Hacker (CENTURIES series: Book #5) (VERY SLOW UPDATES)

11

You know those hangovers where it felt like you went through a meat grinder the night before and your head felt like you slammed it into a door about fifty times in a row? Yeah. This was nothing like that.

– This was much, much worse.

I woke up in a hospital, and the first thought to pass through my head was thank God; Thank God the emergency codeword had worked. I had lived.

The second thing that went through me was the immense amount of pain that jolted through my head as I tried to focus my eyes on a fixed point. It felt like I had been knocked out solid with an iron baseball bat.

I groaned lowly and instantly felt the heaviness of my body, like an anvil had taken residence inside my bones. Everything felt sore and ached, like I was a bag mush that had been shaken like dice in a cup.

If only the human body had a Ctrl-Alt-Delete function.

"Caleb?"

Her voice. The prettiest voice in the world made my ears sharpen and had me groaning again as I sensed rapid movement on my right. Someone grasped my hand and squeezed it, and even though I tried to, I failed to squeeze it back.

"Sm... urf," I rasped out. My throat hurt like hell, sore like the rest of my body and drier than a nun's pussy.

"Oh God, Caleb," Smurf sobbed beside me, before suddenly shuffling again. I heard a button being pushed, and I had been in enough hospitals to know she had summoned a nurse. "You're awake. Caleb."

Finally, after what felt like minutes of trying to get my eyes to cooperate, I blinked and managed to find her through a harsh blur. My eyes focused and found a very grunge-looking Smurf standing by my bedside, clutching my hand with tear-stained cheeks. She wasn't wearing any makeup, which allowed me to see the swollen redness around her eyes.

I tried to reply some more, but my throat hurt too much. I decided to close my eyes again, just as I heard a door getting opened. More movement, then voices.

"He woke up. H-he said my name and he looked at me a-and—"

"Alright. I need you to let me come through for a moment. Mr Montrell? Caleb? Are you with us, Caleb?"

I was so tired, but I struggled to open my eyes again. After some more adjusting, I found a blurry nurse checking up on me, checking my pupils with a flashlight that made me wanna close my eyes again.

"He's conscious, alright. He's probably very disoriented and drowsy from the medicine. He might come around again a little later, but he needs more rest. But this is good. He's recovering."

I heard a relieved sigh from my Smurf. A quick thanks was exchanged, following some words I couldn't make out. I was drifting away again and I was too tired to fight it.

I surrendered to sleep and the comfort of knowing I was alive.

Somehow, I had lived.

~~~

A couple of hours later I woke up again, feeling much more lucid, but every bit as in pain as before. I announced my consciousness with another groan, trying to move my head.