12.11.2020
The first thing that really stuck out to Shelby was that the large building was pretty much devoid of windows. Taking in her surroundings, Shelby walked a few steps behind her father as they entered the lobby. The second thing she noticed was the silence once the door leading outside closed. The room had to be soundproof because for the first time in months her ears weren't being overwhelmed by a plethora of sounds. She wasn't quite used to the increased hearing, or any of the other symptoms caused by the disease. For the first time in months, she felt an ounce of normalcy return to her. That was until the sharp smell of antiseptic filled her nostrils; however, it was a welcome replacement for the stench of exhaust she had to endure every time she ventured outside the comfort of her home. Though, even at home she wasn't entirely able to escape it.
A girl dressed all in white was standing behind the counter. Her name tag read Linh Bach and she looked like she was in her early twenties.
"Good afternoon, what can I help you with?" Linh said. She had a prominent Australian accent.
"G'day, I'm Dave Goodkind and this is my daughter, Shelby. We are here to see Doctor Gretchen Klein."
"Ah, yes. Of course." The girl threw them a polite smile and turned to the computer to type something before stepping from behind the counter. "If you'll follow me."
Linh took them up to the third floor. In the hallway, they passed a young man in a white hospital gown flanked by two men dressed all in black. The young man's pale head was shaved to a buzzcut, and his eyes and ears were covered by bandages.
In passing, Shelby got a whiff of old blood mixed with the stench of death. They were in a facility akin to a hospital so she didn't think much of it, but nonetheless it sent a shiver down her spine.
Linh stopped, opening the door to an empty office. "Go on in and wait here, Doctor Klein will be with you shortly." With that she left them standing in the office, having left the door wide open.
It didn't take very long for Shelby to hear the loud clacking of heels on the floor resounding in the hallway.
A woman with long, sandy brown hair entered the room. Underneath her lab coat she wore black slacks and heels.
Shelby couldn't fathom why in the world someone would opt to wear heels if they were to stand in a laboratory all day-why one would subject themselves to such needless suffering.
The woman looked delighted to see them, almost as delighted as Dave looked to be here. "Good afternoon. I'm Doctor Gretchen Klein." She said, smiling widely.
"Good afternoon, Doctor." Dave said.
"Good afternoon," Shelby said as well.
"It's such a delight to be here." Dave said, "We were very relieved when you reached out to us."
"Well, that's definitely good to hear." Doctor Klein smiled at him and turned to Shelby. "Shelby, I am so glad you were able to make it."
"Me too." Shelby said, smiling politely at the woman who claimed to be able to cure her.
"Let's take a seat, shall we?" Gretchen motioned to the desk and walked behind it to take a seat in the black, leather office chair while Dave and Shelby sat down in the two chairs in front of it.
Doctor Klein took out a clipboard from a desk drawer and a pen from the breast pocket of her lab coat. "So tell me, how long have you been experiencing these symptoms?"
"For almost six months." Dave answered before Shelby could, not that she minded. She was glad he was taking the lead in this. The situation was already unsettling enough.
Shelby was sitting with her back as straight as possible, presenting herself as immaculate as she could. She needed the woman-though, not just the woman-to know that just because she got infected with this disease didn't mean she was suddenly a savage, that she was still the same person.
They went over her symptoms and Doctor Klein told them she'd had suspicions about what Shelby had and now could confirm that she was indeed suffering from a disease called Lycanthropy. It was a so far incurable disease that heightened the patient's senses and made them subject to the phases of the moon. It enhanced their cells, allowing them to transform both at will and against their will, depending on the phase of the moon.
"Do you know what a retrovirus is?" Gretchen asked, but didn't wait for an answer. "It's a virus that uses RNA as its genomic material. Upon infection, when it enters a cell, the cell will convert the retroviral RNA into DNA, which is then inserted into the DNA of the host cell, which then produces more retroviruses, which in turn infect other cells. It's a fascinating process and so far completely irreversible.
"Another example of a retrovirus is HIV. Though, unlike HIV, the virus that causes Lycanthropy, LYCV-1, spreads through the body rapidly, leaving little to no time to intercept and slow down or stop the infection from overtaking and changing every cell in the host's body on a fundamental level, first targeting stem cells.
"We believe it originates from a virus that infected wolves, a virus that made them deadly vulnerable to silver, but also somehow made them stronger and more aggressive, and gave them an unusual obsession with the moon.
"We've yet to find an old strain of LYCV-1 to prove our hypothesis but there's several stories from separate accounts from a few centuries ago of humans encountering wolves with shining eyes who were entranced by the full moon. But we, of course, can't be certain whether these stories are credible or if they're just that, stories. However, we believe that through mutations and unequal crossing over during DNA replication the virus became zoonotic and, through the domestication of wolves, traveled to human hosts."
