Hello all! Thank you for reading chapter ten. Really, I'm grinning, especially after you had to put up with the absolute crap that was chapter nine. I'm not here to vent. What's done is done. Let's move forward shall we? Oh darn, we've hit a snare. It appears as though chapter ten isn't much better... I just hope you like it.

I've been gone a while, ne? It's been almost a month! I've had several consecutive band competitions to attend and of course they're scheduled on the days I decide to update. However, marching season is almost over, and I'll soon be able to spend more time writing! Ah, the joys of being a band geek...scratch that, genius.

Thank you's

AquilaStrife- Thank you for the review! The email thing isn't working? I wonder how many chapter updates I've missed. You don't think I can write a bad chapter? WHAT? THAT'S IT, YOU'RE GETTING MY ENTIRE REPERTOIRE OF CLC RELATED MERCHANDISE! I LOVE YOU! I've reached a whole new level of elation. I'm so glad you liked it! As for the games, no worries, they're both worth the wait!

Wends- Thank you so much for your review. Sorry about the cheesy-ness. I was fully aware and went against my better judgement and updated it anyway. Nothing more to say. Seifer made you cringe? Really? Hm, sorry about that too. I hope you enjoy chapter ten a little better!

Okay, now that's that's finished, on with the chapter!

"Hey, Sora," Riku called, pushing the door open gently. "Are you awake?" There was no vocal reply, but he was greeted with the whirring and beeping of the various machines Sora was hooked up to.

"I'm coming in." He thought for a minute, then added, "if that's alright." He listened again. The sheets rustled as Sora moved around on his mattress, but Riku still hadn't gotten the answer he wanted.

He was expecting a brash exclamation as to why he hadn't visited earlier, and maybe some loudly shouted complaining; anything but this odd, unsettling silence. He could have been asleep, but being that Sora was such a light sleeper, he doubted it.

"Okay, then, I'm coming in." He pushed the door open completely and waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. He could barely make out the bed with the stream of light that shot in from the door, and thankfully, he had noticed the stool sitting in the middle of the floor before he tripped over it.

"Sora?" Closing the door behind him, he made his way slowly over to the bedside of his favorite co-worker, and leaned forward as he walked to get a look at him. There was another rustle of the sheets.

"It's me." Riku squinted. He could just make out two eyes staring back. "How are you feeling?"

Sora didn't say anything. His dormancy was maddening. Riku, for some unexplainable reason, could feel a distinctly pressing force billowing up in his chest. He stepped closer still, stopping when his foot touched the frame of the bed. He paused, not exactly sure of what to do. It was dark, too dark to see much, and he didn't want to turn on the light for fear of seeing something he didn't want to see.

"Sora," he tried again. "I wanted to see how you were doing...that's kind of impossible. It's really dark in here."

He couldn't make out anything specific, but he could see the glint in Sora's eyes from some unknown light source.

He waited patiently for something, anything to ease his growing apprehension. Never would he have expected to be so fearful for his friend.

Then, he felt something curl diffidently around his fingers.

Holding his breath, he moved them a little and was surprised to feel a little pressure pushing back. He could feel the smooth coolness of an IV wire against the back of his wrist, but it wasn't alarming.

He gulped. "Sora?"

Sora's fingers curled tighter around Riku's.

"...Your hands," Sora rasped suddenly, pausing to settle some of the pain in his throat. "They're clammy."

Riku's eyebrows shot upward. It was an odd greeting, but a greeting none the less. Satisfied to hear Sora's voice, bejeweled with his typical offhandedness, he smiled. "Sorry."

"You ought to be."

"Eh...I guess that's enough. Not all of us are medical geniuses like some people. Ironic isn't it?"

"Are you finished yet?" Cloud asked, impatiently tapping his foot. They had been sitting there the better part of half an hour while Seifer figured out what he was going to do, and then another half an hour was spent waiting for him to figure out how to do it.

"Yeah, yeah." He turned one final knob on the respirator that he was adjusting. 'I'm finished."

Cloud glanced over at Leon, then stared furiously at Seifer. "What exactly are you finished doing?"

"Um..."

"Well?"

"Okay...yeah, telling you might be beneficial..."

"I'm listening."

He studied his clipboard for a moment, frowned, took out a pen and scratched something out, re-wrote something, then smiled. "Okay, yeah, I uh, put him on a respirator."

Cloud gritted his teeth. "Anything else?"

"Hang on a minute...right. I also ran an IV of 40,000 units of Diphtheria Immunoglobulin...I guess that's how you pronounce it...and... hooked him to a bunch of machines you wouldn't even be able to begin to understand how to read."

"Great."

His expression suddenly changed. He looked uncharacteristically serious. "Wait...there's something else I should tell you."

"What?

He straitened his throat and held the clipboard to his chest. "If something, anything goes wrong..." He paused. He made sure their eyes were locked in unblinking seriousness. "...Do NOT call me. I'm not going to be in charge of messing up the head doctor. Get someone else."

"What?!" Cloud's face crumpled in outrage. "What is that supposed to mean?"

