Fragments of Decay

I Should've Stayed In Bed

Alice didn't used to be scared of needles, she didn't used to be scared of any medical procedures, really. It's hard to be afraid of anything when Hellen Cho is talking and laughing about how silly your dad is and by the time you realise she's doing anything she's already done. The green man - he'd introduced himself as doctor something but her dad would've called him Shrek and she thinks that might make it easier - is nothing like Dr. Cho.

Dr. Shrek is mean. He's all harsh words and sharp unkind laughter. He'd laughed when she said she wanted to go home and he'd mocked her when she told him her parents would find her. "I wouldn't be too sure of that sweetheart," he'd said and that was another thing. The constant pet names, they make her skin crawl and her throat close and she refuses to cry. She won't show him how scared she truly is, she can't do that. So she doesn't cry, even as he keeps sticking needles into her, drawing blood then putting something in her bloodstream. - and isn't that the most terrifying thing ever? Some foreign, probably alien, unknown substance running through her veins? -

The first time had burned, it had hurt like nothing she'd ever known before. She hadn't even been able to do anything about it, wrists and legs still firmly strapped to the chair. She'd been unable to do anything but scream, first profanities, screams of curses that would've probably made Mr. Rogers faint, even when she didn't have the energy left to form actual words anymore she kept screaming. She'd screamed her throat raw a while ago. It didn't matter, it didn't count as crying. She's fine. She wants her mom, she wants her dad, she wants Mrs. Pepper, she wants Mrs. Natasha.

Dr. Shrek hadn't cared either way. He'd stood off to the side emotionless as she desperately tried to break free, face devoid of any emotion. He waited until she was nearly doubled over - as far as she physically could be anyway - to smile, almost looking satisfied, and scribble something down on his weird equally green notepad. She hates him. She hates his condescending gaze and the way he feels totally within his right to just manhandle her however he wants, pushing her chin up, examining her face, stealing her blood.

She despises him. She's powerless against him. She's powerless to do anything but spit out hoarse insults and bite the insides of her cheeks to stop herself from crying. It's no use, she wasn't ever going to last. She doesn't know how many more injections she has, all she knows is pain, white hot searing pain coursing through her veins over and over and over again until she can't take it anymore and blacks out.

She comes to nearly immediately, though she's not in Shrek's room anymore. She hits the floor right as she wakes up, seconds too late to keep her head from colliding with the concrete harshly. The door slams shut behind her and for a few minutes she doesn't move. She stays right where she is on the floor, dark spots still dancing in front of her vision. She's already losing consciousness again when she feels two pairs of hands turn her over.

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When Alice wakes up again - properly this time - it's to hushed voices. For a second she thinks she fell asleep on the couch again, that it's her dad talking with Mrs. §Pepper. She knows that's not true before she even opens her eyes, the voices sound too young, the surface she's laying on is too hard. The weird man and his many needles weren't a dream. She opens her eyes, there's a girl hovering over her. She's propped up against a wall and the girl is carefully prodding at the marks the needles left on her arm. Alice wants to sit up, to ask where they are, who they are. Before she can attempt to do that there's hands at her shoulders holding her down.

"Don't move,' the girl tells her, "Whatever they gave you is not out of your system yet. Moving will only hurt. You should be fine in a little while" The words are said with a sort of clinical indifference, like the girl couldn't actually care less whether or not she moved. She doesn't, clinical or not it seems to be true, even the tiniest head movement sends waves of shocks through her body.