Tailspin, page 9
Darkness.
No more pain, at least for now.
***
There really was no pain. Pim lay in the dark, looking up at the night sky. It was cold, and shivers ran through his body every now and then. He knew that was why he was cold. He’d been put outside with no jacket.
A soft blob of rain fell on his nose, and he licked at it. He was thirsty, so very thirsty.
The rain fell harder, heavier, and he drank every drop he could.
It wasn’t until the real cold set in that he felt the pain as he lifted his front left paw.
He couldn’t move it, but he must.
Wherever he was, he needed to move. The cold. The dark. It wasn’t good to be out here. Not for this length of time. His body, those parts of his body that were flesh and blood, wouldn’t like the rain or the cold. Not for too long.
The parts of him that weren’t flesh and blood also wouldn’t like the rain. Not in the long term.
With all of his might, Pim forced himself up. His broken left paw hung, and with every tiny step he tried, it swung and pain spread up into his shoulder.
He walked, hopped, as far as he could. The ground was so slippery beneath him. One wrong move…
That slippery soil shifted beneath him, as though it couldn’t take even his light weight.
Pim’s whole world flipped over, end over end.
He plummeted alongside the soil, rainwater, and rocks and landed in a pit.
The pit stunk of rotting meat, vegetables and, oh gods, rust. He could smell rust.
Pim sucked in a breath and tried to stop the invading horrors he could smell. Everything here meant death. Death to them, death to him.
Mud covered him and water poured in from above.
Drowning was supposed to be painless. At least he’d been told that. Who had told him that? He couldn’t recall. Only that it was.
He laid his head back, looked up into the sky, and watched the stars blink in and out.
He hoped it would end soon.
He hoped out there, life was better for him and for his kind.
10
“How’s he doing?” someone’s voice drifted to me. Was that Lieutenant General Michaels? My mind stirred, yet I struggled to move under what seemed to be heavy blankets.
“He’s slept a lot,” a woman replied.
“Really understandable,” Michaels said, his voice low. “But he’s good?”
“Yes, he’s good, he’s all there, and functioning, the tech is doing him good. The nites helped with healing too.”
“I’m glad. Had a really rough start that kid, last thing he needed would be to turn into one of those things.”
“Just say it, you mean turn into one of those specters.” I heard the worry in her voice; it shook. “Never seen it happen myself yet, and I’ve been around for a lot of mods.”
“You don’t want to,” Michaels mumbled. “You really don’t.”
“We didn’t expect you to come, not so soon.”
“I’ve a vested interest in his family, this tech, you know that.”
“You really think you can get his mother back on your side?”
What had my mom got to do with this? A vested interest? In me? Why? Tsomak? I mean it made sense he had his personal ID card, after all, but why? My mom, I was so confused.
“I also saw the reports coming in, and I was in the vicinity.”
“You don’t need to make excuses if you needed to see him, it’s okay. I won’t tell anyone.”
“Thank you. You’re a credit to your profession as always.”
“He’s awake if you want to see him,” she said next. “Heart rate’s going up.”
I instantly panicked. I didn’t want to look this bad, this weak, before him. I needed to be more.
“No. He’ll have too many questions, especially if he’s been listening in. Questions I can’t answer, not yet.”
“That is going to be hard on him to understand the why. That was a lot of tech, a lot of money spent on him.”
“It is, and it won’t get any easier because he doesn’t have a clue who any of us are. He must trust this is for the best for himself and for his parents.” He paused and sighed. “Thank you for letting me in as always, Alba, a pleasure.”
“Of course, sir.”
Then they were gone, talking in the corridor just outside of my hearing range.
I did manage to sit up then, and stared straight at the First Lieutenant Bryd. “Can I get some water?” I croaked.
“Thought we might have to abandon you,” Bryd said. “Cut our losses?” He put his data pad down, but he did pour me some water and handed it to me.
I struggled to hold it as my hands shook but forced myself to steady it. Then I put it to my lips and drank.
With only a thought, I accessed my HUD, and my right eye lit with such intensity that a headache started right away. Blood pounded in my ears, and I struggled to do anything else.
“How long have I slept for?”
“Seven days,” he said. “You came out of surgery, insisted that the doc green light your tech, then when you relaxed, that was it. Out like a light.”
No wonder I was thirsty. Though there was a drip and half-empty bag attached to my wrist. What about…oh shit. I put the glass down and lifted the sheets covering my lower half.
“Nurse will take it out now that you’re awake and really with us.”
I just stared at the dangling tube that came out of my dick, then I noticed the stupid label above it.
Medical
Catheter fitted 15th December - Optimal drainage achieved.
“Don’t worry at all. It’s a normal procedure for a patient in a coma. Here you’ve had the best care going.”
A coma?
The sheer thought that people here had seen all of me made my face flush and my headache even worse.
I put my hand to my temple and tried to massage the side of it.
First Lieutenant Bryd stood and moved in a little closer. “May I?” He nodded at the side of my head.
