Track 02
My eyes creaked open. There was a window…? I was on a bed. There were voices too. I blinked a few times before I tried getting up. “mmmm” I groaned. Getting up was a mistake. It only aroused the slumbering headache within. I grabbed my head with both my arms and attempted to squish the pain away.
“It seems one of the survivors from yesterday’s radical attack has awoken to tell her story.”
Getting up didn’t only arouse my headache. I peeked up through my hands and was quickly bombarded with an infinite amount of flashing lights. The clicking and blinking and snapping and shouting were migraine-inducing. I groaned some more.
“We’re here; live, with one of our waking survivors of the Klover Community Centre Radical incident.”
“It is an absolute miracle for so many of yesterday’s Klover hostages to come out alive that dreadful afternoon. We at ENN have live access to a waking-”
“A grateful day it’s been today for families to be reunited with their respective victims, here is one young lady who has yet to-”
Multiple news reporters were facing their individual cameras, speaking to their respective channels about how shocking it was that I was alive. It was absolutely horrifying. I looked down at my clothes which were even more horrifying. Some evil nurse or devilish machinery had taken full advantage of my unconscious docile nature, to unforgiveable extremes by forcing me into these polka-dotted hospital duds from hell. I normally never cared whatever the heck I was wearing; my usual attire consisted of a pullover hoodie and a sacred scarf wrapped around my shoulders after all, but I couldn’t help but feel self-conscious with all the heavy-duty video cameras and foam covered microphones pointing down at me from every angle.
Why were they allowed in here?
… Oh… that’s right, you needed parental dissent or objection from a relative in order to disallow media access. Probably while everyone else had their relatives signing repelling forms, the news channel gangs were all forced to pool together at the only opening room left for gossipy intel. No relative of mine would be fending off their legal rights to pillage my privacy. Not for this incident or any I could find myself involved in. No matter how life-threatening. Not now… nor ever…
I heaved out an exhale that seemed to take away my spirit for an intense number of seconds… until I found myself a powerful distraction: the hospital workers had changed me during my unconsciousness, we’ve established this, but where did they put my clothes? Specifically my scarf?
Panic much deeper than mere embarrassment started infecting all corners of my mind. I looked around the bed, avoiding the curious gaze of the many onlookers, I looked around a desk, over the TV (with the lagged image of my waking face on it – a sight I had to rip my gaze from), then under the sheets, and around the room towards the door when-
My panic subsided. On a chair, near the door, lay a pile of my folded clothes, my scarf rested with care, on top.
I hadn’t noticed, until I located my belongings, but the news staff were all questioning me about the events that occurred in that building.
“So Miss, what was it like to be a hostage in yesterday’s attack? What was it like knowing your life could end at any second?”
“I… um-” I stuttered.
“Miss” -click click- “Miss” “Miss”-click- “Miss”,
“Miss, can you describe to us how the threats were started?”
“Miss, were you traveling with anyone that day, did you know anyone else in the crowd who was in any immediate danger? Did you have to witness anyone else getting harmed like yourself?”
I tried not to look at them like they were all insane, keeping in mind of the fact that my face was gawking at multiple different channels at once. By the speed and rate of their questions you’d think I were a celebrity.
“Miss! I’d imagine you’re overwhelmed by the traumas you’ve faced yesterday, but please tell us exactly how it feels to be a living miracle?”
“Miracle?” I scoffed. “It wasn’t a miracle, I was saved by that-”
“So you’re saying a police officer is responsible for this miracle? What would you like to say to the police force for saving your life?”
“What? No. It wasn’t the police force; it was that kid with the headphones. Where is he? You should be asking him the questions, not me.” A little twang of guilt struck me for wanting to push these reporter hawks on the guy who saved my life, but at the same time I felt like I’d do anything to get them out.
“So there you have it Jim, just like the other victims we’ve interviewed, it seems the trauma has affected her memories.” Many of the reporters were saying similar schemes of my trauma being the reasoning for the lies spewing from my mouth.
What interview? You idiots just interrogated me and forced the info you wanted to hear down my throat. I clenched my teeth and looked out the window to calm my spirits. Gazing for anything at all that might help my racing heartbeat. The sky didn’t work, I always felt like it was a fraud; projected there as a holographic mirror of this utopian city.
I looked down to the distant mountainous land I’d never reach nor get past, just another blockade to keep me from freedom, down further, my eyes sunk, now to the trees along the streets. They didn’t strike me as a natural stimulant either, just the perfectly planted pieces of plastic aligned the way the developers had planned, real or not, from up here they were only models posing as eye candy. Down again, losing hope as I looked into the streets. The reporter’s voices were filtering back into my mind. Rushing people, busy movements, fast paced transportations causing a ruckus like the news people noise streaming straight through my skull.
Then I saw it- the- g- that- that- Him! Out there, many floors down, in the middle of a four-way cross-walk, I thought I caught someone staring at me. Someone who had to be him! The guy who saved me! My eyes widened as I scurried closer to the window. A crowd of people crossing the street sucked up the person I was preoccupied by, and I lost them. Was that really him?
“As you can see, this poor young miss behind me is dazed from the traumatic events. It is only thanks to the brave police forces of Ezveria that she is alive but she is delusioned into thinking she was saved by one of the radicals themselves.”
Desperate fools dying to hear a story they want to write. I smiled an irritated smile and turned to them. Unbelievable. Completely unbelievable. I knew these people were scumbags, but I never would have imagined it to be this bad.
“Fine...” I breathed. “Fine! You’re right! I’m crazy!” I got up to a knee and reached for a pillow behind my back. “I’m delusional!” I screamed and threw the pillow straight to the reporter’s head. I threw it so hard that it squirted out puffs of coloured feathers all over the room. I quickly reached for the other pillow and stood up on the bed. Behind my back I edged towards the help button and discreetly poked it repeatedly.
“-Much too sick in the head to answer all your stupid, self-answering questions!” I chucked another pillow across the room to a video camera this time. More coloured feathers exploded across the room, then a number of nurses piled in. I sprang off the bed and dashed towards my clothes near the door. One nurse tried grabbing me, but I was too quick. Hugging my stuff to my chest I skidded out the room, a flurry of feathers followed me out. Then I sprinted down the hall, pulling a lot of attention and chasers with me.
“Out of the way, delusional maniac coming through!” I’d leave the bill with all those reporters that caused this. If they can afford to barge into people’s rooms with their fancy tuxedos and tuxettas, and gadgets and hairdos, then they can afford my medical treatment.
At the end of the hall I saw a sign that pointed left for elevators and right for stairs. I’m sure my pursuers didn’t want to take the stairs, so I turned left out of consideration for them.
Once I turned and was out of their sight, I entered a random room and hid behind a curtain away from the door. There, I wrenched on my jeans. Some kid eating a lollipop was in the bed gawking up at me while the charging mob of cameras and nurses ran past. I gave the child a quick smile and ran out the room in the opposite direction towards the stairs.
I shoved the door out of my way and slid down railing after railing, all the while tugging off the hospital sheets, throwing it to the side, and diving into my hoodie. By the time I reached the last step, my hood was on and I was flinging my scarf over my shoulder and strolling out of the stairwell like a normal person – which I was by the way; normal.
I made my exit out of the hospital and rush-walked to that street I glimpsed before where I thought I saw that kid. I wouldn’t live my rescued life in peace if I never thanked him for it. Therefore I’d find him no matter what. I was determined.