~A few days after the incident, and I get to skip school~

I sat on the counter in Victor's lab and kicked my feet back and forth while I watched he and his men work.

"Did you really have to be in here?" He asked, annoyed.

"I'm sick, I want to see what you plan on doing about it."

"Ugh… You're starting to really piss me off. Haven't you been here long enough?"

"No, Doctor, no I have not. I don't think your men mind too badly either." I scooted out of the way as one of them went to open the drawer I was blocking and take out an empty vial. He took the goggles in my hands and put them back on my face where they belonged and walked back to his work station.

I blinked and then peered down at the math Victor was doing on paper.

"Fascinating, isn't it?"

I looked up at him. "What..?"

"The math you haven't seen before because you're in a lower math class."

"D-Doctor!" I cried.

He laughed a little, as if he enjoyed teasing me like that. That made me a bit miffed.

"You have to give me some credit, Dr. Niguel. I'm still smarter than a lot of the patients here." That was true. And I'm not talking about common sense here. I put a hand on his shoulder. "You should talk about the Krebs Cycle with me."

He slapped my hand away. "Stop it. Why do you bother me more than the other doctors? If you want to be a surgeon so badly, then go talk to Stiles about it."

I looked at him. "Isn't it obvious?"

"What are you talking abou-" His pupils narrowed. "You do not.."

I grinned. "I do too! Pretty much everyone on staff knows, too. Just ask your men."

"Knowing that its creepy having you this close to me," He put a hand on me. "Go away," And pushed, sliding me down the counter.

I got off the counter and walked over to him. "Doctor.." I said with fake tears in my eyes.

"Don't try that on me, it's not going to work." He said, nearing the bottom of the page with numbers.

I sniffed and made whimpering sounds.

"Tch.." He laid his head on the table for a moment and then lifted it back up. "Fine.."

I wiped my tears away. "Yaaaay.." And sat in his lap.

"Hnngh!" He glared at me, but, surprisingly, didn't try to move me.

I grabbed an image off the table. "Hey, is this mine?" It looked like an X-Ray.

"Hera, don't-" Victor warned me.

My heart stopped beating for a moment when I saw what was on there. I dropped it in my lap and started stuttering. "W-W-W-W-W-What is that?" I covered my mouth. "Some kind of Lung Bat?"

"It's what's inside of YOU." He told me.

"Doctor.." I said, turning to face him with my face red, and getting redder. "You do promise you'll find a cure, won't you?"

He blushed a little. "Wha… YES! Why wouldn't I?" He snapped.

"Because you don't like me.." I said "Or anyone."

He looked around, and then leaned in close to me. "If I didn't like you, you wouldn't still be in here." He whispered, and surprisingly, not angrily.

So I tried to stay quiet for the rest of the time.

..But I stayed in his lap.

Until something strange happened.

I also took my goggles back off.

"Dr. Niguel, my chest hurts." I said, looking up at him.

He sighed, putting his tools down. "How bad?"

"Hmm.." I looked up with an index finger on my cheek while I thought. "Four and a half."

"Well, let me know if it gets any worse," He said, and then picked his tools back up.

"Hmm.." I cupped both my hands around the right side of my chest. I pulled them back and looked at them. "Ah ah ah ah!" I breathed, the sound of my breathing raising to near-panic.

"What's wrong now?" The doctor looked in my hands. "What the hell?" And we both fell onto the floor.

"Get this disgusting thing away from me its attacking my face!" I cried, holding my hands up to keep the flying bat-shaped creature away. From what I could tell, it didn't look like a REAL bat, obviously. But more like a pathogen-ified version of one. Like GUILT.

"Quick! Someone capture the Akumu core!" I heard someone scream, and then a bunch of the men rushed over to me.

The freaky Lung Bat landed on my chest where it had come from and suddenly vanished, obviously back into my chest.

I closed one of my eyes as blood from my face nearly dripped into it.

"Would someone get a nurse in to clean her up?" Victor asked. Oh no- more like demanded.

"Dr. Kasal said YOU'RE supposed to be in charge of me right now," I pouted, my lips pursed. "He's gonna get mad."

He facepalmed. "Ugh… Fine." He picked me up from under my arms and lifted me back up onto the counter. "Someone's underweight," He muttered. I shot him an angry glare, but he didn't notice as he was opening one of the upper cupboards for a First Aid-Kit.

He opened it up and put a pair of gloves on. "I'm too smart to be doing this.." He muttered, and ripped open a package of sterile gauze and a small supply of the antibiotic gel.

"Well, I appreciate that you are." I said, still a little miffed.

