A/N: I wrote this and the next chapter to "The Other Side" as performed by David Gray. I strongly suggest you go download this song to listen to while reading.
Claudia was giving the venom a good fight. The doctors had managed to revive her a bit, enough for her to stay awake so they could work with her. She gasped, trying to get control of her jerking limbs.
Nurses rushed back and forth, trying to find the right antidote. But since they didn't usually carry cobra anti-venom, they had to have it delivered by helicopter to the hospital. As they waited, Claudia twitched on the stretcher, staying awake at all costs.
A matronly nurse wiped the girl's forehead with a wet cloth and sighed. Poor thing, she thought to herself as the rest of the staff rushed around, trying to do something helpful. They were searching the coffers of the supply room for a cure that could tide her over, or they were running DNA samples to try and figure out the girl's identity. The rather eccentric man that had brought her in had gone missing, so they couldn't even question him.
But nothing could really help in the small amount of time. After twenty years' experience in Arizona, the nurse knew this child was very close to the end of her life. All that could really be done right now was make her as comfortable as possible and pray.
Half an hour passed. The girl steadily worsened, her skin becoming wan, then yellowish as her lips turned blue and she began breathing shallower and less often. Her eyes rolled back at intervals and the body began to lose its twitchy nature and settled down, then became motionless entirely. She became unresponsive, and the nurse let a tear fall for her. Dying aloneā¦that was her worst fear. She wouldn't dare abandon this lost and nameless child in her final moments, not even if the building was coming down.
In a few minutes, a great cry rose up from outside, and a torrent of hospital workers came spilling into the small room, one of them clutching a bottle of anti-venom. The helicopter had come through! They raised the bottle of liquid to the child's lips and tilted it back, rejoicing in the fact that they had done all they could and it had paid off.
The nurse sighed and gave a soft smile, almost laughing to herself at the irony. Holding on for all that time, fighting the burning pain within each of her veins, and this girl gave up the fight just a few seconds before, closing her eyes and exhaling that final breath without so much as a whisper.
A/n: I know this chapter is horrendously short. Forgive me, but it is a good cliffhanger, no? I promise the next chapter will be up quite soon, so please don't come attack me!
