Marshall looked up from the ground, tears streaming in rivulets down his face. He couldn't stand the sight, all his friends lying in the hospital cots like mannequins, tied down, frothing at the mouth. He dipped his head again, choking on the tears that wouldn't stop flowing, wouldn't stop softly caressing his cheeks, his watery blue eyes aglow. He could hear from the other side of the six-inch glass the horrifying screams and murmurs coming from his friends, the infested gargles rising up through the vents in the room and into the waiting area outside. His own boyfriend, Chase, was especially acting erratic, eyes wild beyond sanity, gleaming with sweat and blood as he vainly and savagely tried to escape from the hospital bed, but the leather straps held his arms, legs, and neck in place. He was raging mad, screaming like a Banshee. Marshall just cried, harder, longer.
He wished he had been there when the parasite had escaped into the lab, when the little lice-like bugs crawled up through his friends' noses, eyes, and mouths, eating out their brains and infesting them from the inside out. He had gone for a washroom break, exiting the chemistry branch of the hospital ward, and had come back to dogs in hazmat suits, gas masks, the door to the lab sealed off and the glass looking in covered in bloody vomit and guts. He had stared, confused, scared, distraught beyond comprehension, not believing that the terrible figures that writhed in the lab behind the glass were his beloved friends, his colleagues, his boyfriend. Chase had been the one to accidentally release the parasite into the room, and now he bore the bitter and most grueling consequences.
Now, their gaunt forms were like skeletons, haunting and horrible, moaning in their respective beds, tubes struck through on every conceivable part of their body. His boyfriend, Chase, was by far the worst, his skull deteriorating, his intestines clearly visible through his rotting flesh. He was still very much alive and breathing, but Chase no longer there; rather, the parasite was now Chase. Marshall couldn't stand the sight. He turned and walked out of the ward, out of the hospital, out into the cold night air. It was late. He breathed in, deeply, feeling the cold air grace his nose. He fell to his knees, hands resting on his lap, his heart torn in two, irreparable damage; he was shaking, heaving sobs racking his body. He couldn't comprehend his loss. He sat, staring at the cracked pavement, crying his heart out in frustration to a God who let this happen, to someone who could have taken so much away so fast. It started to rain, but he didn't care. His lab coat was drenched with rainwater by the time he got up, went back inside, and looked back through that horrible glass.
"Goodbye guys." He whispered, voice on the verge of breaking, tears flowing still, and with a final whisper barely audible to even himself, "Goodbye Chase. My one and only love." He crumpled to the ground again. He didn't know how to move on. It was simple, grotesque even. He sighed, hiccuped, and got up on shaky legs. He looked back one last time, turned once more to the exit, and just sat down on a bench underneath the rain roof, rested his head on his hands, ready for the world, but not yet to embrace it. Never again.