by Kelli Kimble
“I’m an old pro at this,” Talika said, her chest puffed out with pride.
The woman turned to an array of controls and flipped a switch. The halo device started to hum.
“Is it starting? Is this the scan?” I said.
“Not yet,” Talika said. She looked at the woman. “That’s what I thought, too. It’s just warming up. The doctor will do the actual test.”
“The doctor? She’s not a doctor?” The patches on my forehead were starting to feel weirdly warm. I reached up to touch one, and the woman caught my hand and gently returned it to rest on my stomach, patting it when she had it in place.
“No. She’s a technician,” Talika said.
I glanced at the woman. Again, her eyes struck me as exceedingly kind. She smiled. I decided I had to trust her. She would make sure I was okay.
A woman wearing a scarlet kimono came in. Her hair was swept into a complicated roll, and the collar of an expensive blouse stuck above the neckline of the kimono. She was wearing glasses—something very few people did. She snapped her fingers, and Talika rushed over to her. They talked together in hushed tones, which was odd. Why didn’t they just have an internal conversation if they didn’t want the others to hear? Talika was nodding and gushing that all the rules had been followed—except that one moment when someone had thanked me for assisting, before she’d realized I was the subject. The woman’s eyes cut towards me accusingly.
I wasn’t sure I liked being called “the subject”. What was Talika? Wasn’t she a subject, too?
Talika came back over to me, and the woman trailed behind her, continuing to study me with a cold eye. “This is the doctor, Nim,” Talika explained. “She’s going to do the brain scan today. Then, tomorrow, we’ll get started on the real tests.”
“Why don’t we just start today?” I asked. I wanted to get whatever was going to happen to me over with, so I could get back to real life.
“This test is a baseline, to see where your abilities are before the trial test.” Talika seemed to be brimming over with excitement. I’d never seen her so excited—except for maybe the time when we were stalking Marve’s house, and his mother took out the trash. She’d wanted to go through the garbage cans; she was sure we’d find some bit of Marve’s life that could be enshrined at home in the little paper box she kept under her bed for safekeeping. But, I’d convinced her it was too risky, and we’d gone home. She hadn’t spoken to me for three days after that.
The doctor stepped forward, brushing Talika to the side. She looked at the technician. “Is everything prepared?” the doctor said. Her voice wasn’t the least bit raspy, and I understood now why she hadn’t talked to Talika telepathically. She couldn’t.
The technician held up a finger for her to wait a moment. She pushed a button, and the exam table began to move and change shape. The head of the bed lifted, moving me into a semi-reclined position. The halo was now directly above me, surrounding my head. She smiled and stepped aside. The doctor walked around the table and went to the controls. “Now. Nividita, is it?” she asked. “We’re just going to get started here.” She reached out to touch a button.
“My name’s Nimisila,” I said.
“What?” the doctor asked without looking at me.
“My name. It’s not Nividita. It’s Nimisila.”
“Right,” the doctor said. “We’re going to get started, then. This won’t hurt. You need to stay absolutely motionless. If you move, we’ll have to start over. We don’t want to do that; the machine is harmless in low doses, but if you’re tested too many times, it would . . . not be good.”
I flicked my eyes to Talika. A blush was forcing its way up her neck. “What would happen?” I asked.
The doctor tore her attention away from the instrument panel. “What?” she asked in a clipped tone.
“If I were tested too many times, what would happen?”
She shrugged. “Tumor formation. Possibly, brain damage. We’ve never gotten that far. Are we done with questions? I have things to do.”
She didn’t wait for me to answer. She turned back to the instrument panel and pressed a series of buttons. The halo made a slightly higher-pitched noise, and then it lowered around the bed. It didn’t hurt. So, I was glad for that. But, the whine of the machine pierced my ears, and I had to force myself to be still. Talika, the technician, and the doctor stood at the foot of the bed, watching. The sensor patches were heating up. It was just starting to feel like it might be burning me, when the halo dropped in pitch and raised slowly to the position it had been in before. It gradually whirred into silence.