"I'm not going to lie to you, so far we've been unsuccessful with reversing the virus's changes to the DNA of our patients. But we've made so much progress the past few years, I truly believe we're incredibly close to a breakthrough to finding an effective treatment. We're still very much in the experimental stages but I can personally guarantee you it would be beneficial for you to join the program. I can't tell you with absolute certainty how long your stay here will be, but I can promise you that I will do everything in my power to cure you."
Their first consultation with Gretchen didn't take longer than 15 minutes and after agreeing on a date for their next appointment, Shelby and Dave were making their way out of the facility.
When they were exiting the elevator in the lobby, a door to Shelby's right, next to the long reception desk, opened. A man in a white lab coat was walking out of there, only just catching the elevator they'd just walked out of.
The door, leading into a long white hallway, was slowly closing while Shelby and Dave walked towards the exit of the building. Before it clicked shut, Shelby vaguely heard what could be considered a scream, though the sound was too quiet, even for her, to be sure. Shelby pushed the thought away. If there really was something happening in the building she'd have been able to hear it much clearer. Ever since the incident that caused her to come to this facility, her hearing had significantly improved, allowing her to hear things clearly that a normal person wouldn't be able to hear at all. Though, the second she'd walked into the building, the sounds around her had subdued to a minimum, a peacefulness she hadn't experienced in months. Though, however peaceful it was, it was also a little jarring, a little like losing control. A kind of control she wasn't supposed to have in the first place, Shelby had to remind herself. However, she couldn't help but wonder what went on behind these walls that they didn't want her or anyone else to hear.
Whatever she'd heard, or thought she'd heard, was probably something entirely else. The whole situation-the disease, the facility-it all unsettled her, scared her to the bone. She was fairly certain her fear was just making things seem like something they weren't. Doctor Klein was going to help Shelby. She was going to fix her.
***
01.02.2021
"Hello. Are you also here to help other people?"
Shelby was sitting on one of the chairs against the wall in the hallway right behind the lobby on the first floor. After checking her in, Miss Bach had told her to sit here and wait for someone to come get her to get her settled in. At the question, Shelby was pulled out of her wandering thoughts. She turned her head to the left to where the high pitched voice came from.
A little boy-about five years old-was standing next to her. How had she not noticed him come up to her? Had she really been that deep in thought? Shelby shook her head, still a little dazed, and quickly put on the brightest smile she could muster, "Hi there, what's your name?"
"I'm Adam." The kid answered as he returned the smile even more brightly. He was wearing a blue beanie and a hospital gown.
"What did you mean by that?" Shelby asked, "That you're here to help?"
"I'm here to help find a cure for a very bad disease."
Shelby swallowed thickly. She could only assume he was here for the same disease as her. She couldn't help but feel an overwhelming sadness engulf her. It broke her heart that the little boy had to deal with this. He looked so young and bright and way too innocent to have to be subjected to this. It really wasn't fair.
"How long have you been a...y'know?" Shelby couldn't help but ask.
"A what?" The boy furrowed his brows-in the cutest way possible-with genuine confusion.
"A...wolf." Shelby clarified, only able to make herself use half the word, but the boy seemed to have understood.
"Oh, that! I've been a werewolf all my life." The smile was back in full force. He said it like it was the most normal thing in the world-even in a way like he was proud of it.
"You were born like this?" Shelby asked, unable to keep her surprise from entering her voice.
The boy nodded vehemently, still smiling. He looked so carefree, like he wasn't at all bothered by what he was.
***
01.02.2021
"Please, remove any and all clothing." The woman said in the most emotionless, bored voice Shelby had ever encountered.
"Excuse me?" Shelby said while subconsciously hugging herself with her arms. She was standing in the middle of the room. It had white tiled walls and a dark, gray tiled floor with a long channel drain in the middle and another one close to the far wall. Fluorescent ceiling lights illuminated the room, but didn't emit nearly enough light to not cast the room in an eerie vibe. And one of them kept flickering.
"Are you deaf?" Annoyance seeped into the woman's voice, making it only slightly less monotone as she repeated her demand. "Remove your clothing."
Shelby swallowed, her fingers hesitantly going to the hem of her shirt, though not quite pulling it up yet. "Um, can I ask why?" Shelby said, smiling in a way that she hoped looked polite and not nervous like she was feeling.
The woman raised an eyebrow but complied and deadpanned, "It's for potential bugs."
"Well, I can assure you I don't have any."
"You're a lycanth; it's standard procedure. I'm going to need you to remove your garments now." The woman commanded once again as the woman behind her, dressed all in black, took out an elongated object that looked a lot like a stun baton.
Shelby didn't want to find out if it actually was one, so began to undress. She understood the precautions they had to take. She was a monster. For now.
