Disclaimer: The paperwork that declares me owner of FinalFantasyVIII hasn't come through yet, but we can still hope. Thanks to everyone who's reviewed so far, especially Harps.
They told her it was nothing major. They told her that her baby wouldn't be in pain. They told her lots of things. She couldn't trust them.
Heidi shuffled down the bright hallway, hospital slippers making a muffled rustle beneath her feet. The medical complex was cold and impersonal- the sterile environment may have been healthy for the body, but it couldn't have been good for the soul. Couldn't be good for the mood, either. Heidi was lagging and lethargic- she didn't seem to be able to lift her spirits at all. Her baby was sick and her husband- who knows where. Time was passing by sluggishly and it dragged on in a sickening fashion. Wake up, eat, sleep, visit Zell, eat, sleep. . . and the cycle continued. Two days took an eternity. An eternity for nothing? Her baby had been treated with phototherapy and bililights for the past two days without result. So tiny, her little Zell. Barely three pounds. . . Pandemona sail him through the sky- it seemed like the wind could easily pick him up and carry him far away. Heidi almost giggled. If that happened she'd end up alone again.
The room was the same room that she had come back to for two days now. A small tray of food had been left on the bed-side table. Bland food; the tray held vanilla pudding, rice, and fish. Heidi was going stir-crazy. Or just crazy. She poked a fork at the rice and hesitantly brought it up to her mouth. The rice never made it past her lips. The pudding was rejected as well and the fish would not be eaten under any circumstances. It had been the fault of bad fish that her baby was sick, hadn't it? Heidi would rather starve than eat the cause of all her problems. The tray was carried into the bathroom and the food spooned carefully into the porcelain bowl where it was promptly flushed. Heidi was smart enough to know that if the doctors discovered she wasn't eating, they would watch to make sure that she did and Heidi was not about to eat their poison fish. It was the waiting that was nerve-racking.
Heidi was busy staring at the wall when Doctor Xiam opened the door. He had a strange quirky look on his face as he opened his mouth to speak. "We finally have some news," he commented, though by the way he carefully avoided saying weather the news was good or bad Heidi surmised that the news could not be as cheery as the doctor sounded. "Zell's been treated with the bililights for over two days now, but there hasn't been any result. In order to further treat his ABO incompatibility we're going to go ahead with a blood transfusion," the doctor said, still sounding hopeful. Heidi stared at him blankly, seeming like a small child in need of a hug. Doctor Xiam thought for a moment, clicked his tongue and left. Heidi examined the palm of her hand. She wondered if Zell's fingerprints were anything like hers. She decided they weren't, even though she didn't have any concrete reason to believe so. It didn't really matter anyway.
Once again, Heidi scuffed down the white hallway. She rounded a corner like she was in a trance. Heidi walked awhile longer until she reached a long glass window in the middle of a wall. She could see Zell through this window, just as she had seen him undergoing phototherapy. But this time he had tubes and needles and something that looked like an IV, but the liquid was wrong- red, not clear. Heidi's stomach dropped. Her precious baby looked like some medical experiment gone wrong. Zell's eyes were glazed looking as he shifted restlessly and made a tiny pitiful moan. Heidi stared through the wall of glass and put a hand to the pane that separated her from her baby. A second later Heidi's heart broke as Zell raised a teeny-tiny hand the best he could with all the tubes in the way. Her mind raced- she had caused her baby pain. He would never understand. He could never love her after this. He would hate her forever. So she would run.
Heidi walked back to her room trying not to attrack any attention or cause any suspicion whatsoever. The walk seemed to take much to long. Finally, with a sigh of relief, Heidi reached her room. She hurried inside, closed the door behind her and sunk back against the door. She was getting too old for this. The doctor came every hour on the hour. He was due in about ten minutes. These visits lasted approxamately five minutes. . . So, five past left fifty-five minutes until the next visit. It would take her about five minutes to get dressed into real clothes- ones besides the hospital gown, and about ten minutes to get out of the complex. That would leave fourty minutes before they discovered she was gone. If she could get past the station and back onto the bridge to FH before the station was shut down for the day she would make it.
Doctor Xiam knocked on the door- exactly on the hour, same as always. Heidi was paranoid that he suspected something. Any sideways look was worried about- he surely must know what was going on. After four minutes Heidi was practically screaming. When the doctor finally bade her goodbye, Heidi's nerves were shot. She counted ten seconds after the door shut then sprang to the bathroom and changed into her own clothes. Unfortunately, the last time she had worn them was when she had been pregnant. The maternity clothes hung loose on her making her look too small. There was no time to remedy this though, she was already a minute behind schedule.
She walked the halls trying to look nonchalant, but whenever she came to an area of wall without doors she flat out ran until she came to the next door. She continued this all the way to the first floor. The front desk was located right opposite the front doors. Heidi waited until the nurses were busy with another patient and then casually walked out the door. Once outside she hustled as fast as she could. There was a system of pathways that led out of Esthar that would take long enough to navigate. There was only thirty-five minutes until the station closed. Heidi felt so out of place. Everyone else around her was wearing the customary Estharian robes, while she wore the common dress of FH. Nothing to be done, nothing to be done. If she could just get to the bridge, she'd be alright.