“Well, that’s done, then,” the doctor said. “Thank you for your cooperation, Nividita.”
“Nimisila,” I said.
“Right. We’re done here. Talika, you can return to your quarters.”
The technician came forward and began removing the fobs first, then the sensors. They pulled off some skin and hair when she yanked them off. I winced. She held my arm and indicated I should get off the table. I jumped down, and she passed me towards Talika, who put an arm around my shoulder and guided me towards the doors.
“We’ll see you both tomorrow, at the regular time,” the doctor said, just as the doors opened.
Talika nodded, and we went down the hall, then returned to our room. When the door was shut, she gave me an encouraging look. “That wasn’t so bad, was it?”
“No, it wasn’t,” I said. “But, I’m not particularly excited to get a tumor.”
“You won’t get a tumor,” she said, rolling her eyes. “You heard her say they’ve never taken it that far.”
“You told me they’ve advanced with every round of experiments,” I said. “It stands to reason that eventually, they could take it that far, and it could be with us.”
“Absolutely not,” she said. “I trust the doctor. She knows what she’s doing.”
“She isn’t a telepath, is she?” I said.
“No. She’s Mrs. Darit’s sister. That’s why Mrs. Darit was qualified to teach us, you know; because she grew up with a sister who was physically unable to get an implant, so she learned to talk out loud to communicate with her sister.”
That struck a note in my head. It was important, but I couldn’t place why. Drowsiness seemed to come out of nowhere and cover my brain like a blanket.
“You’re tired,” Talika said. “The test will do that to you. Maybe you should lie down and rest.”
I didn’t need the suggestion; I was already pulling back the scratchy blanket to get underneath it. My head nestled into the stale-smelling pillow, and I was asleep.
◆◆◆
The weight of something being tossed onto my bed woke me up.
“Nim, come on,” Talika said. “It’s time to get up.”
My eyes felt crusted shut, and I rubbed at them with my fists. “What?”
“It’s time for your first trial test,” she said.
I peeled my eyes open and looked down at the bed. She was already dressed in a dingy, grey set of scrubs that might have been white at one time. The weight I’d felt was the set she’d left for me. I rolled out of bed and grabbed them, my stomach growling. I didn’t bother to go to the bathroom to change this time. I peeled off the purple-and-green mismatched set and put on the new set. This time, they were different shades of yellow from wear but might have once been the same color.
Talika stood at the door, her hand on the knob. She wasn’t able to conceal her impatience—though she might have thought she was. “No time to eat. We’ve got to get to the lab.”
“Just let me brush my teeth,” I said. I followed her into the hall and went across to the bathroom, not waiting for her agreement. I brushed my teeth and splashed some water on my face. I’d been too nervous yesterday to worry about missing breakfast, but today, I was feeling weak. My stomach gurgled and growled loudly. The deprivation wasn’t foreign to me, but that didn’t mean I liked it.
I joined Talika in the hall, and she immediately began m
oving towards the lab. I followed a half-step behind. When we got to the lab, the technician was in position, waiting for me. Her eyes crinkled with a smile, and she gestured to the table. I was relieved to see her, and I did as she asked. She placed the sensors across my forehead and chest. Then, she rubbed the inside of my elbow with the sharp-smelling liquid and produced the syringe. I didn’t balk this time. She winked before drawing a tube of my blood. It didn’t hurt, but it did make my head feel a little light.
The technician frowned at the readout of my vitals and tapped the sensor on my chest. Then, she fiddled with the dials. She looked to Talika, who was standing next to the table, examining her fingernails. They apparently conversed.
“Ugh, are you kidding?” Talika said.
“What?” I asked.
“She says your blood pressure is too low; you have to eat something before the test.” She turned and left the lab, offering no further explanation. The technician smiled and shrugged.
