The Hollow (Rose of the Dawn Series Book 2)

“Tithonus”

By
Alfred Lord Tennyson

(1809-1892)

Verse
1

The
woods decay, the woods decay and fall,

The
vapours weep their burthen to the ground,

Man
comes and tills the field and lies beneath,

And
after many a summer dies the swan.

Me
only cruel immortality

Consumes:
I wither slowly in thine arms,

Here
at the quiet limit of the world,

A
white hair’d shadow roaming like a dream

The
ever silent spaces of the East,

Far-folded
mists, and gleaming halls of morn.

The room is grey. I’m naked and lying on
cold metal, skin numb from a million pinpricks.

My eyes are
open, but I’m unable to move. Dead bodies lie beside me, piled one on top of
the other, invading the periphery without turning my head. My eyes burn. It smells
like antiseptic syrup. This must be the smell of death.

Someone else is
in the room. Talking. Not as loud as the fans whirring in the background. It’s
all just humming in my ears until they get closer. Laughing. Two people, now
three. Standing over me. Looking down.

“Are you sure
there’s nothing?” One of them says. It’s a man. He’s tall. Wears a suit. Grey.
Another man beside him is almost identical. I’d feel embarrassed if I felt
anything at all.

“No pulse. She
was dead on arrival,” a third person says. A woman. Wearing a long, white coat.
A doctor.

“No!” I scream!
“I’m not dead!” I scream even louder! Only in my head. No one reacts. No one
hears me. The light in the room gets brighter. Warmer. My body is becoming
lighter. Weightless.
Am I floating?
A pearly-white mist surrounds me. I’m
elevating within the room, above the two men and the woman. They don’t notice,
keeping their gaze on my still body below.

“But I’m right
here!” I yell. “Why can’t you see me?”

Seeing through
the gauze shroud that covers me, my hands are folded across my midsection. My
arms and legs are an unnatural white color. Too white. Glowing white. I am a ghost
looking upon a corpse.

One man lifts my
cover and anger surges, wells up inside me above, while I remain still below.
The doctor takes the sheet and taps it down with a gentle hand.

“Respect for the
dead, please,” she says. Her voice is soft, but detached-sounding. Like it
isn’t coming from her body.

“I’m not dead!”
I yell. “I’m! Not! Dead!” Again, I’m the only one who hears me. The doctor
turns, her hand indicating the door.

I suppress the
panic long enough to use all potential energy to move. To make anything move. Slowly,
my eyes shift, once left and back to center. Right. Center.

“Did you see
that?” One suited man touches the other man’s arm to stop his retreat toward
the exit. “I think her eyes moved.”

“Yes! Yes they
did!” I scream, happiness filling my chest. I lower back down to my body.

“Reflex action,
gentlemen. Shall we?” Her hand once again points toward the door. I can see the
doctor scowl as she looks straight at me. Her eyes boring holes into my own.
With one swift move, she pushes me on my rack, back into an icebox. The door
slams with a loud and hollow click.

“Hello?” I’m
back in my body, stuck inside this wall. My voice echoes in my head. I’m cold.
It’s cold. Not like the warmth that was left behind.
Where was I back there?
Where am I now?

I’m in a dark
metal box. Metal walls. Metal door. All around. My eyes are open and unseeing.
There is ice on my eyelashes. I can feel them stick to my eyelids. My lips are
parted, I can feel the cold inside my mouth. My nose is frozen.

I still can’t
move. I can’t speak, but I’m not restrained. I’m contained and overtaken by
exhaustion. My physical eyes stay open while my acuity shuts down.

When I wake up,
I’ve been removed from the freezer. I’m in the main room, the same bodies are
piled up as before, but this time I’m one of them. I’m about to go crazy when
someone walks into the room. An attendant wearing navy-blue clothes, a V-neck
shirt that matches long pants tied with a string.

He walks over to
me, pulling me out of the pile and onto a gurney. I still can’t move. My eyes
won’t close. They are dry and there’s a stabbing pain behind them. I wish he
would close them for me. I wish they would close forever.

