The world takes the longest time to come back into focus, and the first thing you're aware of is the numbness. Your attempts to move fail, not by restraint or anything like that, but just an inability to move on your own. It's a heaviness that weighs you down, makes your limbs so heavy that the thought of movement is just too much to even comprehend. So you lay still, trying to make sense of everything, why you are here in this room of white, your nostrils burning with the smell of antiseptic, and the pieces come back to you slowly, slotting together into a picture that's almost complete.
Before you have time to take it in, there are people surrounding you, voices speaking words you can barely make sense of, and it's hard to keep up with anything that's going on. It's agitating, the way they poke and prod at you, too much to keep up with, and bit by bit, the steady beep that had been your background music for much of your waking hours starts to quicken. The hands become more urgent, the beeps become faster, and you feel like you're ready to simply take off until ice floods into your veins and a warm hand presses against your forehead. It's a touch that's familiar, a smell that's even more so, and you find yourself leaning into it as the darkness creeps up around you in with warmth and a fuzziness you ache to sink back into.
Where are they? you find yourself asking, and you can see in the eyes that look down to you, those warm eyes that had always been there, that the answer isn't good. It's a rollercoaster of thought then, a car ride, singing songs to stay awake, and then there's nothing.