From: "kyscott" Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 04:11:44 -0500 Subject: Submission: One Microscopic Cog Source: direct Title - One Microscopic Cog Author - Kristy Scott E-Mail Address - kyscott@msn.com Rating - PG for one slightly bad word Category - S, I suppose Spoilers - Ascension/One Breath, Memento Mori Keywords - None Summary - How DOES a person become part of a government conspiracy? Disclaimer - Louise isn't mine, though her owners call her something else. Anne isn't mine either; her owners call her something else too. Ditto for Kevin. Julie IS mine, and if anyone would like to pay a large sum of money for her, I will use it to pay for vet school. (That's a hint to any lawyers--I'm not worth it, especially since I doubt anyone will be taking me up on that offer and, therefore, I will make no money from this.) Author's notes at end. ******************************************************************* One Microscopic Cog ******************************************************************* My name is Julie, and I work for demons. Strange, isn't it, that I should only go by that name? I had other identities once, a long time ago. Names that reflected different aspects of myself, known to family, friends, teachers, patients. But for a long time I've just been Julie. Stranger still that I should see my employers in such a light. When did it begin? Too many years ago, I suppose, when I graduated from nursing school. I was so young and so proud. And so nervous. I'd had several job offers, all of them good, but I was still afraid of making the wrong choice. Maybe I wouldn't like the city or the hospital. Maybe I wouldn't like the staff or the work. Maybe I wouldn't have much contact with patients. Then, as they say, came the offer I couldn't refuse. ******************************************************************* "We're a large firm, mostly developing and testing gene therapies. The position we're hiring for right now is in the clinical trials department. There's a very exciting one running right now on some promising reproductive techniques. It's probably where you'd be assigned." I smiled at the recruiter, hopeful. "May I ask what sorts of qualities you're looking for? I'd--well, I'd sort of like to know how good my chances of being hired are." She laughed, a polite, professional laugh. "Oh, we would never have even met if you weren't as good as hired." I blushed, feeling oddly flattered. She glanced at my record on the desk before her and added, "As for the qualities that attracted us, well, your academic transcript is quite impressive. You show a particular skill for lab work and molecular biology--I notice you took a couple of classes along those lines, outside the regular curriculum. By all reports, you are calm, mature, respectful, quick to learn, discreet... with all the industrial espionage concerns these days, you can see how important discretion is." I nodded earnestly and tried to look trustworthy. "And, of course, you're unattached. That's not something we require, but we have facilities in a number of locations; you could periodically be required to move, and with no family..." She glanced up from my record and smiled. ******************************************************************* They hired me the next week. I worked in the recovery ward for women who had undergone a surgical procedure. I didn't know the specifics, not then, just that my patients were mostly asleep. I gave the prescribed medications at the prescribed times, and tried not to notice when someone else's patient cried out in pain or confusion. After nearly a year, working eight hours a day with two other nurses, I was called in to the coordinator's office and offered a transfer. I would be working closely with one or two doctors in the lab--no patients--and I would have to move to Pennsylvania. But the opportunities for advancement, should I deserve it, would be great. I was good at lab work, though I didn't usually enjoy it, and I had no reason not to move. I accepted. That's where I first met Kevin. He was a doctor, but no one ever called him by anything other than his first name. We worked together in his lab every day, studying and testing and manipulating DNA. He was polite enough, but he had this way of staring at me with a cold, evaluating gaze. I stopped looking at him whenever possible. While I was there, I learned things. Things I'm pretty sure they didn't want me to know. I found out I was working for the government, which didn't bother me. I also learned I was working with viruses; that was all right, too. The disturbing part was the way the viruses were being modified. We were doing cloning work, inserting DNA from a source never identified to me; I saw the transformed virions do things I had never seen, never imagined. But I dismissed it all as the early stages of gene therapy. After a year and half, Kevin called me in to his office. ******************************************************************* "Julie, I'm moving to a new posting in Virginia. I'll be working with patients on an experimental procedure, combining reproductive techniques with some radiation--going back to my roots, you might say." I didn't smile at the comment. The entire department knew he'd done "groundbreaking" work in radiation therapies; he mentioned it every chance he got. He continued, scribbling notes on a lab record. "I know you haven't liked being a lab rat, though I must say you're good at it." A compliment? From Kevin? *Angels and ministers of grace, defend us....