Cough Up My Lungs (Leave In My Heart) - (Love and Deepspace)
For @febuwhump day 14: Hanahaki Disease
Happy Valentine's Day??!!! Before the mob comes after me, it's not my fault the Febuwhump mods decided to make this today's prompt, I could not miss out on the opportunity for angst LOL
Can you all believe I've never written a Hanahaki fic before? I thought it was time. And I had this idea as soon as I saw the prompt for it.
TW/CW: I took more of a horror approach with this so if you're not a fan of body horror, this one might not be for you. The ending is left open as well so depending on how you interpret it, it could also include major character death. Just pretend this is another Myth storyline
~~~~~~~
It started when she chose. And soon Zayne watched all the men in her life succumb to a strange illness that left flowers choking their life away.
Read on Ao3
LaDS Whump Masterpost LaDS Masterpost
~~~~~~~
Cough up my Lungs (But Leave in My Heart)
It began on a day he wasn’t even supposed to be at the hospital. Zayne had been taking a few days off to work on a research paper for an upcoming conference, when he got the call from Greyson.
“I wouldn’t interrupt you if I didn’t have to,” his colleague said, apologetic even as Zayne could detect the unease in his voice. “But we have a…strange case. I want you to consult on it. It’s also…well, it’s Miss Hunter’s partner.”
Zayne left his paper for later and rushed to the hospital. He found her there in the waiting room, pacing restlessly. He called her name and a brief look of relief crossed her face as she saw him enter.
“Zayne! Thank you for coming.”
“What happened?” he asked.
The worry returned as she wrung her hands. “I don’t know—we were just finishing a hunt when all of a sudden Xavier started to act like he couldn’t breathe. He began to cough up blood then he just…collapsed.”
“And he wasn’t injured?”
“No, it wasn’t even a difficult hunt. We took down two mid-level Wanderers in about ten minutes.”
“Did you encounter anything odd—any abnormal fluctuations?”
“Nothing unusual.”
Zayne pursed his lips, but couldn’t spend more time questioning her right now. He needed to see what was going on with her partner.
“Have one of the nurses check your Metaflux levels,” he insisted.
She nodded and as he turned to leave, she caught his sleeve. “Please look after him, Zayne.”
Zayne felt something clench in his chest, a prick of physical pain behind his ribs. He forced a small smile at her and nodded. “I will do everything I can.”
He hurried back to the exam room where they currently had Xavier hooked up to multiple monitors, an oxygen mask strapped to his face. He seemed to be unconscious, pale, lips tinted blue behind the mask. His chest shuttered in uneven, labored breaths.
Greyson and the attending nurses looked relived as Zayne entered.
“Dr. Zayne, thank you for coming in.”
“Yes. What’s going on?”
“We’re not sure,” Greyson said and motioned to the screen on one wall which showed the results of several x-ray scans. “There seems to be some unknown obstructions in his chest cavity.”
Zayne frowned as he studied the scans. There appeared to be strange foreign masses culminated in Xavier’s lungs and around his heart. It was hard to tell exactly what it might be from the scans, but the patterns reminded Zayne of some sort of…vegetation for lack of a better word.
“Have you checked his Metaflux levels?”
“We have, and there’s nothing out of the ordinary. Just the normal levels one would expect a Hunter to experience after killing a Wanderer.”
Zayne pressed his lips into a thin line. “I’ve never seen anything quite like this. But we can’t rule out that it’s some form of Protocore syndrome we haven’t yet seen—”
The monitors began to blare and Zayne spun to see Xavier choking, blood flecking the inside of the mask.
The two doctors and nurses rushed to stabilize him, making sure he was breathing steadily if not extremely labored. Zayne made his decision.
“I believe in this case I’m going to have to see this first hand,” he said. “Prepare him for surgery. I’ll take the lead on this.”
He went to scrub up and fifteen minutes later, he stood in the operating room, making his incision into Xavier’s chest. It was second nature to him, no matter that this man was a close friend to her. He wouldn’t let that effect his work. He knew she trusted him to take care of her partner and that was enough for Zayne.
Despite the abnormality on the scan, he had fully been expecting crystals when he opened Xavier up.
But that was not what he found. No.
Nestled behind the hunter’s ribs, tangling around his lungs and heart, squeezing the life from him, were flowers. Pristine blue flowers—wavyleaf sea lavender, Zayne thought. A gasp went through the operating room as everyone took a moment to pause.
