, but it was minor. She looked fragile, this wasn't supposed to happen with a Nocturnal. Especially one who'd taken on the serum so well and showed so much potential.
Her eyes flickered a little behind their lids, making me sit up at her bed side. Slowly that movement turned into the butterfly flutter of them opening, filled with sleep. There was a reddish tint to their brown colour under the UV.
She breathed in deeply before peering over at me, the white linens of the hospital bed not far from the colour of her skin still.
"What happened?" She murmured groggily.
A subtle smile played at my lips as relief swelled through me, "It's complicated."
Her mouth curved up subtly into a weak smile. "How like life..." Glancing about the room, she asked, "Where am I?"
"In the Sanctuary, one of its twenty rooms. This one is for isolation and observation." I answered, lowering my voice as I spoke because she'd flinched a little at the sound.
This wasn't an overly spacious room. With its white walls glowing eerily under the UV light. Switched off monitors, a table of sterile tools across the room, a wall of technology I'd never really gotten to know. Small blinking lights coming from it, and a few wires. Where this room differed from the lab above, was that it was in part a theatre, observation room, and a way to contain the dangerous or, if it ever happened, contagious. This being why certain chemicals and drugs were kept out of it unless they were needed for a case.
For some reason it made sense to Nicodemus to combine prison and infirmary.
"This is the sanctuary?" Kate blinked about, her words slow. "Hmm," her eyes closed again.
Without a sound, even from the door closing, Rin appeared at my side. Her hand reached forward, taking Kate's wrist. "Stay awake," she growled.
Kate brought herself round again, squinting up at Takeichi. "Why, I'm tired..." She complained.
"I don't care. I'd rather you be tired than dead." Rin withdrew her hand again, frowning towards me.
Nicodemus opened the door, his actions were clumpy and loud in comparison to Rin. He cleared his throat before delivering his verdict, "She's not out of the woods yet. I can't say how long it will be until we can be sure she's stable."
I sighed and dipped my head down. "Of course."
"Stable?" Kate asked, shaking the sleepiness off now. I could feel her anxiety rolling off of her, the adrenalin running through her veins. She was pushing herself to sit up a little.
"Had I not been aware of some thing's, I'd have assume rejection of the ReGenisis. Which can be fought, sometimes with the aid of a drug Nicodemus developed." Rin grit her teeth together in her mouth.
I scowled up between Takeichi and Nicodemus, they hadn't been forthcoming in explaining it to me either. I'd never appreciated being in the dark, which was one of the reasons I was no longer in Unit Zero I suppose.
"I don't know if it's possible to stop your bodies breakdown now that it's begun. We've tried. If you pull through, you'll be the first Nocturnal to adapt intravenously." Nicodemus's hands were cupped behind his back, his shoulders slumped a little forward.
"Wait, adapt?" I growled. He wasn't talking about the change from human to Nocturnal. He was talking about an upgrade, like the Scavengers often sought.
"The ReGenisis serum adapts to a person's body, becomes a self replicating part of it. Once injected it ceases to be the same as the liquid in the bottle it came from." Nicodemus continued, pacing back and forth restlessly as he explained, "This means if a person were to inject that same serum a day or so later, it would be seen as a foreign body, sought out and destroyed by the serum already present." He sighed heavily, his hands un-cupping from his back and stretching up into his hair where he gently teased it up in thought.
"The problem comes that it is two equal powers fighting themselves. If just a little part of the new serum takes a hold on a number of cells, it has a foothold." He paused, breathing out heavily through his nose. "From outside it looks like an infection to begin with, I suppose. But the body wages a war on itself, the serums stop protecting and replicating cells because it starts to become confused. It's primary role becomes destruction. For the patient that means slow, painful decay." Nicodemus stopped, glancing up at us, where I think we were both trying to process the information. "Death, basically."
"I don't understand, she wasn't a Nocturnal, she didn't have the serum in her body already. I would have detected it. She would have been healing..." I stood up from the seat at Kate's bedside.
"No," Rin huffed quietly, dipping her head to hide the roll of her eyes. Seeing as they shone like two moons, it was hard to miss the action. "She wasn't a Nocturnal in the same sense...But she has had the ReGenisis Serum before, a basic one. The only one that served its original purpose," She crossed her arms as she brought her head back up to look at us.
"Excuse me?" Kate and I echoed. She was unsure, I was holding back venom.
"Firethorn is her mother's maiden name. Which is why you didn't recognise it." Rin closed her eyes, she was as irritated as I was.
I looked to Kate for confirmation, she sank a little. Her eyes turning worried, guilt riddling them. I could see something dawning across her face, confusion out weighing it all.