The Game Developers Son

Chapter Five

I opened my mouth to speak. No words came out. Could I not speak? What was going on? I tried speaking out again, only managing to create a quiet whisper that was hardly audible. I stopped stroking Connor's head to place my hand over my mouth in an attempt to try and see if I could even breath through my mouth. Shockingly, I felt something cold and hard covering the area where my nose and mouth were. Did I have an oxygen mask on? Why did I have an oxygen mask on? I felt around for the straps, wanting to rip this thing off so that I could commuinicate again. I found the strap, slipped my fingers behind it, and pulled it downwards. The rough edges of the plastic mask dug into my face as I ripped it off. The moment it was off from my face, and was resting against my neck, breathing became a lot harder. What the hell had happened to my lungs? Why weren't they working properly? I despretely took a deep breath of the icy, antiseptic air that surronded me in, making my lungs yell out in agonising pain. They felt sore, as if I had just run twenty marathons or something. I breathed out, waited a second, and took another deep breath in.

"Are you alright, Damien? Come on, you need to get that mask back on. The doctors put it on you for a reason, you know!" My Mom complained, grabbing it and trying to slip it back into its original position. I wanted to escape, yet my body hurt so much that I could hardly move. The only thing that I could do is roll my head to one side, only to end up facing her again when my Dad put his hands on either side of my face. It didn't take long until the mask was back onto my face, forbidding me from talking all over again. "Anyway, can you write down what you were trying to say?" She handed me a pencil and a small, pocket sized notepad. How the heck was I meant to write when I couldn't even sit up, as well as control my fingers properly. Sure, I could stroke Connor's hair, yet I couldn't move each individual finger. It was horrible. I shook my head, turning away from the small set of staionary equitment. "Do you wanna sit up?" I nodded, waiting to see how they would make me sit up. My Dad picked up a small, pastel yellow remote and pressed a button on it, causing the top half of my bed to rise upwards. When I was almost at a perfect ninety-degree angle, he lifted his fingers off form the button, placed it back on the table that was at the end of my bed, and handed the notepad and pencil. I had no other choice but to ask what I wanted to say. I rested the notepad on my thigh, gripped the pencil in a uncomfortable fist, and attempted to write. Due to my entire forearm aching from pain, as well as my fingers being numb, I would be genuinely shocked if they would be able to read a single word.

When I had finished 'writing' my question, I set the pencil down, before looking at what I had wrote. Each single word was a difference size, others were in capitals, some of them in lower case, and some letters weren't even in the correct words. I was starting to get the feeling that, somehow, my brain somehow got damaged alongside...well, whatever else happened to me. God, I just wanted to find out what happened. My Dad walked back over to me, ruffled Connor's hair, before picking up the notepad and reading it. After studying it for a few minutes, he nodded to seemingly himself, and slipped it into the back pocket of his pants. He mumbled something to Connor, causing him to stand up, let our Dad take his seat, before crawling up and sitting back onto his lap again. Was my Dad somehow able to read what I wrote? How in the world was that possible? He ran his fingers through my hair, pulling out all of the knots and tangles that were within it. How long had I been out for to cause for so many tangles to happen? The last time my hair was this knotted was when I went to Summer camp for a week, and I happened to forget my hairbrush. I also didn't use the restroom for the entire week, resulting in a horrible bladder infection and a blocked bowel, which I had to get operated on...Needless to say I never went back to any types of camps again.

"Damien?" My Dad leaned slightly closer towards me. "Can't you remember what happened? Can you remember anything that happened? Anything at all?" Of course, I could remember some details, but I couldn't say any of them due to my mask seemingly stopping me from making any noises whatsoever. I shook my head, a small pit of anger being formed inside of me. I knew some details yet all of them weren't important! I wanted to know what happened to me! I wanted to know why I couldn't breath! I wanted to know why half my body was numb and half of it was aching like mad. I wanted to know! I wanted to know so freaking badly! "Well...You were playing the game I just made, which was a horror game, and after the first jumpscare, you started to look extremely pale, sick, and you started to wheeze, as if you couldn't breath. After a while, you vomited like crazy, fainted, and hit your head pretty hard against the floor in my study room. Hunter mentioned that you were having a heart attack, so your Mom kinda freaked out and called an ambulance." He paused for a second to glance over at Hunter, who was starting to look like he was going to faint at any second, before speaking again. "When you were in the ambulance, the paramedics ran some quick tests and found out that Hunter was, well, right. Turns out, two of your artiries somehow collasped, and that somehow caused both of your lungs to almost stopped working. Blood flow to your brain also stopped, so that's probably why you feel like death. Hopefully it won't last for too long, though." The anger got replaced with fear. I had a heart attack? How the hell could I have a heart attack? Wasn't my heart perfectly healthy? "Turns out, you have a condition called Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy...It's basically when your heart muscles are bigger than usual, and your artiries are smaller than usual. Luckily your not so badly affected...They thought you...you were going to pass." He stared down at Connor for a few seconds, rubbing his eyes. He then lifted Connor off from his lap, and made his way out of the room. Was...Was he crying?