Awakening from what was supposedly a colonoscopy, Grieves is told by hospital staff that due to confusion arising from similar patient names he was mistakenly given a sympathectomy to cure sweaty palms.

As the days tick by Mr. Grieves' post-operative experiences grow ever more bizarre until he finally realizes that he is caught inside a nightmare of his own creation and seems unable to escape or awaken back in the real world.

The bubble eventually reached his brain and caused so much damage that he ended up in an apparently permanent vegetative state.

Meanwhile, back inside his own mind, Grieves is in a desperate losing battle with his own manifested fears and decides that the only way out is to commit suicide in this dream-like state, hoping that it will cause his real body to expire and free him from the interminable torment he has had to endure.

He manages to leap from a 7th-floor window onto the concrete below, and the final shot is of his real-world body lying in an empty hospital room where it flatlines, closing its eyelids in physical death.