by Ken O'Steen
HABILITATION
Chapter 1: Awakening
I saw the world through closed eyes, heard it as if through foam and felt nothing. I had grown accustomed to the ambient noise of the room and so did not notice the rhythmic beeps, the hum of the a/c and the gasp and sigh of the ventilator. I did notice two people talking, though it took me many minutes to discern what I was hearing and by then the conversation had ended. I was tired, exhausted. I felt over worked, over stimulated and so I slept.
The doctor swept into the room, his lab coat brushing his ankles.
“Progress?”
“His medulla is showing increased activity. His heart and lungs began to work on their own at precisely 21:19 yesterday. Overall activity is increasing but so far no sure signs of consciousness.”
Doctor Warren picked up the clipboard at the end of the bed and flipped through the forms. It was thick with notes and observations, far more thorough than he was used to but he also understood the importance behind it.
“Thank you Angela,” His brows furrowed as he re-read a line, “Have another round of blood work done please, send the results straight to me.” She nodded and unlocked the cupboard as Warren left the room.
I could feel my eyes fluttering beneath my closed lids; it was a strange sensation after feeling nothing for so long. I yearned desperately to open my eyes, knew the muscle movements required and yet could not seem to get them to respond to my thoughts.
My thoughts. I was just getting ahold of those as well. I dreamt while awake and had only brief moments of clarity and control before my mind wandered into some new sequence and I was lost to the visuals. I rarely had enough time to be frustrated before I dreamed again.
“He is developing too slowly. Run him through a muscle simulation tomorrow morning following 50mg of anabolic steroid. Increase the amount of vitamin B & E in the solution immediately. I want him conscious by Monday.”
Angela sighed, “As if I have any control over when you wake.” She said to the Professor lying on the bed once Doctor Warren had left the room.
What is that? I felt a strange sensation but could not figure out its location. It felt like a pulse, a contraction and a release. As I began to slowly pinpoint the location it changed, moved to somewhere else in the abyss. It changed again, and again. I lost focus and it was gone.
“Again. Run it again. Three times a day.”
“Yes sir.” Angela responded. She was tired, exhausted. She had deep bags under her eyes, her long blonde hair was getting greasy and she threw it up into a messy bun so she could ignore her desperate need for a shower.
My hand. My hand was moving. I was happy, I felt elated but there was no physical response, no smile. I still didn’t know where my face was. But I could feel my hand twitching rhythmically with each pulse. I could feel the path of my nervous system as it was triggered externally. With each pulse I began to learn the path, expand it in my own mind. Before I had fully completed the path the pulsing switched. My other hand was moving. Then my left toes, then my right. My eyelids twitched, they opened but I was only able to comprehend a bright light and nothing more. It was enough. The pulses ended and I began to explore the paths on my own, learning them, memorizing them. The hardest part was activating them.
Angela rushed to the door; hit the ‘help’ button. Doctor Warren came rushing into the room.
“Professor? Professor can you hear me?”
The Professor’s eyes were open, staring straight at the ceiling. Doctor Warren pulled the cylindrical flashlight from his pocket and shone it into the Professor’s eyes. The pupils contracted equally.
I felt sick. The brightness had begun to take shape but intensified. I could feel all the tiny muscles around my eyes contracting my pupils. I was so hyper aware of things I had never felt before my body’s reaction was to reject them. My stomach convulsed, that was all I knew, the feeling of the muscles.
Doctor Warren was halfway through a victorious smile when the patient released the contents of his stomach. The bile smelling sludge spilled over his cheeks and chin and down onto his neck.
“Quick, he’ll choke.” Warren yelled. Angela rushed to his side, hit the button and the bed began to fold, pushing the patient into a sitting position as Warren scooped vomit from the mouth with his white gloved hand. Warren collapsed back into a chair, “He’ll be fine.” His stats had not dropped; his diaphragm had not missed a contraction, “Good work Angela. We are nearly there.”
I closed my eyes and opened them, amazed at the feeling.
“He’s blinking.” Angela stated, amazed.
“Let him. This is good.”
I began to experiment. I had control of my eyelids though I could not move my eyes, I stared only at the dull white ceiling except for the few times that a blonde lady stood over me. It always took my eyes a while to adapt my focus whenever she appeared in the foreground of my view. She looked tired and stern, furrowed in concentration. She went about her work and would disappear again.