Once she was down to her underwear and her bra, she stopped.
"The rest too." The woman said, visibly running out of patience. There wasn't an ounce of empathy in her cold, gray eyes.
Shelby complied. Her fingers trembled as she removed the last of her clothing.
Once she was completely bare, the woman sprayed delouser all over her body before washing it off with a high pressure spray. The water she harshly hosed Shelby down with was cold enough to make her shiver for the first time since the incident that had turned-no, infected her.
She threw Shelby a towel, and after she was all dried off, she gave her a hospital gown and plain white boxer briefs. After Shelby had put it all on, the woman returned with one more thing before they let her go to the exam room.
"What's that?" Shelby asked, though she had a pretty good idea of what the annular, metal object was from the looks of it.
"It's just a precaution." The woman said, not bothering to look her in the eyes as she spoke. She fastened the collar tightly around Shelby's neck, though not tight enough to impede her breathing.
It felt so heavy and foreign. Small metal contact points were prodding uncomfortably in her neck.
The whole process felt dehumanizing.
Just because she wasn't entirely human at the moment didn't mean she didn't deserve to be treated with respect.
***
When Shelby opened her eyes she was in an unfamiliar room. Toni was standing next to the bed, but she wasn't looking at her. Instead, her eyes were trained on something outside. Shelby wasn't sure how long she'd slept but it seemed to be well into the day from the light that entered the room through the window, giving Toni a white glow.
She tried to sit up but her body felt unusually heavy so she gave up.
Toni didn't seem to be aware she was awake so she called out to her. "Toni?"
Her head turned sharply towards her. Instead of the warmth her eyes usually carried, they were filled with an iciness Shelby hadn't seen in months. Pure hatred and disgust radiated off her, making Shelby recoil.
Toni didn't say anything, she just looked at her, and after a dozen seconds, Shelby couldn't stand the silence anymore. "What's wrong?"
She didn't understand what she had done to elicit such a reaction-not recently anyway. She vaguely remembered the conversation with Toni's mother. Had Shelby gone too far? She had just wanted to help. All the signs had pointed to Toni being in great distress. Maybe she had read Toni wrong. Maybe Toni had actually wanted to talk with her mom, whom she hadn't seen in years, and Shelby had gotten in the way of that. Maybe the only reason Toni hadn't been able to invite her in was because of Shelby. And now she hated her for it.
Shelby could fix this. She'd apologize, and she now knew Angela's scent; she could find her and get her to come back.
While Shelby tried to find the right words to tell her this, Toni turned to look out the window again and asked, "You know when a dog gets infected with rabies?"
"What?" Shelby frowned. This was not at all what she'd expected Toni to start with.
"An infection like that can turn a beloved family pet into a monster." Toni put her hands in her pockets as if they were just having a casual conversation, but Shelby could virtually taste the hostility in the air.
There was a pit growing in Shelby's stomach. She didn't like the direction this was going. She was utterly confused, and she was even less sure of what she had done to upset Toni, and she didn't know what she could do to fix it. Nothing about this made sense.
"Do you know what happens to an animal that turns into a monster?" Toni asked. When Shelby didn't provide her with an answer, she said, "It gets put down."
Toni finally turned and looked at Shelby again as she said, "That's what your father should have done when he found out what you had become."
Shelby felt like she'd been punched in the gut. Tears stung her eyes, blurring her vision. Of all the things Toni could have said this was the last thing she'd expected, yet it was also the thing that made the most sense.
Toni shook her head, and walked to the door, and just like that she was gone, and Shelby was alone. Toni had left the door wide open and Shelby was met with the sight of a long white hallway, one that looked all too familiar to her. A chill ran down Shelby's spine as realization dawned on her, accompanied by a surging panic. She felt like she was going to throw up. She needed to run or do something, anything but lay here. The window. For as far as she remembered, there didn't used to be windows in the facility, but that didn't matter right now. She'd gotten lucky. It was her way out. She could break it and jump out. She didn't care how high the fall was, whether it would leave her broken and bruised, as long as she'd be out. She needed to get out. Shelby tried to get up, but her body felt too heavy to move, like the blood in her veins had been replaced by mercury, weighing her down, making even just the slightest lift of her finger take great effort.
The sound of the elevator doors opening in the distance, on the opposite end of the hallway, caught her attention.
Two women walked out, one dressed in white and one in black.
The one in white was holding a clipboard while the one in black already had her stun baton out in one hand, and was carrying an unclasped collar in the other.
"No." Shelby gasped and shook her head frantically. Still unable to move anything below the neck, she could do nothing but mutter "No, no, no, no, no." as she sobbed while the scientist and the guard entered the room.
