I hated the smell of hospitals. The sounds — or sometimes the lack of sounds. Hated the ‘calming’ monochromatic colors they were decorated in. Hated the maze of halls that I had to walk through every time I wanted to see Mom. Hated opening the door and seeing the wonder woman from my memory like a fading doll on a white bed. Hated seeing the breathing mask over her face and a feeding tube snaking out from under the edge of her white quilt.

For financial reasons, she shared the room with three other women, all Sleepers. All had fallen unconscious on the same day six years ago. They never spoke a word to each other, but they’d spent every day together since coming to this hospital. From interacting with their family members over the years, I knew the other women pretty well. Luckily, I was the only visitor right now.

My senses were good enough now that I was aware of doctors and nurses walking up and down the hall outside Mom’s room, even though the closed door. I ignored them as I picked up a padded metal chair from the wall and carried it to my mother’s bedside. I sank down and smiled softly. “Good afternoon, Mom.” I reached out and gently touched her light brown hair, the same color as mine and Aliya’s. There were graying strands at her temples, something that she would have been proud of if she were awake.

I’m not getting older, I’m getting more experienced. It's an honor, she used to say when I’d tease her for aging.

I opened up the bedside drawer and pulled out a red brush. “I’m going to brush your hair now, okay?”

She never answered, but it seemed rude to just start doing things without asking. Maybe it was because there was a small part of me that hoped that Mom could actually hear me, even if she couldn’t respond. As I carefully drew the soft bristles through her hair, I started to speak about anything and everything that came to my mind.

“It’s been a long time since I last visited, huh? I’m sorry, I’ve been busy. Things have changed a lot recently. Like a lot.” I paused. I bet I couldn’t even tell her about the System, even though she wasn’t even conscious. “I’m not an E anymore. I can’t tell you why, and honestly, it’s really complicated. But I’ve been doing some pretty dangerous stuff lately. Nothing too out of control.” I paused when I thought of everything that’d happened the last couple days. “Okay, that’s a lie. You would pull my ear off and yell yourself hoarse if you knew what I’ve done lately.” I laughed, in spite of myself.

God, I would give anything to have her do that right now. I’d go deaf for life if it meant that Mom smiled at me again.

“I, ah…” My voice cracked and I had to swallow before I could force another smile. “I just wanted to say I’m sorry.” I leaned back and let my hands drop into my lap as I started up at the fluorescent light. “I’m sorry, Mom. About the energy crystal. I promise, there’s a reason why I did it. I know that it probably put the hospital in a desperate position, and I don’t even know how many innocent people this will affect, but I couldn’t let that crystal come into Earth. It’s not even just because of the task.” My heart felt like it was ripping apart with guilt, just thinking about it. “But it would have been worse if it came into Earth.”

I sighed and rubbed my face. “Still, it's just one crystal. A huge one, sure, but how many millions are brought out of the Gates around the world every day? How many Hunters get turned into monsters and killed by their own people, weekly? Is what I’m doing even doing anything? Am I really helping? I can’t just sit back and do nothing. If it was just me, maybe I could close my eyes and pretend. But as long as I think that you, Aliya, Aunt Mina and Uncle Mark are in danger, I can’t just sit still. Even though I’m pretty sure all my efforts are useless.” I took a long breath and held it before I let it out. A bitter smile curled my lips. “I wonder if this is how Kesstel felt? Or did he get blindsided by it too, and that’s why he’s so pessimistic?”

A picture of him walking toward me through the mist came to my mind. I blinked out of my thoughts and sat up straight. “Ah, I haven’t told you about Kesstel, have I?” I forced all the bitter uncertainty away and replaced it with a bright smile. I put the brush away and pulled out a special lotion from Mom’s side drawer. Her skin was paper pale from lack of sunlight for the last six years and needed to be frequently lotioned. I glanced at the chart over her nightstand and guessed that it was about time to do that.

“Kesstel is, well, out of this world.” I laughed at my own joke. Gently, I rubbed the lotion onto Mom’s cheeks around the clear oxygen mask over her nose and mouth. “He’s cold and standoffish. Honestly, he scared the hel — heck out of me when I first met him. And the next couple times after that. He’s not a bad guy. I think. I don’t know much about him. But I’ve seen him enough that I’m getting used to him. I actually even forgot that he was an S rank for a while yesterday. Then when he got mad, I was actually shocked. And more shocked that he made it so that I wasn’t affected by his aura.”