"Tch.." He wiped the blood off my eyelid and the rest oozing from that cut and then applied the gel to it, which quickly caused the wound to disappear. I could hear some of his men giggling like little school girls as they watched.

"Victoooor.." I whined.

"HEY!" He whirled around. "IF YOU DON'T GET BACK TO WORK I'LL KEEP YOU ALL BACK AN EXTRA TEN HOURS!" They rushed back to their work stations.

He turned back towards me and wiped the rest of the blood off, and then applied the gel. He threw the gauze and the gloves away and put the First Aid-Kit back.

"I almost have a serum prepared. You can stay quiet until then, right?" He asked me.

I nodded obediently and put my hands in my lap on the counter and watched.

..Until he put the goggles back on my face.

•°•

"Hera's getting Lovey-Dovey with Victor!" Lilac teased when I told her and Amanda what happened when they came to Caduceus after school.

"I was not!" I told her. "It doesn't matter if I like him that way, he's still way older than me. Isn't it sort of, Oh, I don't know, illegal to get "Lovey-Dovey" with him?"

Before Lilac could answer, I could suddenly hear sirens.

"..Is that the Dipshit now?"

"What?" I asked.

"Mark had to go to the office near the end of school," Amanda answered. "He said it was an emergency."

"Yeah, and he was really moody!" Lilac added in. "Before that he was crying about something. An old flame or something like that."

"Kyoki, Seigyo, and Hato."

…"Seigyo, and Hato."

.."And Hato."

Dr. Stiles told us that Dr. Kimishima said that Kyoki, Seigyo, and Hato were parasitic forms of Insanity, Control, and Heartbreak.

"Oh no." I whispered to myself.

"Leslie!" I ran down the hallways. "Leslie, Leslie!" I cried out for my nurse, but ended up running into Nurse Thompson instead.

"W-Where's Little Monster?" I cried.

"The boy they should brought in? They're testing his BMI readings.. Akumu victims supposedly have it rise when they fall into the "Slumber"..It's a miracle you haven't yet, too, Hera."

"Yeah, well, I probably will eventually so let's not get too used to it, huh? I really need to see him and any other patients that were brought in!" I tried running past her.

"You can't do that!" She grabbed onto my shoulders. "After testing he-!"

But I didn't hear the rest because I broke from her grasp and ran down the hall. I stopped when I saw green hair out of the corner of my eye and I looked into a room where my nurse had just finished hooking a brown haired boy up to a machine. "His BMI levels are certainly high.." She said, stepping back.

"Hey, Leslie!" I ran into the room.

She turned to me, and that's when I noticed that Little Monster wasn't awake. I stepped back and held my hands up to my mouth.

"It appears it already has him.." Leslie noted sadly. "I'll leave you alone to be with him until his scheduled operation…" She left, closing the door behind her.

"I'm sorry.." I whispered. "If only there was something I could do to help. Like…. Like.."

•°•

"Daddy, I know how you used to draw stars all the time. In the air? You told me that another star would appear and it would show you what was wrong with people. I can draw stars, too, Daddy, let me draw one for you.." Little Hera holds her hand out from her and tries drawing a star in the air.

"It doesn't look right!" She wails, sitting down on the floor next the corpse. "I'll draw one for you, Daddy, and one for me." She holds her other hand out and begins to draw a star with both hands. She can clearly see the stars forming in the air, glowing a bluish-green color, but she can't seem to stop drawing. She swears she can see herself in one star and her father in the other. Not having any control over what she is doing, when the stars are complete, she slides them together until they overlap. She holds the star in her hands and her eyes snap shut.

"Where am I..?" She asks. "Is this inside Daddy's head..? And why am I flying?" The little girl twist and turned as memories flew past her in bubbles. "Ooh!" She squealed, as an interesting one flew past her. "Since I'm going to be a docter like you, Daddy, why don't I play with this one..?" She flew over and grabbed onto one as it absorbed into her. "Why is there blood on these gloves..? What is that bloody tool in your hand, Daddy?" "A-OW!" The bubble is shocking me, Daddy! Its-!"

Hera wakes up and suddenly finds herself on the floor. She grabs her father's hand and feels the inside of his wrist. "You have no pulse.."

°•

I gasped. Do I have my father's surgical skills at my fingertips..?

"Maybe, Little Monster, If I'm careful not to steal any of your memories, I can see what you remember prior to infection with Akumu.."

I held both my hands infront of me, and prepared to draw the stars that greatly resembled what I was taught to identify as the Healing Touch. Could this possibly be another form of the Greek gift? My fingers glided across the air. The Healing Touch smells like herbal leaves… I took hold of the stars. One had me on it and the other had Little Monster. I slid them both together and held the lone star in my hands and closed my eyes.

