ᴘɪᴄᴛᴜʀᴇsǫᴜᴇ. | ᴊɪᴋᴏᴏᴋ ✔️

37 | hazy

Faint, muffled noise.

Subtle yet sharp beeps, pangs against his skull which hardly feels like it's in one piece.

His eyes are glued shut by some untouchable force.

Body, immobilized by sheer exhaustion, at least from what the boy's barely conscious brain can deduce. But that's about it. There isn't much he can piece together at the moment from what scraps of strength he gathered to fight back the legion of sleep demons that seemed to him more like angels, kind, gentle angels whose only desire is to bring him a deserving rest.

Even now, those angels in his head attempt to bring him back down but some stubborn determination in Jeongguk's heart fights even harder.

Obscure voices surround him. A swirl, a hazy mess. The voices seem to get closer - he can't determine what they're saying, but they sound alarmed, in shock for some reason.

It's gradual, but the auditory haziness dissipates. He can make out a word. Just one. A name. His name.

He manages to peel his eyelids apart to the smallest degree, just enough to let light greet his vision. It's bright, an uncomfortable, painful brightness at which he squeezes his eyes shut again.

"Come on now, you're almost there, Jeongguk."

"Oh, my goodness, miracles do exist, he's conscious..."

He can hear clearly now - clear enough, that is, to process the words being said above the present fuzziness clinging to all of his senses. Jeongguk opens his eyes once more. The light still stings but he knows it's not going to sting any less if he keeps them shut.

And it's the most bizarre feeling - like he's light as a feather and as heavy as lead at the same time. Resting on these pillows, registering the people those voices belong to are doctors and nurses, he comes to the realization he's in a hospital. This bed isn't his own. These people aren't his family. This isn't home.

This isn't home.

Why isn't he home?

What am I doing here?

The gears in his brain strain to move from the rust they gathered, being hauled up in the head of a boy unaware of just how long he spent unconscious. All that Jeongguk knows is that he was unconscious. But he isn't now.

"Jeongguk, can you hear us? You're going to be alright, we're just going to need you to stay still for a little while longer. You're doing great, you're gonna be fine."

Gentle voices, kind words. But they aren't what Jeongguk wants to hear right now.

He wants confirmation. Answers. How he ended up here. What's going on. What's going on?

The boy is too physically drained and only about 10% present mentally, so in no way is he attempting to fight or argue with anyone or anything right now. He lies still. Feeling his own heart beat slow and weak, but it seems to build up in seconds to something that constrains his breathing much less. Perhaps it's the effect of whatever machine he's hooked up to - or perhaps a miracle. He doesn't know. He can't tell. But if one of the doctors thinks it was the work of a miracle, maybe even they had their doubts of the success of their own technology.

Maybe, at some point, things were hopeless.

And yet here he lies. Conscious. Alive.

The more the gears in his head begin to move, the stranger that fact seems to him. That he's not dead. That he's lying here, breathing, albeit with a bit of difficulty at the moment. But again, it seems to grow a bit easier as time passes ambiguously.