Zeke barged into the Providence Infirmary of the Occult with his Healer’s Garb equipped, mask pulled up, and doctor’s bag in hand.
The spirit known as the Healer’s Garb was an entity that existed within his soul and granted him mystical power—just like the other members of the Tainted Generation. His Garb manifested in the form of a long, forest-green leather coat—with epaulets on the shoulders and flap pockets on the side of his arm and chest—looking like something military-issued. The dark green leather mask covering the lower half of his face had an exhalation valve to the side.
As he stepped into the waiting room, the chamomile fragrance and song of crackling fires from the sconces welcomed him back. It gave him a much-needed sense of serenity before his stress rocketed to its regular high levels once he started the final procedure.
Naomi walked out from behind the polished timber counter. She was wearing her white nurse uniform, complete with gloves and a cap of the same clean color. A red bow was tied at the center of her waist.
Zeke halted as she rushed up to him with a face filled with concern, but he spoke first.
“Any more patients?”
“No,” Naomi said, shaking her head and then lowering it, twiddling her thumbs as her expression took on a more pathetic look. “But that might not be so good because that means there may be people or creatures with ailments that need our help and—”
“Naomi,” Zeke said as he touched her shoulder and glanced at the red cross on the center of her cap. “We can’t think about that right now. We need to focus on who we can save now.”
Zeke broke off and rushed past the doorless arched frame. Naomi caught up to him and maintained the same walking speed.
“Were you able to get it?” Naomi asked, referring to the imp tail extract needed for the cure.
“Yeah,” Zeke answered and started running; Naomi kept up.
The patient’s unfortunate form was caused by an imp, doing its sadistic equivalent of “it’s just a prank, bro.” Luckily the Infirmary’s newest staff member could summon a black dog with genetic tracking capabilities to locate the creature that fell under the Major Demon category.
Zeke promised the conjurer he’d take good care of Onyx, the black dog, as he searched for the imp. He found it in the back alley of a restaurant, probably waiting to pull another prank on an unsuspecting human.
It wasn’t much of a struggle. Zeke cut off its tail, banished it back to the Netherworld, and phoned Aida to call off the summon so Onyx could safely return to her farm.
After Zeke and Naomi turned a corner, he told her, “Naomi, go to the dispensary and get White Magic medicine for the patient.”
Naomi nodded, and the two split in different directions.
The ailment belonged to the Black Magic category, but it didn’t mean it could be easily solved with White Magic. The procedure required a couple of things to be done before having the patient gulp down White Magic solution with a whitish-blue color made from Naomi’s white feathers and unicorn blood they’d stockpiled in the dispensary.
Zeke flinched as a monstrous roar spread through the Infirmary, booming into his eardrums. He tried to keep himself from imagining how much the patient’s mutation had worsened since he left.
There was no point in imagining because he would see it for himself in just a few seconds.
Zeke finally reached the operating room door, just like all the other doors in the Infirmary—It was engraved with beautiful reliefs, a single pentagram, and a plaque. It read: OPERATING ROOM.
He had no excuse to pause to catch his breath since he had his Garb equipped. A part of him wished he did so he could stand outside the operating room to brace himself for just a little longer.
Another roar erupted from the other side of the room.
Paging Doctor Rosario.
It was go time. Zeke clenched all over as he put on a brave face and stepped inside.
If the shape of the patient’s current form had a name. Zeke didn’t have a clue about what it might be. It was like staring at the world’s largest bacterium, breaking through the confines of the microscopic realm with its massive size. Multiple oozing mouths and dark eyes were all over its gray-black skin.
The patient had grown slimy, gray-black tentacles with plenty of eyes. Ugo, clad in his blue, mummy-like Healer’s Garb, was caught in one of them and swung around the room with the green ceramic tile walls, making for the worst amusement park ride ever.
An orange slash projection swept past the tentacle, setting Ugo free and letting him drop to the oak wood floor as the mutant bellowed in agony with its green gushing wound.
Zeke looked over to Aida, clad in her Healer’s Garb: an oni mask and a short black kimono decorated with colorful ukiyo-e. She wore it over her gray cropped striped shirt, khakis, and white sneakers. Ready to do some more cutting, she was in her quick draw stance, one foot forward, both legs slightly bent with her long sheathed katana—Tsukikaze in her hands.
“Aida, you’re hurting the patient!” Zeke said to her.
