Authors Note*

I'm not coordinated on this site yet so please don't judge my lack of knowing where things are. I apologise in advance for the fact that this chapter slips from Narrator to Johns POV sometimes. So I went through and tried to put all of Johns POV in bold, sorry about that.

It's now five am and John is back at the ward. Staying up so late last night wasn't such a good idea. The dark room was filled with the sound of dead people breathing and the beeping of machines. Curtains were drawn around most everyone and Rose poked her head through the last set looking slightly worse for wear.

"Thank god I'm done for the night" She palmed her clipboard off to John and cracked her knuckles. "It is so creepy in here alone at night"

"Was it really that much fun?" John grinned, opening the door for her.

"Oh you're hilarious, well done. I'll see you in a few hours." Rose left before he could answer, so he turned to head up the aisle. Checking the clipboard, John saw that he still had to check half the ward patients before logging it in the computer. This meant he then had to send emails to the patient's family members, and to the head supervisors. And he doubted Rose had done any paperwork that late at night. That meant he would be slogging away at the computer for at least three hours before he could get back to reading to Blondie. He'd thought up the nickname because of the white blond hair that fell to his eyes.

At least he isn't awake to hear me; he could probably kill me if he got angry.

Smiling to himself, he went along the patients checking them off the list before hitting a sheet titled "John Doe". No details other than general appearance had been filled out and family members were yet to come forward. Various comments from Rose detailed his otherwise perfect health apart from his apparent coma, along with an anecdote about wizards and spells. John shook his head slightly, before flicking on the lamp beside the bed.

"Whoa? Wait, what?" okay this time he swore he saw that hand move, just for a second, that pale, long fingered hand had clutched the bed sheets. It unnerved John, to say the least so he pulled another blanket out and spread it over him. "What's up with you? No one knows why you're in a coma, and now you're apparently just going to start waking up? What's with that dude?"

He finished detailing Blondie's condition before returning to the paper covered desk. 'I see Rose has been working on her manuscript again," he muttered. Stacking the various papers in messy piles by the foot of the desk he nudged the computer switch with his toe. The screen stayed black and unresponsive. "Oh come on not again. Don't make me write reports by hand you stupid thing" Audibly groaning, John leant back in the chair, his mind running away along a track of carefree memories.

His phone went off somewhere in the ward, signalling someone wanted him and his eyes snapped open. Jogging slowly back down to Blondie's curtained off space he stopped dead, jaw dropped open, hand gripping the thin curtain material. The blanket he'd just placed over him a few hours before was now on the ground and Blondie had his arm stretched off the edge of the bed. Slipping past, John grabbed his phone before kneeling down to pick up the scratchy covering. Feeling a little tense, he snapped his head back up thinking he was being watched, but the long lashed eyes remained closed tight and the mouth slightly open. Behind him, the monitor played the rhythm of his heart.

"Ok this is just getting weird"

Returning to the desk, he checked his phone and sighed. He had several messages; all from none other than miss sickly herself. Jade wanted to make sure that he and rose were alright with taking on her shift as well whilst she was sick. At one point john had forcefully had to remove her from the ward and return her to her room. He couldn't help but feel that sometimes Jade worried too much about others and not enough about her well-being.

Are you sure you're ok with this? Karkat said you were looking tired.

Of course I'm tired, I think anyone would be. Karkat needs to keep his nose out of it and his mouth shut. There is no point in getting her worked up over things that can't be helped. How do I respond to these without hurting her feelings? Maybe I'll just leave them there for a while.

John checked his watch and seeing that it was now 8:34am he stood and stretched. Walking along the aisle opening curtains he chattered away to the patients about different things. None of them could respond, but he always thought that they could perhaps hear what was around them. And one of his worst fears was that these people were lying here stuck in darkness and not knowing what on earth was going on. So he tried to keep them up to date on any information, including whether their families would be visiting them that day or not. Since the computer wasn't working, he didn't actually know who was coming today or if any were at all, but john just figured that when it was up and running again he'd be able to go back and tell them.

He was feeling rather mirthful by the time he got to Blondie's curtains and swung them open with vigour. "Morning Sunshine"

"Hey good looking"

Authors note:

Yay another chapter.

I didn't really portray Rose well in this chapter, any pointers as to her dialogue style would be appreciated :) I don't know if this counts as a cliff-hanger or not? But it's not as long as I would've liked it to be so yup.