The Hospital

Sabrina's eyes fluttered open. She sat up and stretched her arms behind her head and let out a long yawn. Slouched in her sitting place on the bed, she let her gaze wander to the boys sleeping on the bunk beds and then the girl on the other side of the bed.

Riley was sleeping soundly, tucked under all the blankets and hugging her pillow tightly. Sabrina was surprised that the raven-haired girl wasn't already up and about.

What time is it anyway?

She looked to a little table by the bedside. It read 6:30am. Her eyes widened. Since when did she wake up so early? She put her head back down on the pillow and closed her eyes, waiting for any remnants of sleep to come get her. She waited and waited, but none came.

She sat up with a huff.

It's no use. Come on, Sabrina, just get ready.

And that was exactly what she did.

She emerged from the bathroom around 20 minutes later with some fresh clothes and her hair neatly positioned in a pony tail. She looked around the room and found that the other occupants in the room were still fast asleep.

With a soft smile, she walked to the foot of her bed and gently shook Riley. Riley didn't wake up so she shook a little harder. The girl shifted but didn't regain consciousness. Sabrina shook her hard several times and called out to her as well.

And she says that I sleep like a log. She's like in hibernation.

Losing her patience, Sabrina went to her own side of the bed and grabbed her pillow. She eyed the girl for a few moments, clutching the soft fabric before slamming it down repeatedly on poor, unsuspecting Riley.

"Wake the heck up, dude!", Sabrina yelled as if she was in the middle of a war.

Riley sputtered into wakefulness.

"Jeez! I'm awake! What are you- Lia! STOP!", Riley said covering her face with her forearms to try and shield herself from the brunette's vicious blows.

"Oh, morning!", Sabrina chirped as she stopped attacking her friend.

Riley stared at her in bewilderment.

Sabrina turned her attention to the two boys who somehow slept through that entire... thing.

The girl readied her weapon and walked to their side of the room. She looked at the top of the bunk to see Archer sleeping with his back to her and then glanced down to see Cody sleeping, his face down on the pillow.

She looked back at Riley with some concerns. Riley sensing what she was asking after seeing Cody's position just shrugged and said that it was fine.

Damn. It's like he doesn't have lungs or something.

Her eyes kept flicking between them as she was deciding who to torment into wakefulness next.

Her gaze settled on the older boy at the top. She caught sight of some of his blanket dangling over the edge of his bed frame. She grabbed it and yanked it with all her strength.

She stumbled back as it fell to the floor. Archer shifted from the lack of warmth.

Riley just watched everything with interest.

Sabrina climbed halfway up the ladder and began her attack. Her swings with Archer were weaker than her swings with Riley, due to her trying to balance herself on the ladder so it took a little longer for him to wake up.

Archer stirred and that's when Sabrina realised something.

Crap. He's going to be so mad!

She didn't stop her onslaught though and continued as the boy tried to wave off the pillow. When he decided that it wasn't going to work, he grabbed it out of her hands and, she lost her balance and shot her arms out to desperately grab something. She caught the frame of the bed and sighed in relief when she didn't meet the floor.

She peeled her eyes away from what was below her and looked towards the sleepy monster, but what she saw was something she hadn't expected to see.

That's--that's not possible!

Archer was sitting upright with his legs crossed. The ball of his palm was gently rubbing against his left eye. He had an awful case of bed hair which she thought was kinda cute, and then he let out a soft yawn.

Sabrina's eyes were as wide as saucers.

Cody had woken up with the commotion and curiously peered at her with squinted eyes. He shot a look at Riley who just giggled.

Sabrina glanced between the two troublemakers and noticed something was up when they both gave her knowing smiles.

What do they know that I don't?

Her attention was brought back to Archer as he groaned. "What's going on?", he slurred, his voice was deep and groggy.

Sabrina cleared her throat. "I was, um, just waking you guys up. You know that we - uh - have a busy day today," she stammered uselessly.

Archer looked at her, his eyes were still full of sleep and his hands were in his lap. He stared at her with a very confused expression before he simply said "Oh", and then got up.