“What the hell?” Greyson muttered under his breath.
Zayne blinked, recalibrating himself before he got to work. “We don’t have time to question. Let’s remove the obstruction.”
Two hours later and they had plucked a bucket full of wavyleaf sea lavender from Xavier’s chest. As they carefully freed it from around his heart and lungs his breathing and heartbeat stabilized almost miraculously, no longer being cut off. Zayne sutured the incision like normal and stepped away, leaving the rest to the attending assistants.
“Good work, everyone, we’ll move him to recovery.”
It was an oddly silent operating room for a surgery that had gone so well. Zayne stared at the metal pan filled with bloody flowers for a long time.
“I’ve never even heard of anything like this,” Greyson said quietly. “Do you think it’s some kind of Metaflux exposure issue or…a new variation of Protocore syndrome?”
“I don’t know,” Zayne replied simply. “I’m going to look into it.”
But first he had to go and inform the Hunter in the waiting room that her partner should make a full recovery.
She was relieved to hear, nearly collapsing. Zayne caught her elbow and sat her down, holding her trembling hand.
“What was it, Zayne?” she asked. “Nothing serious?”
Zayne hesitated, unsure how to say it. “We’re still not sure. At the moment, my most likely theory is some symptom related to extended exposure to Metaflux. He had an obstruction in his chest that we removed.”
“But he’ll be okay now?”
Zayne nodded. “I believe so, but we’ll be keeping an eye on him for the next few weeks to make sure that the symptoms don’t return.”
She nodded. “When can I see him?”
“In about an hour or so, once they’ve gotten him settled. Why don’t you go have a hot drink in the meantime? Someone will come get you when he’s allowed visitors.”
“Okay.”
He helped her up and watched her head toward the vending machines. Zayne headed back to his office and sat at his computer. He took a moment, slowly unfolding his glasses and putting them on before he began to search every database of medical journals and cases to see if he could find anything remotely related to flowers growing in the lungs.
Search after search yielded nothing. Zayne finally realized it had been hours, and he got up to get a cup of milk tea. Xavier should be awake by now, and he wanted to go check on him.
He found her by Xavier’s bedside, her hand laid gently over his own where it sat on the bed. Xavier watched her, but there was an odd…detachment in his eyes. It was nothing like how he usually looked at her. And Zayne had seen it plenty of times; sometimes, in the past, that look had even garnered his own jealously. He’d seen Xavier’s look as he sat in his own bedside vigil, and he had seen it right after waking up from anesthesia. This wasn’t the way he normally looked at her like she represented every star in the sky to him. This just looked like…emptiness.
Something about it made Zayne pause, sending a feeling of unease through him for a moment before he schooled himself and stepped inside under the pretense of checking on his patient.
“How are you feeling?” he asked, checking the monitors.
Xavier blinked tiredly and shifted his gaze to Zayne. “I’m…tired.”
Zayne watched as his eyes traveled, almost confused, to where her hand patted his.
“You should rest then,” she insisted with a small smile. “I’m almost jealous that you get time off.”
Xavier’s mouth twitched as if he knew he should smile back, but wasn’t sure why. “Alright.”
Zayne made sure his dressings were fine, and helped him to get more comfortable before he turned to the Hunter sitting at his side. “Visiting hours are almost up. Do you need a ride home?”
“Sylus is coming to get me,” she replied with a tired smile and Zayne felt the pang he always did upon hearing his name.
“Alright.”
She stood, giving Xavier’s arm one last squeeze. “I’ll be back tomorrow.”
Xavier only hummed quietly in response. Zayne finished making notes on his chart then asked if he needed anything.
“No,” Xavier replied, then his brow furrowed. “Doctor…”
Zayne glanced up from the chart. “Yes?”
The Hunter shook his head and settled back. “Nothing.”
“Rest,” Zayne commanded. “If you need anything push the call button.”
Xavier nodded and his eyes slid shut, breathing steadying in a deep, drug-induced sleep.
Zayne set his chart back down and left the room. As he crossed back through the waiting room lobby, he caught sight of the tall, white-haired man crossing through the doorway and pulling her into his arms. Zayne caught his eye briefly and gave a sharp nod. Sylus nodded back before leading her out with a comforting arm around her waist, asking her if she’d eaten and where she’d like to go.
Something burrowed sharply behind Zayne’s ribs. He knew he didn’t have the right to feel that ache and yet he couldn’t help himself.
