With the best intentions - My Short Story for finishthestory #67

With the best intentions

by @f3nix

"A double toast! At your brilliant timing, for the second damn time."

The nurse spoke turning his gaze to the parking lot, beyond the window whose bars, swallowed by rust, had lost all their decorative hypocrisy. His cheerful lashing tone clashed with the fixture of his gaze elsewhere.

The lump of words channeled along the patient's Eustachian tubes like a sticky egg liqueur, while the neodymium lamp commented on the phrase with a quick moth’s flicker.

Through the steel bar on the side of the bed, her bleary, half-closed eyes returned to her the image of a lanky shape exiting the bedroom.

She wondered why she had only been noticed now, only now despite the endless carousel of drowsiness in which she had fallen for eons. A never-ending display of Chinese lamps, swarming with the nightmares of a painting by Bosch.

The impetus of thirst coagulated in a guttural moan, insufficient to make the sarcastic human crane turn back towards her.

The sound she emitted reminded her of a documentary with a koala, forced to walk on hot coals during a forest fire. It was something she had seen with Lucian that last night spent together before she left in secret heading to the clinic.

I had to fix it for us, Lucian. For once only, maybe the right one. And instead, look where I fucking got myself.

A sudden laugh tried to make its way. The spasms brought to her mind the horrible awareness of those tubes that, like worms, were violating her body. She had not noticed but two figures were now observing her from the edge of the bed.

"Rise and shine, Ms. White. You had a car accident just a mile away from the clinic. Fortunately, on his way back home after the shift, Valery noticed the wheels of your vehicle in the ditch along the avenue. We had to operate you urgently, a lung had collapsed and we had to contain internal haemorrhage in the abdominal cavity. It was not easy but someone up there decided that your day had not yet arrived. "

As he spoke, the doctor's eyes stared at her in dullness and, at the same time, darting with curiosity.

She would have said that some of her saviour’s facial muscles - not all the necessary ones - were struggling to reproduce a slow smile. The attendant loomed from behind the doctor's silhouette, tilting his head silently to one side.

For God’s sake, tear all this stuff away and just give me a damn glass of water. Then I'll pay you what I owe you and leave.

She would have shouted at them, but the only breath filtering from her broken mouth didn't even sound like a koala moan anymore.

"Yes, I understand the curiosity, Ms. White." The doctor's eyes now reminded her of those of an abyssal fish.

"You have crossed the border and turned to us to participate in the pharmacological trials and, may I add, further to helping medical progress, you have also come because we pay fairly well."

A wet and repeated slap against the floor, in a point her eyes couldn’t reach, seemed to smear those statements along the washed-out walls. Through scarcely oiled winches, the human crane behind the doctor leaned forward in her direction.

"Well, Ms. White, notwithstanding the circumstance, you will be pleased to know that we have decided to still include you in the program. You will earn your fair compensation, after all."

Perhaps because of the narcotics, the doctor's face kept changing as if his features were playing hide and seek in the blind corners of her perception. A sound came from a low point close to the bed, similar to a badly restrained gurgle, while the doctor quietly turned away.

"You will have your money, despite your unfortunate condition or, perhaps, thanks to it," he said in a last laconic murmur.

She wanted to shout out, a pleading cry for freedom. But her mouth was dry and her throat felt restricted, barely allowing her to breath. Then her vision blurred, dissolving into bland blobs of grey and white while a shadow loomed near the edge of her vision. The shadow seeming to come near accompanied by a smell, of meat and blood, lead to an unfurling of fear and stress all over again. This feeling solidified as her arms and legs wouldn't move inspite of her best efforts and she lay back screwing her eyes shut.

She felt tears fill her eyes, flinging her head from side to side to clear them, she opened her eyes. Her vision sharpened and she was able to see the doctor clearly for the first time. She blinked again and again as the vision was unbelievable. The doctor had no arms but tentacles, pink and scaly one side and a smooth gray on the other. This was not happening to her again. She had escaped them once, for Lucian...

Her vision swam with blotches of color as she understood her situation. She must have been recaptured and drugged. They were going to continue their experiments on her. She had failed. Not only was her life over but Lucian was as good as dead. I have screwed this up. I am sorry. So sorry.

She noticed that the doctor was standing close to her bed and was holding a sipper of foul smelling liquid. He extended a tentacle holding her head in her place and put the sipper to her lips. She struggled and spit out the liquid when she realized it tasted like blood, but much of it did go down her throat. What will they make of me? Why are they filling me with blood and narcotics? They want to change me? Make me like they are?

Anger surged inside her and with a heroic effort she turned her head and bit into a tentacle. The flesh came away in her mouth but the doctor had not shifted away. Swallowing the bloody morsel she took a huge bite again. Spitting the chewed flesh at the doctor this time. The doctor made a guttural sound but moved away and already tired, she flopped back into her bed, her mouth turned up in a grim smile of satisfaction and her eyes filling with tears of desperation. Her vision cleared for a moment showing an IV tube dangling from a bag of medication snaking towards her and then blackness smothered her.

Lucian watched her return to drug induced sleep through the glass panel in the door. Dr. Kilimed spoke.

"You know that technically she is the one getting paid."

"Yes, Yes, of course." Lucian forced a cordial smile and continued in a soft flat tone.

" I have given you a... good deal. Hmm?"

"My experiments are for the good of all." The doctor stood straight, staring at him, indignation itself.

"And I can help you only if I get paid."

"She is the volunteer." Dr. Kilimed reiterated.

"She is a schizophrenic who is dangerous to herself and to society. If her healthy body is good enough to contribute to science then I deserve to get paid for it. She does not have any use for money any more. We have had this conversation before. If you can not pay me, I am taking her away."

"It is not so simple. I did not expect her to be an acute case. You saw how she spit out the water and the sandwich. We have to take special care, expensive care."

"Ah! You want a discount. You bastard, you." Lucian smiled at the doctor.

The doctor reached inside his pocket for the wad of cash, already thinking of the trials which he was going to conduct on the live specimen.

THE CONTEST: https://steemit.com/finishthestory/@bananafish/finish-the-story-contest-week-67

PICTURE CREDIT: www.fgfinder.com/images/clinical-trials/arthritis_hand.jpg