Here's part two for you, dear readers!
I would have had this up sooner, but I had an accident of sorts—I fell down the stairs and hit the corner of the banister on the way down. That gave me a really good concussion (the bump I have is one to make Alister proud). I have recovered from that for the most part, but if something seems to be a bit off kilter let me know…though it could just be me being paranoid.
The nurse looked back at Alister with motherly concern. "Lost about what, dear?"
Alister shook his head, trying to put words to the emotional turmoil currently raging inside of him. None of this was possible, it couldn't have happened because Miruko was still alive. Regardless of everything else in his surroundings that were familiar to him, his younger brother had died in that tank…so why was he still living and breathing?
Maybe everything was a horrible nightmare, whispered a hopeful voice in his mind, and Miruko managed to avoid the tank explosion.
Alister frowned. He wanted to believe that thought, he really did; the idea of his brother surviving that explosion certainly had merit. But yet, everything that had happened in the aftermath of his brother's death was far too detailed to be a dream. Though he couldn't recall any of it now he knew he could not simply dismiss it. That would be careless, among other things.
The nurse had still been speaking while he had been trying to get his thoughts together, and Alister looked up at her with an apologetic expression. "I'm sorry, but could you repeat that?" he asked, carefully keeping his voice down to avoid making his head throb.
"I was just saying it was common for people who experience severe head trauma to experience some disorientation and memory loss," said the woman kindly, pulling a flashlight out from her breast pocket and turning it on. "Now look at me, dear."
Alister complied, still too confused to truly argue yet. The nurse shone the light at his each of his eyes, remaining silent as she worked. "Your eyes are still showing signs of anisocoria," she said seconds later, shutting the light off with a soft click. "You've got a pretty good concussion on your hands."
Miruko looked up at her with a baffled look on his face. "What's ani…anisc…what does that mean?" he asked, giving up on pronouncing the word correctly. Alister felt a small smile tug at the corner of his mouth, in spite of himself.
"Anisocoria is just a really big word for pupil dilation," said the nurse cheerfully. "One of his pupils is larger than the other right now; that usually occurs when you get a knock on the head," she continued, playfully patting his younger brother's head. The child giggled, pushing her hand away.
Alister's small smile grew in size. To hear Miruko laugh again was worth more to him than anything in the world. He had almost forgotten what it had sounded like, thanks to…thanks to…well, whatever it was that had made him forget it.
But, he remembered as his smile faded, he still needed to figure out what happened to put him here. He had to piece everything together, and to do that he was going to have to delve a little more into the circumstances surrounding his hospital stay. He waited until the nurse left before he looked at his brother.
"Miruko, what happened to me?" he asked with a certain amount of reluctance.
Miruko looked up at him with his innocent gray eyes. "We were in the refugee camp and the bad men attacked it with their guns. They were blowing things up—bang! Boom!" he emphasized, spreading his hands out around him in demonstration.
Alister felt another smile tug at his mouth, but he forced it down and focused instead on his brother. "Then what, Miruko?"
"Well, we were running and you told me to get on the tank so I would be safe. I dropped Mama's locket and you went after it," said Miruko, his eyes flickering. "I wanted to go with you, but you told me to stay put because it was safer."
Alister felt his breath catch in his throat. He remembered every detail, every minute of that day: the smoke, the gunfire, the sharp acrid smell of the gunpowder, the heat of the blast…and everything Miruko was saying correlated with that memory.
Except for the glaring fact that his brother was alive.
"And then?" Alister asked, swallowing hard.
Miruko got a worried expression on his face and squirmed guiltily in his seat. "I know you told me to stay put, but I dropped Dyna Dude…" he trailed off apologetically, looking down at his hands at the charred toy he was gripping. "I couldn't let him get blown up! He won't be able to save the day then!" he added defensively, misinterpreting his older brother's suddenly shocked expression.
