Blank Tables

Chapter 2

Hunter awoke to two voices, panicked and obviously fighting about something. One he recognized immediately as his Uncle's, but the other took some time before he remembered exactly who's it was. He knew the voice to belong to a friend of the family, Sasha, a Russian who Hunter wouldn't deny to actually be crazy, who was notorious for showing up bloody and hurt and sometimes even homeless on their doorstep. He was apparently a long time friend of his mother and and uncle, who had gone to school with him growing up. Hunter wasn't quite sure exactly what he did, but it really did take it's toll on the guy.                                                                                                                                                                                           

At that particular moment,  He couldn't really tell what the two friends were saying, as for some reason it didn't register with his brain. Another thing he didn't know, was where he was. He could tell he was laying down, but he wasn't sure of his whereabouts. After a moment, the familiar smell of his home and the feeling of the living room couch that he was laying on clicked in his mind and he instantly felt a little more in-touch with himself. He then successfully attempted to move his hands and then opened his eyes. 

Never before had he been so aware in the process of rising back into consciousness, he felt like he had been in a coma for a lifetime. His muscles felt weak, his throat dry and his lops cracked, but his mental state felt like it had just been woken up with a lightning bolt. every sound in the room became clear and he could see the veins through the inside of his eyelid as he closed them again. 

The room seemed so bright, and the air felt surprisingly warm, as if someone had turned up the thermostat again. He tried to relax a little bit more but before he got far he felt a sharp striking pain in his eyes, that shot back through his skull and down his spine. He jolted up with a loud grunt and clutched his head in both hands, clawing at his scalp. 

Sasha and Travis stopped their quarreling and rushed over to where he sat perched on the edge of the sofa. Hunter opened his eyes again, and saw the crystal clear images of the two men, crouched before him and staring intently at him with wide eyes.                                                                                                                                                               

"What happened?" he said, looking at the two of them, wanting an answer.                                                   

"We have to tell him," stated Sasha, his heavily accented voice thick with concern.                               

"Okay then, tell him," replied his uncle, obviously not wanting to bearer of whatever bad news they had to tell him.                                                                                                                                                                                 

"I did all the work," he said defending himself and crossing his arms, turning his thick body towards Travis, "It's only fair you tell him."                                                                                                                                       

The two men began arguing again and Hunter lifted his hands to his face and groaned. In that moment however, he noticed that something tugged on his left arm and he looked over to see an IV tube with red liquid inside sticking out of his flesh. He held his breath as he traced the red tube with his gaze and followed it up to a stand with a bag full of a dark red liquid. As much as he didn't want to admit it, he knew what it was.                                                                                                                                         

"WHERE DID YOU GET THAT?!" Hunter shouted at the oafs, the two instantly falling silent and shrinking back from the aggression in his voice. Travis took Hunter's hand and lifted it up the the left side of his neck, where his fingers found themselves tracing the edges of two puncture wounds, slightly swollen from the skin being pierced. 

He could only stare at his Uncle and Sasha, wondering exactly what this meant. Surly he had just been attacked by some raging lunatic, but that didn't explain how he had been paralyzed like he'd been in the alleyway, or how exactly the attacker had made the puncture wounds.

He tried to tell himself that he was simply being crazy. The attacker had injected him with something, and used some device to puncture his neck and then...Hunter realized he didn't really know exactly what had happened next.  

"What happened in that alleyway Sasha?" He asked him, almost scared to find out what the man had to say. Sasha only swallowed hard and licked his lips, his eyes flashing to his uncle's, nervousness under the surface of his usually stone-cold emotions. 

"You were bitten," Sasha said, scared out how Hunter might react, "you lost a lot of blood because something, well..."

Hunter could've sworn that his heart stopped for a second. His eyes alone asked Sasha what he couldn't seem to say.

"Something took it from you."

Another thing that Hunter noticed was that the room seemed to get a lot hotter, and his heartbeat got faster and faster till he felt like his chest was going to explode. He choked on words he couldn't get ahold of in the last bits of breath in his lungs. He felt a tearing sensation in his chest, a pain that he didn't feel was even possible. Blood started to come up his throat, stinging as it forced it's way up into his mouth and out of his nose. He couldn't breath, and what was worse was that he couldn't scream, because all that came out was a ghastly sounding gargle from his blood filed throat as blood streamed from the edges of his mouth. He had ended up on the floor by the couch, his hands grabbing blindly at the corners of things around him as he writhed around the blood soaked floor around him. 

Not exactly the way he'd hoped to go out. Blinded by his own blood, drowning in his own life force, flopping around like a dying fish on the floor. He couldn't hear, the pressure of his own blood forcing through his body had blown out his ear drums, he couldn't see, he could only gargle and blow bubbles in his blood. His body heat was hotter than he felt possible, his face felt like it was literally burning, and then his heart beat finally peaked and he felt the pressure and pounding in his body stop almost as soon as it started. Finally this unbearable agony left him and he felt his body go numb, life letting him go from the pain in had caused him.