Prompt 4 – "Great. I got a cold for my birthday."/Prompt 5 – Rogue Organ

The kitchen had taken on a sweet, heavenly smell of chocolate and raspberry as several treats were being baked at once. Moffitt set a cooling rack on the table before Anah placed a cake on top of it. "You don't think this is a bit much?" he asked.

"Never!" Anah said. "Besides, I want to make up for last year."

"Jules's birthday itself wasn't bad," Moffitt replied. "It was… everything that came after."

"I thought we said we weren't going to talk about the magpies," Vanora said.

"Apparently, we are talking about the magpies," Dietrich muttered.

"No one wants to talk about the magpies," Troy grumbled.

"Then why are we talking about the magpies?"

Troy playfully nudged Dietrich. "Alright, alright. Say, where is Jules anyway?"

"Is he still out in the stable?" Moffitt asked.

"That's the only place he could be," Vanora said. "He wasn't looking too well this morning."

"As in, sick?"

"I hope not. The party's tomorrow. It wasn't hard to see he was very lethargic."

"He is related to his father," Dietrich said.

Moffitt glared at him. "You know, I expect that sort of remark from Troy, not you."

Dietrich smirked before taking a sip of his coffee.

They all turned when the front door opened and Jules entered the house, with Tully following him. Jules's face was ghastly pale, and he was holding onto the wall for support.

"Go on. Inside. Lay down," Tully said, gently.

"Good gracious, Jules, you really are sick." Vanora was quick to get alongside her son and assist him into the parlor.

Troy swore under his breath in Greek. "Poor kid."

"That's what I was thinking when I found him in the stable," Tully said. "Looking lost, confused, pale. I brought him back in immediately. Sarge, you know how to work with horses—"

"I'll finish his chores." Troy stood and set his coffee on the table.

Moffitt went into the parlor to see Vanora covering Jules with a blanket and telling him not to move. "How is he?" Moffitt asked.

"Well, we caught him while his fever's spiking, which explains why he seems very lost," Vanora replied. "When are Shauna and Antheia supposed to be back?"

"They should be back soon. I'm sure Antheia will start trying to take care of Jules right away." Moffitt stepped out of the way when Dietrich peered into the parlor.

"Would you like us to do anything?" Dietrich asked.

"Not at the moment," Vanora said. "You're welcome to stay, though."

"Gladly."

A sense of dread had taken hold of Moffitt's stomach and was threatening to tie it in knots, despite the rest of the day going alright. Anah made her potently garlicky chicken soup, and Antheia, as Jules's girlfriend, made an attempt to take over all nursing duties. Jules even seemed to be doing better by the end of the day. Some color had returned to his face, and he was sitting up while having tea with his father before bed.

"Tomorrow was supposed to be the party," Moffitt said. "I'm sorry this all happened."

Jules sighed while bringing his cup of tea to his lips. "Great. I got a cold for my birthday." He shrugged before taking a sip. "At least you all will still be here. That's all that matters."

"Yes, but we don't want to stress you out too much, given your illness. It won't help."

"Who knows? I might feel better tomorrow morning."

Moffitt nodded. "Finish your tea, say your prayers, and let's hope so."

Jules grinned a little. "I will say this is better than the magpies."

"I agree with that. Anything is better than the magpies."

With that being said, Moffitt expected that night to go smoothly. He awoke sometime around one in the morning to get a drink of water. He wasn't fully awake, and wholly reliant on every sense apart from sight to get to the kitchen sink. Relief began to come over him as he took a glass and touched the cool metal of the faucet handles. When he turned the water off, he heard one of the bedroom doors open, and turned to see a tall and thin figure leaning against the wall. He could hear the figure's breathing was wheezy and labored.

"Dad? Dad, I can't breathe."

The whole house was dark, and Moffitt wasn't fully awake. Was he dreaming? Sleepwalking? Did I just hear my son tell me he can't breathe?

"Dad? Is that you?"

"Jules?" Moffitt said quietly. An icy sense of dread, horror, and disbelief coiled around him.

"I can't breathe. Well, I can, but… it feels like someone's got their fist around my throat."

This must be a dream. I don't want it to be real. Moffitt walked over to where Jules was leaning on the wall, and touched his shoulder. He felt real. The heat of illness radiating from him felt real as well. Yet there was still a part of Moffitt that didn't want to believe this was anything but a bad dream. It was so quiet and the fact that all he could hear was Jules's wheezing was increasingly disturbing.

He wasn't about to let something terrible happen in a dream. Not if he had control.

"I'll get your boots and jacket," Moffitt said. "We… We need to get to the hospital."

