Battery Of Tests

Mr. Robert started to align various items on the table in front of him. Each pile corresponded to a different test he’d need to get Anna through. She gulped.

“Alright.” He said, putting on the visor from earlier. “We’ll try this one again. Normally the result should be the same.” She sat on her chair, turning it to face him. He flicked the visor’s switch to power it on and looked in her direction.

“Crashed again. Glad that’s consistent.” He turned it off and put it back on the table, grabbing the next one - some sort of metallic wand with a diode at the end, and some small screen on it. “Don’t look directly at the laser. It’s a frequency humans can’t see, but it can still blind you if you gaze at it too long.”

“Can’t I simply close my eyes?” she asked.

“You could, but I want to test something about your vision, if you don’t mind.”

“What? Is something different about my eyes?” she asked with concern.

“Hopefully not, probably yes. I did say you weren’t operating under the same rules of physics as usual, so anything could be different. Which means… Test everything.”

She felt a growing worry about all this… But she had to endure it. The professor switched the wand on, and she saw a little purple light appear at its end. He turned it towards her and she looked down. There was no indication of anything related to the laser, but there was an annoying speck running about on her clothes that she tried to brush off repeatedly.

“Uuuuh…” the professor hesitated. “What are you doing?”

“There’s a… thing that keeps moving all over the place. I don’t know what it is.” Anna said as she batted at her clothes once more.

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The ‘thing’ disappeared instantaneously, leaving her confused for a couple seconds, before it showed up again in between two folds of her hoodie. She did her best to ignore it, only following it with her eyes while the professor finished his test.

“No anomalous spike detected… But you seem to be able to see ultraviolet light.”

“Oh… What?”

“The spot you complained about came from the laser. It’s supposed to be outside of the human spectrum of visible colors.”

He put the laser back down. “I don’t know why you’ve got that ability. Could you see it before your change, maybe?”

“I… Don’t think so…”

Mr. Robert grumbled. “At least that confirms the problem is something about your body.”

This routine continued for a while. Though technically all Anna had to do was stay put on her chair, something about the tests just exhausted her greatly. She felt like she was about to fall back asleep at any minute. Was it the stress? It could be…

“Professor, I… I think I need to take a nap.” She came clean, hoping he could explain it or something. She could already feel her nose dipping.

“That’s…!” he exclaimed, turning around. “That’s problematic. Why?”

“I don’t… know. I swear, I slept well last night.”

“Really? No nightmare, no weird dream, nothing of the sort, you sure?”

She thought for a moment. Something felt wrong. “...None that I can remember.”

He sighed again. “I did say it’d be preferable if I could get your side of the story while I tested you… But I can’t do anything against you falling asleep. If you need a break, take it. I’ll continue the tests while you rest.”

“Thanks… Thanks a lot.” The last thing she saw before falling asleep was Mr. Robert grabbing the next device on the table.

Anna awoke some time later, curled up on her seat. She rubbed the sleepiness out of her eyes and straightened up back to a sitting position.

Mr. Robert was sleeping on one of the other chairs they’d brought earlier, his empty coffee mug barely hanging on his fingers by the handle. She realised he must’ve stayed up all night to fix some of yesterday’s mess…

She thought the least she could do to repay him was to help with the triage of the pile of junk that he hadn’t finished yet. She stood up and stretched, then moved towards the pile. Everything that looked pristine she put in one of the nearby boxes, what was obviously broken she put away in another pile, and for the in between she didn’t have the knowledge to make a judgement call on, she put back under the table.

The bell rang and reminded her she could look at her phone to know the time.

...Oh no.

It was already lunch period. She had slept for multiple hours.

Mr. Robert emerged from his sleep and slowly climbed the stairs without paying her much attention. Guess that meant she was free to go? She grabbed her bag, put her facemask and sunglasses back on and went out.