Waking Other Lives
First Day on Earth

Seth’s POV

“I can’t believe you are awake, too. I was worried sick,” Sierra said, plastering her body against mine. I just held her, and we remained like that standing in the middle of the hospital room, with our ugly hospital gowns, hugging each other. Even words were meaningless at this point, nothing was more important than this bodily contact, this feeling that she was here, with me, right now. She lay her head on my chest, her auburn hair silky beneath my fingers, her small hands clasped at my neck and I felt nothing should or could ruin this moment. Until I heard Dr. Hastings speak.

“Uhm, well, I guess you feel good enough to have visitors. Sierra, we held your parents long enough. They want to see you. We’ll call them to the hospital right away. As to your parents, we ...uhm, we are not...,"he said, addressing me.

“That is okay, Dr. Hastings. I don’t have parents, they’ve been dead since I was fifteen,” I said, and I heard Sierra gasp in shock. Apparently she didn’t know. So few people did, only my buddies had been privy to the news about that part of my life. I shrugged, I didn’t want my kitten to be sad on my behalf. What was the big deal, I’d been on my own in this world since the car accident which had taken them away, and I had avoided social services by working and earning my own money in a garage. It had been no biggie, and no one ever had possessed a frigging idea I’d been living alone.

I held myself not to laugh, the look on the doctor’s face was priceless, he had an expression of pity, sympathy and sadness, his wrinkled eyes fixed on my robe as if he couldn’t bear to look me in the eye. If he only knew who or what I was, or I’d been, I doubted he’d keep feeling sorry for me.

“But, I do have a brother,” I said. “Dante, I bet he’d be happy to see me,” I said smiling.

“Oh?” the doctor raised an eyebrow in surprise. “We didn’t know, if you could give us the details, we’d be happy to let him know, of course,” he said, now smiling in relief.

Though, Dante was not my brother on earth, he was my Drakon brother in Rawonia, and that was good enough for me. And, needless to say, Dante was actually my best buddy on earth.

“Dante,” repeated Sierra, her voice bubbling with excitement. “It would be marvelous to see him, and Elvan, too. I want to make sure she’s fine, after...”

“After I tried to kill her, yep. We better make sure,” I whispered. “I didn’t know, I just didn’t,” I said, unable to believe all the lives I had led, and all the things I’d done, somewhere, far far away.

“Of course you didn’t, it’s okay. And the golden dragon told me she’d be fine, anyway.”

I suddenly remembered the dragon words spoken back there in the cave. In my dragon form, I only had a minimum grasp of the meaning behind the words, it was all a bunch of emotions for me, I was seeing them all in a variety of colors, e.g. love for my mate as orange, anger to those who captured my mate as red, happiness for replaceing her as yellow, sad news about her fate as pitch black. Black, just like the darkness which blanketed the universe back there. A black which did not offer any light or solution, filling every ounce of your body with a growing desperation, a feeling of suffocation, as if you would never be able to breathe, ever again. That’s how I’d felt when I heard the mother dragon tell us Sierra would die once she united all the pieces of the hearts. I’d not allow that. I clutched her tightly, as though Rawonia’s heart was already here to fetch her from me.

“It is okay, Seth,” she said in understanding. “We still have time.” She closed her eyes as if holding back a deep sigh of sadness, of regret. She was trying to be brave, but it would not come to that.

“You are not dying, and that’s that,” I said. “Rawonia’s heart, or the golden dragon can go to hell. You’ll live with what you got, the two hearts of the Goddess should be more than enough for you to live a long life. In fact, we’ll have that checked right now,” I said, turning to the doctor. “Dr. Hastings, Sierra has a heart condition, we need to know how bad that is, and what we can do about it.”

“Oh?” the doctor said, in surprise. “I was not alerted to that. I’ll let our cardiologist give her a checkup immediately, this could be a problem. Ms. Liu, can you please take Sierra to the third floor?” he urged her.

“I’ll come with you,” I said, walking along with Sierra.

“You should rest here Seth, you just got out of a coma. They will not take you inside the checkup room, anyway,” the doctor explained. He was rushing, his hurried gestures making me nervous as though we had a time bomb to determine Sierra’s life span, and it was speedily ticking away. I clenched my fists until my knuckles went white, and my face broke out in an angry frown. It was not the doctor’s fault, but I was looking for a scapegoat, and right now, he was my number one candidate.

“I go where she goes,” I said, standing resolute. I held her hand firmly, our fingers entwined, just like in Rawonia. And, her small grin was an indication that our memories were perfectly aligned.

“I can’t wait to get out of this wretched hospital, and have you all to myself,” I whispered in her ear with a devilish grin.

Her face blushed as if a wave of heat surged into her cheeks. “I’d like that, very much,” she said, her eyes lit with fiery fire. Then, her face fell in remembrance. “My grandma...” she said. “I saw her today, she looked so pale, so...” she murmured, unable to finish her sentence. “And it’s all my fault.”

