Caelan didn't need anyone to tell him that fighting that man was useless. Not only was he one of the strongest people in the entire area, he was ruthless enough to raze anyone who dared to stand against him.
Ironically, that was the precise reason he and his mother were still alive at all. His sheer strength acted as a natural repellent, driving off anyone who thought about threatening what was his.
But crumpled on the ground as he was, every broken thing in his body screaming at once, a violent torrent of rage and hatred roared through him until it had filled every last corner of his being.
And he could do nothing with any of it. Nothing but grind his teeth together and watch his own mother get beaten senseless.
'Get up.'
'Get up!'
Plop.
He flinched at the sound. Looked over. His mother had crumpled to the ground, barely a breath escaping from her lips. Her face was a ruin of black and blue. Her right leg was bent at an angle that did not need a doctor to read — the deep, spreading bruise made it plain enough. A thin trickle of blood ran freely from where her head had met the table.
"Hah.. hah.. Stubborn bitch. Tch."
The man's face twisted in disgust at the sight of her. Or at least that was what it looked like from Caelan's low angle on the floor. He watched the man turn away without sparing him so much as a glance before retreating back into his room.
"I'm sure you'll get your chance someday," the voice inside his head said nonchalantly.
Caelan wanted to be angry at that. Maybe he deserved to be. But he also knew it would accomplish nothing. The voice was a part of him, after all. So instead, he slowly hauled himself up onto one knee, then onto his feet. He staggered, one hand clamped to his abdomen, and made his way to where his mother lay barely conscious on the floor.
The moment he knelt beside her, she looked up at him. Her eyes were glassy, unfocused, and yet she found his face. Then, in a voice that completely betrayed the state she was in, she said quietly,
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry for being such a failure as a mother."
Caelan stared at her. Guilt settled over him like something heavy and unwelcome. He carefully gathered her frail frame and lifted her up onto the couch, then reached into his worn backpack and pulled out a clean cloth. With practiced efficiency, he worked his way across the wounds on her face and body, cleaning each one before pressing bandages down over the open gashes. When he reached her leg, he stopped.
He had no idea what to do with it. He stared at it for a long moment, and the staring didn't help.
To make things worse, any hospital in this district was too incompetent to be trusted with a fracture. And even if they weren't, they refused to accept any patient without requesting impossible amout of money. More than he could scrape together even if he put most of his organs on the market.
Granted, for an unawakened kid in a place like this, were worth next to nothing anyway. Most children here didn't survive long enough for their organs to matter to anyone.
So his options were almost nonexistent. Worst case, she developed an infection and died. Best case? He genuinely didn't know what to expect.
For a moment, he considered living in endless debt or living without his mother. Using cold logic, the choice was obvious.
Of course, it was to sacrifice his mother in exchange for a life free from debt collectors. But was that what he wanted?
He hesitated for a moment before looking at his mother peaceful feature and decided.
"How am I any different from that man if I abandon her while she's hurting like this."
It wasn't really a question.
However, as he glanced toward the window. The clean sunlight that had occupied the sky earlier was long gone, replaced by the gaudy bloom of neon signs washing the city in restless colour. Somewhere below and distant, vehicles droned and music leaked.
Any sane person who lived within the city's bounds knew better than to go outside after dark. The streets after sundown were a battlefield of shifting gang territories and unpredictable violence, and even the spaces between the wars were populated by people who were not looking for company.
So, whether he liked it or not, he would have to wait until morning before he could bring her to the nearest hospital, which sat roughly thirty minutes away on foot.
Caelan reluctantly settled onto the couch and stayed there, barely blinking. The pain kept him awake anyway.
And before he knew it, the artificial neon glow beyond the window quietly fade away and surrendered to the warm sunlight as it embrace the world with pure, unfiltered radiance.
He quickly got up from the couch. Which, a movement that he immediately regretted. His ribs reminded him of how bad of an injury that they bare. His jaw also didn't leave him alone. He exhaled through his nose and waited for the worst of it to pass before moving again.
Sighing tiredly, he carefully move towards the back of the house, where he had stashed a rusty wheelchair he had found some time ago for exactly this kind of occasion. Not that he had hoped to need it this soon though.
He cautiously placed his still-sleeping mother in the wheelchair before marching out toward his doom and misery, condemned to live as a debtor for the rest of his life.
"I'm sorry, future me. But this is for the sake of our mother."
***
The journey took far longer than expected.
After over an hour of walking — which, slowed considerably by the weight of the wheelchair and the fact that he was, by most reasonable standards, not in any condition to be walking at all — before the building finally came into view.
The so-called hospital looked more like an abandoned warehouse rather than a medical facility. Even the faded sign hanging above the entrance flickered weakly, as though it were on the verge of giving up.
There was no one at the door, so he pushed through and made his way to the front counter, where a mechanical robot sat performing the function of a receptionist with the warmth and enthusiasm one might expect from a machine.
"Treatment for a broken leg," Caelan said flatly.
The robot did not waste a moment.
"570,000 Credit. How would you like to make your payment?"
Caelan were taken aback for a moment. He had braced himself, but bracing and receiving were two different things.
"I...would like to take a debt instead."
"Taking a debt will double the original price. Please fill out the document and sign here if you would like to proceed." The robot extended a tablet and a stylus without any detectable awareness of what it was saying.
Gulp.
If possible, he would really would have very much liked to punch the robot's face due to the sheer absurdity of the condition. But, he held that impulse at arm's length and signed the document with the energy of someone signing away a significant portion of their remaining years.
"It is a pleasure doing business with you, sir. Please wait until next month for the treatment."
His eyes widen at the statement.
"What!? That's ridiculous!"
"If you require treatment immediately, there will be an additional charge of 100,000 Credit."
This time, if there's no one stopping him, he will actually punch the filthy robot.
'No wonder they staffed the front desk with a robot.'
Fortunately, the voice in his head offered lightly, "It's too late to turn back now. Our life going to be miserable anyway."
He clicked his tongue and signed a second document. One that he suspected would follow him for a very long time.
After all was said and done, he wheeled his mother into a room before being told to wait outside.
Surprisingly, not even ten minutes had passed when a female doctor with tattoos running along her arms stepped out of the operating room. Pulling down her mask, she spoke in an annoyed voice.
"Kid," she said. "My job is to treat a person."
Caelan's chest tightened.
"Not a corpse."
!!