Solar Mage

Chapter 78: Morality

"tap tap tap"

A soft noise sounds, echoing through both sides of the heavy metal door each time my hand strikes it's hard plating.

After the three perfectly timed knocks, I lower my hand and stand in front of it patiently.

"What was that?"

"Did the patient wake up?

"Quick, go and check!"

Several obstructed voices behind the thick glass spoke, too muffled to discern who was speaking. Regardless of the obstruction, the panic in their voices, audible without the need of much concentration to hear it.

Martha said that I would be monitored at all times. Yet, these physicians seemed to have been so deep in conversation that they weren't even able to notice me, even after I had already reached their door. Who are these incompetent people?

After many sounds of falling and glass breaking, the heavy metal door opens very slowly and dramatically.

Finally.

After a few seconds of waiting for the heavy metal door to open, making a terrible scraping sound from the two metals scratching each other, I come face to face with the nurses that were put in charge of monitoring me, or rather, almost face to face.

What the hell is this? There's a second and third door after this one?!?! Those two doors literally make a glass airtight chamber before it actually connects to the exit!!! What the hell is this place? Did she actually put me in a lab? And why the hell is that nurse standing so far away, three airtight doors away from me?! I don't have a disease!!!

Pulling down a metal lever, the nurse with blonde hair, that's closest to me, opens a hatch, creating a small hole in the third door from me.

"What do you want?"

She says in an annoyed and dismissing tone, with an ugly frown on her face.

Hoh, would you look at this? How surprising, never have I ever seen a nurse treat their patient in such a way, especially not in a clinic operated by the Mint Viscounty. I thought that someone as– hmm... I don't know how I feel about calling Martha strict anymore, seeing her act that way, ugh, it gives me shivers just thinking about it. But I never thought that someone as competent as Martha would let such a person work under her.

I look away from her and glance over at the other two, one dark blonde, the other, with dark orange hair. Both of them side-eye me, their bodies barely visible from my angle, but their wine glasses very. My eyes narrow as I stare intensely at the dark purple wine swirling in their glass.

I see, so all three of them have no idea what their job description requires them to do. They must've all tricked Martha while hiding their true colors from her. Once they got assigned to their dream position, just having to keep an eye on a sick kid from time to time, and acting professional when another nurse or physician occasionally comes to deliver medicine, they could do anything they wanted, showing their true colors. I fully understand their minds now, what an obvious ruse.

By the time I finished organizing my thoughts, my eyes had already returned to normal, staring blankly at the glass of wine.

"So? What do you want?"

The nurse in the front repeats once again, with the same attitude. My eyes regain focus hearing her voice, returning their gaze back to her.

Fine, if none of them wants to treat me respectfully, like they should, I'll do the same. It'll be a quicker way out of this room anyway. I haven't done this in a while, let's see if I've lost my touch yet. But I wonder, how far should I go? Ah whatever, I guess I'll find out along the way.

As I begin to open my mouth, I bring my hand up hastily, abruptly letting out a loud and raspy cough from the bottom of my lungs into my fist.

"AHKEUGH!!!"

The nurse backs away from the door, her hand quickly reaching for the lever, and keeping it on, and gripping onto it tightly as she observes me heavily gasping for air, my eyes on the ground, and hands on my knees to keep myself standing.

Under my long messy hair, my eyes stare at her intensely, carefully observing the reactions of her, and the other two nurses.

Looks like I won't need to hold myself back dealing with them.

I take my hands off my knees, and slowly rise with a sickly expression, looking like I am barely able to stay awake, on my face.

"Good afternoon miss, I woke up just now, and I was wondering if I could trouble you for a cup of water and some food?"

The annoyed and disgusted expression on her face remains unchanging as she stares at me with those hateful eyes.

"You have water and food next to your bed, if you want more, you'll have to wait until the next designated meal time. Until then, you'll just have to wait. There's nothing I can do."

She shrugs her arms, closing her eyes while I continue staring at her with raging eyes, hidden under my hair.

Ha, what a fucking joke, how could a clinic ever deny a patient food if they need it? I was right about not having to hold myself back, I'll make sure to ruthlessly end all of their careers.

"Well, if that's all, I'll be closing the door now. Next time, only call us for something important, actually just don't call us for anything!"

The three of them laugh together, the two in the back fully emerging into view to clink their wine glasses, while the one in the front pulls up a lever, the large metal door starting to close as she hurries around to join the other two.

Suddenly, a loud thud that splits the loud scratching noise of the metal door echoes throughout both rooms.

The noise catches the attention of the nurses, who divert their eyes back to the dull metal room beyond the glass chamber. Seeing me collapsed on the floor, they freeze, too shocked to process the visual information that their eyes tell them. A second later, when their wine glasses hit the ground, they finally snap out of their shock, and begin to panic.

"Holy crap, go get a physician right now!"

The blonde leader of their group shouts anxiously.

"I'll go get Doctor William!"

The one with dark orange hair runs out of the room, her heels clacking loudly as she hurries up the marble stairs.

While the blonde haired freaks out, the one with dark blonde hair remains calm, but confused.

"Wait, why do we even need to save him? Wouldn't it be better if he died?"

The blonde snaps back at her without holding back her anger.

"No! It would only be good if he died after a month! If he dies now, in the first day under our care, what do you think Martha will say? She'll start to get suspicious of us! Especially if the patient died from being crushed by the door, so go stop it!!"

