Effects of Darkness [Book Two]

11: Healers

"Don't even think about it."

Sky pauses her hand movement as she walks beside her brother towards the hospital, turning her gaze to see him sending her a disapproving look.

Slowly, she pulls her hand out of the bag which carried a container with a sigh, frowning grumpily at him as they headed through the hospital doors, seeing their mother straight away, standing in the middle of what seemed like chaos.

Melissa's face lights up as she sees them, eyes quickly zeroing in on the food container Sky was carrying, "Oh, thank god. I'm starving," she exclaims, almost snatching the bag out of her hands in her haste, making Sky huff in amusement.

They follow her as she moves to the receptionist's desk, hurriedly unwrapping the food they had brought her. She pauses, glancing at their blinking faces and moves to quickly kiss them both on the cheek, "Sorry, sorry," she says, squeezing their arms. "Thank you for bringing me dinner."

"It almost didn't make it here with Sky carrying it," Scott tells her, smirking at his sister.

Sky rolls her eyes, "Oh, shut up."

Scott turns back to his mom, "Is everything okay?" he asks as they look around at all the doctors and nurses rushing around, helping the many injured people.

Melissa gives them a grim smile, "Except for half the accident victims in a ten-car pile-up being rerouted here from downtown, and the E.R. attending not answering any of his pages, yeah, I'm okay," she assures them.

Scott frowns, "What does not answering pages mean?"

"Nobody can find them," Sky absentmindedly answers as she looks around her, ignoring the look of surprise Scott gives her at her knowledge. "And they definitely need that extra help."

Melissa smiles at her, nodding, "So now we have to wait for the on-call to get here."

A patient comes over, and Sky quickly grabs her arm in support as she wobbles, reaching for Melissa.

"Miss," she calls.

Melissa gives Sky a quick nod of thanks before focusing on the woman, "Yes?"

The woman leans on Sky, "Excuse me, can I kind of please have something for the pain?" she asks, clutching her stomach in a grimace.

Melissa gives her an apologetic look as they lead her to sit down, "Okay, I'm sorry. I know. But, actually, giving you something could complicate things, so we really just need to wait for the doctors," she tells her. "Okay?"

The patient grimaces in pain, "Yeah."

Melissa lets out a breath, turning to the receptionist, "Okay. How much longer on Dr Hilyard?" she asks.

"Ten minutes."

Sky frowns, turning to her mom as Scott goes to sit next to the woman in pain, "Is there anything I can do?"

Melissa hesitates for a moment, before nodding, "Yeah, actually, can you go to the storage room? We need to get more bandages and sutures stocked up in the E.R."

Sky nods, turning to leave, "I'm on it."

"Wait!" Melissa calls, making her stop as she leans on the receptionist's desk and grabs a volunteer badge quickly, handing it to Sky. "Thanks, sweetheart."

Sky grins, "No sweat, Mom."

***

"You've got the fewest injuries here, Mr Johnson," Sky says with an eye roll as she walks past a man in one of the E.R beds, filling up the drawer beside his bed and placing a cup of water beside him. "But if you don't stop nagging me, I'll give you one," she warns casually.