Anonymous Review:
VelgaAltair: I think I mentioned it in an earlier chapter what their roles are in the band. Gilbert is the lead guitarist, Antonio is the lead vocalist and bass guitarist, and Francis is the drummer. You can see the subbed episode on a YouTube link that Peridot Tears sent me on her review. Haha, yeah, the Prussia I roleplay is somewhat sarcastic and pessimistic also. However, I'm not sure if it's because of this story or not...
Soundtrack: Loud people's voices in a large room. Oh goodness, this was ALSO written during that speech and debate competition.
Inspired by: 'The Seagull'
"It's time for your exercise, Gilbert."
Gilbert rolled his eyes and groaned inwardly. He could hear the rusty wheels scratching the smooth, hard floor. "I don't need a wheelchair to exercise, nurse. If you want me to keep fit, you should let me walk."
"It's the doctor's orders, Gilbert," Nurse Katyusha stammered. "You shan't walk until he confirms that you're well enough."
"He doesn't know how well I'm doing," Gilbert grumbled. Dr. Braginski only knew his white blood cell count and his weight.
"You could even meet other people and make friends," offered Katyusha.
Gilbert snorted. She was treating him as if he was a kindergartener. He didn't want to make new friends in this hospital. He was fine with the people he had outside the hospital grounds.
Katyusha wheeled the wheelchair next to the bed. He abruptly sat up and threw the blankets off of his body.
"I'm telling you, I can walk!" Gilbert argued. "If all it took to exercise was to sit on a chair, the United States of America would have absolutely no obesity problem whatsoever."
"But…" Katyusha whimpered, her bottom lip trembling. "D-Doctor Braginski said that you had to use the wheelchair. You aren't strong enough to walk—"
Gilbert scoffed. Well, what did Braginski know? He didn't know that Gilbert had spent nearly three hours every day practicing walking on his own. He didn't know that Gilbert poured the pasty porridge into the wastebasket and that it passed as vomit. He didn't know that Antonio and Francis snuck in pancakes every time they visited.
"And what would happen if I just stood on my feet and walked around?" Gilbert sneered. "Would he strap me down to the wheelchair and force me to use it?"
Tears welled in Katyusha's eyes. Gilbert felt a pit of guilt in his stomach. He had no grudge against Nurse Katyusya; it was Dr. Braginski that deserved every ounce of irritation Katyusha was receiving.
"Look," Gilbert muttered, softening his voice. "If I fall on my first step, I'll use the stupid wheelchair."
Katyusha wiped her eyes and nodded. Gilbert planted his bare feet on the smooth white floor. He urged his muscles to stay strong. After so many times of practicing and forcing himself to swallow down his fatigue, Gilbert reckoned that he could manage on his own now. He slowly stood up, making sure not to rise too fast or else he would become too dizzy to move.
"See? I'm fine," Gilbert said proudly, taking small steps around the room. "Are you satisfied?"
"Y-yes," Katyusha said quietly. She took Gilbert by the arm and helped him out into the corridor. Gilbert felt a small sense of pride rise in him as he made his way down the hallway. He told them that he could handle his health on his own. They should've listened to him.
"Where are we going?" asked Gilbert.
"To the small courtyard outside the hospital," explained Katyusha. "You could meet some of the other patients out there."
"Oh goody. Playmates," Gilbert said dryly. "If you are all so keen on making me walk, why don't you just let me walk home?"
"Mr. Beilschmidt, you're still in delicate condition," Katyusha sighed.
"But I'm getting better, aren't I?" argued Gilbert. "You didn't try to wheel me outside my room before. So doctor dearest must think that I'm making some progress."
Katyusha didn't answer. They traveled down to the first floor via elevator and towards the courtyard. Katyusha pushed the glass door open and beckoned Gilbert to come outside. Gilbert hesitantly obliged, squinting from the stinging sunlight. The sun's warm touch felt foreign on his skin, like a stranger's handshake. He breathed in the air and smiled. The air was probably coated with pollutants, bacteria, and fumes, and it smelled so much cleaner than the sterilized air inside the glass hospital.
"Come on," Katyusha urged, taking his elbow and gently leading him to the middle of the courtyard. It was merely pavement and stone benches; no trees, plants, flowers, anything. Plants carried potentially dangerous allergens.