Instead, I
muster up all my strength to move my eyes again, to get his attention. They
roll to the side, then my eyelids close.

I can blink!

I blink again,
only once. I feel sick.

“I know, I
know,” the attendant says. He’s young with brown hair and brown eyes. His voice
is hushed. “I see you seeing me.”

A tear rolls
down my cheek and he wipes it away with his thumb. He knows I’m not dead.

“This will give
us just enough time to get you to your room,” he says, sticking the side of my
neck with a needle. He injects something cold. Burning cold. Almost hot.

He moves his
hand up to my eyes and closes them. I exhale, relief washes over me. I have no
choice but to drift back to sleep.

My eyes are open again. I opened them. I
thought I would’ve been out of this place by now. The attendant said I would be
in my room, but I’m not. Lying on the same gurney, another attendant wearing
the same clothes is standing beside me. Hovering over me. Waiting for
something.

I don’t hear
anything and then I do. Like the volume in my head is being turned up, someone
else is talking. About me. What to do with me.

“Second floor.
Female ward. Let’s go.” I can’t see who’s talking, but it’s a man’s voice behind
me. He clicks something by my head and starts to push me to the exit. Two
double doors. Blue, I think. Rusty. A crack in one of the windows spiders out
in all directions.

I am wheeled out
of the icebox and across a hallway, into an elevator.

The doors close.
It’s cool inside, but not cold like the room I just left.

“Look at her
eyes,” the voice at my head says. He’s still out of my range of vision so I
can’t see him.

“What about ’em?”
The man at my feet replies. He is short with black hair. His voice is higher
than I would’ve expected.

“There’s no
color. Have you ever seen that before?”

“Frostbite.” The
man by my feet answers. He glances at me, but doesn’t stare.

“There’s still
ice in the corners,” the man I can’t see laughs. He reaches a finger down and
touches my open eye. I can’t move my head out of the way, or even blink.

“Leave it alone.
Don’t stare and don’t touch!” The second man says as the opposite door opens
and he pulls me out of the elevator.

“It’s not like
she can do anything about it. What’s she gonna do? Tattle on me?” Again he
laughs. I try my hardest to close my eyes, but it’s no use. I’ve lost it. My
emotions are locked into my body.

“Let’s just get
her where we need to get her. Female ward, room B143.”

“What is she in
for service or experiments?” The laughing man pushes harder.

“Does it
matter?” The second man says and his voice implies sympathy. Or is it sadness.

I’m rolled past
metal bars outside each room. No windows. No natural light. I hear the wheels
slap through water on the floor.

We stop at a
room and the door is opened. It’s dark inside. The gurney is pushed in and
locked into place, parallel to another bed already in the room. Lights turn on
with the movement. The blinds are closed. The attendant at my feet picks up the
sheet while the other rolls me off the gurney and onto a bed. I land on my
stomach, my face buried in a flat pillow that smells musty.

Pike.

Aegis.

My pillow.

The attendant
that I can see rolls me onto my back, pushing me over so I don’t drop off the
bed. My head is against my chest and it’s difficult to breathe.

“C’mon, let’s
get outta here. She’s freakin’ me out,” the laughing attendant says. My eyes
are filling with thawing water and he’s a bit blurry. He’s big and very tall
with a blur of red, wavy hair. He moves away from the bed toward the door.

The second
attendant lowers the sheet back over me and takes care to tuck in my feet and
around my sides. He takes my head in his hands and gently aligns it with my
spine. I’m now staring up at the ceiling, but I’m able to catch my breath. My
eyes are slowly warming. I try to blink and I can close them about halfway.
Better than nothing.

Before he leaves
the room, he clicks something on a panel. The room gets warm. Almost hot. As he
leaves, the light goes with him and I’m left in a dim room.

I try to focus
on moving, otherwise, I may just panic. I can’t let myself panic. Not yet.

