The room was bright, and cold, and hard. She'd never realized just how little comfort there was in such a barren, clinical environment. Her father had been the only thing to fill the room with a disarming presence. In the silence, the few posters on the wall made a poor substitute. Was it always so cold in the hospital?

The walls seemed so thin. Just on the other side, the combination of near-yelling and a fervor of medical attention served as the only thing to occupy Noelle's attention. Noelle hadn't really met Berdly's family in the past— he wasn't really that kind of friend, she thought. But, presumably his parents, not that Noelle knew, arrived shortly after Berdly himself had been brought in. They sounded so afraid. And yet, Berdly had...

Berdly was as alright as Noelle could have hoped for, she supposed, given what had happened in the dream. Or world. Or whatever. His heart was still beating, his lungs still breathing. But poorly. And apparently, no matter what the doctors or nurses or whoever did, his temperature was still low. Enough to be worrying. For the most part, his heartbeat was weak and his breathing was slow, apparently unexpectedly so.

Noelle had only seen a glimpse of it all before the hospital's employees ushered her away. When he was first brought in, how quickly everything mobilized. Just the perceived urgency was enough to make Noelle more nervous than before. Some time had passed, but little had changed, though the sense of urgency had begun to dwindle in the other room.

She listened carefully to the muffled words on the other side of the wall, unable to stop herself, really. She got occasional words between a doctor and Berdly's family. Unresponsive. Coma. Hypothermia. Seizure. The string of keywords, unclear in which ones were descriptions and which ones were speculation, did not calm her down.

Eventually it became quiet throughout the entire building. Her father had dozed off, while Noelle had been more or less completely lost in thought. Within the room, there was no obvious sign of what time it was. Had it been hours? She had ought to get home. And with her dad asleep— she decided not to wake him up to say goodbye.

But, stepping out of the room, she had to take one last look. For her own morbid curiosity, which had festered into a compulsive panic of sorts. Quietly, she opened the door. Inside, the family Noelle had heard panicked before were sleeping, sitting on chairs pulled up at the bedside. She would be careful not to wake them up— Noelle could only imagine the thoughts that must have gone through their head the past day…

Both in spite of and because of the wide variety in monster anatomy, an oxygen mask fit specifically for a beak was not the hardest to get, and one was sensibly secured over his face. A small device clipped onto a finger, an IV into an arm. The quiet, slow rhythm of the heart rate monitor was something that she didn't hear through the walls. Several blankets were piled onto him. There was almost a sereneness to his unconscious expression; if it wasn't for what Noelle knew…

She felt overwhelmed. Overwhelmed to the point of numbness, almost. And yet, she wasn't the person who had it the worst; the view before her made that clear. It just… wasn't fair. Berdly didn't deserve this, and his family certainly didn't either. And she didn't know exactly what was wrong or how to fix it or what she should do or if it was all gonna be okay or—

Noelle silently shut the door before her increasingly irregular and labored breathing woke anyone up. She wasn't crying. But she wasn't far off. It was time to go home. Tomorrow, maybe. Maybe the doctors would figure something out. Maybe Noelle would have a sudden realization strike her, and she'd know how to fix all of this. At the very least, her goal of knowing… it had been fulfilled. She knew well enough now. She'd spent well over a lifetime's worth of time in the hospital, fretting and… Noelle was going to walk home.

The sun had set some time ago. It was dark out now. Outside, moths and flies buzzed around the lights by storefronts and apartments. Higher up, the moon, the stars, they seemed to serve as perhaps the only thing Noelle could take solace in.

Sleep was slow to take her. Her thoughts seemed to revel in gripping her brain tightly, no matter how tired she felt. And no matter how tightly the covers were wrapped around her, her room felt so cold. Numb, shivering, overwhelmed. Eventually, she would fall into a dreamless sleep. Her exhausted brain did not come up with anything even approaching the fantastical world that had gotten her in this position in the first place.

The following morning, she quickly learned that the school would not open for the day. With the discovery of Berdly and the clear implication of something sinister— with the students knowing it all as well as the exponentially worried parents now— there was nothing the mayor or the police department could do to keep their words from falling on deaf ears now. Perhaps that was a blessing, Noelle thought. More likely, it was a curse; with nothing to distract Noelle, with no chance to try to speak to someone— anyone— about how to make this all better… What could she do? In that place, she had such immense magical powers. It felt as if she could do anything. Here, every fiber of her being was occupied by a weighty sense of powerlessness. No ice magic now. No healing magic. Nothing. She was useless as her friend lay comatose in a cold hospital bed.

Noelle sat there with breakfast before her. The clot of anxiety in her stomach made the mere sight of food nearly nauseating.

It was her fault. Noelle cast the spell. She let herself be used. And she got breakfast. Berdly got needles and tubes and clips and monitors and—

Maybe he was doing better now. It had been several hours; it wouldn't be too unreasonable to believe that the doctors had figured something out regarding his condition, right? There was still a chance that this was all a coincidence, that Noelle didn't do this to Berdly. They'd probably gotten his temperature back up, or at least figured out what was wrong. At the least, the idea that they had was enough to let Noelle slowly get down her breakfast. There was nothing in particular happening that day, given that school was out, perhaps for several days. Noelle could go check in on Berdly for just a few minutes— while there she could also talk with her dad again. Two birds with one stone, then.