"Gilbert, come meet the others," Katyusha called out. Gilbert approached the three patients that were all wheelchair-ridden. They looked very sickly and pale as if they were locked in dark closets their whole lives.
"Hey," Gilbert greeted, sitting down on a bench next to them. "I'm Gilbert Beilschmidt. You lot?"
"Eduard von Bock," said a boy with dark blond hair and glasses.
"Raivis Galante," stuttered a very small boy.
"I'm Toris Lorinaitis," said a boy with brown hair.
"Toris Lorinaitis," Gilbert echoed. "That name sounds familiar." His eyes widened and he gasped. "Whoah! We met in freshmen year, didn't we? I fought against you and someone else in a sparring duel!"
Toris furrowed his eyebrows before lightly gasping in surprise. "Gilbert Beilschmidt? My goodness, you're right! I can't believe we meet again!"
"In a strange situation, unfortunately," Gilbert said. "Who was the other guy? He was pretty good."
"He was Feliks," Toris said eagerly. "Feliks Łukasiewicz."
"That's funny," Gilbert said, frowning. "That's the same name as—"
"—the receptionist in the main lobby?" Toris finished. "They're the same person. Feliks is getting volunteer hours for graduation by working here."
"Wait—Feliks was the one that fought with me? Him?" Gilbert exclaimed. Toris nodded, smiling slightly. "What happened to him?"
"What do you mean by that?" Toris asked.
"He seems to have put down the sabre for hair clips," joked Gilbert. Toris shrugged good-naturedly. "So what happened to you?"
"I was admitted into the hospital after freshmen year," Toris said sadly. "I've been staying here for three years. All three of us have, actually."
"Whoah," Gilbert said in a low voice. "Three years! What doctor do you have?"
Raivis flinched and began trembling like a rabbit. "D-D-Doctor Braginski."
"I'm so sorry," Gilbert said gravely. "How come you've all been here for so long?"
"Nothing terminal, but they take a long time to treat," sighed Eduard. "We've been under Dr. Braginski's care the whole time."
"I think we've been staying with him the longest out of all his patients," Toris commented, brushing some of his brown hair behind his ear. "Though Eduard sometimes gets to visit home every now and then. He's not as bad as we are."
"I can trick Dr. Braginski into thinking I'm improving," Eduard explained. "It takes a lot of psychological warfare to beat him."
"You know a lot about how he works, then," Gilbert muttered.
Raivis nodded jerkily. "I wish we d-didn't," he said in a pitiful voice. "We've been here for far too long. I want to go home but Dr. Braginski never l-lets me go home."
"Never? In all those years?" Gilbert gasped. Raivis gulped and nodded. "That's wrong! That's sick! He can't do that!"
"Yes, he can," Toris said exhaustedly. "He's the head doctor in this hospital. What he says, goes, even if it doesn't make sense to the rest of us."
"Why does he keep you three here?" Gilbert demanded.
"Maybe to keep him company so that Nurse Natalia would be distracted from him," Eduard muttered. Toris blushed and looked away.
"Yeah, I noticed. Why is she always clinging on to him?" Gilbert asked.
"They're brother and sister. So is Katyusha," said Eduard.
"But…but she's clinging onto him in a way that isn't platonic," Gilbert said falteringly.
"I don't really understand that either," sighed Toris. "Katyusha and Natalia have been working here as long as Ivan has."
"Ivan?" Gilbert asked confusedly.
"That's Dr. Braginski's first name," said Eduard.
"You guys are on first name terms?" Gilbert asked. Toris shrugged.
"We've known each other long enough to be," Toris mumbled. "I'm starting to worry that I may know him more than I know my family."
"What happened to your family, anyways?" Gilbert asked. "Can't they bust you out of here? Don't you have some sort of choice?"
"They're scared," Toris said quietly. "Scared that if I leave I might go into a relapse. Dr. Braginski told them my case was very serious…"
"Does that happen to all his patients?" asked Gilbert fretfully.
"Perhaps not all of them, but a good amount," Raivis mumbled.
"Well, if it isn't my favorite patients!"
Toris, Raivis, and Eduard stiffened immediately at the cheery voice. Gilbert felt as if snakes were wrapping around his throat when Dr. Braginski spoke. He swallowed hard and glanced over his shoulder to see Dr. Braginski making his way towards them, a sunny smile plastered on his round face.
"G-good morning, Doctor," Raivis stuttered, gripping tightly on the armrests of his wheelchair.
