I woke up again to the sounds of beeping and the hum of the nurse as she wrote more things down in her chart. I rubbed my hands over the covers a few times to try and grab her attention. The nurse glanced over and then started walking over to me, she sat at the end of the bed again.

"I know that you must be very confused right now, but it appears that you had a bad reaction to the super healers the General had me pumping you with. I'm going to have you stay for a few days to make sure that everything is out of your system, the good news is that we used a different kind of anti-concussant and your concussion is all gone," The nurse always smiled when she talked to me. I noticed that out of everyone that had been here with me, she only smiled when talking to me.

"If you don't mind me asking, you've been my nurse a few times now, but I still don't know your name?" The nurse laughed a little and looked down, almost flustered. 

"Janie," Janie. Pretty. Janie got off of the edge of the bed and went back to work on her clipboard, how many notes could she possibly need to write? We sat and kept to ourselves for a while. I counted all of the ceiling tiles while Jaine wrote away on that little clipboard of hers. A different nurse came in and brought me a tray of food. The medical ward always served the same things, buttered noodles, mashed vegetables, a fruit cup, and a glass of water. I smiled when I saw a brown paper bag next to the food. I reached inside and pulled out a notebook with a letter attached to the front.

I'm so sorry that my stupidity got you stuck in the medical ward. I just didn't understand why you were so passionate about training and bailing on our movie plans. I'm so sorry and hope that you'll forgive me! - Brother Hunter

I chuckled and set the paper down next to me, eager to open the notebook. I recognized it as soon as I saw the cover, Hunter was an amazing artist and would show me some of his drawings when I just got fed up with everything around us, or we failed a mission and I felt especially bad. Ballet dancers leaping through the air, starry nights, exquisite flowers, terrifying monsters, warped scenery, and funny cartoons littered the pages, each one making the smile on my face grow. I heard Jaine start to walk over.

"Oh, what's that?" I closed the book. I knew that Hunter trusted me, but had he even met Janie? I would feel awful if she accidentally invaded his privacy. I looked to Janie, her face was blank.

"Sorry, it's not mine. The notebook is Agent Blue's, and I don't know who he is willing to let see it," That smile crept back up onto Janie's face.

"Oh, that's perfectly fine, my fault for being nosy any way,"

"Don't say that, there's nothing wrong with being curious! I'm sure he wouldn't mind if you saw this one," I held the book towards her, it was a picture he had drawn of me trying to do a headstand for the first time. I didn't know why I felt the urge to comfort Janie, even though it was clear that she wasn't distressed in any way. Janie took the book in her slender fingers, holding it like it was made of glass.

"Is this you?" I nodded and Janie started laughing. "Oh my god, it's amazing! How does he draw so realistically? Did he make you hold the pose?" "Oh no, he drew it recently, but it was actually a long time ago when that happened, I was probably about ten years old when I tried to do a handstand for the first time. Hunter just has an amazing memory. He also loves to draw my most embarrassing moments," Janie laughed again, and it was beautiful. I bit my lip in frustration, what was she doing that made me notice all of these little things about her, was it the drugs that were pumping through my veins,? The side effects of having an allergic reaction?

We spent the rest of the night talking. Janie shared stories about her days at schooling, catching me up on all of the things that I never knew about childhood.

"What do you mean they made you guys dance together?" Janie was trying to hold back her laughter at my question, but she was failing miserably. 

"It was a school dance, and they made each boy go up to a girl and then ask the girl to dance, and we had to say yes. Then we just danced. That was it, just dancing." I gaped at her, it just seemed so bizarre that intimacy was forced in public settings, I know that Hugh and Hunter would never be so close in public, and that Sala, Cierra, and Mark didn't hold hands in the hallways. "So, you never got to go to a dance?" I shook my head.

"No, I was taken to start training when I was eight, they found me in a crumbly building with the rest of the rainbow," Janie put her hands on my shoulders.

"You were eight years old?" She seemed angry but not at me. 

"Yes, Blue was five at the time. I'm the oldest out of all of us," Janie clenched her jaw, I could see that this started to ignite a flame inside of her, I felt awful for making her this upset. "It's not a big deal, we got to learn things normal kids would never be able to, and some of us got families that we wouldn't have otherwise. Jackson, Mark, and Cierra were orphans before we were brought in, and Hunter and Sala were going to be. I know for a fact the Mark was about to die on the streets if the military hadn't gotten to us. What about you?" I bit my lip, and that was all Janie needed. She pulled me into a tight hug, and I melted into her touch. This felt so different from the hugs I got from the group. The hugs I received from them were lukewarm in comparison to this. Every nerve in my body was firing off at the same time, warmth spread throughout my body and a true state of calm washed over me. It was faint, but there was a lingering smell of peaches and strawberries, and a hot tear rolled down my cheek. Janie hugged me tighter, and we laid down on our sides. I fell asleep to her holding me in her arms, when I woke up, she was gone. Had it all been a dream?

The next two days followed the same kind of routine, Janie would come in every other hour and ask me questions, then she would write down the answers on her clipboard. The simple questions lead to long conversations about random things that we each loved. Jaine was also an artist, but she loved to paint and work with abstract figures, despite her detailed and realistic tattoos, I shared stories of working out on the field with the group and the family dynamic made that smile of hers even wider. When it came time for me to be discharged, I found myself not wanting to leave the room that was too bright and too fake to seem real.

Ingrid forced me to sit back for the next week of training, working on half of my max for weights and only being able to focus on flexibility training. Everyone started treating me like this, Mark would take my tray out of my hands and then carry it to where I was sitting, Cierra would run in front of me and hold every door open, even Jackson was more gentle and kind, and it made me furious. I was not a child, I was a strong woman who got hurt and then got better. I needed to get out. The walls of the compound seemed to be even smaller after my conversation with Jaine. I wanted to go out and see everything, I wanted to go over the wall and just run until my legs gave out, and I knew how I was going to be able to do it too.