Talika returned shortly with a tray of food. I could smell the eggs and toast as soon as the door opened. It smelled delicious. She brought it to me and dropped it on my lap. “Eat this,” she said.
I didn’t have to be told twice. I all but inhaled it. It didn’t come anywhere close to satisfying my hunger, but it did take the edge off. Immediately, I began to feel better. One of the people bustling around came and cleared the tray.
The technician gestured to Talika and guided her to another exam table. It hadn’t been there yesterday, and somehow, it had escaped my attention until now. But, she put Talika on the table and repeated the preparation procedure with her. There was no halo over her bed. Instead, the technician produced what looked like a metal helmet. She strapped it over Talika’s head, smoothing her hair out of the way. When she was done, she gave us each a thumbs-up. I returned it, smiling. Talika just nodded.
The doctor came into the room and went to Talika’s side. She bent low over the table so that she could talk confidentially. Her shoulders hunched up, and even from where I was, I could see her knuckles were white from gripping the railing on the side of Talika’s table.
Her apparent stress did not fill me with confidence.
The technician patted my arm, and I shifted my focus to her. She smiled and bobbed her head, giving me a thumbs-up. My vitals must have spiked when the doctor came into the room.
The doctor came over to me. “Good morning, Nimidita,” she said. I didn’t bother to correct her this time. She glanced at the technician, then back at me. “Looks like everything is set up and ready. We’re going to start a basic test. You don’t need to be nervous. It won’t hurt.”
My eyes snapped back to the technician when she said it wouldn’t hurt. Doctors always lied about how much it was going to hurt. But, the technician was still smiling and bobbing her head.
“What’s going to happen,” the doctor continued, unaware of my unease, “is simple. We’re going to put up a screen between you and Talika so that you cannot see one another. Then, she will broadcast simple phrases to you. You will write those phrases down. You will not speak—either verbally or telepathically—with her, or anyone else. That’s it. Easy. You can do that, right?”
For a fleeting moment, I thought I should pretend I couldn’t hear Talika. Had they seen any evidence I could? None of them had tried to talk to me telepathically. But, Talika knew, and she had already agreed to cooperate. It reminded me that I couldn’t trust her anymore. She wouldn’t support my decision to resist.
“Yes,” I said. “I can do that.”
She patted my knee as she produced a brittle smile. “Good girl. Talika said we could count on you. I’m glad she wasn’t wrong.”
Someone moved a sheet hanging from a steel frame between our beds. The doctor nodded to the technician. Someone handed me a pen, and a clipboard with paper on it.
Cat. Talika’s voice bubbled into my thoughts.
I wrote down the word. The doctor nodded enthusiastically.
Dog.
I wrote it on the paper beside the first word.
“No, number them,” the doctor instructed. “One, two, three. In a list, see?” The doctor took the clipboard from me and wrote numbers down the side of the paper. “Just cross out ‘dog’ and put it beside Number Two.” She handed it back to me, and I did as she asked.
Tree.
I wrote it down.
Stew. Sun. Moon. Girl. Boy.
The words were coming faster now, and it was hard to keep up. “Can we slow down?” I asked. “She’s saying words faster than I can write them.”
The doctor nodded and prompted Talika to slow down. We continued for another dozen or so words, before the doctor interrupted. “I can see this is going well. You’ve written down the entire list, just as I gave it to Talika. You’re both doing a wonderful job. Very good.” She paused and consulted her own clipboard. “Now, we’re going to try something different. Talika is going to say nonsensical words—words we made up—and you’re going to write those down, as well. Now, I know you might not be able to spell them, since you’ve never heard them before. Just do the best you can, hmm?”
I nodded, and she signaled for Talika to begin.
Supafirt.
I suppressed a giggle. It sounded an awful lot like “fart”. I wrote it down, sounding it out, syllable by syllable.
Gluwook. Petbuzo. Lamita.