***
As Shelby woke up, the first thing she became aware of was the intense, aching dryness of her throat. She tried to look around, but her eyelids felt just as heavy as her body had felt in what she now realized had been a dream, and they quickly fell shut again. All she was able to gather was that it was dark and that she was yet again in a room she didn't recognize. Her heartbeat was still racing from the nightmare, but before panic could overtake her again, she heard the same voice that until a few seconds ago had carried such coldness and aversion, now whispering to her with enough warmth to thaw the arctic.
Shelby couldn't quite make out what she was saying, she wasn't conscious enough for that, the heaviness of sleep was already starting to drag her mind down again, though, that didn't stop her from trying to hold on to that small sliver of consciousness while trying to discern what the voice was saying. Soon enough she was able to make out that Toni was repeating something along the lines of "You're okay."
Shelby turned her head to the left and managed to once again pull her leaden eyelids open to the smallest crack to see Toni crouching next to the bed, her face only inches away from hers. None of the iciness from before was reflected in her eyes, instead, they were filled with concern.
"Hey," Toni said so softly that Shelby had to do all she could not to cry and throw her arms around her.
"Hi." Shelby tried to say back but it sounded all breathy and more hoarse than she could remember her voice ever being. She tried to clear her throat but it only made it ache even more.
Toni's brow creased with worry, "Do you need anything?"
A hug. But she didn't think she'd be able to handle rejection right now. She also didn't want to force Toni to do something she might really not want to do, if her dream was anything to go by, so instead Shelby croakily said, "Water."
Toni helped her into a more upright position, and helped her drink; though, it did little to nothing to soothe the burning dryness in her throat.
"Where are we?" Shelby managed to ask before giving up on trying to keep her eyes open.
"The guest room." Toni said while lowering her down again. "Is there anything else I can do?" Her voice sounded more distant with each syllable as sleep tried to pull Shelby further and further away from her again.
The image of Toni, eyes filled with disgust, was still branded on the inside of her eyelids. Unable to shake the Toni she had just met in her dream, the Toni who's reaction to her otherness had made so much more sense than her real reaction, Shelby said, "Can you pretend not to hate me and hold me? I just-I don't want to be alone." She wasn't sure if she had spoken loud enough; if Toni had heard her. But then Shelby heard a quiet, "Yeah, I can do that." and she felt the bed dip.
Shelby tried to move a little more to the other side to give Toni more space so she wouldn't have to lie on the edge and risk falling out. Not that Shelby would let her. Not as long as she was conscious anyway.
Shelby felt arms tentatively start to encircle her, which she took as encouragement to move closer, flush against Toni's side, and to put her arm across her abdomen and nestle her head in the crook of Toni's neck.
Toni stiffened, though only for a second, before she adjusted the position of her arm and started to rub soft, comforting circles on Shelby's back.
The care with which Toni was handling her slowly scratched away at the version of Toni from her dream that was etched in her mind.
"I don't hate you, Shelby."
Shelby sharply inhaled. She wasn't entirely sure if she'd imagined the words as the ever increasing drowsiness made everything around her seem farther and more unreachable with each second, but she couldn't stop herself from tightening her hold on the girl who lay half beneath her until sleep dragged Shelby back to the depths of her mind.
***
01.16.2021
"How are you feeling right now?" Dr. Klein asked. She was observing Shelby from the seat opposite her. They were having lunch. Well, technically only Shelby was because she was the only one actually eating.
They were sitting in a small room with a table and two chairs, facing each other. Everything in the room except the floor was white. On the wall to Shelby's right was a large mirror, almost extending over the entire wall. It reminded her of the one-way mirrors in police interrogation rooms.
Today, Dr. Klein had decided to sit with her. It was Shelby's fifteenth day of her stay at the facility. Dr. Klein was checking in on her, asking Shelby about how she was experiencing everything here, if there was anything that made her feel uncomfortable or unsafe.
"I'm real good." Shelby said before putting another spoonful of soup in her mouth, and proceeded to take a bite from one of the thick slices of bread she'd been given. Aside from the harsh intake process and some of the less than pleasant tests she'd had to undergo that were apparently part of the physical exam, like the determination of her pain threshold, her stay here wasn't all that bad. Sure, almost everyone treated her coldly, but she supposed she deserved it. That's what her daddy would say anyway. She had sinned, and now she had to repent and hope the Lord would grace her with his forgiveness and cure her from this disease. This was a challenge placed upon her by God and she would persevere. She had to. It was her only chance for everything to get back to how it used to be-for her father to look upon her once more with love in his eyes instead of disgust.
"Nothing out of the ordinary?" The doctor asked in a more observative tone than she'd had during the rest of the conversation.
"Um, no." Shelby shook her head. She smiled nervously, "Should there be?"
"No, not at all. Just checking in." Gretchen smiled at her reassuringly.