I paused, my hand at her throat. Mom’s faint pulse pumped under my fingertips. “I don’t know what I should do about him. Should I keep distance between us or try to be friends with him? It seems like he has all the answers I need, I just don’t know how to get them from him.” Another bitter smile pulled at my lips. “What right do I have to try and be friends with an S god?” Then I laughed. “And how many assassins are going to come at me just for trying?”

I let out a long sigh and started to rub lotion onto her left hand, feeling her bones and veins through tissue-thin skin. “Ah, Mom. What do I do?” I whispered and lapsed into silence, listening to the ticking clock on the wall.

I noticed a human in the hallway stop at Mom’s room. A moment later, there was a light rap on the wooden door.

I looked over my shoulder. Uncle Mark stepped into the door. “Hey.” I smiled and stood up to give him a tight hug. “I didn’t know I was going to see you here.”

“Jyn, it's good to see you.” Dark bags circled his eyes and yet he smiled and hugged me back. His thin face had aged since I last saw him and there was more gray in his dark hair. “It’s been a while, huh?” He grabbed a chair from the wall and set it next to mine. How many times had we sat like this in this sad hospital room throughout the years? Too many times.

I bobbed my head. “Yeah, you were out the last time I visited.”

He paused and nodded. “I find myself coming here a lot.”

I glanced at him, surprised. “Why?”

A tired smile pulled at his lips as he gave me a side glance. “Your mom is a good listener, I guess.” His face brightened and he pointed to the Fanged Snapper bracelet on my wrist. “You’re wearing it too. Aliya never takes it off, I swear. She can’t wait to show it to everyone she meets. Sometimes I see her just sitting there and twisting her wrist to make the scales rattle. She says that she likes the sound.”

I smiled and touched my own bracelet. “I’m glad that she likes it.” I wore mine as long as I wasn’t in armor. The shop clerk was right, the bracelet did give a small +2 magic boost. But I couldn’t fit it over or under my arm bracers. I thought about enlarging it, but I didn’t want it to get damaged in a fight. I’d rather not use it in the Gate and keep it longer.

I swallowed hard so my voice didn’t crack. “Mom is a good listener. I’m a good listener too.” I looked into his brown eyes. “I mean, we’re a family. And you’ve been an amazing uncle to me and Aliya all our lives. I owe you a lot. I want to do anything I can to help. And if listening is what you need, that’s what I’ll do.”

His smile wobbled and tears pooled in his eyes. He reached out and hugged my shoulders hard. “I don’t deserve you or Mina or Aliya.” His voice broke and he took a couple deep breaths until he calmed down.

“I was just spilling my guts to her too.” I sat back and straightened Mom’s blanket. “What were you going to talk to her about?”

He took a big breath. “The usual,” he said slowly. “About job hunting and worrying about your aunt’s health. About how,” he paused, “I wish I could do more. I wish I wasn’t such a failure.”

My mouth cracked open but it took me a couple seconds to speak. “I don’t think you’re a failure. You’re just in a slump. But you can pull yourself out. We’re all here for you, believing in you.”

I knew that depression wasn’t like a cold. How you felt bad for a couple days then, poof, it was gone. It would be great if it was, but it wasn’t. I didn’t know what to say to help him. This was the man who helped raise me. Every time I felt like a failure, he was there to buoy me up. I should be able to do the same for him. But what if I said something that made it worse?

He gave a sad laugh. “Right. A slump.” He sighed. “I’ve always been in a ‘slump.’ I took in two sweet girls and raised them in poverty.” He started talking faster, as if spilling out words that he’s kept bottled up for too long. “I’m in such a slump that I need my little niece to work herself to the bone to put food on my table. And don’t think I have the same magical illusion as Mina and Aliya. I’ve heard the stories your dad told when we were sharing a beer and he didn’t dare tell your mom. I know how it is on the other side of that wall.”

His breathing sped up. “No matter how many applications I send out, I’m getting old and there are younger, more capable people out there. When I did get that telemarketing job, there was just so much noise, I couldn’t think, my brain shut down and I couldn’t breathe. The next thing I knew, I was walking out in the middle of training.” He buried his face in his hands. “I failed. I failed to help my family. Again.” His voice broke. “I’m worth more dead. At least you’d get the life insurance money.”

My eyes widened and my heart stopped. “Shut up!” I jumped to my feet and my chair skidded across the ground then fell over.

