The body lay there, trapped, like a figure embedded beneath layers of ice. John was shivering, cold, almost frozen. All that he could focus on was the unbearable pain that was raging through every inch of his body. He was tightly strapped to the bed, the leather straps around his arms and legs denying his attempt for bodily movement. The young man's face was so pale that it almost matched the ghost-white spreadsheet of the …showed first 75 words of 659 total…

…showed last 75 words of 659 total…a metre away from him. Carefully opening the foil packet and smelling the white substance with relief, he slowly placed the powder in the syringe and automatically slid the thin metal bar into his thin hungry skin. It was the last time he would feel manufactured joy. As he injected the 'off topic drug' into his precious blood, he sat there with the ticking of the alarm clock counting down his last minutes on earth.