Prince Of Tennis Fan Fiction ❯ Hejira ❯ Reminiscence ( Chapter 6 )

Author's Note: Meh. Don't even ask about the big, looong hiatus.

 

 

 

 

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Hejira

Reminiscence

 

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The clanging of metal wheels against aluminum shook Fuji out of his temporary slumber. He sat up in his chair and yawned, surprised that he had managed to fall asleep. Judging by the amount of light coming through the windows, it was early morning, maybe four or five A.M. He noticed a few doctors wheeling a large metal contraption down the corridor in his direction. He was only mildly interested until the doctors threw open the doors opposite Fuji and pushed the machine in. He watched the door swing shut with a bang, speechless. Suddenly, he began to worry. What was that thing? What were they planning to do to Aiko?

 

 

The soundproof walls and doors to Aiko's operating room stood between complete silence and utter chaos. While Fuji sat motionlessly in the dimly lit hallway where he could hear his own heartbeat, the world inside the room was filled with the sounds of metal operating tools clinking as they exchanged hands, strained voices shouting orders from every direction, and the slow beeping of Aiko's heart monitor.

 

 

"Isn't there another solution Dr. Sano?! This can't be the only option left!" Nurse Rina cried exasperatedly as she watched the defibrillator machine being wheeled in.

 

 

Dr. Sano shook his head, ignoring the other nurses who ran back and forth past him. "If we wait any longer, her heart will fail. This is the only solution." He said sadly. He knew, of course he knew, what a risky choice this was. But it was better to try and fail than to just sit back and watch.

 

 

"Alright!!" His voice was stronger than he felt. "Get the paddles!" He ordered.

 

 

Rina finally sighed, nodding as she ran to retrieve them.

 

 

"Gel!!" Dr. Sano yelled, and another nurse whipped the sheet off of Aiko's pale, sweating body, pulling her nightgown up and spreading a thick, clear jelly over her chest and stomach.

 

 

The remaining nurses were either pushing the machine over to the bed, changing the settings on the machine, or closely managing and watching Aiko's vital signs. If anything went wrong, Aiko would be the one to suffer for it.

 

 

"Clear!!" Dr. Sano ran over to the bedside, putting his hands on the paddles and placing them on her chest firmly. "Charge three hundred!" He shouted.

 

 

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Aiko was surrounded by noise. It was the only thing she was aware of at the moment. People were running around, shouting and yelling, and something was giving off an eerie metal clanging. All she wanted was for it to be quiet. She just wanted to sleep, but with this racket, she could do anything but. She felt her heartbeat slow, and her breath came in slow, even gasps. Sleep…she thought, wishing for the blackness to engulf her senses.

 

 

But she received just the opposite of what she wanted. Suddenly, her shirt was being torn off, and a cold, sticky substance was smeared onto her hot skin, making her flinch. And the next moment, two hard, round objects were being pressed on her chest. Before she could even register what the objects were, a huge shock rippled painfully through her body. She wanted to cry out, but found that she didn't have the energy.

 

 

Her heart immediately went into overdrive, pumping so quickly and forcefully that it threatened to burst out of her rib cage. Somewhere in the distance, she heard a man's voice.

 

"CLEAR! Charge four hundred!"

 

 

Another jolt shook her body off the bed, and she fell back down with a painful thump. She now felt numb, her mind closing in on itself. It felt like she was drawing away from the world, into her own consciousness somewhere deep in the back of her head. She could do nothing to control her senses, it seemed, as she slipped into a peaceful state of apathy.

 

 

It was an odd, but somehow peaceful feeling. It almost seemed like a movie theater. In the darkness of her mind, she was sitting on the floor with her arms wrapped around her knees. She seemed to be watching a picture slideshow, one that she only just realized seemed to be pictures of her past.

 

 

She felt another jolt, but this one barely made her flinch. She was in another world now, her own world, and was oblivious to anything that wasn't included in it. She watched, mesmerized by the series of pictures zooming by in front of her eyes. Like sharpened knives, each one brought her a stabbing pain, but she couldn't tear her gaze away.

 

 

Only a few of the images lingered long enough for her to recognize. She saw one of her as a young girl, sitting on a man's lap. Then another of her laughing and playing with dolls. In these two, she was probably only about three years old. She saw a few more like these, and they brought a smile to her face. But as quickly as they began, they faded, and were replaced with darker, more depressing images.

 

 

She was five, kneeling in front of a shadowed figure with her hands clamped over her ears and tears running down her face. In another, she was looking down at a strange metal object in her hand, fascinated, scared, and disgusted at the same time. Another few followed, too blurry to make out, but they seemed to show her walking down a dark hallway. Images of strangers followed. Then, this one unusually clear, an image of her looking down at her small hands and seeing them drenched in crimson.

