Unsainted

1: Taught Me How To Die

The dream felt real. The pain, the grip of an impossibly large pair of hands crushing his throat; squeezing the life out of him, the wetness on his fingers and toes. The burn of a candles flame. The screaming and the crying.

 Atrox awoke in a impossibly dark space in complete paralysis, though at first it didn't bother him; he was just glad to know his tortures nightmare was over. His body was cold and stiff; refusing to listen to his commands to move, it didn't take long for Atrox to start internally panicking as he forgot how sleep paralysis worked. 

A bright light and a rush of warm air startled Atrox as a door was opened just behind his head, despite this he couldn't see past the white sheet that had been hastily thrown over him. He was dragged out on a metal board and loaded onto a small trolly, before being pushed into an even brighter room. The cart stopped and a shadow ripped the sheet of Atrox, it was a person covered head to toe in a blue plastic covering with a surgeon's mask covering the lower half of his face,

 "hello?" Atrox said. 

"Jesus christ" the surgeon said upon seeing his face; ignoring what Atrox had just said. 

"What now?" another voice said outside of Atrox's small field of view, 

"Look at his eyes" the first surgeon said, taking of out a small torch from seemingly nowhere and shining it into Atrox's right eye. 

"His eyes are yellow; so is his skin, do you think it was liver failure?" The surgeon removed the torch and left Atrox's vision and a panic in his mind, Atrox couldn't speak. 

'Am I still dreaming?' Atrox thought to himself staring into the blinding bright light above him "can either of you hear me?" Atrox said again.

 It was now becoming obvious that despite hearing his own voice speak these words, the men around him couldn't.

 "Who cares" the second surgeon said,

 "we do the autopsy, then we tell everyone it was a tumor in his brain and bury it forever" He said before momentarily appearing in Atrox's vision with a scalpel in his hand. Atrox wanted to cry, he wanted to scream but his body refused to move and the surgeons were none the wiser.

Both surgeons came into Atrox's vision both holding surgical tools, "let's begin" the second surgeon said bringing the scalpel to Atrox chest. He could feel the cold steel glide through his skin and flesh; scraping on his sternum, the pain was overwhelming and real. It burned like fire as the surgeon cut from the top on his ribcage, to the bottom. The surgeon finished the incision and they both looked at the wound with concern in their eyes, Atrox couldn't see the cut but he could feel his blood slowly leach out; failing to clout at the opening. 

"Is... is he bleeding?" the first surgeon asked, lifting Atrox's left arm and pressing his fingers against his wrist. 

"He shouldn't be" the second surgeon said continuing with the operation; swapping his scalpel with circular bone saw "He's been dead for forty-eight hours, blood shouldn't be moving through his system."

Pressing his curiosity the first surgeon dropped Atrox's arm causing his fingers to twitch, not enough to be seen; but enough to confirm to Atrox that he was still alive. At least for now. The first surgeon moved to Atrox's face and pressed his right ear against his mouth and nose, listening for a breath.

 "Dude you need to get out of the way" the second surgeon said with a sigh and a bone saw in his hand,

 "shhh" the first surgeon said holding up his finger as he listened carefully. The muscles in Atrox's body began to tense; out of his control and his mouth began to water,