((A/N: This is the longest I've ever taken to write a single chapter and I have no idea why. -.-;; I guess it's just that I've been busy and not too driven, but now I'm in a writing mood and perhaps I'll finally post this. I apologize to anyone who was following the story because I took quite a while for this update.

My small disclaimer- I didn't write the lyrics, obviously. I 3 Mr. Holopainen and that is my disclaimer. They are not mine, they belong to him. And Nightwish as a whole, I s'pose.

Also, language is a bit coarse in this chapter, so kiddies be warned.))

Passiontide

An angel by my side

But no Christ to end this war

To deliver my soul from the sword

Hope has shown me a scenery

Paradise poetry

With first snow Ill be gone

- Higher Than Hope, Nightwish -

'How could you put off treatments? Especially just for a few people to visit you! Those lost hours could be lost years, don't you realize that?' Her father's harsh words were burnt into Chelsea's mind. She knew that she probably wouldn't survive if treatment for rejection wasn't started immediately, but she didn't wan't to lose what she was certain would be her last chance to just have a few days with her friends, nothing to worry about.

'I hardly got a few years to live like a normal person, I'm taking these last few weeks as one.' She'd heard that a person can sense when death is upon them, and the cold feeling in her bones couldn't be shaken off. Chelsea James was going to die, and she was more certain of this than she'd ever been of anything.

Visiting hours would begin at three, right now it was quarter 'til. These moments of lonesome silence were the worst. They gave her time to think, time to doubt other things in her life.

What would become of her - not her body, but her soul - after she died? Would there really be a new, perfect afterlife for her? Nothing in her life was perfect. Why would it be any different after she died?

"So how long until you know what's wrong with me?" Meg cringed whenever she saw the masked looks on her father's face. He may be able to fool his other patients, but they were strangers.

Meg had been flown by helicopter back to the Virginia hospital her father worked at. As a rule, doctors did not treat patients they already had an attachment to: family, friends, lovers, people they knew at all. Supposedly, it would interfere with their decision making. Meg was begining to believe this rule was a good one.

Her father was lying to her and she knew it. Every time he said the doctors were still baffled, or there were specialists looking at the biopsies, she could see that dark cast in his eyes, the shield he put up every time he had to be emotionless to a patient. She often wondered how no one noticed this, but concluded that for one they didn't know them and for another, if they were being treated by her father, his eyes were the last thing they cared about.

This time he sighed and she knew he wasn't going to lie any more. He pulled a chair to the bed and sat down, taking her hands in his own.

"Meg... honey..." his voice was soft and she could tell how hard it was for him to chose his words.

"Just tell me dad." she whispered, her voice jagged. She could already feel her eyes burning with tears and he hadn't even told her what was wrong. A wave of dull pain swept through her head but she blinked it off. She'd been experiencing these headaches for weeks now and attributed them to nothing more than a bit too much stress.

"They found a tumor in your brain..." he whispered, "...a biopsy has been scheduled for tomorrow afternoon." his tone was cold and detatched, as was he. His grip was weak and Meg pulled from it.

"Wait... you just scheduled me a surgery without even consulting me?"

"It was nessecary, Meg. We need to find out if it's malignant." He stared straight through her as he spoke and Meg could hardly even recognize him as her father. Her father was always upbeat and lively, no matter what was going on. This was different though, she realized. This was close to him. When it was just strangers, he was so good at being detatched. A special gift that she certainly did not possess. She thought back to her time with Donovan Jacoby. She wondered if she would be facing a similar fate soon.

"I want to be alone, Dad." she whispered now, curling herself up and pulling away from him.

"Please Meggie-"

"-Not right now dad." she repeated sternly. I need this time for myself." He didn't argue long and left with a slight sigh. When he left she broke down into tears. A brain tumor, possibly cancerous. The headaches, blured vision, and passing out days before at Katie's wedding reception all made sense. There was a clump of cells growing in her brain, pressing out and setting her senses haywire. She was going to die. Sure, she knew this in the back of her mind for what seemed like her whole life. People are born, live, and die. It's the natural order of things. But right now she realized her own personal mortality, and how imminant her end may be.

Now her thoughts drifted to Morgan, and his prediciment last summer began to make startling new sense to her. Of course Morgan wouldn't have wanted to know if he was going to die. Not if he was going to live his life like this- waiting for a bunch of doctors to cut him open and tell him when. But it was different for her at the same time. Huntington's Chorea had not only no cure, but no treatments as far as she knew. As for cancer, there were plenty of treatments, and each one was more horrific than the next.

