Paradox Part Two

Chapter Four: Screaming

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Screaming was just the thing she was doing as she woke up, sitting bolt upright and standing out of the comfy chair in the room. She looked over at the bed, where her cousin was weakly staring at her. She realized, though, that he was simply staring through her. Gwen's eyes teared up again as she comprehended that he was hallucinating in some way. The same blood spots from the dream lay spread across his chest.

The peace was broken as the door was pushed open by three adults. Two of them immediately rushed to the bed as the other rushed to Gwen, all immediately becoming chaotic and loud. Gwen immediately was pulled up into a bear hug, being squeezed to death by her father. He released her from his grip, and held her shoulders with his hands. "Are you okay, Gwen?" he demanded. After the shock of the sudden grasp wore off in a second, she responded, "Yes. Of course, I'm fine." Her response was met simply, "You don't look it."

She didn't, either. She rivaled her cousin in bloodstains and scratches and bruises. Her bloodshot eyes were paired with a red nose and cracked lips. Her voice came out as a weak croak. "Not right now, Dad. I'm not important right now." He solemnly shook his head and swiveled around to face his nephew.

Ben's parents were huddled over him caringly, whispering to him sadly. A doctor walked in from the still-opened door.

"Mr. and Mrs. Tennyson," he looked up from the papers he was reading off of, and, pausing for a second, asked, "You are his parents, right?" The man and woman next to the bed nodded and stood up. His father's tall, strong build complemented his mother's agile and thin one.

"Okay, then." His tone became heavily serious. "Um, I don't know what to say. We're running out of options, honestly." He rubbed a finger along his temple. "We don't know what he was shot with here. It's some kind of sharp, diamond-like material. It's punctured a lung, his neck, and his small intestines. Hard, too. They're stuck in there well. There's even a few in his shoulder and spine."

The parents gazed with an odd look upon the doctor's vocabulary, but shook it off as his dashing black hair and perfect smile led them to believe he was a newer doctor.

"This means, though, his breathing capacity is cut by fifty percent. He's having some odd neural problems as our scans show and he's losing a lot of blood."

The parents looked anxiously at each other and than at their child.

"The truth is, we think that the diamond has somehow sliced it so badly that it can't be removed without destroying a lot of things. This prevents us from doing a transfusion. What's also preventing us from any kind of surgery is his blood is that we can't type it – not any kind of positive or negative. He's not even any kind of O, which cause some real problems for us."

"So what do we do?"

"Well, I suggest…"

The doctor was suddenly cut off by a light and sound alert from a few machines to the left of the bed. Everybody's eyes widened as he called in a few nurses, shouting multiple commands. The family moved off to the side as more and more doctors moved in.

The heart monitor continued to beat continuously faster. Lines across the electronic screen were rapidly increasing in intensity. The changes were noticeable in the boy, as well. Breathing suddenly became a struggle, and he clutched at his heart. Ben began to hyperventilate, and his heart rate continued to increase.

Gwen had, at this point, began sobbing, and the rest of the family found it irresistible to join in.

And, suddenly, the worst possible sound that could be heard was heard. The rhythmic beating of the heart monitor had now become an unchanging monotone. It's output became an unmoving line.

His cousin ran up to the bed as doctors were trying to push her back and her family was trying to pull her back. She was becoming hysterical, shrieking odd phrases like, "This isn't supposed to happen!" and "You promised!"

With horribly inconvenient bad timing, Grandpa Max walked in and stood in the doorway.

To Ben, all senses had stopped. He still had a vague detail of sight, although that was fading as well. The world seemed to zoom outward like a camera was viewing the scene from above.

And that's how it ended.

But not just yet.

Through the extreme chaos of the hospital room, the device on Ben Tennyson's arm glowed a vibrant yellow. Its face spun rapidly, creating the noise of a speeding car. Everybody stopped at this odd development, even the hysterical Gwen, to watch what was happening. The face spun faster and faster, until the device itself came off with a sickening pop. Gwen, the only one realizing what was happening, began her shrieking again and the room resumed pace.

And that is how it ended.

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Birds chirped happily, while the sun shined brilliantly. The weather was pleasantly warm. It was a beautiful day in all aspects.

However, the scene was bizarrely solemn. Most of those on the site were silent. It appeared very bleak.

A dry sob could be heard every once in a while of the small groups that milled across the lawn.

I won't sugarcoat it: it was a miserable day. A dark cloud invisible held the collective group of people in its foreboding grip. Yeah, it was that bad.

There was a small tent set up in the center of the roaming group, but only one person was under it. None of the others felt ready to go in yet.

Over to the west of the grassy plain, one man and one woman stood, looking sadly upon the scene.

"Are you sure we really want to be here?"

That was the man. His short black hair spread across his top. His well-shaved face frowned at the dreadfully bleak group.

"Would you rather have it happen to you now?"

"No… but how is being here supposed to stop it?"

The woman, with medium-length red hair, stopped the upcoming string of questions by saying, "Don't know. But we have a part in this somehow, I just know it."

She received a weird look from the man next to her. They both started to walk along the tarmac path, but the man held back for a second. "No. I still don't think we should be here."

The woman looked at her black-dressed relation. "Oh, come on, what could happen?"

The man began counting off on his fingers a few possible events. "I let something slip, we kill somebody else in our history, we see you…"

She stopped his speaking with her hand. "I get it. You don't want to be here. Neither do I personally, but we need to be here."

"Fine, let's just get over it as quickly as possible."

The pair followed the rest of the group, which had begun to line up near the tent, where a group of people the two recognized stood near a casket.

The man began to whisper to the woman frantically, just out of hearing range of the others in front of them. "It's open casket. It's open casket! I can't take this! What if they recognize me? What do we do!"

The woman stopped him yet again. "Calm down, spazzy. It'll be alright. Don't worry."

The man, after long ignoring the woman, looked towards the front of the tent, where people were looking down and back up at the family repeatedly.

"I can see him. I can see him! Oh, that's sick!" The woman looked at him strangely, asking, "What?"

"We're wearing the same suit."