Prologue
Awakening
I could feel the anaesthetic wearing off and lucidity taking its place, my body awakening to the hushed voices of two young females conferring close by.
“What happened to her?” one asked, her voice the closest.
Her hand stroked my arm, her touch warm and gentle – strangely foreign to me.
From somewhere near, the other sighed, flipping open what sounded like a file and flicking through the papers inside. “Suicide attempt,” she replied, her voice strained and harsher than the first. “Jumped off a cliff. Her body sustained serious injuries; broken bones, severe blood loss, possible brain damage and, strangely, burn marks – possibly self-inflicted beforehand. She was almost beyond repair, but she healed quickly.”
“Impossibly quick,” the other agreed, her voice rising and then softening in emphasis.
“Yeah, well, doctors have sent off for blood tests and brain scans so if there’s anything out of the ordinary her results will reflect that,” she explained, moving swiftly around to my side and taking the other woman’s place by the cardiac monitor, which was beeping softly by my head.
“And what do we do in the mean time?”
“In the mean time we monitor her progress and check her vitals regularly.”
“Right.”
Then there was the sound of movement.
A door opened quietly and the kinder woman’s voice came back as a question.
“And does she have a name?”
The woman at my side exhaled, her voice edged with concentration. “Well, she’s not on any medical records,” she said as she moved towards the open door. “So for now she’s just referred to as patient 342.”
The other woman laughed. “‘Patient 342 it is!”
The door closed with a soft snick and their voices gradually faded. A calm silence lingered in the air around me. I lay quietly, feeling the rise and fall of my chest as the tips of my fingers traced the thin blanket around me, the cardiac monitor keeping a constant rhythm by my side.
I considered my situation for a second.
I was obviously in a healing centre, accordingly suffering from serious injuries sustained after a suicide attempt. My body was recovering quickly, as appropriate, but it seemed to come as a surprise to the females in here previously. And, although aware of my condition and virtually conscious of my surroundings, I had no recollection of the events leading up to this state.
I’d already completely ruled out the accusation of attempting to commit suicide, knowing somehow that the damage to my body was sustained another way, and it was dark, cold – painful.
I shook those haunting thoughts away quickly, deciding to evaluate the situation before I acted illogically.
Although weak, my body responded, sending tiny messages all over the place, examining the damage for myself and assessing the seriousness of the situation.
But nothing seemed out of the ordinary to me.
All parts of my body responded. My pulse was clear and beating at a perfect rate, my bones had healed, there were no burns on my skin, and, although feeling nauseous and light-headed, I was in good health.
So, why was I to be monitored by the females? Why were further tests and scans being carried out on my body – and, why would they think I had thrown myself off a cliff?
It made no sense.
I decided to open my eyes, readying myself for the painful burst of light as they fluttered open. I blinked several times to adjust. The room was small but bright, closed blinds hung loosely from every window, and the door, a faded brown, with the numbers 342 etched onto the glass. The walls were a faded eggshell blue, and there were trolleys and trays and machines surrounding the bed, a loudly ticking clock was high up on the wall opposite.
There was a lot more technology and unwanted equipment in this room. Needless tubes ran all over my body, numerous charts and records were scattered across a glass board in the corner of the room.
Where was this place? Why was I really here? Where was my mother – my father?
Did I even have a mother and father?
Why couldn’t I remember?
Something was different.
Something was wrong.
I lifted my head slowly and turned my attention to the cardiac monitor, examining the rise and fall of the lines running across the screen. Straightening my stiff back, I sat up and analysed the monitor more carefully – wondering if it was my pulse rate that worried them or if it was something else.
Something I couldn’t see.
I jumped and the cardiac monitor picked up on my distress. Stood by the open door was a dainty female. She was wearing green scrubs and her blonde hair was tied back neatly, a clipboard was hugged to her chest.
She paused in the doorway, a look of surprise crossing her face as she began to stutter and shift uneasily; casting wary glances out into the corridor before she stared at me again.
“I, uh… it’s just I,” she stammered, her voice soft and gentle, the same voice as before. “You were… unconscious when I last checked on you. Five minutes ago.”
“Unconscious?” I croaked and cleared my throat, surprised to hear the roughness edging my tone.
She nodded hesitantly, her eyes wide with curiosity as she hugged her clipboard to her chest. “You were brought in a few days ago. You were… I mean your body was…”
I wondered why she didn’t finish her sentence, but then I noticed the shock in her eyes and I decided it was best not to hurry her.
“You sustained some serious injuries,” she tried again, levelling her voice to a professional tone. “You were on the brink of death, although, we assume that’s what you were trying to accomplish?”
This time it was a question, but I had too many that needed answering for me to bother justifying myself to her, so I just nodded and waited, watching as she cleared her throat and took one last look out into the corridor, confidently stepping into the room and closing the door behind her.
“You’ve healed incredibly quickly. Considering the damage and injury it’s phenomenal. I can’t even begin to explain it,” she laughed nervously, the smile gone as soon as it had come. She anxiously consulted her files, standing at the foot of the bed and flicking through the pages, pulling a pen from her pocket and touching it to the right page. “Okay, uh… name,” she breathed out heavily, leaving the sentence open.
There was something different about her.
Her skin was too tanned, her eyes were too light, her intelligence wasn’t as advanced as it should have been.
And her body emanated too much heat.
When I didn’t reply she looked up and pursed her lips – her fully blossomed, pink lips, too bright in comparison to my ice blue.
Something wasn’t right.
Something about her, this place, this whole situation.
“Miss, your name please?” she asked again, fighting to keep her voice patient.
And suddenly it struck me.
She was human.
.
Gender:
Points: 300
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