Sabrina didn't move from the ladder, so he just shrugged and jumped off the top bunk with ease.

She stared at him until he disappeared into the bathroom.

The other two didn't speak about what had transpired. Instead, Cody brought up something interesting.

"You know, I was thinking," he started and the girls gave him their full attention.

"If we're planning to go to the hub soon, we're gonna need some medical aid. Like let's just say, worst case scenario, someone gets shot, and they can't move. We can't just leave them there and it'd take a while to patch them up and that's time we wouldn't have if guards and possibly sentries are gonna be on our tail."

Sabrina and Riley nodded in agreement with thoughtful hums.

"You know hospitals have these things for emergencies. I call them 'Med guns'."

"I've heard of those!", Sabrina interrupted. "They can heal most injuries in like, one minute tops."

Cody nodded. "Right, but the downside is that they are only equipped with one healing shot. Hospitals have around five of these puppies lying around in case of an emergency. If we can get our hands on some, it would turn our already terrible odds more to our favour."

"That's actually pretty good," Riley confessed, "but did you consider that other people may have already taken them? I mean it's being a while since this whole shebang started, what are the odds that we'll find even one, let alone five."

"Guess we'll just have to take that chance," Archer said coming back into the room.

They all looked at him quizzically. "What? The bathroom walls are thin," he shrugged.

"Well, lucky for you guys, Archer and I did run into a hospital once. We didn't get a chance to search it though. We could go there," Sabrina suggested, and they all agreed.

It was settled.

xxx

It was a long walk, but it was bearable. Going out together put them at ease. More people meant more eyes and more eyes meant that it was harder for foes to get the jump on them. Archer and Riley walked in front, talking quietly to one another while Cody and Sabrina were behind them, just looking around.

It had been a while since Sabrina had walked this path with Archer. She found her mind wandering back to the events of that day and how angry she had gotten. She didn't know why she had gotten so angry, but thought it was justified at the end. A person could have died. Archer was an idiot.

The boy in front had similar thoughts going through his mind. He nearly died that day. This path made him uneasy, but not uncomfortable enough for him to turn around and head the other day. He thought that he was completely justified into going after that person in the black cloak. What if they were a spy? If he hadn't confronted them, both he and Sabrina could have died. He was not an idiot.

Most people would say that it was weird for a nerd to be outdoors. Stereotypes, you know? But it was the complete opposite for Cody. He was thrilled to be out and about again. He loved being outdoors, the fresh air calmed him. He soaked up every bit of sunlight been offered to him and drank in all the details of nature. It was beautiful to him. His gawking at nature didn't stop him from focusing on his mission, though. He'd always been a great multi-tasker. While his eyes flicked over to different things, his mind was coming up with potential places where the hospital staff would keep their med guns. He knew this would be a great asset, and he intended on leaving the hospital with it in his clutches.

Riley wanted to just ease the tension. She could see that Archer did not like this place and a glance behind her showed that the other girl didn't either. Something had happened here. Something bad. Riley couldn't help but feel that something bad was going to happen again in this place. She was never a very spiritual or even religious person but, she knew a bad aura when she felt it. She urged the others to keep a sharp eye and focus. Things could turn sour very quickly and if it did, they needed to be ready for it.

Once they arrived, they looked up at the building. It wasn't as big as other hospitals, it's size couldn't even compare but, a hospital was a hospital and hopefully it had what they desired. All stories had miracles going for the heroes, Sabrina hoped that her story would too.

She snuck a quick glance behind her to see if anyone was there and her eyes locked on the alley where she and Archer had seen the cloaked person. She could see it all happening. It played back, how she ran and tried to keep her full bag with her, how she yelled at him to stop, how she couldn't keep up and how she'd just managed to be there at the nick of time to save Archer's life.

A distant whirring was heard from above them, she looked up but, saw nothing. The noise had stopped.

Am I going insane? I swear I heard something.

She shook it off and turned to the four-story building once again and followed her fellow rebels inside.

The comrades decided it be best to sweep the ground floor together, as it was the largest and then split up for the next three.

