A/N I am having a little hard time to write this at the moment. I know where I want this to go, but the words don't seem to come out of my head for the pages. I hope it doesn't show too much. Please, enjoy the chapter and let me know how you liked it.

Kristoff was hurriedly scooping porridge in a dish. He kept looking over his shoulder to see if anyone was coming, but no one did before he was finished. Then he rushed out of the door, Axel on his heels. Kristoff grabbed a ladder leaning against the wall, and walked hurriedly towards the attic window at the back of the house, while balancing the plate and the ladder in his arms.

"Axel, keep watch," Kristoff whispered to the dog and started climbing. Axel sat down and watched him go.

When Kristoff reached the window, he opened it and crawled inside the attic. Then he pulled the ladder up. Often at mornings Kristoff would stay later at home, until everyone else had left the house, and then he would open the ladder inside the house, so Elsa could spend time in the house. But today Pabbie was home the whole day. These days Kristoff would rush to bring some food to Elsa and then bike to a bus stop as fast as he could to avoid missing the bus. Elsa probably didn't care staying in her room though. Lately, she had been too sick to get down the house anyway.

"Elsa?" Kristoff whispered and knocked his knuckles softly against the wooden planks. Elsa didn't answer anything, so he just pulled the planks apart and went in anyway.

The smell attacked him right away. The room was stuffy and foul-smelling. Elsa had been clearly throwing up and the uneaten food from the day before had started to spoil. The girl herself was laying under the covers, only wisps of platinum hair peaking underneath the blanket. She was breathing heavily and erratically, almost sounding like she was crying.

Kristoff padded next to Elsa's bed and hovered over her to take a look at her face, gently pulling the blanket down from her face. Her whole face was twisted in grimace, but there were no tears on her cheeks. She seemed to be in great pain. Kristoff sighed deeply and leaned to give Elsa a soft kiss on her temple. Against his lips, he could feel a sweaty and warm forehead. Elsa was shivering like she was freezing. Poor Elsa. He felt like he shouldn't leave Elsa alone when she was being this sick. Kristoff wished he could stay and take care of Elsa, but he was already taking too much time. He wished Elsa a good day and left. Dread building in his stomach. Did he make the right choice?

Kristoff was sitting in his second class, but couldn't concentrate on anything. Someone threw a rumbled paper ball at back of his head, but he barely registered it. He had this awful, gnawing feeling that had stayed with him since the morning. It was telling him that everything wasn't okay. Elsa wasn't okay, she hadn't been in a long time, but now she was at her worst. Kristoff was starting to realize, that Elsa had been pretending to be better than she was, but now she was too sick to pretend anymore. She had been too sick to get down to shower yesterday, when he was in school. She didn't even try to lie about it like she most likely had two days before that. Kristoff had tried to figure out what kind of sickness she could have, but he had no understanding of medical conditions, and asking would be too suspicious. He had tried to get some information from Pabbie, who was a doctor, but it was too risky and Kristoff wasn't great liar. Asking his mom was out of question, she would immediately know that something was up.

"Kristoff. Could you come here and write the answer for x?" Teacher's voice pulled Kristoff from his thoughts. He snapped his head up and looked at the blackboard. The numbers on it made little sense to him. Only thought he had in his head, was that Elsa would know the answer. Elsa always helped him with his math. What if he didn't have Elsa anymore when he went back to home? Kristoff suddenly felt ill.

"I don't feel well", he said and dashed out of the classroom without waiting for any answer. He ran the empty hallway all the way to a restroom and locked the door.

Kristoff sat on the toilet seat and pulled his knees up and hugged them. Then Kristoff surprised himself by starting to cry. His sobs and sniffles were soft, barely audible, but he felt them all the way in his soul. It couldn't keep going on like this. He didn't want to tell about Elsa, he didn't want anyone to take her away and he didn't want to betray her trust. But what if she died? If he didn't tell anyone, he would still lose her, but so would the whole world. Someone had to help Elsa, and he couldn't do it anymore. He had tried his best, but had failed.

