32. Ethan
Ethan
What just happened?
Seriously, what the fuck just happened?
I couldn’t process it.
One minute, Rami had been teasing me about my taste in cakes, and the next…the next…
My gaze fell on the bodies. The severed limbs. The blood.
There’s so much blood.
Rami’s hands moved to my face. “Ethan, I need you to focus, baby. Are you hurt?”
I shook my head minutely. Wings, those were wings I could see over his shoulders.
“Listen, I can explain everything,” he said urgently. A woman screamed to his left and my head turned that way. Rami’s hands held me firm, keeping my eyes on him. “But right now, I need you to either go outside or help me.”
I wasn’t leaving him. I didn’t understand what was happening or how he had fucking wings, but I wasn’t stepping away from him for a second. “How?”
He took a deep breath. “I can save some of these people, Ethan. I can heal them. I need you to help me triage them. Those losing too much blood or unconscious with a pulse. Help me prioritise them.”
His words weren’t making sense. None of this was. “You can what?”
“I can heal them,” he whispered, his eyes almost…pleading. “I can heal anything.”
I can heal anything.
An alarm bell was ringing in my mind, begging me to pay attention, but I pushed it away. There was no time for that now, not as people lay dying. “I can do that.”
“Good.” Rami let me go and gave me a brusque nod. “Let’s get to work.”
He turned away and a choked gasp left me. “Rami, you’re hurt.”
The bottom half of his wings were black and charred. I had no idea if he could feel it. If he could, he had to be in agony. He had to have known what taking the impact would mean.
But he’d done it.
To protect me.
“I’m fine,” Rami said, cutting through the screaming crowd to a man collapsed in the centre.
All around us, those doctors and nurses whose injuries weren’t life threatening were also at work.
But even to my untrained eye, I could see they were fighting a losing battle.
“Get searching, Ethan. Check pulses first.”
I scrambled to do as he asked. I tried not to pay attention to the blood or limbs I was stepping over. My shaking fingers pressed against a woman’s neck. There was no steady thrum. Not even a light wisp of life.
A sob broke from me.
The second person I checked was the same.
But the third, a young teenager, finally gave me hope. “Rami! Here.”
He was beside me almost instantly, his hands hovering over them. Nothing happened, not as far as I could see. But I sucked in a breath as colour returned to the boy’s cheeks, his breathing turning steady.
“You’re doing great,” Rami said, his eyes on me. “Keep going.”
I nodded, but before I could move to the next person, several sounds had me freezing.
At first, I thought it was another explosion. My body locked up as I squeezed my eyes shut, waiting for that awful heat to find me.
“Ethan,” Rami’s voice had my eyes flying open. “It’s okay. It’s help.”
I followed his pointing finger to the front of the café.
At least, where it had been up until a few minutes ago.
Now, there was just a massive gaping hole.
Lightning was hitting the ground repeatedly; that was the noise I’d heard.
When it cleared, there were more people with wings.
A mixture of black and white, although the latter outnumbered the former.
“What the…” My voice trailed off as I recognised all of the faces. Every one of Rami’s housemates was there, with the exception of Sam. All of them but Nox and Jeremiah had white wings.
The latter had black wings. Along with my three housemates, who stood alongside them.
Without hesitating, they raced into the café, their faces grim. One detached, heading straight for me.
Quill.
He reached for me with a slightly watery smile. “Come on Ethan, let’s get you out of the way.”
“I need to help,” I said numbly as the group of winged people fanned out. “Rami needs me.”
Quill sat me on a chair that’d somehow survived the blast. “We can take over now. What Rami needs is for you to be okay. Can you breathe for me?”
Wasn’t I already doing that? I forced myself to pay attention and winced. The sound of my rasping breaths was bad, even to my own ears.
My housemate was on his knees in front of me, his wings spread wide, like he was trying to hide the carnage. But it was too late. I’d seen it already.
I’d never be able to erase it from my mind.
I mimicked Quill’s slow breathing pattern until my pulse settled. When I was able to speak, I asked, “Are you okay being here?”
He cocked his head to the side. “That’s your most pressing question?”
