Chapter 8

As soon as I agreed, a familiar tugging sensation engulfed me. Then, my surroundings dissolved into a blanket of blinding white. When my vision cleared, I found myself standing right outside the hospital's ICU. The corridor reeked of disinfectant that made my stomach churn. Beyond the glass door of the ICU lay a version of myself I barely recognized. It was Caroline's body, her face deathly pale. A web of tubes ran from her body to the surrounding machines. The flickering waveforms on the screen were the only sign that she still clung to life. Standing guard by her bed was a figure so thin he was almost unrecognizable. It was Albus. I remembered him, neatly dressed in his white lab coat, his tone gentle as he recounted funny moments from his experiments. But now, his hair was a disheveled mess. It clung to his forehead unevenly. The white lab coat that once fit him perfectly now hung loosely on his frame as if draped over a rack of bones. He crouched by the bed and clutched the