The longer Moffitt was awake, the more aware he became that this was indeed real. Jules was really having trouble breathing. The realization set in rather quickly, and Moffitt began rushing to get his own boots on once Jules was ready. He threw on his jacket and neglected to zip it in favor of grabbing his keys and getting Jules out the door. The cool May night woke him up further, and prompted him to run with Jules out to the Land Rover outside the garage. He realized he hadn't woken up Vanora or Anah as he began pulling out of the driveway, but he refused to make Jules wait a second longer. How much worse could this get? Was Jules going to stop breathing entirely?

"Don't panic, alright?" Moffitt reached over to squeeze his son's hand. "You'll increase your body's demand for oxygen if you panic. Try to stay calm. We'll be at the hospital in a few minutes, I promise." He wasn't sure if any of that was the right thing to say—he was just saying whatever came to mind in hopes that something would be helpful.

At that hour, there was no traffic anywhere, and even the lights were cooperative, allowing Moffitt to drive through Cambridge without much stopping. He was able to park quite close to the entrance to the hospital's emergency room, and was opening the door while still pulling the key out of the ignition. He sprinted around to the passenger side to help Jules out and quickly walk him into the hospital. Moffitt winced and bit back a hiss when his senses were assaulted by the bright lights in the lobby. In the light, he could see how red Jules's face had gotten. He was at least getting some air in, but not enough.

The nurses on the night shift were able to get Jules to a physician quickly, and it didn't take long for the doctor to find that Jules's tonsils had become so infected and swollen that they were making it difficult for him to breathe. What Moffitt didn't want to hear was the doctor's concern that the surgery would be somewhat challenging with Jules's condition. The nurses tried to assure Moffitt that things would be alright soon while escorting him out, but that did nothing to keep him calm while he was alone with his thoughts in the waiting room.

Moffitt was unable to sleep, and it wasn't like there was anywhere comfortable to do so. He knew tonsil removals were a common procedure, and had the doctor told him it would be straightforward, Moffitt imagined he would have been alright. But, no, he just had to be told that it might have some complications. Then again, it was a huge "might," but that still meant it was possible for things to go wrong. He paced around the room for a bit, then went up to the doors to the hall that led to the rest of the hospital. The doors were designed to be opened from the inside, so he could do nothing here.

He wanted badly to see Jules and make sure everything was okay. Moffitt tried futilely to open the doors, and anxiety rapidly built inside him as he was reminded of one of the first nightmares he had relating to the magpie prophecy the previous year. The nightmare itself was a common one, showing the events of a mission he undertook in North Africa to retrieve and destroy an ancient scroll. There had been a catch, though—if he was captured, Troy had orders to shoot him to prevent him from giving any information to the Germans. He had been caught, and he was badly beaten, and he did come close to being shot. It ended better than expected, with him being rescued, but the events played out repeatedly in his mind, in dreams and while he was wide awake. The night after Jules's fourteenth birthday, Moffitt went through that dream again, but instead of himself being beaten by the Germans, he was helplessly watching his own son endure the same treatment.

Standing at the doors in the hospital, Moffitt was finding it more and more difficult to breathe as well, for a different reason. Images from that horrible dream flashed across his mind. His heart was pounding faster and harder, and he was suddenly overcome with a desire to crash through the doors and demand to see his son.

He felt a firm hand on his shoulder, and turned to see Dietrich standing behind him. The skinny German looked like he had just woken up, but also looked less cranky than Moffitt expected him to be. Once again, Moffitt wasn't sure if he was dreaming, but he managed to ask, "Y-You had a vision, didn't you?"

Dietrich, a bit too tired to vocalize, nodded, and led Moffitt back over to the chairs.

Moffitt's hands were shaking as he sat down. He drew in a sharp breath. "Is Jules going to—"

Dietrich shook his head, and took both of Moffitt's hands, squeezing them tightly. Finally, he spoke. "Stop panicking. Take a deep breath. Relax."

Several agonizingly long minutes passed with Moffitt making an attempt to breathe and calm down. His hands gradually stopped shaking, and he looked over at the doors as a nurse entered the room.

"Your son is out of surgery, sir," she said. "It'll be about an hour before he starts waking up. I'll come get you then."

Moffitt stood. "No, I want to see him now."

"He needs to rest—"

"I understand that. Please, let me see him."

The nurse sighed. "Alright. Come with me."

Before Moffitt could follow her, he heard Dietrich say behind him, "Where are Vanora and Anah?"

Moffitt froze. "They… I-I didn't wake them. When Jules said he couldn't breathe, I rushed him here as quickly as I could."

"Go see Jules. I will get Vanora and Anah."