* "But when you transferred here, you were promised the opportunity for advancement. This is it." He looked me square in the eye for the first time since I'd entered. "You'd supervise an entire ward--a small one, no more than a half-dozen or so at once. All more or less unconscious, recovering from surgery. And it's night shift, twelve hours, eight to eight. I know you've never been much of a morning person." My mind reeled. "A recovery ward? Six recovering patients at once? How many nurses would I be supervising?" "None, actually." I opened my mouth to protest, but he kept going. "They wouldn't be under anesthesia, of course. It's just that some of the drugs we're using really knock out their systems and they need to sleep it off. They'd be transferred off by the next shift." ******************************************************************* I would be in contact with patients again, albeit sleeping ones. I would work nights, something I've always found oddly congenial. Something about Kevin's explanations struck me as bizarre, which was worrisome, and I would have to work with him again. But I liked this position much better than my last, so once again I asked no questions. I took the job. My first visit to the ward was during the day, even though I would be working from eight p.m. to eight a.m. Kevin introduced me to the day-shift nurse with whom I would exchange reports at each change of shift. Her name, I was told, was simply Louise. And, as always, I was just Julie. Louise was older than I. Everyone there was. She was shorter, too, and heavier, with short, straight, mousy-brown hair. Her demeanor was quiet and, as I would learn, very affectionate around our patients. She was motherly and competent. She was, in short, the type of sweet, caring nurse I had utterly failed to become. Before Kevin left, I saw him scowl at the pretty gold cross that was Louise's only ornamentation. It was worn on a short chain, to keep it out of the way when working with a patient. Not at all unprofessional, and Kevin's obvious displeasure was just one more reason to dislike the man. Louise showed me around the ward and "introduced" me to the half- dozen or so patients we would care for. They were all women, all unconscious. Louise explained the story to me, her words almost identical to the ones Kevin had used when telling me about the transfer. They were here undergoing an experimental fertility treatment, which explained the high doses of hormones each received. The treatments were a form of surgery, which explained their level of consciousness, or lack thereof. I gathered that this unit was similar to the one I had worked on before, but the procedure these women had undergone was probably more radical. I made note of--and dismissed--the slight burns some bore, the ones I had seen on cancer patients receiving radiation therapy. As time passed and I settled into my routine, I convinced myself that the story was true. Patients I monitored one night were seldom there the next, though they might appear again weeks later. Nights were filled with administering prescriptions, each labeled with the patient's number--no names. And it was supposed to be a double- blind experiment, so I never knew what some of the medications were. After all, I might act differently around patients receiving one drug or another. That would affect the data. In between medication times, I had to shift the women's positions to keep muscles from cramping or bedsores from developing. There were vital signs to be taken and charts to be updated. The nights became routine, the change-of-shift report sessions comfortably monotonous. And then Patient #2317-616 arrived. I barely noticed her the first night. She was no different from any other patient. And when she was still there the second night, a rare occurrence, I still didn't care. Obviously she was having a difficult recovery. But I filed away the fact that I was administering a drug to her that none of the other patients received. I didn't allow myself to wonder what it was. The third night, when I came to work, she was still in my ward. A slight, fair-skinned woman, her red hair distinguished her from the others. I asked Louise for her story and was told she was semi- comatose, probably an unexpected reaction to the treatment. I accepted, and work proceeded. Two weeks later, one of the others arrested. I heard the high wail of the cardiac monitor's alarm as her heart halted, and I slipped immediately into emergency mode. Reviving her, stabilizing her, consulting with the doctor, and charting the incident and the doctor's orders took a long time. When I finished, it was well past time to administer medications. And #2317-616 was awake. At least, her eyes were open. They were blue, unfocused. And she was whispering a single word, a name. I was elated. Somewhere in me I found the concern for every patient, every person, that had drawn me to nursing. And I knew that, somewhere, someone was waiting for this woman to wake up and come home--hospital stays could be so hard on family, especially a stay as long as hers. I dutifully charted the change and gave her injections. A short time later she slipped away again. I related the incident when I gave report that morning. ******************************************************************* "Louise, are you not the least bit concerned by this? She's been here forever, compared to any other patients. Why aren't they transferring her to a long-term care facility, or making some effort to revive her--she's obviously 'in there' somewhere!" Privately I wondered if they were leaving #2317-616 in this condition in order to document the side effects of this new drug, but it still seemed terribly wrong. "Of course I'm concerned, child." Her eyes flickered around our small nurses' station and her voice dropped slightly. "But I've seen this happen to her before. I tried