I had prayed that my death would be swift. It was all that I had asked for when my time came. However, my senses sharpened, allowing me to see and feel everything. The scent of my blood replaced the air I struggled to breathe. The taste of death on my tongue mingled with the pain biting through me like acid.
“Mecca!”
My name was being shouted, causing an eerie echo to bounce against my one half-working eardrum at full volume before fading into whispers.
I attempted to pick myself up, but my arms were overcooked noodles, limp and useless. My attempts only left me lifting a little and trembling back down to the cold floor, lifting and back down. The center of my body, the part that needed the most protection, had to have been ripped open.
With each desperate breath I sucked in, my chest heaved and my lungs flatlined, unwilling to participate in a process that should have been normal. Air would only go so far down my throat before I gagged, choking on what I believed was my own blood.
“Mecca! You’re all right.”
Arjen was lifting and turning me so that I faced the ceiling. The room swam across my vision, shadows that I assumed were Arjen’s men were floating around me.
“You’re okay,” he kept saying. I had either lost my chain or the device had stopped working because I could no longer hear Arjen and relied on my ability to read lips. I was suffocating, choking on the thick rusted liquid filling my mouth.
“Let me see. Slowly. Take breaths as slowly as you can.”
He took deep breaths, attempting to breathe with me. I think I said okay, but panic set in when the struggle to breathe grew increasingly difficult, and each breath brought on a hacking cough that shot blood from my mouth into the air.
My legs kicked, and my arms were barely flailing while I fought for my life, for air, for Arjen. I had always known that this life would snuff me out, but I never imagined I would go this way, in my own home.
“Don’t you even think of leaving me, Mecca. You fucking fight. Fight!”
I was trying, for Arjen, trying to breathe, but I was too broken. I sensed death lurking the same way I had always been able to sense danger. The grim reaper had a tight grip around my neck and wouldn’t release me—wouldn’t allow me a single drop of air.
“Don’t close your eyes? Keep looking at me.”
The vibration of his voice bounced off of me, and I was barely able to read his lips because my eyes were too heavy for me to keep them open. My lungs felt like they were cooking over a flame, blazing from the inside out.
I lost muscle control and was left jerking while I heaved and gagged, struggling for breaths that wanted nothing to do with me anymore. The hacking coughs came with each sip of air I fought to take. Arjen was working on me, attempting to fix something that was too damaged for repair.
At least I had been lucky enough to experience love before I was taken. Now, I was in the quiet with the chaos in my mind laying claim to me. I caught snatches of Arjen’s tensed face, his haunted eyes, and his frantic hands searching for healing where there was none.
He was so handsome, the best thing to fill my vision before my strength was snatched, and I began thrashing violently while gagging on a river of blood.
Would Arjen morn me, or would vengeance be his new mistress?