•°•

"Little Monster? Little Monster, where are you?" I cried.

"I'm here.." Okay, now I could hear literal crying. As if it we were on stage, a light shone down in this black world I was in and I saw my friend huddled on the ground. I ran over to him. "What's happened to you?" Shouldn't I be in his memories..?

"Eia.." He cried, hugging a picture. I ripped it out of his hands to look at it. "You had a girlfriend?" In the picture was a slightly younger Little Monster and a girl with big, black teased hair dressed in black and neon clothes with a Hello Kitty necklace and Snakebite piercings.

"Eia… Why did you have to break up with me?" He cried softly. Uhh I'm not really good with comforting people like this, that was Amanda's job.

"I think I can help you get over Eia…" I said.

"Get over Eia?" He wailed, and tore the picture from my grasp. "Why? I love her.."

"But.. Um. Look how much pain you are in. Don't you want to feel better again?"

"I guess.." He sniffed. "Okay, Hera. I'll let you help me.."

"Great." I stood up and jerked my hands downward, and O.R. suddenly forming in this bizarre realm.

"How am I in a bluish-green dress..?" He asked as I washed my hands at the sink and put gloves on. I turned around.

"DO NOT.. Pull at your sterile gown.." I told him, sighing.I pointed to the Operating Table. "Get on, now."

He obeyed.

"Don't Touch Me, I'm Sterile!…" I paused. "Little Monster, do you hear Amanda's voice?"

He rolled his eyes so he could look at me upside down. "Yeah. Why?"

I growled. "I have a bad feeling if she tries moving my body when I'm like this.." I drew another star in the air, this time with Amanda on it, and slid it to where if I were still at Caduceus, it would overlap with the stars already present.

Amanda suddenly fell onto the floor in the O.R. "What the? Why am I in scrubs? Hera, why are you in scrubs? Why is Little Monster-?"

"Calm down, Amanda.. I think I brought you into Little Monster's dream.. He's dreaming, because of the Akumu.."

Tears began to form in my friend's eyes. "I don't get it.."

"Shh shh.. Amanda don't cry you'll get Little Monster going.."

"Eiiiiaaaa.." I heard from the operating table.

"Dammit, Amanda, look what you did!"

"Shh, Shh.." She walked over to him and stroked his hair. "It's going to be okay.." She cooed.

"Amanda," She turned and looked to me. "Come wash your hands so we can get started, and then administer the Anesthesia.."

She nodded. "Mmhmm!" And ran over to me. I stepped out of the way so she wouldn't push me trying to get to the sink. She turned the water on and rinsed her hands under it with an herbal soap, and then held her hands under an automatic paper towel dispenser. She dried her hands and used the towels to turn the faucet off before throwing them away and putting gloves on.

"Administer the Anesthesia and we can get ready to extract this thing from his body.."

She took the mask and placed it on his face. "Sweet dreams, Little Monster…" His eyes quickly closed.

"Alright.." I said, walking over to his unconscious body. Dreams within a dream.. "Hand me the antibiotic gel, Amanda."

"Yes, doctor.." Her eyes widened. "Did I just call you.."

I nodded. "You did. Hurry up with that gel."

She nodded, blushing a little, and handed it to me.

I unscrewed the lid and dipped my finger into it, taking a generous amount and disinfecting the area. "Scalpel," Amanda took the gel from me and handed me the scalpel. I looked into it and swore I saw Leslie talking to someone in it from the glare. Ignoring that, I made a quick and deep incision, having no need to go slow. My father was quick at these things, you see.

"W-What is that?" Amanda cried when the operation field became his heart.

A flat, pinkish, heart-shaped creature with a crack going down the center walked around on tiny legs. It had antennae with eyes on it and pinchers.

"The entire operation field is inflamed," I noted. "The Hato must be biting him. Nurse, get me a syringe of the Anti-Inflammatory medication."

Amanda blushed. "Did you just call me-?" She sighed. "Yes, Hera.." She loaded a syringe and I injected it into area after area.

"I-It's holding onto a larger chunk of the heart! It's going to rip it out!" Amanda cried.

I looked around, unsure of what to do, as not an idea came to mind.

"Hera!" Amanda snapped. "You have to be more careful!" She sighed. "I'll get a synthetic membrane, but please be careful!"

I took it off the tray with the forceps and laid it on the gaping hole in his chest, and quickly covered it with gel and rubbed it with my hand before it peeled off due to bleeding. I glanced at the nasty creature who had done this to my friend as it finished munching on the flesh it had torn off.