But he didn’t have time to think of the girl who would never be his in that way. Even his research paper was going to have to be put on hold for now. He had much more important things to focus on.
***
Zayne spent the next two weeks looking into any possible source he could think of. He even gained an invite to the Hunter’s Association to speak with Nero to see if there was possibly a Wanderer in their database that could have solely caused Xavier’s strange illness.
But there was nothing. Xavier recovered with seemingly no side-effects from it, outside of the continued detachment. He could almost convince himself that it had been a fluke. Or maybe he had hallucinated the whole thing. He almost didn’t dare double-check with Greyson and the others he’d worked with that night.
But the seemingly singular occurrence would soon be joined by another.
A couple hours into one overnight shift at the hospital, the paramedics wheeled a vaguely familiar man dressed in a designer suit in on the gurney.
He didn’t have to glance up to know she was already running through the doors behind it.
“Zayne!”
His eyes landed on her, makeup smudged, an elegant evening dress attempting to steal his professionalism before his breath caught in his throat.
“Was that Rafayel?”
She nodded and Zayne motioned to the nurse on duty to get any necessary information from the Hunter before he was already on his way back, having a sudden sense of foreboding, or rather, certainty, of what he would find.
The paramedics were lifting the figure onto the exam table, already cutting off his clothes, Zayne rushed in, one of the nurses helping him hurriedly wash up.
“Symptoms?”
“Male, 24. Patient collapsed during a gala. Seems to be having trouble breathing.”
Zayne could hear the whistling gasps as Rafayel’s body shuddered, his lips were turning blue and his hand weakly reached for his throat.
Zayne stepped over to the table and took his jaw, grabbing a penlight to peer down his throat. One of the nurses came over to affix an oxygen mask over his face but Zayne stopped her.
“There’s an obstruction in his airway,” he said. “We need to get it out first. Keep him still.”
With the paramedics converging, tipping Rafayel’s head back, Zayne took up a pair of forceps. As the attending nurse pushed down on Rafayel’s tongue Zayne reached in to remove the object.
The patient went rigid, choking, eyes rolling back in his head. Zayne tugged and a burst of fiery red and orange spilled from the artist’s lips.
“What the…” one of the paramedics began. “Was he trying a magic trick or something?”
Zayne simply stared at the object for a long moment, heart beating more heavily than usual, before he began to snap orders.
“Take him to get a chest scan. And prepare an operating room for me. He’s going to need it.”
He stepped back to steady himself as much as he could. He hated that this made him so nervous. He hated things he could not understand. He could feel the subtle crack of ice creeping over his wrist and clenched his hand until he willed it away.
He was simply a doctor. And he would treat his patient. For her. Another person she cared deeply about.
Several hours later, Rafayel was stable and put into a recovery room. Zayne stared at the pan of flame lilies he had pulled from the artist’s chest. One of the attending nurses eyed him warily.
“What do you think this is, Dr. Zayne?”
“I can’t say,” he muttered. “I need to know more. I just can’t find anything.”
Of course she was still in the waiting room when he cleaned up and went to tell her the news. And there he was as well, the leader of Onychinus. He had brought her a pair of flats and sweets from a high-end bakery, sitting with his arm around her, chin resting on her head.
Sharp pain burrowed deep in Zayne’s chest, vines of jealously winding tighter, but he strode toward her, fixing a smile on his face.
“Rafayel is in recovery right now. He did well.”
She exhaled in relief, wiping her face as she squeezed Sylus’s hand tightly. Zayne couldn’t help but let his eyes travel to the ruby ring on her finger, remembering how she had beamed upon showing it to him the first time. “Thank you, Zayne. I don’t understand what happened. It was almost exactly like Xavier…”
Zayne hesitated, then decided to fish for clues. “They seemed to be suffering from the same symptoms. Is there anything they have both been exposed to over the last month to your knowledge?”
She looked bewildered. “I…I don’t know. They don’t really run in the same circles. I haven’t even seen Rafayel for a couple weeks. He’d been so busy before the gala.”
Zayne didn’t want to press, knowing she was in a delicate position right now. He swallowed down the other questions as she sat up and fished her phone out of her purse.
“I—I should call Thomas and Talia. I’ll be back.”
As she hurried out the doors of the waiting room to a quieter location, Sylus and Zayne sat in awkward silence, meeting each other’s eyes briefly.