Meg sobbed. She cried for herself, for her brain that had been invaded by this terrible tumor, for everyone else who faced this fate, and even for Morgan for ever even thinking that he may have been at risk of a death that could be perhaps as terrible as this.

Megan Charnell cried her eyes out for every misery in the world.

"She's still in the hospital! Don't you think you should at least give her a call?" Morgan glared at the picture on the wall ahead of him. He, Josh, Jeff, and Eric were in the waiting room of the hospital Chelsea was now in, waiting for Katie and Lacey to come out of her room.

"It's none of my concern." Morgan said gruffly, slumping back in his chair. Meg Charnell had been taken to a hospital closer to her home the previous day. He made no attempt to visit her before this either. The girl wasn't any of his concern, and all he wanted was to be free from this world. This world of pain, suffering, sickness, and death. He had his share of this when he watched his first young love die.

'Anne...' Her name drifted through his name like a warm, floral breeze. He would never forget meeting her, or how wrong his first impressions of her had been. He felt the same way about Meg now, though it was the exact opposite.

Meg was exactally what he thought Anne to be- a spoiled rich girl who never knew suffering. Not like him, not like his family, not like Anne or Mr. Winngate. Maybe this was just what the girl needed.

"You're one cold son of a-"

"-Cool it, Eric." Jeff interrupted. Eric was waiting here to wish Chelsea good wishes before he returned home and she entered isolation. He knew of Chelsea's crush for him last summer, but he was too busy trying to get on Meg's good side to pay her any notice. Now Morgan had the girl just crying to be with him and he brushed her off like she was nothing. Maybe it was jealousy that was making Eric feel such animosity towards Morgan, but he just labeled the cold cowboy as a genuine asshole.

"Jeff's right..." Josh added, sighing from his spot in the corner, "The last thing we need is you two fighting over that girl. I think we're all gonna be in a whole world of shit with the Jameses for Chelsea putting off treatment."

"No... it's gonna be our girls in a world of shit, bud." Jeff smirked. The last thing he could do was defend Lacey, or anyone for that matter, in a fight. He couldn't take a walk without being at risk of bleeding to death. Fighting was out of the question. These thoughts crossed through his mind and shamed him, even though it was merely a figure of speech.

After a few minutes in an akward, dead silence, Katie emerged from the room. Lacey was soon to follow, and both were swiping tears from their eyes.

"I don't like the looks of this." Josh whispered, wiping away stray tears from Katie's face. She pressed her face into his shoulder and sobbed, holding onto her new husband as if for life itself. For Chelsea's life she was, at least. Everything she'd read about, every risk she was up against Chelsea was succumbing to. She knew that even with treatments, there was a good chance that the rejection would be permanent. If that were the case, she was as good as dead. Katie knew the chances of getting even a first heart transplant, and those of a second were slim to none.

Lacey stared stoicly at the ground, keeping her mouth shut. The last thing she needed was to break down in front of all these people, two of whom were basically strangers. She bit her lip and leaned against the wall, letting out a low sigh. Chelsea was going to die. She knew it in her mind and in her heart. This was it.

Amanda died when she was sixteen, and Lacey was sure it would be the end of it. Then she met Jillian. As much as she didn't want to get to know the girl, she felt an instant bond. Jillian then died as Chelsea got the heart transplant that both girls were waiting for.

Now Chelsea would be gone, and it would only be Katie and herself. She was well aware that Katie's time was limited as well. Each year after a transplant, the recipeint's odds went down. As normal as her life could be, it would never last as long as she wanted. It would never be as long as her friends' or, more importantly, as Josh's.

"Don't you understand?" Lacey whispered, voicing her fears, "Chelsea's gonna die. You only get so many chances, and this one failed! It was her only hope, and it's lost too. Don't you know what the odds were for a first heart? She'll never get a second!" Lacey cried out in frustration for her friend. How fair was it to feel this way? Right now she wished more than anything that the drugs would work, but she knew they wouldn't. She saw the looks on the James' faces and heard their hushed words. The drugs were having no effect, and doctors were begining to believe they wouldn't have no matter what the condition.

They would be putting Chelsea back on the waiting list for a transplant soon, then it would only be a waiting game. Waiting for someone to die so she could have another chance to live. How fair was that? Lacey succumbed to the tears burning at her eyes. How fair was life, though? How fair was life?