So many doctors and healers were surrounding the bed that, at first, I couldn’t see the patient. Toni raced around to the empty space beside Dr. Griep, and I drew up at her shoulder and looked down. Every inch of the Novai was shaking—not just shaking like he was cold, but spasming out of control. His fingers clenched and unclenched over and over again. His wrists strained against the cuffs so intensely that black veins protruded up his forearms. The eyeless divots in his face looked like they were smoking, with swirls of gray whirling visibly beneath the skin. His hips bucked into the air and slammed back down onto the mattress repeatedly, actually moving the bed frame by centimeters each time with his strength, and his knees bent like he was performing squats. Shouting in both English and A’li-uud monopolized my senses, but I didn’t hear a word that was being said. The edges of my vision were going white, and I was falling into a memory…

I spun around and watched my dress twirl. It was so pretty, light blue and sparkly and long. Just like Cinderella’s. Mom didn’t want me to wear it even though she bought it for me before Christmas, “We’re saving it for Christie’s wedding,” she told me, but Christie was getting married today, and now I got to wear my dress.

Finnie was wearing her dress too, but she had a pink one. She wasn’t in the wedding. I was. I was the flower girl, and I smiled at Finnie with smug pride.

“Don’t I look pretty?” I bragged.

“I like pink more than blue,” she said. She tossed her head, something she had learned from me. When I did it, I thought I looked grown up, but when she did it, she looked dumb. But she was only seven. I was nine, so I was lots older and more grown up than her, and I told her so.

“I get to throw the flowers at the wedding,” I announced. Then, mockingly, I added, “You have to sit with Mom and Dad because you’re still a baby.”

She glared. “I am not a baby!”

“You are too.”

“I am not!” She stamped her foot and made a snarly face.

For a second, I thought she was trying to scare me into saying I was sorry. Her eyes were squinted, her nose wrinkled, and her top lip raised. But she didn’t go back to normal.

“Your face is gonna get stuck like that,” I jibed.

Still, she glowered at me, and I felt my stomach tumble with bad butterflies. It was like she was frozen.

“Finnie, stop it.”

Suddenly, she fell. Her whole body just dropped backwards, and she fell flat on her back with a bang. I didn’t move, hoping she was fooling and would jump right up with her stupid little sister laugh, but she didn’t. Her arms started shaking, then her legs, and then her head flopped from side to side. I ran to her and grabbed her cheeks. Her eyes were wide open and looked up at me, but she didn’t see me. She just shook.

Terror ripped through me, and I screamed, “MOM!”

“Undo the cuffs!” I heard the order from Dr. Griep clearly, but I couldn’t move. Antoinette did it for me. She bent over the Novai’s right wrist and released his arm. It flew up and bounced back down with the force of his previously-restrained momentum before remaining on the mattress and quaking violently. His other arm did the same as one of the A’li-uud healers managed to free him from the cuff.

His ankles were still held in place. “We cannot let him go,” said another healer loudly. “He is confined for his safety and ours.”

“If he’s held down, he could dislocate his joints, and we won’t be able to keep him restrained while they heal. Undo them. We’ll strap him back in when the seizure’s done,” Dr. Griep insisted.

The healer reluctantly obeyed, and, within seconds, the Novai’s legs were freed too. His whole body was now jerking, and everyone around him prepared to catch him if he rolled off the bed on either side. I just stared, frozen to the spot and horrified.

Mom raced into the bedroom. She looked very pretty with her curled hair and fluttery dress, but I could tell she was scared. That scared me even more. I started to cry.

“What happened?” she demanded, dropping to her knees beside Finnie and bumping my hands out of the way.

“Nothing,” I whimpered. “She just fell over and started shivering.”

Mom pulled back one of Finnie’s eyelids. I saw her finger shaking almost as bad as Finnie’s. “Jack!” she yelled.

One of the healers leaned down and screeched. I knew the sound—he was speaking Novai—but I felt sick to my stomach. My whole body was hot and cold all over, and I was drenched in sweat unrelated to the godawful temperature of the air. Antoinette’s elbow kept bumping into me while she tried to help tilt the Novai’s chin up, but I hardly noticed. I was rapidly going numb, and I was sure my knees were about to give out at any minute.

“Jack, she’s not breathing!”

“He’s not breathing!” yelled Dr. Griep.

“Call 9-1-1!”

“Mom,” I sobbed. I was desperate to hear her tell me it was okay, it would be okay. “Mama, I didn’t do it.”

“I know you didn’t, baby,” she told me. My father had already left the room to call an ambulance, but I was starting to think nothing would help. Finnie hadn’t stopped shaking, and she was shaking so badly she bounced against the floor. Mom reached over my sister to grab my hand, and she looked at me with a very serious face. “I need you to get me a glass of water so Finnie has something to drink when this stops, okay? Can you do that?”

I looked down at Finnie, her small body in her pink dress convulsing. She was making awful grunting sounds, and then she gagged. Thick, white, foamy gunk spilled from the corner of her mouth, and I started crying harder. Mom slipped her hand under Finnie’s head to stop it from smacking against the floor over and over again and jiggled my hand.

“Phoebe, I need your help. Go get me the water, okay? You can do it. I’ll stay here with Finnie. Okay?”

The Novai was spitting, bubbly droplets spewing from his mouth. A stream dribbled down his cheek to the pillow under his head. Gurgling sounds were emanating from his throat. I stumbled backward.

“Phoebe, I need your help!”

The voice was not my mother’s, but Antoinette’s. She was looking over her shoulder at me while holding onto the Novai’s chin as tightly as she could to keep it turned upward.

“We have to keep his airway clear! Help me hold him!”

I took another step back, shaking my head, as tears began welling in my eyes. I felt their slick warmth ooze over the lip of my lower lid and slither down my face. My chest hurt because I wasn’t able to breathe, and my heart felt like it had gone into overdrive. The Novai gagged, and Toni turned back to him and doubled down her efforts. A sob escaped my lips.

“Phoebe.” A hand pressed against the small of my back. “Come with me.” I didn’t move, and fingers wrapped forcefully around my upper arm. “Come.”