Chapter 2
Ash awoke, everything around him was blurry and noises filled his air; chattering, beeping and other incomprehensible sounds. His vision started to focus; Ash was looking up at a white, pristine ceiling. He started to move his head side to side, trying to comprehend his surroundings, make sense of this swirling pool of madness around him. To his right, a figure started to come into focus, muffled noise was coming from the blur. Ash tried to respond to the noise, but he could only manage a weak groan. The groan took all of Ash's energy and the room started to fade out, the noise becoming silence, passing out again.
A new room, this one was dark and the air felt off. Ash opened his eyes, finding himself already sat upright. He was sat on a cold damp chair in a hospital gown. He tried to stand, wanting to explore the room and make sense of this new strange environment, but as he found his wrists and ankles bound to the chair. Fear and panic entered Ash's body, his mind flashing back to when he was kidnapped at the age of seven. "Is anyone there?" Ash cried out, "Why are you doing this? Please let me out?" No answer, Ash found it pointless to try again and waited for his eyes to acclimatise. Ash's eyes started to pick out different silhouettes in the room, another dark, yet empty chair in the corner. What seemed like hours had passed, Ash had started to nod back off until he heard footsteps coming from the other corner. Ash squinted towards the corner and a tall dark figure started slowly towards him. Again, the figure reached out towards Ash and unlike before, Ash had no one to help him. The figure grasped Ash's throat and started to squeeze. Ash screamed out, louder than he ever has before.
The room turned white and Ash was facing the ceiling once more. People crowded around Ash, but he was unsure why. He heard loud, mad, uncontrollable screaming with an equally loud siren accompanying it. Why was that person screaming and where was it coming from, Ash asked himself. More people gathered around him, including Brock. Brock was looking directly at Ash, and Ash back at Brock, he was trying to say something to Ash, but the screaming and siren drowned his voice out. He kept repeating himself, over and over, getting more and more urgent. Ash raised his head and looked down on himself, at least a dozen people were holding Ash's down and a Nurse Joy was using bed straps to stop him from thrashing. Brock's voice was coming into focus, "Stop shouting!" Brock shouted over and over. Ash started to gain control over his body and slowly stopped his thrashing and screaming, allowing his friends and the nurses to release him. Nurse Joy still wasn't going to take any risks and kept Ash strapped to the bed.
After two hours and an injected sedative later, Nurse Joy took the straps of Ash and left Ash on the bed with a psychiatrist for both company and consolidation. "Is there anything you want to tell me and anything you say will be in complete confidentiality," the psychiatrist asked in a typical soft voice. Ash didn't register the psychiatrists question and just stared blankly out of his hospital room's window, trying to recall what set him off earlier. "How are you feeling now?" Ash, again, didn't pay attention. After another three hours, the psychiatrist came close to giving up on the silent Ash, until he quietly uttered a simple sentence that gave her hope. "I remember my nightmare."