Golden thorns chapter 32
Coran awoke to whispered voices. He kept his eyes closed. His head ached and he felt feint. The mumbles turned into words. "We shall see how he is tomorrow. Naturally it would not be fair to make the rest of the team go on a mission undermanned and without their leader." A woman's voice, stern and decisive.
"I'm sure he'll be fine. We all suffer from flu now and then." A softer, milder voice, male. Heeled footsteps sounding like hammer strikes in Beacon's forge left the room. The door shut quietly. The male voice returned.
"You can open your eyes now Mr Silverthorne. The curtains are closed and the room is dark." Coran rolled over and looked around the room. The curtains were indeed drawn and a deep red light filtered through them, soothing his headache. There was no-one else in the room, except for the one man sitting in the wooden chair normally positioned by the desk. Professor Ozpin smiled warmly at him. "I hear that you have been asking to see me." Had he? He couldn't remember
"Yeah… what time is it?" Coran groaned, face half-buried in his sweat drenched pillow
"It is approaching midday. It is currently Saturday. Tomorrow evening is the dance and the day after that is your team's first mission." That was it.
"That's what I wanted to speak to you about, Sir. I have my doubts about the mission."
"Coran, I'm sure you'll be fine. I've seen students weaker than you recover from illness like this in mere hours."
"That's not what it's about sir. I- I had a dream. It sounds ridiculous but I had a dream where I relived all of my worst memories." He said hesitantly.
"A result of the fever, I'm sure" replied Ozpin. Coran continued.
"Then I saw things that weren't memories. I- I-" he stopped, mustered his courage and continued "I saw my teammates die and it was my fault. I lost the only friends that I had in the world because I failed."
"Coran, listen to me. This is a temporary lapse in confidence due to the accident in Foreverfall accentuated by the fever you are currently experiencing. You are the perfectly capable leader of a perfectly capable team. I'm not going to lie to your face and say you can do anything because overconfidence has been the downfall of better men than me. Remember that although you will be going on an official mission you will be accompanied by a fully trained huntsman or huntress."
"Sorry sir, you're right. It just… felt so real."
"In my experience, the worst always are. Don't stay in bed all day now. You have work to do." And with that, he left the darkened room, closing the door softly behind him.
About five minutes later the door opened again and in walked Devlyn. He sighed, walked over to the chair and sat down.
"This is getting old, dude. You really need to stop getting broken in dark rooms." Coran chuckled slightly.
"I'll try to remember that for next time. So are you on nurse duty or something?"
"I'm just here so that I don't get shouted at by the girls. No sponge baths for you."
"Well I'm glad you're here. I have a list of chores for you guys to do before Monday. You all need to check your gear. Give it a complete overhaul and make sure that it's in top shape, top up on rounds and make sure you have clothing for both warm and cold environments seeing as we don't know where we're going yet. Also, would you mind taking my glaive down to firebrand and the forge crew? They know what my specs are so they shouldn't need me to be there. What is it, why are you smiling?"
"Because. You've been asleep for almost twenty four hours. We've already done all of that stuff. Honestly, you should have a little more faith in us."
"Well consider me impressed. Where are the others?" at which point the door burst open and Jo burst into the room, Marie following shyly as Jo announced "you won't believe what just happened!"