Phytoremediation

Everyone will see it. Everything's connected.

Sunny felt himself drift back to consciousness. This was getting to be a bit too familiar.

Sunny opened his eyes. A nostalgic medical eyepatch covered his eye. He heard Basil excitedly calling a doctor's name. Everything was still a bit hazy, but he began to get his bearings, and sat up.

An unfamiliar hospital room surrounded him. A bag Sunny recognized from Basil's room was sitting next to his bed. The door creaked, as Basil and a doctor came inside.

The doctor pulled a chair from near the wall, and sat in it next to the chair Basil happily bounced into.

"I'm so glad you're awake Sunny!" Basil excitedly proclaimed, as a doctor put on reading glasses, and looked at his clipboard.

"So, Sunny Whitbaker, yes?" the doctor asked.

"Yes." Sunny answered concisely.

"Doctor Long, emergency ophthalmologist, I would shake your hand, but I don't want to contaminate these surgical gloves." The doctor adjusted his glasses with the back of his hand, "So, Sunny, you are very lucky that you suffered no permanent brain damage. You really seemed to have had quite the fall."

Sunny looked at Basil, then back to the doctor. "Err... yeah, I guess so..."

Did he tell him, or...

"Unfortunately, your eye will... likely never work again. Trying to do another laser reconstruction risks grievous damage to the nervous system, and possibly even brain damage. If this type of this were to happen to you in, say, November, or December, you would likely have a working eye again too... but, unfortunately, your eye will most likely never return to function." Dr. Long spoke solemnly.

Sunny looked into his hands... or, only one of the hands, because the other was not visible, both resting on his knees. His vision miraculously being returned, and his friend surviving.

The night he... "saved" Basil, the reason he even got up and went to his room in the middle of the night was because he felt Mari direct him. She wanted him to help Basil, even if he didn't understand at the time.

"Your other eye also had to have its tear duct cauterized with a microheater, because it was somehow damaged. This means you won't be able cry from that eye anymore, which while not quite as... extreme... as what happened to your other eye, it is still worth mentioning." Dr. Long shuffled his clipboard, before continuing.

"Now, your eye may look... off-putting, so wearing some sort of covering made of a fabric is suggested. Do not wear anything made of wool, yarn, or leather, as these can damage the eye, cause infection, or both. You can also purchase medical eyepatches from a pharmacy, which are great for keeping your eye out of harm's way. If your eye begins hurting anywhere other than the center, come to our hospital immediately.

"Ah, this is Longyuan Hospital by the way, Sunny!" Basil added.

"Anything you think you got to tell me about your eyes?" Dr. Long asked as he got up to leave.

"No, thank you." Sunny replied. He felt awful, but most of that wasn't because of his eye. It was because of his emotions surrounding his loss.

Dr. Long left the room, leaving Sunny and Basil alone. "I'm... I'm sorry." Basil said with hesitation.

"For what?" Sunny asked, a bit confused, but more preoccupied with his thoughts.

"It's all my fault. I'm the reason your eye is going to be blind. I ruined your life..." Basil looked like he was actively fighting back tears.

"You aren't the one who threw me down a flight of stairs." Sunny countered.

"I might as well have." Basil sniffed, before admitting the truth, "I knew Hero and Kel were coming to that gym... I wanted to have you two make up... I didn't know it was that bad." Basil buried his face into his hands, repeating "I'm sorry"

This revelation surprised Sunny. Maybe he should've been a bit less subtle with his message that morning.

Sunny thought of how his mother was yelling at him this morning. "Basil, does my mom know what happened?"

"Yeah, I saw her yesterday." Basil responded quietly.

Another wave of surprise washed over him. "How long has it been since I was pushed down the stairs..?"

"Two days... I think... I'm not very good with time." Basil answered. His hand were still covering his eyes.

"Holy shit..."

Sunny's impromptu "shock therapy" was interrupted, as the weather bulletin on the tv screen that was playing some jazz fusion song suddenly switched to a man at a news desk.

"Welcome to Channel 5 news. I'm Nick Wu, and today we have a very important news segment. A missing man who is linked to a murder." An image flashed up on the screen, below the black bar at the top of the screen, which denoted that the channel being broadcast was channel 4. It also showed the current time, being 3:31.

The picture was a familiar face, but Sunny couldn't quite remember. "Before we explain the situation, please note that if you see this man, call the police immediately. Do not approach him, do not speak to him. If he approaches you, leave immediately."

Basil looked like he was shaking a little. Sunny wanted to help, but this broadcast seemed rather important.

"This man is named Yuri Zigong. He is 18 years old, and is 190cm tall. His build is unassuming. This man was missing from the scene where 2 of his roommates were found dead, and one was found stabbed 3 times in the chest, but survived."

Basil looked more anxious. Sunny tried to make him feel calmer, "Hey. It's okay, Basil."

This didn't seem to work.

"One of the men found dead was seemingly poisoned, and the other was an American exchange student at a nearby university, found with 35 stab wounds all around his body. These young men were 19 and 21 respectively. There will be a moment of silence for the loss of their lives at the end of this broadcast." The news man put his head down out of respect, before continuing, "the only survivor of these attacks has provided us with information about this incident."

The screen cut to a man that immediately made everything click. His greasy black hair. His eyes staring wildly into the distance. His hyperexpressive mouth. It was Wang.

Sunny now understood Basil's shaking. Sunny now also understood why he recognized the name Yuri, and felt like hitting himself for not realizing sooner.

Wang spoke with the same weird shaky voice he did at the "party" he set up. "So, I was... I was goin' out to get a sandwich. From that convenience store, right? There was like, a long line. I got back home, and I saw Yuto passed out on the ground with foam or something coming out of his mouth." Wang seemed to shudder at the memory, but it was difficult to read his emotions with how his mouth constantly seemed twisted into an exaggerated false expression, like some sort of Jim Carey impressionist.

"Then I, like, called out to Yuri and Colin, and like, Yuri walked down the stairs. And I yelled at him to like, call a hospital, right?" Wang seemed to shiver for a moment, "He just walked up to me, and stood over me for a few seconds, and I just looked into his eyes, and like, his face was just expressionless man, and then I looked at his hand, and I saw a knife, just fucking soaked in this deep red blood. This awful smell hit me, like the knife was making a weird smell, and then he stabbed me with it. He then like, kicked me onto my back, and started stabbing me again, and then again, but then like, the cops came. I think they came for a noise complaint or something like that, I dunno who called them, but he ran out the back door and I haven't seen him since." Wang finally cut short his rambling.

The footage cut back to the news anchor, who took the awkward pause that news guys always do whenever the camera switches. "Truly gut-wrenching. May the madman who killed those poor boys be caught soon, before he can hurt another. Let us have a moment of silence for the victims."

"Holy shit." Sunny remarked.

"Sunny... do you think he'll try to get us too?" Basil asked worriedly.

"Well now I am." Sunny replied.