Chapter 20: Within
It was barely three and a half in the morning when Vlad frantically looked for the nurse-call button by his bed.
He didn't know what the blood blossoms infusion was doing to him, but it was obvious wasn't it it was a ghost repellent and Vlad had drunk it all there was a hole in his upper chest a gapping wound of nothing where flesh and skin should be and he couldn't feel his own heartbeat.
it wasn't the first time was it
The room was almost pitch black – except for a small line of light coming from the other side of the door – and yet Vlad could see the hole in his torso, could see his own lungs glowing pink green like ectoplasm through it, could see the bones last remnants of the dead if not for their souls lost away his rib cage as it pretended to keep his insides within his body.
something rippled through his entire body
His lungs shimmering in pink and ectoplasm and death once again inflating slowly was he still breathing then he couldn't tell, a grotesque sight to behold.
"clear!"
he'd been shocked before
Vlad let go of the nurse call button in a panic as the phosphorescence within his chest cavity flickered out, his lungs out of sight as should be and yet, not present anymore.
As if they'd fallen out of his body, through the other organs he could distinguish in the dark.
pounding
present dull against his ribcage
"clear!"
Something was glowing above the mattress, not too far from where he sat.
Vlad had the feeling he shouldn't look – shouldn't know – but there was nothing to do too late already even pretending he couldn't see wouldn't change anything. There was no ignoring the pink-suffered light expanding and collapsing and expanding again right by his side.
not so far from where his lungs should be either
but too low
not where it was supposed to be
not inside him
"clear!"
hurts a flash of green
"banzai!"
Vlad kept sitting on his hospital bed, his head in his hands and his lungs hanging out, half visible if only because of their glow, when Nurse Porter and a doctor rushed in. Perhaps, if he didn't say anything, it would all go away.
Perhaps, if he didn't try to pretend that any of this could get better...
perhaps