Thread: Of the Waters of Life

James' first feeling upon returning to the living was a tightening in the muscles of his stomach and sides. He barely noted the gloved hands that helped guide him to the ringed bag as he heaved nasty, sour yellow. A final cough that shook his whole frame, and he curled back, having barely lifted his head from the pillow. The cloth was cool, though he could feel the material was damp under his ear. He cleared his throat, trying to dislodge the remaining bile while there was the sound of a bag being tied up and thrown away, a beep, and a crisp, feminine voice saying, Colonel, he's been awakened as you ordered. James shivered, trying to relax his muscles as his body tightened. So this was hell, eh? He'd never been a particularly religious man, but he was dead, wasn't he? He knew how much radiation he'd loosed into the room, had set the levels himself. Death was surprisingly normal. Not religious, but certainly scientific. Hell, he imagined, lacked barf bags, so there had to be a simpler and more living explanation. It didn't seem that the woman cared what he did at the moment, though she knew he was awake, so he could just close his eyes and attempt to go back to sleep. Memories, after all, were so very jumbled when one was sick. Maybe all that before, with the memorial, and the soldier, and his baby girl screaming, maybe that was all simply a fevered dream. James managed to open one eye as he sucked in a shaky breath between his teeth. It was bright. White, so very white, and James couldn't remember where he had seen a color so pure before. Sterile, he imagined, probably more so than any place he had worked in outside of the Vault, and even that suffered from rust. Rust didn??t look like it survived here, not with this pure white. Another breath, not so deep because he simply couldn't unclench his muscles as he shivered. He could barely see details, but there was movement. I'm going to give you an injection now. If you would try to relax. She sounded irritated by his inability, and James found the whole thing hilarious. Here he was, not dead, and a woman was angry at him for having the nerve to suffer the effects of acute radiation poisoning. Maybe it was hell. Do you treat all your patients like this? he slurred, voice hoarse, as she stabbed him with the needle. He would bruise, he thought, but, then again, with rads like that he??d bruise no matter what. The scientist tried to watch as she moved away, but his eyes refused to focus correctly. His nurse or doctor was a white blur to him, with another blur on the top for what he assumed was hair. May I have some water? His throat burned, and God, was he thirsty, but she pretended not to hear him. Where am I? Again no response. James wondered if he had even spoken. She must have given him something for the pain and for the muscles contractions, or perhaps something just to make him sleep, because the next he knew, he woke to a much cooler pillow and a slow drawl. Well. James mentally scrambled, trying to place that accent. He had heard it before, hadn't he? It looks as if the good doctor is awake. Carlson, would you get him another IV started. I'd like to start? talkin?? soon. Autumn? But the man, the man should be dead. Like himself. This time, he didn't even open his eyes. We know you're awake, Mr. Project Purity. Unlike the conditions you're used to working in, we actually can monitor our patients. Voices continued in the dark around him. ??He??s a very sick man, Colonel.? That was the woman from earlier, her voice just as crisp and cool above the tapping of fingers against an IV bag. ??We??ve just managed to get his temperature down to 41 in the last hour. You??re only going to have a few minutes to speak with him.? Jamese chanced opening his eyes. His sight was a little more sure this time, though he still found the woman Carlson, Autumn had said hard to focus on. Dehydration, perhaps? Damage to the lenses from the radiation? How long had he been in that irradiated room? The scientist ignored Autumn for the moment, watching the woman work. The way the saline solution scattered the harsh light above situated in the ceiling as she hung the bag was extraordinary. Wait. Down to 41? No wonder he was a bit loopy the damned fever had nearly scrambled his brains like so many reconstituted chicken eggs. Already, he could feel sleep blackening the edge of his vision, and when he turned his head on his clammy pillow so his temperature must have been jumping up and down, he swore he must have nodded off in between looking at the woman??s skilled hands and the colonel. James wondered, for a moment, how he must look. He was never a large man, very few Wastelanders were, and in his time out of the Vault, he had rarely the chance to eat anything more than a few scavenged bits here and there. And alcohol, of course. The doctor in him knew how bad a liquid lunch was, but there had been so little time, and so much to do? He had lost weight and would probably continue to in the Enclave's hands. At least weight was the only thing he had lost. He could feel the way his hair, nearly all grey from age and stress, clung to his damp skin. Somehow, the thought of being bald would only add insult to injury. ??Now, Doctor.? James didn??t even turn his head towards the source of the voice. ??I know you??re enjoyin?? our hospitality and all.? The colonel managed to make ??hospitality?? sound like a foul word that had just managed to fall on his tongue and leave a bitter taste as he spat it out. ??But I got a few questions for you. I need that code. Right here and now. You give it, and maybe you see your girl again. Maybe I??ll have Nurse Carlson here up your anti-rad meds.? An order masked as a deal and Autumn was certainly the sort that was used to having others listen to him. James could see that in every bleary line of the man, the way he held himself with just a touch of relaxation to the military posture, the way he managed stern tones in such a non-threatening accent. Bright green eyes, the only color in a face that had taken on a shade something like old mattresses, met the Colonel's sweeping gaze serenely. So Margo was free -- oh, thank God, the relief he felt at that statement rushed through him from head to toe like the pain-killer his nurse had given him once when he had woken before he should have. Colonel, he croaked. As I have already told you, the project is to give clean water to everyone. James took that moment to swallow reflexively, though his throat was as dry as if someone had stuffed cotton down it. Including your men. I don't see why the Enclave would want control of such an experiment. And in any case, it doesn't work. I've also told you that already. Margo was free, and they still didn't know about the GECK. Even without him, Madison, Madison could finish it. She or Margo would have his notes, would know what was needed. And they could wait, or get help from the Brotherhood now that they knew what that final missing piece was. You found the problem. Autumn was a persistent man, wasn't he? James closed his eyes, taking a deep breath as he felt his muscles begin to relax again. ??No man revives a project after twenty?? My child was an adult and I was more useful out here than in the Vault, James interrupted. And twenty years to gnaw at? at the same problem is? What was he saying? Suddenly, the conversation seemed so very unimportant and his thoughts scattered away from him like children set free to play. Perhaps he imagined the growled 'bastard' or dreamed the various figures in his room as he slept. Another nurse or doctor, with sterile grey eyes over a wide, white mask, looking into his face and speaking to him. More saline, the Colonel coming in and out, and always those crisp, white lights and uniforms of the staff. When James woke up, really woke up, again, there was no one. No nurse nor doctor, no Enclave men demanding information, no one. Wary, the scientist sat up, noting the lack of muscle cramps that he would expect from severe dehydration. So they had been taking care of him. He swung surprisingly steady legs down and edged himself to the side of the bed. The floor was tepid under his bare feet. Not metal, then, though it certainly looked like it. James reached for his IV drip stand, dragging it along with him as he explored the room. The space was bare and wide enough to through the sound of his stand back at him as he inspected the corners and checked the handles of the lockers that, of course, wouldn't give. Nothing. They'd probably locked it all away. They'd left him with in an over-sized or perhaps one size fits all set of scrub-like clothes, off-white and shapeless.