Chapter 3: At the Hospital
"Name, please?" the receptionist's clear, crisp voice rang out.
Xander stared at her for a few seconds, seeming to not comprehend the question. "Buffy," he gasped out. It didn't seem to have occurred to him before the woman might need a little more than that. The nurse cleared her throat, but it still took him a few seconds to get the hint. "Summers," he said finally. "Buffy Summers."
Tara looked at him sympathetically as the receptionist, whose name tag said "Jennifer", fiddled with the computer. Tara knew he was trying to be brave and strong for Dawn. She understood, for she was trying to be strong as well, not just for Dawn, but for Willow and all of them. But Xander, Buffy, and Willow had been best friends for years. And it probably didn't help Xander's mental state that he and Buffy had been fighting. Tara suddenly wondered why he had come to the house earlier. Was it to apologize? For all their sakes, she prayed to whatever goddess was listening that he'd get a chance to.
"I'm sorry," Jennifer said, looking up from the computer screen to glance at the three of them. Tara gulped. That couldn't be good. But the woman wasn't finished yet. "Miss Summers is still in surgery. You can wait through there if you would like."
Jennifer pointed to a door, and they silently followed. They walked quickly through the doors, and when Tara saw a familiar redhead, she practically ran to her lover. Willow was sitting in those uncomfortable hospital chairs outside the operating room. Through the windows, they could see Buffy lying on the operating table, hooked up to various machines while doctors and nurses moved quickly around her.
"They won't let me in," Willow said softly when Tara sat down beside her. Xander and Dawn remained standing, staring through the windows.
"That's probably for the best," Tara told Willow. "We don't want to get in the way."
"I know," Willow said, turning her tear-streaked face to her girlfriend, "but they won't tell me anything. Not how long they'll be operating, or if there's any chance she'll..." Willow trailed off, turning her gaze to her feet. None of them wanted to voice their fear.
They remained silent for a long time. None of them knew how long; time seemed to flow differently here, where lives hung in the balance. Eventually, Xander and Dawn sat down. At some point, Xander went to get food from the vending machines. None of them were hungry, but they knew they should be, so they forced down a few bags of snack food. At some point, Dawn fell asleep, her head on Tara's shoulder. Tara just sat there, stroking the teenager's hair and staring into space.
Xander suddenly jumped to his feet and kicked one of the empty chairs. Hard. Tara and Willow stared at him, and Dawn shifted in her sleep. Xander just stood there, running his hands through his hair and breathing heavily.
"I'm not so sure the chair is the culprit here," Willow said, attempting at humor.
Xander tried to smile at her attempt to lighten the mood, but his mood refused to be lightened. "It's just...I should be doing something. Buffy's lying there, and there's nothing I can do to help. It's what we do. We help her when she needs it. Or we're supposed to, anyway." He sat down dejectedly. "She could die, and there's nothing we can do."
His head suddenly snapped up. His gaze flicked between Willow and Tara, then settled on Tara. "There's nothing I can do," he said slowly, "but there is something you can do."
Tara stared at him, alarm settling into the pit of her stomach. "You don't mean..."
"You're a witch, Tara. You can use magic to help her! Doesn't she deserve that!" His voice was deadly calm, and his gaze unwavering.
"Magic and healing were never meant to m-mix," she said, mentally cursing her nervous stammer. "When they do...it goes bad. Xander, the last time we broke the Wicca rules, we ripped her out of h-heaven. She c-certainly didn't deserve that!"
Willow looked at her with sympathy in her eyes, and put her own hand over Tara's. Before she could say anything, though, Xander spoke up again.
"So we brought her back, and yeah, it didn't turn out too well, but now that she's alive, are you just gonna let her die? How is that right?"
"Tara," a small voice began. They all turned to Dawn who was sitting up. "I just woke up...What's Xander asking you to do?"
"Use magic to heal Buffy," the witch replied softly.
"I don't understand. What's so bad about that? And what does it have to do with the resurrection spell?"
Tara looked at Dawn. She could see the fear, and now the hope in the teenager's eyes, and it made her wish she could do something to help. But this...it just felt wrong. "It's wrong to use magic for healing. Magic and medicine don't mix. When people try, it goes wrong. The last time we broke the Wicca code, we brought her back from heaven."
Dawn shook her head in confusion. "But...she's not dead yet, so it's not like she could be in heaven or anything like that."
"She is still here, on this plane, but there are other ways this could go wrong. When we brought her back, we risked bringing back something...else. The same could happen now if we tried to heal her. We could kill her, or we could turn her into something bad. I'm not going to risk doing that to her." Tears were gathering in Tara's eyes, tears from all the emotions she had been trying to suppress. But she would not let them spill now, not when so much was at stake.
"But," Dawn pleaded in a desperate whisper, "there has to be something you can do."
"There isn't," Tara replied. "I'm so sorry, but there isn't."
"You don't know that," Xander said. "You can't know until you try."
Tara gulped at the attack. She didn't know how to convince them, and she just wished Buffy were there. Besides the obvious reasons, she felt that Buffy would understand. The Slayer had similar rules of right and wrong, and she knew from personal experience what happened when they were broken. The witch tried to find the words to make Xander understand, but she couldn't. Then suddenly, she didn't have to.
"Xander, she said no." Tara turned to regard Willow with amazement. But Willow was not done. "Now back off!" she said stridently. "Buffy's not dead. She's the Slayer. I'd say there's still a pretty good chance she'll make it through this, and we won't have to resort to the dark arts. So just...stop talking like she's dying!"
Just as Willow finished her outburst, a doctor stepped out of the operating room. All four of them jumped to their feet, eager and terrified at the same time. The doctor removed the mask on his face with a bloodied glove, then tossed the mask and the gloves into the nearby trash can before turning to them.
"I have some good news...and some bad news," he began. "The good news is we've got her stabilized. The bad news is that we don't know if she'll ever regain consciousness. Frankly, it's a miracle she made it this far."
Willow stared at him. "Are you saying she's...she's in a coma?"
The doctor looked at Buffy's best friend with genuine sympathy. "Yes. Now, we're going to move her to another unit, and then we'll let you visit her one at a time. After that, I'm going to have to ask you to leave. Our visiting hours did technically end about...20 minutes ago," he said, glancing at the clock on the wall.
As he moved past them, Willow heard herself say "Thank you" in a broken-hearted voice.