delaying each of her meds; it's the odd one out that sends her under again. Poor girl, she's always whispering that name as she slips away." I was appalled. "Louise, you CANNOT just withhold her meds! We have no idea what these drugs are for, how critical the timing is in administering them...." The brown eyes locked with mine were sorrowful. "We know what this one is for, child." ******************************************************************* Louise asked me to swear I wouldn't report this to Kevin, and I had to acquiesce. She outranked me; more than that, I liked her. And what she had said was nagging at me. #2317-616 always woke up when the meds were late enough, and she always slipped away a few minutes after that unknown injection was given. By the time #2317-616 had been there for six weeks, I had grown accustomed to seeing her. Yet odd events seemed to be circling around her. A man had begun coming in almost nightly, watching from the window set in the door. The handful of times I passed him in the corridors, the cigarette odor was so strong I almost reminded him of the regulations against smoking in the building. Why did I refrain? I never saw him with a lit cigarette. And he seemed to have some power in the organization. Kevin, an imperious man if ever there was one, all but cringed every time he spoke to the man. I'm still not sure why I believed he was there because of #2317- 616, but Louise felt the same way. As time slipped by, it became increasingly evident that this woman was at the center of something strange. I wondered if perhaps this man was the person she called for in her half-lucid moments, but the idea didn't seem to fit. It just felt wrong. One day about two months after #2317-616's arrival, Louise began giving me the usual report when I arrived and changed from street clothes to scrubs. #2317-616, as had become custom, was last. The inanity of it struck me hard. ******************************************************************* "Louise, we're referring to this woman by that number as if it's a proper name! How absurd is this? I can't give her much, but dammit, she deserves some kind of identity!" Louise was obviously startled--I was usually neither vehement nor profane--but I thought I saw one corner of her lip twitch. "I have to agree with you there, child. She deserves better than what she's received here, and I suppose it falls to us to give it to her." She raised her eyebrows at me questioningly. "Anne," I said promptly, not even stopping to think. I blushed slightly. "It's the hair. My favorite series of books, when I was little, was about a redheaded girl named Anne." Louise nodded, her smile tender. "Anne it is." ******************************************************************* For another two weeks, things remained calm and proceeded in their clockwork fashion. Still our mysterious visitor stalked the halls; still nameless women rotated through our ward; still Anne lay still and silent, every so often rousing far enough to whisper the only word that seemed to hold any meaning for her. And then our little world was rocked when Louise was discovered sneaking a patient from one of the ambulatory wards out of our own. She refused to tell Kevin or the mystery man how many times this had happened or why she was doing it. When Kevin told me, that night, I knew. She'd brought the woman to see Anne. We were able to discuss the incident the next evening, Kevin apparently trusting me enough not to monitor our conversations. I was furious. ******************************************************************* "You're the one who insisted on naming her, dear. You know she's a human being, not a subject. Such isolation isn't good for her; the poor girl needs comfort, a human touch." "For God's sake, Louise, you talk to her every chance you get. I've even picked up the habit! And you kiss her forehead goodbye as if you were her mother--I've seen you! Do NOT tell me this patient needs us to risk our careers to give her more human contact. She's not even conscious!" Louise's face hardened into anger, directed at me for the first and only time. "I am doing this for 'God's sake,' child. He does not want to see His children treated like this. And I do not care if Anne is not quite conscious. She can still hear perfectly well, and remember to some extent, the things that have happened around her. I cannot stop what they've done to this woman--to any of these women--but I will do all that is in me to help them survive it." "Survive it? These are therapeutic, MEDICAL procedures. How on earth are they NOT going to survive them?" And suddenly the anger was gone and only pity left behind. "Oh, child... you haven't figured that out yet? You've worked with Kevin; I was so sure you knew what happens in the end...." The story she then laid out before me was a horrifying one, filled with conspiracies, plots, and evil deeds--with pain, grief, and ultimately death. For some reason, Anne was the target of the latest plot. They were sending her home, as they had sent the others, but she would be receiving three doses of a medication none of the others were given. A drug, Kevin had supposedly said, that would "insure she can no longer be a liability." "They're going to make sure she can't survive, dear. They're afraid of her." ******************************************************************* I denied everything Louise had told me. I refused to believe that such things were being done, that I had been a party--however ignorant--to such actions. I held my self-delusion for some days, until a new medication, also unlabeled, was included in Anne's daily injections. Everything Louise had warned me about came crashing back. Hating her, hating