Zayne finally cleared his throat. “She’s been all right?”
Sylus nodded once. “Believe me, I’ve been keeping an eye on her.”
Zayne nodded. “Tell her I’ll let her know when she can see him.”
He turned and headed to check on his patient, a thousand thoughts swirling in his mind, and none of them ones he wanted to ponder.
***
She left with Sylus late that night after Rafayel had woken up and seen her. First thing in the morning, his aunt came to sit with him for a while. Zayne saw her just as she was leaving, an odd look on her face, something almost haunted. He went to check on Rafayel, seeing him propped up, staring up at the ceiling.
“How are you feeling this morning?” Zayne asked with his usual bedside manner.
Rafayel’s eyes turned dully toward him. “Alright, considering.”
Zayne nodded and took notes, checked his vitals. As he was finishing his exam he was about to leave the room when Rafayel called him back, voice shaky.
“Doctor?”
“Yes?”
The artist wet his lips, fingers curling into his blankets. “Is it normal…to feel so empty?”
Zayne frowned, unable to help the unease creeping through his chest. “What do you mean?”
Rafayel’s fingers crept up his chest to rest on his collarbone. Under the hospital gown Zayne could see some kind of mark, perhaps a tattoo. It was black and had the look of something burned out.
“It’s like…I lost something vital, but I don’t remember what it was.”
Zayne remembered the vacant look in Xavier’s eyes after he had removed the flowers. The way he barely reacted to her proximity. He didn’t want to entertain the thought but…
“The pain medication can sometimes have psychological side effects,” he said simply, perhaps the first lie he had ever told a patient. “Give it a few days and try to rest as much as possible.”
Rafayel nodded slowly and closed his eyes, fingers still pressed to the strange mark.
Zayne’s research continued. Frantic, looking at anything remotely related and still finding nothing.
On more nights than he wished to count, he woke, gasping for breath, chest tight and aching, with lingering nightmares about flowers crawling up his throat, choking the life from him.
Once, he could have sworn he woke to the smell of jasmine.
Sleep eluded him, he didn’t even truly know what day it was anymore. He found himself making breakfast on auto pilot, the news on low in the background until a headline caught his attention.
“The rumors seem to be confirmed that the Farspace Fleet Colonel has come down suddenly with a mysterious illness. He is currently being treated in a hospital in Skyhaven…”
Zayne paused in the act of buttering his toast, eyes locked on the television screen. There were no details, but in his heart, he knew.
Zayne slowly set his bread down, wiping off his hands methodically.
He called his friend Dr. James from Skyhaven and surprisingly got him quickly.
“Zayne, this is a surprise. I’m just coming off shift.”
“I need to ask you something,” Zayne said without preamble. Have you…treated any patients or heard of any with…strange conditions? Foreign objects in the chest cavity—not crystals.”
The man was silent for a long moment. “You know I can’t share that information.”
“I don’t need to know who,” Zayne said. “I just need to know what.”
The man gave another long pause before he lowered his voice. “It was like nothing I’d seen before, Zayne. I opened a patient up and just…Asiatic apple blossoms. Absolutely bizarre.”
Zayne thanked him and ended the call, standing there for a long moment frozen in silent contemplation.
He had pushed aside the thoughts for a long time. But he couldn’t deny it any longer.
There had been zero cases he had been able to find in any medical journal, historical record—he’d even resorted to looking through tabloids. There had been nothing remotely related to flowers in the lungs.
And the victims weren’t random. They were all connected in one way.
She was the only variable.
Zayne picked up his phone and dialed the number she had asked him to keep as an emergency contact even when the thought had made resentment plant a seed he refused to water.
“Yes?”
“It’s me,” Zayne replied.
“Doctor?”
“We need to talk. Can you meet me?”
They settled on a meet-up location and an hour later Zayne walked to the back of the bar. An unassuming place in the middle of the afternoon, the lighting dim, appropriate for the occasion.
Sylus offered his hand courteously before returning to his seat. “Would you like a drink, Doctor? My treat.”
“I don’t drink,” Zayne replied.
Sylus shrugged and picked up the glass of wine that sat at his elbow. “Tell me what’s on your mind, then.”
Zayne was silent for a long moment before he finally opened his mouth to speak. “It’s my duty as a medical professional to ask. Have you been experiencing any odd symptoms lately? Shortness of breath, fatigue—”
“Coughing up flowers?”
Zayne blinked, suddenly wary. Sylus snorted.