"Alright. Thanks." Moffitt handed Dietrich his keys, then turned to resume following the nurse. He was led to a large recovery room several doors down from the operating theater. There were a handful of other patients asleep in their beds, but some were awake and quite chatty. Moffitt avoided making eye contact with them, and got a chair so he could sit by Jules's bed. It was distressing to see Jules in this position, stuck in a hospital bed with a respirator obscuring his face. Moffitt wasn't going to disturb him. He pulled his chair as close to the bed as possible, and took Jules's left hand. Moffitt got comfortable where he was, feeling exhaustion start to set in. He had to squint to read the numbers on a clock directly across from Jules's bed, and noted that it was a little after three-thirty in the morning. After looking at Jules one last time, Moffitt put his head down, and tried to sleep.

Moffitt was awakened by the sensation of someone squeezing his hand, and opened his eyes to see Jules was conscious, though he looked like he could sleep for another day. Jules managed a smile under his respirator, and waved to his father. Relief flooded Moffitt, and he put his head back down in an effort to get more sleep. His nap was brief, as the sound of boots on the floor prompted him to lift his head.

Dietrich had entered the room with the rest of the Rats, Vanora, Anah, and Antheia in tow. "I understand it is almost five in the morning," Dietrich said. "But, everyone was willing to leave the comfort of their beds to come and comfort both of you."

"You didn't have to," Moffitt said.

"Hey, we've done worse," Troy replied.

"A lot worse," Tully added.

Moffitt let out a sigh. "Alright. Thank you."

Vanora sat next to him and hugged him tightly. "Are you alright, Jack?"

"I'm perfectly fine, darling." Moffitt kissed his wife's forehead. "It's our son who needed surgery last night."

Jules was being carefully hugged by Antheia, and snuggled by Anah.

"You know what this means, right?" Tully asked.

"What?" Moffitt replied.

"Jules gets to have all the ice cream he wants until the doctors say he can eat solids again."

"There is ice cream at home, and custard that was originally for the party today," Anah said. "He can have that."

It was hard to describe how good it felt to have everyone there, but Moffitt still felt somewhat disoriented from the events of several hours ago. One minute, he was just getting water. The next, he was hearing Jules telling him that he couldn't breathe. The sights, sounds, and smells of the hospital were real, and he wasn't denying that what happened actually happened, but he couldn't help feeling that there was still a strange, dreamlike quality to what occurred.

When Jules was finally discharged, his instructions were to rest. It would be a couple of days before he could talk again, and a few weeks before he would feel better overall. Of course, Anah and Antheia were insistent on taking nursing duties, and Vanora didn't get a chance to do anything until Troy said it was time to go home, and took Antheia with him. With the rest of the Rats and Dietrich on their flights home, the house was quiet.

On a bright, warm morning several days after Jules's surgery, Moffitt was out taking care of his horses. He paused filling up their troughs with water when he saw Vanora approaching him. "Hello, darling."

"Hello, love," Vanora said. She stood on her toes to kiss her husband's cheek. "Jules has started talking again. I told him not to overdo it, but he wants to see you and ask you a few things."

"Alright. I'm just about finished here. Could you finish filling the water?"

"I think that's about all I can do."

"And that's all I need." Moffitt kissed his wife before handing her the hose. "Thank you, darling." He headed back to the house, and went into the parlor after taking his boots off. "I was told you wanted to see me?"

Jules was sitting upright on the couch, with a cup of tea, a book, and a sleeping Anah curled up on his lap. "Yeah, I did." His voice was immensely raspy, like someone had been rubbing the inside of his throat with sandpaper.

Moffitt handed his son a notepad and pen from his desk. "Well, like your mother said, don't push it. Use that if your voice hurts too much."

"Thanks, Dad." Jules took a sip of his tea. "So… what did happen a few days ago?"

"On the night of your surgery?"

"Yeah. All I remember is waking up, having trouble breathing, and then… then I had masked faces over me. Everything went black, and I woke up in a hospital bed with you next to me."

Moffitt drew in a breath. "That's… That's about right. I was in the kitchen when you came out of your bedroom. You told me you couldn't breathe, like someone had your throat in their fist."

Jules nodded. "It was dark. It felt like a bad dream."

"It felt like a bad dream for me, too. I really didn't want to believe it was real, but I rushed you to the hospital anyway. They got you into surgery to take your tonsils out almost as soon as we got there."

"Okay. That all makes sense."

Moffitt bit his lip. "You said you saw faces?"

"Yeah."

"Have they been showing up at night?"

"No. That was scary, but I think… I think I was already drugged when I saw them. They were all blurry and their voices were muffled. It didn't feel entirely real."

Moffitt nodded. "Well, do let me know if this whole thing bothers you at all." He tried to think of something a bit more lighthearted to say. "In other news, you're just like your old man now—you're missing an organ. Well, two organs, but a pair of the same organs."

Jules smirked. "Honestly, with how often you get sick, I'm surprised you haven't lost your appendix yet."

"Jules?" Moffitt said.

"Yeah?"

"Don't jinx it, please."