RED PARALLEL

Chapter 52: I Hate Nurses

It took a while - a great big of a 'who knows' while - for consciousness to return to its numb owner. It hit him hard on the head, like 'duuude, you just lost some big shit around here'. Where was he? Who were these people? All dressed in grey fair blue wide shirts, badges, carrying metal trays with pills and-

Oh, no.

A hospital. Uhum. A fucking crowded annoying kind of a hospital, with hospital beds, hospital people, hospital walls, hospital smell, and... Hospital food... Oh, my... He stared at his body, and he was shocked. Half his left leg was heavily plastered, white and stony, arms and waist wrapped in a panicking beige strip, like a mummy. His bed had a metal rail around it, one more meter and he'd be inside a cage.

No, no, no...

He tried to get up but both arms were numb as hell, his back had apparently disappeared and his head got dizzy and back to the pillow. That sensation swiftly reminded him of when he had woken up at The Crib, years ago, screwed up and broken. Yet no yellowish warm color, just grey, and dull-white, several beds ranged across the long infirmary room, with all sorts of screwed up people. The man at his side had a plastic inhaling mask stuck on his face, unconscious - or maybe already dead - body about to disappear inside the sheets, two plasters on each arm, a purple leg... On the other side, a fat woman, this time the plaster around her bald head, band covering half her reddened face. And then around, deformed plastered people, some of them groaning, some of them super dead, some of them with doctors who were scribbling notes and wearing bored faces, because they wished they were having some fresh b-soda and a pizza rather than being near a bunch of sick broken people.

He shut his eyes and tried not to puke, but not to worry, no food would come out. There was a vacuum inside his body, yet it didn't mean it wouldn't ache. And it did when he noticed that his left arm had a needle on it, a long plastic thread connected to a monster transparent purse with a nasty beige liquid. He panicked and started yelling, trying to pull out his arm, but his body was immobile and there was no voice coming out but a stupid choke, and damn, why not just die, and die, and die, he didn't ask for needles, for plastics and wraps and all that stuff. The robot people with badges would just pass and never notice his silent despair, too busy treating a patient that wasn't him. Maybe he was invisible like the plastic, after so many chances to be dead.

The worse was yet to come, yeah, and that made him utterly mad because a nigga appeared - yo, finally - with a box of new bandages and grabbed Traviz's leg like a generic piece of clapboard and removed the plaster, without a word, without demonstrating that that piece of wood belonged to a living panicked person who needed some help to vanish as quickly as possible, preferably out of thin air. Just no. After changing the bandages, the asshole stuck a syringe at the middle of the thigh, without asking for permission, so Traviz blacked out and slept until the next day, ready - but no - for another prisoner routine.

The torture went through days and days and days, mornings afternoons and nights and other special hours, needles changing, new strips and plasters, someone simply grabbing him and turning his body like a roll and passing cotton with cold liquid all around him, especially in his butt. Later, he realized that there was a pipe connecting the bottom of his belly to some sort of bucket. His feces. And the piss. Running out of his body with no need for a private decent trip to a toilet. Then, he remembered the red blisters on his dick. Jeez, someone might have noticed it, of course! And it didn't take long to confirm. Another nurse - a sneezing guy short as hell - opened up Traviz's random ridiculous hospital cloth-like, there was no back, simple as that - and started putting his fucking hands on his dick, cleaning it, placing bands and passing shivering and burning liquids. He tried to yell, but all he managed was to shake his feet, and the nurse didn't even care, too focused on the sad cornered dick.

Urgh!

The inferno hospital saved some surprises for later. Another jerk came. Why not call a cute hot woman, goddamn. But no, because inferno was inferno. Hell rules were meant to be followed, especially in that place. Yeah, a cold hell. What the hell. So the third nurse came, with no relevant appearance, just a terrible smirk on his face, like, really terrible. After changing all of the changeable sets, the man spoke:

"Having some fun out there, right? I see stupid inconsequential teens like you all the time, you know. Before you try to ask me annoying questions, oh you can't, let me tell you. You are a lucky person, which is sad since you'll probably never learn about what you should know. People like you don't deserve a place in this world."

Traviz tried to make the most disgusted and offended face ever.

"You have Herpes," the man said. "A ridiculous virus, acquired from your thousands of unprotected sexual relationships. People are always proud to fuck on a daily or maybe hourly basis, well I'm happy that some of them will end up dead. It's a shame your blood test was negative for HIV, I'd have a blast to confirm another patient who'd spent his entire mediocre life paying for a flock of remedies. There's still hope, though. Keep your mindset and we'll see each other again. You still got time. There's always an opportunity to screw up yourself even more. You're on the right way, congratulations."

The insane nurse-doctor maniac monster walked away before Traviz could attempt another limited reaction.