Kristoff wanted to call his father to come get him now, but his phone was in his backpack in the classroom, and his father was too far away at work. He was a professor in university, which was located in another city. He usually traveled there with a train. It would take him too long to get back. Kristoff wanted his mother then, but Bulda was a nurse, and she wouldn't answer the phone during workhours. But Kristoff couldn't stay at school another moment, he needed to go to see Elsa. With that resolution, Kristoff got up and left the restroom. He exited the building, leaving all of his stuff to the class room, including his jacket. Outside, the late autumn breeze pinched his cheeks which were wet from tears. His unbuttoned green plaid shirt and t-shirt did little to prevent the wind and cold, and he was freezing within minutes. However, he didn't turn back.

When Kristoff finally reached the small, local hospital, in which his mother worked in, he was shivering and shaking from the cold. Kristoff's teeth were clattering and his cheeks were burning from newfound warmness inside the building. It didn't take long for some lady on the reception to come to ask him what was he doing in the hospital and where was his jacket.

"I want my mom," Kristoff wailed, and for his horror, he started sobbing again. He was 12-years-old boy, and there he was, crying his eyes out and asking for his mom. If his schoolmates saw him now, they would never let him forget. But Kristoff couldn't help himself, all the confusion and fear and uncertainty was starting to just be too much for him to handle anymore.

The lady was confused, and tried to get more information out of him, but was unsuccessful. That, until another nurse passed by and recognized Kristoff. He took Kristoff to his mother, who was astounded to see her son there.

Kristoff just ran to his mother and sobbed against her sterile smelling hospital clothes. "I wanna go home, mom. We have to help Elsa. I wanna go home." His muffled pleading was barely understandable at that point, with all the sniffling and sobbing. And Bulda had hard time to understand her son.

"Honey, what's wrong? Who's Elsa?"

This time Kristoff cried even louder: "I wanna go home! I wanna go home!"

Bulda tried to soothe the crying boy, and figure out what was wrong, but Kristoff was just too upset to cooperate at all.

"Sweetie, I'm in work, I can't take you home now. Could you wait in-"

"No! I have to go home now! I don't want her to die. I'm sorry. I don't want her to die," Kristoff cried and hiccupped the words out, and barely made any sense.

"Go, take him home. We will do just fine, it's a quiet day today. The boy clearly needs his mother more than the patients need a nurse now," a man with long, white coat said to Kristoff's mother. Where did he even came from? But nevertheless, with that Bulda ordered Kristoff to wait in car while she went to change her clothes. Then they started driving home.

Kristoff was sobbing the whole way and couldn't answer any of Bulda's questions. Bulda didn't press that hard, deciding to leave it for home. Kristoff on the other hand felt torn, he was going to betray Elsa. He was going to tell his mother about Elsa, and they would take Elsa away from him. They would take Elsa somewhere he didn't know, but he knew that it was somewhere that Elsa didn't want to go. Elsa would rather die than go there, but Kristoff couldn't let her make that decision, she was too precious for him.

Bulda parked the car at the yard and looked at her son. Kristoff had calmed down a little, but was still clearly upset. Now Bulda wanted to know what exactly had made the boy so distraught that he had come to her work to demand to be brought home.

"Kristoff, what is this? Did something happen in the school?" The boy only shook his head. "What is it then?"

Kristoff took deep breath and seemed to try to compose himself. "It's Elsa," he mumbled, but didn't seem to find any more words to continue. It was second time he mentioned that name. A girl's name he had never mentioned before that day.

"What about Elsa? Who is she?"

"Elsa's my friend. She's really sick, mom. I promised I wouldn't tell anyone, but mom, I think she'll die if I don't. Mom, you have to help her."

"Help her? Where is she?" Kristoff just hang his head low and seemed too ashamed to answer, that wasn't a good sign. "Kristoff, where is she?"

"In the attic. I'm sorry mom, I am. It's just- It's that- She didn't have any other place and it was getting too cold and she was getting sicker. I-"

"There's a sick girl in our attic right now, Kristoff?" The boy looked away from her and swallowed, that confirmed the statement enough for Bulda. "What is this? How long has this been going on? You know what, never mind. We'll talk about this later, I want to see that girl right now." And with that, Bulda got out of the car and hastened towards the house, Kristoff at her heels.