Glancing around
the room, the walls are a dingy-white, paint chipping off from the top. A tin
ceiling, ornate in its design is rusting. My eyes flood. I’m able to blink the
water away. The vision is gone. I’m hallucinating. But what am I really seeing?

The room is not
dingy at all, but stark-white. Shiny and new. Floor-to-ceiling windows are
hidden by long panels of dark cloth, not allowing any light to get in. All
around the base of the angular room are tiny lights, illuminating the floor. There
isn’t much in the room for decoration, but there are touch screens mounted
around the room. Off.

Tucked into bed
and still unable to move. My neck is sore from the dull ache of an injection. I
feel it and other things. Blood flows out to my fingers and toes. It’s faint,
but it’s there. I open my mouth.
I can open my mouth!
I’m able to move my
lips. Air shushes out. Warm. Stale.

“P-P—” Air
presses through my lips. There’s a lump in my throat and I’m unable to -

“Please?” I push
out. I tremble and then shake. Something is sinking in. Fear, maybe. Panic. I’m
scared.

“Ssss-ssommme-one?”
Someone has to be out there.
Where are you?
My voice is so small in this
room. I can’t get any more words out, I almost choke on the terror.
Where
are the attendants? Are they coming back? What’s going to happen to me?

Suddenly a screen
lights up and at first I think it’s voice activated, until a heavy drape across
the room slides back and a nurse walks in. She clicks the same control pad the
attendant did and the temperature immediately drops. Not much, though. It’s
still warm. Her hand swipes across the screens as she passes them. One after
the other lighting up. Everything about me is there on the walls: name, age,
gender, height, weight, birthdate, birthweight, shoe size, waist, chest, and
hip measurements. Even a recent picture of me is up on the wall. I’m surprised.
I look pretty.

The door behind
her shuts slowly, as if weighted. I didn’t hear it open in the first place. She
has on a white jumper and white tights, white clogs and a white bow in her
black hair.

“Good afternoon,
Miss Campbell,” she says, putting a clipboard down on the small bedside table.
I see a checklist and scribbled notes, but it doesn’t look like any writing or
language I’ve ever seen. Why does she need this when she has everything up on
the wall?

She leans over
me, takes my arm, and pushes back the gown’s sleeve. I’m wearing a gown. I must
have been dressed.
When?
The nurse presses something to my arm,
something hard, and stamps something into my skin. I don’t feel anything other
than the pressure. The nurse then takes another device and scans the mark she
made on my arm. The screen is updated with current vitals such as oxygen and
blood pressure.

The nurse walks to
the curtains over the windows and open each one with a flick of an invisible
switch. The room turns a brighter shade of grey. There is chain-linked metal
over the windows, creating a criss-crossed shadow on the floor and on the bed. I
see it and then it’s gone.
Where did it go? Am I going crazy?

A million
questions run through my head, and two make it out of my mouth.

“W-where? H-how
long?”

The nurse
doesn’t look up, just clicks a mechanical pencil and writes notes on the white clipboard.
“You have got a lot of questions. Do not tax yourself. They will all be
answered in time.”

I swallow hard.
It’s like an egg is stuck in my throat. I try to force it down. If I can, I
might be able to get out something that makes sense.

“Who am I?”

The nurse doesn’t
react. I didn’t mean to say that. Not that way. I want to know how she knows
who I am. Where did all this information come from?

“I-im – im –” I
stutter.

Try again.

“Imm - b-b-
bead?”

“No, Dear, this
is not the Imperial Bead Hospital.”

I exhale. That
was hard and I’m getting tired again. Then where am I? I want to know.

The nurse
doesn’t smile. She writes notes slowly and deliberately after examining every
part of my body. Then putting the pencil and clipboard down on a white side
table, she opens a drawer and prepares a bandage by unrolling it and then rolling
it tighter than before.

I’ve been hurt.
It’s coming back to me.
Why won’t she tell me more?

“I will have to
change your dressing.” She puts down the gauze and pulls on rubber-like gloves.

My dressing? What
dressing? For what?