A woman entered the room. She moved to the counter behind them. Shelby paid her no mind as she continued to eat. She was used to it by now, the coming and going of medical professionals in the rooms she was in. They rarely ever spoke to her unless it was to coldly ask her to do something like hold out her arm so they could take another vial of blood.
Suddenly, the woman came to stand next to her. Shelby had been treated by her before a few times. She presumed she was one of the nurses assigned to 'her case' or something of the likes. She looked to be in her late twenties, maybe early thirties. Her long black hair was in a neat ponytail. She was holding a syringe-containing a yellow-ish, translucent liquid-and looked at her expectantly. "May I?"
Shelby reverted her eyes to Dr. Klein.
"This is Susan." The doctor said, "Please, hold out your arm so she can give you the shot."
"What is it?" Shelby couldn't stop herself from asking. Her father would be disappointed in her for even asking the question instead of obediently going along. She just hoped Gretchen would take it as curiosity, and not as fear or reluctance. The last thing she wanted was to seem ungrateful. Shelby had always had an aversion for needles, and this one was particularly large. And frankly, she liked to know what was being put in her body. What effects it would have. Until now they'd been fairly straightforward and transparent with her about what they were doing during all the tests she'd been subjected to. Though, those times they'd explained to her what it was before administering the shot or putting her through the test without her needing to ask for it.
"Just a little something to test one of our hypotheses. Don't worry, I can assure you, it's all completely safe." Gretchen said and looked at her encouragingly.
Shelby forced her worries down. She was supposed to trust this woman. She was willing to help her at a very low price. Dr. Klein was a medical professional, she had sworn the Hippocratic Oath. There was no reason for Shelby to be afraid so she held out her arm to the nurse.
"You're going to feel a sharp prick." Susan said right before pushing the needle into her arm.
Shelby briefly felt the sharp sensation as the syringe punctured her skin, but-like all the other times she had gotten some kind of shot-the sensation of the foreign liquid being pressed into her arm felt far more uncomfortable than the initial prick.
After putting the syringe away, the woman put a small black device on Shelby's left index finger, and retreated to the back of the room. The little screen on the device read two changing numbers, the bottom one Shelby recognized as her heartbeat but she didn't know what the upper one meant, just that it read 97.
"You should really finish that before it gets cold." Dr. Klein pointed at the soup.
Shelby couldn't help but feel increasingly uncomfortable under the woman's attentive gaze. She was used to people meticulously watching her, reprimanding her for every small flaw, it being the slightest bit of weight gain or the tiniest wobble in her heel. But the way Gretchen was regarding her felt different, like she wasn't just looking at her surface level, but slowly scratching away at her every layer, making her feel more vulnerable than she ever had.
After a few minutes, Shelby had finished the soup and was nibbling on the last slice of bread.
"And, did you like it?" Gretchen asked, motioning to the empty bowl.
"Yes, I did." Shelby said, "Though it did taste a little different than the tomato soup my momma makes."
"Do you feel sated?"
"Yes." Shelby smiled, and made herself be polite. If dr. Klein wanted to make small talk, she would, no matter how uncomfortable her scrutinizing gaze made her feel.
"Nothing unusual?"
"Um, no?" Shelby asked rather than stated. She frowned slightly, though still trying to maintain her smile. "Should there be?"
"How does your throat feel?" Gretchen asked, ignoring her question.
Shelby didn't get the chance to become wary of Gretchen's questioning, because once she focused on her throat, she noticed it did feel a little tighter, slightly constricted, but not enough to hinder her breathing.
"Just a little uncomfortable. Kind of constricted." Shelby answered as her heartbeat picked up. The sensation in her throat, though not entirely closing off her windpipe, felt entirely too familiar. "Why?" Shelby couldn't keep the anxiety from infiltrating her voice.
"You said the soup didn't exactly taste like the tomato soup you're used to. That's because it wasn't tomato soup but lobster soup." Dr. Klein said matter-of-factly, confirming Shelby's suspicions.
Shelby's eyes widened as she looked down at the empty bowl. Her heartbeat quickened even more, as did her breathing. With each passing second, it felt like her throat was becoming more and more constricted. Her hand shot to her neck to grasp her throat. All she was able to do was take in sharp, quick breaths while she felt more and more like she couldn't get enough air into her lungs.
Susan suddenly stood next to her again, and was prying her hands away from her neck. Shelby let her. The nurse was going to help her, right?
Susan briefly touched her throat. She took hold of Shelby's wrist and looked at the black device on her index finger before shaking her head at Gretchen.
What did that mean? Why wasn't she giving her epinephrine? She wanted to ask but she couldn't get any words in inbetween the quick shallow breaths she took. Refraining from grabbing her throat again, Shelby held onto the edge of the table. Her heart rate increased to the point she'd be scared for it to burst out of her chest if she wasn't so unable to focus on anything other than the constriction in her throat. Shelby couldn't take her eyes off the nurse who began retreating and left the room altogether. She turned her eyes to the seat in front of her, but it was empty now.
