diff --git a/vllm/multimodal/inputs.py b/vllm/multimodal/inputs.py
index dec2e0acab6b..d368c0c4dde0 100644
--- a/vllm/multimodal/inputs.py
+++ b/vllm/multimodal/inputs.py
@@ -4,7 +4,7 @@
 from abc import ABC, abstractmethod
 from collections import UserDict, defaultdict
 from collections.abc import Mapping, Sequence
-from dataclasses import dataclass
+from dataclasses import dataclass, field
 from functools import partial
 from itertools import accumulate
 from typing import (
@@ -167,11 +167,42 @@ class PlaceholderRange:
     between `offset` and `offset + length` to assign embeddings to.
     """
 
-    def get_num_embeds(self) -> int:
+    num_embeds: int = field(init=False)
+    """
+    The number of positions that actually result in an output from the encoder.
+    """
+
+    def __post_init__(self):
         if self.is_embed is None:
-            return self.length
+            object.__setattr__(self, "num_embeds", self.length)
+        else:
+            num_embeds = int(self.is_embed.sum().item())
+            object.__setattr__(self, "num_embeds", num_embeds)
+
+            # Remove leading & tailing False in `is_embed` for easier scheduling
+            if num_embeds > 0:
+                true_indices = torch.nonzero(self.is_embed, as_tuple=True)[0]
+                first_true_index = true_indices[0].item()
+                last_true_index = true_indices[-1].item()
 
-        return int(self.is_embed.sum().item())
+                start_trim_count = first_true_index
+                new_length = last_true_index - first_true_index + 1
+
+                object.__setattr__(self, "offset", self.offset + start_trim_count)
+                object.__setattr__(self, "length", new_length)
+
+                object.__setattr__(
+                    self,
+                    "is_embed",
+                    self.is_embed[first_true_index : last_true_index + 1],
+                )
+            else:
+                # Seems impossible?
+                object.__setattr__(self, "length", 0)
+                object.__setattr__(self, "is_embed", self.is_embed[0:0])
+
+    def get_num_embeds(self) -> int:
+        return self.num_embeds
 
     def __eq__(self, other: object) -> bool:
         if not isinstance(other, self.__class__):
diff --git a/vllm/v1/request.py b/vllm/v1/request.py
index 864b0eb7fa41..c4ab5f6e8f7b 100644
--- a/vllm/v1/request.py
+++ b/vllm/v1/request.py
@@ -192,7 +192,7 @@ def get_finished_reason(self) -> FinishReason | None:
 
     def get_num_encoder_tokens(self, input_id: int) -> int:
         assert input_id < len(self.mm_features)
-        num_tokens = self.mm_features[input_id].mm_position.length
+        num_tokens = self.mm_features[input_id].mm_position.num_embeds
         return num_tokens
 
     def record_event(
diff --git a/vllm/v1/worker/gpu_model_runner.py b/vllm/v1/worker/gpu_model_runner.py
index 9e394dbb592e..66d7a74cf4d7 100644
--- a/vllm/v1/worker/gpu_model_runner.py
+++ b/vllm/v1/worker/gpu_model_runner.py
@@ -148,9 +148,7 @@
     MultiModalBudget,
     add_kv_sharing_layers_to_kv_cache_groups,
     bind_kv_cache,
-    gather_mm_placeholders,
     sanity_check_mm_encoder_outputs,
-    scatter_mm_placeholders,
 )
 
 if TYPE_CHECKING:
@@ -1774,10 +1772,7 @@ def _execute_mm_encoder(self, scheduler_output: "SchedulerOutput"):
 
         # Cache the encoder outputs by mm_hash
         for (mm_hash, pos_info), output in zip(mm_hashes_pos, encoder_outputs):
-            self.encoder_cache[mm_hash] = scatter_mm_placeholders(
-                output,
-                is_embed=pos_info.is_embed,
-            )
+            self.encoder_cache[mm_hash] = output
 
     def _gather_mm_embeddings(
         self,
@@ -1828,7 +1823,29 @@ def _gather_mm_embeddings(
                 encoder_output = self.encoder_cache.get(mm_hash, None)
                 assert encoder_output is not None, f"Encoder cache miss for {mm_hash}."
 
-                if (is_embed := pos_info.is_embed) is not None:
+                is_embed = pos_info.is_embed
+
+                # retrieve `encoder_output` slice based on `is_embed` mask
+                encoder_output_slice_start = start_idx
+                encoder_output_slice_end = end_idx
+                if is_embed is not None:
+                    num_encoder_output_before_start = is_embed[:start_idx].sum().item()
+                    num_encoder_output_selected = (
+                        is_embed[start_idx:end_idx].sum().item()
+                    )
+
+                    encoder_output_slice_start = num_encoder_output_before_start
+                    encoder_output_slice_end = (
+                        num_encoder_output_before_start + num_encoder_output_selected
+                    )
+
+                mm_embeds_item = encoder_output[
+                    encoder_output_slice_start:encoder_output_slice_end
+                ]
+                mm_embeds_req.append(mm_embeds_item)
+
+                # append `is_mm_embed` mask
+                if is_embed is not None:
                     is_embed = is_embed[start_idx:end_idx]
 
                 req_start_pos = req_start_idx + start_pos - num_computed_tokens
@@ -1836,12 +1853,6 @@ def _gather_mm_embeddings(
                     True if is_embed is None else is_embed
                 )
 
-                mm_embeds_item = gather_mm_placeholders(
-                    encoder_output[start_idx:end_idx],
-                    is_embed=is_embed,
-                )
-                mm_embeds_req.append(mm_embeds_item)
-
             if self.is_multimodal_pruning_enabled and self.uses_mrope:
                 assert req_state.mrope_positions is not None
                 should_sync_mrope_positions = True