𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙢 𝘽𝙤𝙙𝙞𝙚𝙨

Chapter Forty three

Jennie

It's been hours and I still haven't gotten any words. I pace a frantic line, a jagged zig-zag in my distraction, in the hallway while the doctors are working away on the other side of the second door on the left. Working to save Y/N's life. The life she only just got back.

Everything is such a whirlwind in my head that I can't keep track of anything. The morning started with trying to persuade Hyun-suk that the Corpses were changing. Then we were running, first from the people of Haven and then from the Boneys.

Y/N lost her friend Roo - no, not her friend. Her mother. And then we fell into the pool, Y/N using her own body to cushion my landing.

The split on the back of her head was just one more injury that came back to haunt her when her heart started beating.

I take in a shaky breath as I think over that mesmerising fact again.

Y/N's heart beats. She's alive. By some strange miracle of fate, Y/N has come back from the dead. Which means it's possible for the others as well. There's a chance that the other Corpses can get their lives back too.

Somehow, we found a cure.

The front door opens and a moment later Jisoo appears at the end of the hall, her hair coming loose from the ponytail and her eyes panicked.

When they fall on me her face visibly blanches. "Oh gosh, Jennie," she said and she hurries toward me.

Jisoo's eyes are lingering on my chest and when I look down I realise it's because my shirt is stained a bright crimson.

"It's not mine," I said to assuage the terror on Jisoo's face. "It's hers."

"Is she okay?" Jisoo asks, knowing right away who I'm talking about.

"I don't know." A choked sob fights its way up my throat and I press my knuckles against my lips in a futile attempt to keep it in. "I don't know, Jisoo. It's been hours and no one has said anything. There was just so much blood. What if... What if she-?"

"No, don't think like that," Jisoo said immediately. She puts a hand under my chin and tilts my head up so I'm forced to meet her gaze. "She'll pull through. She's a fighter, Jennie. And she's got you to come back to so that can't hurt."

My lip quivers and Jisoo folds me into her arms. I cry silently into her shirt in the middle of the hallway, letting out all of the emotions that I've had to keep bottled in for the last twenty-four hours.

A hurricane of feelings rushes through me and by the time my eyes run dry, I'm exhausted.

We sit down against the wall opposite the door and Jisoo slings an arm around my shoulders. I lean into her companionably and we settle ourselves in to wait.

I have no idea how much time has passed before Jisoo shakes me awake with a whispered, "Jennie."

My eyes reluctantly pry open, but once they land on the doctor I bolt upright so quickly the world tilts a little.

"Y/N?" I ask breathlessly. Gosh, there's so much blood on the doctor's clothes.

The handsome doctor smiles and nods, "She is going to be okay," he said. "It was touch and go for a bit but she should make it."

My legs are shaking so badly that I have to lean on Jisoo for support as relief rushes through me.

"What happened to her?" Jisoo asks.

"Corpses heal more slowly than humans," the doctor explains. "When her heart restarted and got the circulation going again, it forced blood into all of those unhealed injuries. We also had to remove a few stray bullets and bits of shrapnel that the skin had healed over so they wouldn't cause her any more trouble. And it'll take a while to replenish the blood she lost, because we don't have the supplies to perform a transfusion."

The doctor smooths down the front of his blood-stained scrub top and continued. "But you'll be happy to know her heart rate is rising slowly but surely towards normal and so is her core temperature. Give her a few days and she'll be just like any one of us, only with a few more scars."

"Can I-?" I can't even bring myself to finish the hopeful sentence but it turns out I don't need to because he nods again.

"She's asleep right now, we had to give her quite a bit of sedative to counteract the pain, but you're welcome to sit with her," the doctor said and steps out of the way of the door.

"Thank you so much, Doctor...?"

"Cullen," he answered. "Carlisle Cullen."

"Thank you Doctor Carlisle," I said and then I slipped past him into the room.

There's a single bed set up in the middle of the spare bedroom and Y/N is lying on it, tucked in beneath an old wool blanket.

Her jacket is gone, strips of white wrap around her arms, head, and I imagine that they probably continue down underneath the blanket as well.

Still, despite it all, Y/N looks alive.

Jisoo brings in a chair and sets it beside the bed with a knowing smile. "I'll be upstairs, just shout if you need me," she said.

I can't express my gratitude, but Jisoo just grins and kisses my forehead. "Take care of your zombie hottie."

I chuckle as Jisoo lets herself out of the room and leaves me alone with Y/N.

Repositioning the chair by the bed, I sit down and take Y/N's hand - one of the few bits of her not wrapped in gauze - in both of mine.