Outside it was similarly bright and chilly as yesterday. Some brisk winds carrying some fallen leaves, and the sunlight providing a sort of mute warmth that barely registered in the cold air. It was nice in a way, Noelle supposed, but it also provided no comfort like a warmer day might have.

Should Berdly still be in a poor condition, Noelle thought as she walked, then she would have to try to figure out some way to fix it. If it was her fault, then the only thing she could reasonably do was try to fix it. Especially if she wasn't going to be occupied with school. But the only thing she really had to go off of was Susie. Most of the people in that… world were people Noelle had never seen before, and hadn't seen since. And Kris, well… she couldn't bring herself to blame Kris, but undoubtedly in her mind, they were acting strange. She couldn't fully trust them right now, unfortunately.

She stood outside the door to Berdly's room, with her hand on the handle. She took a breath, preparing herself for whatever she might see, and she opened it and began in.

Berdly's family wasn't here right now. But in the middle of the room, between her and the unconscious bird was Kris and Susie. Susie had glanced over her shoulder to see Noelle walk in. Truth be told, she wasn't prepared to see them here. But, it would afford her the opportunity to talk to Susie, and perhaps figure out more about that dream world, should she need to.

"Hey, Noelle," Susie muttered.

"Oh, hi, Susie," Noelle said, still a bit surprised. Walking closer, she asked, "Is he, uh, doing better?" She more or less knew the answer— it wasn't like he'd gotten up from the bed.

"Um, I don't know. He's alive, I guess?" Susie gestured over to the heart rate monitor. IT seemed to be beeping a bit faster than when Noelle was last in the hospital.

Noelle now stood by the bed. Keeping from being distracted by Susie at her flank for a moment, she assessed Berdly, to see if something, anything had improved. It didn't seem that way. "Hm," she hummed, trying to disguise her general unhappiness with the situation. "Well, what are you and Kris doing?"

"I don't know. Ask Kris; I'm just following them around."

"Oh. Why?"

"Don't really have much else to do, I guess. Y'know, with school out," Susie shrugged. Noelle noticed, behind Susie from her position, that Kris was seemingly blankly staring at Berdly, and hadn't looked away the entire time Noelle had been in the room. She felt bad concluding as such, but one way or another, Kris wasn't acting right, and Noelle couldn't trust them. She hoped somehow that that wouldn't be the case soon. They were… no, they weren't friends, exactly. Kris had—

"You alright?" Susie asked.

"Hm?" Noelle flinched, brought back into cognizance. "Oh, I'm fine. Just…" she looked over at Berdly. Susie's eyes followed.

"Mmm, yeah. I feel bad for him." Noelle's attention briefly shifted to the heart rate monitor, actively listening into the steady pace of beeps. Was it faster than a moment ago? "I heard they found him in a closet."

"Yeah, I…" If all of this was really tied into that weird dream Noelle had, then talking to Susie about it was likely her only way to figure anything more out. And yet Kris… Kris would have to be gone whenever that happened; she just couldn't trust them, no matter how guilty casting them out made Noelle feel. But Noelle couldn't think of a way to get the two of them alone to talk. If she knew how to do that well, she probably would have done so many times thus far.

"Anyway, cause of that, Kris' mom wants them to come back home. I guess they're worried about whoever put him in that closet." Susie cleared her throat. "So, uh, are you busy today? I'll be bored when Kris leaves, y'know? Maybe the two of us can hang out?"

Damnit, if it was any other day, Noelle would basically be unable to contain herself. But, the almost dead-looking classmate on the bed in front of her kept her in check. Even still, though, it wasn't like that much had changed from just a few days ago.

"Oh! N—no, I don't have anything going on today. We can do that," Noelle stuttered, smiling. "What did you have in mind?"

"Hm," Susie thought, "well, I guess we could—"

The door into the room opened, causing Noelle and Susie to turn to face it. In stepped Undyne, clearly doing police work. "Oh, hey kids!" she grinned.

"Hello," Noelle said somewhat quietly. It was perhaps getting to be a bit crowded in the room by this point.

"Why aren't you three at school?" Undyne questioned.

Noelle began, "...School is—"

Undyne laughed boisterously. "I know, school's cancelled today! Anyway, you're his classmates, right?" She gestured to Berdly. Noelle nodded. "When was the last time you saw him? Before he went missing."

Noelle didn't really want to be answering questions right then. That didn't mean she wouldn't answer them, of course. "We were studying in the library computer lab after school the day he went missing."

"Oh, that's really useful," Undyne muttered as she very hastily wrote a note down on a notepad.

"We were also at the library," Susie stated, gesturing to her and Kris. Kris had turned around at some point and was now also facing Undyne.

Undyne looked up. "All three of you were there at the same time?"

"Yeah," Susie said.

"And Berdly," Noelle added.

Undyne laughed. "Of course he was there!" She wrote something extra on her notepad. "Mind coming out here and me asking more questions?" Her hand went to the door handle, after putting the notepad aside.

"Oh, of course," Noelle agreed, internally apprehensive.

"Great!" Undyne opened the door, stepping out into the hallway. Kris was the first to start walking towards the door.