The effort of speaking was apparently too much for her, and her eyes closed again, her head lowering back onto Hiro's hand. He simply sat there, watching her, before he came back to his senses and put the now-empty water bottle back into his pack, picking her up again and standing up, holding her bridal-style and starting to walk towards the doorway back inside. He had no idea what else to do, so he'd have to hope Mikado-sensei was still in the infirmary. He was one of the rare few humans who knew what she really was, so he normally stayed as far away from the infirmary as possible, but now, he knew she was the only person who he was certain could help this alien.
He walked slowly, slower than he wanted to, but he knew that rushing could damage the being in his arms even more. The slow pace was maddening, and he wanted nothing more than to run as fast as he could, as if speed would maximize the chances of someone who by all rights should be dead right now.
He laughed internally at himself as he walked. He hated aliens, and yet here he was, saving one's life. The logical part of his brain repeated She is an alien like a mantra, but the altruistic part kept up its own mantra. But she is hurt. He'd given in to his altruism already. Might as well see it through to the end, whatever the result might be.
When he looked up, he realized he had already gotten to the infirmary. He shifted his position. It felt strange, being here, a place he had always avoided.
He inhaled deeply, then immediately regretted it as the smell of iron filled his nostrils. He checked the bundle in his arms. She was still unconscious. She cringed in her stupor when he shifted her position so he could check her pulse. It was weak, but it was also regular, no signs of abnormalities in her heartbeat. He was no doctor, but he knew that that was a good sign.
He quickly opened the door and looked inside. He sighed in relief when he saw Mikado-sensei sitting at her desk.
"Mikado-sensei!" he called. She turned around in her chair to face him. She was wearing her typical outfit, a shirt that was two sizes too small and long pants, and was holding a pencil. Obviously, she had been working on something, because if she hadn't been, the first few buttons on her shirt would have likely been undone, something Hiro knew from observation.
Mikado-sensei was about to say something, before noticing the girl in Hiro's arms. "Oh, my!" she exclaimed, standing up and kicking her chair back with her leg. "Let's skip the niceties. What happened to her?" she asked, walking to them and holding out her arms.
Hiro passed her to the nurse, making sure to gently set her down in her arms, careful not to touch any of the wounds that were obvious through the blood.
The girl groaned, or attempted to groan, in pain as she was transferred, and coughed, releasing more of the black blood.
Hiro shook his head. "I don't know. I found her on the roof. She looked like she'd been hit by something and skidded across it." he informed her.
Mikado-sensei nodded, starting to walk towards one of the beds in the infirmary. The white sheets almost instantly turned black as the blood found a new absorbent material.
Mikado-sensei sighed, looking at the girl with what Hiro thought at first might be recognition. Oh, of course. Mikado-sensei was an alien. Of course she'd recognize this girl.
She turned back to face Hiro, and after quickly glancing at him, waggled her finger in the air in his direction. "You go wash yourself in the sink while I handle this. You look like a crime scene." she said.
Hiro looked down at himself, and lurched his head backwards in surprise. The front of his shirt was covered in the girl's strange blood, and it was all over his arms and hands. Some of it had gotten on his backpack too, and he feared for the papers within. Oh, well. A few pages of notes were worth saving a life, even if that life was an alien's.
He nodded, and went over to the fairly small sink, quickly rinsing his arms off with water. He shuddered involuntarily at the feeling of the cold water. He hadn't realized how warm the girl's blood was.
When he'd washed the blood from his extremities, he looked at his shirt and sighed. It was clearly ruined. Normal blood is hard to wash out, and he suspected this kind would be impossible.
He debated what to do, but decided to just leave it on. After all, once he did leave the school, he didn't want to be seen shirtless.
He walked back over to where Mikado-sensei was checking over the alien girl. "Do you think you can save her?" he asked. His tone was almost emotionless, a skill he'd picked up years ago, but he still had a clear note of concern for the girl, despite his best wishes.
Mikado-sensei laughed. "I can heal anyone." she said confidently. "You did the right thing, saving her like you did. I know how you feel about our kind."
Hiro cringed. "Please don't tell anyone about this." he said. "I don't want anyone asking questions."
Mikado-sensei nodded, then smiled. "I doubt they will even if they do find out. Your eyes scare them off." she said.
