Chapter Text
Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep...
That constant beeping. It could drive you insane. It drilled through the ears like a worm burrowing into its hole, digging apathically and flinging dirt in every direction. Until it eventually reached some dark place and made itself comfortable there like a fat tomcat.
Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep...
That sound could become truly nerve-racking over time. Maybe even harmful to health. Visitors only had to endure it for a little while, and the people exposed to it every second probably didn’t notice it at all—or so he hoped. The creepy thought that someone lying helplessly there might still be fully conscious somewhere deep inside, perceiving everything around them—that was horrifying. He shuddered and pushed himself up from the uncomfortable wooden chair.
Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep...
Was it getting louder? Or was it pushing even deeper, even more eagerly, into his ear? Or was all of this nothing more than another sick product of his frayed imagination?
Even though he had begun to hate the beeping, he knew that everything would be over if it ever stopped.
The beeping proved that there was still life. At the same time, it showed how useless it was to wait and hope for something to change.
Its source was a small metallic box, not unlike a computer. But the screen displayed no cheerful video game—only jagged lines rising and falling in waves. No USB stick or keyboard was attached; the wires snaked along a long, tangled path until they disappeared into the patient's scarred skin. And then there were countless other cables—God knew what all of them were for—only one seemed somewhat familiar: the one connected to a bowl-shaped plastic mask that emitted slurping breath sounds.
Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep...
Sadly, those sounds were far too quiet to drown out the beeping.
The blond young man stretched with a groan, lifting his arms toward the ceiling as far as he could, then paced across the room for what felt like the hundredth time.
He had the strange feeling that the floor remembered his steps, adjusted to his weight, and that each time he crossed it to the window, he carved a tiny groove into it. A mark in the floor that would tell future visitors that a man had walked here—one whose nerves must have been completely frayed.
He reached his destination and placed his hands on the cold windowsill. The windows were so large that they stretched from the ceiling down to the hips of an average-sized man, filling the room with the soft light of early morning—unless one pulled the heavy snow-white curtains shut. Then the newborn rays would sneak into the tiled room like thieves, reflecting off the spotless floor and gleaming tiles.
Sometimes, one could see shadows in the room where none belonged, giving every visitor the feeling of being constantly watched. It could drive you mad.
If you weren’t already, you would be now.
Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep...
And this damn beeping didn’t help improve the situation at all.
The young man clenched his trembling hands into fists—so hard that his overgrown fingernails cut into his skin like small knives. Then he released them again and watched, breathing more calmly, as thin streams of blood ran across his pale skin, filling the red river of his lifeline.
Cursing, he wiped his hands on his jeans and paced back to the chair in the same stiff posture as before, resigning himself once again to the wild, screaming swirl of his thoughts.
There was no point in waiting. It was all so absurd. He wasn’t going to wake up.
No one did in a condition like this. And if they did… everything would be different.
The accident had changed him completely. A small memory gap, no answers to his questions, or the loss of his talent—anything could happen.
He would never get back the friend he had said goodbye to the night before Halloween.
Of course, there was the possibility that he might simply wake up, unable to remember the incident, and resume his old life without losing anything. Maybe he would even suddenly gain new abilities, just like some people did when they awoke. A miracle.
There was always hope.
But Chester felt he was losing it more with each passing day. Whenever he sat on that creaky old chair—a conspiracy of the medical staff to make him suffer as much as possible so he’d leave sooner—and looked at that pale, lifeless thing lying there like a puppet, that was supposed to be his longtime friend… he believed less and less that a miracle would happen. Miracles were for little children who needed to confess bad grades to their parents, not for grown men who had experienced more in life than they ever wanted.
He wouldn’t wish his past on anyone. The friends, the love, the fame, the fortunate chance to turn his life’s passion into his job—those he wished for everyone. But the rest…
Face buried in his hands, he rubbed his skin raw and didn’t dare look up again.
He didn’t want to see how pale his usually mocha-colored face had become, how his lips had lost all their colour. Didn’t want to see how lifelessly the arms hung down, how limp the body lay and could be moved by anyone who touched it, like a marionette with invisible strings.
If only he had his MP3 player here, he could shut out these damn noises.
The desperate breathing, the terrible beeping. He would hear it for the rest of his life—it would haunt the back of his mind whenever he tried to create new sounds.
But the thoughts… the thoughts couldn’t be shut out. He could bury them, let them join the worm and the cat, but when the internal rain returned, they would rise again, shake their scratchy fur so it flew in every direction, dirtying his thoughts with their muddy footprints.
Mike. Oh, Mike.
Why couldn’t one just turn off thinking? In one of the magazines lying around, he’d read that humans supposedly use only 20% of their brain. Well, if you couldn’t access the rest, why couldn’t you shut down the part you did use?
Why didn’t humans work like computers—just switch them off when they weren’t needed anymore, defragment them, delete the data you didn’t want or need?
Why did it have to be so complicated? What were feelings even for?
To suffer? To live? To find meaning in everything?