 

 

Everything that came after that last image zoomed by at a speed too fast to follow. But as the 'slideshow' came to an end, the last picture seemed to freeze-frame. It was blurry. She could make out a pair of dark, amber colored eyes. They stared at her, as if trying to convey a message.

 

 

Then, slowly, they closed.

 

 

Aiko stared at this image for the longest time, before suddenly, the picture shattered, as if it were made of glass and it had been punched. The small shards flew towards her, and her eyes widened in surprise and fear. She closed her eyes and ducked, inches before the sharp objects reached her face…

 

 

"CHARGE 900!!!"

 

 

Aiko, the one in the real world, awoke with a mind-numbing jolt.

 

 

 

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Fuji looked up at the room across from him. "I wonder what's going on in there." He thought worriedly.

 

 

He waited patiently. About a half hour later, Dr. Sano stepped out of the room, walked across the hall briskly, and sat down in the empty chair beside Fuji. They sat in silence.

 

 

"So…?" Fuji finally spoke up, his voice soft but unusually loud in the empty hallway.

 

 

Dr. Sano hesitated, before smiling. "Mission accomplished."

 

 

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Aiko opened her eyes.

 

 

"Still blind, I see." She thought grudgingly. No pun intended.

 

 

She tried to sit up, but sharp spasms of pain ran through her aching body, and she collapsed back onto the hospital bed. Surely this was déjà vu. Why was she always in pain?

 

 

She sighed, closing her eyes. She remembered saying goodbye to Fuji as he left for tennis. Then she made her way through the house to the bedroom, tripping once or twice on the various objects strewn on the floor throughout the house. Then what?

 

 

Then she had suddenly felt a wave of exhaustion and nausea, so she got a drink of water and lay down on Fuji's bed. Seconds turned into minutes, and eventually into hours. She had become unconscious, waking up partially at random times to a throbbing in her head. She distinctly remembered kicking off the sweaty blankets, wondering why she was so hot, then pulling them back up when she started shivering, and repeating this process several times. Then Fuji was beside her, and she blacked out.

 

 

She knew she was at the hospital because of several observations she had made.

 

 

First, she had that foreboding feeling that could only mean something she didn't like. Second, she could smell it. Everything around her, from the pillow to the sheets to the air smelled like Hospital. She grimaced.

 

 

She knew she was supposed to keep away from hospitals. People have told her that before. They've told her that being in a hospital might endanger her secret.

 

 

Wait.

 

 

What secret?!

 

 

Her eyes snapped open and, if anyone had been there to see, moved around rapidly, as if searching for something.

 

How did she know that? Did she have her memories back?

 

 

She thought for a few minutes, before relaxing, realizing that she was still an amnesiac. But somehow, she had woken up this time with a few more memories than last time.

 

 

She remembered all those weird images that had flashed through her mind. What did they mean? They seemed like rubbish to her. None of it connected. They were like five or six puzzle pieces given to her when she was trying to complete a million-piece puzzle set. Useless.

 

 

Suddenly she was very tired. She tried to stop thinking about her past and what these images meant, but they drifted around in her mind until she was able to fall back into a deep sleep.

 

 

 

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"Thank you so much." Fuji nodded in gratitude.

 

 

"It's my job." Dr. Sano stood up, shaking Fuji's hand before walking away towards his office. After taking a few steps, he spotted Nurse Rina coming his way.

 

 

"Thank god it worked." She said, approaching him with a manila folder.

 

 

Dr. Sano nodded. "Indeed. She's very lucky."

 

 

Nurse Rina smiled, before handing the folder to Dr. Sano. "Here's the analysis of her current condition and her electrical effect on the defibrillator machine." She frowned. "Might wanna take a look at them. I don't understand it completely, I'm only a nurse. But I do know that they're a little different from the normal results." She clicked away down the hall, leaving Dr. Sano with the small folder of papers.

 

 

He continued his way towards his office, opening the front cover of the folder to take a look. Temperature…normal. Heartbeat…normal. Blood pressure, white blood cell count, consciousness level…all normal.

 

 

He flipped over that sheet of paper, wondering what the nurse was talking about. As his eyes scanned quickly over the next page, he frowned. Rina was right about these, they were highly uncommon results.

 

 

He reached out a hand to push open the door of his office. After stepping in and taking off his lab coat, he sat down in the big easy chair in front of his desk, switching on his light and laying out the contents of the folder on his big desk for closer study.

 

 

Something…

No, scratch that.

 

 

Everything about this girl puzzled him.

 

 

 

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Author's Note: Hope everybody liked this chapter. Now you just have to wait another half year for the next chapter! *gets slapped* Ow…