The experiment of Nuel chapter 6- Afterwards
Laria jolted awake. Her head was throbbing as if she had woken up from a severe hangover a sense of confusion and disorientation accompanied her mind. She tried to open her eyes but noticed how her vision was very blurred, so much so that she could not distinguish anything, she decided to get up to go to the bathroom to wash her face, maybe her eyes were dusty, and cleaning them would help. An excruciating pain in her left side forced her back down in bed, she wanted to clutch her side with her left arm but as soon as she tried to move it, that too was shaken by sharp pain, uncontrolled spasms ran through her muscles... But what was going on?
The sense of confusion showed no sign of stopping and she found herself unable to remember recent events, not being able to see well did not help her. She tried to call her parents, she did not know if it was immediately appropriate to go to the hospital but she wanted to get up and needed help. No one came to her, how strange, the rooms were close and they should have heard her. A background noise reached her ears, maybe they had guests in the house and they did not hear her? It did not matter, Laria needed them and would keep calling until someone answered her
She did not know how long she kept calling her parents, maybe it had been a few minutes maybe it had been hours, the state of confusion did not help at all ... the fact is that she heard a female voice.
"she' a___a! Qui_____bri___medi____" the sound was fuzzy
"m..oth...er?" She tried to move, she had to figure out where she was and what was going on "Moth....eeer..wh..wh.aat.. is..?" she couldn't speak properly and didn't know how to make herself understood.
"Ehi ___no___, now i ____up______ ok?" Although confused Laria understood the meaning and nodded her head positively. "aan__up__ now ____ope ____mouth___medic____"
Laria felt something press against her lips, finding that they too were sore, but she realized that it was the medicine the female voice was talking about. It could not get any worse and she decided to trust it, straining to open her mouth. Once she felt it on her tongue she swallowed, but because her throat was very dry that action caused her to cough slightly. Pains ran through her rib cage.
Was there any part of her body that didn't hurt?
The voice, this time slightly sharper said. "Perfec__now__ eep. By tomorr___ch better"
"wha..aat..what...i-is..happ...happenin..?" Why was no one telling her anything? what the heck was going on, Where was she? She wanted to scream but it was already difficult to move her lips to speak.
"____tomorrow____ " The voice reassured her as Laria felt she was being put back down in bed.
Although anxiety was eating away at her stomach and pains were furrowing her body, Laria suddenly felt very tired and in a short time, she succumbed to sleep.
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Laria was in 'Kedros', the two days had passed quickly and she had had just enough time to rest. She looked around, unable to make out people's faces.
Neid should have already been there for at least half an hour.
Laria impatiently stirred her tea with her spoon as she thought about what things Neid would say to him.
"Have I kept you waiting?" a voice behind her
Turning with a slight grin Laria replied, "Long enough for my tea to get cold. This ends up on your tab, mind you."
"I guess that includes the sweet bread you ate while you were waiting," Neid said with a laugh.
"But of course!" she replied with a smile. She could not get angry with her colleague and let it go.
As soon as Neid sat down Laria began to ask him " So what? Was I right?"
"Ah not even time to take a seat I see" he replied "Well, I guess if I didn't update you right away you would risk melting down" this time with a hint of sarcasm in his voice
Laria smiled but glared at him to let him know she wanted an answer
"You were right, there was a lot of energy missing, but I fixed the output."
"And how did you do that in just two days?"
the answer that followed left her speechless "I didn't."
"But you just said..."
"There is no more time"
Laria found herself at home, sitting on her bed. What had Neid said?
A deafening rumble distracted her, going to the window to see what was happening, the wall shattered throwing debris left and right.
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Laria woke up suddenly with her eyes wide open and breathless. She immediately noticed how the pains had greatly diminished; she could even move her body without being shaken by uncontrolled spasms. Her vision had also returned, and the first thing Laria noticed was that she was in a giant pavilion, surrounded by hundreds, if not thousands, of beds housing as many people.
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Panic assailed her. Who were these people? Where was she? and more importantly, what was she doing there?
She did the only thing an adult person with an education and a job could have done. Call loudly for her family.
A woman, roughly in her 40s, came to meet her. She wore a light blue gown smeared with different colors, including the dark red of congealed blood. Laria recognized her as a nurse from Nuel's 'heavenly love' hospital. Were they there? and why?
"Darling have you recovered?" the voice interrupted her.
The woman's voice sounded familiar; she had heard it before. Laria tried to regroup her thoughts. She had to figure out how she had ended up there.
"I'm better...thank you. May I ask... who are you?"
"I'm Dotrin, I take care of this area of the pavilion, very nice to meet you. I took care of you a few weeks ago but I don't think you can remember."
Here was the reason for the familiar voice! It was quite obvious under the circumstances, but Laria was still numb. Perhaps that was also why she made the connection later than she should have.
"Sorry...maybe I heard wrong. Did you mention a few weeks? I remember you gave me the medicine yesterday..."
The nurse's face saddened "Oh...This point is never easy... You see, the medicine I gave you was to send you into forced rest. you've been asleep for almost three weeks dear."
THREE WEEKS?
"THREE WEEKS?" she screamed louder than she should have and had to cough a few times from exertion.