"Good morning, young Raivis," greeted Dr. Braginski. "How are you feeling today?"
"Much better, th-th-thanks," Raivis babbled. Eduard put a reassuring hand on his.
"Not well enough to leave the hospital, I imagine?" Braginski commented lightheartedly.
Raivis shrugged his thin shoulders. "I—I don't' know. I've been doing a lot…a lot better lately—"
"Oh, but poor Raivis," cooed Braginski. "Your health is very delicate as of now. If you even try to leave my care, think of all the things that could happen! A relapse would worsen your condition and maybe land you in an even dire situation. You wouldn't want to burden your family with more suffering on both parts, would you?"
Raivis gulped and shook his head vigorously. Gilbert felt a burning lump in his throat. His nerves were excited with indignation and his voice yearned to shout at the doctor.
"What about the rest of you?" Braginski asked Toris and Eduard. "Still feeling frail?"
"I really think I'm improving, Ivan," said Toris nervously. "It's been so long since I've seen my home. It isn't that far away from here either, so if I do get sick again, I can easily come back—"
"But Toris, it's much too risky!" Braginski exclaimed in honeyed tones. "If you leave, I cannot stop you from dying in your sleep and breaking your family's heart because you were so sick."
"Now, Doctor," Eduard said sternly when Toris's face grew very pale. "Even if Toris did stay in the hospital, you couldn't stop him from dying in his sleep anyways. No one can."
"All will come to the hospital again, wouldn't they?" Braginski said sweetly. Gilbert wanted to choke. The inside of his mouth tasted like bitter slime and he knew it had nothing to do with bile or vomit. Braginski suddenly turned all his attention to Gilbert.
"Gilbert." Suddenly, Braginski's face darkened. His eyes were wider and more dilated than usual, his childish smile broadened into a wolf-like grin, and his voice sharpened into a dagger. "You know what I said about going out of your room without a wheelchair. You could get hurt. Are you deliberately breaking the rules?"
"Nurse Katyusha let me," Gilbert said stubbornly.
"Nurse Katyusha knows better than to listen to a foolish patient," Braginski said dangerously. He took a step closer to Gilbert. Gilbert wanted to back away, but he was already pressed against the wall of the courtyard.
"I'm standing fine by myself," Gilbert argued as Braginski took a walkie talkie out of his lab coat and muttered into it in Russian. "I don't think I need a wheelchair if I can walk on my own."
"Oh, can you really walk by yourself?" Braginski said innocently. Before Gilbert could respond, the glass doors swung open. Nurse Natalia hurried to Braginski's side, pushing a black wheelchair.
"I've got your message, Brother," Natalia said swiftly.
"Thank you," Braginski said softly. "It seems that young Gilbert here is feeling a bit…weak right now."
Gilbert had no time to react. Braginski grabbed him by the arms and knocked him off his feet. Gilbert yelped as he was shoved into the wheelchair. He fought to stand back up but he felt two rough and large hands push down on his shoulders, hindering him.
"Let's take you back into your room, da?" Braginski murmured in Gilbert's ear.
The look in Braginski's cold eyes and something in his voice made Gilbert's skin crawl off.
He felt it slipping from his fingers.
Every tick of the clock vanished into the past. Did they exist? Had they ever existed? No one could prove what happened in the past. You can never bring back something that was already gone. The time was dead; it couldn't be brought back to life.
The seconds kept passing him. He could only lie on his bed and bade them goodbye.
Tick.
Tock.
Tick.
Tock.
Gilbert was draining away. He could feel his strength bleed out of him and seep into the mattress under him. He could barely clench his hands without struggling. He had grown old in a matter of months. He was eighteen years old and he was dying an old man's death.
Death in slow motion.
Gilbert gazed at the ceiling above his head. He already knew that there were exactly seventeen dead flies trapped inside the rectangular lights above. Seventeen dead and forgotten. Nobody cared. Nobody even knew where they were unless they too were trapped and forgotten in the same prison.
Tick.
Tock.
Gilbert and time were an hourglass. His strength and energy was slowly trickling away like the sand pouring away from the upper half. Every second was a grain of sand slipping down the tunnel into the empty void below.
No!
The sand was going too fast! Too many at once! Why did it not go one at a time? They were shoving each other, fighting to be the first to fall, clinging in clumps as they disappeared down the hole. They died in packs. Time was impatient. It wanted the job done quickly.