“That’s not true,” I said, my fingers caressing her cheeks. “None of this is your or my fault, we have not asked for any of this. Remember that,” I reminded her.

“That may be, but still, I don’t know. I feel like .... I don’t want to lose her,” she sighed.

“And, you won’t. We made it out alive, she will, too. And, all because you completed the missions. We owe this all to you, Sierra. Instead of blaming yourself, you should be proud. I am so proud of you. Think of what you accomplished on your own despite my stubborn Drakon head,” I said, laughing. “I love you,” I said, no longer following the nurse ahead of us. I grasped her shoulders, forcing her to face me. Then I kissed her loudly in the middle of the hospital corridor. Hating public demonstrations, she protested at first. But then, her body relaxed and she melted in my arms, her fingers curving into my shoulders. I couldn’t believe how good that felt. It had been so damn long. There was a light which surged from her chest, flowing right through me, she was feeding my dormant dragon. I felt the magic of the kiss and the light rejuvenate me.

“Kitten, what are you doing to me,” I whispered, having a hard time quelling my urges. I pushed her away when it was all too much, I was out of breath, and so was she.

“I feel faint,” she said, and then she did collapse, right into my arms.

“Damn, what is happening to her?” I yelled, and the nurse was finally alerted to the fact that we were not following her. She rushed back to where we stood, trying to understand what the hell happened on her watch. They brought in a stretcher, but I refused to give her to anyone, and I carried her to the third floor despite all the warnings and yelling from the staff. They immediately took her in the emergency room, and I found myself waiting outside, feeling as though my life was being slowly ripped apart.

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Sierra’s (POV)

This was driving me nuts, I was going insane. The white walls, the small confined space, the loneliness. I had tried everything, I had even used my hands, giving in light to the door or the walls, but I was not facing a wounded dragon in need of my healing light, I was facing a prison cell, from which there was no escape.

I shouted, banged on the walls, hoping I could replace another like me. But, it was all silent. Would I die in here? It felt like it. I lay on the damn bed, there was nothing else to do, but wait till I found a solution. I would survive, I had to, for Seth, for myself. I wondered what he was doing now? Was he awake from the coma, was my grandma awake? Were the two getting along? Was Seth missing me, like I was missing him? Was he grieving for me?

The feeling of emptiness grasped me, deepening into a dark abyss.

Would I ever see Seth again?

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(Seth’s POV)

After hours of waiting, we finally saw the doctor come out of the emergency room, approaching Sierra’s parents, and her brother, Travis who had all been hungry for some news in the waiting room. Travis’ eyes lit up when he saw me, and he jumped in my arms the moment he stepped in the lounge with his parents. He introduced me to his parents, who just nodded their heads, casually. Though Rawonia’s heart had assured us that the consciousness from all three universes would merge for everyone once the mission was completed, it was apparent to me that not every human had led a life in all the three universes, which meant they were still ignorant of the fight ahead of us. By the looks of the many in this hospital, and Sierra’s parents, this was the case, it seemed.

I jumped out of my seat when I saw the doctor, moving right along with Sierra’s parents. Though I was not from the family, I had every right to hear the news about Sierra. I would wreck this place if they had a problem with that.

“Well, your daughter is fine, she was overly excited it seems, which shouldn’t have happened in her condition,” the doctor said, casting an accusatory glance my way.

“What condition?” I asked immediately.

“Is she pregnant?” Sierra’s mother cried out, plastering a replica of the blaming glance on her face which would have turned me into ashes had she been a dragon.

“No,” the doctor said. “She has a heart condition.”

The news shattered me, I believed that the two pieces of Rawonia’s heart would have been more than enough. And, here the doctor was implying otherwise.

“What are you saying?” Sierra’s father asked, bewildered. This was obviously news for him.

“This is very weird. But, what is functioning in place of a heart in Sierra’s body is...well, I don’t know how to put it. It is very strange indeed. It’s just one third size of a normal heart. It’s a miracle your daughter is even alive,” he replied.

“One third?” I shouted in shock, not because she didn’t have a full sized heart, but because it was only of one third size. Sierra had grasped another third from the mother dragon. What had happened to it?

“You mean two thirds?” I asked, prompting an answer. Sierra’s parents were looking at me as if I was crazed.

“No, I mean one third,” he repeated. “She needs a heart transplant. Immediately,” the doctor recommended. “I’ll put her on the list, but it may take a while to get one. Meanwhile, she should not overexert herself, and avoid excessive emotions,” he said, making sure the words found their target.

I remained silent, keeping my hands away from Sierra would be hard, but I would gladly do it if it would help her stay alive. What was astounding to me though was the news I’d received. What did that mean, and what had happened to the heart Sierra had received from the Land of Dragoon? And, how would I get it back?