Jack woke up back in the plain white room that he had been in earlier. There were two main differences this time however, his entire body was covered in bloody bandages, and there was a lady sitting next to the bed clothed in robes more elaborate than the doctor he had been working with earlier. She was currently reading from a large file with some type of symbol stamped on it.

It seemed that his stunt in the isolated room had burst numerous veins all over his body. He would be surprised if there wasn’t damage to his mana passages as well from the brief glimpses that he could recall through the pain he was in at the time. On the other hand even if his body was damaged he was pretty sure his mind was his own once again.

He couldn’t pull up a “status” and was now pretty certain that all that the status screen that he had been bringing up before was illusion cast with his own mana but controlled by whatever being had been influencing him. If he really wanted he could probably replicate such a thing but there was little reason to do so. The only thing that he would be able to see would be things he already knew.

Shifting he attempted to sit up but was stilled by a hand on his shoulder. “Just rest Mr. Bertrand your body has sustained a great deal of damage from the incident. I’m surprised that you are already awake, as with your wounds and the medications we thought you would be out for at least a few more days.”

It seemed that his awakening had caught the attention of the lady who had been sitting next to him. Letting out a short laugh Jack quickly found it turning into a wet cough as there was some kind of liquid in his throat. After a brief moment a cup was put in front of his face for him to spit into. Opening his mouth, he spit out what felt like a deluge. As the cup pulled back, Jack saw it was filled with a brackish black liquid.

“Yeah, certainly not the best I’ve ever felt, but if I let things like this stop me I would have given up and died long ago.” Jack laughed at his summation and turned his head to get a better look at his companion. “I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage Mrs.?”

“You may call me Madam Blue. I am the head researcher of this institution. Your case and response to the introduction of mana was interesting enough to demand my personal attention.” The now named Madam Blue responded checking the notes in her hands and remarking. “It seems that along with your other vitals normalizing back to human standard you also are now able to speak. I had wondered if that would be the case.”

“So why are you in here then? If as you said that I wasn’t expected to wake up for another few days.” Jack asked, talking to distract himself from the state of his body.

Looking him up and down Madam Blue flipped to the end of the file she was holding and wrote something down. In a detached voice she informed him, “As I said your case was interesting enough to demand my presence. We have had a series of nurses watching over you for the last couple days, changing your bandages and fluid bags along with other necessities. I along with a few of our most esteemed members have been coming in three times a day to run diagnostic tests on you. In fact I just finished a set of them before you woke.”

As she mentioned having recently finished taking tests the door opened up and a young man walked in pushing a cart with bandages, fluid bags and other items. “How’s our patient looking today Madam Director? Still the same as yesterday?”

“Ah, good afternoon Dorian, I hope things are better today. I see you are on time today for changing the bandages and no. It seems that he has awoken, much earlier than originally anticipated.” Madam Blue’s voice kept the same cold monotonicity as if nothing mattered.

Dorian promptly responded. “Yes Ma’am. We are fairly certain that we have everyone else settled at this point after the excitement from the other day. A couple more have had to be put under restraint but most have calmed down by now.” After giving his brief report he rolled the cart over next to the bed and began to change Jacks bandages.

Jack found it to be an extremely uncomfortable experience, not only from the pain but also the prolonged physical contact that was completely out of his control. Trying to distract himself from the situation Jack turned his head to face Madam Blue and spoke to her. “So just how bad is it? My body feels rather sore but I am guessing I have been dosed with some level of pain medication judging by how much of my body is bandaged.”

“You have fairly extensive injuries all over your body many of your veins burst during your episode causing a significant amount of blood loss along with some internal bleeding. Luckily we had enough blood on hand to allow for several transfusions along with the fact that your body had been acting in a near hibernal state according to your records which helped to reduce the effect. Outside of the blood loss most of your muscles have torn and likely need a few more days of bed rest before they will have recovered enough to allow for proper movement along with possibly requiring several weeks of physical therapy before they are once again working at full capacity. Let’s see, there is also your mana passages, both sets show signs of calcification and damage. All in all it is quite amazing that we managed to keep you alive much less that you are already awake and able to talk.” The director listed off as if she was reading a simple laundry list rather than the almost comical amount of damage that Jack had sustained. “Anyways now that you have awoken, we will be adding interviews to your daily routine along with the testing and care. Please do answer any and all of our questions to the best of your ability.”

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Sure, I do have to ask about what exactly this treatment I’ve been receiving will cost me. I am guessing that my answers are part of my payment? Or are they considered part of the diagnostics.” Jack asked his life experiences reminding him of the fact that nothing in life is truly free and that there is always some motive behind seemingly altruistic acts. If they were willing to keep him alive with the damage that he had incurred there was certainly a reason why and it wasn’t out of the goodness of their hearts.