He was drowning in sand.
Gilbert slowly reached a hand out to the ceiling. He was covered in it. Choking, dry, colorless sand. It crowded his eyes and his nose and underneath his fingernails. He couldn't breathe. He was trapped and he couldn't get out. He couldn't ever escape.
The sparrow!
No…there were no birds here. Why sparrows? Gilbert racked his memory, but couldn't recall where the bird came from.
Gilbert wearily turned his pale head to face the clock. It was a black, ugly scar on the blank white wall. The blank white room. Everything was blank and expressionless in this room. Even Gilbert's sanguine eyes were too tired to show emotion.
Twelve. One. Two. Three. Four. Five.
Did they count down hours or years?
The second hand was passing by too quickly. It jerked and paused, jerked and paused, cutting the seconds into equal pieces. Even when time was divided so neatly, the days flowed past Gilbert without meaning or comprehension, as if time was nothing but water flowing out of a pitcher, but sooner or later the pitcher will run out and be empty.
Was that how Toris, Raivis, and Eduard felt? The years passing by them, flying on swift wings? Three years. In three years he would be twenty-one. He should be finishing undergraduate college and moving on to graduate school. He should be finding a fiancée and determining his future. He shouldn't be trapped inside the hospital, behind thick glass walls like an insect caught in a jar to be shared in a show-and-tell session.
HE WAS THE SPARROW—
What?
There was no sparrow here. He hadn't seen a wild creature for ages. Even the birds did not dare to pass the windows of his room. Perhaps they did not want to catch the stench of death. Gilbert remembered reading an article about a cat that would dwell in the rooms of people that were about to die. Could animals really sense who would die soon? Would they come for him like the Grim Reaper?
Breathe in.
Breathe out.
How many seconds did it take to breathe in?
Did it waste more time to breathe if there was sand all around him?
Sand.
Wet, dark, packed sand weighing down on him like stone.
He couldn't move under it.
Breathe in.
The air tasted like metal and rubbing alcohol.
It was sterile air.
Lifeless air.
Breathe out.
Gilbert's breath was so weak.
It was from the sand. It had to be. The dead air, the choking sand, the second hand swinging past the numbers like a pendulum. They were all throttling him.
Gilbert gritted his teeth and exhaled deeply.
Not weak.
Nothing of his will ever be weak.
Clench fingers. Make fists. Force the weakness and tiredness out of the bones. They couldn't stay if they were forbidden.
Seventeen dead flies in the lights.
Did they die of heat? Of hunger or thirst? Exhaustion?
Or did they just give up?
Gilbert's mind flickered to the cardboard box under the table and he felt a sinking pit inside of him. He remembered the video camera and the tapes and everything that came with them.
Did he give up?
The sunflowers stared at him with their blank, brown faces. They were mocking him. Gilbert could hear them laughing. They should be warm, inviting, and sweet. They were sunflowers. So why did the room feel so dead, so cold, so stifling?
Sunflower, where's your sunny smile?
Gilbert looked at his hands. They were white and bony. His wrist bones were protruding too much from his skin. His nails were growing long after not being trimmed in so long. They trembled; he curled his fingers into a fist and pressed it against his lips. They felt cold, like plastic.
It was funny how he was withering while the fake flowers were able to watch over him and gloat.
Let the sparrow go.
What sparrow?
Gilbert gazed wildly around the room, expecting to see a bird perched conveniently near the ceiling. Perhaps a 'quoth the raven, nevermore' moment for him. Yet there was nothing. Nothing but his own mind torturing him.
Gilbert didn't understand. He did nothing wrong. He committed no crimes nor hurt anyone.
So why was he in jail?
He was strapped down with chains of illness and weakness. He was locked away from the rest of the world in a pure white prison cell. Even the window could not open. Only a thick square of glass shoved in the middle of plaster.
Home.
He wanted to go home.
He wanted to feel warm again, to laugh again, to smile, to sing, to run without anything dragging him down. He wanted West, Elizaveta, Francis, Antonio—hell, he could even deal with that priss Roderich any day.
Gilbert was slowly sinking. He was not heavy enough to make even the slightest indentation in the mattress, but he could feel the springs and the cloth swallow him whole like quicksand. It wanted to devour him, keep him prisoner just like it kept Raivis and Toris prisoner. The sheets were tangling him, tying him down.