I wrote them all down. The doctor moved to stand over my shoulder so that she could see what I was writing. I heard her make occasional scratch marks on her paper. The words continued for what seemed like half an hour. I had to flip to a new sheet of paper every so often.
The doctor stopped us when we got to word #100. “Now,” she began. “A new test. Talika is going to say a phrase or sentence. Then, you will repeat what she says to you out loud so that we can all hear it.”
My name is Talika.
“My name is Talika,” I repeated.
I like to eat fruits and vegetables.
“I like to eat fruits and vegetables.”
This test dragged on and on. My voice started to fail and get scratchy, and I had to ask for something to drink. The doctor reluctantly agreed that perhaps we should have a break so that we could all use the restroom and refresh ourselves.
Talika and I drifted down the hall to the bathroom. Neither of us was in much of a hurry to get back; the tests were wearing me out and boring Talika. She didn’t like to be bored, and she would soon be chafing against the tests.
She let me go first. When I came back out of the bathroom, she was pacing in a circle.
“You don’t like this, do you?” I asked.
“I thought it would feel big, you know? What we’re doing, it’s just . . .” She trailed off.
“Boring?” I supplied.
“Yeah. I didn’t expect it to be so boring.” She opened the bathroom door. “Wait for me?”
I nodded.
When we returned to the lab, a tray of milk and cookies was waiting for us. My fingers itched to grab as many as I could hold, but I forced myself to take only two and nibble on them while sipping the milk.
The doctor was standing at the technician’s station, studying the readouts. She noted some things on her clipboard, then snapped her fingers. “All right, let’s get back to the tests. This time, we’re going to be timing how long it takes for Nimisita to receive a message Talika has sent.”
We returned to our respective exam tables, and instruments were adjusted.
The tests resumed.
Chapter 5
The doctor walked us through test after test—though they all hinged on the idea that I could hear Talika when she used telepathy. They didn’t ask me to respond in kind, which was fine with me; at the moment, I wasn’t sure if I could respond only to a single person yet.
We returned to our room, exhausted. The testing took all morning and the better part of the afternoon, with a break for lunch, and two shorter breaks for “refreshing.” It seemed like a polite way to say we coul
d use the restroom.
A dinner tray was waiting for us in our room, and I was grateful to see it. I ate my portion without even tasting it. I just wanted to get into bed and fall asleep. Talika was quiet, a signal that something wasn’t sitting right with her. But, she didn’t bring it up, and I didn’t want to fall into a place where I trusted her again, so I was happy to remain silent.
When we were done with the food, I got right into bed and pulled the covers up. She didn’t comment. She stayed at the table.
◆◆◆
Like the past two days, I woke when she was getting dressed for the day. I felt incredibly refreshed, and I went through the motions to get ready for more testing.
We reported to the lab, and the technician ushered us to the same configuration as the previous day. Talika sighed, and her shoulders slumped, but she didn’t complain. We were each set and ready to go, when the doctor arrived.
It turned out to be a repeat of the previous day. An exact repeat. The words, phrases, and all the activities were exactly the same as they’d been the day before. Even in my head, Talika sounded like she was ready to jump off a cliff from boredom.
But, we made it through another day, and another, and another. We spent an entire week going over the same tests, repeating them exactly as we had on the very first day.
Each night, when we returned to our room, Talika was more and more agitated. She took to pacing between the beds, barely touching her food. Whatever she didn’t eat, I did, and after that first week, I was surprised to find my hands didn’t look quite so skeletal anymore. I felt strangely content, and my struggle against the process faded.
The next week, it changed.
This time, we spent the entire week doing the opposite of what we’d done before. I broadcast the words and phrases to Talika, and she wrote them down, said them, or was timed. At first, I could tell everyone in the room could hear me, and my telepathic voice was too loud. People in the room were cringing at the sound of it. I concentrated on controlling it and making it softer. Then, gradually, I restricted it. By the end of that next week, I was able to speak only to Talika, and I could modulate my voice to any volume or pitch.
