Page 10 of Fatal Fantasy

It sounds familiar, but the words are foggy, and in a split second, everything goes silent. I move further away from the noise, toward a place where the pain stops, and a calming sensation takes control.

I don’t belong here, not yet anyway, but just as I slip away for good, a jolt of electricity runs through my body, bringing the pain back in agonizing waves.

The voices are back, along with loud wailing, but my eyes refuse to open, likely saving me from seeing what horrors I’m surrounded by.

“I’ll be back, brother. You’re going to be okay.”

Massi. My brother.

He’s here, and if I can hear his voice, I must not be dead yet.

His hand squeezes in mine, but a more petite touch is missing, and if I can’t find her in my subconscious, there’s nothing left to live for anyway.

That one thought echoes through my mind, searching for my girl in everything I can process or recognize, but even when everything begins to fade to black, she’s still not here.

Two Weeks Later

A bright white light invades my peace, and I fight against it, but something about this feels like I should find the surface.

My body wants to come out from the darkness, but when I peek one eye open, the pain rushes in all at once, and I groan, attempting to return to the place where nothing hurts.

It doesn’t work, but I instantly feel hands on my skin, and voices ring in my ears, piercing through me like nails on a chalkboard.

“Nurse! Nurse, he’s awake. I swear to God, he opened his eyes!” Someone yells, the sadness and terror enveloping me as I squint to see who’s making all the noise.

“Ty, look at me. It’s alright, I’m here. You can wake up now, brother. I need you here, please wake up,” Massi sobs, and I slowly open my eyes into his, a stream of tears rolling down his cheeks.

Slowly, I lift my hand, but it fights against me, like my arm is weighed down by bricks, and all the pain is centered in that one spot.

“Mas …” I try to speak, but my voice is hoarse, and I realize that I’m in a hospital, my blurred vision able to make out the IVs lodged in my veins.

“Mr. Kelly, welcome back to us,” A voice I don’t recognize says, and I turn my head, locating a shadowy figure standing beside me. “You’ve been in a coma for the last two weeks, healing from your wounds, but you’ve been in good hands.”

Two weeks? Jesus Christ, no wonder why I felt like I was floating through space.

I’m poked and prodded, relief flooding my veins and making my head spin, but the pain finally stops, and my eyes can adjust to the light.

A doctor comes rushing in and explains what happened, but the medical shit flies over my head, and I’m only concerned with one thing.

Where is Carter?

“Carter?” I choke out, interrupting all the conversations happening around me.

“Not right now, Ty. We’ll talk about it later,” Massi says, moving across the room and sitting beside my bed, but I push my back off the terrible mattress, tugging at the IVs in my arm.

“Where?” I grunt, not even finishing my sentence, but getting my point across.

If something fucking happened to her, I wouldn’t be able to live another day, and every second that I don’t know where she is stabs into my chest, the pain worse than whatever the bullets did to my body.

“She’s gone. She left us, Ty.” His words obliterate my entire world, and I deflate against the bed, each breath stagnant and slow, like the air has been stolen from my lungs.

He’s wrong, he has to be fucking wrong, because Carter wouldn’t just leave us.

Again, I try to sit up, but the lower half of my body doesn’t respond, my legs acting as if they’re cemented to the bed.

Every move I make feels like it’s working, but as I stare down at my feet, they don’t respond, not even with a slight twitch.

“Mr. Kelly, that’s what we’re trying to explain. The bullet lodged against your spine, and while we were able to remove it, there’s no way to know what kind of damage it did to your spinal cord. There’s a chance that you … you may never walk again,” The Doctor says, and my world falls apart once more, the idea of being paralyzed, or spending my life in a wheelchair crashing down on me like a cruel punishment from the universe.