At the tender age of eighteen, Alexander, the prince of Macedon, stood in the thick of his first battle at Chaeronea. The screams of the injured and the dying covered him like a fog, and the clash of swords rang in his ears as he looked out over the bloodied sand that seemed to go on for miles. He watched as his Companions fought only a few paces from where he sat high on Bucephalus' back, the warhorse agitated, excited, and in his element. Alexander soothed him with a silent pat on the neck and closed his eyes, the scene before him becoming almost too much for him.

It was not a moment later that he heard Hephaestion cry out in fear and warning.

"Alexander!"

He opened his eyes just in time to see an Athenian soldier charging for him, sword at the ready to gravely wound and possibly kill him. Before Alexander could even move to respond to the challenge, his vision of the man was blocked, and Hephaestion had taken the misplaced blow instead, the metal of the sword cutting deep into his upper arm, severing muscle and sinew and going down to the bone. Hephaestion was close enough that the blood from the wound splash back onto his horrified face.

Hephaestion fell from his horse, and his scream of pain was like a dagger to Alexander's heart. It allowed him to move again and he ran the man that had dared to harm Hephaestion through without a second thought. When he turned back to Hephaestion, Cleitus and Ptolemy were already trying to sit him up and calm him, as well as inspect the damage. The fighting nearly nonexistant on their part of the field anyway, as the enemy was after the King of Macedon more than the Prince, they were allowed time to do this.

Cleitus was crouched behind his younger fallen comrade, whispering to him and trying to assess the severity of the wound. Hephaestion gave another roar of pain as Ptolemy did just that.

"He nicked the bone. He needs a doctor right now, Alexander, or he could lose all function in his arm."

Hephaestion began to panic, panting and crying softly, "I do not want to lose my arm... I don't want to, I don't want to..."

Cleitus glared at Ptolemy before turning back to the frightened, injured boy as Alexander rode off at the speed of death to fetch a doctor from the medical tent a little ways from the battlefield, "Hephaestion, listen to me. You need to stay as calm as you can. I promise you the doctor will do everything in his power to save your arm," they all knew that Alexander would allow no less.

Hephaestion nodded slowly, like he knew this was the case but couldn't bring himself to believe it, "Uncle Cleitus?" Hephaestion had begun to call the older man that at the age of six, when he had first come to the palace and had mistaken Alexander's title for the man as his name. Cleitus had laughed heartily at the mistake and corrected him, but the name had stuck, as it still did even though Hephaestion now knew well the meaning of the honorary title.

"Yes, my boy?"

"C-Can you tell Alexander that I love him if I die? Please?"

"You will not die, Hephaestion," Cleitus assured him forcefully. He then gave a sigh, "But yes, I will."

"Thank you. Uncle Cleitus?"

"Yes, Hephaestion?"

"May I hold your hand?"

Ptolemy was stunned as his comrade slid his fingers in with Hephaestion's uninjured ones without a word. It was just then that Alexander returned with one of the doctor's assistants in tow with a stretcher.

"Just relax, Phai. Eirenaios will make sure you are safe and the doctor follows my explict instructions."

"O-Okay..." as Hephaestion was lifted onto the stretcher by Eirenaios, Cleitus, Ptolemy, and Alexander and then taken off the battlefield after one last word with Alexander, "I-I tried, Alexander..."

"You did wonderfully, Phai. You did as your instincts told you to and risked your life to save mine. I am forever in your debt. Now, go on and heal."

Alexander watched as his best friend was taken off the battlefield and to the surgeon's tent. Now all he could do was wait. And hope.