"You heard me," Seifer said dismissing him with a wave of the hand. "I'm getting out of here. If he wakes up and has questions, lie."

"No, come back here! I'm not staying!"

But it was too late. Seifer was out the door in a huff, going off to some unknown location, and Cloud was left reaching out to the door for someone that wouldn't be coming back through.

"I don't believe this."

Silence responded.

"I hate hospitals."

Vexed that his situation was not going to change, and too exhausted to come up with good, reasonable excuse to leave, he slouched back into the chair and kicked his feet up on the stool. Being charitable had its drawbacks.

He closed his eyes and let out a long, drawn out sigh. He didn't want to be here, much less with Leon, and even lesser with a sick Leon, but somehow managed to work his way into the worst possible circumstance anyway. Strangely though, it wasn't so bad.

The room wasn't exactly home, but it wasn't terrible, and the chair he was in was actually rather comfortable—save for the crack in the back part that kept catching his shirt. Leon was all but silent over there on the bed, so he wouldn't have to listen to his complaining, and the soft hum of the respirator was actually rather calming after a while.

The air itself smelled like disinfectant and plastic, but it was surprisingly warm and almost therapeutic. Cloud felt his eyes drooping. The sound of the respirator was starting to mix with the sound of his own breath. His feet on the stool were becoming strangely fuzzy and the stool melted into the floor, and walls. Everything was hazy and improbable, but perfectly serene. A quick nap wouldn't hurt, Cloud decided, closing his eyes and drifting off.

Riku was still holding onto Sora's hand, although nothing else had been said. Riku had sat down on the rolling stool that he had almost tripped over earlier, and was now lying on Sora's pillow with the tips of his spiky hair tickling his nose. Careful not to hurt him, he squeezed his fingers a little tighter and laid both their hands over Sora's chest.

He wasn't exactly sure if Sora had fallen asleep, but didn't want to chance waking him up. Instead, he just held his position, moving only to blink. It was pointless since the room was so dark, but Riku could barely make out the spikes on Sora's head and the image made him happy.

He wondered how long he would have to stay in this dark room. He wondered how long it would take for Sora to finally get better. He hoped it wouldn't be long, as he seemed to be hooked up to enough machienes to generate a small city, and he had been given quite a lot of medication as well.

He hoped the doctors knew what they were doing, and would soon help Sora, especially Sora, recover.

The thought occurred to him that Leon should have been in here tending o him, but then he remembered the scores of other patients and the lack of hospital staff as well. He would have to ask Leon later about Sora's progress and maybe, just maybe he could get actual permission to visit and wouldn't have to sneak in anymore.

Of Course he would have to actually find Leon, a task he wasn't sure he had the energy to bother with. That guy seemed to be everywhere at once, darting here, flying there, stopping only once in a while to pick up a revitalizing cup of coffee. Maybe Cloud knew where he was.

Riku scrunched up his face. Cloud was an enigma. Even if he did know where Leon was, (he probably did) he most likely wouldn't tell him, because he thought with his pride, not with rationality. In Cloud's twisted little mind, knowing about Leon was some sort of moral infringement, and he was certainly not about to admit it to Riku.

He also wondered where Cloud was in the first place. He hadn't seen him in what felt like ages, and he was certain it didn't take that long to give someone a cup of coffee. Maybe he couldn't find Leon, in which case he would have returned eons ago and would have had the cup himself.

Poor guy, maybe he had gotten lost, or flattened in the lobby by the mob of sick people, maybe both.

He felt Sora fidget a little and instinctively squeezed his hand tighter. Whatever Cloud was doing at the moment Riku was sure he could handle it himself. Besides, there was nothing Riku could do to help; he was busy at the moment.

There was an odd sound. It was a soft beep. Actually, it was a stream of soft beeps, beeping in a perfect rhythm. Then, the beeping became more distinct, and there was a hum added to the mix. It was as if the cotton had been pulled from his ears.

He noticed how cold his hands were. He didn't move them, they were too stiff. His feet felt the same way, though they were less free than his hands. His head though had an entirely different feeling. It was as if the cotton from his ears had been quadrupled in size, then rammed into the space his brain was not willing to give up. The result was a tremendous headache which made him want to go back to where he was before he felt all these sensations.

Willing himself to continue, he pried his eyes open and was immediately hit with a dull, yellow light. It wasn't blinding, but it was still bright enough so that he had to blink several times to adjust to it. This was not a familiar place.

He opened his mouth to speak, but quickly realized that it wasn't going to happen very easily. He felt something positively horrible sticking to the back of his throat, preventing him from making any recognizable sounds. He would have to work through this.

He let het his eyes droop to the left, and there was someone, someone very blonde, fast asleep in the chair next to him.

...Cloud...

There! Chapter ten is finished! Chapter eleven will be much better, followed by chapter twelve, and that's the end! Again, if you have any questions about Diphtheria, then send 'em to me, and I'll answer them in chapter twelve.

Oh, also, check my Bio page for story updates etc. (keep in mind, they are only approximations.)