She stood up and clenched her jaw, showing her teeth. “I know…” she said. “We’ll make it up to her by curing her. Did you already mix the extract?”
Zeke crouched, opened his doctor’s bag, and took out a corked bottle filled with thick red liquid.
He spotted the crushed operating table on one side of the room. Then he saw AJ standing near the beeping supernatural machines and monitors, gaping at the mutant, which now touched the ceiling with its top. She wore a dark red leather lab coat over her sporty outfit: a jersey, joggers, and sneakers.
“Mano!” Ugo called Zeke over as he slipped out from the grip of the severed tentacle. “What’s the plan?”
Zeke looked over at his step-brother, still not used to his new look. His bleached hair tips had gone the way of the bouffant, and now his spiky tips were brushed down and regained their natural black color like the rest of his hair.
The Geneticist and Surgeon eyed Zeke, eagerly waiting for instructions.
A tentacle came swinging in their direction; they all ducked at once and got back up. Zeke glanced up at the patient. From the day Aida joined, she shared with the team all the books she’d found that contained detailed information about the Codex of Supernatural Ailments the previous Tainted Generation had put together. Soon, they discovered that their library had held books containing the same information. Frustratingly, the Codex described the ailments but not always the exact solution.
It was funny how quickly one finds something when they know exactly what they are looking for. Zeke wasn’t sure if all the books they had contained, in fact, a million different ailments, but they were massive tomes nonetheless. The team had diagnosed the ailment of their current patient as a 938.1: Incomplete Demonic Transmogrification. When a demon performs a transmogrification spell poorly on its victims, whether by accident or on purpose (concerning the case, it was the latter for sure), the victim takes an abominable, shapeless form.
He looked at Aida first. Thanks to her Garb’s abilities, she could see every being’s genetic code, access them for vital information, and even edit them, changing their physiological and meta-physiological properties and many more changes that’ll persist in future generations. It was like hacking a computer for her.
“I need you to splice her DNA,” Zeke said.
Aida gave him an unamused look and then dodged another tentacle that came her way. “Zeke, you know, changing her back to normal won’t be as simple,” she said. “As soon as I get the gene back to normal, she’ll just morph back if what is causing the spell is still in place.”
Zeke grinned, already expecting this reaction, and was glad he would be able to use the rebuttal he prepared. “I know. I just want you to start looking for her original genetic code now so you’ll be ready to insert it when needed.” He jumped over a swinging tentacle. “And add new hereditary codes to help with her soul’s production of antibodies for demonic curses, and so it can be carried onto her future children… if she chooses to have them!”
Aida nodded and ran off to get started.
“Ugo!” Zeke called.
“Talk to me, Mano!”
“One of the imp’s horns is lodged somewhere on her body. Find it and remove it. But it’s very durable and can’t be done in an instant or else we could risk tachycardia. She’ll die. You need to remove it slowly.”
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“I’ll use my saw,” Ugo responded, stepping back to make hand signs for his spell. It ended with a gesture where he held his hand forward and fingers curled downward—cobalt blue electricity collected under his hand and materialized into an archaic surgical saw. Arabic-like occult symbols were dotted all over the serrated blade, the same color as his Garb’s bandages.
Ugo held up the saw. “I think I saw the horn when I was flung around.” He looked over at Zeke. “What will you be doing?”
Zeke raised the corked bottle in his hand. “I have to rub this on her uvula.”
Ugo stole a glance at the patient. “From which mouth?”
“The biggest one,” he said as confidently as possible. Sure, one of the Codex tomes they had explained the 938.1. can be cured that way, but never specifying which mouth. Even though it was a personal milestone for him to go with the flow, he wasn’t quite ready to admit he was guessing out loud.
“Zeke, what do you need me to do?” AJ asked.
He ducked under a swinging tentacle and stared at AJ as if just remembering she was in the room. “Uh…” he said while scanning the room in a panic, and then pointed at the machine she stood next to. “Watch the machine!”
Next, Zeke crouched to his doctor’s bag, grabbed a flashlight, and turned it on as he ran towards the blobby patient. He caught Aida doing her genetic splicing spell from the corner of his eye.
With unwavering focus, she rearranged the DNA structures before her and made hand signs between each delicate maneuver. The DNA took the form of orange double helixes, floating in front of her like 3D holograms made with technology years beyond.
“Found it!” Ugo shouted as he ran behind the patient.