Alister felt oddly light-headed. Why hadn't it ever occurred to him that maybe Miruko had somehow gotten off the tank? He'd looked, certainly, but thinking back on it now he could only remember snatches of that desperate and futile search; the emotional distress he'd been in had not helped him any with that task. His younger brother had instructions that should a battle arise that he was to go hide, no matter what the circumstances may be—had Miruko followed his brother's instructions after the tank had exploded?
Miruko confirmed the answer to that question moments later. "After the tank blew up I got scared and hid like you told me to, but then I realized that you might have gotten hurt and I went back. When I got there…you weren't moving and you were hurt…and then one of the good guys found us and brought you here, and we've been here since then."
Alister frowned as he began examining the new information. Had there been a second explosion that he had been caught in? If so, why didn't he remember it? It should be fairly easy to remember, one would think—especially since he remembered everything else.
Ah…but then again, you were in emotional shock and you did get caught in the aftermath of the blast. Who's to say that you didn't get hit by falling debris or shrapnel? It's entirely possible that were caught by only one explosion and don't even remember being hit in the head at all, said the same voice from earlier.
Alister heard sniffling sounds and he glanced down at Miruko sharply. His younger brother was crying, trying not to draw attention to himself. When he noticed Alister looking at him, though, the child began to openly sob. "I thought you were dead!" he wailed. "That tank went boom and then you were gone and I couldn't find you! And when the doctor let me here you weren't moving and you wouldn't wake up!"
Instantly every thought in his head vanished to be replaced with concern and the redhead placed a hand on his brother's shoulder, eyes softening. "Hey…I'm all right now, Miruko," he said reassuringly, pulling his brother gently into his arms. "See? I'm alive and I'm not going anywhere anytime soon."
Even as he said it he felt a small stab of guilt. If everything that was happening was all a dream and not reality, he would be leaving Miruko again fairly soon and he would not get a chance to see him again.
But if it wasn't…
As much as Alister was afraid to admit it, this was beginning to sound less and less like a dream and more like reality. The more he thought about it, the more it began to make sense; everything Miruko had told him was entirely plausible and could have occurred, but whether it had actually happened had yet to be seen.
Abruptly, his head throbbed and Alister winced. All the thoughts running in his mind were beginning to overwhelm him; the combination of events going on around him, the stress from an unnamed accident, and the concussion he was nursing were certainly not helping him any.
As if on cue the woman came over to them from behind the curtain, a gentle smile on her face. "I'm sorry, sweetie, but visiting hours are up," she said, her eyes flickering as she looked at the brothers. "You're going to have to leave, honey."
Miruko sniffled, looking up at Alister hopefully for a contradiction. "Can't I stay, big brother?" he asked, gray eyes round and filled with unshed tears. "Please? I don't want to go—I want to stay here with you."
Alister felt a lump in his throat and reached out for his brother, pulling the child to him. He held boy close, not wanting to let go—he never wanted to let go of his brother ever again. If he could help it Alister would hold onto his brother until the earth stopped spinning.
"Miruko, I'll still be here when you come back," he promised at last in a gentle voice, fighting to keep the lump down. He was aware that his promise most likely would be broken if this was a dream, but he desperately hoped that this wasn't. "For now, though, you have to go."
He reluctantly released Miruko from the hug and the child sniffled, following the nurse morosely but without further argument. Alister watched them go drowsily, already falling asleep from the emotional and physical exhaustion. Something in the back of his mind warned him not to go to sleep, but the reason was too vague and Alister was simply too tired to puzzle it out. He was asleep the moment Miruko had walked out of the room.
The first night at the hospital was spent having nurses and doctors prod him awake to make sure he had no existing damage from the blast. It was also filled with half-formed images and voices that came and went, nothing ever coherent enough to make out.
The second night was slightly better, since the doctors came and went less frequently and the images seemed to be fading away.
The third night was the first night he spent getting an actual night of sleep, though it was peppered with the ghost of images and voices, of impossible places and impossible events. They were faint, though, and did not wake him up.
By the fifth night of his stay his head no longer hurt and he was able to leave the hospital with Miruko the following morning.
By the end of the week, Alister remembered nothing of the dream that had made him question reality.