them, hating myself, I hid the vial in my pocket and waited for shift change to arrive. For the first time, as I handed her the vial, I saw a moment's fear in Louise's eyes. It was smothered in a flash, but I knew; even she could not be certain how far it would go. We were committed. ******************************************************************* "It has to be gotten rid of," she said firmly. "How? If we don't dare inject Anne, we can't give it to any of the others. Can we rinse it down the sink?" "No. I suspect they test the water." This was the height of paranoia. How could they be so obsessive as to believe that someone was going to be dumping their drugs into the water supply? "It's not crazy, dear," Louise said in amusement, reading my face. "We were going to try it." She turned away from me for a moment, only to face me again with the medication drawn up in a syringe. "You'd best go intramuscular," she said, rolling up her sleeve; "it'll be safer than intravenous." I could only stare at her. She could not mean it. I knew the stories of dedicated scientists who tested their concoctions on themselves, but this... "It's all right, child. I did the same thing on my last shift with her first dose. It wasn't as bad as I expected." The fear I'd seen in her eyes belied that claim, as did the hand that had risen, unconsciously, to touch her cross. "Now, you give me this one and I'll give her the last. If they test her before she leaves, that injection should mask the fact she's not gotten the others. I hate to give her any at all, but... Come on, now, there's no time for second thoughts. You can do this. There's no longer any other choice." My eyes were surprisingly dry as I swabbed her arm with alcohol and injected the medication deep into her muscle. When it was done, I handed her the syringe and sank weakly into a chair, my head in my hands. I felt as though I'd just enacted her death sentence. Louise disposed of the syringe, then patted my hair in her motherly fashion. "Go home and get some rest, try to follow your usual routine. Can't have them suspecting you're a party to my treason. I know this is a dark place, child, but you can be its ray of light. They can't take your soul from you until you let them." To my surprise, she fastened something around my neck. I looked down to see a small, gold cross resting in the V of my scrub top. I looked up and met her brown-eyed gaze, wanting to protest. But Louise forestalled any comment with a quick shake of her head. She tugged me to my feet and helped me shrug into my sweater. Despite her cautions to behave as normally as possible, I could not resist placing a hand on Louise's shoulder as I left the small locker room. "God be with you," I whispered, surprised to discover I meant it. "He is, child," she responded, in that voice that could calm all fears. "He is." ******************************************************************* I could not sleep that day, nor could I do anything else. I finally passed the time with a dusty Bible on my lap, praying to a God I thought I had forgotten. Kevin was at shift change the next evening and introduced me to the new day nurse, whom I was to begin training. I greeted her, stunned, and accepted Kevin's report on the day's patients. My mind was blank with confusion, anxiety, fear. All of it was amplified a thousand fold when I did not hear Anne mentioned in report. I hoped desperately that he had simply forgotten, but when I entered the ward the little redhead was gone, a tall, dark-skinned woman in her bed. I remember nothing of what I did that night. The morning's news confirmed the night's fears. A brief mention of a hit-and-run, a sketch of the victim, a request for the family of Louise Owens to come forward. And time stopped. I knew no one would call; she had no family, and I could not allow her death, her sacrifice, to lose its meaning. So I knelt, and clutched her cross, and began to cry. I never saw Anne again. But in her memory I began to gather more information, to supplement what I had learned from Louise. All the while I hid my activities and, whenever possible, withheld the drugs. I have even betrayed two other nurses I knew to be making rather clumsy attempts to uncover the truth. They were removed, and I was promoted. In so doing, I believe, I have retained my soul. Someday I will have enough information. Enough to go public, to discredit and expose them all. To shatter everyone's most fundamental beliefs. It will all fall apart. But perhaps it will reassemble in a better form. ******************************************************************* THE END ******************************************************************* Author's Notes--First off, the title comes from a line in the song "Red Right Hand" by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds; it can be found on the CD "Songs in the Key of X". Second, "Anne's" identification number comes from the card Mulder finds in "Redux". Having had several to choose from, I used the "FUSSIDN" entry. Feel free to correct me if this seems wrong. I spent a fair amount of time trying to get the timing of "Anne's" visit right, but I welcome anyone to point out errors I've made in that department, too. Third and last, if you can find it in your heart, PLEASE let me know what you thought of this by e-mailing me at kyscott@msn.com. If I should lock up my keyboard and restrict my computer use to playing Freecell, I need to know. But I do have a couple of ideas for The Further Adventures of Julie (nurses are VERY important at lobotomies, you know). Her fate is in your hands. Should I let her come out and play, or does she get stuffed into a drawer, never to see the light of day again?