“Mmmm.” Came a noncommittal reply as Madam Blue stood and began to head out of the room. “I have no time to talk at the moment. I will be back tomorrow after you have gotten some more rest. We will be having a conversation about just what you can remember leading up to your incident.”

Jack watched the door close behind her before commenting to the nurse attending to him. “My, she’s a cold one isn’t she. She’s the director you said?”

“Yeah, she is. To both of those things. But she’s a good boss and takes care of everyone that works here as well as our families.” Dorian absently replied back.

Jack laughed derisively. “Ha! I’ll be honest that isn’t a great relief as I don’t work here. I’m just a guy who got knocked out on the street and next thing he knew he was waking up in a strange place with his memories messed with.”

“Fair enough. This is going to hurt so brace yourself.” That was the only warning Jack got before one of his legs was lifted up and the bandages on it torn off. “The damage to your legs was worse than your upper body, luckily you seem to be healing well.”

Jack let out a muffled groan gritting his teeth to keep from uttering worse.

“Yeah, I don’t doubt it. Don’t worry we’ll be done shortly, and I’ll be giving you some pain meds along with the fluid drip here to help. Look from what it sounds like you don’t overly trust the director and can’t say I blame you if what you say is true on how you got here.” Dorian chatted away as he finished with the first leg and moved over to the second. “But, I doubt she has anything particularly bad for you in mind or anything. She’s insisted that we take care of you to the best of our abilities and with how she hates to waste resources she wouldn’t jeopardize everything that we put into getting you healed up just to hurt you or something. Of course, I have no real idea of what she plans or what they want to ask you about so there is that.”

It was at this point Jack started to tune the nurse out and tried to get a feel on how his body was doing. He was embarrassed enough at being touched for all the bandages he couldn’t stand the idea of dealing with the ignominy of having to have someone changing and cleaning him from having soiled himself. While he intellectually knew that it probably had happened sometime in the last few days he did not want to experience it while being aware if at all possible.

As he started working though his body bit by bit attempting to tense and relax the muscles to see what all would respond he sound found himself having a harder and harder time breathing. He opened his mouth to let the nurse know but found himself coughing up more of that liquid instead.

“Oh damnit. I was so distracted by the Madam Director being here I didn’t even think to start with that.” Dorian let out worriedly and brought a small bucket over. With the bucket in front of Jack just below his chin Dorian pressed a paper covered with sigils onto Jacks chest. There was a brief moment where it suddenly felt like the world pressed and squeezed on his lungs as a torrent of black liquid came shooting out of his mouth. Then just as suddenly as it came the pressure disappeared and he could breathe again, this time without the feeling of liquid filling his lungs.

“How often… does that need to be done?” Jack wheezed out as he caught his breath.

“Hmm. Well it needed to be done ever few hours while you were unconscious, I don’t know for sure if it would need to be done more often now that you are awake but I would assume it does. I’ll let the others know and we’ll make sure to check more often. If it is getting bad and you need immediate assistance the crystal right there can be turned and it will alert us.” Dorian pondered for a brief moment before admitting and pointing to a small crystal embedded in the wall next to where Jack lay.

Jack grunted and fell silent going back to working on trying to feel how all of his muscles were doing as Dorian went back to changing bandages. A while went by with the two men both working in silence before the nurse broke it once more. “Okay we’re about done with this set just going to change out your drip and give you a dose of painkillers and then you’ll be set for the next bit. Don’t be too surprised if you feel sleepy or out of it these are some powerful drugs.”

Jack nodded acknowledging what he was told not bothering to even open his eyes. Soon after he heard the door close as the nurse left the room. Opening his eyes Jack decided it was time to actually test his limits and see if he was amble to move. It could have simply been the drugs but what he felt right now was no where near as painful as many of the things that he had experienced so far in his life.

With that in mind Jack began to force his body to move. First one leg then the other went over the side of the bed. He grasped the bed railing with one hand and reached out to grab the drip stand with his other. With a muffled groan he heaved himself forward off the bed and onto his feet.

His body screamed in protest, his legs shaking in exertion from simply bearing his weight. He would and could do this. Barely staying upright with both hands holding on Jack shuffled toward the wall. As soon as he was within arms reach he let go of the bed and stretched out to catch himself before he fell. He grimaced at the spike of pain but felt elated at proof that even if it was a struggle he could move if he needed. Slowly to be sure but still it meant that he could achieve some level of independence.

Success carrying him forward Jack shuffled his way slowly to the bathroom.