There were cold, emotionless people too—people like the ones who had done this to Mike.
Where was their conscience, their tormenting feelings?
Where was justice?
Chester jumped up in distress, kicked his chair aside, and crouched on the floor beside the bed to rummage through his pitch-black sports bag. Not because he was looking for something specific, but because he needed the smell his belongings gave off. For one brief moment, as long as he buried his face in his clothes, the stench of disinfectant disappeared, replaced by a comforting warmth that lingered for minutes afterward like a guardian angel.
He inhaled the scent deeply, as if breathing the smoke of his last cigarette a thousand years ago, then abruptly let the checkered shirt fall and ended up searching for the aspirin after all.
The package immediately fell into his hand—it wasn’t the first time he had used it.
Into the half-filled glass on the nightstand and down his throat. His headache wouldn’t go away anyway. It had become a part of him, like his heartbeat.
He tried to remember when they had started.
During the loud fight with the other band members, his skull had already been pounding, as if someone inside had decided to crack it open from within.
When the officers suddenly entered the room for questioning, he had nearly choked on his first pill. So it had to have been earlier.
Not in the ambulance—then nausea had joined the mix.
It must have started in Mike’s apartment.
When he cheerfully strode up to the massive canopy bed and shook the sleeping man harder and harder, who simply wouldn’t wake up…
…would never wake up again.
Chester closed his moistening eyes and sank back into the chair, rubbing his temples in circles. These headaches had come as quietly and unexpectedly as this whole damned situation.
When had it begun? A week ago? Two? A month?
With a desperate attempt to make himself laugh, he examined his fingernails. How fast did they grow again? Could he find a ruler somewhere and measure how long he’d been here? But then he’d need to know how long they were before.
He let out a forced little giggle that sounded like a hysterical gagging noise and let his hands drop.
Well, when he’d signed the form—effectively making this room his new home, which had been approved after long consideration because of the risk that the patient, upon waking and being hit by his memories like vultures, might harm himself—he had left Mike alone only once, to fetch clothes from home. And he only left the room to shower in the adjoining bathroom with the door open or to take care of human necessities. The nurses always knocked before entering, and he paid them every day to bring him three full meals and check on his friend without screaming hysterically.
Everything was organized and ran smoothly. Sleeping on the wooden chair gave him terrible back pain, but he was too proud to ask for another. He spent his time working on unfinished lyrics, reading brightly coloured magazines, or torturing himself with thoughts that grew stranger by the day.
Where had his initial strength gone—the strength that had wavered only a few times, which he had forgiven himself because he’d bravely stayed? It had dissolved into thin air, just as his hope was doing now.
There was nothing he could do; he couldn’t help anymore. Just as he had suspected.
But at least he wasn’t to blame. No, not him.
It was Mike.
Mike, for being so damn naive and trusting.
Mike, because he always needed friends around him.
It had been doomed from the start.
He shouldn’t have been surprised.
Chester propped his elbows on his knees and cupped his chin in his hands—hands shaped like a bowl. Motionless as a statue. A beautifully rounded statue, warm and breathing. Alive.
What lay in the bed was no longer alive. It had been dead since the moment it refused to return to the living. Slipped into a coma. Needed tubes to stay alive.
The statue shook its head sadly, thoughts fluttering away like frightened pigeons.
Then they landed again and pecked maliciously at his mind, searching for leftover grains to devour.
This made no sense. Why was he still waiting? Why didn’t he just leave?
Why couldn’t he admit he had known the truth the moment he saw it on TV?
Maybe because everything he had in this world—everything he needed like air to breathe—was in this room. Because nothing waited for him at home except cruel emptiness and uncertainty.
Alone with his conscience, he would eventually end up like Mike.
He wasn’t dead yet, no. But there was barely any hope he would ever wake up.
One night, he would simply stop breathing. Peaceful in his sleep.
Stop existing. Chester wasn’t fooling himself. It would happen—unless a miracle occurred. But he didn’t believe in miracles. And he didn’t believe he could negotiate a numb, emotionless compromise with his conscience. It would kill him. He would kill himself.
As soon as Mike stopped breathing.
Not more than a thought. If he died, Chester wouldn’t be able to control it anymore.
It would claw its way from the roots to the surface, embrace the rain, strangle the worm and the cat, and shatter the statue. With a gun, a knife, pills, a rope—whatever. Maybe jumping would be better. Then he’d know how the pigeons felt.
Flying… flying was something beautiful. He had flown countless times with Mike but had been too excited to focus on the feeling. If he jumped, he’d feel it. And maybe… maybe on his way upward he would meet Mike… smiling… waiting… sleeping…
It happened in the space of a single heartbeat.
As Chester collapsed into his chair and drifted into the darkness of sleep, his eyelashes twitching, another spirit awoke in the small tiled room.
The beeping sped up, though its volume stayed the same so it wouldn’t wake the sleeper. He was the only one still asleep.
And Mike Shinoda opened his eyes.