Uncle Mark jumped and looked up with red eyes.

I glared down at him, heaving out fast breaths. “You are not a failure. You never have been. You could have abandoned me and Aliya at an orphanage when Mom fell asleep, but you didn’t. You raised us with all the love and encouragement that you could. We might not have had the newest clothes, but we knew what family meant. That’s better than what half the people in this city have.” I jabbed a finger out the window. “No amount of money is going to replace that. I know. I know. I got a lump sum of money instead of a dad. That money never hugged me. That money never told me it was going to be okay. That money didn’t stay up with me till one in the morning, helping me with homework even though he had work in the morning.”

The anger burning in me fizzled out, leaving a deep sadness in my heart. “Why can’t you see how much we need you? Especially Aliya and Aunt Mina. You’re the only father-figure that Aliya remembers and Aunt Mina would fall apart without you. Our family is already so broken, we’d fall apart if something else happened.” Tears burned my eyes. “I’ve been trying so hard. I’m literally putting everything I have into keeping you safe. I bleed, I struggle, I run in circles trying to figure out what to do, I end everyday so damn tired that I feel like I can’t get up in the morning. But I do anyway. Because I have to keep you safe. Not just Aliya and Aunt Mina. It’s you too, Uncle Mark.”

I took a deep breath, shocked at the words that had come out of my mouth. I never wanted to tell him any of this. And I sure as hell shouldn’t be talking like this in a hospital room. I sighed and covered my face. “You don’t have to hurry. You can take all the time you need to find the right job for you. I’ll take care of everything until you’re on your feet again.” I lowered my hands and looked at him with pleading eyes. “Just please, don’t give up. Don’t disregard the love we all have for you. Don’t throw away all the effort I’ve made for you. Please.”

He bowed his head. Big drops of water plopped down on the knees of his khaki pants.

I stared down at his head. God, please tell me I didn’t say the wrong thing this time. I just wanted to help, I didn’t mean to lose it on him.

There was a soft knock on the door.

I turned my head and saw a doctor standing there in a long white robe. “Is this a bad time?” His soft voice carried through the room.

Shoot, I must have been too loud. I forced a smile. “No. Is there a problem?”

“Ah, yes. There actually is.” The doctor stepped into the room and closed the door behind him. He held a manila folder in his hands.

I glanced at Uncle Mark who was still trying to get his emotions under control. Well, I was the one that was yelling, so I should take the heat for it. I walked over the doctor. “Sorry about the noise,” I said, sheepishly. If I apologized right off the bat, maybe I’d only be warned and not asked to leave.

The doctor nodded to the side. “Hunters have strong emotions, it’s nothing out of the ordinary.” He smiled kindly, but his droopy eyes were sad. “It’s actually about Annette Devhro that I need to talk to you about.”

My stomach plunged in the ground. “What’s wrong with my mom?” She seemed just fine to me. Nothing had changed in six years.

“Nothing, technically. She’s showing all the correct symptoms of a Sleeper and that’s why I need to talk to you.” He handed me the folder. “In a little over half a year, it will be her seventh year in the Sleeper state.” He looked me in the eyes. “It's usually about that time that a Sleeper’s health starts to rapidly decline. We, at Garden City Hospital, don’t keep Sleepers here longer than seven years. The equipment they need is a lot more costly and it only preserves their lives for another year or two at most.”

My eyes widened. I did know that Sleepers didn’t live more than ten years after they fell asleep. But it’s something that I’d always pushed to the back of my mind. When Mom passed out six years ago, I told myself there was plenty of time to find an cure. That’s why we didn’t pull her plug years ago. There was always hope that she’d wake up. Even though it had never happened before.

I swallowed hard. “Have they come up with an antidote yet?”

The doctor shook his head, like it’s something that he’d done thousands of times. Probably because he has. “I won’t lie. The scientists aren’t any closer than they were twenty years ago.” As if he hadn’t just crushed my heart, he continued. “You’ll need to start making some decisions. If you’re going to move her to another city, you need to make preparations now. All hospitals put a tight cap on how many Sleepers they take and spots fill quickly. If you aren’t going to move her, there are other preparations you need to make.”

He didn’t say it, but he was talking about funeral arrangements.

My hands fisted as my thoughts raced and jumbled together, trying to find a solution to the problem. System? I asked in my mind. Is there a cure for Sleepers?

[… Not yet.]

*****