The pulses started up again and this time I was able to learn the path to my hands. I opened and closed my fingers; as a fist then individually. My ears were adjusting as well. I could hear the shuffling sounds she made, the light snoring when she slept and the clinking of her fork and knife on a plate. Whenever the man entered the room their words were too fast for me to follow and I could catch only snippets.
As my eyes came into my control I peered around the room. A hospital? It made sense. I was sitting in a bed. There were plain walls, cupboards, heart monitor, a ventilator and a couch. I could not move my head, I was stuck with only what was directly in front of me.
“Professor? Can you understand me? Make a fist if you can.”
I made a fist and released it. The effort of keeping my muscles clenched was strenuous.
“Good. That’s great. My name is Angela. I’m here to take care of you. The man you see coming in and out is Doctor Warren. He is also here to take care of you. I don’t want you to feel afraid, you are safe here. What I need from you is for you to keep moving, keep learning.”
I made a fist again in acknowledgement. She smiled and I wished I could smile back at her. She brushed the hair from my eyes, I was thankful for that, it had been bugging me for some time. Her skin was soft and cool against my forehead.
“I think you need a haircut.” She said returning with scissors.
I hated my hair long. It was strange, to remember. I had no memories except of the abyss that expanded exponentially before me but I knew that having long hair bugged me. It was the first glimpse I received of my own, unique personality.
It was a strange sensation, hearing the scissors cut slowly around my head, pinpointing their direction and location with my ears. My brain calculated based on frequency and time difference from my left ear to my right. I could feel the cilia moving with the frequencies and though I could not name the frequencies by exact value I could differentiate easily between them.
I flexed my toes, contracted my calf muscles. I was learning quickly. I could already slowly nod and shake my head. The hardest muscle to master was my tongue; which meant that though I was capable of walking, provided I had a walker to lean on, I could not yet speak. My bladder was also, unfortunately, beyond me.
She taught me how to swallow with small sips of water, that was also how I learned to cough.
The feeding tube was removed from my stomach and under Angela’s supervision I was allowed to eat vitamin and protein enhanced mush, since I could not yet chew properly.
They brought me children’s toys to play with, to practice picking things up and using them, putting shapes into their appropriate holes, to flip pages of a cardboard book. My muscles were still only partially under my control and if my focus drifted I would drop
the toy or forget to shift a foot forward while walking. Perhaps worst was when an arm or leg would flail wildly. I learned of this the hard way and Angela had suffered for it. She smiled at me now with a bruise forming on her cheek and I wished desperately to apologize but all that would come out was a gurgling of incomprehensible sound.
I tried writing but did not have the control required for such subtle movements. On a small chalkboard I could write out giant words, small enough to fit four to five letters. The first word I spelled out, shaky but legible was ‘SORRY’. I wanted to touch Angela’s cheek, to cup her face in my hands but I was too afraid of what my limbs might do if I lost control.
At night Angela slept on a small cot in the corner of the room. Eager to please her I would pretend to sleep until I could hear her light snores. Then I would sit up and practice different movements with my limbs. Mostly I practiced trying to speak.
We saw much less of Doctor Warren those days. He was more concerned with my health now that I was conscious and left Angela and I more or less alone as I began to gain control. Occasionally he would stop by, pull her from the room and discuss my progress. He was happy when I learned to walk but when he returned later and I was still attempting to write in my giant letters he seemed disappointed. There were no clocks and no windows, I had no sense of the passage of time. I knew only that my knowledge was expanding at an increasing rate.
“Do you remember anything from your past?” Angela asked me as we sat down to breakfast. I had graduated from a walker to a cane and it rested against the wall beside me.
“No.” A single word and yet I was proud of it.
Angela’s brow furrowed, I copied her and she laughed. I smiled at my ability to please her, “A few more days and you will be completely independent I think.”
“No.” It was all I had, ‘no’ and ‘yes’ to relay how I was feeling and yet Angela had become a master at reading me.
“We will still see each other, don’t worry. I just mean that you will be able to do things completely on your own. We will be able to have conversations, your questions will be answered and we can finally leave this room. Doesn’t that make you happy?”
“No. Yes.”
“You know you can’t stay here forever. The world is waiting for you. You’ll still have me to help you navigate it. I promise.”
I felt a little better. Grabbing my fork I ate my fruit salad that Angela had cut up for me. I was a grown man but I had given up feeling insecure over my inabilities days ago. I was only twelve days old after all.