Chapter 180: SELECTIVE AMNESIA
"But doctor, I need to find Erika. I don’t have the time to stay there and recover," Ethan objected to the idea.
"You don’t get it Ethan," said Felix before he wiped his face with his hand. "You have a bullet in your head, do you know how dangerous that is?"
"Erika had been kidnapped by Adrian and I need to get her back from that jerk before he does something bad to her," he repeated with the attempt to get down from the bed again.
"Calm down for a bit," Michael tried to push him back on the bed but the latter already had enough of it and he swayed Michael’s hands away.
"I can’t calm down knowing that Erika is not by my side!" He expressed his frustration but immediately regretted it as he felt his head throb for the nth time. Lowering his voice, he added, "I need to leave and go look for her."
"And where do you plan to look for her?" Felix questioned him. "Ever since you’d been asleep, we’ve been doing our best in trying to find her as well, Ethan. Look, we are not trying to stop you from looking for Erika, you are just not strong enough to do that at the moment."
"Felix is right," Cassandra added. "You’ve been asleep for the past one week now due to the gunshot and we thought that you’d never wake up."
Ethan’s eyes widened in disbelief to hear that he’d been sleeping for a whole week.
"And Erika still hadn’t been found? We need to leave now and go look for her," he attempted standing up from the bed again but Felix blocked his path.
"You can’t leave this hospital now," he said, trying to convince him but Ethan wasn’t in his right mind to listen to anyone.
"Mr Anderson, if you insist on leaving, it could worsen your state," said Dave.
Feeling that her brother wasn’t going to calm down easily, Cassandra called her parents and informed them of the good news and the bad one that would soon happen if they didn’t get to the hospital quickly.
"Why are you trying to stop me from leaving this place? Erika is your sister and don’t you want to hit the face of that jerk who took her away?" he questioned the brothers.
The two brothers glanced at each other before Michael finally decided to come true to Ethan.
He walked to the IV drop that hung on the stand, brought the needle and attempted piercing it back into Ethan’s hand but he wasn’t willing.
"You can’t leave this hospital, don’t you understand that?!" Felix yelled out of frustration. "If you act foolishly now that you haven’t recovered, you could loose your life," he added.
"What do you mean by that?" Ethan asked with an evident confusion on his face.
"Well, nothing is going to happen to you as long as you don’t hit your head on a solid surface which is why you can’t go look for Adrian now. It’s too dangerous for you and you still need a lot of time to recover," Michael replied before facing the doctor. "Dave, please start the test immediately and let us know how we can help," he requested and Dave nodded before he left.
No one had been able to survive a headshot before and this was their first case. After running several scans on Ethan’s brain, they found out that as long as his head didn’t hit a hard surface, he was going to be fine.
Ethan decided to rethink everything before he questioned,
"So what are you suggesting?" The only goal in his mind was to rescue Erika and nothing else but since his health was at stake, he was willing to listen and not worsen things.
"We suggest you stay here while we continue Erika’s search," replied Felix after he final led calmed down.
"No way!" Ethan objected to the idea.
"Look, we faked the news that you were dead so that Adrian would believe that you are dead. Although I’m sure that by now, he’d already shown it to Erika," he said through gritted teeth.
"Wait, how do you know that Adrian was the one who kidnapped Erika?" Ethan questioned Felix.
"It was because of the camera that was able to capture the image of the van that he took Erika in. We tried to trace the van but we can’t find it anywhere now," Michael was the one to reply this time.
Ethan clenched his fist in anger after hearing Michael’s words. He suddenly felt weak and useless. If he had taken Adrian’s appearance in the city seriously, then he could have sensed this attack and Erika wouldn’t have been abducted by him. Now he wondered how she was.
Adrian had mentioned how angry he was with him and hoped he hadn’t touched Erika with those filthy hands of his but after remembering how strong of a woman Erika was, he believed that she was able to handle him but that didn’t mean that he would take Erika back from him and also end Adrian’s worthless life.
But if Felix couldn’t trace Adrian’s whereabouts, it could only mean that the place he was hiding both him and Erika was in some remote place that couldn’t be easily accessed. He would need to contact an expert in a case like this. He was awake and he needed his Erika back on his side.
In the middle of his thought, the door to the hospital room opened wide and the sob from an elderly woman was heard.
"Ethan!" Mrs Anderson cried out. She repeated Cassandra’s actions by hugging him tightly but hers was tighter and warm. The hug of a worried mother. "Son, you are finally awake."
Members from the three families packed inside the room as they asked about Ethan’s health.
They tried as much as possible to not touch his head due to the fear of making things worse. His wound wasn’t completely closed so they needed to be careful.