“Your nurses should have more care who they gossip around. Some of us have ears attuned to whispers.” He was silent for a moment before he said, more quietly. “She doesn’t know.”
Zayne didn’t relax exactly but nodded. “She’s the only common thread,” he admitted. “And since she appears to be showing no signs herself, I can only assume it has to do with proximity to her. Perhaps something to do with her Protocore. I only thought that I should make sure you were not experiencing any symptoms.”
Sylus took a long swallow of the blood red liquid, an unreadable expression on his face. “I apricate the concern, Doctor.”
“It is my duty.”
“You still love her,” Sylus said quietly. Not a question, simply stating a fact.
Zayne felt that now familiar pain inside his chest, worming deeper. He swallowed it down. “I can’t deny it,” he replied.
Sylus gave him a look. It wasn’t pity—the leader of Onychinus didn’t pity anyone—nor was it smug. It was more an unfathomable understanding that Zayne found to be worse.
“And what about you, Doctor?”
Zayne refused to reply. Acknowledgement would mean he could no longer deny what he knew to be true. Sylus set his glass down as if he had already made his diagnosis.
“I’m sorry, Doctor.”
“She chose you, I would never hate her for that.”
“No. And yet maybe if you did…” Sylus cut himself off and shook his head. He stood, but not before pulling something from his coat pocket and placing it on the table in front of Zayne. “Sometimes there is truth in legends and curses. Science can’t always explain everything.”
Zayne’s eyes traveled to the small book sitting on the table as Sylus left. He sat there for a long time before tucking the book into his pocket and leaving the bar. Clouds gathered in the sky, threatening rain, and Zayne hurried home, the book in his pocket feeling abnormally heavy.
He made tea as a precaution against the cold, and his throat hurt, something catching in his chest with every breath. Perhaps he was coming down with something.
He pulled the book from his pocket, setting it on his coffee table and ignored it as he began to answer work emails.
Concentration grew harder. He cleared his throat, drank his tea, ignoring everything. Then finally, he snapped his laptop shut and reached for the book.
It was old, yellowed pages and small text appeared upon opening it. He flipped through the pages, unsure of what he was looking for until he found a small illustration of flowers entwined around internal organs. His breath caught, something pinching behind his ribs, and he began to read, the words swimming in front of his eyes.
Unrequited love, coughing up flowers, failure of removal leads ultimately to death.
But perhaps more sickening were the words that followed:
Doing nothing leads to death, but the removal of the flowers will cause the victim to lose all feelings toward their unrequited love.
His heart beat frantically, his chest aching as if his very ribcage was tightening, burrowing into the organ. Zayne tried to breathe steadily to calm his racing pulse, but the act seemed suddenly impossible as if the breath was being strangled out of him. He dropped the book, the pages falling open to the fated passage.
Something rose in his throat, fluttering, clawing at his esophagus. He staggered toward the bathroom, bending over the sink as he retched, coughing up a mouthful of soft petals and waxy leaves.
He panted, staring in a particular resigned horror as he saw the pristine white blossoms flecked with red sitting in the sink. The heady scent of jasmine coupled with copper left him dizzy.
He had been denying it for too long. He wasn’t sure when he had truly known, but now he could no longer pretend that he was immune.
A sob escaped his throat as he leaned against the counter, feeling the jasmine grow inside him, tightening around his insides. The pain was nearly unbearable. It wouldn’t be long before he couldn’t breathe at all. There would be no relief. Only numbness. Only apathy.
Frost crawled across the mirror as his Evol rose defensively. He sank down, back resting against the vanity.
He could taste the jasmine on the back of his tongue. Bittersweet like the way it had felt to hear her confess that she had chosen Sylus.
His heart throbbed and Zayne clutched his chest, gasping. The pain was threatening to swallow him. But he couldn’t help but wonder if it was truly better to feel nothing at all?
You were always meant to have a heart of ice, a voice inside of him whispered.
He felt a pang stab him, vines creeping through his ribs. He coughed again, blood flecking his hand.
His phone was sitting beside him, but he didn’t make the call he should have. He sat there with the memory of her for a long moment. The way his heart had once fluttered at the sight of her, at how deeply she cared for him even now. How deeply she cared for everyone.
He could feel the vines crawling up his throat, reminding him that his fantasy could never become reality now. It was all a distant dream.
Perhaps the next lifetime would not end in jasmines.