"Doctor! It's at it again!" Amanda informed me as it grabbed hold of more flesh.

"Hand me the laser," I commanded.

She did so, and I began burning the back of the Hato parasite.

"It's shell's fallen off!" Amanda cried. "Quick, while it's vulnerable!" She handed me the scalpel and I swiped at its bare back, leaving a laceration.

"The shell is growing back!" I quickly removed the pieces of the first shell with the forceps, and treated more inflammations as it bit down.

"It's biting another large area!" I took the laser as Amanda handed it to me and I burned the shell off once more, slashing it. "BMI reading levels decreasing.." Amanda noted. I quickly removed the shell with the forceps.

"Syringe, and with the Anti-Inflammatory," Amanda did as I said and I injected it into the inflamed areas.

"Doctor! The shell has grown back, the Hato is biting again!"

"Laser!" I commanded, and quickly burned the shell off once more and slashed it with the scalpel. I picked up and removed the remains of the shell and treated the inflammations as the shell grew back.

The Hato suddenly caused a zig-zag laceration going half-way down Little Monster's heart, imitating the one on its shell.

"You can't save him.." I heard a voice taunt us from behind me.

"Amanda.. Whatever you do, don't look at Castalia.." I warned her.

"You're skills are even rustier than your father's were, you can't save anyone!"

Amanda's eyes suddenly got angry, she suddenly looked up at my mother. From the glare of my tools, I could see that she thrust her hands downward.

Amanda refocused on the operation. "He's going into cardiac arrest!"

"Dammit!" I whispered. "I'm going to massage the heart!"

I placed my hands on the organs, trying to stay in rhythm and I moved my hands up and down.

"We have a pulse!" Amanda declared.

I noticed that a lot of blood oozed from the wound the Hato caused. "Drain," I said, holding my hand out.

She placed it in my hand and I quickly drained the blood.

"Doctor! The Hato is trying to fly away!"

I quickly pulled the wound over with the forceps and then sutured the giant laceration and took the laser as she handed it to me and burned the wings off.

It tumbled back onto the heart and I took this time to burn the shell off, and then gave it a final slash with the scalpel.

"BMI readings are back to their normal level! Please treat the remaining wounds and close him up.."

She handed me a syringe of the Anti-Inflammatory and I treated the remaining wounds.

"Oh my gosh.. Little Monster.. You're going to make it.." Tears spilled down her face as I sutured the operation field and disinfected the area, pulling the bandage over.

"Daddy, I hope you're proud of me.."

"Good work, doctor," She sniffed.

"Let's get back to Caduceus, now," I said. "Who knows what will happen if we stay now that the Akumu is gone.."

I looked down into my hands and saw the overlapping stars. I pulled them apart in a fan and pulled them each out, one by one, and set them on the ground and they spun on their tips.

•°•

I opened my eyes. I saw Amanda sitting on the floor beside me, where I stood. Little Monster opened his eyes first. He pointed at me. "WIZARD! WIIIZARD!"

"H-Hera!" Leslie cried. "Y-You cured him! His BMI readings are back at their normal level.. I walked in here, and the three of you were glowing and smelled like mint and other herbs.."

Amanda raised her hand when she opened her eyes. "Uh, yeah, I noticed that, too. And then Hera dragged me into that mess."

"You had the skills of a nurse in there, Amanda. How…?" I asked.

"Probably because you had me in that freaky O.R. ..I still have that knowledge, you know.."

Little Monster lifted his shirt up. "Heeey, I even have a surgical scar! Neat."

"Ohh.." Leslie fainted.

"Les-!" I covered my mouth.

Amanda eyed me. "What's wrong..?"

I got up and ran over to the trash can in the room, and proceeded to puke. That sort of took a serious toll on my body.

•°•

And that was how I found myself in Victor's lab again.

"What did it look like?" He asked, and put the goggles back on my face.

"Exactly how you drew it," I pointed to the sketch he did after I described it to him the first time. "..And kind of pinkish with darker spots on the shell."

"And it "bit" the surface of the organ and caused a zig-zag shaped laceration?"

"Um, yeah, pretty much. A lot of the operation field was inflamed."

"..I still don't see how you were able to operate on him like that."

I crossed my arms. "I told you. I have the Soul Surgeon's knowledge at my fingertips!" Yes. My father was known as the "Soul Surgeon" by his colleagues. I learned that from the memory. Memories. Dr. Chase called me the "Dream Doctor" and now a few other people are, too. If Dr. Adrastos had the Healing Touch and the ability to reach into people's souls, could I possibly have inherited that in the form of dreams? ..Does the Healing Touch have a higher level of healing than what Dr. Stiles knows?"