The nurse, clearly concerned, put a hand on her shoulder "Don't fret dear, please, in the state you are in you must neither make exaggerated movements nor stress your body ."
"I...I..." she could not find the words "Who gave you permission to put me in a medically induced coma for so long!"
"I'm sorry dear, but it's the procedure. In the state you were in we had to do everything we could to make sure you survived. You needed not to wake up." she sounded seriously sorry.
After a few minutes, Laria began to calm down. It was useless to go against what had happened, she could not change anything, unfortunately, however, she could gather information... "What happened? Where are my parents?" she had to understand what had happened.
The nurse had a distant, pained look on her face.
"Please tell me what happened," she continued to push for answers.
The woman heaved a sigh "Nuel was attacked, dear. A giant explosion spread out from the center of the city."
"Excuse me but my house is toward the outside...Can you tell me where in the city you found me when it happened?" Laria was getting nervous, wanting to get out of that bed and understand what had happened.
"Dear...Nuel no longer exists..." with tears in her eyes.
Laria stood with her mouth open.
'In what sense does Nuel no longer exist?' This is what she wanted to ask, but her body did not respond to her thoughts and she found herself looking at the woman with a bewildered look and wide eyes.
"No one knows what happened...It is thought to be a Lord's attack...The ray...The ray was so wide that it left only the outermost buildings..." she paused with each small sentence, evidently so as not to burst into tears "I'm sorry...This pavilion, along with the other nine...this is all that remains of Nuel..."
"No...it's not...it's not..." Laria could not speak "It's not...it's not possible" it was absurd, she could not believe it! She had to get up, go see the city, she had to look for her parents!
Laria made to get up but soon discovered that her legs did not respond to her commands, and the push she gave herself with her arms threatened to make her fall out of bed. Fortunately for her, Dotrin had been very responsive and caught her on the fly...The girl, without thanking the nurse, was trying to put up words "I...have...I have to go...my parents...I don't know where they are."
She did not know if her parents were alive if her friends were alive...and she was stuck in bed, unable to do anything. Tears began to run down her face.
"I'm sorry dear...I don't know where your parents are, I hope they are among the injured. If you want you can give me your name and I will mark you on the search list, so if your folks are looking for you they will be able to see where you are or vice versa you can see them."
Ignoring the woman's words Laria burst into tears and, gathering her head in her hands, began to sob uncontrollably.
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It had been four days since Laria woke up and learned that she was in a giant relief pavilion, erected because for some unknown reason the city had been destroyed.
Perhaps she did not want to face the truth or was simply too devastated to know about her condition and not knowing that of her loved ones... But Laria knew that this was no accident. Last day, in a moment of lucidity, she had asked Dotrin the exact day of the explosion; the woman was stressed and tired from the time that had passed and could not remember the days now. After some insistence, she had managed to learn the day on which the catastrophe had occurred. It just so happened that the day was the same as the day of the experiment and the center of the explosion was in the vicinity of the city center, where the Nuel Research Center happened to be located.
Coincidences she could not miss...
Yet Laria, although severe headache when she tried to remember past days, remembered some moments in flashes. She was sure that something was wrong with the experiment and that she had tried to say her own...But what was wrong? Another point was that she was sure that she had talked to Neid, the director of the laboratory and that she had gotten a positive answer like ' don't worry, you don't take any more risks or something like that.
For Laria to have survived such a large explosion, she had to be near her home, a long way from the center of Nuel... Why would she have been there if she did not think everything was fine? Knowing her she would have run into the sublevel to stop Sisap... Yet she could not remember what could have happened... It was getting on her nerves and she felt helpless.
Knowing that she might have been one of the causes of so much destruction and pain, she tried not to think about it so much because she was afraid of going crazy, even though her thoughts always ended up there. It's hard not to think about how things could have been different when you're on a stretcher surrounded by thousands and thousands of wounded in a chaos of screaming, moaning, and nurses looking out to ask if everything is all right...
Nothing was going well.
Laria had given her name after two days and no one had looked for her. Dotrin occasionally informed her if her parents' names had appeared but so far nothing. She was alone, left to her faults, worries, and problems.
Thus another four days passed.
While waiting to hear back she had decided to go over the days before she awoke in the hospital. It would help her memory as well as keep her away from the worst thoughts.
As she found herself intent on jotting down some details, with the few things that came back to her mind, and on a little notebook kindly lent her by Dotrin, she was interrupted by a coughing fit, evidently made to get her attention.
"You don't know how long it took to track you down, miss," a female voice
Surprised Laria turned hopefully to observe who the person was who wanted to speak to her. She hoped she did not recognize the voice and saw her mother standing in front of her. She was disappointed to see an elderly lady, in her seventies at least, near her bed. She was dressed in a black suit that made the only jewelry on her person stand out, a necklace made of green emeralds that encircled her neck. Gray hair pulled back into a bun headed a face furrowed with countless wrinkles but looking anything but tried. Laria had the inexplicable feeling that the lady had such strong willpower that she felt small in comparison.
Was she by any chance a relative he did not know? Unfortunately, she was in no great condition to make an effort to remember anything and decided to have an answer with the ever-appropriate "Who are you?"
The lady hinted at a slight smile before answering, "I am Shera Neal, but you can just call me simply Shera. And you are Dr. Laria Godetr, we have a lot to talk about."