Fall of the Rightful King-Clean

Chapter Twelve

Nick

“Ok, he’s strapped in, lift on three. One. Two. Three!” the minotaur yelled to me over the noise. We lifted the stretcher off the ground and into the ambulance. The minotaur, Randy, no longer fit in there, so I went in first. Inside, the noise was a little quieter. I wiped soot and sweat off of my forehead.

The scene outside was barely controlled chaos. Multiple car pileup. Dozens wounded. It’d started when an 18-wheeler’s driver started turning into a griffon. He’d panicked, swerved, and now this had happened. A few cars were on fire, but there were no serious burn victims. At least, none that we’d found.

Patient is unconscious with multiple complex, closed fractures. Serious bruising and lacerations. Prep IV at lower dose to compensate for weight. Bandage cuts and apply pressure to stop the bleeding.

Ethan, one of the other emergency responders, stepped into the ambulance, but when he saw it was me, he backed out, glaring. He’d turned into a unicorn, so I thought he’d be one of the few still able to use medical equipment and should be happy about that. But no, I was the big bad guy for still not having fur. At least Randy was pretty cool about the whole thing. I’d seen his change – it’d happened in the locker room. He went from six feet and skinny to eight feet and massive in just a few seconds. He’d brushed off his shredded clothes, flexed his muscles, and then actually nodded.

“Hey, Espinoza,” he’d grumbled in his new voice. “You want to go grab me some extra-large scrubs?”

And then he went to work. I couldn’t quite understand it, but maybe some people were just that resilient, or maybe he’d prepared himself for it.

Or it could just be that he knew people would need him. A female pegasus hopped up into the ambulance, quickly closing the doors behind her with a pedal some guys had rigged up. We started driving off.

The pegasus we had on the stretcher had his bones broken in at least a dozen places. None of those were from the car crash, although he had a pretty bad cut. He didn’t have normal injury marks, either. Why had that happened? How'd he get so badly hurt? It was almost like the change was hurting him, but that was ridiculous. At least this guy wasn’t too badly off. A few months in casts and he’d be fine.

I had to do almost all the precision work, but the pegasus, Kyra Miller, did her best with what she had. She had me prep an IV, but she managed to get it inserted on her own, and bandaged up the guy’s cuts. It wasn’t perfect, but it’d work fine, and I didn’t want to redo it in front of her. It seemed important to her to still be able to do her job.

Once we’d gotten the patient to the point that he wasn’t actively dying, she sat back and let out a deep breath. She’d been moving very quickly, using all four limbs and keeping herself hovering just above the patient.

“You’re a godsend, Espinoza,” she said. “We need new covers for those dang needles so we can open them when you’re not here.”

I looked down at my hands and flexed my fingers, but didn’t say anything.

“I don’t know what you’ve got going on that you’re still you, but please don’t kill it.” She wiggled and turned, grimacing. “I can’t figure out how to… stupid wings are always in the way. And I thought boobs were bad.” She said.

“You have to lie forward,” I said, but she cut me off.

“I know I’m supposed to lie down like an animal, but guess what, Espinoza, I’m not an animal. I am still a person and I’m not… dang it, sorry.”

At the hospital, we pulled the stretcher in. I was hoping to get a drink before moving on, but immediately I was grabbed and almost literally tossed into another ambulance.

Everywhere I went, they had me working on equipment, opening things, faster, hurry up, come on, human. Driving, speeding, grab the equipment, insert things. Then drive, go, get out, removing things, injecting, preparing, go, drive, get out, lifting, pulling, cutting.

And I knew why. Unicorns could probably eventually learn to do all this with their magic, but no one was really precise enough yet to do that. The minotaurs had four fingers per hand, and they were usually too thick to help. Griffons’ claws were just slightly more useful than hooves for delicate tasks, as it turned out.

So take all of this into account – how mentally and physically tired I was after just a few hours of this, and most of my shift was still ahead of me. I finally, finally had a few moments when no one was yelling at me to get something done. I’d gotten a voicemail. It was from Erin.

But I couldn’t leave – people needed me. It’s not like I was an accountant or an auditor or something – I literally kept people alive. I mean, sure there were other people here as well, but we were seriously down on employees at the moment.

One voicemail from Erin. I played it.

“Nick… please,” she said. Her tone made my heart stop. “Please come home. I was at the doctor’s and… Nick… please…”

Ok. I took a minute to wash off my face, arms, and hands, and then I went to talk to my boss.

“Espinoza, talk to me,” he said, rapidly scribbling down something. His handwriting had actually improved slightly now that he used magic to write.

