Such Sweet Nothing

There was a banging inside of my head that I just wanted to stop. It was just so loud. I went to move my hand to reach up to grab at my head and that’s when I became aware that I couldn’t move. Shit, shit, shit. I had no idea if my eyes were open because I was staring into nothingness, a black void. The banging became more frantic and I tried to open my mouth to cry out for it to stop.

“Kylie!” More banging ensued as I became aware of the fact that something very, very wrong had happened. I was feeling panicked, frantic, like I needed to break something. Wait, I didn’t’ need to break something. It was like my feelings were not my own right now. My body and mind felt broken, like it was tuned into a different frequency. What the fuck had happened?

“Kylie!” My eyes shot open and I found myself on the floor of a torn apart testing room. I wiggled my fingers; oh thank god I wasn’t paralyzed. My eyes were trying to adjust to the light as I tried to push myself off of the floor. The banging had stopped as I gripped the side of a flipped over lab bench. My arms were weak and shaking underneath my weight. Pieces of glass were falling off of me and hitting the floor as I pulled myself up to sit on my knees.

“Oh my god. You’re alive, I can’t believe you are alive.” His voice sounded far away but I heard it through the glass window in the smaller room. “JARVIS let Bruce know she is alive.” I lifted my head up and saw Tony with the helmet on his suit lifted up.

“You can’t come in here, I don’t know-“ I coughed and saw the blood splatter on the floor. “How much of the radiation is left.” My breaths were shaky as I felt like my lungs were trying to hold on to any tiny speck of air it could.

“My suit will protect me, I need to get you out of there.” I shook my head as he moved to smash the glass. The doors had sealed shut when the explosion had happened. The window was big enough for a person to fit through, but it was meant to be a barrier strong enough to keep in gamma rays.

“You can’t.” Tony’s face showed he knew I was right but that he also didn’t want to listen to reason.

“I can, it will be okay. The building is evacuated.” I shook my head and let my head fall forward to my chest as I closed my eyes. I noticed a wet, dripping sensation under my nose and on my ears. I reached a shaking hand up to my nose and pulled it back. Blood. I did the same thing to both of my ears and received the same result.

“How am I not dead yet?” I looked back up at Tony who was just staring at me, as he put his hand on the window.

“I don’t know.” He answered truthfully as we both heard someone running through my main lab room.

“I told you not to come down here!” He sounded mad and I was too as Bruce’s face appeared next to Tony.

“JARVIS said it was contained in a room in the lab.” Tony looked towards the ceiling with an aggravated expression before looking back at me.

“Was it gamma radiation?” Bruce’s face told me he was hoping my answer was no.

“Yes.” I answered as I wiped away the blood running down my face with the back of my hand.

“I should have died.” I muttered pushing myself off of my knees to stand up. My legs felt weak.

“We need to get you out of there.” Bruce’s tone was panicky. I was beginning to feel anxious.

“No.” I shook my head. My emotions felt like they were going through an automated card shuffler. There were too many, too quickly, some of them weren’t making any sense.

“Kylie, we need to get you medical attention.” I met Bruce’s eyes and saw that his face was wet from tears.

“Bruce, I think I am okay.” My words seemed to be lost as I reached up to wipe away the blood from my ears.

“I’m breaking this fucking window.” Tony said as he pulled his hand away and I heard his suit power up.

“Stop!” I screamed and coughed up more blood that splattered onto the window.

“You aren’t doing it with him here.” I shook my head as I looked at Bruce. Tony was looking at him as well as Bruce pressed his lips tightly together.

“Nothing is going to happen to me. Just get her out of there.” He turned to look at Tony.

“Step back, Kylie.” He listened to the person he agreed with more and I was not happy.

“No. I’m not letting you guys be put in danger.” My eyelids were beginning to feel heavy again as I fought to keep them open.

“Kylie?” My legs gave out and my knees slammed to the floor. It was like my whole body was on fire; I wanted to rip my flesh from my bones to make the pain stop. There was screaming, a lot of screaming. It took only a second before I realized that that terrifying noise was coming from me. I felt the rest of my body hit the floor as I writhed around in pain. There was a loud noise and then glass shattered over me.

“Kylie pain, fix her.” I was staring up at Tony as he picked me up off of the floor.

“You’re going to have to help me get her through.” Tony was looking past the wall and into the other room.

“The big guy is going to grab you, okay?” I nodded, or at least tried to nod at Tony as he passed me through the window and I felt myself being cradled against something hard. I was staring up into the face of the Hulk; he was looking down at me with a concerned expression as I heard Tony climb through the window after me. It was the same expression he had a few days before when he busted out of his own glass cage.

“We need to get her down to the seventh floor.” Tony said as I heard him walk closer to us, the Hulk looked at him and growled slightly.

“You want to carry her?” Tony’s question surprised me as the Hulk grunted. I felt angry and worried and confused and sad and scared.

“Let’s go.” I felt myself slipping in and out of consciousness.

“Hey.” I had no idea where we were in the building now, the lights were moving above me and the air felt colder here. He looked down at me; his expression was so Bruce that it hurt.

“Let him know I’m sorry and it wasn’t on purpose. Something went wrong,” I coughed and felt blood seeping from my nose and ears and mouth now. “Make sure he knows that I wanted him more than anything and tell him to stop calling you a monster, okay?” We had stopped moving and all I could hear was Tony somewhere off deeper in the room and the Hulk breathing heavily.

“Hulk bring Bruce back?” I shook my head at the question and closed my eyes.

“I don’t want him to see me like this, to remember me like this.” I opened my eyes and saw him nod.

“Remember?” He caught onto the last part of my sentence and looked confused.

“Leaving?” He asked as I tried my best to smile up at him.

“I think so.” I heard Tony talking to someone whose voice I did not recognize.

“No leaving.” His serious tone matched his facial expression. “No leaving.” He repeated as he looked down at me.

“No leaving.” I got out before I let my eyelids fall and let my body succumb to all of the damage the accident had done.