Chapter Text
“Hello?”
“Hello, is this Nice?”
“Yes, this is he.”
“Ah, I’m calling from X hospital. I’m afraid there’s been an accident-“
Nice’s eyes widened as he listened to the Nurse explain what was going on. He felt icy dread creep into his veins and fear grip his heat. Why was this happening? This couldn’t be happening.
“I understand. I’ll be there soon” Nice said and hung up the phone.
Quickly gathering up his things and heading out the door. He shot a quick text to Lin Ling letting him know where he was going, so he wouldn’t freak out when he got home from work. Then, he got in his car and drove off, heading for the hospital. Thoughts rushed through Nice’s mind as he gripped the steering wheel tightly. But his mind kept going back to pathetically whispering that he hadn’t even told Wreck how he felt. Would he die without Nice ever having the chance? No! Nice shook his head, he needed to stop catastrophizing and just focus on getting there. Wreck would be fine and Nice would be there to support him. Nice tried to take calming breaths and tried to hold back his tears. It wouldn’t do to have his vision be too blurry to drive. He needed to get to Wreck.
XXX
Wreck stared down at his unmoving body with a sort of morbid fascination. The paramedics had already brought his body out of his car and had laid him down on a stretcher on the ground. They were doing chest compressions, hadn’t even bothered moving him into the ambulance. Wreck wondered if that meant he was already dead.
Based on the way one of them would check for a pulse between compression and shake their head, Wreck was pretty confident of the answer to that question. So, he was a ghost. Wreck was a bit surprised to find that he didn’t seem to care too much about it. He wasn’t sad or angry or anything really. He just felt really numb and detached. Wreck figured that he should probably be feeling at least something towards his own death than this apathy. Maybe he was in shock? After all, one didn’t see their own dead bodies all that often. It was probably shock.
Wreck was startled from his reverie as one of the paramedics ran right through his body towards the ambulance. Wreck jolted as a shiver and what felt like static shifted though his body. It turned out, being walked through as a ghost was highly unpleasant. The paramedic rushed back with a machine in his hands and Wreck made sure to get out of his way this time.
He watched as the paramedic placed the machine down next to his body and placed pads on Wreck's chest. He realized the machine was a defibrillator and they were going to try and restart his heart. Would it work? Wreck watched on in interest as they gave him one shock. Nothing. Another shock. Nothing again. On the third shock Wreck’s body gasped and the monitor registered the resuscitation of his heart in unsteady beats.
He was alive! Wreck looked down at his ghostly form, expecting him to go back into his body now that he was alive, but he didn’t fade away or somehow return to his body. But he wasn’t dead, so he shouldn’t be a ghost, right? Just what the hell was going on?!
Wreck followed the paramedics on the ambulance when h they loaded up his body and rode with them to the hospital. He followed his body when it was wheeled into the hospital, but stopped in the waiting room when they wheeled him back into surgery. He didn’t really want to see that. With nothing else to do, he took a seat on the chairs that lined the walls and waited.
Eventually, a distressed looking Nice walked into the waiting room and sat in one of the seats on the opposite wall. Wreck perked up in his seat and wondered how Nice knew to come here before remembering that Nice was his emergency contact. Right. The hospital must have called him.
“Hey, Nice.” Wreck greeted him. As expected, Nice didn’t react to him at all.
Nice’s phone began to ring and he answered it. Wreck got up and walked to stand beside Nice so he could hear what he was saying better.
“Hi, Lin Ling” Nice voice was watery from holding back tears. It made Wreck’s own heart hurt and he wanted nothing more than to reach out and wrap Nice in a hug at that moment. “I don’t know. He’s still in surgery. They told me his condition is critical.”
Nice’s eyes welled up with tears and his voice was shaky. Wreck continued to listen and tried to follow along with the conversation despite only being able to hear one side of it. “… what if he doesn’t make it? …. Would you? I know you don’t like hospitals…. Yes, please…. Okay, I’ll see you soon.”
Nice hung up the phone and Wreck could only watch as he buried his head in his hands and sobbed.
“Hey, don’t cry. I’m fine, I'm right here.” Wreck knelt down and tried to comfort Nice, but when he reached out his hand to touch him, it passed right through Nice’s body, leaving his hand feeling like pins and needles. Wreck stared at his hand for a moment and then tried again, desperately wanting to at least be able to pat Nice’s shoulder. Anything to give him at least a little bit of comfort. But every attempt at reaching out failed and he could do nothing as Nice sat and cried.
“Ahem.” A man cleared his voice at the end of the hall. “Hey, you there.”
Wreck looked up to see a man in a white suit standing at the end of the hall. He had shoulder length slicked back white hair and was wearing square tinted glasses. He was staring at them, but Nice seemed to not have noticed the man. Then, Wreck realized the man looked as if he was staring right at him. Could this man see him? He pointed a finger at himself questioning.
The man grinned. “Yes, I’m talking to you.”
Wreck cautiously stood up. “You can see me?”
The man nodded.
Wreck saw his chance for answers and immediately started questioning the man. “What’s going on? Who are you?”
“Who, me?” The man lazily reached into his jacket and pulled out a brochure that read ‘So You’re a Ghost, What Now?’ “I’m your ghost guide of course. Welcome new soul to The Inbetween.”
The man held out the brochure and Wreck mindlessly took it, he stared down at the brochure and read the title over and over. When his mind got over his initial shock, he looked back up at the man with wide eyes. “What?!”