It was time for Zeke to pull his weight in the procedure. He unscrewed the cork from the bottle, lowered his mask, put the flashlight between his teeth, and dived into the patient’s largest mouth.
Living a nightmare for claustrophobics everywhere, Zeke crawled deeper as the firm, pink muscle tissue squeezing him from all sides pushed him forward. The inside of the patient’s mouth was clammy and moist, marinating him with goo.
As he neared the throat that looked even more cramped, he aimed the flashlight beam up at the fleshy ball that hung over him. With barely any space to move around, he hastily pushed two fingers into the bottle and reached for the uvula hanging over his head.
He was now deep enough to see the curve in the throat that led to the digestive juices. He could hear its bubbling; it sounded like a taunt letting him know that if he fell in, he would be dissolved in seconds.
After the third session of rubbing the uvula with the viscous red liquid, his surroundings began to rumble and slowly shrink. It was the cue for him to get out, but with the slimy muscle tissue pressing onto his body from all over, crawling back out of the mouth was a struggle.
The tongue he lay on pushed him onto the gooey roof of the mouth, and the tissue to his sides was compressing him as it made throaty clicking noises. He kept the flashlight in his mouth despite wanting to scream in panic, not wanting to risk the patient choking on it. His jaw ached as he forced himself back through the cramped space.
He managed to get one foot out of the opening. Then, the mouth made a violent contraction, constricting his movement entirely. It was hard to tell whether he was stuck in the mouth or the throat as the patient was transforming back.
Right before Zeke had the chance to accept death and put in his bets if he turned out to be the Damned, Deliverer, or neither, he felt a tug on his ankle.
He was pulled out with brute force and slid onto the wooden operating room floor, dropping the bottle from his hand and spitting out the flashlight he almost choked on. Naomi stood above him with a blanket slung over her shoulder. She was crushing his ankle in one hand and holding a corked bottle of white liquid in the other.
Zeke gawked up at her. Sometimes it was hard to remember that the doe-eyed sunflower blonde was a hundred times stronger than any winner of the World’s Strongest Man.
“Uhh, Naomi, thanks for the save… but you’re hurting me,” he said.
Naomi let go. “Sorry, Zeke!”
“I’m done,” Aida announced, with the set of newly arranged DNA molecules floating before her.
Ugo stepped out from behind the weakening, shrinking blob with a cut horn in his hand. “Got the horn.”
Afterward, Aida pushed the DNA molecule, and it absorbed itself into the blob. Not only was her magic useful to help patients’ bodies become stronger with better genetics after recovering from supernatural ailments, but it also allowed the body to return to exactly how it was.
According to what he had read on the topic regarding Incomplete Demonic Transmogrifications, even after doing the procedures to have the victim transform to normal, sometimes the body is left with deformations, on the inside or the outside—Making it a 938.2: Demonic Post-Malformation.
Relief left the building as Zeke winced at the mucous-like substance stretching from his hair to his hand.
The patient glowed and transformed back into her form of a 25-year-old skinny brunette: Cindy Berkman—Another cured patient to add to the growing list. She lay sprawled on the floor and was completely naked.
As Naomi unfurled the blanket from her shoulder and approached the patient, Zeke located Ugo. He shoved him out the door before he could see the young nude woman.
The woman moaned softly as Naomi knelt and wrapped her in the blanket.
“It’s okay, you’re okay now,” Naomi said, removing the cork from the bottle. “Please, drink this. It’ll help.” She helped the patient drink the liquified angel feather to wash out any remnants of demonic microorganisms in her system.
“Another case solved,” Aida said as she removed her mask and blew at her bangs.
Zeke smiled and gave everybody a thumbs up. “Good job, Providence team!” His smile faded as he noticed AJ looking away from everybody and cowering to make herself seem smaller.
----------------------------------------
Before returning the patient to her fiancé, they needed to let her rest in one of the patient rooms since a 10-hour slumber follows after being cured of such an ailment. Like state-of-the-art smart lights, the sconces in the rooms of the Infirmary somehow knew when an occupant didn’t want them on, not that their light would have woken up the patient anyway.
While crossing through the waiting room with his Infirmary team, Zeke stopped midway as the others went through the door marked with the Transportation Sigil.
Zeke focused on the tapestry of a three-faced sun hanging over the altar, which contained the bowl of holy water, thinking back to the incident.