The comrades searched every inch of the place. Moving couches, tables, vending machines, shoving things off desks, turning drawers and cabinets inside and out. They looked through anything and everything, hoping it would offer some clue to the whereabouts of the med guns.

Cody wandered around and found the floor plans, doctors rooms and which rooms were where. He studied it a bit before calling out to the others. "Hey guys! There's a basement here too! I call dibs on searching that!"

"Really? How'd you know?", Riley said, emerging from underneath a desk. Cody gestured to the big sign on the wall and the girl went to look at it. Sabrina and Archer saw them talking quietly and then joined them in looking.

"The fourth floor is under construction. Looks like they were making the place bigger. I doubt they'd have anything important up there but it wouldn't hurt to look," Archer pointed out.

"Looks like the second floor is pretty big too, it's almost as big as this one. Who builds buildings like this?", Sabrina asked annoyed.

"Apparently these guys," Cody commented.

"Okay, here's what we'll do. Cody, you search the basement, since you already called it-" Riley began followed by Cody holding up his fist with a victorious 'Yes!', "I'll take the first floor," she gestured to herself. "Archer, you take second floor since it's the biggest and Lia, you take the third. The third isn't that big and if you're done and still have time, you can search the fourth for good measure. We regroup here. If anything happens, signal us on the walkie-talkies. Got that?"

Everyone nodded and off they went.

Cody darted excitedly down the stairs to the basement while the other three were unfortunate enough to have to walk up the stairs because the elevator was out of order. Well, Sabrina and Archer more than Riley.

They went up the flight until they came to Riley's floor. Just before they could continue to go up Riley spoke. "Be careful up there. I've got a bad feeling about this place," she whispered cautiously and left them on the staircase.

Sabrina and Archer looked at each other and continued going up. It was Archer's turn to depart. He turned to the shorter girl with a look that said 'Be careful' and placed his hand on his gun holster  and gripped his switchblade in his other hand. Sabrina nodded and pulled her gun out. He turned and began searching his floor and Sabrina went up one more flight.

She came up to the door and it was surprisingly closed. She pushed it open slowly and pointed her gun in front of her. She crept slowly onto the third floor, her eyes and gun barrel looking the same directions. Her ears tuned into every single sound that she could hear. The soles of her boots made no noise as she moved throughout various rooms, searching while being as attentive as she could. Her eyes were always looking for every possible exit point just incase. Unfortunately, there wasn't much in case a threat arrived because of the height she was at.

After an excruciatingly long amount of time, she finally finished searching around the floor given to her. She didn't find it. Her mind wandered to how her other friends might be doing. There was no distress calls yet, but had they finished their floors?

Archer's floor was the largest from the three of them. He would have taken a while to get around it. The basement was also quite big, but she was sure that when Riley was done with hers, she'd go down to Cody.

Sabrina thought it best to alert her friends to her whereabouts if something happened.

She pulled out her walkie-talkie and then pushed and held the button to speak. "It's Lia. I didn't encounter any problems yet but, I also didn't find the gun. I'm going to the fourth floor to check things out," she reported and let go of the button.

She was met with static before a familiar raspy voice answered her. "Go ahead. I'm done with my floor and found nothing as well. I'm going down to Cody to help him out. We rendezvous at the lobby," Riley said.

"Copy," Archer replied.

"Got it. I'll be waiting for ya," Cody said.

Sabrina dreaded the stairs now. She trudged up lazily, her gun still in her hand and searched.

The door was open and all the walls, separating where the rooms should have been were gone. The place was filled with beams holding the ceiling up and translucent sheets showing where the walls would be. There were windows installed though.

Nothing to search in here then.

Sabrina was just about to turn and walk back down when something shone through one of the windows. She ran up to it as quietly as she could.

Her eyes widened at the sight.

The tail ends of a small troop were heading into the building. From what she could tell, most were in already and the ones standing outside were only guarding the exits.

This is bad.

She immediately reached for walkie-talkie when she heard someone else on it.

"Guys, we've got company," Cody whispered urgently. "I'm coming down," Sabrina replied and ran to the stairs.

She stopped when she heard a loud thud, a gunshot and then Archer's scream.