I blew out a breath. “Kinda? Everything else feels a bit…”
“Surreal and like you’re hallucinating?”
“Got it in one.”
Quill gave me a tight smile. “I’m okay. Will probably have a breakdown later, but I can’t ignore calls like this one.”
I reached out to touch his shoulder. “I’ll be there to break down with you. We can watch Below Deck and eat our combined weight in cereal.”
“It’s a date,” Quill said before glancing back over his shoulder. “Shit, I hope Rami didn’t hear that. I don’t want to be smited.”
His choice of words had my eyes widening. “Wait, is Rami…an angel?”
Not a question I’d ever thought I’d ask, but here we were.
“Yes,” Quill said. “An exceptionally powerful one. And before you ask, I’m a demon. Everyone in here with black wings is. But don’t worry, I’m more likely to cry because you’ve pinched the last of my Coco Pops than torture you over it.”
“Well, I think you’re safe from Rami,” I said, my gaze finding him. His hands were held out over an older woman, his brow furrowed in concentration. Blood covered his shirt and arms, and there was even a smear of it on his neck. “He’s busy.”
A sudden thought occurred to me. “Why isn’t anyone else coming to help? Like the emergency services?”
“We have compulsion nets up,” Quill said. I added compulsion nets to my list of topics to ask Rami about later. “No one outside of here will know anything has happened until after we’ve left.”
“But the hospital’s right there.” I gestured at the sprawl of buildings across the road. “Surely we need all the help we can get.”
“Just Rami alone has a better chance of saving these people. All of us are trained in emergency medical care to a certain degree; we’ve got it under control. If we let them in, we’d have to leave, which would mean…”
“More people would die,” I finished for him, watching as Rami left one person and moved on to another. Sweat was pouring down his face, his arms shaking with fatigue, but he didn’t stop. “I get it.”
“Quill!” Micah called out, his usually pristine clothes smeared with blood. “A little help?”
Micah gestured at where the ceiling was bulging ominously. Quill sighed. “Shit. Duty calls. Will you be okay?”
“Yes. Are you sure I can’t help?”
“Definitely. Just sit right here and don’t move. If you do, Rami won’t be able to focus.”
It was on the tip of my tongue to ask why. I knew Rami cared about me, but surely he had bigger worries on his mind right now than where I was.
Quill was up and gone faster than I was able to register. As I stared at the various angels and demons working in the tiny space, I realised Quill wasn’t the only one moving eerily fast. All of them were.
The twins were the most fascinating to watch—besides Rami, of course. There was none of that jovial banter they’d displayed during the many breakfasts I’d spent with them. Their expressions were grim as they worked in sync, throwing bandages to one another without needing to speak a word.
Suddenly, I heard a weak cough behind me. “Ethan?”
I spun around, gasping at the sight that greeted me. “Dr. Hall?”
My oncologist was half sprawled behind the counter. Dust and blood covered him as he blinked up at me in a daze. “Help me.”
“Shit.” I scrambled off my chair as I spotted a piece of rubble over his leg.
I thought about shouting for help, but they were all so busy.
Dr. Hall was conscious and talking, so he wouldn’t be a priority.
Besides, the chunk of rubble was small. I’d be able to lift it myself. “Just hold still. I’ve got you.”
“What happened?” Dr. Hall winced as I removed the slab from his leg. “Did a bomb go off?”
“I don’t know,” I said honestly. “Maybe. Could’ve been a gas explosion, I suppose.”
He winced again. “Can you come nearer? I can’t hear you.”
Sympathy welled up in me. My ears had been ringing, but nowhere near as badly as they should’ve been. I suspect Rami had something to do with that.
I leaned over Dr. Hall. “Of course, I’m so sorry. I said—”
I never got to finish my sentence.
There was a sharp prick in my neck, and then the sudden sensation of falling.
“Shh, there’s a good boy,” Dr. Hall crooned in a low voice. He didn’t sound sluggish now, but completely alert. “Let’s get you somewhere more comfortable.”
The last thing I saw was Rami’s back as I was dragged behind the counter, his wings now almost healed.
Then, there was only darkness.