The Last Genie: A Novella

Chapter 3

When Ithel finally woke up in the hospital, he felt weird. He expected to feel at least some pain, but he didn't. He just felt kind of drunk, but not a normal kind of drunk.

I'll go ahead and tell you. Ithel was high on the pain meds that were dripping into his arm. In all of his almost fifteen hundred years, Ithel had never been high on pain medicine or any substance, and he didn't like it.

Even though Ithel had never been on pain medicine or been in a modern hospital for that matter, he had watched enough TV to know that he was feeling weird because of whatever was dripping into his arm, so he reached down and yanked the needle out.

Ithel was no fool, and like I said he had watched a lot of TV, so he didn't try and get up even though all he really wanted to do was get the hell of out there. He waited and when a nurse came in and tried to put his IV back in, he explained that he was a recovering addict and couldn't risk taking any pain medication. He had to sign a form, but he was able to keep the IV out of his arm.

By that night, Ithel's pain medicine had completely worn off, and he was in agony. But, that was ok. He was used to being in agony. The important thing was that his mind was clear.

Ithel convinced the night nurse to turn off all the equipment that was supposed to be measuring his heart rate, blood pressure, and who knows what else because it was keeping him awake, and then when the ward was quiet, he slipped out of his bed and nearly collapsed on the floor.

Ithel hadn't realized it because of all the other pain he was in, but his left leg was hurt quite bad.

Ithel gritted his teeth, steadied himself on his bed, then limp-staggered into the bathroom. After relieving himself, he looked in the mirror and was not happy with what he saw. There was a large bandage around his neck, and the left side of his face was covered in little cuts and scrapes.

Ithel removed the bandage around his neck and dropped it in the trash, then limp-staggered to his bag of personal effects, which was hanging on the back of his door. He opened his bag and found his pants and wallet, but annoyingly, his shirt, shoes, and cash were gone.

After mumbling a few choice profanities, Ithel got dressed the best he could, which entailed tucking his gown into his pants, and cracked open his door. He made sure the hallway was clear, then limped quietly out of his room, and into the room next door.

Unfortunately, there was a woman in that room and her clothes would not fit, but finally after creeping into two more rooms, Ithel found a shirt that was fairly baggy on him but would do and shoes that actually fit quite well. He quickly put them on and limped out of the hospital.