And the culprit was the one to snap him back to reality with a smack on the side of his head.
“Let’s go, Mano,” Ugo said. “Stop thinking about that already.”
Zeke sighed, putting the thought aside, and followed him to the exit, reaching their bedroom via Transportation Sigil, leaving his medical bag behind.
The nerd-wonderland had bookshelves filled with American and Japanese comic books and video games with limited edition figurines on top of them and other collectibles scattered across the room (including Zeke’s study desk). Multiple game consoles were also hooked up to a TV on the other side of the room with two bean bag chairs before it.
“¡Diablos! I am starving,” Ugo said. He had called off his Healer’s Garb, just like Zeke and Aida, and was now in his blue sweatshirt, worn jeans, and black sneakers.
“I could eat,” Zeke said. Staying true to his unusual fashion sense, he wore a plain black T-shirt, dark blue slip-on shoes, and printed pants displaying an eye-watering Persian rug pattern.
“So, what should we have?” Naomi asked. She had changed from her nurse uniform and wore a yellow plaid pinafore dress over a white sweater.
Zeke watched Naomi amble toward the bean bag chair and drop onto it. Then his attention was stolen by Aida, who picked up a Hyperman figurine and sniffed it. “Careful with that,” he said, keeping his tone measured as he took the precious item from her.
Aida grinned. “Sorry.”
“It’s fine. By the way, you didn’t happen to give the patient any new, unsolicited genetic traits with your spell… right?”
She put her hands on her hips as her mouth fell open. “What are you accusing me of? I didn’t give her anything that wasn’t completely necessary.”
“So, you did do something.”
“Helping her genes develop more child-bearing hips wouldn’t hurt. She’s getting married soon… completely necessary,” she said with her eyes sparkling.
“Aida!”
“It’ll help her deliver her future babieeeeees! I did it for the children, Zeke. Cindy would thank me.”
“What else did you do?”
Aida curled her lip to the side as she tapped the tips of her fingers against each other. “You know… just in case the marriage doesn’t work out, and she decides to seek love in other… beings. I made sure the mating process would be much easier.”
Zeke dropped his face into his hand. “Oh, Dio mío,”
“Can we go to the mall?” Naomi shouted, raising her hand as she sank into the bean bag chair. “We can go to the food court and then visit that really cool comic shop.”
Zeke reminisced about the last time he and Ugo walked into their regular comic book shop with the girls and the chaos that followed—a couple of heart attacks and several comic readers harassing the stepbrothers for their brainwashing secrets.
“Let’s just hang here, order a pizza, and watch a movie,” Ugo said, sitting on the edge of his bed.
Zeke carefully put the figurine back in its spot and said, “How about Heath’s Sports Bar?”
“You just wanna eat there because of the discounts we get, thanks to Naomi,” Aida said in an annoyed tone. “What is wrong with you guys? You’re thinking too small. We can go anywhere! Dum aloo in India, Festival in Jamaica, Ketoprak in Indonesia, or we can eat outside this Realm.”
AJ stepped forward and said, “I think we should—”
The doorbell ring cut her off.
“Door!” Aida said and perked up. She dashed out of the room.
“AJ, hold that thought,” Zeke told her and left the room.
Zeke and the gang went down the staircase and into the entryway, where Aida bounced up and down as she stood before the door.
“I wonder who it could be!” Aida said.
Zeke approached the door and pushed his eye against the peephole. It was somebody he didn’t recognize—a young black man wearing sunglasses. He stepped back and opened the door.
The visitor looked like a rock star from the 90s’. His brown skin seemed to be glimmering under the spring sunshine, and his fantastic taper fade haircut kept the top of his short hair brushed up and slightly tilted to the side. He wore a leather jacket, black pants, and brown leather boots.
“Buenos diaaaaaaaaas!” He said in his booming voice, like an entertainer, almost knocking Zeke off his feet. “How’re you doing, Ezequias Rosario?”
“Hey!” Ugo said. “Who are you, and how do you know my brother’s name?”
“I don’t just know his name, Ugo Morata, Sixth-Born of the Fourteenth Tainted Generation of Healers,” Sunglasses said. “Damn, that’s a mouthful. You guys should really consider shortening the title permanently.”
Zeke turned back to share a look with his comrades.
“Sorry to ruin your afternoon,” Sunglasses said, smiling, “but I’ve come to kill you all.”