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Suddenly, I woke up.

My brain was fuzzy, memories were vague. It took a while for my eyes to adjust to once again splitting rays of light into sepparate colours. They seemed to have been closed for quite some time. My mouth was dry, I couldn't move an inch.

For fifteen mintues or so I simply laid in what appeared to be a bed; my body adjusting to once again being self-sustaining. As my ears began to function I could hear bleeps of machines next to the bed. The bright lights added, I figgured this was a hospital setting. Suddenly a face looked down upon me. I didn't recognize it, but her garnments and the occational red cross on her clothes confirmed my beliefs. I was in a hospital.

I tried to say something, but nothing comprehendable came out as my tongue wasn't functioning. "Please, congressman - you mustn't wear yourself out! You've been in a coma for quite some time.", the nurse said. With those words some memories began to reappear. Memories of what seemed distant times, times when there was still political vigour in me. But how did I end up in a coma? Was it those cursed cigarettes, simply overworking - or had my political enemies taken more drastic actions to but me out of business for good?

As I laid there, simply breathing, it struck me that some things can be forgotten - and some things cannot. I began as a tingling sensation in my left leg - like phantom pain. I could feel something crawling inside me, yet my eyes could not detect any movement going on at the place where the pain seemed to have it's source. The crawling got worse, spread to further places across my body. With the little mental strenght I had in me I tried not to panic. I tried to tell myself that my nerves were playing a trick on me - that nothing physical was actually going on. Within a minute though, the pain and it's friend panic had overwhelmed me. My pusle started to elevate, and since my brain had given me the responsibility of breathing, my full focus was now to simply keep my body oxygenized.

I tried reaching for the emergency button, which was close enough for a child to reach. Yet in my weakened state of mind and body it became a struggle. It's said that women are better at multi-tasking than men, which was something I got to experience first hand. Struggling for each breath at a steadily increasing rate, lifting my hand became an active choice. My ears where the first to fail me, and as even the sound of my own breathing began to dim out breathing became even more of a challenge.

My eyes were next. I had to stay focused on my target - I only had one shot at this! If I missed the button, all would be over unless the nurse was able to reanimate me. Hell, for all I knew this could be a perverted hobby of hers - keeping people barely alive, watching them struggle only to stumble and fall over their own weakened bodies. Like an inverse feeder-fetisch. And yes, in my boredom I had tried many things. Such a place would not have surprised me a few years ago. As a congressman I might've even been the guy where one could get a permit for such a place. How ironic.

I started to taste blood in my mouth - which actually was a good sign. At least one of my senses were still up and running. My arm shook terribly, simply by being barely raised and reaching. This would be the end of me, I thought. Strangled by my own body. I lost control of my hand, and realised this was futile. In a last attempt, I swung my arm around with the last effort I had in me. My lungs wouldn't pump any more. Whatever sense of being awake I had left started to leave me, and I became sleepy at an alarming rate. A tear started to run down my cheek. Like most of my friends, I would now reach my end.

A bright light suddenly flashed. A new kind of pain began to fill me - but this time it felt as if I was stuck in an iron maiden. Every nerve in my body started reporting in pain, lack of oxygen and the wear of what felt like digging through the Pakistani deserts. A specific stinging sensation came from my chest, and as my eyes started to once again function I noticed a 20 cm syrenge stuck to my chest, the word "ADRENALINE" stuck to the side of it. It felt like someone was trying to strangle me with spaghetti through my nose, and I pathetically tried to struggle against it - which ment I waggled my legs and arms a bit. As the first injection of direct oxygen however began to fill me up, the body took over it's usual functions and I could rest my eyes on the coffee cup on the side table of my bed.

I might have been down and out for a while, but the obligatory Danish coffee/cigarette break was still in effect. Wherever this was, I was home. And alive.