"Shelby?"
Shelby swiftly turned her head to the right. When had Dr. Klein gotten out of her seat? And when had she come to stand next to her?
As the woman looked down on her, she looked completely at ease, like this didn't come unexpected at all. "What you're experiencing right now is not caused by your former allergy, but rather a panic attack." Dr. Klein said while squeezing Shelby's shoulder. It was probably meant to be reassuring, but it only made her feel more confined. She felt powerless and small and completely at the woman's mercy as she continued to feel like she was suffocating.
"You just have to remind yourself of that and let yourself breathe." Dr. Klein said, "I'm going to need you to close your eyes."
Shelby did as the woman asked and shut her eyes. She tried to focus on the doctor's voice as much as she could as she continued speaking.
"Now, if you concentrate, you'll sense that your throat isn't actually closed off, but your mind has just convinced you it is. The reason you feel like you're not getting enough air is because you've been taking in too much oxygen by breathing too quickly, which now makes it feel like with each breath you take, you're not getting enough oxygen, while it's actually the exact opposite. All you need to do is calm your breathing and you're going to be just fine."
***
02.05.2021
Shelby was lying on her side, facing away from the doctor while he prepared for her third bone marrow extraction. She preferred any of the other tests over this. The needle used for the extraction was one of the largest she'd ever seen, but it wasn't the puncturing of her skin that made it such an uncomfortable experience, it was actually pretty bearable compared to the piercing pain that shot through her lower back once the needle reached the bone. They couldn't use anesthetic. Apparently, even if they did, it would only relieve the discomfort that accompanied the puncturing of her skin and have no effect on the pain she felt once the needle made contact with her pelvis bone. The fatigue that followed-and would take at least two days, even resulting in her having to use the wheelchair for a few hours-wasn't the most pleasant thing either, but there was nothing she could do about that. She just had to persevere.
***
02.19.2021
As Shelby was being wheeled back to her room, the boy she had met the first day of her stay joined her and her companion (she refused to think of him as a guard, she wasn't some criminal or animal they had to contain) at the elevator.
"Hi there." Shelby said. She couldn't stop the smile from overtaking her face upon seeing the boy run towards them from the hallway to her right. She'd seen him a few times during her stay, the nurses had even allowed them to play a boardgame once during an afternoon they'd both been free of tests. It had been a week since she'd last seen him.
As Adam came to a stop next to her, she noticed how tired he looked, even more tired than she felt right now, having come from her fifth bone marrow extraction. But, though his eyes were sunken deeply, the look in them was still just as bright as the day she'd met him.
"Hey Shelby," Adam said.
He tried to hug her so Shelby leaned forward to make it easier for him, and put her hands on his small, frail back. She couldn't stop herself from sucking in a sharp breath when she felt the individual vertebrae through the boy's hospital gown as well as his ribs.
"Hey," Alex said, "No contact."
"Sorry." Adam said, sounding remorseful but taking his time to back away from the embrace.
Alex promptly pulled Shelby upright, back against the backrest of the wheelchair.
"Where is your guard?" Alex asked Adam.
The boy shrugged just as a nurse exited one of the rooms in the hallway he had come from.
"Adam! There you are." The nurse said as she quickly made her way to where they were standing in front of the elevator. Her voice seeped with annoyance. "I thought I told you to stay put."
"But I heard Shelby."
"He just wanted to say hi." Shelby said quickly.
The woman ignored her and kept her attention on Adam, grabbing him by the upper arm. "If I tell you to stay put, you stay put. Do you understand?"
The boy nodded.
"You don't want to have to put the collar back on, do you?"
Adam shook his head vehemently, for the first time since she'd met him Shelby saw his eyes fill with fear. They wouldn't have used the collar on him and actually turned it on, would they? He was a five year old child. He was harmless. No, they wouldn't have. They couldn't be that cruel. They had most likely just threatened him with it before.
The elevator pinged right as the nurse started to pull the boy away.
"What are they doing to him?" Shelby asked, watching the boy being dragged away rather harshly by the nurse as Alex wheeled her backwards into the elevator.
"That's none of your concern." Alex said while they waited for the doors of the elevator to close.
***
03.31.2021
"How are you, honey?" Jobeth asked after she sat down in the chair opposite Shelby. "Are they treating you alright?" Jobeth extended her hand to caress her cheek
"Yes, momma." Shelby smiled and leaned into the touch.
"You look tired. Are you getting enough sleep?" Jobeth asked with worryful eyes as she took in Shelby's appearance. She dropped her hand from her cheek to rest it on Shelby's forearm instead, caressing it with her thumb.
