[TCT-Prelude] Half-Life

[z011]

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"...no change in days...."

"...think they can hear what...."

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"...we went riding and I fell off..."

"....in Heaven, look over your daughter and grant her..."

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"...-sider long-term options. She may nev..."

"...I love you, meu precioso Dália."

"I love you, Papai," her throat felt dry and the words came out in a cracked whisper. It was dark, but when she tried to open her eyes the light poured in like tiny knives of brightness. "Why do you sound so sad?"

She heard a dozen voices then, calling for doctors and uttering prayers of thanks; she felt hands touching her legs and arms. Even with her eyes closed again, she knew it was her mother that grabbed her hand, wet spots of tears dripping down onto skin. Other senses were filtering in now, the strong sweet scent of flowers undercut by the sharp tang of disinfectant, the feel of cotton sheets and plastic covers beneath them, the cool feel of metal on either side of her. She knew these things nearly as intimately as she knew her home.

"What happened?" she still couldn't speak above a whisper, but the room went almost instantly silent at her words.

"There was a tornado, irmãzinha," her eldest brother, Paul, was somewhere to the left of her, past her feet. His deep voice was thick with emotion and she could see in her mind his expression, shining eyes from fighting tears and lined brow even at his young age from always feeling responsible for his younger siblings. "You were hurt."

"Hurt?" Sebastian, the second and far more fiery sibling exclaimed. Dimly, Dahlia heard the click of the door to the room opening. "The hospital collapsed on her! She been in a-"

"Silencio!" Helena hissed, cutting them both off. She was younger than Dahlia in the Berganza line-up of children, but she had already married and had a child of her own. That mothering came naturally was an understatement. "Let the doctor explain things."

"Coma, I've been in a coma," Dahlia said to herself as much as to whoever else was in the room. She felt her mother's hand slip from hers and the shadow of someone else fell over her. "How long?"

"Nearly three months, Dr. Berganza," came the warm but professionally distant voice of a man she didn't recognize. "I'm Dr. Rennen. You're wincing, is the light bothering you?"

"Yes," she croaked again and felt the light behind her eyes dim as the switch was flipped off. "May I have some water?"

She heard the tap of the sink she knew would be in the room run and felt a hand behind her head, tipping her forward enough so that she could sip at the cup without gagging. The water was lukewarm, but over her vocal chords like a panacea. "I remember....the was an alert. We had to move everyone to the bone- to the basement." Every hospital had their own colorful names for areas of the building; the morgue had been in the basement of St. Luke's of Minneapolis and had earned 'boneyard' from the first crop of residents to serve there. It had been passed on despite (publicly) disapproving looks from attendings (who'd called it the same thing when they'd been residents anyway).

"That's good, Dr. Berganza," Rennen said in the soothing tones doctors used to try to keep patients from freaking out on them. Usually it irritated Dahlia to be talked to like that, but right now she was clinging to the reassurance in his voice like a lifeline. She'd tried to reach up and take the cup of water herself. Nothing had happened. "Can you open your eyes now?"

She did so tentatively, blinking into the semi-darkness. The light from the cut-out on the door was bright, but it didn't feel like someone was stabbing her the brain anymore. Dr. Rennan, a older white man with thinning grey hair and deep lines of worry and stress from years of his chosen profession, smiled kindly at her. She returned the expression reflexively and glanced around the crowded room. Half her siblings were there; Maria, the eldest daughter, was sitting with their mother, holding the older woman as she cried in relief. Helena was standing with Paul and Sebastian, clustered at the foot of her bed and watching the doctor like hawks circling for the swoop. Her father was just behind Dr. Rennan, literally looking over his shoulder and holding a hand to his mouth, trying not to push the good doctor out of way and hold his little girl. To her right was little Raphael, the youngest of the Berganza brood at twelve years old, watching her with wide eyes, his hands on the bar on the side of the bed. "Dijeron que iban a morir," he whispered to her.

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"Raphael!" Helena said sharply.

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Dahlia tried to wave her off and again nothing happened. She tried to take a deep breath and felt her entire body shake from the effort. "Dios permitió que me quedara un hermano pequeño poco más," she said back quietly, then turned back to Dr. Rennan. "I can't move my arms or legs, doctor," her tone was even, almost professional, but there was a thread of panic that escaped her attempt at control.

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He nodded slowly, unsurprised. He placed his hand on her arm and asked, "Can you feel my hand?" She nodded and he repeated the simple experiment along both arms, her legs, and along her sides and stomach. "Can you tell me your full name, please?"

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"Dahlia Maria Deborah Juliana Berganza," she recited.

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"What is your birth date?"

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"December 1st, 1988."

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"What color is the wall?"

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"Blue," she sighed. Understanding the reason for the cognitive function questions didn't make them any less annoying.

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"Name as many animals that start with the letter E that you can think of."

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"Generic name or scientific?" she didn't mean to snip, but the questions were really annoying and her head was starting to hurt. Everything was starting to hurt.

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Dr. Rennan chuckled, "Alright, then, I think your mind is working just fine if you're making jokes now." He shooed Raphael off the stool next to the bed and sat down, his expression settling into that 'bad news' set of lines any doctor that practiced for more than a decade earned. "Your spine was severely compressed in the collapse of St. Luke's Hospital, Dr. Berganza. Several vertabrae cracked and there was damage to the spinal cord. We managed to fuze the bones without further damage, but-"

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"But I'm likely to be a quadriplegic for the rest of my life," Dahlia finished for him. She could still hear her mother, crying out prayers of thanks that she was alive, but her mind was moving too quickly. She'd already passed 'elation at living', turned left at 'something really bad happened' and was firmly sitting at the crossroads of 'you'll never walk or even feed yourself again' and 'your medical career is over'.

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Dr. Rennan squeezed her arm and offered a sincere, "The fact that you still have sensation in your limbs is encouraging." The fact that you're not brain-dead is a miracle, was left unspoken.