Chapter 9- A Night in Camp
"We need to get to a safe location if we're going to rest." Keith said. He yawned. "How late is it?"
"Nearly 11:00." Drake said, checking his watch. He yawned. "We should get some sleep. Otherwise bad things might happen."
"Yeah, where are we going to go?"
"The green dorm isn't very far from here." Julie said. "I would know, I spent a year there."
"Okay." Keith said. Drake walked over to Matt, who was still on the ground on all fours. Drake crouched down and helped Matt up. Matt mumbled something about a pain in his heart.
"Right. Let's go." Drake said. "Uh, which way?"
"This way." Julie said, and began to lead them through the woods.
"Through the woods?" Bentz said. "I could have sworn there was a path."
Julie snapped a branch off a tree next to her. There was a very rough path, overflowing with leaves and other brush. "There is one, it's just not much."
"I need to fix that…" Bentz muttered. They tramped on the path for nearly fifteen minutes until they finally saw the dilapidated green dorm. It had once again been beaten down in the fiend invasion, but a few of the rooms were intact.
"We'll stay in that one." Julie said, pointing to one of the rooms that seemed to be in fairly good shape. Keith opened the door and let them all in.
"These guys are in worse shape than I thought." He said. The room was small, and there was a very small bunk bed with a roll-out bed underneath it.
"Well." Drake said, and sat Matt down in the corner. "It's better than nothing." Matt groaned and looked up.
"Ow." He said. "Are we setting up camp or something?"
"Yeah. We decided… well, I decided that you could use some rest." Julie said, and flushed a little.
"I could use some. Thank you." Matt said.
"Care to enlighten us as to why you suddenly lost your usual cool?" Keith asked and sat on the bed. Drake and Bentz sat next to him. Julie sat on the chair at the desk in the corner.
"Yes, I should tell you." Matt said, and massaged his heart. "It only happened about eleven months ago."
"What happened?" Drake asked.
"Well, after I got back to my… home after the events of last year, I experienced random pains in the region of my heart. So, I went to a doctor to get a diagnosis."
"How did you do that, with the entire Egyptian government after you?" Bentz asked.
"There are some doctors that I can access without questions and without record of my visit. I have contacts." Matt grimaced from the pain in his heart. "It took about four days of testing before the doctor found what was wrong." He paused and leaned back up against the wall he was sitting next to.
"What was it?" Julie asked.
"I was diagnosed with a very rare heart disease. So rare, is it, in fact, that it does not even have a name. It is also very dangerous. Terminal, in fact."
"Terminal?" Julie looked confused, but she also looked like she suspected the answer.
"It means that I'll die eventually from it. It has just become active. I will die in 48 hours."
There was a long silence following this pronouncement. No one had expected this. It was broken by Julie's sobs.
"Oh, god… why that…"
"I know it's hard to accept." Matt said. "In a little less than 48 hours, I will no longer be able to help you. Until then, though, I will do everything within my power to stop this. But until then, you all should get some sleep."
"What about you?" Keith asked.
"I'll keep watch and alert someone when I need to switch."
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Drake woke up, sweating. He had had another of his nightmares. He sat up. Matt was standing vigilante by the door. Drake got out of the bed and walked over to him.
"Couldn't sleep, eh?" Matt said before Drake was within his range of sight.
"Yeah, how did you know…?" Drake asked.
"Remember, I can feel the vibrations in the air and ground to detect those who would try and sneak up on me." Matt said before Drake could finish. "Nightmares?"
Drake nodded. "How is it that you never seem tired?"
"I don't need almost any sleep at all." Matt said. "Good thing, too, since I'm an insomniac."
"Really?" Drake said. "You seem to have a lot of disorders and the like… your eye, your heart, and your sleeping abilities…"
"Not to mention my immune system." Matt said.
"Huh?"
"I haven't said it, but I have AIDS as well."
"How did you get that?!?"
"Accidentally received it in a blood transfusion. Fourtunatly, by some miracle my body was able to pick it out and slow it down drastically, enough so that I would be able to live an almost normal life."
"Why did you need a blood transfusion?"
"I got hit by eight kunai in a battle during my ninja days. I nearly died, and when the ninja medics transfused some blood so that I wouldn't bleed to death, they accidentally got a sample with a small amount of HIV in it."
"That stinks."
"It hasn't affected me much."
"You've had a rough past."
"It's not too bad. Sure I was bullied in school, and I hated social life, which sucked because I was in a family of eight."
"Oh. I never knew."
"Most people don't. I don't tell almost anyone."
"Why not?"
"Don't ask."
"Will you be okay with your heart and all that stuff?"
"Yeah. My heart problem won't affect me again until it kills me. And the other stuff doesn't do much to me, not any more than what it did last year, which was negligible. And now, you need to sleep."
"I can't get to sleep…"
"Here." Matt said, and reached into a pouch on his belt (he seemed to have a lot of pouches) and withdrew a little green leaf. "This is a fairly rare herb that will help you get to sleep. Just take a bit off the edge and chew it up."
Drake tore off an edge of the leaf. He climbed into bed, put the herb in his mouth, chewed, and was asleep as soon as he swallowed.