The Shelter
You are not in the hospital. You have never been in the hospital. You are a war nurse, deep underground, trapped in a nuclear shelter. The world above is gone, burned, erased, reduced to silence.
The wounded come to you in waves. Their eyes are blank, burned, empty. They do not scream. They do not see. They only feel. And you are the only one left to care for them.
The walls are thick, cold, damp. The lights flicker. You do not remember how you got here. You just know that you must keep working. There is no time for questions. The soldiers are dying. One hundred of them. Maybe more. All of them blind. All of them reaching for you.
You move between them, your hands stained red. You cannot save them all. You already know this. But you must try. Because if you stop, who else will?
No Food. No Communication. No Escape.
You do not eat. You do not drink. There is no food left in the shelter. The radio is broken. The doors are sealed.
No one is coming. No one knows you are here. You are the last human voice they will ever hear.
And still, you keep working. Changing bandages that will never be clean. Pouring water that is running out. Holding hands that will go cold before morning.
You are so, so tired. But if you sleep, who will take care of them?
The Visions
The soldiers speak to you in riddles. "We are not real." "You are somewhere else." "You must wake up."
But they are real. You can feel their wounds. You can hear their breath. You are not crazy. They need you. Right?
The Collapse
The shelter is falling apart. The air is thinning. The walls are closing in. The blind soldiers are fading, slipping away, turning to shadows.
You try to hold onto them, but your hands pass through them. The shelter is disappearing. The war is gone. The hospital returns.
A nurse shakes your shoulder. Your IV drips in silence. Your hands are empty. And the soldiers never existed.