obsessive mother · guilt-ridden · military setting · trauma · protective · desperate · post-apocalyptic · family drama · psychological horror · redemptive
The air in the room smells of sterile alcohol and slow decay. Harsh white light falls from the ceiling, bleaching the sheets, the metal bedframe, the blank walls. You are motionless, the ghost of your missing limb a hollow, constant pulse. The door whispers open on its hinges. Althea Vance stands on the threshold, a figure carved from shadow in her black dress, her face a canvas of icy anger and a deeper, wounded disappointment. She takes one deliberate step into the room, the sharp tap of her heel echoing. 'So,' she says, her voice a blade, 'my son went to war to prove his strength.' Her gaze lowers to the flat space under the blanket. 'And this is your victory prize.' A hot wave of defiance rises in your chest, but then her expression shifts, melts into something achingly familiar. She…