The March of the Black Queen (book III)

58.) All My Life Still Ahead

I wake at once. Gasping.

It's as if all the air has been knocked out of me. Like my senses have gone into overdrive.

Hypersensitivity. Shock. Adrenaline rush.

I try to sit up, but I'm bound by cuffs. My weak limbs feel strained. My wrists burned by the rubber as if I've been twisting about trying to escape.

Where am I?

There's a heavy curtain  drawn around me, hospital machines beeping but none in sight. My head feels dizzy, my thoughts quick and loopy. A nauseated feeling squeezes my guts and my insides begin to panic.

Breath becomes harder to find as my panic heightens. The intensity of a whoozy migraine makes me want to grip my head, but my hands are still tied and all I can do is shove my head backward into the stiff pillow behind me, rolling my head from side to side to try and feel some sort of relief. 

I start to flex my arms, bend my knees, trying to curl into my self to make enough friction and pressure to break free. This doesn't feel right, something off. This seems like a trap, a napping— where the fuck is everybody!?

"Hello!!!," I yell and my throat burns. It's raw and sore. My voice is hoarse and tired like it hasn't been used in centuries. "Hello!? Can anybody hear me?!"

"We're going to need you to calm down. Take a few slow breaths. You're okay, Freddie. You're safe."

Who said that?

That's the question I try to say, but no words will come out of my mouth. My throat is dry, constricted with a sudden rush of fear, like any words that dare climb up my throat will scrape and scar me.

I'm too scared to open my eyes again. The harsh, blinding light is too much for my delicate vision and— hey! I can see!

Or... I could see. I could see everything, though there still isn't much to take in. No more blurry vision, no shadows to decipher. My sight isn't fuzzy, everything is crystal.

I shut my eyes a gain and squeeze them tightly. This is a dream. It's all a dream. It has to be.

How did I get here? Who's talking to me? Where are they?!

I slowly pry one eye open. My head still pounds, but I just want to be sure.

I breathe slower. In through my nose, out through my mouth. Everything's fine. I'm still in one piece, aren't I? But where—

"How do you feel now, Freddie?," a man somewhere hidden from the blinding, bright—

...that voice...why is it so familiar?

Though every sound and visual alike are heightened, rushing the void-like image of my surroundings into my brain for translation. I'm on a hospital bed. The four pristinely clean white walls that cage me, seem to go on forever.

"Can you hear my call?," the voice speaks again making me jump, slightly startled. "Why aren't you answering?"

I blink once.

Twice.

I squeeze my eyes closed again trying to shut out the sudden ear piercing noise, but end up in a sort of cringing spasm. My hands fly up in their restraints as I attempt shield my ears, but the hideous sound has already slipped beneath my skin, making it prickle. My jaw clenches and my shoulders scrounge upward.

"Sorry about that," feedback from a microphone makes me turn a bit, eyes spying the intercom hanging on the wall behind me.

"Had to figure out if your sense of hearing was back. You've only been able to see for a while now. Just staring at us...," he pauses.