Ryan's gaze swept the room, the polished medical instruments, the grim faces of the doctors, Thelma's sharp eyes watching him for even the slightest twitch of fraudulence.
One of the white-coated men broke the silence with a derisive sniff.
"Mr Greaves," he said carefully, as though speaking to a child, "your condition is being managed. There's no need for outside interference, especially from… an unqualified visitor."
Thelma stiffened but said nothing. Her lips pressed into a line, and Ryan saw the brief flicker of doubt in her expression.
Greaves coughed, the sound ragged and wet. "Unqualified? That boy carries the same weight his father did. Can you not feel it?"
The doctors exchanged looks, a mix of professional irritation and pity for a dying man's delusions. One muttered, "With all respect, sir, faith will not cure corrupted flesh."
Ryan stepped closer, ignoring the jab. His senses screamed. The aura wasn't just clinging to Greaves--it was burrowing, threads of oily black weaving under the skin, pulsing in time with his heartbeat. Every shallow rise and fall of Greaves's chest looked like a struggle against invisible chains.
The rot was more than sickness, it was something older, darker, a wound meant to claim a man's soul. Not even the doctors recognised it. But Ryan did. And whether he liked it or not, he was the only one in the room who could rip it out.
As he drew nearer, something shifted. His instinct, primal and unbidden slid into place.
He knew. Somehow, in the marrow of his bones, he knew what to do.
"I'll try," Ryan said quietly.
Thelma stepped in front of him. "Try? You expect us to let you experiment on my father's life? Who even are you? You show up drenched on a bench, and now you're supposed to be, what? A miracle worker?"
Her words cut sharply, but there was no true venom in them. It was the desperation of someone who had already buried her hope too many times. It was evident she loved her father very much.
Ryan's lips twitched. "Honestly? The miracle worker part is a lot. But sitting around while your grandfather drowns in this… thing?" He gestured at the crawling shadows beneath Greaves's skin. "That I can't do."
Thelma blinked, thrown off balance by his bluntness and boldness.
Behind her, Greaves rasped, "Let him through, child."
Thelma hesitated, then stepped aside, though her eyes narrowed, still doubting. "If you kill him, don't expect me to shield you from the fallout."
"I expect you to do nothing less," Ryan muttered.
The doctors shifted uneasily as Ryan approached the bed. "This is absurd," one hissed. "We are qualified professionals--"
"And yet," Ryan interrupted smoothly, "he's still dying under your watch."
The man reddened, but Ryan was no longer listening. He pulled a chair close and sat at Greaves's side. The old man's hand trembled faintly against the sheets, his veins darkened by the poison working through him.
Ryan placed his palm lightly over the wound that crawled across Greaves's chest. It wasn't visible to anyone else, but to him, the wound was a screaming knot of shadows, thrashing like a trapped animal. A demon's strike no doubt.
It snarled at him, hungry.
Ryan closed his eyes.
He pressed his palm over the wound just beneath the ribs, fingers steady. Heat stirred beneath his skin, It flowed out of him, threading into Greaves's body. It fought back, claws scraping against his will. He felt its bite sink briefly into him, cold and sharp, but he pushed harder. Absorbing the darkness.
And then, like a taut rope snapping, the pressure broke.
The doctors leaned forward despite themselves. Thelma's lips parted, confusion flickering across her face.
Greaves inhaled. A long, shuddering breath that seemed to fill his chest for the first time in weeks. The shadow receded, dissipating into nothingness, leaving only the frail, human body beneath.
Ryan opened his eyes, sweat dampening his brow. "He'll live."
The room was silent.
Greaves's pallor was already shifting, the blue tinge of his skin giving way to faint colour. His chest rose and fell with a steadier rhythm. He looked less like a corpse clinging to the last threads of life and more like a man pulled back from the brink.
The doctors stared, dumbstruck. One stammered, "That's… that's impossible. We monitored--he was..."
"Dying," Ryan finished for him. He leaned back, his hand falling away. "Not anymore."
Thelma's gaze had changed. The suspicion was still there, but layered now with something sharper, curiosity, and beneath it, a reluctant spark of belief.
"You," she said slowly, "are not what you seem."
Ryan gave a humourless laugh. "Story of my life."
Greaves chuckled weakly, his voice rasping but alive. "You truly are your father's son."
Ryan stiffened but didn't answer. The last thing he wanted right now was another reminder of a man he'd never known but somehow could never escape.
"I don't know what you just did," Thelma said, her tone quieter than before, "But he hasn't looked this alive in months."
Ryan gave no reply. He stepped back from the bed, his expression unreadable.
Thelma's jaw clenched, as though wrestling with words she didn't want to say. "I thought you were a fraud," she admitted at last, looking apologetic. "Maybe… I was wrong. We are indebted to you."
Greaves, eyes half-shut, whispered, "The Reaper walks again. Perhaps… perhaps there is hope yet."
Ryan stood over him, steady despite the strain still buzzing through his veins. Thelma's gaze lingered on him, soft and searching, while the doctors whispered in disbelief at what they'd just witnessed. Whatever they saw, miracle, curse, or legend didn't matter.
Ryan was no longer a question. He was an answer.