Inside, she yelled for Pabbie and kept going towards the ladder which would lead to the attic. When she was pulling the ladder down, Pabbie came to them and asked what was going on.

"Apparently, there's a sick girl in our attic," Bulda said, her voice snapping a little. Then she processed to walk up the ladder, paying no mind to Pabbies confusion or her son's pleading to wait.

But when she peaked her head in the attic, she saw nothing. There was no girl and she wasn't sure if she should be relieved or mad. She looked down to the rest of the group and was about to say that there was no one up there, but Kristoff interrupted her: "You have to go all the way up, she's hiding."

Bulda was about to protest. She would have been sure that Kristoff was just messing up with her, but the defeated tune in his voice made her do what he suggested. She got up all the way, and soon was joined by Kristoff and Pabbie. Then Kristoff asked them to follow him and he started walking towards one of the walls. Kristoff easily separated couple of planks from it.

"She's in there," Kristoff said, his head low and he sounded so broken.

Bulda wasn't sure what to do next. Kristoff was just standing there, unmoving and the opening he made was too small for Bulda to crawl in and too low for old Pabbie. When no one did anything for a while, Pabbie found a hammer and started removing the rest of the planks, making opening big enough for the adults too. Then they peaked in.

The light from the attic illuminated to the room, making it possible for Bulda to see. The room was small, and the roof was too low for them to stand with their backs straight. The stink in the room reminded her of the sick people in her work. Also the spoiling and uneaten food on the ground didn't help the matter. The most disorienting thing was that there was a mattress at the end of the room, and someone was clearly sleeping in it.

Kristoff didn't shy away from the stranger, but kneeled next to her and hugged her as much as one can hug a person who's laying under a blanket. "I'm so sorry Elsa, I had to tell them. They will help you, I won't let anyone hurt you. Please, trust me on this." Kristoff pleaded, sounding like he would start crying again soon. The lump on the bed only made some mumbling noise, she sounded to be in pain.

Finally curiosity won over Pabbie, and he closed the distance between him and the children. He kneeled next to Kristoff and guided the girl to turn on her back so he could take a better look. The girl's eyes were closed, mouth partly open, and she seemed to be in great pain. Her arms were cool to touch and the skin was mottled and bluish. Oh no.

"Bulda! Call an ambulance! Tell them to come immediately!" He ordered. Bulda looked alarmed, but didn't protest. Kristoff tried to ask what was going on, Pabbie didn't have time to explain anything right now. He had to get the girl downstairs, so it would be faster to get her in the ambulance. "I'm sorry miss, I know moving must hurt you greatly, but I need to get you downstairs." He murmured gently for the girl and lifted her up, she didn't weight nearly as much as a girl her size should have.

The girl moaned in pain and tried weakly to push him away from her. Despite the protesting, it was relatively easy for the old man get her in his arms and carry her towards the ladder. Ladder was harder part. Even though the girl was tiny in many ways, she wasn't too short. Her long limbs and intense pain made it nearly impossible to carry down the ladder, but Pabbie managed. Then he carried the poor girl all the way to the first floor of the house, and laid her on a couch.

Kristoff immediately rushed to his friend's side and took a hold on her clammy, marbling hand. She barely reacted at all. Elsa rolled her head in pain and breathing seemed to be a struggle for her. Was this how he was going to lose his only friend? "She wasn't this bad at morning Pabbie, I swear. Is she going to die? I don't want her to die."

"I wish I could tell you. Now all we can do, is hope for the best and-"

"The ambulance is here!" Bulda's yell interrupted Pabbie, and soon paramedics rushed into the house and too soon they were loading limp Elsa on a stretcher. It all was happening too fast, Kristoff couldn't quite grasp on the situation. Not before the paramedics were already carrying her friend away, Pabbie at their heels.

"No! Wait! I'm going with you!" Kristoff yelled after them, but Bulda caught him before he made it out of the front door and held him back. "Let me go! Elsa needs me! Elsa! Elsa!" But Bulda didn't let him go even though he trashed and kicked and screamed. When he saw them closing the ambulance doors, Elsa and Pabbie inside, he fell limply on the ground, defeated.

"Elsa," He whispered to the air, watching the car speed away, its red lights flashing and sirens wailing. He felt empty.