I let out a low chuckle. “May as well. Everyone seems to have been hands on.”
“You’ll get used to the fact that some of us know the deal, and I’ll show you how to ease it. Just like my mentor did.”
“Is that what you are?”
“Not officially,” he said.
I moved my hand away from my face and let him touch it. It took no time at all for him to put his thumb gently alongside my cheekbones. Then he found the spot, and within a moment, the pressure was easing.
“Just like that?” I asked.
“Just like that. If you get pressure buildup on both sides, I’d always make sure you do your dominant hand first. Otherwise, it seems to throw off your equilibrium for some reason. I’m a lefty and was always throwing up after five minutes of the headache and massage technique. It wasn’t till someone else mentioned it that I realized myself.”
“Right for me, then,” I said, making sure that I paid attention to the spot he’d picked. He showed me again on his face.
“Good, you’ve got several spots in your skull, too. Once you’ve access to the full system and net, you can look up some good techniques. For the first year, you are going to need them.”
“Year?” I asked.
“The headaches aren’t going to go away, not for a long time.”
Fuck, this was awful. The nausea kept trying to climb back up. “Why?”
“Basically, your eyes and your mind will be doing much more work; your eyes will have to see everything from every angle. It takes a toll, and it hurts. Here’s a preliminary schedule for you,” he said. Then moved back to where he’d put the data pad and picked it back up. A moment later, there was a 3D image before me with a timetable.
A very strict timetable.
4 a.m. start. Every. Single. Day.
11 p.m. finish. Every. Single. Day.
I was pretty used to getting up early for the bus run to the hoteliers. But 4 a.m. Every single day? I put my finger to the screen and flicked through it.
One month. Two months. Three months. Six months. Twelve months.
“Every day?”
“Every day,” he said, “No breaks, no let ups. No sickness. To catch up to where you need to be, you’ve got to put in a hundred fifty percent.”
“Then I’m glad I slept,” I said. “When can I start?”
“Tomorrow, if you want.”
“Tomorrow,” I replied with a nod. “Tomorrow it is.”
“I’ll leave you with the data pad. This is yours now. Everything else you’ll be assigned when you move on from here. Clothes, et cetera.”
“Thanks. I’m glad you didn’t abandon me.”
He tapped the side of his head. “Check out the tech, check out the price tags. You owe the company. They’d have to really think you were a lost cause before they abandoned you.”
I nodded, and he walked away, then left me.
I turned to the data pad. The headache…pounding wasn’t really the word. My head wanted to explode.
I didn’t want to see what they’d done by actually looking just yet. Instead, I found the net on the data pad the old way, and then found my records.
The 3D image then displayed what I thought it might.
My full image and my injuries. Hearing a doctor gloss over them was very different from seeing it on a pad. You think you understand, but until you see it for real, in a real picture taken from the operating theater…I don’t think anyone would ever get it.
I’d been through hell and back, there was no doubt. When I moved, it hurt. When I tried to focus on anything, it hurt.
I set the data pad aside, hoping that Lieutenant General Michaels might come back.
Instead, an older nurse in a long white coat with pale wrinkly skin and white bobbed hair entered the room. Her tag showed up with the name Alba. “Someone told me you might prefer to use the bathroom yourself?”
I nodded at her. “Please.”
Alba moved to my side like a woman possessed, and despite my wanting to keep hold of the blankets, she yanked them out of the way, exposing my naked flesh into the hospital air. “You don’t need to look,” she said.
“Shit,” I said. I couldn’t help it. I’d not noticed the color of my skin when I looked before. “It…”
“It looks a lot better than it did,” Alba said and put some gloves on.
“Will it hurt?”
“I’ll be gentle as I can be, and it may burn a little, but it shouldn’t hurt.”
I looked away, not wanting to see any of it, not able to watch when she picked my dick up. I…ugh.
“Take a deep breath,” she said. I felt her moving me around, then she said, “Exhale, that’s it.”
It felt like she just tugged. There was a slight burning, and then she was giving me a gentle wipe with something cool.
When I looked back, she was tucking my sheet back over.
“You did great,” Alba said. “If you don’t feel like you need to use the bathroom in the next few hours, if anything else happens, or if it gets uncomfortable, let me know.” She then pointed. “I’m only on the other side of that mirror, I can see, but push the button on this.”
I’d seen these little call devices once before, after Tsomak’s accident.
“Thanks. Can I just drink normally?”
Alba nodded and refreshed my water.
I drank some more and instinctively massaged the side of my head. “I’ll get you some mild relief for that. They’ll want to wean you off all drugs in the next week. But for now, we’ll use what levels you need.”
She left me for a minute, then brought me two pills. I swallowed them with a drink of my water. “Rest,” she said. “If you’re going to try to walk later, you’ll need it now.”
“Okay,” I said. I’d already noticed the private bathroom sign on one side of the room. I could make it. I was sure.
“Push the button. I’ll be in as soon as I hear it.” Alba shook her head. “Don’t go on your own.”
I watched her go, then reluctantly put my head back again.