The dark blonde haired nurse, unfazed by the insults, as her confused expression remains plastered over it.

"Uh, which one was it again?"

The head nurse groans in annoyance.

"Ugh! Just go put him on the bed so it doesn't look like we were careless when the physician comes!"

She storms over to the lever command center, bumping shoulders with the dumbfounded nurse who just stares, trying to process what the other just commanded.

"Wait, but isn't he infected with a disease? I don't want to catch it by touching his body!"

The darker blonde says while the blonde pushes up a lever, and pulls another two down, the heavy metal door stopping its advance, and the two glass doors sliding into the wall.

"What the hell are you saying? Oh my god, why did I even help you get into this clinic? If you're going to do nothing, then at least get out of my way so I can save all of us from being fired!"

She storms past the other once again, intentionally hitting her shoulder on hers.

"God, I mean, just use your brain for a single second. Why would I ever accept head physician Martha's offer of watching this dying kid if he had a contagious disease? He just ingested some kind of deadly poison, I would never put myself in harm–"

She abruptly pauses in her sentence, after she passes through the three doors, and enters the metal room, speechless as she looks down at my face, no longer blurred by the thick glass doors.

"Oho~ get over here girl, I just had a great idea!"

"W-what is it?"

The other blonde nervously peeks into the room from behind the third door.

"Just get over here and look!"

Hesitantly, the other nurse makes her way over to where the head nurse crouches down.

"Wow, he looks like an angel!"

"I know right? And I can have him to myself for the next... however long we manage to keep him alive! Ah~ I'm getting so excited just thinking about it! This scene is so romantic! Quick, help me take off his clothes, I want to see what he looks like underneath~"

Without hesitation, the other nurse crouches down and the two of them begin to unbutton my gown, their hot breaths blowing onto my face with each lustful exhale, under my clothes, a slight streak of sweat runs down my back.

God damn it William! Where the hell are you?!?! I won't be able to act anymore, I'm about to kill these nurses if they finish unbuttoning this shirt!!!

Suddenly, as they reach the last two buttons, a loud stomping echo comes from the marble stairs above, beyond the room around us, a quick clacking noise sounding in the background, overshadowed by the aggressive stomping.

"Arthur!!!"

There he is! My closing act!

William's voice screams, a loud slam quickly following it, from the impact of his fall. After a short recovery to regain the feeling in his weak legs again, he storms forward, directly at the two terrified nurses, struck frozen in fear huddled around my body, holding a side of my gown with one hand, while the other is lightly planted on my bare skin.

"What are you two doing?!"

The enraged William shouts frighteningly, feeling his moral compass, what he had been taught by his parents and everyone he knew since he learned to speak, suddenly being challenged strongly, in the place he had worked his entire life to get to.

The blonde haired nurse, face pale in horror, looking at the alarmed orange haired nurse standing behind him, trying with all her might to not look into the physician's menacing eyes, while the other nurse can only keep their head down as she sulks in dread.

"I– uh, it's not what it looks like!"

She says, finally looking into the doctor's furious eyes.

"Oh really? It isn't? Because what it looks like to me is that three nurses who got assigned to a risk 4 patient, decided that instead of watching the near dead patient, decided to celebrate, drinking wine while their patient collapsed unconscious due to their incompetence!! Afterwards, because they got so drunk, they decided to take advantage of their unconscious patient at death's door, and do such horrors to a child, that I cannot speak of because the sun is in the sky, while in a room of our respectable clinic?!?! AM I WRONG?!?!"

Nope, you are absolutely spot on William, that was some impressive guessing.

"N-no, you don't understand, we-we were just trying to open up his shirt because he was having trouble breathing!"

"HE HAD TROUBLE BREATHING?!?! DO YOU EVEN HEAR YOURSELF?!?! HE DOESN'T HAVE A BREATHING DISORDER! EVEN IF HE DID, HOW WOULD THAT EXPLAIN WHY BOTH OF YOUR CLOTHES ARE OFF?!?!"

William stomps on the ground in front of them, the heavy impact echoing throughout the metal room, causing both to begin trembling.

Both nurses keep their eyes to the ground, keeping their eyes from moving to their greatest extent, until the dark blonde finally gives in, the tears overflowing out of her eyes tremendously.

"BUAH!!! I'M SORRY, PLEASE!! I DIDN'T MEAN TO, I WAS JUST–

"YOUR TEARS MEAN NOTHING! YOU SHOULD HAVE THOUGHT ABOUT THAT BEFORE COMMITTING SUCH ATROCITIES!! NOW GET THE HELL AWAY FROM HIM BEFORE I MAKE YOU!!"

The nurses are stuck, too scared to move their hands from me. Ultimately, William violently pushes both of them away, with much effort, picking me up and carrying me on his shoulder.

"I will make sure that the two of you receive suitable punishment for this."

He says while looking back at the two nurses who struggle to lift themselves off the ground, pathetically crying in a desperate attempt to draw William's sympathy.

"And you, I will be reporting this incident to Dame Martha so don't even think about trying to escape. Make sure you tie those two up and I won't speak of you in it."

William looks at the trembling, dark orange haired nurse who stares at her friends with petrified eyes before walking up the stairs without looking back another time.

"I'm sorry it took me so long to get to you Arthur, you must've been so scared, but you don't have to worry anymore, I've got you now."

William whispered in a soft, empathetic voice, my eyes opened, staying silent as I lay in his warm arms.

...