Get away.
Don't let them get you.
Gilbert's breathing rate grew faster with feverishness. He tore off the blankets and threw them on the ground. He used all his strength to push himself up and off the bed. The floor felt as cold as ice and just as slippery. His basketball shorts were slipping off; the elastic waistband had become too big for him.
He turned swiftly to the clock on the wall. Its ticking was so loud Gilbert swore that people all the way in Africa could hear it. It was like the trumpets leading to the last day of the world.
Every tick felt like another drop of blood draining from his face.
Gilbert growled. He staggered towards the wall, unhooked the clock from its high tower and in a swift motion slammed it against the floor.
The plastic casing cracked and shattered. The face smashed and scarred like a human's. The arms splintered off like toothpicks as the batteries inside crackled. It screamed in horror as the cartilage in its face snapped from the force. Teeth were chipped and broken off. Cheekbones shattered.
Gilbert felt powerful.
Gilbert smashed the clock on the floor over and over again until he couldn't lift his arms anymore. The floor was covered in shattered plastic and springs. Time was not palpable. It was not invulnerable. Not to Gilbert. He wouldn't let it.
He threw the remains of the clock against the wall before climbing back onto his feet. He had to get out of here. They were coming for him; what, he had no idea. He just knew that he had a debt that he needed to pay.
Gilbert stumbled out the door without a second thought. He gave no thought of what he was going to do, where he would go, how he would escape. He just needed to get as far away from that prison cell as possible.
Why were these hallways so long?
Gilbert quickened his pace. His heart beat wildly in his chest. He was excited. He was going to be free. He needed to see West again. He wanted to see his friends and Elizaveta, but not in that room anymore.
"Gilbert!"
A voice called at him. It was eerily familiar, but not in a good way.
Nurse Natalia.
Run!
Gilbert heard shouts and cries behind him. He urged his legs to move faster even though they were dragged down by frailty.
Where were the stairs or the elevators?
He felt like he was Theseus trapped in the vast labyrinth while the ruthless Minotaur sniffed for his blood. They were coming for him, the nurses and doctors. He took a quick turn to the left to elude them.
"Stop him!" a voice shouted directly behind him.
He broke into a run. He didn't care where he was going, he just wanted to run. He tore through the corridors, past the countless doors that walled in other sickly prisoners. He could feel his head spin as if someone cut it off and used it as a Frisbee. His nails dug into his palm as his hands clenched into a fist.
Someone suddenly appeared before him. Gilbert couldn't tell where he came from, but that didn't matter because now he was trapped. The person grabbed his wrists and shoved him against the wall. There were so many voices screaming and yelling on top of each other. Gilbert's throat hurt; perhaps one of the yelling voices was his own. He could see Nurse Natalia's and two other doctors' faces hovering over him, their mouths yawing with loud words. Gilbert's own mouth spat at them as he flailed and fought for freedom.
Let me go.
LET ME GO!
Gilbert felt something sharp and painful stab him in the neck. He tried to thrash and fight off the needle but it was too late. His thoughts grew slower and more sluggish. His eyesight blurred until he couldn't tell whose face was whose. He couldn't feel his limbs anymore. Did he ever have legs?
No.
Not now.
He needed to go home!
Gilbert was falling, falling, falling down the endless black hole, so dark that it was impossible that light ever existed.
Fading.
Please just let me go…
Black.
Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia make an appearance! I reckoned that since the Baltic Trio had stuck around with Russia longer and were closely guarded by him during the Commie time that in the allegorical view they would be the patients that were the sickliest and who stayed the longest.
Gilbert's attempt to escape was supposed to represent the times when East Berliners tried to climb over the wall to West Berlin. In the beginning of the whole Berlin Wall era, escapers would be heavily punished if caught. Then the East Berlin soldiers guarding the wall were ordered to kill whoever was trying to go over the wall, hence Gilbert's attack by sedative and failure to escape.
Though just to clear things up, it wasn't completely impossible to go over the wall. Around 5,000 people successfully escaped. East Germans successfully escaped by a variety of methods: digging long tunnels under the wall, waiting for favorable winds and taking a hot air balloon, sliding along aerial wires, flying ultralights, and in one instance, simply driving a sports car at full speed through the basic, initial fortifications (quote from Wikipedia). 136 people had died trying to go over the Wall.