It was my bladder that woke me some time later. I could do it; I could. But I had no sooner swung my legs over the side of the bed when I felt sick.
I pushed the button.
Alba took one look at me. “Told you.”
“I know, I thought—”
She moved to the side of my bed and offered her arm. I took it and wobbled my way across the five feet of space to the bathroom.
“Think you can stand it?”
I lowered my head, and while she held my cloth gown up, I nearly flopped onto the seat. “Everything feels so bad.” I put my hand to my head. “Everything hurts.”
“It will.” She sat on the small seat of the walk-in tub opposite me. “It’s gonna hurt for a while yet. But it will get easier. I’ve seen worse.”
“Really?”
“Yes.” Then she pointed to the toilet bowl and asked, “You going yet?”
I frowned and concentrated on peeing, then I forced myself to stand and was about to flush.
“Leave it,” Alba said. She helped me back to bed, then returned to the bathroom. I saw her moving about, then she came to record something on a data pad at the end of the bed.
“Everything okay?” I asked.
“Discoloration is expected,” she said. “Drink some more fluids, and we’ll get you up in the night. I bet by tomorrow it will be of a normal color.”
***
Just that small walk to the bathroom wiped me out. I had dinner, which I couldn’t eat much of, then slept till I needed to use the bathroom again.
“I could get you a bedpan?” Alba asked.
I shook my head. “No, the sooner I get used to everything, the better.”
The more I pushed today, the easier tomorrow would be. I kept telling myself that. I needed to use the bathroom another three times before daylight shone through the hospital windows.
The nurse came in and brought a younger woman with her. She didn’t wear a white coat, but rather a fitted suit in black and brown, as well as a yellow that almost matched the shade of her hair. “This is Roe. She’ll be with you throughout the day.”
I looked at Roe, already not wanting anyone else around. “Are you coming back?”
“I’ll be back later on. Think you might want a bath?”
I missed my mom, but what child didn’t want their mother in their hour of need? I nodded at Alba. “That would be great.” I thought a bath might be nice, especially if I had work and walking to do today.
Roe smiled at me, though she held her hands in front of her, wringing them together. She looked as awkward as I felt. “I’ll get you moving some more,” she said. “We’ll take a walk out to the ocean base and back.”
“That sounds far,” I said, suddenly worried any amount of exercise would just kill me.
“You’ll be okay, Roe knows when to push and when not to,” Alba said. “I’ll be back later.”
The new nurse moved to a cupboard at the other end of my room. “They have clothes here for you. If you want to get dressed, we can take it slow. You won’t be running any marathons, but I’ll take you downstairs and outside the intensive building to our first testing facility a short walk away.”
The thought of walking that far worried me. “Tests already?”
Roe plonked the clothes on the end of the bed. “Yep, you should be performing minimal duties already, and you’re behind.”
I could hear Tsomak now. “Suck it up, buttercup,” he used to say to my mom when she had to do something she really didn’t want to.
Roe took my breakfast tray out.
I looked at the clothes and then pulled the pile to me.
Jacket, shirt, pants, underwear, and socks.
I slipped the underwear on first, then took off the robe and eyed my black bruises. I ran a finger down my torso. It had a few more scars now. They were pink in the light, but didn’t hurt to touch, which I was pretty surprised at as well.
The pants and shirt were made of a nice, thick, soft material, not threadbare like most of my clothes. When I’d dressed, Roe returned. She helped me with my boots, as bending over made my head hurt.
“Headache?” she asked.
“Yeah,” I said.
“One to ten, how high?”
I thought about it for a moment. “Five,” I replied. It was nice to get a little help dressing, even if it wasn’t as hard as I thought. I was worried about my arm, but nothing hurt. It just looked terrible, and the brace was a little awkward to manage.
Roe led me out of the room. She never offered me her arm, but she waited for me and took it slow.
“You’re on the top floor of the special surgery wing,” she said. “Twenty-four-hour care. They’ll move you down in a couple of days, and the closer you get to the bottom floor, the better you are.”
“Hopefully I get to the bottom floor this next week, then.”
“Never had a patient who took longer than that to get off the top floor and out of the hospital.” She grinned. “I’ll make sure it’s this next week, if I can.”
11
Reaching the elevator, Roe took me down several floors. It felt good. When we exited and stepped into the lobby, I could see the richness of the hospital in the care that was given to the entire area. Stepping outside into the sun was a very different experience.
“Beautiful day,” Roe said.
“It really is.” I blinked, tried to shield my eyes a little. “Everything is so bright.”
“You’re looking through a different lens,” she said. “You’re not only seeing with your eyes now, but with the enhanced detail the X1 gives you.”
“Do you have any of this?” I asked her.
“No way.” She laughed. “That tech is for pilots only.”
“Pilots only,” I repeated. I liked the sound of that.
“Have you tested it out yet?”
I shook my head. “I was a little worried it would make my head hurt more.”
“They’ll get you using it on the tests this morning. When you can, practice outside their tests.”
“Insider tips?”
