"Restrain him!" came a voice.
The man was pulled away from Nick, who put a hand up to his face to feel the blood flowing from his mouth.
"You will pay for this, whoever you are. You don't know what you're up against. We will get them back no matter what it takes," the man angrily told him.
Jackie and Harriet were in another hallway and saw the entire thing occur. The hurried up to Nick and Sarah.
"God Nick, are you alright?" Jackie asked him.
"I'll be fine once I stop the bleeding," he replied, looking at his fingers with the blood on them.
"Here, come with me. I'll help you," Jackie told him. "Harriet, think you can escort this young lady to her brother?"
Harriet nodded as she left with Sarah.
"You know, that was a stupid thing to do," she told him.
Nick stopped in the hallway, causing Jackie to stop as well.
"Jackie, that young girl came here with her brother. There was no mention of either parent or other family until he came in. We can't be certain that they are their parents. For all we know, they could be mentally unstable people, looking for a reason to be here and take them away," Nick told her.
"Fine Mr. I-Know-It-All. How did they know to come to the hospital looking for them? Especially since this wasn't released to the general public yet?" she asked him, crossing her arms.
The two were now in a staring contest until Nick decided to look away.
"I don't know," he quietly replied.
00000
Harriet led Sarah down the hall to the room where her brother was.
"So, Sarah, how old are you?" she asked.
"15. My brother's 17. He's going to be 18 in two days. What a way to celebrate it by being in the hospital," she sighed.
"I agree with you and by the look of it, he's still going to be unconscious by the time it gets here too," Harriet replied as they walked inside to be greeted by Jules.
"Hello Harriet. Sarah, I've been waiting for you," Jules said, smiling at her. "I just want to make sure that there's no new injuries and how your previous ones are doing."
Sarah nodded with a smile.
00000
Matt and Rae were walking down the hallway with Letty.
"So you say that the two who came on yesterday are brother and sister, correct?" asked Matt.
"Yes, they are. She's fine to go but she's not leaving until he is as well. Right now, he's in a coma. It's nothing serious so we can expect it not to be too long," Rae told them.
"Yeah. Wonder what their parents were doing? Letting them go out in the car like that," Letty smirked, looking around the floor.
Her gaze soon came to Jackie and Nick, the latter holding his hand up to his mouth.
"What happened to him?" she wondered.
"To who?" asked Rae as she and Matt turned to look in her direction.
They saw the two and hurried over to them. They saw the blood in his mouth and on his hand.
"What happened to you?" asked Matt, curiously.
Nick opened his mouth to answer but Jackie stopped him.
"No way, no how," she told him, shaking her index finger. "You know those two who came in yesterday? The boy and girl?"
The three glanced at each other before looking back at them and nodded.
"Well, just now, down in the waiting room two people came in, claiming they were their parents and Nick here wouldn't let the man touch her and the result is a couple of swacks in the face. His reasoning is apparently that if those people were truly her parents, she'd be overjoyed and he wouldn't have been as upset as he was," explained Jackie.
Three sets of eyes opened wide.
"Nick, you're more crazy than I ever thought possible. What if those people actually were her parents?" asked Letty, almost screaming.
"She was hiding behind me. What am I supposed to do then? Step out of the way and let her get trampled on? I don't think so," he replied as he headed off into the washroom.
He left the four in a total state of confusion.
00000
He spit out the blood into the sink.
'The guy certainly knows how to pack a punch,' he thought to himself as he raised his head and peered into the mirror.
He gingerly placed a hand on his now sore eye. He could see a bruise starting to appear around the eye already. He cursed before turning around...
Only to find Matt standing there.
"Nick, you're impossible. Do you even realize what you're getting yourself into?" he asked.
"Of course I do. I'm helping a young lady fell comfortable during the stay she has here. I have a feeling that something's going on in that pretty little head of hers and I simply want to help," replied Nick as he walked past Matt.
Matt couldn't help but sigh.
"She reminds you of you, doesn't she? One person in such a big place and pretty much no one to talk to?" he asked.
Nick stopped dead in his tracks and thought about that statement for a moment before he hurried out of the washroom and down the hall.
The three women watched him walk out in a huff.
"Nick, wait," called Matt as he came out of the washroom.
The three watched him go into the distance.
"I think he thinks he's doing the right thing," Rae sadly said.
"And I think we're condemning him for doing whatever he's doing," Letty said.
Nick watched Sarah sit by the still form of her brother. He gave a smile as he walked inside to see her. Her face turned from sad to happy once she saw him.
"Hi Doctor Kokoris," she said. "How're you feeling?"
His eyes widened.
"I never told you my last name. How'd you figure it out?" he wondered.
"I asked. Besides, it was on your nametag," she replied, giving a small laugh.
He also gave a laugh. He suddenly stopped once he realized the reaction would cause him pain.
"He hit you hard, didn't he?" asked Sarah.
"Don't worry, it's not bad," he told her.
There suddenly was silence between the two.
"Listen Sarah, I have to go home now. I'll come and see how you're doing in the morning," he finally told her.
She nodded and watched him head for the door.
"Doctor Kokoris?" she called out to him once he reached it.
He turned around and looked at her again.
"Yes?" he wondered.
"Watch your back. Please," she told him.
He nodded as he started down the hall.
00000
Nick was walking towards his car in the parking lot. He pulled out his keys, preparing to unlock the vehicle once he got to it.
He was almost there when he heard the squealing of tires. Thinking it was some rowdy teenagers outside, he ignored it.
He slowly lifted his head once he realized that the noise was getting closer to him. He swerved around to find a car heading right for him. If it wasn't for the high speed and squealing tires, Nick wouldn't have known it was coming for him.
Nick started to run out of the way, but couldn't. It plowed into him, crushing his leg. He cried out in pain.
TBC...
