Chapter 184
"No!"
A heart-wrenching scream, as if her soul was being torn apart, burst from deep within Isabella's throat.
In her dream, she completely broke down, collapsing into a pool of blood, the world reduced to nothing but endless crimson and despair.
Meanwhile, in reality, Isabella, lying in a special ward at Jerry's medical base, began to tremble violently, her body out of control.
On the screen monitoring her vital signs, the lines for heart rate, blood pressure, and breathing frequency fluctuated wildly, triggering shrill alarms.
"Oh God!" The young assistant doctor's face turned pale. Watching Isabella on the bed, who looked like she was enduring torture even in deep sleep, his voice trembled, "Jerry, she looks like she's in so much pain. Her heart rate is way past the safe limit, and her brain waves show extreme activity in the fear zones. Do we really have to keep going? This feels like we're torturing her."
Jerry stood by the bed, calmly observing the data on the machines and Isabella's reactions.
Unlike the assistant, there was no panic on his face. Instead, a nearly cold smile lingered on his lips.
"Sometimes, just running away or shielding someone isn't real treatment," Jerry said in a steady voice. He gestured for the assistant to adjust the speed and concentration of the medication drip. "Post-traumatic stress disorder, especially the kind tied to witnessing violence and death, often requires the patient to relive and face those painful memory fragments in a safe, controlled setting. It's about rebuilding their understanding and desensitizing them."
He adjusted his glasses, his sharp, focused gaze visible behind the lenses, "The nightmare she's going through right now, though painful, is essentially her brain, guided by the drugs, actively processing those suppressed fears."
"Our job isn't to stop this process, but to guide it and strengthen it until her subconscious starts to realize that this is just the past, just memories, and that she's safe now."
Jerry glanced at the screen where her heart rate was still dangerously high and gave a calm order, "Increase the drug concentration by another five percent. Make sure she doesn't face any real physical danger, but let her fully feel the pain in the dream."
The assistant doctor gasped but followed the instructions anyway.
Having worked with Jerry for years, he knew that this seemingly gentle doctor could be radical, even brutal, when treating certain special patients. Yet, the results were often surprisingly effective.
Isabella had been secretly brought to Jerry's heavily guarded private medical base in the suburbs by Vitale two full days ago.
During these two days, she spent most of her time in a drug-induced deep sleep or a half-awake, half-dreaming state.
But her sleep was never peaceful. Nightmares clung to her like a curse, attacking her over and over.
Her heart rate often spiked and dropped like a roller coaster. Cold sweat soaked the bedsheets multiple times, and the occasional sobs and screams she let out in her sleep were heartbreaking to hear.
Vitale had come by on the first day. Seeing Isabella struggling in pain during her nightmares, he flew into a rage and nearly smashed half of Jerry's medical room.
It took a lot of effort for Jerry to make him understand that this was a necessary part of the treatment—short-term pain for long-term relief.
In the end, Jerry prescribed Vitale some strong sedatives and sleep aids, almost forcing him to go back and rest, promising to keep him updated on Isabella's condition at all times.
Jerry knew that if Vitale stayed here every day, watching Isabella suffer like this, it wouldn't help the treatment. Vitale himself might break down first, and that would be the real problem.
The dream continued, like an endless cycle of hell.
Isabella relived her family's deaths over and over, Barton's mockery, the feel of blood, the despair of losing everything...
The pain came like waves, drowning her, washing over her again and again.
But at some point, after countless cycles, a strange change quietly began.
When the extreme pain repeated enough times, her brain seemed to activate some kind of self-protection mechanism.
A sense of numbness started to spread.
In Isabella's dream, the images were still vivid, the gunshots still piercing, the blood still warm, but the soul-shattering agony that once tore her apart began to dull.
At the same time, a faint thread of rationality, like a tiny flicker of light in a dark, deep ocean, stubbornly emerged.
"This is a dream."
A very faint voice whispered in the depths of her consciousness.
"Dad and Zane are fine. Vitale sent people to protect them."
"Barton ran away. He can't get to them."
"The blood isn't real. The warmth is just an illusion of the dream."
"Eva, the explosion—Vitale said it wasn't real."
"Dreams are the opposite of reality."
This old belief, tinged with self-comfort, became the last hope Isabella clung to at that moment.
The pain didn't disappear, but it started to coexist with a growing sense of clarity.
Isabella knew she was dreaming, knew these were projections of her fears, knew reality might be harsh but not necessarily as hopeless as her nightmares.
Finally, after witnessing her family fall in a pool of blood once more without breaking down and screaming as before, the dream began to crumble and fade.
The menacing faces, the glaring blood, the deafening gunshots—all blurred and drifted away like a fading painting.
A warm, real sensation of light seeped through her eyelids.
There was the smell of disinfectant, the steady beeping of machines, and a faint, cool feeling on her neck and temples.
Isabella's eyelashes trembled violently a few times before she slowly opened her eyes.
Her vision was blurry at first, with double images, then gradually cleared.
She saw a pure white ceiling and soft, shadowless light.
Isabella slightly turned her stiff neck and realized she was lying on a comfortable but clearly medical bed. An IV tube was connected to her arm, and small electronic patches with thin wires were attached to her temples and chest, linked to a nearby monitor displaying data and waveforms.
A young woman in a light blue nurse's uniform, with a gentle expression, stood by the bed, writing something down.
Hearing movement, she looked up, saw Isabella's open eyes, and let out a relieved smile.
"Ms. Lorraine, you're awake? How do you feel? Is there anywhere that feels especially uncomfortable?" the nurse asked softly, her tone full of concern.
Isabella's mind was blank, as if she had just been through a long, exhausting journey, drained of all energy.
She stared blankly at the unfamiliar surroundings as fragments of memories flooded back like a tide.
Vitale, the cliff, Eva, the explosion, the argument, the injection, the nightmares...
Overwhelming confusion and weakness made it hard for her to think.
Isabella opened her mouth, but her throat was so dry she couldn't make a sound.
The nurse quickly dipped a cotton swab in warm water to moisten her lips, then offered a straw, letting her sip a little water.
The warm water soothed her parched throat, bringing a small sense of real warmth.
Isabella's mind cleared up a bit.
Looking at the nurse, her eyes filled with confusion and a barely noticeable trace of fear, she asked in an extremely faint, hoarse voice, "Where am I?"
"Where's Vitale?"