Rory’s body had been falling apart since she was 15. It was an incurable and inoperable disease that has only been seen a number of times throughout history.
Actually, it was so rare that you could only ever find it in religious texts. Rory liked to think of it as her own little disease, though. The world referred to this disease as Roberts’ disease; apparently Robert was the first person to have this disease. Bastard, in her mind. I mean, who names a fatal disease after themselves? But Rory preferred to call it Countdown Disease.
The symptoms of the disease were relatively few, but some were quite severe: nausea, constipation, pain, swollen joints, ossification, and bursting blood vessels. Rory had had all of those except for any of her blood vessels bursting; well, to be fair, she’d only had partial ossification. But now, at 29, Rory probably only had a couple years left, at most, until something more severe happened, and, honestly, she had been thinking about killing herself recently, more or less because she didn’t want others to see her decline.
Rory’s emerald eyes and shoulder-length, wavy auburn hair became downcast. She was always told that she was beautiful, but that was mostly her mother telling her that, and she had always had this disease. How could anyone find her attractive? Maybe on the surface, but then they would figure out one thing about her, and it would be all over for that potential relationship.
But today was going to be special, or so her mother told her. Rory was going to see a doctor who has an untested treatment plan that she was going to get for free. For free!!
What’s the catch?" Rory thought.
Rory started scrolling through her phone looking at the alpha gameplay footage; that’s all that was available for My Ancestors, or MA, as people were apparently calling it. It appeared that the developers decided to call playable characters "settlers"; why that was anyone’s guess. Everyone knew they were still called NPCs; however, the company that made it was even unknown to her and everyone else; everything was supposed to be revealed once the game made it to the shelves.
Rory hadn’t realized her mother had been talking to her this entire time; she "zoned back in" and heard her mother saying,
"This doctor will be different; this doctor will have the answer; this doctor will have the cure."
Rory, personally, didn’t believe her, but she humored her.
Hours later, Rory was still watching alpha footage of MA, even though her phone battery was already at 14%. Some of the stuff Rory was seeing for this game was so realistic that she couldn’t believe that it had made it out of the alpha phase like this; it was so brutal that she could swear that they were re-creating real life during that era for this game. The only solace she could find is that, even if it were that brutal, everyone would be playing in VR, so no pain would be felt.
Rory’s mother and her finally make it to the hospital. Which really looked more like a field hospital, but she was going along with this for her mother’s health, not her own. The hospital was named very mockingly, The QOL Foundation," in large neon-lit letters. It looked like something she’d seen 40 years ago in a movie.
Rory and her mother walked through the "tent flaps" that denoted the entrance to the hospital, and a carbon copy of what you would imagine a receptionist to look like greeted us with a smile, and the words "this way" said so monotonously that Rory couldn’t believe she’d made it this far as a receptionist. She reminded her of the robot voices her mother talked about when talking about her great-great-great-grandmother’s movies.
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Rory made her way into a sitting room of sorts. Rory only had to wait for a minute before the doctor made his entrance. He gruffly said,
"I have already ordered an MRI, a CAT scan, and an X-ray, and we have a pill that you need to take beforehand. Also, you will be getting an injection that will be painful, but, thankfully, you only need four of them. We figured out that only 4 would be necessary for you."
Rory looked up at the doctor and wondered why he was using the tone that he was, almost like he was used to complete obedience when he spoke. Rory replied,
"Okay" and followed him into the next room.
The next room was expansive and included all the machines he had referenced and many more besides that. It kind of reminded Rory of a space-folding bag that would be bigger on the inside than the outside. Similar to that old show... what was it called? Oh yeah, Doctor Who.
Rory looked around and saw beakers and glass instruments everywhere. Rory followed the doctor to the far side of the room and sat down on a chair that was clearly meant for administering IVs. Another person, a nurse, appeared and took Rory’s heart rate, blood pressure, and oxygen saturation level. Rory’s heart rate was elevated, her blood pressure had skyrocketed, and her oxygen was right where it should be—at least that is what the nurse said. The nurse explained that an elevated heart rate and blood pressure were a normal reaction to coming to the doctor’s office and that because of that, they weren’t indicative of her normal levels. However, she continued and said that her blood pressure could be a worry in the future.
The nurse proceeded to say, under her breath but loud enough for me to hear,
"Everything is well within normal values".
Rory looked at her, taken aback, and then quickly covered that up with a plastered smile. The nurse smiled back and asked which arm she wanted the injection to be administered into. Rory smugly replied,
"Left leg, please."
Now it was the nurse’s turn to be surprised, as she was so used to giving IVs in the arm. The nurse hesitantly told Rory that this was going to be an arterial blood draw and the leg wasn’t exactly the best place to do it, but she acquiesced.
Rory then saw the needle that she was going to use and started to panic. Rory knew that since she’d turned 15, she hadn’t been able to carry much, walk long distances, or support herself for long periods of time, but she was worried that this might have a permanent effect on her walking ability. Rory glanced at the needle. The needle was large, reminiscent of a soda straw, and half as long. The only difference between a soda straw and this needle was the vicious point that it narrowed down to. Rory considered asking to change her previous answer, but then the nurse stabbed her with it in Rory’s left leg with absolutely no preamble. There was no subtlety to it. The nurse just raised her arm and jabbed it into Rory’s thigh. Rory looked at her and screamed,
"What the hell, lady?"
She looked back at Rory and just smirked with a sadistic look in her eye and said,
"Now that didn’t hurt too bad, did it?"
Rory responded hesitantly and tersely,
"You didn’t even aim; where the hell is all that fluid going to go, and why can’t I feel my leg?" The nurse looked up at the doctor and said,
"She’s ready for you".
The doctor brought a wheelchair and commented,
"You might not be able to walk right now, and that’s completely normal, so please hop this way."
Rory proceeded to hop over to him and sit down without any semblance of grace whatsoever. The doctor turned Rory around and headed toward the first test site. And all the while, Rory couldn’t feel her left leg.
A couple hours later, with the numbing spreading in Rory’s leg, she received two additional shots, each more painful than the last. The third shot even had to go in Rory’s right leg because of the searing pain in her left leg. And that same searing pain, which took its time amping up in Rory’s left leg, immediately started in her right leg. But that could also be because of the forgotten fourth shot, which was administered when Rory wasn’t aware and only vaguely felt more pain.
Apparently, this nurse had it out for Rory, and Rory let her know by screaming as loud as she could as close as she could to her face. How the hell did my mother not hear me screaming? Rory’s body decided then to start shutting down. She felt her consciousness wane multiple times. And, coupled with the racking pains in her lower body that were beginning to migrate to her upper body, She couldn’t move anymore, and it wasn’t because of the pain; there must have been a paralytic agent of some sort in those shots. Rory attempted to scream, but even her mouth wouldn’t comply, as if frozen in time. She then heard the nurse say,
"The treatment can now begin."