Shelby was aware of how tired she looked, she had seen the bags under her own eyes this morning in the mirror in her room. They didn't allow her to have any makeup so she hadn't been able to cover it up. She had just hoped her mother wouldn't notice, but of course she had. Shelby was still recovering from another bone marrow extraction from three days ago. It felt like the more of those she went through, the longer it took for her body to recover.
"I'm okay. I just miss home." It wasn't a lie. Shelby really did miss home. So much. But she didn't feel like telling her mom about the things they put her through. She didn't want her to worry more than she already did.
"I know, honey. I miss having you home." Jobeth said, her eyes glistening.
"Daddy wasn't able to make it again?" Shelby tried her best to mask her disappointment in her voice.
"No, I'm sorry, honey." Jobeth smiled sadly. "I'm sure he wanted to come, he's just been so busy with the gym, and keeping the peace at the church after the Gilroys' outrage-"
"It's okay, I understand." Shelby put on a smile. It was better like this. While her mother visited almost every week, Dave had only accompanied her once, three months ago. Shelby would see him again when she was cured. Maybe then his eyes won't be filled with disgust anymore. Maybe he'll look at her with love again. It'll be worth the wait.
***
04.11.2021
Shelby flinched as the guard threw the patient against the wall, pinning him with his front against it.
The patient was panting heavily. Claw marks covered his neck, accompanied by a wide, bright pink burnmark which encircled his neck where his collar would have been. He must have torn it off.
Another guard came up behind them to put a new collar around the patient's neck.
Shelby was by now well aware what the collar was capable of. Not that she had experienced its full function herself. Not yet. Shelby had been making sure to put on her best behavior like she was taught, like her father expected her to. Plus, she didn't see the point in aggravating the people around her-the people who were helping to fix her-to the point that they felt the need to use it. They were just doing their job. It made sense for the people working here to want them to wear these things, to feel safer because of it. Shelby could only imagine how terrifying it must be to be surrounded by people like her, people with...monstrous tendencies.
Alex was escorting Shelby back to her room, but they had stopped when they'd seen the commotion. Alex was looking at them, he'd grasped Shelby's upper arm harshly, threat clear 'don't try anything', and kept his eyes on the struggling patient being held down as if to see if they needed assistance.
"You can't fucking keep me here. It's fucking illegal. I have rights!" The patient shouted. His voice was partly muffled by the wall his face was pressed against.
"Humans have rights." The guard corrected him with disdain filling his voice, "Not fleabags like you."
It wasn't the first slur Shelby had heard the guards and some of the other staff strew around. Though, it was one of the most common for people with her disease. Other common ones were dog or dog-fucker, corpse, leech and bloodsucker, though, those last few were reserved for people with a different condition.
The guard let go of him, but the patient barely got any time to compose himself, let alone attack or flee or whatever his intentions had been, because barely half a second after the guard stepped away from him, his body started convulsing with shocks, making him fall to the ground as his eyes turned back in his skull.
Shelby was unable to tear her eyes away from the spasming patient, but out of the corner of her eye she was aware of one of the guards holding some kind of remote, turning some kind of button, after which the convulsions became worse, until the other guard stopped him by saying something about 'having to keep him alive or Klein will have our heads'. The guard holding the remote rolled his eyes but turned the voltage down.
The patient let out a shuddering breath and his body jerked a few more times but less intensely, in a way that Shelby wasn't sure whether there was still a low amount of voltage going through his body or whether these were just aftershocks.
Even with how far away Shelby and Alex stood, she was able to make out the smell of burning flesh.
This was the first time Shelby had seen with her own eyes what happened when the collar was activated, what happened when you provoked the guards. It only strengthened her resolve to do whatever these people asked of her, sometimes even without question in fear of them seeing it as some sort of resistance.
"Fucking dog." The guard muttered under his breath, his voice carrying a mix of disgust and annoyance as he and the other guard carried the now unconscious patient to one of the stretchers set aside against the wall and started pushing it further down the hallway, away from where Shelby was being held onto by Alex.
"Newbies, man," The other guard said, "They always learn eventually."
***
04.15.2021
Shelby sat down with her knees on the floor, and folded her hands, resting them on her bed as she closed her eyes.
Even with the horrible things she'd observed, more than a small part of her believed she deserved to be in here-for sinning, but mostly for what she'd done to Becca after. The things she'd said to her still haunted her at night. The disease had brought all the ugliness that had already been present deep within her to the surface. She'd already been a monster long before God had turned her into one. That was what her father had said. And she believed him. She prayed every night for the Lord to turn her body back to normal, promising she would never again indulge in her sinful temptations. But sometimes, she prayed with understanding-that she understood why He had punished her, and she accepted she would have to carry her ugliness on the outside now, too, once a month, for all the world to see just how ugly and far from perfect she truly was while she prayed, and waited for Him to grant her forgiveness and redemption.
