On the fifth day, Gabriel found his strength.
It was 2:00 AM. The hospital was at its quietest, though the hum of the machines still grated on his nerves. Through sheer, agonizing willpower, Gabriel had unhooked his traction and slid his broken body out of the bed. Every movement was a symphony of agony, but the need to silence the "Noise" was greater than the pain.
He found a pair of surgical scissors in a discarded kit near the sink. They weren't his scalpel, but they would do.
He limped into the hallway, his hospital gown fluttering around his bruised legs. He knew Beatrice was doing her rounds. He followed the sound of her humming—that incessant, joyful tune—into an empty ward in the East Wing, a place where the beds were stripped and the monitors were dark.
Beatrice was at the supply cabinet, her back turned.
Gabriel moved. He didn't have his usual grace; he was a limping, broken thing, but he had the element of surprise. He raised the scissors, his eyes fixed on the "noisy" pulse point in her neck.
Shhh, he thought. Now it's—
THUD.
Gabriel didn't even see the movement. A hand the size of a shovel caught him by the back of his gown.
The scissors flew from his grip as he was hauled backward with such violent force that he felt his internal stitches groan. He didn't hit the floor; he hit the wall.
Leo was standing there, his face half-hidden in the shadows of the unlit ward. He didn't look surprised. He looked bored.
"I told you to fix yourself, Gabriel," Leo whispered, his voice a low, terrifying rumble that drowned out the distant beep of the hospital. "Not to go looking for more work."
Leo stepped forward, the moonlight through the window catching the cold, slate-grey of his eyes. He reached out and gripped Gabriel's freshly set shoulder, his thumb pressing directly into the surgical incision.
Gabriel let out a strangled, muffled scream behind his wired jaw.
"You aren't ready yet," Leo said, his grip tightening until Gabriel felt the bone begin to shift again. "You're still too weak. A masterpiece should be destroyed at its peak, not while it's still in the shop."
Leo picked Gabriel up by the throat—effortlessly, as if he weighed nothing—and hurled him across the room. Gabriel crashed into a row of empty metal IV poles, the clatter of the falling steel echoing like thunder through the quiet wing.
"Go back to your bed," Leo commanded, standing over him like a shadow from hell. "Heal. Laugh at the nurse's jokes. Because if you try to take another life before I'm done with yours, I'll take your tongue. And then you'll know what real silence feels like."
Leo vanished into the darkness before the security guards could arrive.
Minutes later, Beatrice found Gabriel slumped among the IV poles, weeping through his wired jaw.
"Oh, sweetie!" she cried, rushing to him. "You must have been sleepwalking! You're just so eager to get better, aren't you?"
Gabriel looked at her, his soul screaming in the dark. He wasn't the hunter. He was the bait. And the "Machine" was never going to let him go.