My eyes widen
and it shows up on one of the screens. The nurse glances up at it. She doesn’t
look at me, but rather speaks to the wall.

“If you are
anxious, I can sedate you.”

“N-no.” I shake
my head and it feels like it is filled with thick, thawing liquid. And when I
move my head from side to side, the center of mass shifts with it.

“Your bandages
need changing and your wound needs to be cleaned from the gunshot.”I remember. Running.
JJ.

“You sustained
damage to your lower back. The shot did not go clean through and the doctor had
to remove it before you were cleared for transport. I am going to flip you on
your side now.”

The nurse folds
back my sheets and turns them down. They are just as neat as if she had left
them alone.

“You’ll feel my
hand on your back with some pressure.”

I feel nothing.

I can see her
lean into the bed.

She stabs me
with something and I squeal. Pain shoots through my back, radiating up and down
my legs. My arms shiver in pain and then it dulls.

“That is good.
The IES injection is wearing off.”

I furrow my
brow. It takes quite a bit of energy to do so and it surprises me when it shows
up on the screen. I don’t know what she’s talking about.

“The interlaminar
epidural steroid. Epidural. Pain relief for your back.”

“Shot?”

“Yes. Lower
back. We had to inject the drugs directly to your spine through the space
between your vertebrae. When you can feel we will know whether you sustained
permanent neurological damage.”

I hear the sound
of tape ripping off skin. I can’t feel it. It must not hurt enough.

“I am pulling
off the bandage to clean and sanitize the wound. I am going to replace the
gauze pads for fresh ones.”

She talks like a
robot. But at least she’s talking. There’s strange comfort in that.

I can hear her
rubber gloves skid over my skin.

“You are all
set. Your dressings are fresh and they will not need redressing until this
evening.”

“N-no! No!” I
shout. My voice loud and choppy. I don’t want her to leave. Don’t leave!

“I will be back
this evening to change your bandages. I will bring you something to eat. Do you
have any requests?” Bile rises in my throat and I feel sick.

She turns and
swipes at the screen. A scan of my brain appears on the screen. The word
inconclusive
is reported on the bottom. She swipes again and my most recent food intake
comes up on the wall. She clicks and scrolls. The light changing so quickly, I
think my headache might return. Even the weight of my recent evacuation is
there. In plain daylight.

“You have been
given nutrients osmotically and intravenously.” She doesn’t look at me, but points
to a large bag of clear fluid below one of the screens. I hadn’t noticed it,
being so small compared to the wall of technology. The bag drips out the fluid
into the clear tubing attached to the port on my hand.

I still don’t
feel anything.

The nurse closes
the screens. “You should get some feeling back soon. Time will tell, of course,
but it should not be too much longer. I will come back and give you something
for the pain when it does. When the epidural wears off, you will feel the
wound, though it is almost completely healed,” her voice drifts.

“N-nurse,”

“Yes?” She
stops.

“How… long h-here?”

“A few days,” she
states.

Without the
screens, the room goes back to grey. She walks over to the curtains and draws
them again. The little lights on the floor illuminate.

“The kind of
wound you had,” she stands beside my bed and puts the bandages back into the
drawer. She picks up her clipboard and writes as she continues, “would normally
take months to fully heal. Your body has done it in a fraction of the time.” She
walks to the door and opens it.

“Will…I…leave?”
I yell.

She stops and
turns.

“No one knows
you are here. No one is coming to get you. If you think about leaving, you will
get stopped. They will come after you.”

A screen lights
up as if reacting to the horror of her statement. Leaving the door open, she walks
back over to me and takes my hand, palm up. She stamps it with a pronged shot.

“Ouch!” I yelp.
I feel that. The pain is severe enough to bring back my voice. The screen goes
black. Something is still there in my hand. I can feel the pressure in my palm.
The nurse then leans down, her face beside mine.

Frightened by
her proximity, I look up and out the wide-open door. Medical records are strewn
across the floor and ribbons of wallpaper peel away from the wall that I can
see.