***
04.25.2021
Shelby started as the door behind her fell shut. She was in a room she hadn't been in before. She wasn't sure she was allowed to be in here. She had been looking for a bathroom. She was on one of the underground floors she hadn't been on before. They were taking a break from the plethora of tests they were subjecting her to this afternoon and had allowed her to go to the bathroom. Only, she had gotten kind of lost in search for one.
On the other floors the bathrooms had been around the same place so she hadn't thought to ask but apparently the infrastructure of this floor was entirely different, and instead of going back to ask, she'd decided to try a few doors. If she went back, one of the nurses might insist on accompanying her. Having gone along with everything they asked of her, never having put up any resistance, now proved to have its perks. They trusted her. Or at the very least, they saw her as enough of a low threat to allow her to go on her own. And, right now, she was glad to have a break from being scrutinized and prodded at. Somehow she felt less alone when she was on her own than when she was surrounded by the staff, who treated her like she was nothing more than a subject.
Shelby had thought she'd be able to find the bathroom on her own, but the room she was currently in was definitely anything but.
The flickering ceiling lights cast the room in an icy white glow that matched the cold temperature. The walls on both her sides were each lined with two horizontal rows of steel hatches, and metal tables with equipment were standing in the center of the room.
Shelby walked around the frontmost table to the wall on the right and moved her hand to the handle of one of the hatches. She definitely wasn't supposed to be in here and now she was also snooping around. She really should just leave before someone caught her, but for some reason she couldn't stop herself from opening the hatch.
As soon as she did, cold air wafted out, carrying the stench of death. Inside there was a long steel tray she was pretty sure was a body tray, both by the sight of it as from the smell that came from what-or who-lay on it, covered by a white sheet.
She didn't know what possessed her to partly roll out the tray, and take hold of the sheet, and uncover what was underneath, but she really wished she hadn't. The soulless eyes that were staring up at her made her take a few steps back until her back made contact with one of the steel tables in the center of the room. Her hands went back to steady herself. Instead of landing on the table, her right hand made contact with one of the trays with equipment, making it and its contents clatter to the ground. She was barely aware of the noise as she held onto the table and leant against it, unaware of the metal bending in her grip. Even when her eyes became blurry, she was unable to tear them away from the shaved head from the man she had only seen once, two weeks ago, when the guards had restrained and electrocuted him to the point of unconsciousness.
The man could have done anything to result in him ending up dead. She'd seen him provoke the guards, though it had just looked like he was trying to get away, not fight them, but for all Shelby knew he could have attacked them and it would've only been reasonable for the guards to defend themselves. However, that didn't explain why they had a room at the ready to store more than two dozen bodies, and Shelby had a feeling the others weren't all empty.
She really didn't want to be here anymore. Not just in this room, but in the building. No matter how much she wanted to change, being here, suffering through test after test while everyone here treated her like she was worth nothing more than a labrat...it really wasn't worth it. She'd been in the facility for almost four months, and every time she'd asked how much longer she needed to be here, or if they'd made any progress, they'd given her a vague answer before changing the subject. Were they even planning on curing her?
The familiar clacking of heels resounding in the hallway, slowly sounding closer to the room Shelby was in, allowed her to finally look away. She quickly moved to push the body tray back in and close the hatch before she ran to the metal tray and the scattered equipment on the floor and fell to her knees. As quickly as she could, she put the scalpels and other metal tools on the fallen tray. She was able to get up and put it on the table right before the door swung open.
Shelby flinched and quickly wiped away a tear that had escaped. She needed to act like everything was normal, like she wasn't fighting the urge to run, which would inevitably result in them catching her and doing God knows what to her. The reality that they might not just activate the collar but kill her if they saw her as a threat, dawned on her. She needed to pretend everything was alright until the next time her mother visited. She'd tell her she couldn't stay here any longer. She'd beg her, do anything she could to convince her to take her home and never make her go back.
"What on earth are you doing in here?" The woman regarded her suspiciously. Her hand was slowly going to one of the pockets of her lab coat.
"I was looking for the bathroom and-."
"Does this look like a bathroom to you?" Incredulity and annoyance were prominent in her voice, but it also contained an ounce of anxiety.
"No, ma'am." Shelby trained her eyes on the floor, praying for the woman to just turn around and take her back to continue the tests. She couldn't stop thinking that one wrong move could result in her ending up on one of those body trays.
"What's that?" Susan asked.
Shelby followed her line of vision to the indentations her hands had left on the metal table. Her heart was hammering so hard in chest she could feel it in her throat. "I tripped."
Susan regarded her with calculating eyes before saying, "Let's get you back to your room. We can continue the tests tomorrow."