“Something’s wrong with my girlfriend, she just got back from the hospital and needs me there now. It sounds like an emergency.”

“We’re dealing with emergencies right now,” he said. “That’s what you signed up for. I’ll need you to work the full shift and then at least a half after that.”

“What? No, I can’t. It’s my girlfriend. I have to at least see if she’s ok. Then I’ll come back.”

He shook his head. “We don’t even have time for you to have this conversation. You may not have noticed, Espinoza, but hands are at kind of a premium right now. We can’t have you leave. Now get out there and work.”

“Look, sir,” I started.

“There are people dying, Espinoza, and our guys can’t help them because they’ve got these stupid bricks for hands. You can save people.”

“They’re managing,” I said, “Miller doesn’t even have magic and she’s doing IV’s.”

“Freaking fantastic,” he said. “We still need you here. Now. I’m not trying to be cruel. Once things are calmed down you can take a nice, long vacation with your girlfriend, but right now we have to have you here.”

I knew I was crossing a line with this next sentence, but… it was Erin. She was in trouble. I had to help her. My boss was married. He’d have to understand, right?

“What if it was your wife?” I asked. My boss looked up at me, half shocked that I’d even say that. “Would you stay if it was the other way around?”

His eyes narrowed, but he didn’t reply. I saw him glance to the side, where he kept a picture of himself and his wife. He appeared to be thinking it over, but then he shook his head.

“I’m sorry, Espinoza. You’re too valuable right now.”

I felt my face harden. My boss frowned. “If you go now, don’t come back,” he said quietly. “It’s up to you.”

I sped the whole way home. My mind was racing with all kinds of possible scenarios. Cancer. Severe burns. Poison. Suicide attempt. Car crash. Gunshot. There weren’t very many cars on the road as I raced through red lights. Good thing, in hindsight.

When I got inside, my heart was still racing. I heard Erin crying and Brittney and Alan talking to her. Even before I could say anything, Erin stood up and pulled herself close to me. I held her and tried to help my heart calm down. Breathe in through the nose. Wait. Out through the mouth. Wait. Repeat.

I could feel Erin shaking. Not just because she was crying – her knees weren’t supposed to stand like this anymore. I helped her sit down. I couldn’t even talk. There was this huge pressure and hot pain in my throat as I looked at the woman I loved. She could barely talk.

“I… we… the doctor said… he said that people aren’t always changing right and my…” Erin sniffed loudly. “My eyes aren’t changing right and I’m gonna be blind!”

The entire planet fell onto my shoulders. No...

“Wha-what am-m-m I go-gonna do?” Erin hiccupped. I just gently pulled her in for another hug. Hot tears stung my eyes. We cried together for a few minutes before I could finally enunciate.

"No..." I said. "This was... you were..."

"How am I gonna do a-anything?" Erin asked, her voice still broken and jumping.

I fell back against the couch. All my strength and energy was gone.

"No, no," I said. "This isn't fair. This isn't FAIR! The magic was supposed to fix problems, not make them worse!"

"Wha-a-at are you s-saying?" Erin asked, hugging herself.

"Brittney had broken legs before she changed! I thought this would fix me- I mean..."

Crap. I got too emotional and I slipped. Good for you, Nick.

"Nick, you told me you were ok. You told me it was fine!" Erin said, her tone shifting from upset to accusing. "Did you lie to me? Nick?"

I let out a deep, long breath. There wasn't anything I could do at this point. Might as well come clean.

"Look, I... you know I went to the doctors a lot about four months ago."

"Yes, and you said they thought you'd hurt your back playing soccer. Did you lie to me?"

"It... they found a... it's like a tumor, but it's a very rare condition. It doesn't show any symptoms until you get close to the end."

Erin couldn't even talk. She just held herself, eyes wide and streaming with tears. Alan, who I'd forgotten was there, just stared at me with an expression somewhere between crying and shouting. Brittney just sat on the floor crying.

"Why didn't... can they do anything?" Erin asked in a tiny voice.

"No," I said, shaking my head. "Treatment would make me live a few months longer, and it'd be painful the whole time. I... didn't want anyone else to suffer, so-"

"So you lied to me? You told me you were fine when you knew you were dying and you didn't trust me?"

"No, Erin, I didn't want you to know so it wouldn't hurt you. There's nothing they can do!"

She stood up from the couch and started walking towards the stairs.

"Erin," I said.

"Don't!" she yelled back. I heard her lock herself in a room upstairs. I didn't follow.

"Holy crap, dude," Alan said.

"I don't need to hear it," I bit back. "I'll be back tonight." I left, got in my car, and drove without a direction in mind. I didn't make it far before tears started to fall.