Hiro nodded. It was odd, how his eyes were so repulsive to humans, but when aliens looked at them, they took several seconds of staring before backing away. That was the only time he ever used his stare as a weapon, to drive away the aliens. He had memorized the length of time each of them took to give up and leave him alone. Run took the least amount of time, looking away after just 3 seconds. Momo and Nana were next, each roughly 5 seconds. Lala took 8. Yami took 10. And Mea currently held the record, having taken a full 13 seconds to look away.
Of course, those numbers may have changed, now that everyone apparently trusted them just as little as he did.
He was brought out of his thoughts by the sound of the girl coughing several times. Mikado-sensei was feeding her something from a test tube she'd gotten from somewhere. The substance in the tube was clear and lightly fizzing, releasing a strong acidic smell into the air.
He guessed that it was some chemical that ate away at blood after she held the girl's nose, forcing her to attempt to inhale the liquid.
Right away, the girl went into a series of coughing fits, and Mikado-sensei held her down so she wouldn't open up her wounds again with her jerky movements.
When the girl had stopped her coughing fit, her head fell back onto the pillow, making a wet squishing sound as it released the air from the blood-soaked fabric.
Mikado-sensei nodded, then took out a beaker full of the substance, simply dumping it onto the girl's body. Hiro was about to protest, saying that it could dissolve the blood she was supposed to have, but stopped when he realized it wasn't going very far, simply cleaning up what was on the outside and leaving the wound sites exposed.
Hiro whistled softly between his teeth. The tattered remains of her clothing, a simple black, almost translucent nightgown, had been removed by Mikado-sensei while he was washing his hands and was now simply tossed in the trash, the material simply too damaged to salvage. Now, with her skin exposed to the air, he could see that her wounds hadn't been nearly as bad as he'd thought. They were long, connecting like patchwork across her body, but they weren't too deep. They'd heal eventually, and many of them might not even leave a scar. It was just the internal bleeding that had been the problem.
Seeing those wounds made him wonder. What could have possibly done this to an alien? And to a little kid at that?
Mikado-sensei continued ministering to her wounds as Hiro watched. As she worked, she chatted about random things that Hiro mostly either ignored or replied to with single-word answers.
After a while, Mikado-sensei stopped working on the girl, and looked at Hiro, smiling. "She'll make a full recovery now. All the the excess blood has been purged, and most of the internal rupturing has been fixed, though she'll have to keep herself from moving too much until she's healed. Luckily for her, her bones and vitals are undamaged." she announced.
Hiro smiled in spite of himself. "Good." he said. "Thank you." He mentally sighed at himself. Being grateful for saving an alien's life. This was definitely a one-time thing.
He walked closer to the girl, letting himself run a hand along her hairline, brushing a stray strand away from her face.
When his hand touched her, her eyes opened, as quickly as they had before. They quickly trained themselves on his, and they stared at each other again.
The girl was silent, but a small smile played across her face. She must have recognized him from before.
Hiro smiled back. "Well, you're alive." he said to her. "And you'll recover eventually."
She gave an almost imperceptible nod, and looked like she was about to say something, before Mikado-sensei interrupted her.
"Nakamura-san. I have something very important to tell you about her." she said, causing Hiro and the girl to break their stares and train their eyes on her.
"What is it?" he asked.
Mikado-sensei sighed. "Well, first of all, I want you to bring her home with you. Let her stay there until she's healed. I can't keep her here, or at my lab. Secondly, as an alien, she has different needs than humans, though her particular species is mostly the same. Lastly...well, I'll let her tell you herself, once she's ready to." she said.
Hiro blinked, then looked at the girl, who looked back at him. He sighed. "I really don't want an alien in my house, but I suppose since I went this far for her, I might as well accept." he said, after a few seconds' pause. The girl smiled again before sitting up.
She tilted her head slightly, noticing that she was naked, but didn't seem to be bothered by it. Of course, that could be the trauma making her not care as much.
She turned to face Hiro and smiled again, a bit more widely. She opened her mouth to speak, and this time, her voice came out clearly, with none of the gurgling from before.
"Thank you for saving my life." she said, in a quiet, but not timid, voice that suggested that she was carefully controlling her words, making her sound far older than Hiro had guessed. He'd thought she was maybe 12 or so, based on her body size, but she spoke like an adult. She tilted her head. "What is your name?"
Hiro nodded in response to her gratitude. "Nakamura Hiro." he replied.
The girl nodded. "Thank you, Hiro. I am Nemesis."